Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[Lightcosmo]

36 minutes ago, WraithReborn said:

I’m glad you enjoyed them. I show all three when they were in theaters years ago. Honestly I’ve never been a big fan of superhero movies

Haha, thanks!

I recently got into them. Ofc I watched Spider-Man when it first came around, but besides that was never to into them at all, either.

[Armagon]

39 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

And it's hard to read dramatic sarcasm on text, haha.

Yeah that was like one of the few times i wasn't too sure.

39 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

...no, wait, what am I saying-- that's right, Armagon! Feel bad!

Ruben, i believe we call this a "tsundere moment".

36 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

and so the eternal rivalry continues

Until he finally gets to play Skywalker Saga and we both agree that it's pretty great.

24 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

This is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

"Don't get cocky, you little shit!" -Luke Skywalker when Darth Vader reveals the truth in The Empire Strikes Back.

 

[Elina]

31 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

 

Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh I love Tales of the Abyss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Sidereal Wraith]

1 hour ago, WraithReborn said:

I’m glad you enjoyed them. I saw all three when they were in theaters years ago. Honestly I’ve never been a big fan of superhero movies, the only character I care about is The Shadow:

 

Dammit, I didn’t mean to quote myself!

Edited April 7, 2022 by WraithReborn

[null]

5 minutes ago, Elina said:

Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh I love Tales of the Abyss!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

it really is a lovely game

[Acacia Sgt]

Dist the Rose best character.

[null]

Dist is a treat

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I like how everyone's ignoring this bombshell of a line you just casually dropped.

Wolt's gonna make Roy a milkshake.

Actually... 

Spoiler

...I'll spare you the real details.😜

I mean, I did write them all down and was going to hit "Submit Reply", buuuuuuuuuuuut part of me questioned if it was a good idea. So I didn't. Though I did transfer the description to a document on my computer, to preserve the moment's pornographic passion.

 

1 hour ago, Armagon said:

For a joke, i'm impressed at how much you thought this out.

I do this sometimes.😆 This might be the third time I did it with Roy The Sexed-Up Puppet Master (never as lengthy as this though). Seems like I enjoy wasting my time like this.

Although, it made me forget to do what I originally jumped on my laptop to do- look up reviews to determine which American Ballet Theater performance I want to see this summer.🩰 And no, men in tights has nothing to do with it (even though it makes Spartacus unintentionally hilarious). I just like classical ballet. I was intending to see my second performance in 2020, but Covid prevented that.

 

1 hour ago, Newtype06 said:

You should try writing for the WYBO competition!

I did, twice. First try was a very very very very mediocre Xenoblade Chronicles X piece. The second was a 8631-words closeted and smut-free ShannanxOifey entry.

If you'd like to see the Jugdral gayship, here, I've dug it up. I called it Twenty Years, which is how long it'll take you to read it.:

Spoiler

Time: Gran Count 778, early Summer.

 

From the edge of the Yied Desert, a Grannvalian envoy approached Castle Rivough. It consisted of mostly horses and their riders, only a few walked alongside the steeds. Though blemished by a little dust, the group had changed into their finery a while ago, for soon they were to be received by Issach, arrayed outside the castle town. The gathered elite of the city and country were like the many peasants interested in spectating this event on foot. Horses adorned in accents of silver were reserved as a highlight for the leading Issachan representative: the king himself.

• Oifey: Hail thee King Issach! Hail King Shannan! I, Oifey, Duke of Chalphy, Chancellor of the Kingdom of Grannvale have arrived for an audience with you, at His Majesty King Seliph’s behest!
• Shannan: Welcome Chancellor! Welcome Duke Chalphy! It was here, at the edge of Issach my realm, that Grannvale and your great uncle met with my great father twenty-one years ago! It was here your kingdom and noble house began a most terrible war!
• Oifey: Peace! In peace I come King Shannan! We fought together but a year ago to end the tyranny my forefathers had wrought and which oppressed your people for decades to follow! I wish to heal old wounds, not strike new ones!
• Shannan: I know your sincere purpose well Duke Chalphy! The correspondence between us and your Majesty King Seliph of Grannvale is what led to our meeting on this day. As brothers and equals blessed by seven and one Crusaders, our Kingdoms must assist each other to bring the scars left by Loptyr’s return to fade.
• Oifey: Indeed King Shannan! Facilitating such assistance is my cause on this day, and I have crossed the Desert of Death to do so. Do I and my retinue have the right to pursue this?
• Shannan: The right is your’s Duke Oifey! Now let us bring ease to our voices and begin our diplomacy elsewhere. I welcome you to the court I’ve arranged here at Castle Rivough for this occasion, partake of it as your weariness demands and whims desire with all my generosity.

-

And so, Oifey trotted towards the outer wall of Rivough’s castle town in procession. Dozel during the reign of the Grannvale Empire had chosen to operate primarily out of Rivough, finding Issach to be backwater ill-befitting of a Grannvale ducal family. Extracting tax and tribute in kind, cash, and labor through coercion and funneling it through Rivough to Grannvale itself was the Empire’s priorities. As a result, Castle Rivough was for twenty years of oppression in good condition, and thus fit for greeting this special envoy. 

It was not a grand envoy: the Chancellora cohort of his handpicked diplomats with information collected on Grannvale’s present state, a convoy for their needs, and a military guard in case of bandits whilst passing through the Yied Desert. As Duke Chalphy with the Crusader Baldr’s blood in his veins but without his Brand, and though he had fought alongside King Shannan without regard for status, Shannan’s ceremonial reception party was likewise calculated to be relatively small. Smaller than would have been afforded to King Seliph had he visited.

• Shannan: So few Duke Chalphy? You must be here solely for your mission then.
• Oifey: My wife Duchess Clidna ,your distant cousin, is on her way. She is accompanied by your closer kin, Ulster, Duke of Dozel. They should both be here by tomorrow.
• Shannan: Likewise, Queen Patty is not here, but she promises to come on the morrow. Before we were to leave yesterday, she met a veteran of King Leif’s army. It appears she struck up a good moment’s conversation with this woman, not of Issach, yet a mistress of the blade nonetheless. So, how is Lady Clidna?
• Oifey: She is well, adjusting to life in Grannvale as Duchess is not the easiest when one has spent it all in Issach, but fortunately Ulster and Larcei and their Issachan retinues has made the change of circumstances easier.

Duchess Clidna was a relative of King Shannan. She belonged to a cadet branch of the former royal family of the kingdom of Ganeishire, one of the sub-kingdoms into which Issach was divided. They were bound together under the greater King of Issach directly descended from the Crusader Odr and bearing his Brand. She had none of his holy blood, but was nonetheless a collateral descendent of Odr. 

Her father and brothers had joined Prince Marricle in his last stand against Grannvale in Ganeishire Castle, yet she had fled with her mother as her father had requested, to hide in the northern badlands of Issach for her safety far from Grannvalian authority. She was between Oifey and Shannan in age, and when word came that the Prince had returned, she and her mother turned to him to offer their loyalty and find security. She became a devoted member of the Liberation Army, unable to fight, she took managing to the mundane supportive roles which allowed the warriors to concentrate on battle and excelled at rallying the women who did much of this work. 

