It would be very cool if the game had a photography route where you could buy different camera bodies (higher resolution, black and white, lens limitations, number of pictures you can take are basically bullets) and lenses (longer range, better aperture, lens quality most of this is already factored into scopes) to upgrade and perhaps sell photos (more points for golden hour, perfect poses, how close of a shot, the landscape behind, perhaps notable locations on the map like waterfalls or mountain peaks, etc) you take to magazines (requests for specific pictures, deer mid call, fox drinking, birds mid flight) or quests for the folks at other cabins, even spots to hang them on the walls in the game. Perhaps making it so you have to choose between leaving with the camera or a gun, so you can’t go out and take a photo of the animal before you kill it (so you don’t earn double the money). It would be a very interesting way to play, calling in animals to get the perfect landscape behind them or perfect pose. It just seems like the structure is already there in game it could just be tweaked to make it more robust.

Havenbrook awoke to an atmosphere tinged with fear and uncertainty. The disappearance of a local farmer’s son, Ethan, sent shockwaves through the tight-knit community. The town rallied together, desperate to uncover the truth behind these mounting tragedies.
Tom Johnson, the skeptical mechanic, found himself drawn into the mystery that had gripped Havenbrook. Ethan’s father, John, sought his help in deciphering the cryptic clues left behind. Together, they poured over Ethan’s belongings, searching for any semblance of an explanation.
Amidst the belongings, they discovered a worn journal filled with the farmer’s meticulous scrawls. The entries detailed strange encounters with individuals who exhibited an uncanny resemblance to their loved ones. They spoke of an invisible force that seemed to control the town, manipulating the minds of its inhabitants.
Tom’s skepticism began to crumble as he and John delved deeper into Ethan’s findings. It became evident that Havenbrook was not merely plagued by unexplainable phenomena—it was under the grip of an alien presence.
As night fell, Tom led John to a hidden spot deep within the woods—a location discovered through Ethan’s journal. The earth beneath their feet felt charged with a peculiar energy, as if the very ground harbored secrets waiting to be unveiled.
With trembling hands, Tom removed a layer of brush and exposed an entrance to a hidden underground lair—a place of unimaginable horror. The walls were lined with rows of transparent pods, each containing a slumbering figure. It was a chilling sight—a grotesque display of human-like creatures nestled in their cocoon-like enclosures.
The truth crashed down upon them like a tidal wave. Havenbrook had become a harvesting ground, its citizens unwittingly providing sustenance for these alien beings. Tom’s skepticism transformed into righteous fury as he swore to protect his town and save those who remained.
Word spread through Havenbrook, and a sense of urgency filled the air. The townspeople, once skeptical like Tom, began to question the nature of their friends and neighbors. The threat was no longer confined to the shadows—it was hiding within the very fabric of their community.
Sarah, armed with the revelations from the mysterious shack, joined forces with Tom. Together, they exposed the alien presence to those who would listen. But paranoia spread like wildfire, eroding trust among the townspeople. Accusations flew, and lines were drawn between those who believed and those who clung desperately to denial.
As the Harvest Moon loomed on the horizon, casting an ominous glow upon Havenbrook, the fate of the town hung in the balance. The remaining citizens, torn between fear and determination, braced themselves for the impending battle against their hidden adversaries.
​
https://arctictavern.com/harvest-moon-chapter-3-the-harvest-begins/

Stanford released a remarkable new second order optimizer known as Sophia which uses estimator and utilises clipping mechanism.

According to the paper, It is 100K steps more efficient and takes significantly less wall-clock time to compute.

The paper is amazing and a milestone at least according to me. They did not provide any code but provided pseudocode and Algorithm to program the optimizer. I find it helpful programming or either understanding the code rather than just reading the literature itself even its pseudocode. Which is why, I took the time to write a function that utilises the Optimizer.
If you're interested what hyper params they used it's very much clear in their paper and they also mentioned to get the hyper-params for sophia using a grid search and based on AdamW and Lion's param choices.
It is very fast project so I was only able to write the code in very basic way no pytorch or jax whatsoever. I am optimistic to add a training script and few nifty features. That's not until a few weeks.
I personally think reading the code and learning Sophia will be very helpful and for many it can provide a new research direction (maybe for your thesis as well). I have adding the github link to my code.
Contribution:
Roma wasn't built by itself. If you think you have something to offer feel free to contribute to the repository. It'll help others to learn. And you as well. And if you have found my work interesting or helpful consider giving a star, it helps the repository being visible to many people and kinda motivates me to consider providing updates and cool stuff with a project.
Otherwise, here's the GitHub code and Paper Link
GitHub code: https://github.com/sleepingcat4/Sophia
Paper Link: https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.14342

Tokyo - Yokohama - Nagoya - Kyoto - Osaka - Tokyo

Hi all, going to go through our trip covering golden week and time around it (: It was myself (F21) and my partner (M24) and the reasoning behind the timing was mainly due to bank holidays in the UK being unfortunately placed perfectly in line with golden week this year! Despite this, I feel we actually got pretty lucky with it all. I'll put an emoji to note which days were for golden week but for the tl;dr we weren't affected that much.
Other important contexts, both interested in Japan for a few different reasons. Anime isn't a small one but I'm also a huge fan of the Yakuza games, he's into the JDM car scene, and we just enjoy travelling in general. We didn't do many things like Universal, Disneysea etc. but hopefully there's some things in here that people will enjoy hearing about! I'll go through some tips/recommendations for the casual readers first before going into the trip in depth - please let me know if there's anything else you want to know about!

Tips + Recommendations

Yamato Takkyubin Luggage Forwarding If like us you are going to be staying in quite a few different places, this service is so so so good I cannot overstate it. We had two big suitcases and one smaller one, we sent just the big ones for two of the trips and then for the final trip from Osaka to Tokyo we sent all 3 and just used our backpacks to bring essentials for the night.Pretty much all hotels will allow you to use the service, some may request you pay them with cash for the actual service but for all but one of ours we could use card. We sent Yokohama -> Kyoto, then Kyoto -> Osaka, then finally Osaka -> Tokyo. There are options for same day delivery I believe however we did both the next day and for a few days later. Feel free to ask any questions in the comments and I'll answer if I can!
Trip Planning I've been fortunate to be able to travel a lot so wasn't nervous about the actual travel, however Japan is such a far away country that I didn't want to go and get there then not know what to do and waste my time. In the past holidays with family were more about relaxing on a beach, or with my partner our city breaks are short as they are other European countries and so easier to return to if we wanted. I wanted to take a different approach to this trip so I made a big Google Sheet and Google Map with all the places I wanted to visit/see. It was never meant to be a strict itinerary as some people I showed seemed to assume 😅 But it really helped me to visually see where things I wanted to go to were, and then make a rough plan in case I did get stuck at some point.Anyway it was a really good idea in hindsight and I'm very glad we did it for this trip as our first time going! Here's a picture of the map looks like, we didn't necessarily do everything but we did most things - https://i.imgur.com/2xLyy7Y.png. I used mymaps.google.com, to be honest there's definitely betteeasier to use tools out there but I got this to work for me so I stuck with it.
Walking People aren't kidding about the amount of walking, although I think our top amount was still under 30k so don't worry too much. That said, if you don't walk a lot anyway then your feet are going to hurt. My partner was fine, I was awful. I thought my shoes would be fine and apparently they weren't so if you can pack walking boots please do. The other thing is I think the way you walk affects it too, my partner and I both had multiple pairs of shoes with us but where his converse boots were fine, the soles of my feet were awful in the same types of shoes 😭
Driving I am not a driver but my partner is. He has a full manual UK driving license and insurance, and so for Japan all he needed was to get the International Driver's Permit a little before we went. We rented a car for three different occasions, two times from the same place then the final was for a JDM rental. All was fine, the JDM place was confused for a moment as my partner has a Polish passport + UK license but we translated Poland for him and after that there were no issues! You'll need to check what you need depending on where you're from, it's easier for us due to the same driving side although when we rented for Daikoku and the Nagoya drive they did give us an automatic so just be aware of that if you want to request/drive manual. The rental places we used were Orix rent-a-car for the Daikoku and Yokohama -> Nagoya trip and we had a Mazda 2. For the JDM rental we used Omoshiro.

Trip Report

Tokyo

25/04 - Airport, Shinjuku hotel, Shinjuku We followed a similar first day that I'm sure many of these reports will begin with - arrived at the airport, we had filled out the VJW forms and had both QR codes ready to go. Immigration had about an hour wait so longer than normal but we were also near the back of our plane and there was at least another full plane in front of us. Actually going through immigration was a complete breeze. Once through and picked up our luggage, we got a Welcome Suica, then headed to Shinjuku. We reached our hotel about 4 hours early for check-in, wasn't sure what to do for that time but they were happy to take our bags until we could go to the room (something that is consistent with all the hotels we went to thankfully). Jetlag was pretty bad, I was flagging by afternoon but we pushed through it and took the few hours to just walk around and see the sights. We spent some time in Hakone-yama before heading back to the hotel and getting cleaned up/accidentally falling asleep too early.
26/04 - Akihabara, Golden Gai Of course woke too early by not being as proactive as we should've with warding off jetlag but used that to leave early for Akihabara. After getting some breakfast we saw the Yodobashi Camera and went in there for about an hour just looking at all the floors 😅 It was raining a ton but it surprised us with how warm it still was and quickly realised why people prefer umbrella with no raincoat!! Spent pretty much the whole day in Akihabara, went round a ton of shops and also went into our first of many many arcades we'd go to. We went back to the hotel to return the items we'd bought then walked to Golden Gai as our hotel was about a 15-20 minute walk ^^ Had some delicious ramen, unfortunately didn't drink as my partner was finishing antibiotics for the first few days but it was still great to be there. Slept a lot later which was good.
27/04 - Kabukicho, Shinjuku National Garden This was more a day for me to fufill my Yakuza game sightseeing. Being so close to Kabukicho I was so excited to visit a city and be able to make my way round without a map loool. It was just the end of the blue festival so the iconic arch was still blue although I did get to see it red at the end of the trip so I wasn't too bothered about that. We went around Kabukicho, the square, again spent tons of time in the arcades and discovered how much we enjoyed the MaiMaiDX machines. Ended up getting one of the passports that save your progress and give you an extra play so if you like arcades then I recommend them!! After this and some lunch, we were going to do a walk to the national garden then realised I went the wrong way so we took the train. As a side note here, the Suica and train system is so useful. Very similar to using a card for the underground except it's actually clean. Walked around the national garden, it was very sunny and warm. Didn't know it had it before going but there's a starbucks in the middle of the garden and we managed to join the queue about 10 minutes before they stopped taking new orders. Had a nice time watching the sun set in that garden before heading back to the hotel.
28/04 - Teamlabs Planets Wasn't something I was going to initially go to however I checked out tickets the day previously and saw some for this day and decided we could do it as we had a ton of free time. I had chosen 2:30pm for an entrance time however it was such a nice day so we left early and spent time just walking around the docks. It was so so sunny, the area didn't have loads going on however it was still very pretty. We spent time in the parks and walking alongside the water. Teamlabs was pretty cool, I did enjoy the water based sections although dodging both influencer and family photos might detract from your experience. This was also where I realised I'd already become the stereotype tourist and was sunburnt :') I guess I had to learn my lesson physically and I did thankfully stop any further burning after this with diligent sun cream appliance afterwards pretty much every day. After this we went back to Shinjuku and after food we packed up ready to go to Yokohama.

