I saw this question posed on tiktok, but I think Tumblr would really enjoy it too.

If a fae creature offered to give one million dollars for a bone chosen at random, how many bones would you allow them to take?

Light clarifications; The fae is not the one choosing the bones. The bone is taken at random. Each bone, no matter the size or importance, is worth a full million dollars. You must also declare the exact number first, you can't go bone-by-bone. You either say 2 or you say 10, you can't work your way up to a higher number. The bones are removed instantaneously, and the money is given immediately as well. You will not get in government trouble for acquiring the money.

Tell me in the tags/replies how many bones you'd let the fae take. And as always, reblog for bigger sample size.

if you want to test your luck, this site lets you choose a random human bone :) https://randomlistgenerator.com/human-bones

I once did the math, and with $10m, a person could put that money in a decent yield savings account, live on $100k a year, and never run out of money.

$15m is just more insurance for that idea. A good savings account could have an annual return of 5% or more, so you could take $500k for your first year, and let the rest earn interest, bringing in $750k, meaning you net $250k, and live a ridiculously good life with no need to work.

I saw this question posed on tiktok, but I think Tumblr would really enjoy it too.

If a fae creature offered to give one million dollars for a bone chosen at random, how many bones would you allow them to take?

Light clarifications; The fae is not the one choosing the bones. The bone is taken at random. Each bone, no matter the size or importance, is worth a full million dollars. You must also declare the exact number first, you can't go bone-by-bone. You either say 2 or you say 10, you can't work your way up to a higher number. The bones are removed instantaneously, and the money is given immediately as well. You will not get in government trouble for acquiring the money.

Tell me in the tags/replies how many bones you'd let the fae take. And as always, reblog for bigger sample size.

if you want to test your luck, this site lets you choose a random human bone :) https://randomlistgenerator.com/human-bones

My subs have those barcode tattoos, but it's not some kind of slavery play like it often is...

See we're got a complicated poly free-use situation going on with lots of extended polycule members who may drop in and want to borrow a sub or three for a scene or a month.

So we designed our system around the non-kinky institution that most closely resembles our situation, where we've got a bunch of individual "resources" that need to be loaned out to verified patrons and tracked so we can tell where our items are, when they are supposed to be back, if they're late to be returned, and put holds on them.

So we're using a library management program.

You just go to the circulation desk, scan your polycule card, then the subs you want to check out. It's a simple and efficient solution!

We're still having some teething problems with late returns, though. And it's trickier than we expected to fill out the item description pages. How exactly do you categorize a bisexual transmasc painslut with a thing for puppy play into the Dewey decimal system? Still, the work continues.

sorry but. doesnt that just make it some kind of slavery play in the end...?

also HOITT

Nah cause for slavery play you gotta, you know, do slavery play. Roleplaying that you own a sub, purchasing a sub, that kind of thing.

We're not doing that (in general, at least. I imagine at least one dom/switch has done some slavery play with a sub they were loaned). We're doing a free use thing where any sub can be used by any dom in the group (with safewords and preestablished limits, of course. We're playing, not running some weird human trafficking ring). The barcodes are just to help keep track of who is where and with who, because this got way too complicated for just a shared Google sheets page.

And you may think it's hot but that's probably only because you're not having to maintain all this library infrastructure! This software is from the 80s and I'm running it on NT4, and the damn barcode readers keep failing to scan. They're just not designed to read the lines off human flesh, especially single they kinda assume that the target surface is perfectly flat, which humans rarely are.

I did suggest we used contactless RFID implants instead of barcodes, but half the polycule wasn't into the idea of getting an RFID chip injected into them, and the other half was way too into it. (the puppysub half, natch).

So I'm having to research alternate barcode readers, which is going terribly. Do you know what happens when you call up Zebra and ask them which of their scanners work best on human skin? If you're LUCKY, they hang up on you! And explaining "no, it's for a sex thing" does NOT HELP.

So I'm stuck here at the circulation desk looking at datasheets and trying to compare how good they are at low contrast reads and non-flat surfaces.

I thought I'd found a handheld scanner that'd work, but it turns out that if your skin is any darker than your average Irish vampire, it fails to work. And frankly this whole situation is weird enough without accidentally implementing a racist tech stack.

I really got to get my resource allocation bar code soon...

I could give you one but with the current state of my system there's like a 20%-25% chance you'll end up in 386 Inland waterway and ferry transportation

I'm not into watersports, could I get put in 299 Religion-Nonchristian Religions-Religions Not Provided for Elsewhere?

wondering how well the motif of a new monster communicates visually; can you tell what kind of theme this has or its visual inspirations?? What things do you see first in it? I don't NEED them to be immediately obvious but I'm curious!