For Oifey was a topflight strategist and logistician, he had met with Clidna on frequent occasions. He liked her upbeat demeanor, and a strong friendship followed. Feeling old by this point in his life, he felt a wife was necessary, and when Seliph had crossed from Miletos and entered Grannvale for the firs time in his life, Oifey felt victory was assured. With the peace of mind to pursue love, he proposed to Clidna soon after the liberation of Chalphy, and they quickly wed after the final battle had concluded. 

The celebrations were saved for their coronation as Duke and Duchess of Chalphy, he was thankful, and she was happy if surprised to raise to this status. It was a physical symbol of the Issach-Chalphy bonds began when Sigurd and Shannan had met, and she was perfectly willing to be a part of this. Oifey continually thanked her for accepting his hand in marriage, and was willing to spare no expense to make her feel at home in a distant land.

-

• Shannan: We’ve seen enough war for many lives Duke Chalphy, therefore I have arranged not for sport on this day. Will a celebration of the newborn continental peace and liberation through song and spoken word be sufficient? Accompanied by a lunch that should be to your likings?
• Oifey: That will be more than sufficient, your magnanimity is great King Shannan. 

Bowing to King Shannan to thank him, Oifey and his diplomats relocated to the courtyard of Rivough Castle, sitting at a banquet table in the midday sun, he was positioned to the right of King Shannan, a spot generally reserved for a close advisor or other highly distinguished guests. The music began and the food, a small three-course lunch, was served. The talk, however, quietly continued.

• Oifey: Yogurt made of fermented mare’s milk served alongside savory skewered lamb, the flavors of Issach are not to be replicated anywhere else in Jugdral. I’ve tried to obtain the former in Chalphy, but to no avail, thank you for serving it today King Shannan.
• Shannan: Your fondness for my nation’s cuisine is not so unusual Duke Oifey, you did for sixteen years reside here, I would be surprised and disappointed if your palette had not adjusted to it. To see you crave it is warming.
• Oifey: I am a mutt King Shannan. Only fifteen of my years have been in Chalphy, less than in Issach, with years spent everywhere else in Jugdral in between and after.
• Shannan: And I hardly different, by fate we saw the world together before we sought refuge in the land of my fathers and mothers. We belong to the continent yet we govern far less. As for myself, I confess that I prefer Grannvalian wheat bread to Issachan barley; Silessian rye as well. 
• Oifey: My convoy should still have have some loaves, and a few bags of flour if you would like it freshly baked, should I send for them?
• Shannan: That will not be necessary Duke Oifey. Though I would like some for tomorrow’s events, if you would provide.
• Oifey: Consider it discharged King Shannan. And before I should forget, I carry on my person a letter from Duke Dozel- Ulster. I am not aware of the contents, but he said you could read it in the open if you liked. Would you ask for it now?
• Shannan: Ulster is my precious cousin, so do hand me the letter if your hands are still clean of spices and drippings. *Is handed the letter and reads through it*
• Oifey: Have I the right to ask for its contents at this time King Shannan?
• Shannan: I see no reason to hide the affairs of Ulster your friend and fellow Duke to you, though he may not have the title for long.
• Oifey: Whatever is meant by that King Shannan, how fares Ulster as he had not told me?
• Shannan: He finds himself out of place in Grannvale, and wishes to return home to Issach. He questions his right to inherit the Duchy and believes it should be passed on to Iucharba and Larcei. And for himself, he requests I establish a position for him as administrator of the Issachan lands he and Larcei possess by their persons in Issach.
• Oifey: Ulster had seemed a bit forlorn in Grannvale, which is why I allowed him to accompany me on this visit. I had not expected him to wish to cede his title, but perhaps he thought I would disapprove of it. He has thought it through however. A landlord long absent does do wrong to the people who they serve and those who serve them. Iucharba and Larcei if they approve will make a fine Duke and Duchess for Dozel. With Neir’s Brand restored one day soon it may be. We should discuss this with him in the coming days together, and with our word Seliph will not blink to provide the final agreement.

-

The conversation continued and the lunch came to its end by two. Until the hour of six, the diplomats and their lieges discussed the state of their countries and how best to see them assist the other’s reconstruction, without impeding their own. It was a short workday, but this was the first of a roughly two-week stay. That would be sufficient for two close allies to form a viable pact.

At six o’clock, the dusk Sun still illuminating the sky without an omnipresent shadow cast in the air, King Shannan and Chancellor Oifey prepared for this evening’s dinner. It was to be a small gathering, the two of them and a handful of servants and high diplomats.

However, Patty Queen of Issach had arrived earlier than expected, with the woman who had she had met the day before. Hearing of the dinner, Patty insisted she bring the swordmistress as a guest of honor. Shannan greeted his wife and her guest, seeing them in loose but modest and elegant dresses of yellow and orange with accessories of purple and white ready for the occasion. He agreed to her request that they be seated at this evening’s meal. 

He was not sure what to make of this older woman, but finding the idea of ambassadorial dining to be not his beloved’s likings, he rearranged the evening’s events only an hour before they were to start. He and Oifey would offer a toast at the table of their working staff, and then leave for another room where they would have a separate feast with Patty and the swordmistress. The castle’s servants proposed and prepared entertainment for both groups as they ate. In each room a storyteller accompanied by a few instruments, would relay one of those very long and very old epics, filled with vibrant imagery, stagnant details, timeless drama and ribald tales alike. Shannan, his wife, Oifey, and the guest were fine with this, and so their bureaucrats were. The dinner at last began between the four specified individuals, with Oifey meeting this notable woman.

• Oifey: Hello my Lady, I am Duke Chalphy and the current Chancellor of the Kingdom of Grannvale, Oifey Chalphy. Would I be permitted the grace of your name?
• Swordmistress: I know who you are, I was well informed before I had arrived. I am Eyvel, of Fiana, a village in the boondocks of Thracia, I led its Freeblades militia.
• Oifey: That voice, your presence, Lady Eyvel, you remind me of-
• Eyvel: I have gone by no other names, you are mistaken Duke Chalphy.
• Oifey: You blunt my question before I finish asking it, you are no frail woman swordmistress Eyvel. But I will not inquire further of you if you wish it not. May our hour or three here together be a splendid reward for the service I heard in briefest passing you offered to King Leif.
• Eyvel: Thank you for your respect and politeness. And yes, to an evening of delight!

-

Eyvel raised a toast and the dinner began in the earnest. Shannan formally introduced his Queen Patty to Oifey, though they had been well acquainted from their times fighting alongside Seliph in the holy wars. It was again a standard three course meal, during which they made small talk and listened to the epic being told. It told of heroes from before the days before the Loptyr Empire, set in northwest Issach and eastern Silesse. There were two families: one righteous and one crooked. Over several generations, they had fought to control the territory. Shortly after dessert was served, the voice of the old storyteller became hoary and he took a moment to rest. Conversation filled the air to keep the silence away.

