😱💜

This is amazing; we often personify various parts of our body. But little did we know, that it turns out our body personifies itself.

Your body is an incredibly bizarre machine.

“What you see is a myosin protein dragging an endorphin along a filament to the inner part of the brain’s parietal cortex which creates happiness. Happiness. You’re looking at happiness.”

This quote speaks to me

“When I discover who I am, I’ll be free.”

— Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (via books-n-quotes)

This looks like a good read

Book of the Day

“Banshees, Werewolves, Vampires and Other Creatures of the Night” by Varla Ventura

Love this!

Bookwyrm

There is a bookwyrm in the library.

Note the spelling. Not a bookworm. A bookwyrm.

No one is entirely sure when it snuck into the Elsewhere University Library, but one thing has become entirely certain: it is never, ever leaving.

And why should it leave, with a veritable unlimited floor plan filled to the bell tower with delicious, fragrant tomes to claim and hoard and sample.

An ink-black serpentine wyrm that originally was not much bigger than a rabbit, it used to scamper here and there in the library looking for open tomes to slurp the words out of (it is a terribly messy eater, much to the librarians’ chagrin). The words it eats etch themselves somewhere onto its dark hide, though it has consumed so many letters in so many languages that it is difficult now to see where new bits of prose are added.

Students have been warned repeatedly over the years not to feed the bookwyrm. But there are always those who do not heed the warnings of the librarians. It used to be a funny pastime for students that had become stuck in one section or another of the library’s labyrinthine stacks to feed scraps of paper with vulgar words to the then tiny bookwyrm and then try to find where the offending epithets manifested. The bookwyrm was not terribly picky about the words it ate back then, because it was always hungry. Whether they were in good taste or bad, it didn’t matter; its appetite was insatiable.

And this kind of recklessness is why it grew so large in such a, relatively, short amount of time. It sprang up to the size of a cat one semester, then a large dog a year later, and then eventually… well, to the point where it’s a very good thing that the library has a mostly Other architecture, because it surely would have burst the building by now. And the bigger it grew, the more territorial it became. The more it hoarded tomes in certain sections (it really seemed to savor Anne McCaffrey’s works, but would never be found anywhere near Hemingway, for example). The more aggressive it became to students and librarians alike who needed the books also.

Hoping to avoid another calamity like the last wyrm that took up residence on the campus, the librarians decided to make good use of their new pet. With a copious amount of parchment and ink, they lured the bookwyrm down down down deep into the seldom used catacombs of The Library and set it to work. They knew that once it was presented with its new collection that it would never stray far from it again. And there it stays.

It was a constant conundrum that the librarians faced in the early days, when the Fair Folk and students were beginning to… mingle. A place filled with a vast amount of knowledge like The Library is always bound to have certain… archives that are better perused by no one. Ancient texts. Tomes of ages, dated further back than it is currently recorded that written word existed. The language of the birds, poetry of the stars, and truths that would shatter the mind. Words that needed to be preserved but not necessarily studied. Not by the Good Neighbors, and certainly not by incoming freshmen. Absolutely not by school administrators.

A tiny bit of such knowledge is dangerous. A little more is a disaster. Lots of that knowledge, though, would present a crisis of cataclysmic proportions. These are the books, bound in iron and chains, locked with enchantment and dusted with bottled oblivion, that the wyrm keeps. Guards. Claims. Hoards.

Not all words fade with time. Some grow sharp teeth and attack from the dark instead.

So if you are lost in the library and find yourself in a place that is blacker than spilled ink, smells of iron and sulfur, and sounds like an ancient bellows, turn around and leave out the way you came.

Yesterday, if possible (which, in The Library, of course, it always, always is).

This so cool, these could be used for writing fantasy works as well.