I guess I designed it just right because this highly specific first guess is exactly what it does

Space Invader, game controller and glasses/goggles are also correct, it is a Video Games Virus that will infect you and trap you in a thrilling fever dream adventure until you get a high score and/or die :) The eyes are actually the same but its left eye is "blinking"

Hey Bog, can I use this if I ever need a Werewolf game for a computer Bane (evil bad wrong spirit)? I specifically wrote exactly this kind of bane into a chronicle I was working on...

Artist:  SIMON STÅLENHAG

@bogleech @revretch @netherworldpost @dee-the-red-witch

Immediately thought of y'all

Everyone says to make art that makes people uncomfortable and yet when I, a designer of ergonomic office chairs...

i said liminal, not lumbar

If you want lumbar, go to the hardware store

you can support me on Patreon for £1 and help me keep making art!

In writing, epithets ("the taller man"/"the blonde"/etc) are inherently dehumanizing, in that they remove a character's name and identity, and instead focus on this other quality.

Which can be an extremely effective device within narration!

But these only work if the epithet used is how the narrator primarily identifies that character. Which is why it's so jarring to see a lot of common epithets in intimate moments-- because it conveys that the main character is primarily thinking of their lover/best friend/etc in terms of their height or age or hair color.

Holy shit, I kind of... unwittingly did exactly this when I started writing my second Urtrament book-

...now I guess I need to keep this up.

Dungeon Daidokoro- Delicious in Dungeon in The Kitchen #2

(Daidokoro is kitchen in Japanese)

Ok, so the last one got 90-ish notes. Close enough.

I am going to open this one with a request for tips and donations if you like my work. I'm looking at, like, $350 to get my car re-registered because of DMV bullshit that I can't really fix. I have some money, but if people could help with this, I'd be eternally grateful.

So, please, if you can, if you like my work with this, my cashapp is $ValravenApocalypse, my paypal is paypal.me/korbl, my Venmo is @ Valraven. Anything would be a big help.

Man-Eating Plant Tart

In chapter two, Team Laios ventures into the second layer of the dungeon, a large apparently open-air space full of trees and lush foliage. The first meal they eat here is a tart made of man-eating plant fruit.

Which is a difficulty here.

First, there are no man-eating plants. Obviously. Like, we're not even dealing with something like "there aren't giant scorpions (but there are large crustaceans)" or "there aren't walking mushrooms (but there are big mushrooms)." This is just... this thing doesn't exist. There are carnivorous plants, but they're rather small and, to my knowledge, don't really fruit.

There are giant (non-tree) plants, but, to my knowledge, they also don't fruit, and they tend to be in the realm of "pollinated by carrion insects, so they smell like rotten meat." So, even if that giant flower that smells like corpses has fruit, I doubt anyone would want to eat it.

But, let's start by looking at the recipe-

So, to start with, you need some leftover "scorpion hotpot." Which is to say Lobster Portabello Soup, and some Slime Gelatin--which is maybe jellyfish, but I don't think you can really get anything like gelatin from a jellyfish (at least that you'd want to eat), so we're probably looking at agar agar (a gelatin-like substance from seaweed).

Baraselia, Mearauk, Betahn

It's difficult to really figure out similar real fruits to these. In fact, it's not even particularly clear which fruit is which in the manga. But, I did find Ingredients on the wiki, which makes it more clear-

(minor transliteration differences aside)

Baraselia is interesting, its seeds seem similar, broadly, to a pepper's, and led me to initially think it might be basically a bell pepper-

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that a bell pepper's flesh wouldn't stand up to heat the way the baraselia's does

On further thought, I think the baraselia is a bit more like a squash. Thinking about it, pumpkin seeds also cling pretty tight to the stem, but I don't think the baraselia is a pumpkin exactly.

I think a Cassabanana is probably pretty close-

And, while I'm completely unfamiliar with this plant, I saw notes online that the unripe fruits can be cooked like a vegetable. So, I think cassabanana is probably a good candidate for "Baraselia."

I think the betan is the chopped fruit that gets mixed in. It's an interesting looking fruit, particularly in the anime-

It has a vaguely chili-like appearance, which it could well be, but I'm also struck by the visual similarity of the inner nodes of jackfruit-

Jackfruit is noted for it's "meaty" texture, and is used in several savory dishes. I think jackfruit is probably a very good candidate for a Betan stand-in.