• Eyvel: To think the entire continent of Jugdral at war but twenty and one years ago, is now united in bliss, its ruling families interlinked. I could not have thought this possible in my younger years, when I was something of lowly vagabond.
• Patty: But that’s just how things have worked out. I’m Queen of Issach by marriage, my brother is the Duke of Jungby, cousin Lester is King of Verdane, cousin Lana is Queen of Grannvale, and Shannan’s nearest cousins are Duke and Lady of Dozel. I think I’ve lucked out in life, never thought it would be so easy when it was just me and my hitman brother Febail caring for Connaught orphans, and now King Leif my distant in-law is providing everything we couldn't for them.
• Shannan: I can only concur to these sentiments my dear and Lady Eyvel. From a child in innocence, suddenly made to fear that death would catch me if I didn’t run fast enough holding my aunt’s hand. To being worshipped by my people as the second Odr, having fought alongside the new Hodr and Baldr in a crusade against Loptyr revived. Now I am to live in prosperity ever after, it’s enough to make me chuckle from time to time.
• Oifey: You speak as though it has been a simple progression from terror to salvation King Shannan, when I know you know it hasn’t been that. Barring your flight and barbaric captivity, I’ve seen all the same sights as you. There was good and bad in all those intervening years between your beginning and conclusion, even if the storm clouds were always there until the very end.
• Patty: So, when did you two old friends meet? I never heard the story before, wasn’t really interested I guess, but you’re making me curious, care to share Shan Shan?
• Shannan: I’m not sure it’d really interest you Sunshine, but if you’re willing to bear then it would be no problem. Oifey, would you please start for me?
• Oifey: It was when we first liberated Genoa Castle in Verdane after Chalphy and Leonster had invaded it to rescue Lady Edain from the barbarians and punish them for their prior invasion. Sigurd had trusted me with informing him of the castle’s every detail our investigative group had found. When I heard the report of a lone child being locked up in the dungeon, I wanted to see it for myself before telling Sigurd, so I went down there and there saw Prince Shannan, dressed in gray, foreign for what I was used to attire, curled up in a corner. You said nothing and did nothing but look my way. I thought you could’ve been a common slave at first, but I could not figure out why you would be locked away alone in your own cell then.
• Shannan: I was saddened by everything that had happened to me, and Aunt Ayra was out fighting for my sake. I didn’t know if she’d return or if the thugs that had captured us would kill me at any minute. 
• Oifey: Then I ordered you be set free and be brought to Sigurd. You looked meek.
• Shannan: I didn’t know what was happening, I just tried to behave myself as Aunt Ayra asked. If you had told me you were Grannvale it wouldn’t have made any difference, you were why I had fled Issach in the first place. But seeing another kid around, even if I didn’t know why, made me feel slightly better.
• Oifey: After meeting Sigurd, you were brought to a bedroom and put under guard for your own safety. Ayra then came back to Genoa. She wanted to check to make sure it was not a Grannvalian trick; Sigurd had ordered I return with her to prove it.
• Shannan: I was relieved to see Aunt Ayra was alive, and you guided her to me. I could tell you were a bit surprised when she hugged me, but you alway kept a polite smile. Oifey, you’ve never failed to be courteous.
• Oifey: I had reason for a moment to suspect you, to want you treated differently, Issach and Grannvale were at war, but Sigurd said to take care of you and promised you would be returned to your homeland some day. I couldn’t defy Sigurd’s word, I revered him too much to think he could be in the wrong. I dashed any hesitation from my mind and obeyed orders.
• Shannan: After that, Oifey and I developed our friendship. He had to tend to the supportive military duties Sigurd asked of him, constantly moving back and forth between battlefield and base. I remained secure in our present home, training under old men in whatever it took to be a good king. And after Deidre was kidnapped, I swore to keep Seliph safe and raise him as Deidre would have wanted it. Whenever Oifey returned home, he would greet me and we’d take a break together, often with Seliph when he wasn’t sleeping.
• Patty: *Yawn* The way you two explain it makes it seem so boring.
• Oifey: Boring you say Lady Patty? That reminds me, I once asked your husband once why Issachans don’t fight on horseback. 
• Shannan: -Oifey, are you sure-
• Oifey: His answer: “Our donkeys carry gold, not asses.”
• Patty: My! I don't think he’s ever been that crass with me! 
• Shannan: Issach sees the horse not as frill of the privileged’s blood and sport, it’s the essential right of all for transporting the gold of the earth- both metal and crop. That was I meant. And to be fair, Oifey’s voice was not of the gentlest tone when he asked. 
• Oifey: I had sprained my left ankle not long before we had to relocate everyone on that day. A horse was conspicuous you said if I departed on one at that moment. But the haste and the pain of walking with a crutch got to me and I was snippy.
• Eyvel: *Laughs* Not what I would expect of either a holy Duke or King. But I’ve heard stranger tales.
• Oifey: Care to inform us Lady Eyvel?
• Eyvel: Not tonight. But the two of you do seem like brothers.
• Shannan: We are close, in a sense you could call us that. I wouldn’t mind.
• Patty: *Yawn!* That wasn’t boredom this time, I would love to hear more of this kind of stuff, there is more right. But it’s getting late, and I’m a little tired. Shannan my darling, could we send away the waiters and all? I need a ten-minute nap leaning on your shoulder before we head off to bed, and I can’t do with too many others around.
• Shannan: Of course my Pattycakes.

-

And so Shannan raised his arm and bade all but a two handmaids of Patty’s and one old butler of his, Oifey, and Eyvel, gone from the room. Shannan then moved his chair right next to Patty’s and let her lay her head against his left shoulder, while he held her dearly. While like this, comfortable in this seemingly awkward position owed to the chairs having armrests, Patty with her eyes closed continued to speak aloud.

• Patty: Thank you my Shannananan. Since you’re a brother to my hubby even if you aren’t my in-law Oifey, I have to say Shannan does me well. 

Patty then took Shannan's left arm and moved it over her stomach. The message’s meaning was clear, Oifey’s face turned unexpectedly blush. Shannan’s did the same, but in a different way as he continued to tilt his head towards his resting wife. The servants reacted similarly to Oifey. Eyvel’s face saw the light smile she had worn this entire time become more pronounced.

• Oifey: Pregnant Queen Patty? Most welcome news! Congratulations. A toast to Issach’s heir and future, to its Queen, to the Houses of Ulir and Odr, and to the King as well! Only if there was more drink left to offer a toast, but our supper had ceased to be some time ago and our beverages are low.
• Patty: Thanks Oifey! At first you looked down on my behavior, but you aren't singing the same tune now.
• Eyvel: If you’re so happy, then why do you blush Duke Chalphy? That is not a face of I would expect of cheer.
• Oifey: To you Patty, I was only cautious at first given your profession. However, my time with Sigurd taught me to be open to others. Between Shannan’s word you had reclaimed the Balmung and presented Lord Seliph with a fine blade, my caution ceased to be needed. All residual doubts were dispelled once your brother Febail had joined, bearing the Yewfelle I had seen shot on the snow-covered fields of Silesse, it became clear you were the daughter of Lady Brigid and her beloved Dew, dearly departed friends of mine. You joining the liberation was divine destiny. And to you Lady Eyvel, that is how I am given this heartwarming announcement. And do you not see the same on King Shannan’s countenance?
• Shannan: I only did my part. But yes, I have done my Queen well and my royal duty. Be it a son or daughter, I will love them just as I do my beloved.
• Eyvel: As I might expect of a proud husband Your Majesty. Have you not a wife yourself Duke Chalphy, may I ask?
• Oifey: I do have a wife, the Duchess Clidna, she should arrive here tomorrow. And no, from what I am aware, we are not expecting children yet.
• Eyvel: Perhaps she delayed because she needs time to gather herself for the announcement?
• Oifey: That could very well be the case, but I haven’t the faintest idea of whether to expect such news. Once it comes, preparing for all thereafter is easy. Beforehand, it is difficult to moderate expectations, either one dashes it from their head altogether, or they become obsessed to paranoia.
• Eyvel: You are less gathered than you suggest you are Oifey, Duke of Chalphy. But regardless, I think you are a nice person. Treat her well.