Villains - Archfey - Worldbuilding Wednesday

The villain is my favorite part of ANY campaign. So here I am gonna talk about how you can make different kinds of villains, honing down on a specific type and offering various ways to make them interesting. As always, we will be looking at real world history, culture, and mythology to make your villains seem realistic and specifically dastardly. For our first entry let’s discuss…

~~~~~~~~~~~~Archfey Villains~~~~~~~~~~~~

Why archfey? Two reasons: 1) I like archfey, they’re fuckin’ dicks. 2) Someone who’s name I can’t find asked me to make this and I am more than happy to make things for my followers.

NOW, let’s understand what an archfey really is.

An archfey is a creature of fey ancestry that is excessively powerful, nearing the power of a deity. Usually, such creatures are native to the Feywild. Within this realm, they command great power and can even shape the realm itself to their whim and whimsy. 

Common Misconception

Archfey doesn’t mean “superelf.” An archfey can be a pixie, a dryad, a ghost, a beast of some kind, anything that is classified as “fae” or “fae-like” can be turned into an archfey. Elf-like archfey are the most COMMON, but absolutely not the ONLY form of an archfey.

The other misconception is that the archfey are good. This is because the Feywild is mistaken as a plain of good, while Shadowfell is a plain of evil. This is wrong. Feywild and Shadowfell aren’t images of good and evil. Their are images of abundance vs lack of emotion. Shadowfell is a plain of the depressed, the emotionless, the broken. Feywild is a plain of the bipolar, the expressive, the artists and the madmen.

(I’m getting tired of saying “archfey”)

Characteristics of the Archfey

So to understand how we get an Archfey villain, lets discuss some general characteristics of the archfey.

Background.

The archfey come from the Feywild. This is a place governed by emotion. When its denizens feel something strongly, they can physically change their environment. A cruel witch will transform the forest around her to grow trees that bleed and produce fruits shaped like heads. While a kind princess will transform the fields around her into a gorgeous plain of crystalline flowers.

Now, the archfey can transform the Feywild at a moment’s notice. Which means they can do one or both of these things:

They can control their emotions very well.

They only ever have emotional extremes powerful enough to instantly alter the Feywild.

Lifestyle

The archfey live careless lives. They are too powerful to have any natural predators, as such live carefree and happy. Due to their extended life (they live like thousands of years), they are NEVER in rush. Why should they be? They’ve got time, ALL the time.

Environment

Based on HOW the Feywild is, how it is ever-shifting and changing, its denizens must learn to control this change to be able to thrive. Since we are working with an archfey, we can assume they’ve already thrived to the top of their food chain. As such, they must have learned to command the Feywild OR adapted to this changing world, having very drastic changes in personality, behavior, or even looks.

With all this information, let’s share some ideas for archfey villains.

Examples of Archfey Villains

Example #1: The Many Faced Man. Simply put, a doppelganger. The archfey are ever-changing. For this example, our villain always changes their looks. So your Party pisses off this archfey or in some way becomes enemies with him. So when your spends the night camping outside, whoever is keeping watch suddenly poof, is teleported away (because this is an Archfey, it can do this kind of shiz) and in steps a the Many Faced Man who takes this lost PCs form.

I urge you, IRL, pull the Player of this character aside and tell them your plan. Tell them that you want to replace them with a Doppelganger, but not to worry, because their PC will eventually be rescued. THEN, offer them to role play as a doppelganger pretending to be their character. Most players will have TONS of fun with this idea. If you player doesn’t want to RP a doppelganger offer them to role a new temporary PC or just dump the idea.

Example #2: Prince of Liars. A very powerful archfey this one is. He has immense power in the Feywild, and has managed to TRAP the Party in his domain. I’m stealing from Curse of Strahd here, but essentially rework that campaign with more fey-like themes. Instead of vampires, we got fey, instead of Strahd we got a spoiled brat of a prince who is all-powerful but only wants to mess with the Party before killing them in a cruel manner for his or her amusement.

For additional complexity, you can make the Prince of Liars have very drastic shifts of emotion. Think, the bad guy from Split (the movie). One moment he is nice to the Party and leads them to a place filled with treasure, the next he snaps into sheer brutal cruelty and slaughters the ranger’s companion. This will put the Party on edge when dealing with the guy. Furthermore, knowing that the archfey is powerful enough to destroy them with ease puts the Party on the edge, at least until they find something that can kill or neutralize this big bad.

Example #3: The Undying Court. This is for LARGE scale campaigns. Let’s say you have a game that is heavy on politics, but spans different dimensions. So the PCs are working with the politics between Mount Celestia and the 9 Hells and the Abyss, etc. That’s when you throw in the Undying Court. A hive-mind of several Archfey that operate as a singular entity and wish to expand their chaotic influence across the many plains. They may ally with Demon Lords and expedite chaotic situations to gain more power, so your PCs would have to negotiate a turbulent field of politics.