Which leaves Mereoak/Mearauk-

Honestly, they look a lot like cherries or tomatoes, and tomatoes used in savory tarts are just, like, a thing. I think you could very well use a mix of cherries and cherry tomatoes for mereoak.

"Man-Eating Plant" Fruit Tart

Lightly steam the fruits and let cool until you can safely handle them. Cut open the cassabanana and remove the seeds, then the skin from the flesh. Mold the skin into a shell for your tart, outside against the plate.

Mash the cassabana flesh, and add the gelatine and soup, stir until slightly thickened. Taste, adding salt and pepper as needed. Add the chopped jackfruit and the rest of the soup, stir till well combined and pour into tart shell.

Put in oven at 400 degrees. Check for setness at 15 minutes, and give an additional 5 minutes if needed.

Remove once set, let cool slightly, serve.

IS THE LITTLE TEENAGER GHOSTBUSTER GAY FOR THE CUTE GHOST?

harold...

“we'll meet again in the fabric of the universe” that's some dyke ass shit, melody

lesbian visibility week should include apparitions

She 100% is, and I will not hear suggestions that she is not.

everyone reblog this btw I need to spread the word of canon falin dragon cock I need to be heard

@iconicname #you can even see it on official art and stuff lol

you're so right and I can't believe I forgot to mention this undeniable proof from the back of book 10

Some haters say it's a pubic bone, but I maintain that a dragon would not have a pubic bone. That's a dragon cock!

Delicious in Dungeon in The Kitchen

So... I was struck by the thought that I kinda wish some food nerd would go through the Dungeon Meshi dishes and analyze them and sort of give a "this is the real world thing they're making" run down.

And then I realized I'm a food nerd that can do research.

So.

We're gonna try this out, starting with Volume 1. I don't promise that I know everything about cooking. I don't promise I'll always be able to make the thing I'm looking at (I am broke, and I don't have my own kitchen). But I can at least look at a dish and figure out what they're doing and how to replicate it, at least sorta.

Dungeon Meshi Volume 1-- Huge Scorpion and Walking Mushroom Hot Pot

The two main components of this dish are the Huge Scorpion and Walking Mushroom.

Walking Mushroom

Looking at the images in the manga, Walking Mushroom seems to just... be a mushroom that can walk around. There are no organs, the interior seems pretty uniform in substance...

Like, literally, that's exactly what sliced mushrooms look like. Senshi cuts the mushroom into ~4" strips (judging by their size next to the small cabbage-like vegetable, and comparing those plants to his hand in the image of him gathering them. I am assuming dwarf hands are roughly the same size as human hands).

There's a variety of edible mushroom that is probably as close as we're going to get to the size of a Walking Mushroom, growing a cap up to 3' wide, but it seems to only grow in termite mounds in a very specific part of the African continent (please forgive my USAmerican, White education leading me to not being able to identify the specific region), so... if you can get that at all, it's probably crazy expensive (as it should be, unless you're literally getting it from the mounds or local markets yourself). Portobello or similar large culinary mushrooms are probably just fine. The Mushroom Feet are literally just mushrooms, so no worries there.

Huge Scorpion

Ok, so... there is a difference between arachnids and crustaceans. As a start, arachnids have book lungs and crustaceans have gills. Arachnid guts are different from crustacean guts, just because of environment. Hell, crustacean limbs grow differently from arachnid limbs.

That said, everything I see in Dungeon Meshi implies that, from a culinary standpoint, Huge Scorpion is a crustacean-

So, really, it's just a big lobster. Take a lobster, cut off its legs, antennae, and the tail fluke, and you're going to see something that looks pretty similar to the huge scorpion in Dungeon Meshi.

Seaweed

Next is seaweed, which... is just a thing, but also kind of an imprecise term, I think. Basically, "seaweed" just refers to any marine algae that is multicellular and macroscopic (big enough to see). Arctic Moss seems to be a real thing which refers to a couple things- the aquatic moss Calliergon giganteum and the terrestrial lichen in the genus of Cladonia, which includes Reindeer Lichen.

Reindeer lichen is edible, in a number of ways, but it's also not seaweed. So we look at Calliergon giganteum. I cannot get an answer as to whether this particular variety of moss is edible. So... fuck it, say Senshi used Reindeer Lichen, at least we know that's edible.

"Star Jelly" is... I don't know. The main result I find when googling it is that it's the sort of general term for various slimes that show up on lawns and other vegetation, etc. Which means it could be anything from amphibian spawning jelly to who the fuck knows what.