Eyvel was still not sure why Oifey was blushing, but with the happy news delivered the diner could be adjourned. It was approaching nine, and Patty, although she exaggerated her pregnancy’s effects on her, for she was only a little over two months with child, was indeed tired.  

-

As they headed towards the castle’s wing with bedrooms fit for royalty and distinguished guests, Patty stated she wanted Eyvel to spend the night with her. This meant of course excluding her husband Shannan, which he did not mind. What did openly perplex Shannan and Oifey alike is how this woman, arrived before the Queen but two days ago, had worked her way into her bedchambers. Neither would yet say, but they temptingly promised they would sooner or later.

Given the choice between a third prepared suite and Oifey’s assigned room, Shannan stated he would join Oifey. Though it had been scarcely a year since the war against the Empire had ceased, the two friends felt they had much catching up to do. The women Patty kissed her husband on the cheek goodnight and he the same to her. Oifey asked for the Queen’s hand if she wished it, and she more than willing to provide it, still exuberant even on the boundary of sleep. The two men shook hands with Eyvel and bowed before her, to which she did the same. They then split for their respective quarters.

Brought to their bedroom, a servant on watch asked if Their Majesties sought another, there were two in there already, one for a master, another for a servant which would go unused. King Shannan briefly stated that would be unnecessary, they were old friends used to less than ideal living conditions, they would bear with it. The watch servant stated they understood and then stood aside, allowing the King and Duke into the sizable room, they then closed the door and locked it. They began the process of undressing and donning the soft, long and flowing nightgowns their status provided for.

• Oifey: At last, at the age of thirty, you are now a father Shannan.
• Shannan: And you still aren’t one, despite being thirty-five. They say the seeds Man makes grows gnarled with time. You’ve a Dukedom as holy and as great my entire kingdom Oifey. You best plant it while the fields are still fertile.
• Oifey: Oh I’ve tried, but no tendrils rise from the soil yet. And I’m not sure I honestly care they do. …Tell me Shannan, dearest friend, how does it feel to be a father?
• Shannan: I’ve only just put them in my wife, I can’t really say what its like. I’m happy, and this is a new responsibility, but the full weight doesn’t feel like it’s hit me yet, it won’t until they come out Edain used to say. It won’t until your grandchild comes, so I’ve heard elders say. And why are you asking me? You’ve all the more experience at fatherhood Oifey.
• Oifey: That wasn’t real fatherhood, only a farce. I can claim no right to be called anyone’s father.
• Shannan: So you say, but Seliph has said otherwise.

The words struck Oifey true. He recalled the many times, from when Seliph crawled to the day he departed for Chalphy, to leaving him in Belhalla to rule. Even before his real father was gone, Seliph had taken to seeing him as his father. Oifey could have expected Shannan’s rightful response, but he refused to see it coming.

• Shannan: Diarmuid and Lester have said otherwise, you were the one who taught them how to ride. Lana and Larcei have said otherwise. And Ulster’s demeanor certainly says otherwise, his mother and father exercised restraint only when readily called for. I am not so wary either, and I don’t think it was Edain or any other who helped us all those years, I am convinced you nurtured that in him.
• Oifey: And you are not their father then? You could have sired them all had you been one impassioned youth. I was not alone as you admit.
• Shannan: Seliph considers me his big brother as you know. Even before he could tell me that, sometime after Deidre was gone, I had come to see him as my little brother, though it took me a while to realize such. Ulster and Larcei are Ayra’s children and my cousins, I’ve felt a similar brotherly love for them. Diarmuid, Lana, and Lester, well maybe you’re right with them actually, I was no stranger nor mere attendant, but I didn’t feel so close to be a brother. If it was a fatherhood, it wasn’t a normal one at all.
• Oifey: Our lives ceased to be normal when that campaign damned Manfroy orchestrated began, and only now is normalcy returning. We’ve just got to make the most of things.

They were now dressed for sleep. Their nightgown kept their bodies modest, and airy, they would not overheat on this summer’s night. The bed was fit for two, with a fine metal frame and quality stuffing for it and the pillows. The quilt and sheets dyed with several royal Issachan purples, the bedsheet was a shade of lavender, with the quilt darker, its hem the darkest shade and the pillows between the quilt and the hem. Shannan relieved himself in a chamber pot as Oifey laid himself atop the quilt, not yet tired enough for sleep. Shannan noticing his friend’s restiveness likewise did the same, placing his arms behind his head on the pillow as a visible sign of togetherness in a room lit by the moonlight of a waxing gibbous and several candles.

• Oifey: If you are tired Shannan, then rest, you needn’t share in my lack of fatigue.
• Shannan: I understand your insomnia Oifey, it was not present when we first met today, it wasn’t there until the dinner was almost over. 
• Oifey: Times change.
• Shannan: You know that, but you’re having difficulties accepting it. Rather than throw aside the past without a care, how about we walk through it together again, one last time? I’ll begin.

-

• Shannan: Thank you Oifey, for being besides me for the past twenty years. When I had fled Issach with Aunt Ayra, I abandoned my homeland and my old friends. On the run only to be captured, my fear and loneliness grew. Then Sigurd rescued us, but I was still alone. Sigurd cared for me, yet his and Aunt Ayra's worries for my safety meant I could never fight. I remained holed up in castles, I was taught self-defense, and later Ayra showed me Odr’s sacred technique, but I was unable to ever put it to use.
• Oifey: …I wasn’t around that much, but I was more present than anyone else, barring Arden perhaps. And there were those six months of troubled peace at Agusty, months spent at Evans before then, and the year Silesse thereafter. Everyone was around for those times in between the great conflicts, and we befriended them, but we were closest to each other. Like you, I felt restrained, Sigurd never let me fight. Had I been but a year or so older, I could have been like Finn and joined Quan and Sigurd and the rest in combat. I could have been there at Belhalla.
• Shannan: But you weren’t there, Sigurd had felt that ominous feeling on that what we believed would be a glorious last battle, and bade us both to leave with the children. I thought talked you out of that guilt years ago. Does it endure?
• Oifey: I can never forget I have had those thoughts, but I will never and can act on them, there is no longer any need for me to lay down my life for Seliph in place of his, therefore I have no excuse. We all had those premonitions, yet none enough to avert the calamity. On that day, so many good died, including Dew.
• Shannan: You speak of Dewy because of that guilt. He was no older than you, perhaps even my age; he couldn’t have been twenty four as he said, and yet he fought and died that day. His last words I wish I knew. But he fought because it was his job as a thief. He did hold off that Verdanian horde remember. Your duty was strategy and logistics, for Sigurd had only praise for your mind Oifey. I had no purpose. It was dreadful, until Deirdre gave me something to protect. Before then it wasn’t just Ayra, it wasn’t just Sigurd, more than everyone else, you helped me through that prior ennui.
• Oifey: I am thankful I could be of assistance. And Dew was but a kid when he first met us when we were relocated to Marpha and we were walking through the castle. He greeted us in his cheery way from a trip to the pawn shop, but I thought he was eying you, your clothes suggested some status. When you said your name and that you were the Prince of Issach, his eyes only lit up even more. 
• Shannan: Seeing this, you moved yourself just in front of me, politely, but for my own protection. He somehow knew of the Balmung despite his age and ignorance. He didn't know what it exactly was, but he thought I had it. To think his daughter of all people would give it to me years later. Could Father Claud have foreseen this? It sounds like prophecy.
• Oifey: She gave you Balmung, and you gave her your sword. What would our friend, who tried to get us to come along in his mischief, think that you would marry his Pattycakes, the babe he had named shortly after leaving the womb so he told us?
• Shannan: He would have quite the laugh of it *chuckle*, and make us ache with joviality in turn. He was a fine young man by then, like you, and I was what you had been when we first met, with a lip of fur. Yet after he got through his mood when Febail had been conceived, he retained his boyish charm even when his body was past it. For his sake or for Brigid’s, he never said, but I liked it.
• Oifey: …I don’t think we should dwell on the dead anymore. This doesn’t help us in the least. We should move past them.