Yokohama

29/04 - Bashamichi, Daikoku, Cosmo Clock ✨Showa Day Left our hotel at 11 and hadn't yet discovered the wonders of luggage forwarding so we brought all our bags with us on the train to Yokohama! Not too bad though, we got to our hotel a little early but they took our bags as we went and had lunch before the room was ready. Went around Bashamichi (another game location lol) before taking the train to central Yokohama. We had pre-booked the rental cars all before we left to ensure availability but there weren't any problems. This was also my partner's birthday which is something the rental staff realised whilst we were sorting out all the documents 😆. For Daikoku, we didn't need to pass through any ETC gates from Yokohama but it was the first time on the Japanese roads. It was a little nerve-wracking at first as there's very slightly different rules to UK roads but in general driving is fine. We reached Daikoku PA around 20 past 6pm, and it was about 2 hours until police moved everyone along. My partner was in dreamland with the cars that we saw, if you're into the JDM scene at all or just a petrolhead then you'll love it but it is a bit of luck with what you'll see. After we left Daikoku, we went back to our hotel. We'd checked in with them previously that we could keep the car with them as the hotel we had chosen had parking available for an additional cost. We left the car at the hotel then went out for drinks and to see the cosmo clock. Didn't ride it but it was very cool seeing it all lit up over Yokohama. We bar hopped a bit, then went back.
30/04 - Recovery... Not much to say about this day, my partner was fairly hungover so we returned the car to the rental place and then spent the day just chilling at our ryokan hotel and around Yokohama. No drinks this time round as we had a very long trip the next day!!

Nagoya (Road Trip from Yokohama)

01/05 - Expressways, Onshi-Hakone Park, Expressways, Shinshiro, Expressways, Nagoya I'll condense this one a bit otherwise I'll type forever but this was a really fun time. The driving totaled almost 6 hours by the end so it's not for the faint hearted haha. The point was that we'd stop a few times along the way though which is what we did end up doing. We sent our luggage with the forwarding service (to the hotel after Nagoya as we were just staying the one night), then had an early start as we went to the car rental for 8. We chose the same place we rented from for Daikoku and had the same sales rep sorting out any documents so it was a bit quicker although this time we did get a quick explaination on the toll gates. Anyone going on the expressways will need to know how to use them, we were a bit confused the first time but once you've done it a couple times it'll be smooth sailing (and it's such a good system for people with the automatic cards too). We left Yokohama and set our location for Nagoya. We went for about 2 hours before stopping in Odawara for a quick snack and pee break. Pretty overcast day but despite this we still decided to do a stop in a park on the way and went to Onshi-Hakone Park. It was very cool/bit scary going up the winding mountain passes but wow the views are incredible. We spent again probably a couple hours at the park, had some lunch, no view of Fuji but we could see a lot of the other mountains around which are breathtaking in their own rights (: It's right on Lake Ashi so we did get to see the pirate cruise going round. After this break we did another couple hours or so driving before stopping slightly outside of Shinshiro. Something I will say about the expressways is that it is insane how fast people go 😂 We're not about to try anything so it was sticking to the 120 on the signs for us but people just whizz by. Anyway, we stopped at a familymart in this village for a quick break and I know I've said it already but the views are so beautiful. It's green in the UK but it's something else, I kept wondering if it's just viewing through rose tinted glasses/greener on the other side but I don't think that's true at least about those countryside views. It was also one of the reasons we wanted to do the road trip instead of train at least this time round, we could stop in these places and take it in. After our stop there, it was back onto the expressway until we reached Nagoya. It was roughly 6pm when we reached Nagoya, we had intially booked the car for the whole day with return the next morning but they allow early return with Orix so we did that instead before finding our hotel and having some dinner. Not too much time in Nagoya but it was the first time seeing the bullet train which was cool. Nagoya itself has some nice sights, we were thinking about going to Liberty Walk the next day but instead we just decided we'd head to Kyoto once we left the hotel.

Kyoto

02/05 - Shinkansen, Kyoto, Nishiki Market It was a really lovely day and we were taking the shinkansen for the first time. The shinkansen from Nagoya is only 34 minutes but we did end up buying reserved seats as the station was pretty packed. This is probably the main thing we noticed with Golden week, everything else was busy but not insanely so. Nagoya station was a lot busier but otherwise fine. We didn't have JR passes as when I used the online calculator it didn't come out to be worth it for our particular travel so it was full fare for us. The shinkansen itself was good, we would be using it again for Osaka back to Tokyo but due to Nagoya being closer to Kyoto I didn't reeeally think I'd need to book early. It's probably a good idea still lol but it worked out fine for us to book same day despite how busy Nagoya was. Once in Kyoto we took our time walking down to our next hotel. This was another ryokan style so that was nice, we also passed a garden which we noted to go to the next day (Shosei-en Garden). Our luggage had arrived and was waiting for us at the hotel already so we got refreshed then went out for the evening. We went up to Nishiki market then walked back towards our hotel again. Had a sushi train small dinner as we hadn't had any sushi yet and I've also only had a train once before. It might not be the best Kyoto had to offer but wow was it still better than anything I'd had in the UK!! We then spent hours once again in an arcade, if you like games the MaiMaiDX machines really are addictive :')
03/05 - Shosei-en Garden, Higashi Hongan-ji, Tō-ji Temple, Nijō Castle✨Constitution Memorial Day We woke up early, had breakfast at the ryokan, then went straight for the garden. It was a beautiful day once again so plenty of suncream applied. The Shosei-en Garden isn't the biggest but it's so beautiful, they have this pond that looks so still but my partner spotted a turtle and then you start to see more and more. They have some historical buildings around the place, we spent about an hour there before going to the next place. We walked down the road to the next place, this was Higashi Honhan-ji temple. Both locations weren't really that busy to be honest. Seeing this temple was nice but personally I did prefer the gardens. We next went Tō-ji temple. This is one of those locations that are on the 'must-do in Kyoto' but I did like it a lot. The 5 story pagoda was a cool sight. It wasn't so busy although we were going around lunch time so hungry crowds were likely taking a small break (: We spent an unreasonable amount of time just looking at the koi fish in the moat not even in the temple area 🎏 Finally we went to Nijō Castle. This was quite busy although we were one of the latter groups going around as it was nearing the end of the day. Another of the listed must do's but again I would say it's a cool place to see. If you do go, the tour around the main house is interesting and if you decide to climb the walls there's some nice sights of the area around. We finished up this day heading back to the market area and had dinner including a matcha beer. I'm not really a massive matcha person but I was up for trying all the different things, the beer sort of just tasted of normal beer but it looked exactly like a matcha-green coloured guinness.
04/05 - Arishiyama ✨Greenery Day This wasn't really a packed day as we were heading to an airbnb for a couple of nights. We used the luggage forwarding from the ryokan where they were concerned that we wouldn't get our luggage as soon as we wanted due to Golden week. I then let them know we were looking to get it sent for the 6th and they completely relaxed and said that would be perfectly fine 👌 For context if you've not been to Kyoto, the train system is alright but pales compared to Tokyo. Getting to our airbnb wouldn't be too long, about an hour, but as we didn't really have anything planned and only had our small suitcase with us we decided to walk to the next airbnb instead and waste time along the way. This way when we arrived it wouldn't be before check in time and it would keep us out and about. The walk was about 3 hours total although we lengthed it by stopping a few times. There were some celebrations happening due to Greenery day and Children's day being the next day. We stopped to listen to some music, stopped to have a starbucks, then finally we reached out airbnb in Arishiyama. The place was really nice, and it was fun to have a whole place for a few nights instead of a hotel. If you're wanting to, looking at airbnb's is a completely valid option when staying in Japan - you just might get warned before you arrive not to talk or laugh too loudly or the neighbours might complain/call the police 😅
05/05 - Fushimi Inari Shrine ✨Children's Day Initially were going to do both the bamboo/monkey forest and Fushimi Inari but ended up leaving a little later than planned so just committed to only Fushimi Inari. I was expecting fairly large crowds considering the day and the station was..... not great. That said, the station was very small and so although it was crowded we were also out of there fairly quick. This review of Fushimi Inari is going to follow almost everyone's - it was busy at the bottom and as you go up you'll get a lot less people. Even it being Children's day didn't stop us getting moments of just myself and my partner being alone so don't be deterred if the bottom is busy! Beautiful views, we did the full routes going to the top. It was a bit tricky at times but it's not a race, and you'll feel good doing the full thing. We reached the top, were able to partake in the prayers there, then had a great time going back down. There was a little area near the end with a bunch of cats; we turned a corner and saw one and a bunch of people crowding round to take a photo. Maybe only a few steps later you realise there's about 4 more just chilling around the place. It was a cool experience and definitely worth doing at least once if you're there.