However, one thing it could be is a cyanobacteria known as Fat Choy, a commonly used "vegetable" in Chinese Cuisine:

Looks like jelly? Yep. Looks weird enough that you might imagine it comes from a star? Yep. Edible? Yes!

(I mean, maybe don't eat a ton of it, or get it from irreputable sources. At least some Fat Choy contains a toxic amino acid which may or may not have negative health effects, but I'm not a doctor, so all I'm saying is "be aware of this." It's an expensive delicacy, which means that it is a particularly lucrative target for counterfeiters, and China does not have strong, or strongly enforced, food safety laws).

The Hard Stuff

So that leaves "Invertatoes" and "Dried Slime."

Neither of which seem to have a good direct analogue to the real world. Well... sorta.

Invertatoes seems to refer to the plants. The name calls to mind potatoes, and potatoes do indeed grow in the ground and are starchy. It's probably fair to just use any kind of starchy tuber as the "invertatoes." Maybe cassava, since those are large enough that it's at least somewhat believable that "Fantasy Land Cassava" could look like that (although that doesn't fit the "these are normal plants that grow upside down" unless we're being really generous).

The problem is that it's sort of implied that the cabbage-like vegetable seen in the hot pot comes from the same plant, and everything from a potato plant other than the potato itself is toxic. They also don't look like that.

I literally don't know what those cabbage/lettuce-like leafy vegetables are. They're not seaweed, because the two varieties called out definitely don't look like that. They're not, so far as I can tell, the greens of any kind of starchy tuber--

EXCEPT.

So, I was taking one last look at tubers to see if I could find something that seemed to match, and I think Invertatoes could be likened to something similar to chicory. Particularly endives. I never knew endives were related to chicory (ie, "that thing that I'm aware is popular as a coffee substitute in the South, but I don't have much desire to try it, and I wonder if it even has caffeine..."), but, apparently, yeah. Endives are a member of the chicory genus.

So, yeah, lets say that Invertatoes are a sort of fantasy plant similar to the various members of the chicory genus. The trunk can be replicated with chicory root, and the leaves with endives.

That leaves Dried Slime. Dried Slime makes up the noodles in the hot pot, which implies that the noodles are gelatinous, and probably low in gluten. Senshi's explanation of the slime makes me want to think of it as a macro-unicellular lifeform, but... I'm not sure that's accurate.

While it's definitely not an accurate way to describe a jellyfish, I could definitely see a non-biologist describing jellyfish in a way similar to the way Senshi describes the slime. I could also see some fantasy terrestrial jellyfish thing hunting in a similar manner to the slime. Moreover, there are edible varieties of jellyfish, and they're processed in a manner very similar to what Senshi describes for processing slimes. And one way of preparing edible jellyfish is to thinly slice it into noodles.

Hot Pots

I... think this is using a very specifically Japanese sense of "hot pot" (which makes sense), because in Japan, hot pot can refer to a dish called nabemono, while in general, hot pot refers to a particular kind of dining in China where you get a pot full of boiling stock/broth and a bunch of raw ingredients, and you put the stuff you want into the broth at the table. Nabemono is more of "put a bunch of stuff in a pot, and cook it. Serve it boiling." Which is to say, it's soup.

Senshi puts the scorpion meat and mushroom into a pot on its own, and lets it start boiling-

Then, while it's boiling, he goes and finds other ingredients, coming back with the invertatoes and the slime. The two are prepared simply-

Seasoning isn't included in the ingredients, but I can understand this as a choice for presentation. We do see Senshi add something to the broth after tasting it, and I think it's fair to assume it's one of soy sauce, mirin, fish sauce, or similar. I think it's actually really interesting that we see Senshi add seasoning, but we're not told what it is-

Because... that's cooking. You can follow a recipe, but ultimately, you need to taste your cooking and make your own decisions. Senshi lets the soup cook, tastes the broth, decides it needs something, and gives it a bit of time to let the flavors meld before serving it up.

Dungeon Meshi Lobster and Mushroom Hot Pot

So, we're looking at something like this for the "Huge Scorpion and Walking Mushroom Hot Pot"--

Add lobster and mushrooms to water, and allow to boil. While it comes to a boil, prepare the other ingredients, then add to the water. Let the soup come to a full boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes to an hour (can simmer longer, but this will affect the texture of the ingredients. Longer simmering will result in more melding of flavors, but also degraded solid parts).

Taste the broth. It will likely need salt and acid, which could come in a variety of forms, such as kosher salt and lemon juice, soy sauce and mirin/rice vinegar, oyster/fish sauce, or something else. Go with your gut and your taste buds..