-

As the insomnia started to weaken, Oifey stood up and stretched, before peeling back the quilt and laying on the top sheet without pulling the quilt back over him. Shannan just laid back a little more, closer to entirely supine.

• Oifey: On Sigurd’s order, at Lubeck we took Seliph and some of the other children, those who were born and whose parents would let them come with us. We fled for Issach, only freshly occupied by Grannvale, whose control was weak outside of the castle towns. 
• Shannan: When I came back home, many of my old friends were gone, killed by Grannvale, and those who weren’t were orphans like me. My kingdom had been defeated, nothing was unchanged and nothing would be easy. Even in our own home we wouldn’t be secure. News that Sigurd and everyone had been killed drove us to depression.
• Oifey: I wasn’t sure I would ever recover, but I couldn’t wallow in grief, not in front of anyone. For the light of hope Sigurd had entrusted us with, I had to live, protect and nurture that light.
• Shannan: And we sure did that. Without me, I don’t think the Issachan people would have treated you so well. They bore with Seliph and revered Sigurd because I told them to. It took until the Empire changed for the worst and the rumors spread of Empress Deidre’s firstborn of light that they sincerely loved him. And with your wisdom Oifey, you did your part, just as important as mine own.
• Oifey: Indeed we were both invaluable, and I can say that without it being hubris. I had the knowhow to survive the persecution, the hunts for our heads and Seliph’s. To my advice, you effortlessly bent the Issachan people, and I am deeply grateful they were so willing, and that you could make them do it. I have discussed with Finn King Leif’s survival for all his years. Theirs’ was much more perilous than ours’, owed much to the disunity of the Manster District. But behind you Shannan, all the people of Issach singularly united. Not to call our survival carefree.
• Shannan: It was survival from the forces of darkness, it was a war of longest attrition. But it was also parenting. We had to raise the next generation of warriors, Seliph, Larcei, Ulster, Diarmuid, Lester, Lana, and the coterie of young rebels whose parents pledged their lives to us. We didn’t want them to fight to liberate Jugdral, but as Lewyn told us, they were destined to and we would join them.
• Oifey: Parenting in such circumstances was difficult. We couldn’t be too public, else the Dozels would see us drawn and quartered. We had to change homes every so often, and had to be prepared to do so at the drop of a feather. We weren’t alone, Edain was with us, and you could rally scores of women and old men to wherever we went. But we insisted on working so hard at all that the world required of us, it could drive us mad.
• Shannan: Not that the children ever knew, and we lied as much as we could to Edain and the rest. If I had to swear, if you had to punch the ground, we only felt comfortable doing it before each other. And I suspect it was madness that drove you to groom your upper lip as you have.
• Oifey: I wanted to be more of a father to Seliph and the others, and the mustache I felt would do that. Before we met, whenever I had the fortune to glimpse Duke Byron, the great patriarch of Chalphy, I see in his beard the weight of his years and all the sagacity they held.
• Shannan: And yet Sigurd never grew his face out.
• Oifey: Sigurd never had the chance. I had to because he could not. I needed the stature of age, to do what Sigurd could have done with or without a mane.
• Shannan: You insisted on growing old before your time, and I got around to letting you keep it. And now you’re of the age where it looks natural, don’t get rid of it.
• Oifey: Were it not for my wife liking it, I might just have done that now that you’ve said that. Though thank you for teaching the boys to shave, I was Squire Stubbles when I began.
• Shannan: I think I owe my success on that front to your failure, being five years my senior, you provided recent experience I could learn lessons from. You were more approachable than any adult. Also, thanks for teaching them and myself, to swim.
• Oifey: What did your mentors think, in nine years with Issach’s gracious coastline, they never taught their lone prince from the male heir how to survive in six feet of water? All Chalphy boys and even the girls are taught how to swim early on. The warm, beautiful shores of Chalphy facing the cultured land of Miletos, the Strait of its name said to be the home of mythic Dagons.
• Shannan: I think you answered *yawn* your own question. Issach’s shores are awful for swimming, and they never bothered to bring me to a lake. Chalphy is marvelous beyond compare, I thank you for your insistence on that clandestine dip.
• Oifey: It was after I tried to force you to go for a swim in Silessean waters during our stay at Sallane. I got you to leave Seliph with others for the day, you were ill with extreme concern for no reason, and insisted the waters weren’t that cold, to the point I volunteered to go in first. When I got in up to my hips, I feared I would die, frozen and compromised. 
• Shannan: I came when I saw how your body twinged and pulled you back out, even though it was blistering frostbite just the same for me. When you regained your warmth, you swore to give me a much better experience in Chalphy one day. Though I wasn’t expecting it as it happened.
• Oifey: There wasn’t much time to arrange a celebration along the shores. Everyone had to leave for their respective countries with Loptyr gone and the world needing direction for its reconstruction. So when you came to Chalphy from Belhalla, as a day’s stop on the return home to Issach, I had to get you to swim. I got you stay at an old villa right on the coast, and I insisted the guards take the night off.
• Shannan: Before we had gone to bed, you pulled me aside and told me to tell Patty we had Chalphy-Issachan relations to conclude. So our wives went to bed without us, while we ran out to the shores and stripped down in the darkness of a waning crescent. When we returned, the moon was halfway through its trip, and the few staff on the midnight shift we encountered we talked our ways past despite being dripping wet. But for as bizarre as it was, it was one of the most exhilarating moments of my life.
• Oifey: About that, Shannan, Seliph told me something he before I left he had been hiding for a while from us. That blessed ring he had said he had found on the shores of Chalphy in the brief interlude between Arvis’s death and our last holy war, he said he been given it by the spirits of his parents. I scarcely believe it, but when he handed me the ring for a second, maybe I wanted to believe it, I thought I felt the strength of Sigurd and Deirdre’s kindness.
• Shannan: If Seliph saw the truth, he wouldn’t lie about what he couldn’t see, then I wonder if Sigurd and Deirdre saw us together.
• Oifey: Oh dear…
• Shannan: What could they have thought of that? To see two grown men stark naked, frolicking at night in the same place as where their son had, for the first and only time in his life, had seen them and remembered it. What would they have thought of their boys decades later out of their minds ruining the sanctimoniousness of the grounds they had bestowed no small miracle on?
• Oifey: “Their boys”, Shannan?