Osaka

06/05 - Local train, Dotenbori, Den-Den Town We took a train from our airbnb to Osaka and went via the local train rather than the shinkansen. It was fine, we reached Dotenbori and our hotel was not far from the station. We got there a bit early again but our room was already available and our luggage had arrived too (: After getting refreshed we went out for the afternoon to Den-Den Town. This is Osaka's version of Akihabara, and we spent a lot of time with my partner looking in all the card shops. It was pretty rainy but not really a problem between the Lawson's umbrella and ducking into lots of shops ;) We spent time in an arcade for a while before heading out to Dotenbori market area and the bridges for the evening/night. Yet again another location in the Yakuza games so I had fun pointing out different places like the Mega Don Quijote or the crab restaurant. We had some food and ended up in a drinking place that used a QR code and website for ordering to the table which was dangerously easy to use haha. Had some really tasty sushi there too, I'll try and find the name if anyone is wondering! Took tons of photos there, the rain at night gave the city that classic look reflecting the neon lights everywhere.
07/05 - Kobe day trip We went to Kobe for the day, lots of rain but the main market area is all under cover so that was handy. My partner was looking for a new phone which he found, we also went to one of those places where they grill the food in front of you for dinner. It was great going in a scruffy elevator up to the restaurant and stepping out onto a really beautifully designed restaurant, and it wasn't very busy so we were able to go without reserving beforehand. Kobe itself is cool although we didn't explore too much outside the market areas due to just how hard it was raining, I think it was the heaviest on this day unfortunately.
08/05 - Nara day trip, Todai-ji We went to Nara and although the advice is to go early, we went for more mid-day time. It wasn't crowded at all so that was fortunate. We ended up walking past that famous mochi stall that you see on all the tiktoks of Nara. I wasn't expecting to see the making of the mochi and wasn't going to wait for it either however they started about 2 minutes after we found the stall so we did stay and watch and it was cool to see in person (: We tried the mochi, it's pretty good although for me it was a bit too dry from the powder. Was still tasty!!! Walked through towards the deer park and saw the pagodas around. When we reached the deer park of course we had to get some crackers and feed them. Oh my god they're so pushy!! It was actually so funny to interact with them, one tried to nibble me and we got headbutted a bit when we had the crackers but once you've given them all out then they'll leave you 😆. We sat on a bench for a bit and watched some other poor souls go through the same thing. Saw quite a lot of young fawns too which is cute. We kept walking up to Todai-ji, stopped for an ice cream, then went to the temple to see the huge Buddha statue. It was a good experience to see this temple, but at least for me it wasn't my favourite part of the trip. I know for many others though it's really great to see so don't knock it off your list if you're interested in it! I'm glad I went once but probably won't return. Spent some more time just chilling around Nara and looking at the temples and shrines around the place. We went back to Osaka for around 4pm. Spent the evening in Osaka again, no rain this time! Oh this was about the time I was developing a sore throat, a little bit nerve wracking but fully vaccinated + boosters and have had covid previously so was fairly certain it wasn't that. Even so, my partner was coughing a bit which is the start of the cold we both had for the rest of the trip 😔
09/05 - Osaka Aquarium, Dotenbori I didn't put the aquarium on my plan initially but we had another spare day in Osaka and I do like visiting aquariums + my partner likes penguins a lot and they had a lot there. It was a cool experience, a lot of families as to be expected but it wasn't packed so lots of opportunities to see the animals and fish :) The two whales were very cool, they're so massive. We also got to see their rockhopper penguin conservation area, you could see them sitting on their eggs. I recommend the aquarium to any families planning to be in Osaka, it's pretty easy to get to and the station gives clear directions on where to go to get to the aquarium and the nearby lego park. After the aquarium we went back to Dotenbori and looked around the various book-offs as my partner was looking for screen protectors. If you're interested in any Japanese media I can recommend them too, I found some games in there that were a lot cheaper than you find in the West in much better condition. Our coughs worsened by evening which wasn't great, we weren't doing much more in super crowded areas but it's obviously not good anyway. We were wearing masks everywhere beforehand but it made it more important. We did end up getting some Bron, if you're in Japan and have a cough then I do recommend it but just be aware that it contains codeine. We got some from a place that specifically had a pharmacy section, you bring the box to the cashier and they'll give you the actual bottle from behind the counter. Really really great stuff, much better than anything you can get without a prescription in the UK which was annoying as my cough was subsequently worse for about 5 days once I got back!! It's pretty much gone now though (lasted longer likely due to asthma but it was gone for my partner after a couple days of being back). Overall I really enjoyed Osaka, all the cities we went to were cool but for me Osaka was my favourite :)

Tokyo

10/05 - Shinkansen, Airbnb We left Osaka for Tokyo and took the Shinkansen back. We did splash out a bit and took the green car with seats on the Fuji side. I fell asleep for most of the trip but woke in time to see Fuji for the roughly 6-7 minutes it was viewable for. It was my only time to see Fuji due to the weather being almost clear that day aside from a single cloud going right across the mountain. It didn't block the peak though so I don't feel too robbed 😆. If/when we visit Japan again I would like to see it again closer but it was still a great sight. Once we reached Shinagawa station, we switched to the local train to head to our airbnb in Shinjuku once again (although closer to Shibuya this time whereas we were more North before). We were staying in a pretty close knit residential area but did a bit of a hello to the neighbours which was nice. We had done the luggage forwarding again but had set it to come the next day so we would be the people available for receiving it. Spent the time around the airbnb and also tried having an uber eats delivered (which worked great lol).
11/05 - Shibuya, Shinjuku We spent most of this day around Shibuya as we wanted a few souvenirs for family and also hadn't visited Shibuya properly. Went to the crossing, then spent time mainly shopping and going around one of the Donkis. Pretty rainy again but not a problem for a shopping day.
12/05 - RX-7 Day Trip (Lake Hinuma, Ibaraki Flower Park), Kabukicho We used Omoshiro Rent-a-car for the RX-7 (for those interested, here's the car - https://i.imgur.com/HRX4DYy.png ) and they were great. We had it pre-booked again before we arrived in Japan as it's a pretty sought after car to rent. Bit banged up but nothing major, and we had it booked for I think 8 hours? We did return it a little early as we didn't really have anything else to do and didn't want to be late with a return as the shop closed at the time we'd be returning it. A funny part of the terms you agree to is no Initial D style driving. For the trip itself, we didn't have anything major planned so I made a makeshift plan to just go a bit out of Tokyo and visit somewhere different. I found this lake on maps that'd be not too far, didn't realise until we were there that it's less a lake for sights and more for fishing 😅. No worries though, as the main reason was to get some driving in and enjoy having the car (which was achieved!). Got some snacks from a 7/11 then went off. We had a lot of time left so we drove to Ibaraki flower park, yet another quick find from scrolling around Google Maps. It was a very beautiful park, they have a rose market there as well as selling some fresh produce. It's a small charge to go in the park but it's worth it for the hour or more you might spend there and will go towards the park maintenance. Also being the middle of Spring of course it's going to be beautiful with all the new blooms (: We spent time there admiring the countryside and being sad about going back home the next day. We went back to the rental place afterwards, also during this drive was the time where we were finding it so funny how we were sticking to the speed limits in this beautiful car and being overtaken by massive trucks going so much faster. We did have a moment that was like from a movie though, we entered the expressway after the tolls and as we were pulling in an older Honda NSX was being driven next to us. The guy driving looked over and gave us a nod with a straight face before pulling ahead a little so we could be behind him. We ruined that movie mood by both being so excited by how cool the moment was but hey it's one of those things that won't be forgotten at least!! He zoomed off a few minutes later but we weren't risking anything to keep pace ahaha. We returned the car then went back to Shinjuku for our final evening in Japan. We went back to Kabukicho and I was able to see the arch in red :') Took photos of the karaoke place that's in the games, would've gone in but my throat was killing!! So we just stuck to being outside. We went back to the area around our airbnb, had our last dinner there then went and packed up ready to go home.
13/05 - Home :') Our flight was leaving a little before 9am so we were leaving the airbnb for 5ish. Early start but as we'd gotten packed up it wasn't too bad of a walk to the station. Grabbed our train, it was fairly early on one of the lines that goes direct to the station so we were able to get on with ease. The train was rammed by the time we reached the station. No problems getting through the airport, got to our gate and then flew home.

Final Notes

I had such a good time in Japan, I loved being there and hope to return within the next few years if life permits!! We definitely missed some of those 'must-do's' such as Osaka Castle, any of the theme parks, Arishiyama Monkey Park, actually doing Karaoke, and some of the food options due to my own anxieties walking into places lol. That said, I don't regret the things we did end up doing and it just means I'll have to fit some of those into my next trip 😉. Although my partner would like to visit more Northern areas like Hokkaido or Sendai so we'll see!
We didn't have probably as much packed into each day as could've been but for me this was perfect and a great time for my first time. If you managed to read all this then thank you very much, and please let me know if you have any questions about the trip!! I'll be happy to answer. Thanks for reading!

~ 1. Introduction ~
Here is a detailed description of my wishlist for a Mario Kart 9 or 10/X (if Tour is considered the 9th installment) I don't expect everyone to like all my ideas. This is just a wishlist. I obviously would be happy with any Mario Kart Nintendo decides to put out but in a perfect world, this is what I would want for it to be the best Mario Kart imo. I hope you enjoy.
*= Thoughts, Personal opinions, New ideas for modes, mechanics, driver outfits, vehicles, items, options, etc