If this gets 25 more notes (after my bumping) I'll do another.

I brought this unused Loki concept to life!!

I’d been eyeing this stunning design by @aleksibriclot for years, and a little while ago (after two years of working on it) I finally finished it! It has all the dark norse fantasy vibes that I wanted Ragnarok to be, and I figured hey, I can make it myself!

I had to up a lot of my leatherworking skills for this one, and I dove into a lot of new skills as well to try to make all the pieces a cohesive whole. It uses lambskin leather, suede cowhide, and veg tan, as well as an entire sheepskin for the cape!

This whole costume has truly been a labour of Loki love and I’m so glad I was able to share all the madness (process) and the finished look!

wip tag | more of this costume

Witches in rural Discworld do everything. They're de facto country doctors, midwives, morticians, veterinarians, small claims court judges, food pantries, emergency services, just whatever. And 90% of it isn't even magic (though they can do incredible things), it's working hard and helping people and being respectable and a good person and making everyone a little bit afraid of you.

(Meanwhile all those venerable wizards up at Unseen University are like, accidentally opening portals to faraway lands or creating new gods or becoming obsessed with Music With Rocks In and basically being chaotic and useless, I'm just saying)

Witches are what happen when people recognize the importance and utility of People Who Know Things.

Wizards are what happens when society recognises that some people Know Things, but don't care enough about other people to be more useful than dangerous.

Fantasy culture that abhors magic but is built on the services of witches. If an outsider brings this up, they just look puzzled and say "but she's a witch, not a Magic User" because 1- most people don't actually see witches doing magic, so they may genuinely not be aware that witches can, and 2- there's a genuine cultural distinction between Magic User (person who throws around fireballs and summons demons for coke orgies) and Witch (person who knows a lot of stuff and can get shit done, but they're generally benevolent, so we make sure to not give them a reason to be malevolent instead)

Person who lives in that society who is actually a wizard who can literally light your ass up from a mile away, but gets the program and so very carefully asserts that "no, I am not a wizard, I am a Witch. Understand?"

Another worldbuilding application of the "two layer rule": To create a culture while avoiding The Planet Of Hats (the thing where a people only have one thing going for them, like "everyone wears a silly hat"): You only need two hats.

Try picking two random flat culture ideas and combine them, see how they interact. Let's say taking the Proud Warrior Race - people who are all about glory in battle and feats of strength, whose songs and ballads are about heroes in battle and whose education consists of combat and military tactics. Throw in another element: Living in diaspora. Suddenly you've got a whole more interesting dynamic going on - how did a people like this end up cast out of their old native land? How do they feel about it? How do they make a living now - as guards, mercenaries? How do their non-combatants live? Were they always warrior people, or did they become fighters out of necessity to fend for themselves in the lands of strangers? How do the peoples of these lands regard them?

Like I'm not shitting, it's literally that easy. You can avoid writing an one-dimensional culture just by adding another equally flat element, and the third dimension appears on its own just like that. And while one of the features can be location/climate, you can also combine two of those with each other.

Let's take a pretty standard Fantasy Race Biome: The forest people. Their job is the forest. They live there, hunt there, forage there, they have an obnoxious amount of sayings that somehow refer to trees, woods, or forests. Very high chance of being elves. And then a second common stock Fantasy Biome People: The Grim Cold North. Everything is bleak and grim up there. People are hardy and harsh, "frostbite because the climate hates you" and "stabbed because your neighbour hates you" are the most common causes of death. People are either completely humourless or have a horrifyingly dark, morbid sense of humour. They might find it funny that you genuinely can't tell which one.

Now combine them: Grim Cold Bleak Forest People. The summer lasts about 15 minutes and these people know every single type of berry, mushroom and herb that's edible in any fathomable way. You're not sure if they're joking about occasionally resorting to eating tree bark to survive the long dark winter. Not a warrior people, but very skilled in disappearing into the forest and picking off would-be invaders one by one. Once they fuck off into the woods you won't find them unless they want to be found.

You know, Finland.

#every so often#fantasy authors just spontaneously reinvent finland#like how nature has to periodically make a crab

peer-reviewed tags via angryonabus

"Proud Warrior Race"+"Living in Diaspora"

That's just the githyanki (if they weren't written by cowardly white people who don't know the opportunity they have)

Also mandalorians.

And how I often portray orcs.

... Ok, I'm starting to realize that I am just especially drawn to this particular trope combo.

You get back here and say it proudly

When the law tries to go after the CN druid