Shannan fell silent. Was he Deirdre’s boy, was he Sigurd’s? Oifey likewise contemplated it quietly. Sigurd had taken them both in, the both of them orphans. He had contributed to their swordplay, they considered him for all his faults the one they wanted to emulate the most, not to the exclusion of all the others they cherished in their lives. Deirdre for their short time together had come to adore them just as much, with her heart of limitless compassion. They were their boys, their sons, despite being not theirs’ by blood.

-

Their minds then returned to that which had been bothering them both since earlier that evening. Shannan’s child with Patty, it would be Shannan’s, it would be Patty’s, but it would not at all be Oifey’s. They would not be raised in the backwaters of Issach, taught to run from men in armor with Helswath imprinted on it. They would live a normal life, which was very good for the unborn heir to Issach. Neither man wanted another child to have the irregular lives they had lived. But Shannan and Oifey missed their days together, despite all the difficulties. They found joy in those times, and weren’t ready to see that era end.

• Oifey: Shannan, remember how we’d sleep together with Seliph and the rest?
• Shannan: Of course. If they were at all afraid to sleep at night, we’d agree to share one big bed on the hard floor with them. Larcei and Lana we weaned off to Edain once they came of six I think, but I recall Lester yearning for our security until he was eleven.
• Oifey: If Deirdre and Sigurd have been watching us the entire time, they would know that isn’t the full story. When the children were at peace, when all was calm and going, we’d still sometimes share a bed, and we did so until the start of the holy war at Tirnanog, long after they stopped needing us.
• Shannan: I know. That is a fact. Why we did that, I am not certain.
• Oifey: Is that true Shannan? I know why I did such an odd thing. You were the one I could confide in more than any other. Though our origins differed, no one else shared with me the same corpus of experiences I had delighted, borne, and suffered in. In the twenty years past, our dreams have been so much the same, our sorrows alike, and the objects of our affection identical. I wanted to be with you even when I didn’t need to, because nobody else understood me so well. Maybe we could have made others understand, but we felt we had not the time to try that. It was just easier for me to confide in you.
• Shannan: You’ve the right of it Oifey. We hid nothing from each other, for we were one and the same. I couldn’t make the children cry, I didn’t want to burden Edain, nor did I want to demoralize my nation. Our minds were bound together, knowing wherever each other was and was doing. You gave me solace though it were my own internal thoughts. To see you sigh with glad exhaustion from a hard day’s work it reflexively made me respond the same. To be so happy or so sad if it seemed inappropriate for the hour I could hide, but beneath it, I acquiesced that we could be so familiar.
• Oifey: That time is past, but it bears its fruit. Just as Sigurd raised us to do all we have done, so now do our trees blossom. 
• Shannan: Whatever that Eyvel said, there is no tale as odd as our own. A page and a prince, raised by the holiest knight and his wife, in turn become fathers to crusaders who set things right. It’s absurd to think it real, but I don’t regret it. 
• Oifey: Nor do I. And though our world is changing, we needn’t forget it altogether. We have raised our six as one, now we can cultivate new gardens as two. Both crops will be just as real, and just as meaningful. *Yawn*

 

Nearly two hours had passed in musings back and forth, but the recollection was complete. Their days together had been retold, they had validated what they they feared to be false, and they could pass on on to the next phase of their lives. Though now they could be given over to sleep, their unburdened souls took to the numinous. They had not spoken of it directly, but for they were a single heart, they needn’t do so. As it had been before, so it was one last time.

-

The next morning came, and Oifey and Shannan stirred from their bed just as the sunlight began to filter in, contented by however much sleep they may have gotten. They dressed themselves in the fresh attire their servants had stored away the prior day. They were old flames, dearest friends, and they intended to keep a rapport alive past their time of eros, regardless of where they were. They left their room and joined Patty and this Eyvel, who arrived to the breakfast table within a minute of the two men. Again, it was a small gathering, just them and some servants, they would join the diplomats after a light meal for a more formal second course. Conversation began anew.

• Patty: So did you catch up with your brother Shanny? 
• Shannan: I can say I did my Sweetheart. We spoke of old times. Your father was among the topics, he was a good friend of ours as I’ve told you before.
• Oifey: Not to drag the newly risen Sun below the horizon, but Shannan got a little teary-eyed when he spoke of him. Wondering what passed through his mind as fire rained from above.
• Eyvel: If you must know, I could tell you what his thoughts were when I dashed to his side. Dew didn’t let want to let me down to the last instant. He smiled as always.
• Shannan: …So it is as I couldn’t believe! *Cough cough*
• Patty: Mom! You made my husband choke on his link!
• Oifey: Lady Brigid! Where have you have been all these years?! We’ve missed you--your sister Edain has missed you!
• Brigid: I fought to the bitter end at Belhalla, as Ulir’s daughter and bearer of the Yewfelle that was my duty. I escaped, just when all was reduced to cinders and there was nothing left to save. From here on my story becomes too complicated to explain over a short breakfast, but know my memories were sealed and my Brand faded. I awoke as Eyvel, I raised a new daughter, and in me Prince Leif found a new mother, I protected them and a village, and they rescued me in turn. Not too long ago, I remembered everything, and for Issach was closer to Fiana than Grannvale, I came to see my blood daughter before my son.
• Shannan: That is peculiar. Words cannot do justice to the tragedy, but it sounds as though you found fulfillment despite the heartaches as Eyvel. We offer our condolences for every bit of it. 
• Patty: Mother is going to be fine. She remembers everything now and there’s plenty of time to form new memories together. Me, her, my kingly husband, our baby and our brothers.
• Oifey: Are you including me when you say that Patty? For a former thief descended on both sides from brigands, you’re being generous. 
• Patty: Not a big deal. Shannan’s told me before how he doted on Seliph like a big bro, and that he was the same way with Ulster. What is it him having a big bro of his own? I like mine own.
• Brigid: When you return to Grannvale in two weeks or so, allow us to come with you. Febail should hear in person the good news, and I long to see his face again. We’ll send a letter for Edain to meet us there, I hear she now resides in Verdane. I will need us to stop in Darna though, I told Mareeta to wait for me there. She deserves to know the truth and meet my other children.
• Shannan: As my brother, your sister nephews, or nieces, either will do. 
• Oifey: It would be an honor to escort you my Queen and returned Goddess. And Shannan, I will provide if I am able, but I do demand “family’ visits in return. Chalphy is a beautiful place if you weren’t aware.
• Brigid: *Laugh* Finn is a charmer too. Must be young men.
• Shannan: Well you married Dew, so I think it’s mutual my Lady. I won’t say whether I ever had thoughts of you, but your daughter is a sweet girl and I can only beg for your belated approval. And Oifey, I promise to send them to visit, but do send yours’. And don’t forget Larcei and Seliph!

 

This meal, so abruptly overturned at the start by the revelation of a miracle, came afterwards to an end with most of the food had gone untouched. This was given to the servants. Everyone then got up and left for the grand morning banquet. Duchess Clidna and Duke Ulster were to arrive within the hour they were told just as they sat down again. Amused by the prospects ahead, Shannan and Oifey did not have to worry that their prior bond would ever be forgotten.

And here are the explanatory notes on my creative process for the entry and self-criticisms I had also written at the time.:

Spoiler

 

By design, I started utterly impersonal. "Duke Chalphy" and "King Issach" are not terms of affection but titles, and the rest of the language is ritualized. Yes, it does refer to particular events and mention the individuals' names, but this is largely a template future generations and proceeding ones could easily alter for their own use. It is public and formal spectacle. 