• with numbered annotation⁰= Explanations on certain features

🔒= Locked. Must be unlocked by in game requirements or DLC
~ 2. Mechanics ~
~ Single Player / Multiplayer 》1P》2P》3P》4P》
Grand Prix》Class Optimization》Driver(s) Select》Vehicle Parts》Circuits》Cup Select》 Class Optimization options: Engine: 50cc》100cc》150cc》Mirror》All¹》All Mirror¹》 Driver: Solo Dash》Double Dash》² Drift: Automatic》Manual》³ Items: Normal》No Items》 Camera: Normal》First Person》⁴
*¹ - All and All Mirror options are only available in Grand Prix. After a Circuit has been selected, It'll play each Cup in order of that specific Circuit.
*² - All race and battle modes will feature either a Solo Dash or the new Double Dash option similar to Mario Kart Double Dash for extra replayability and character combinations.
*³ - Even if not many people liked Automatic drifting, it was there for a reason for you to choose. Some liked it. Some didn't. It should be the player's choice.
*⁴ - Camera can also be changed freely during the race from the pause menu.
Time Trials》Driver(s) Select》Circuits》Cup Select》Course Select》 Race Solo》Race Against Ghost》View Ghost》Online Ghost》Upload Ghost Data》
• VS Race》Driver(s) Select》Vehicle Parts》Customized Race》Circuits》Cup Select》Course Select》 Customized Race options: Engine Class: 50cc》100cc》150cc》Mirror》 Driver: Solo Dash》Double Dash》 Drift: Automatic》Manual》 Teams: No Teams》Team Game》 Items: Normal》Frantic》No Items》No Items and Coins》Custom》 COM: Easy》Normal》Hard》Pro¹》 COM Vehicles (Solo)²: All Vehicles》Karts Only》Bikes Only》 COM Vehicles (Doubles)²: All Vehicles》ATVs Only》Buggys Only》 Courses: Choose》In Order》Random》 Race Count: 4》5³》8》12》16》32》64》All》 Laps: 1》2》3》4》5》⁴
*¹ - Added a Pro difficulty to make the CPU feel more of a challenge.
*² - Wanted to split the vehicle selections between Solo Dash and Double Dash drivers. Solo Dash drivers will now only select between Karts and Bikes and Double Dash drivers will only select between ATVs and new Buggy vehicles. *Buggys are essential similar to the designs of the Karts used in Mario Kart Double Dash. ATVs are now bigger in size to help fit the idea of 2 drivers on one vehicle.
*³ - The original Super Mario Kart had 5 courses per Cup so I brought that option back for custom races.
*⁴ - Wanted to make the option available for players. These courses will be excluded from Laps option and be set to default when selected: ⁿ⁶⁴ Wario Stadium, ⁿ⁶⁴ Rainbow Road, ᵍᶜⁿ Baby Park, ᵍᶜⁿ Wario Colosseum, ³ᵈˢ Wuhu Loop, ³ᵈˢ Maka Wuhu, ³ᵈˢ Rainbow Road, ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Mount Wario, and ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Big Blue.
Battle》Driver(s) Select》Vehicle Parts》Customized Battle》Course Select》 Customized Battle options: Driver: Solo Dash》Double Dash》 Drift: Automatic》Manual》 Teams: No Teams》Team Game》 Items: Normal》Frantic》Skilled》Custom》 Round Time: 1 Minute》2 Minutes》3 Minutes》4 Minutes》5 Minutes》 COM: Easy》Normal》Hard》Pro》 COM Vehicles (Solo Dash): All Vehicles》Karts Only》Bikes Only》 COM Vehicles (Double Dash): All Vehicles》ATVs Only》Buggys Only》 Courses: Choose》In Order》Random》 Round Count: 3 Rounds》5 Rounds》7 Rounds》¹
*¹ - I shortened the rounds. Anything past 7 rounds is too much imo but that's just me. Also being a little bias cuz I'm not a fan of battle mode.
~ Online Play 》1P》2P》
Worldwide: Grand Prix*》VS Race》Battle》
Regional: Grand Prix*》VS Race》Battle》
Friends》Create Room
Tournaments》Menu. Menu options: Create a Tournament: Icon》Name》Rules》Time Settings》Other》 *Rules options: Mode: 50cc》100cc》150cc》Mirror》Balloon》Classic Balloon¹》 Renegade Roundup》Bob-omb Blast》Shine Runners¹》Coin Runners》 Shine Thief》Thunder Cloud Tag¹》Random Battle》 Driver: Solo Dash》Double Dash》 Drift: Automatic》Manual》 Teams: No Teams》Team Game》 Items: Normal》No Items》No Items or Coins》Frantic》Skilled*²》Custom》 Round Time (Battle only): 1 Minute》2 Minutes》3 Minutes》4 Minutes》5 Minutes》 COM: No COM》Easy》Normal》Hard》Pro》 Vehicles (Solo Dash): All Vehicles》Karts Only》Bikes Only》 Vehicles (Double Dash): All Vehicles》ATVs Only》Buggys Only》 Camera: Normal》First Person》 Smart Steering: Smart Steering OK》No Smart Steering》 *Time Settings options: Frequency: Weekly》Daily》Fixed Period》 Start Day: Sunday》Monday》Tuesday》Wednesday》Thursday》Friday》Saturday》 Start Date: Dependent》 Start Time: Dependent》 End Day: Sunday》Monday》Tuesday》Wednesday》Thursday》Friday》Saturday》 End Date: Dependent》 End Time: Dependent》 Round Count: 4 Rounds》8 Rounds》16 Rounds》 Group Shuffling: Don't Shuffle》Every 4th Match》 *Other options: Player Rating: Any Rating》0-2999》3000-9999》10000-99999》 Public/Private: Open to Everyone》Code Required》
*¹ - Scroll down to Battle section for more info.
*² - Skilled Items for Battle mode only.
Search by Code Search by Type Active Tournaments

• • A Report button will finally be added to report cheaters/hackers/etc.
• • I'm thinking Solo Dash races will feature the usual 12 players (1st - 12th place) while Double Dash races features upto 16 players but 8 groups total (1st - 8th place).
• • Worldwide and Regional Grand Prix will be 2-12 racers (or 4-16 in doubles mode) in a 4-race Cup from any randomly displayed Cups. Cups are then selected based on player voting.
• • Create Room will now feature customized options such as Mode, Teams, Items, CPUs, and Vehicles similar to the Create a Tournament option.
• • For online, I'd also like for a better ranking system to prevent casual players from racing against competitive players and vice versa.

~ MKTV
My Replays. View saved replays from previous races or battles on and offline. * You can now save more than just 6 replays.
Online Replays*¹ View shared replays from others online
Spectate*²
*¹ - Should've already been added in the first place.
²* - View recent online races or battles replays. Earn coins by voting who'll be 1st. * Literally stole this idea from Smash.
~ Other Details

• • The race start intro and race finishes to retro courses will have a remake version of their original transitions along with a rearranged verison of their original theme from that respective retro course. Example for better understanding. * Mario Kart GP courses will have the current game's race start and finish transitions.
• • I somehow also want to incorporate a way that once the Retro Grand Prix is unlocked, the title screen will have remake versions of the original title screens from previous Mario Kart games similar to Mario Party Superstars. Example
• It would show different title screens at each start up similarly to how Mario Kart 8/Deluxe's title screens Example
  
• • Sometimes the CPU seems to make decisions that only seem to target the player regardless of placement. I want a smarter CPU for harder difficulties that won't just use an item just to use. If a CPU is holding a shell, they should use it logically or defend themselves with it logically.
• • I personally am fine with every other mechanic used in Mario Kart 8/Deluxe such as driving techniques used, amiibo settings, Stats, etc. Keep the same driving techniques even during Double Dash mode. I personally was not a fan of Mario Kart Double Dash's drift mechanic and would not want that function brought back.

~ 3. Characters and Vehicles ~
~ Characters
68 Total Drivers (including DLC) 32 Total Alternate Drivers. 100 Total Individual Characters.

• • Driver select screen, press R button to rotate between alternate drivers. Some drivers will have upto 9 different outfits to choose from.
• • I wanted the original 8 to be the starting roster.

~ Drivers
Mario》Metal Mario 🔒》Tanooki Mario 🔒》Fire Mario 🔒》Ice Mario 🔒》Dr. Mario 🔒》 - Mario (Classic) 🔒 - Mario (Builder) 🔒 - Mario (SNES) 🔒 - Mario (Sunshine) 🔒 - Mario (Tuxedo) 🔒 - Mario (N64)*🔒 - Metal Mario (Gold) 🔒
Luigi》Penguin Luigi 🔒》Fire Luigi 🔒》Gooigi*🔒》 - Luigi (Classic) 🔒 - Luigi (Golf) 🔒 - Luigi (Builder) 🔒
Peach》Pink Gold Peach 🔒》Cat Peach 🔒》Fire Peach*🔒》 - Peach (Wedding) 🔒
Yoshi - Light-blue Yoshi - Black Yoshi - Red Yoshi - Yellow Yoshi - White Yoshi - Purple Yoshi - Pink Yoshi - Orange Yoshi
Bowser》Dry Bowser 🔒》Meowser 🔒》 - Dry Bowser (Gold) 🔒
Donkey Kong Jr. - Donkey Kong Jr. (SNES) 🔒
Koopa Troopa》Koopa (Freerunning) 🔒》 - Red Koopa (Freerunning) - Blue Koopa (Freerunning) - Purple Koopa (Freerunning) - Gold Koopa (Freerunning) 🔒
Toad》Cat Toad 🔒》Captain Toad 🔒》 - Toad (Pit Crew) 🔒 - Toad (Builder) 🔒 - Toad (Astronaut) 🔒 - Toad (Blue)* - Toad (Yellow)* - Toad (Green)*
Donkey Kong 🔒
Wario 🔒 - Wario (Biker)*
Daisy 🔒
Birdo 🔒 - Birdo (Light Blue) - Birdo (Black) - Birdo (Red) - Birdo (Yellow) - Birdo (White) - Birdo (Purple) - Birdo (Green) - Birdo (Orange)
Baby Mario 🔒
Baby Luigi 🔒
Toadette 🔒》Peachette 🔒》 - Toadette (Explorer) 🔒 - Toadette (Builder) 🔒 - Toadette (Astronaut) 🔒
Paratroopa 🔒 - Green Paratroopa*
Diddy Kong 🔒
Bowser Jr. 🔒
Waluigi 🔒
Petey Piranha 🔒
King Boo 🔒 - King Boo (Luigi's Mansion)
Pac-Man 🔒
Ms. Pac-Man 🔒
Blinky 🔒》Pinky》Inky》Clyde*》
Dry Bones 🔒 - Dry Bones (Gold) 🔒
R.O.B. 🔒 - R.O.B. (Famicom)*
Shy Guy 🔒 - Light-blue Shy Guy - Black Shy Guy - Green Shy Guy - Yellow Shy Guy - White Shy Guy - Blue Shy Guy - Pink Shy Guy - Orange Shy Guy
Mametchi 🔒
Baby Peach 🔒
Baby Daisy 🔒
Rosalina 🔒
Funky Kong 🔒
Mii 🔒
Honey Queen 🔒
Wiggler 🔒
Lakitu 🔒
Don-chan 🔒
Baby Rosalina 🔒
Iggy 🔒》Roy》Lemmy》Larry》Wendy》Ludwig》Morton》
Link 🔒 - Link (Champion's Tunic)
Villager 🔒 - Villager (Female)
Isabelle 🔒 - Isabelle (Winter)*
Inkling Girl 🔒 - Inkling Girl (lime green) - Inkling Girl (magenta)
Inkling Boy 🔒 - Inkling Boy (purple) - Inkling Boy (teal)
Pauline 🔒
Hammer Bro 🔒》Boomerang Bro 🔒》Ice Bro 🔒》Fire Bro 🔒》
Monty Mole 🔒
Dixie Kong 🔒
Nabbit 🔒
King Bob-omb 🔒
Kamek 🔒
Chargin' Chuck 🔒
Poochy 🔒
~ Newcomers
Noki ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒 - Noki (Green) - Noki (Pink) - Noki (Yellow)
Pianta ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒 - Pianta (Pink) - Pianta (Yellow) - Pianta (Purple)
Professor E. Gadd ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
Toadsworth ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
Luma ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒 - Luma (Blue) - Luma (Pink) - Luma (Green) - Luma (Cyan) - Luma (Red) - Luma (Purple) - Luma (Black) - Luma (Orange)
~ DLC
Sonic the Hedgehog ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
Miles "Tails" Prower ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
King K. Rool ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒》Kaptain K. Rool*》
Krunch ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒 * Would be an excellent choice for a surprise DLC character to those familiar w/Diddy Kong Racing
Zelda ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒》Sheik*》
Kirby ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
King Dedede ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
Captain Falcon ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒
Samus ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒》Zero Suit*》
Geno ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ 🔒

• - there's plenty of room for more characters but I figured 100 was the perfect amount of characters, especially with the double dash feature with everyone potentially having a partner with no odd person out.