And that’s that folks. I hope this provides SOME use to y’all and helps you out with future ideas. Of course you don’t HAVE to follow my guideline 100%. You don’t need to follow it at all, in fact. Just take it as it is, my ideas for a good fey villain. What about you folks? Would you like to see breakdowns of other kinds of villains? I’d love to do more. Send your recommendations my way or share your ideas for villains. I’d love to hear it. Good luck everyone.

The Unfair DM

Help save Roman, Pass it on.

Please help save Roman!

My girl @govaxyourself is drowning in vet bills after her cat needed emergency surgery two nights ago. He’d somehow swallowed about five feet of yarn (that’s quite a lot of yarn for a cat to swallow) and it had gotten caught in his digestive tract, making him very, very ill. The cost of the surgery was already crushing, but they hadn’t even had him back home a full day before they needed to rush him back to the emergency vet with a fever and an internal infection.

Here are some of his vet bills as of now. He’s still in the hospital, and every day he has to stay only adds more fees.

@govaxyourself has maxed out her credit cards and taken out a new one to be able to pay for her cat’s medical care. The current total is nearing $6,000 already, and she’s going to have to apply for another card soon. She’s set up »a GoFundMe«, and everything raised will go directly toward paying off these vet bills and any further charges accrued. If, by some miracle of generosity, more money is raised than she needs, every last extra cent will be donated to the Humane Society where Roman was originally adopted.

Any reblogs and signal boosting you can do is greatly appreciated, and if you have the means, please consider »donating to her GoFundMe«! Every tiny bit helps so much!

Sounds like be

endless list of my kids ♡ richard gansey III 

They were always walking away from him. But he never seemed able to walk away from them.

Gorgeous, have you ever seen a piece of artwork you wish you could walk into? This is one of those for me.

Uncharted Heaven by Lorenzo Lanfranconi

I love cat sidhe folklore.

The Cait Sidhe

Celtic mythology describes Cait Sidhe as a fae spirit that takes the form of a large black cat with a white spot on its chest. People of ancient Ireland believed that cats operated somewhere between the mortal and spiritual realms.

They viewed them as guardians of the gates of the Otherworld.

a link between humans, the Otherworld and other realms. According to Celtic folklore, spirits that took the form of Cait Sidhe, a large black cat, could steal the soul of the dead before the Gods, devil or the angels could claim it. Where they take the souls nobody knows.

Northern Scottish believed hearing a Cait Sidhe scream or yowl meant you or someone in your family would die soon while the centeral and southern Scottish saw them as gentle guardians of death that guided lost souls into the place after.

The Insular Scottish believed they were the ones that warned you of death but also would grant you wishes if summoned and given offerings.

The Icelandic people have the yule cat which is put in the cait Sidhe terminology.

From what I can tell Russians and Germans held the black cats are witches in disguise belief but they also had a fearful respect if them.

Another Irish tradition derived from the ancient belief that certain spirits took the form of a cat happens on All Hallows Eve, known in Ireland as Samhain, hallows eve, all hallowsv day and just halloween on that night, spirits, fae and demons would be roaming the earth. Everyone set a dish of milk outside so that when Cait Sidhe passed your house, they would be happy with the offering and bless your home and maybe even your whole blood line. If you did not set out milk, Cait Sidhe would be displeased and disrespected so they'd leave a curse on your livestock and cause the cows to not give milk or bare young. Possibly curse your wife as well woth infertility.

Catholics and Christians took the idea of the Cait Sidhe and erased the fae part. Claiming they were demons sent from hell so they may sell innocent souls..

The mythology of the Cait Sidhe even had it's hold in the Americas. Ingenious people say the black cat as a trickster, african south Americans saw the black cat as a symbol of evil while African north Americans saw them as guardians.

White americans had mixed feelings on black cats but they always held some sort of magical power be that a protector or a trickster.

The neolithic Irish people and many Scottish also believed in the Cait Sidhe but believe that Cait Sidhe were not fairy spirits but were actually witches that could take the form of a cat. It was said that these witches could transform into a cat eight times but if they took the form of a cat on their ninth transformation, they would remain a cat. Many think it's the origin of the saying that cats have nine lives.

This is also thought the term " never cross a black cat's path " comes from since that cat may just be a Cait Sidhe or a witch.

References too the Cait Sidhe can also be found in Edgar Allen Poe's story the black cat✨

Hilarious!

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