Overall, I structured this work as going: Very Formal-Less Formal-Casual-Intimate/Personal-Casual-Formal.

As a most minor detail, I picked silver regaling Shannan’s ceremonial group and left out any mention of gold. I once recall reading that in India around the late 1500s-early 1600s AD that silver was worth more than gold, and that Dutch merchants used silver acquired in Japan to trade for gold in India (and Chinese products too). So I decided, to make silver more precious in Issach than gold. But I didn’t understand the reasons for this real world value difference in India, so I tried to think of what would cause this. In passing I chose to mention gold mines in Issach, which if productive enough, could provide a cause for a depreciation in the value of gold relative to silver capable of causing a cultural preference for the usually less precious precious metal.

The choice to invent a wife for Oifey as opposed to using one of the 2nd Gen females was because of his age. Yes I gave Shannan Patty, but given Oifey was certainly seen as a father by Seliph, I felt it was too weird to pair him with any 2nd Gen female, who he could be twice the age of, even those he didn't raise like Fee. Helping is there being fewer 2nd Gen females than males, so I wasn't leaving any woman sadly unwed. Although parents in relation to each other, and separately them to their children, is a theme which I answer with "blood doesn't matter”, I couldn't help but want to connect Shannan and Oifey's lines somehow. Clidna being distantly related to Shannan does this, helped by the circumstances in which Oifey and Shannan found themselves post-Belhalla making her feasible. I couldn't have done this if everyone had fled to say Orgahill.

The lunch begins the breaking down of the formalities, with notes of the individuals coming through despite a reliance on titles for address. Issach was stated in an old interview to be based on Central Asia, so I wanted food that wasn't standard Western fare. Not knowing much of Central Asia cuisine other than Uzbek flatbreads and melons, my choice of skewered meat and yogurt is actually Turkish. Well the Turks were originally from Central Asia before conquering the Arabs and Greek Byzantines right? And it isn't like Issach is perfectly Central Asian, not a single horseback warrior to its name, for shame.

Ulster never physically showed up in the story, I had considered tossing him in at the end as a “Our proud child” moment. The point to him wanting to pass on Dozel was partly me reacting to Lex!Ulster becoming Duke Dozel over IucharbaxLarcei at the end of my Genealogy run IIRC. But I integrated him as parents having a mundane discussion about a child of theirs'. As in one parent saying "You know, I'm not sure Samantha wants to play soccer anymore, they've been saying it's too rough." and the other "Well let us wait and see and go from there, she's still very young, who knows what she'll end up being truly passionate about?”. It's parenting chatter, but done such that neither Oifey or Shannan recognizes it as such, and so they don't stumble talking about it each other.

The dinner continues the breaking of formalities. From an introduction open to all, to a luncheon open to the general court of Shannan from nobles to peasant servants, but not something you could just because you heard about it stroll over and see. Now things reach a dinner where pretty much everyone save the well-acquainted trio of Patty-Oifey-Shannan, Eyvel, and a few servants have been removed from the picture. Oifey cracks a quip of his Shannan wishes would have been lost to posterity, and Patty announces her pregnancy, two more personal moments.

I'm honestly not sure why I placed Eyvel in there. And canonically, I later checked, and I messed up- she doesn't regain her memories until 7 years after Thracia 776, I thought it was ambiguous. I actually like the idea of a longer delay, but it's a minor detail to blur, it's only mentioned in her character ending. Though her having her own outlandish story of raising another daughter in Mareeta, maybe Nanna to some extent, and a possible other son in Leif, plus any other youth in Fiana, complements it not mattering about being blood parents to be parents.

Dew slipping in might have been my mind because of his age being comparable to Gen 1 Oifey and Shannan. All mentions of him could easily have been deleted. And to be honest, DewxBrigid was my other consideration for this prompt, which I think I couldn’t forget, but I couldn’t flesh out idea for. Shannan wedding the daughter of a friend maybe adds a little lighthearted zaniness to add comic effect and highlight the unusual familial relations are totally fine. 

Dew not being sure of what the Balmung is, is a reference to false Shannan in Gen 2 if Daisy- Patty’s replacement if Brigid died/was unwed by Gen 1’s end- or Hermina- Fee’s replacement- visits a certain village. The false Shannan proclaims to be the real one, the girl asks for proof, and the liar shows the “Balmung”, which is a shield and the girl sees through his lie knowing the Balmung is a sword.

The story the storyteller at the dinner is again the entertainment of yesteryear. While I had Western ideas of medieval-early modern entertainment in mind with the lunch, the dinner's entertainment was supposed to be more Middle Eastern in the same time period. The outline of the story they told was derived from what little I know India's Mahabharata- the world's longest epic poem (the Iliad and Odyssey and Aeneid can all fit comfortably inside it with room for Canada; the Epic of Manas is apparently longer in form, but possibly shorter in word count).

The turn to the bed chambers brings things to its most informal, private, and personal level, allowing Oifey and Shannan to discard proper behavior and be honest to each other. Although I primarily kept the language of a certain sophistication due to my own preference, they certainly were not letting their hearts melt and catch on fire. The choice to have Oifey relieve himself in the opening expose was just for a hint of realism and perhaps of the two’s familiarity.

Breakfast the morning after was a step back towards towards the level of the dinner the night before. With the issue having been resolved, the duo involved can resume their daily public existences, first with Patty and the soon realized to be old familiar friend in Brigid. And then on the very end note they head back out into the world on a level comparable to the lunch the prior day. Things are back to normal after a night's worries (err... fixing a problem a few hours after it was made wholly felt now sounds unrealistic).

For the bedsheets colors, I was thinking of this:

Treasure official artwork of Gen 1 Shannan, his father Prince Mariccle, and Marricle's half-sister and Shannan's aunt, Ayra. Notice the quantity of purples, I assumed if highest Issachan royalty is wearing this, that purple is symbolically prominent in Issach. Four shades on the bedsheets and pillows was because I was counting four shades here. 

That was why I chose purple, but I was well aware that coincidentally, I had chosen lavender, which I knew to be the color that isn't rainbow which is associated with the LGBTQ community. The Lavender Scare was post-WWII late 1940s-early 1950s purge of all suspected homosexuals from government service and American universities. For a related example, an "amethyst marriage”, amethyst a purple gemstone, meant a lesbian and a gay man who got married to adhere to social norms, but didn't actually love each other and pursued their true romantic inclinations outside of it hidden from the general public.

I tried to balance Shannan and Oifey as persons, I didn't want to make one particularly one way or another, both show reason and strength, both show insecurity and issues. I wanted them to be similar and average-ish, so as to not cast their bond as to have one be the "woman" in the relationship, or either as some gay caricature. The results might have left the duo bland though.

Yes, the "unburdened souls" and "numinous" meant they had sex. I threw it in only in passing, because I didn't want it to define things. I did not want at all for Oifey to caress Shannan's face and say how beautiful his long hair was. Since I left it vague enough, one could interpret it as just hugging, kissing and sweet affections without sex though.