~ Vehicles
Available parts. The parts available are listed here in the order shown in the vehicle customization screen, with the following notation: ¹ = Changes color, depending on the character. ² = Changes color for the Koopalings. ³ = Changes color for Daisy, Baby Daisy, Rosalina, and Baby Rosalina. (DLC) = Part is only available as downloadable content.

• Personally, I would want a system that prevents everyone from choosing the best racer with the best vehicle parts. For example If Luigi is the best racer and his best vehicle is the standard kart with mushroom tires, and gold glider, obviously everyone will choose Toad and those exact parts to win races. I want everyone to choose their favorite racer and parts that make them comfortable to race in, and not just look at a list of the best racers and parts and just copy and paste that. I don't know how to fix this honestly but I'm sure someone could help with ideas to this to make everyone equal in a way on the track with their own individuality similar to what Mario Kart 7 did with their characters.

~ Karts (Solo Dash)
Standard Kart¹ 4-Wheel Cradle 8-Bit Pipe Frame¹ Apple Kart B Dasher Badwagon Barrel Train Biddybuggy (Buggybud)¹ Birthday Girl (Royal Ribbon)²/³ Blue Falcon Blue Seven Booster Seat (Baby Booster) Bruiser (Growlster) Brute Bull's-Eye Banzai Bulldog-W ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ Bumble V Cact-R Cact-X Cat Cruiser Cheep Charger Cheep Snorkel Circuit Special¹ Clanky Kart Classic Dragster (Nostalgia 1) Cloud 9 Crawly Kart Cucumber Dasher II Daytripper (Royal Racer) Dozer Dasher Dragonfly Dry Bomber Egg 1 Flame Flyer Gold Mantis Gold Pipe Frame Gold Standard (Gold Kart) Green Apple Kart Honeycoupe (Dragonetti) Hurricane Jet Cruiser Jetsetter (Aero Glider) Jumbo Jetter Kiddie Kart¹ Koopa Clown² Landship ² Light Dancer Light Tripper Mach 8 Mini Beast (Concerto) Mushmellow Offroader P-Wing Paintster Parade Kart Penguin Slider Pink Mushmellow Pipe Frame¹ Piranha Prowler Poltergust 4000 Power Flower Prancer Prop Kart Quickshaw ROB-BLS Rambi Rider Royale Shooting Star Sky Pop ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ Sneeker (Bounder)¹ Snow Skimmer Soda Jet Sports Coupe (Sports Coupé) Sprinter (B Dasher Mk. 2) Star Broom Steel Driver Streamliner Streetle Super 1 Super Blooper (Turbo Blooper) Surf Sailer Swift Talon Tanooki Kart Tea Coupe Tiny Titan (Rally Romper) Tiny Tug Tri-Speeder Wario Car Warship Wild Wing Wildlife Yellow Taxi Zucchini (Gherkin) Speed Star ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Whirlwind Sport ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Egg Mobile ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ * Was inspired by this image I found. Source Reminds me of the Egg Mobile with Monster tires White Cat ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Dark Schnieder ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Car¹ ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ * Source * the number in the center will be replaced by driver's logo Dragoon Kart ⁽ᵈˡᶜ * Source
~ Bikes (Solo Dash)
Standard Bike¹ Bit Bike (Nanobike) City Tripper¹ Flame Rider Hurricane Jet Bubble (Bubble Bike) Master Cycle Zero Mr. Scooty (Mr Scooty) Phantom Quacker ROB-LGS Shooting Star (Twinkle Star) Sugarscoot (Bon Bon)¹ The Duke Varmint Wario Bike Zip Zip (Rapide) Zipper Wheelie Bike ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source
Bullet Bike¹ Comet Dolphin Dasher Flame Runner (Bowser Bike)¹ Jet Bike Mach Bike¹ Magikruiser¹ Master Cycle Sneakster (Nitrocycle) Sport Bike¹ Yoshi Bike¹ Zinger Sting ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ * just an idea I had for a new bike based off of a beta imagine for Donkey Kong racing. Source * the number in the center will be replaced by driver's logo. Bike version of the Prop Kart
~ ATVs (Double Dash)
Standard ATV (Standard Quad)¹ Bone Rattler Inkstriker Spear (Torpedo)¹ Splat Buggy Teddy Buggy Tyrant Wild Wiggler Hovercraft¹ ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source
~ Buggys (Double Dash)
Standard Buggy ¹ Banisher Bolt Buggy Bullet Blaster Coach³ * Heart Coach/Bloom Coach from Mario Kart Double Dash DK Jumbo Fire Buggy¹ * Red Fire from Mario Kart Double Dash Goo-Goo Buggy¹ Koopa Dasher Koopa King Para-Wing Pipe Buggy¹ Piranha Pipes Turbo Birdo Turbo Yoshi Waluigi Racer
~ Tires
Standard (Normal) 8-Bit Standard Ancient Tires (Ancient Tyres) Azure Roller Bicycle Tires Blue Monster Blue Standard (Normal Blue) Button Capsule Crimson Slim Cushion Cyber Slick Drum Gold 8-Bit Standard Gold Tires (Gold Wheels) Heart Rings Hot Monster (Funky Monster) Iron Leaf Tires (Leaf Tyres) Metal Monster Mushroom Mushroom Off-Road Red Monster Retro Off-Road Roller Slick Slim Snorkel Tires Sponge Triforce Tires (Triforce Tyres) Wood (Wooden) Yoshi Tires
~ Gliders
Super Glider¹ 8-Bit Jumping Mario Beast Glider (Ghastly Glider) Bowser Kite Butterfly Sunset Cloud Glider Crimson Crane Droplet Glider Eggshell Glider Eggshell Glider Fare Flier Flower Glider Gold Glider Great Sail Hylian Kite MKTV Parafoil Oilpaper Umbrella Paper Glider Parachute Paraglider (Breath of the Wild) Paraglider (Parafoil) Peach Parasol³ Plane Glider Ribbon Swooper (Swoop) Waddle Wing Waluigi Wing Wario Wing Magic Carpet ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Wizpig Glider ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Example at 00:31 Tails Flier ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Knuckles Glider ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source Gunship ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source
~ 4. Items ~
× – Does not appear in Battle Mode.
~ Items found on the track
Item Box - Gives the player a random item. Items given are based on the player's distance from first place. * I would like for them to look either similar to how they looked in Mario Kart 64 or Mario Kart DS' design.
Coin - Gives the player a small boost and increase top speed when more are collected, up to a maximum of ten.
Rupee - The equivalent of a coin, used for Hyrule Circuit and Zelda related courses. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track.
Bell - The equivalent of a coin, used for Animal Crossing. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track.
Cash - The equivalent of a coin, used for Splatoon related courses. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track.
Balloon ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of an Item Box, used for Diddy Kong Racing related course. Source
Item Box (Capsule) ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of an Item Box, used for Sonic related course. Source
Star Block ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of an Item Box, used for Kirby related course. Source
Banana ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of a coin, used for Donkey Kong Country / Diddy Kong Racing related courses. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track. Source
Ring ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of a coin, used for Sonic related courses. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track. Source
Food ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - The equivalent of a coin, used for Kirby related courses. They replace coins in the item roulette and in the track. Source
~ New Items
Coin Block ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ - * floats above player for a short time (10 seconds). Hop to collect upto 10 coins. Can only be obtained if player has 0 coins. Replacing the Coin Box item from Mario Kart Tour. Example
~ Returning Items
Banana Peel - When a kart hits a Banana Peel, it spins out. You can carry one behind your kart to protect yourself from a single attack. Can be thrown backward and forward.
Green Shell - Travels in a straight line and knocks over a kart it hits.
Red Shell - Red Shell Homes in on the closest kart in front of the player and knocks it over.
Feather - Causes the player to spin and leap in the air, providing a small speed boost upon landing, akin to a regular trick (characters will also perform a trick animation during the jump).
Mushroom - Provides the player's kart with a small speed boost.
Super Star - Provides the player invincibility from all terrain and items, and also giving a speed boost.
Boo - Unleashes Boo, who turns the player invisible for a brief time, making them impervious to enemy attacks, and steals an opponent's item. Cannot steal Special Items.
Coinˣ - Grants the player two extra coins and a micro boost.
Lightningˣ - Causes all opponents to drop their items, shrink, and drive slowly for a short time.
Fake Item - Looks just like an item box, but when you run into it, it knocks you over.