They started as strangers in Verdane, and became close platonic friends by the time they left Sigurd just before Belhalla. In Issach, under the unusual circumstances they found themselves, they bonded as parents over the children they raised together. With the pressures of Grannvalian occupation and persecution, and a future of liberation in mind, causing them to withdraw from pursuing the luxury of heterosexual romance. It is in these conditions in which they shared in each other's joys and suffering and had been doing so since before Belhalla, that their bond became something more.

Now I'm not sure if I could have made it romantic without sexual and it still being gay, I'm not at all versed in LGBTQ Studies. Well, thinking about it now, I absolutely could have with acts would be unusual for anything short of true romance. But I wasn’t thinking that as I was writing this entry. To be on the safe side, to rule out it simply being a deep bromance, I felt I had to add a mint leaf of sex. Though the point must be stated they weren't drawn to each other because they saw each other's nether regions while bathing one day. Sex did not start their relationship. Sex was a side effect of being so close to each other derived from a friendship-turned-shared-parenthood, a not so important to the individuals involved afterthought.

Not to say that gayness is an accident caused by circumstances! And to call sex an afterthought might be weird if they didn’t mind it enough to do it multiple times over years. It would have been easier to just write things with the two married, but I couldn't because Shannan has a kingdom and Oifey had a dukedom to rule. And this a world where holy blood inheritance matters, while gay marriage doesn't exist.

 

-Was ANY of the above relevant thinking to the topic I was being asked to write about? No. Not really. But I did. 

 

As for self-criticism and a little more explanation.

I acknowledge that things could’ve used more action. Perhaps I could have started the day with the pregnancy conundrum, them silently not talk about it directly, gone through a day of more kinetic events. In the background through said events recalling, with little actually said, of Oifey and Shannan's time together over the years. And then in the night together they reach the resolution by piecing together all they recalled. Or for something less radical, I could have had them been a little more interactive in the bedroom (no, not that way) and not just sitting on the bed talking back and forth.

And I acknowledge the biggest elephant in the room- the large direct absence of the pregnancy. Patty the bearer of the child who causes the insecurity of Oifey and Shannan, which is the crux of the pregnancy’s presence here, is not present in the personal discussions. She only first met the duo in 776 Jugdral Count, at the tail end of their relationship, and she doesn’t know the full truth of it in this story. I certainly ran a high chance of this problem by picking men I chose to be gay, and it expectedly got me.

Something that drew me into OifeyxShannan though, was trying to detail a situation where the couple was already versed in parenting and past the stage of young love in their relationship. It isn’t simply “I’m gonna be a mommy/daddy!” and or dealing with the effects of adapting to parenthood and away from horny youth banging. ShannanxOifey have already raised a farm from seedlings just breaking through the soil to adulthood, they’re veterans here, and they likely never had the “I MUST lose my virginity before I’m 18!” phase that would have begun earlier.

Could have I made a couple past young love and or versed in parenting in another way? Yes. It just didn’t come to me, but I could have. Why the prompt when I examine it now didn’t say it had to be announcing a first pregnancy, it could have been Tiki announcing her 24th with Henry. I just didn’t think of that at the time. Nor did I think of having Shannan confess to Patty his secret history with Oifey and framing it like that, thereby placing the pregnant woman in a more central position.

As for why I stopped with WYBO. I've one major problem when it comes to writing- I can't do dialogue. I can't make the dialogue natural, and I'm always concerned about putting words in the mouth of existing characters, for fear I'll write something out of character for them to say, I don't want to show disrespect to fictional people. I'm not great with characters in general either.

I'm more of a world-building writer. People are my weak point. And even with my lore-oriented strength, I tend to be wary of what I write, since I like having a veneer of realism to it, and I feel like I could always afford to read ever more history books to strengthen my understanding of political/military/economic/cultural structures and systems.

 

37 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

 

Not bad. I don't actively ship the two (though Jade does make a slight gay joke once regarding them IIRC), but Guy's a nice character. And Luke-Later-2/3rds-Of-The-Game reminds me of myself somewhat. 

[Elina]

5 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Dist the Rose best character.

 

4 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

Dist is a treat

Aw yes! I also watched the anime and it made me cry so much.

Spoiler

I was so sad when sync and ion died, and I just about died along with Asch.

 

[Sidereal Wraith]

 

[Sooks]

Tfw they Elise’d Cordelia in TS.

Spoiler

I guess it’s easier to understand with a longer weapon like a spear, though.

And the thread has been absolutely blowing up, I hope I haven’t missed any teehee lore.

[Sidereal Wraith]

16 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Tfw they Elise’d Cordelia in TS.

  Reveal hidden contents

I guess it’s easier to understand with a longer weapon like a spear, though.

And the thread has been absolutely blowing up, I hope I haven’t missed any teehee lore.

What do you mean by “Elise’d” exactly? So as to the lore Rubenio has lost his status as an elitist, became a tsundere, everyone likes Tales of the Abyss and I’m out of bourbon.

Edited April 8, 2022 by WraithReborn

[Armagon]

Star Wars fans stop being an embarrassment challenge (literally impossible)

 

[Acacia Sgt]

Well, I'm debating if to actually change my username... for the first time ever.

[Lightchao42]

Having rewatched Star Door 2, I experienced a breakthrough...

On 3/18/2022 at 11:27 AM, Sooks said:

This Barkhorn/Roaring Lion guy is definitely gonna be important in like 5 games, isn’t he?

It turns out this guy is mentioned in Sky the 3rd, being the Eighth Dominion.

Spoiler

More specifically, he was the Dominion sent to first investigate the Salt Pale.

I don't know if it means he'll be important later, but I thought it was something worth mentioning.

2 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Star Wars fans stop being an embarrassment challenge (literally impossible)

Yeah, The Last Jedi is worth including.

And wasn't that just The Complete Saga?

[null]

I've honestly grown long tired of my username but everyone on all the sites I'm on knows me by that so changing it would be so odd

[Sidereal Wraith]

9 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Star Wars fans stop being an embarrassment challenge (literally impossible)

Hey, I think the Sequel Trilogy is as rubbish as the next guy, but we’re stuck with it whether we like it or not.

[Sooks]

4 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

Having rewatched Star Door 2, I experienced a breakthrough...

It turns out this guy is mentioned in Sky the 3rd, being the Eighth Dominion.

  Reveal hidden contents

More specifically, he was the Dominion sent to first investigate the Salt Pale.

I don't know if it means he'll be important later, but I thought it was something worth mentioning.

Huh. Well he gets randomly name dropped in Cold Steel 2, so yeah.

[Acacia Sgt]

To be fair, mine would be more of an update, not a full-blown change per se...

[Sidereal Wraith]

1 minute ago, Acacia Sgt said:

To be fair, mine would be more of an update, not a full-blown change per se...

What’s it going to be?

[Acacia Sgt]

1 minute ago, WraithReborn said:

What’s it going to be?

It'd be Acacia Sergeant. You know:

Gotta keep up with the times.

[Sidereal Wraith]

Go for it! 

[Lightcosmo]

2 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

And Luke-Later-2/3rds-Of-The-Game reminds me of myself somewhat. 

Luke being a whiny pain in the ass does have its moments, though! Xd

[Sidereal Wraith]

Emperor I’m so satisfied in the knowledge that I’ve finished this series.

[Benice]

1 hour ago, twilitfalchion said:

I've honestly grown long tired of my username but everyone on all the sites I'm on knows me by that so changing it would be so odd

Whatever makes you happy, we'll be happy with too, matey!