Bob-omb - Explodes after a short time when thrown or dropped, knocking over any kart in its blast radius.
Blooper - Sprays ink on all racers ahead and reduces their visibility. The racers hit also lose some of their traction while sprayed.
Bullet Billˣ - Transforms the player into a Bullet Bill, rocketing through the track with auto-pilot, and providing invincibility from all terrain and items.
Spiny Shellˣ - Targets the racer in first place, knocking over all other karts in its path.
Super Horn - Emits a radial shockwave hitting racers, as well as destroying all obstacles, including the Spiny Shell.
~ Special Items
Fireball (Red) - Three fireballs will revolve around your kart. They split up after they're thrown and go sliding ahead. These powerful pyrotechnics can take out multiple opponents at once. Drivers: Mario, Fire Mario
Fireball (Green) - Three fireballs will revolve around your kart. They split up after they're thrown and go sliding ahead. These powerful pyrotechnics can take out multiple opponents at once. Drivers: Luigi, Fire Luigi
Fire Flower - Allows the player to throw fireballs for a short time that cause other karts to spin out on impact. Drivers: Metal Mario, Fire Peach, Fire Bro
Ice Flower - Three balls of ice will revolve around your kart. Throw them all at once and they'll freeze any kart they hit, causing them to slide. Drivers: Ice Bro, Ice Mario, Penguin Luigi
Heart - This protective Heart revolves around your kart for a set amount of time, shielding you from attacks. Any item that hits the player becomes theirs to use. A cute and handy item. Drivers: Peach, Daisy, Villager, Wendy, Mametchi
Yoshi's Egg - This egg rolls down the road and home in on opponents. When they hit and break, they'll drop three more items. Drivers: Yoshi
Birdo's Egg - Homes in on the kart in front of you and crashes once it hits. Three more items will fly out when it breaks. Drivers: Birdo
Chain Chomp - This fearsome beast chases karts with reckless abandon, pulling the player behind it at breakneck speeds. Drivers: Baby Mario, Baby Luigi
Triple Mushrooms - Orbits the player's kart, providing them with three separate speed boosts. Drivers: Toad, Toadette
Golden Mushroom - Provides the player's kart with continuous speed boosts for a short time. Drivers: Captain Toad
Mega Mushroom - The driver grows bigger, which allows them to squash other racers by running over them, making them lose their items and slow down for a moment. Drivers: Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Wiggler
Poison Mushroom - A stationary item. Looks like a regular mushroom but If one is run into, the victim shrinks, as if hit by a Lightning. Shrunken racers who run into it revert to normal size. Drivers: Kamek * ngl, i didn't really know who to give this item to
Mushroom Cannon - A cannon designed to resemble a Mushroom. Continually shoots out Mushrooms in front of your kart for a set time. Drivers: Monty Mole, Peachette, Toadsworth
Triple Green Shells - Three green shells that orbit the player's kart, protecting them from incoming attacks. Drivers: Koopa Troopa, Dry Bones, Lakitu, Koopa (Freerunning)
Triple Red Shells - Three red shells that orbit the player's kart, protecting them from incoming attacks. Drivers: Paratroopa, Dry Bones, Lakitu, Koopa (Freerunning)
Bowser's Shell - An awe-inspiring giant shell! As it careens down the road, slamming and ramming into karts, it's the very image of Bowser himself. Drivers: Bowser, Bowser Jr., Dry Bowser
Triple Bananas - Three bananas that orbit the player's kart, protecting them from incoming attacks. Drivers: Donkey Kong Jr., Dixie Kong
Giant Banana - Not only does this big banana spin out karts that hit it, but after being struck it breaks into three regular-sized Bananas. Drivers: Donkey Kong
Banana Barrels - Arm your kart with two fully-loaded barrels of Bananas! Continually shoots out Bananas in front of or behind your kart for a set time. Drivers: Diddy Kong, Funky Kong
Thunder Cloud - A thundercloud hovers over the recipient and strikes it with lightning after 10 seconds. The user shrinks to a very small size for 10 seconds, driving more slowly. Before this happens, the user has higher speed and acceleration while not losing speed when driving off-road, and may pass the cloud to an opponent by bumping into them. Drivers: Blinky, Pinky, Inky, Clyde * If there was absolutely no choice but to have the next Meta character, it'd be the Ghosts. Having one of the worst possible specials in the game should balance them out.
POW Block - The POW Block appears above the karts as a 2D image, warning players of its arrival, and causes any racer on the ground ahead of the user to spin out and drop their items. * Since wheelies are no longer a thing, it always spins out other racers unless they're in anti-gravity mode or during an in air trick Drivers: Mii, Don-chan
Super Leaf- Gives the player's kart a tail that can be used to deflect items, knock over opponents and collect coins. The tail will disappear after a moment or if the player is hurt. Drivers: Tanooki Mario
Lucky Seven - Surrounds the player with seven items that rotates around its kart. The player receives a Mushroom, Banana, Green Shell, Red Shell, Blooper, Bob-omb, and a Star. Drivers: King Boo, Pauline, Poochy, Nabbit, Chargin' Chuck, Pianta, Noki
Boomerang Flower - Can be thrown up to three times, hitting racers forward/backward and when it returns to its user after the first and second use. Driver: Boomerang Bro, Larry
Piranha Plant - Automatically chomps on obstacles and other racers, giving a short speed boost for each bite. Drivers: Petey Piranha
Double Bob-ombs - Two Bob-ombs will revolve around your kart. Throw them both at once. Drivers: Wario, Waluigi, Roy
Bob-omb Cannon - Continually shoots out Bob-ombs in front of your kart for a set time. Drivers: Shy Guy
Giga Bob-omb - After being thrown, it will explode after hitting a kart or bouncing 3 times. It has a larger blast radius than a standard Bob-omb. Drivers: King Bob-omb
Bubble - Briefly envelops your kart and protects you from damage for a set time. While in the bubble, you will get a speed boost and float in the air. Drivers: Baby Peach, Baby Daisy, Baby Rosalina, Lemmy
Dash Ring - Tosses out three rings in front of you along the track. Pass through them for a speed boost! Drivers: Rosalina, Luma, Ludwig, Honey Queen
Hammer - Throws multiple Hammers in an arc aimed at karts in front of yours. Drivers: Hammer Bro
Super Bell - A bell rings above the driver, knocking away nearby karts and items. The bell rings three consecutive times. Drivers: Cat Peach, Cat Toad
Capsule - Three colorful capsules surround your kart. They'll bounce at opponents when thrown. Drivers: Dr. Mario
Splat Bomb ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ - * Explodes after a short time when thrown or dropped, knocking and spraying ink on any kart in its blast radius and reduces their visibility. The racers hit also lose some of their traction while sprayed. Drivers: Inkling Girl, Inkling Boy
Magical Boomerang ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾ - * Works like a Boomerang Flower that tracks closes kart infront of player like a Red Shell Drivers: Link
Magnet ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * a powerful magnet that pulls opponents towards the player Source Drivers: Krunch
Nayru's Love ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * will surround the racer's kart with a protective shield. Any items that hit this shield will be reflected back at the racer who used them. If a driver using Nayru's Love is attacked with an item such as a Lightning, the racer who used the Lightning item will take damage. Drivers: Zelda
Copy Ability ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * steals Special item from any racer. If no racer has a special item on them, it'll randomly generate a random racer's Special Item. Drivers: Kirby
Dedede's Hammer ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * driver using Dedede's Hammer, will swing it around for about 5 seconds. Any karts hit will be squashed, causing them to lose their item and speed momentarily. Drivers: King Dedede
Invincibility Shield ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * become invulnerable to all damage for a short time. Drivers: Sonic, Tails
Bombs ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * Think Double Bob-ombs, the original Triple Bananas and the Feather item. If used as a protective item, upon the explosion, the player will leap in the air, providing a small speed boost upon landing. Drivers: Samus
Geno Flash ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ - * works like a Lightning but doesn't strink opponents. Drivers: Geno

• - R.O.B. and Professor E. Gadd have the ability to obtain any special item, excluding Fireball (Green), Birdo's Egg, Lucky Seven, Nayru's Love ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾, Copy Ability ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾, and Geno Flash ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾

~ 5. Courses ~
~ Cups
161 Total Courses
Nitro Grand Prix Mushroom Cup》 Flower Cup》 Star Cup》 Special Cup 🔒
Retro Grand Prix 🔒 Mushroom 🍄 Courses : Shell Cup》Golden Dash Cup》Red Coin Cup》Blue Coin Cup》Banana Cup》Lucky Cat Cup》1-Up Cup》Gold Cup》
Flower 🌷 Courses: Leaf Cup》Turnip Cup》Freezie Cup》Metal Cup》 Lightning Cup》Rock Cup》POW Cup》Heart Cup》
Star ⭐️ Courses: Sun Cup》Moon Cup》Red Shell Cup》Thunder Cloud Cup》Wing Cup》Boomerang Cup》Coin Block Cup》Warp Cup》
Special 👑 Courses: Vanish Cup》Cherry Cup》Mega Cup》Tanooki Cup》? Block Cup》Spiny Cup》Shine Cup》Grand Cup》
World Grand Prix🔒 Lightning⚡️Courses: Egg Cup》Triforce Cup》Crossing Cup》Bell Cup》Propeller Cup》Fruit Cup》Feather Cup》Acorn Cup》Super Cup》World Cup》
Extra Grand Prix 🔒* Excellent idea to introduce courses from the Mario Kart GP series as well as new courses for DLC content
~ New Courses
Nitro Grand Prix: Mushroom Cup 🍄 1. New Mario Circuit 2. TBD 3. TBD 4. TBD
Nitro Grand Prix: Flower Cup 🌷 1. beach- or water-themed course 2. TBD 3. TBD 4. TBD
Nitro Grand Prix: Star Cup ⭐️ 1. ice- or snow-themed course 2. TBD 3. TBD 4. TBD
Nitro Grand Prix: Special Cup 👑 1. TBD 2. TBD 3. New Bowser's Castle 4. New Rainbow Road
~ Retro Courses
Mushroom 🍄 Courses Retro Grand Prix: Shell Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Mario Kart Stadium 2. ᵈˢ Yoshi Falls 3. ᵍᶜⁿ Baby Park 4. ˢⁿᵉˢ Bowser Castle 1
Retro Grand Prix: Golden Dash Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ Luigi Circuit 2. ᵍᵇᵃ Shy Guy Beach 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Sweet Sweet Canyon 4. ᵍᶜⁿ Dry Dry Desert
Retro Grand Prix: Red Coin Cup 1. ³ᵈˢ Toad Circuit 2. ⁿ⁶⁴ Moo Moo Farm 3. ᵍᵇᵃ Riverside Park 4. ʷⁱⁱ Toad's Factory
Retro Grand Prix: Blue Coin Cup 1. ⁿ⁶⁴ Luigi Raceway 2. ˢⁿᵉˢ Donut Plains 1 3. ᵈˢ Cheep Cheep Beach 4. ³ᵈˢ Shy Guy Bazaar
Retro Grand Prix: Banana Cup 1. ᵈˢ Figure-8 Circuit 2. ʷⁱⁱ Moo Moo Meadows 3. ³ᵈˢ Cheep Cheep Lagoon 4. ⁿ⁶⁴ Kalimari Desert
Retro Grand Prix: Lucky Cat Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Mario Circuit 1 2. ᵍᶜⁿ Peach Beach 3. ⁿ⁶⁴ Koopa Troopa Beach 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Thwomp Ruins
Retro Grand Prix: 1-Up Cup 1. ᵍᶜⁿ Luigi Circuit 2. ³ᵈˢ Daisy Hills 3. ˢⁿᵉˢ Ghost Valley 1 4. ᵍᵇᵃ Bowser Castle 1
Retro Grand Prix: Gold Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Peach Circuit 2. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Water Park 3. ʷⁱⁱ Mushroom Gorge 4. ᵈˢ Luigi's Mansion
Flower 🌷 Courses Retro Grand Prix: Leaf Cup 1. ᵍᶜⁿ Mushroom Bridge 2. ᵍᵇᵃ Boo Lake 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Twisted Mansion 4. ³ᵈˢ Rock Rock Mountain
Retro Grand Prix: Turnip Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Mario Circuit 2. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Toad Harbor 3. ⁿ⁶⁴ Choco Mountain 4. ˢⁿᵉˢ Bowser Castle 2
Retro Grand Prix: Freezie Cup 1. ᵈˢ Desert Hills 2. ᵍᶜⁿ Mario Circuit 3. ʷⁱⁱ DK Summit 4. ᵍᵇᵃ Bowser Castle 2
Retro Grand Prix: Metal Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ Mario Circuit 2. ⁿ⁶⁴ Frappe Snowland 3. ᵍᶜⁿ Daisy Cruiser 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Shy Guy Falls
Retro Grand Prix: Lightning Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Mario Circuit 2. ˢⁿᵉˢ Ghost Valley 2 3. ᵈˢ Waluigi Pinball 4. ʷⁱⁱ Wario's Gold Mine
Retro Grand Prix: Rock Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Choco Island 1 2. ᵈˢ Delfino Square 3. ³ᵈˢ Music Park 4. ⁿ⁶⁴ Mario Raceway
Retro Grand Prix: POW Cup 1. ³ᵈˢ Wuhu Loop 2. ʷⁱⁱ Coconut Mall 3. ᵍᵇᵃ Cheese Land 4. ᵈˢ Shroom Ridge
Retro Grand Prix: Heart Cup 1. ⁿ⁶⁴ Toad's Turnpike 2. ³ᵈˢ Mario Circuit 3. ˢⁿᵉˢ Donut Plains 2 4. ᵍᶜⁿ Waluigi Stadium
Star ⭐️ Courses Retro Grand Prix: Sun Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Snow Land 2. ˢⁿᵉˢ Choco Island 2 3. ᵍᶜⁿ Yoshi Circuit 4. ⁿ⁶⁴ Bowser's Castle
Retro Grand Prix: Moon Cup 1. ⁿ⁶⁴ Wario Stadium 2. ʷⁱⁱ Koopa Cape 3. ᵍᵇᵃ Yoshi Desert 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Mount Wario
Retro Grand Prix: Red Shell Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ Daisy Circuit 2. ᵍᵇᵃ Ribbon Road 3. ᵈˢ Mario Circuit 4. ᵍᶜⁿ DK Mountain
Retro Grand Prix: Thunder Cloud Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Sunshine Airport 2. ⁿ⁶⁴ Sherbet Land 3. ˢⁿᵉˢ Vanilla Lake 1 4. ³ᵈˢ Maka Wuhu
Retro Grand Prix: Wing Cup 1. ᵈˢ DK Pass 2. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Dolphin Shoals 3. ³ᵈˢ Neo Bowser City 4. ʷⁱⁱ Grumble Volcano
Retro Grand Prix: Boomerang Cup 1. ᵍᶜⁿ Sherbet Land 2. ³ᵈˢ Wario Shipyard 3. ⁿ⁶⁴ Royal Raceway 4. ˢⁿᵉˢ Bowser Castle 3
Retro Grand Prix: Coin Block Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Koopa Beach 1 2. ᵈˢ Tick-Tock Clock 3. ʷⁱⁱ Maple Treeway 4. ᵍᵇᵃ Bowser Castle 3
Retro Grand Prix: Warp Cup 1. ³ᵈˢ Piranha Plant Slide 2. ᵍᶜⁿ Mushroom City 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Electrodrome 4. ᵈˢ Airship Fortress
Special 👑 Courses Retro Grand Prix: Vanish Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Donut Plains 3 2. ʷⁱⁱ Moonview Highway 3. ᵍᵇᵃ Bowser Castle 4 4. ᵍᶜⁿ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: Cherry Cup 1. ³ᵈˢ DK Jungle 2. ᵍᵇᵃ Broken Pier 3. ˢⁿᵉˢ Ghost Valley 3 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: Mega Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ Dry Dry Ruins 2. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Bone-Dry Dunes 3. ⁿ⁶⁴ Banshee Boardwalk 4. ˢⁿᵉˢ Vanilla Lake 2
Retro Grand Prix: Tanooki Cup 1. ᵍᶜⁿ Wario Colosseum 2. ³ᵈˢ Rosalina's Ice World 3. ʷⁱⁱ Bowser's Castle 4. ⁿ⁶⁴ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: ? Block Cup 1. ᵈˢ Wario Stadium 2. ˢⁿᵉˢ Koopa Beach 2 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Bowser's Castle 4. ᵍᵇᵃ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: Spiny Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Lakeside Park 2. ᵍᶜⁿ Dino Dino Jungle 3. ᵈˢ Bowser Castle 4. ʷⁱⁱ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: Shine Cup 1. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Cloudtop Cruise 2. ⁿ⁶⁴ Yoshi Valley 3. ³ᵈˢ Bowser's Castle 4. ᵈˢ Rainbow Road
Retro Grand Prix: Grand Cup 1. ⁿ⁶⁴ D.K.'s Jungle Parkway 2. ᵈˢ Peach Gardens 3. ᵍᶜⁿ Bowser's Castle 4. ³ᵈˢ Rainbow Road
Lightning⚡️Courses 🔒 World Grand Prix: Egg Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Rainbow Road 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Berlin Byways 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Wild Woods 4. ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Yoshi's Island
World Grand Prix: Triforce Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Mario Circuit 4 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Los Angeles Laps 3. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Piranha Plant Cove 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Hyrule Circuit
World Grand Prix: Crossing Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Luigi Circuit 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Sydney Sprint 3. TBA 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Animal Crossing
World Grand Prix: Bell Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Sky Garden 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Singapore Speedway 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Super Bell Subway 4. TBA
World Grand Prix: Propeller Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Mario Circuit 3 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Vancouver Velocity 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Ice Ice Outpost 4. ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Sky-High Sundae
World Grand Prix: Fruit Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Sunset Wilds 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ New York Minute 3. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Bangkok Rush 4. TBA
World Grand Prix: Feather Cup 1. ˢⁿᵉˢ Mario Circuit 2 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ London Loop 3. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Ninja Hideaway 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Mute City
World Grand Prix: Acorn Cup 1. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Paris Promenade 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Merry Mountain 3. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Dragon Driftway 4. TBA
World Grand Prix: Super Cup 1. ᵍᵇᵃ Cheep-Cheep Island 2. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Amsterdam Drift 3. TBA 4. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Big Blue
World Grand Prix: World Cup 1. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Tokyo Blur 2. ʷⁱⁱ ᵘ Excitebike Arena 3. ᵗᵒᵘʳ Athens Dash 4. TBA
~ Extra/DLC Courses
Extra Grand Prix: Mario Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ Mario Highway 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Mario Beach
Extra Grand Prix: Extra Mario Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Splash Circuit 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Tropical Coast
Extra Grand Prix: DK Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ DK Jungle 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Bananan Ruins
Extra Grand Prix: Extra DK Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Bananan Labyrinth 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ DK Jungle
Extra Grand Prix: Wario Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ Diamond City 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Snow Panic
Extra Grand Prix: Waluigi Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ² Stadium Arena 2. ᵃᵍᵖ² Waluigi Stadium
Extra Grand Prix: Pac-Man Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ Pac Mountain 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Pac Labyrinth
Extra Grand Prix: Extra Pac-Man Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ PAC-MAN Stadium 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ NAMCO Circuit
Extra Grand Prix: Bowser Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ Bowser's Castle 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Castle Wall
Extra Grand Prix: Extra Bowser Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Bowser's Factory 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Bowser's Castle
Extra Grand Prix: Rainbow Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖ Rainbow Coaster 2. ᵃᵍᵖ Rainbow Downhill
Extra Grand Prix: Yoshi Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖ² Yoshi Park 1 2. ᵃᵍᵖ² Yoshi Park 2
Extra Grand Prix: Toad Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Peach Castle 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Kingdom Way
Extra Grand Prix: Don-chan Cup 🔒 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Bon Dance Street 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Omatsuri Circuit
Extra Grand Prix: Bowser Jr. Cup 1. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Aerial Road 2. ᵃᵍᵖᵈˣ Sky Arena
Extra Grand Prix: Inklings Cup 1. Splatoon themed course * Splat Circuit 2. Splatoon themed course
Extra Grand Prix: Sonic ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ 🔒 1. Sonic themed course * Twinkle Circuit Source at 1:00 2. Sonic themed course * Green Hill Zone related course
Extra Grand Prix: King K. Rool ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ 🔒 1. King K. Rool/Donkey Kong Country related themed course 2. Diddy Kong Racing related themed course * Jungle Falls or Darkmoon Caverns Source 1 Source 2
Extra Grand Prix: Zelda ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ 🔒 1. Zelda themed course * Lost Woods 2. Zelda themed course
Extra Grand Prix: Kirby ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ 🔒 1. Kirby themed course * Fantasy Meadows (from Kirby Air Ride) Source 2. Kirby themed course * Meta Knight's Halberd or The Great Cave Offensive
Extra Grand Prix: Samus ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ 🔒 1. Metroid themed course 2. Metroid themed course
~ 6. Battle ~
In all games, the engine class of Battle Mode is fixed to 50cc. An exception is the Renegade Roundup mode where it is increased to 100cc.
~ Battle Modes
Balloon Battle》Team Balloon Battle》 Classic Balloon Battle》Team Classic Balloon Battle - Mini Bomb Karts return. Shine Thief》Team Shine Thief》 Bob-omb Blast》Team Bob-omb Blast Shine Runners Coin Runners (Coin Battle)》Team Coin Runners》 Renegade Roundup
Thunder Cloud Tag ⁽ⁿᵉʷ⁾* - Similar to Shine Thief but reverse. Think of it as Tag. A random player has a Thunder Cloud and must tag others to lose it from above their head. If the player holds the Thunder Cloud when the timer reaches zero, this process repeats until one player remains.
~ Courses
ˢⁿᵉˢ Battle Course 1 ˢⁿᵉˢ Battle Course 2 ˢⁿᵉˢ Battle Course 3 ˢⁿᵉˢ Battle Course 4 ⁿ⁶⁴ Big Donut ⁿ⁶⁴ Block Fort ⁿ⁶⁴ Double Deck ⁿ⁶⁴ Skyscraper ᵍᵇᵃ Battle Course 1 ᵍᵇᵃ Battle Course 2 ᵍᵇᵃ Battle Course 3 ᵍᵇᵃ Battle Course 4 ᵍᶜⁿ Cookie Land ᵍᶜⁿ Block City ᵍᶜⁿ Luigi's Mansion ᵍᶜⁿ Nintendo GameCube ᵍᶜⁿ Pipe Plaza ᵍᶜⁿ Tilt-a-Kart ᵈˢ Nintendo DS ᵈˢ Twilight House ᵈˢ Palm Shore ᵈˢ Tart Top ᵈˢ Block Fort ᵈˢ Pipe Plaza ʷⁱⁱ Block Plaza ʷⁱⁱ Delfino Pier ʷⁱⁱ Funky Stadium ʷⁱⁱ Chain Chomp Wheel ʷⁱⁱ Thwomp Desert ³ᵈˢ Honeybee Hive (Honeybee House) ³ᵈˢ Sherbet Rink ³ᵈˢ Wuhu Town ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Battle Stadium ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Sweet Sweet Kingdom ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Dragon Palace ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Lunar Colony ˢʷᶦᵗᶜʰ Urchin Underpass ᵗᵒᵘʳ New York Minute B ᵗᵒᵘʳ Paris Promenade B Icicle Pyramid or Smokey Castle ⁽ᵈˡᶜ⁾ Source 1 Source 2

This year’s arena was known as the Everglades. It was a swamp environment spanning four kilometers, making this slightly smaller than the vast savannah of the previous games. The arena was littered with tall mossy trees thin enough for tributes to climb. The high density of the trees along with the thick canopy of foliage above trapped a lot of heat within. There was some debate regarding the amount of water to be pumped in the arena. Due to Head Gamemaker’s preconceived ideas on the mutts and arena events, the crystal-clear swamp water that encompassed 80% of the arena was 15ft at its deepest. There were patches of raised grassland scattered throughout the arena, giving tributes a few areas of relief from the deep waters. The cornucopia stood in the center of a small clearing with the podiums in a semicircle near the southern perimeter. The depth of the water was ankle height, the gamemakers not wanting to hinder the tribute’s movements for the bloodbath. There were a decent number of supplies, however all food and non-weaponous supplies were stored in dark green waterproof bags floating in the puddles. Traditional Hunger Games weapons were also seen floating in the puddles and propped inside the small cornucopia structure.
When the podiums rose out of the arena, tributes felt the humid heat weigh down on them. A few tributes were relieved by the aquatic setting, especially the District 4 tributes. Pearl was wedged between Laurel (7) and Logan (11). She felt intimidated by Laurel’s muscles and decided to ignore her in favour of scanning for escape routes. After pinpointing two routes with more tree cover, she scanned the lineup for Mortimer. She spotted him between Wren (5) and Jack. He noticed Jack and gave him a greeting. Jack asked if it was true Tobias Stephens was dead, him nodding in response. Mortimer said “If it’s all the same to you, I’ll leave you alone for now. Just out of respect for Tobias and for helping deliver the weed to me.” Jack thanked him before searching for Cat. Cat was found standing between Nikita (2) and Neutron (12). Nikita tried to intimidate her, but she brushed it aside. She spotted Mortimer and Jack conversing, pleased it wasn’t confrontational. Mortimer spotted her and she waved to him. He stared at her for a moment before turning his eyes to the cornucopia. She looked at the cornucopia as well, aiming her sights on one of the bigger waterproof bags.
When the gong sounded, Cat sprinted forward towards the bag she set her eyes on. Nikita attempted to tackle her to the ground, but Cat was quick enough to somersault out of the way. She frantically searched for a way out, choosing to run northwest away from the careers. However, she spotted Pearl fighting Mishti (10) for a bag. Mishti was successful at obtaining the bag and pushed Pearl to the ground before grabbing a knife nearby. Cat bolted towards the two girls, hopping over the fallen Burlap (8)’s body. Before Mishti could strike Pearl with her knife, Cat tackled her to the ground. Cat pushed Mishti’s face under the ankle high water and used her knee to keep her head down. She wrenched the knife and pushed the blade into the back of her skull. She looked up to see Pearl already gone. She turned to see a sword propped against the cornucopia wall and decided to risk it.
Meanwhile, Jack hopped off his podium but was swept off his feet by the slippery mud. He frantically pulled himself up, but was relieved that all the nearby tributes were completely ignoring him. He witnessed the first death of the games when Andrei (2) stomped on Terry (5)’s neck, snapping it in an odd angle. He ran alongside the podiums to steer clear of the ongoing chaos all the while searching for Cat. He managed to spot her closing in on a sword. He ran towards her, unaware of an arrow courtesy of Jassy (12) narrowly missing his head. As he neared Cat, he noticed Logan (11) creeping closer to her with a heavy axe in hand. He yelled at Cat to look out, but she didn’t hear. Logan raised his axe at the unaware Cat. Jack jumped forward and pushed Cat out of the line of fire. The axe lodged itself into Jack’s head, sending him falling to the ground. Cat was horrified upon seeing her partner brutally killed in front of her. She decided she let his sacrifice not be in vain and retreated from the clearing with a bag and sword in hand.
Mortimer was one of the first to reach the cornucopia. He snatched a trident from the back of the cornucopia structure. He turned to exit the building only to come face to face with Laurel (7). She had an axe in her hand and voiced her intentions of killing him for her partner Wolvthorne (7). Mortimer warned her to get out of his way, but she charged forwards. Mortimer used his trident to catch her first swipe, pushing her backwards. He swung the trident, cutting Laurel’s face. She was unperturbed and tried striking him. This time, he dodged and thrust the end of his trident in her ribs. He used her brief moment of painful staggering to stab her in the head. He flung her body to the side like a ragdoll and ran back outside. He noticed two bags close together and decided to risk grabbing them. He scooped up both bags with his trident, with one hanging on each side before retreating. He fell to the ground after tripping over the corpse of Shoya (3). As he pulled himself up, he noticed Pearl hiding behind a tree beckoning him to follow her. As he ran, he heard Wolvthorne’s roars of anger after discovering his partner dead. So angry in fact that he managed to disembowel and kill Nikita (2) before escaping east.
When the bloodbath was over, Artemis and Luther followed the order of events. Artemis enjoyed this bloodbath as not only did they have a couple gory kills, but some rare moments of honor. Luther listed Terry (5) as the first death at the hands of Andrei (2), comparing it to the first kill of the 12th Hunger Games when Sparta (D2 female tribute) curb stomped Fleming (D6 male tribute). Cameras then spotted Burlap (8) stabbed in the eye by Olivine (1), making him the second death. On the opposite side was Shoya (3), whose throat was slit by Lionel (1). The next chronological death was Mishti (10), with Artemis wondering why Cat saved Pearl. Luther speculated that they were probably in an alliance. The fifth death was Laurel (7). Artemis felt bummed out to not see more of her as she seemed like victor material. The sixth and seventh deaths took place almost simultaneously. Number six was Neutron (12) after he was stabbed numerous times by Andrei (2). Two seconds afterwards was the death of Jack. Artemis declared his death as honorable and as a redemption from his disastrous interview. The last two kills of this year’s bloodbath were Ryetta (9) and Nikita (2). Ryetta was killed by Lionel when she jumped on his back and tried to gouge his eyes out. Lionel wrenched her off by the hair and bashed her head into the cornucopia structure. Artemis then moved to Nikita’s death and described Wolvthorne as savage. Luther wrapped the bloodbath analysis up and announced nine bloodbath kills, two more than the previous year.
Cat continued to create distance from the clearing. She followed as much grassland as possible, having to wade through the water at a few points. Suddenly, she came across a wide expanse of water with no land in sight. She slipped on a loose twig and fell to the ground at the edge of this lake. Her backpack spilled its contents upon impact, its contents consisting of a sandwich, four fruit packs, a pocket knife, a bottle of water, string, and a small medkit. The thoughts of losing the items she fought so hard for sent her in a panic. She reached out and tried to gather as much as she could. However, she failed to save the sandwich, the knife, and three of the fruit packets as they all sank below its depths.
After saving the rest of her items, she realized her hyperventilating continued. She crossed her legs and put her supplies to the side. The confused viewers in Maximus Square watched as she took deep methodical breaths while moving her arms up and down. They began to realize she was meditating in order to compose herself. Viewers watched as the gamemakers displayed her heart rate and the number slowly decrease. Soon, Cat was able to compose herself. She decided to inspect her remaining supplies, keeping her sword by her side. She opened the medkit and was disappointed by the lack of quantity. It consisted of one roll of medical tape, two bandages, and strangely a wax bottle of clear liquid. She inspected the label, which revealed the contents to be hydrogen peroxide. She took note of this and pocketed the medkit, string, and the one fruit pack.
Cat lastly picked up the water bottle and realized it to be empty. She internally debated collecting water from the lake in front of her. She cautiously dipped a couple fingers in the lake and then tasted the droplets on her fingertips. Tasting nothing out of sorts, she picked up her water bottle. She was interrupted by the mandatory cannons, signaling the end of the bloodbath. Cat quickly scanned her surroundings while carefully listening for tributes. After hearing nothing, she turned back to the water and felt her heart drop. The once clear water had now become cloudy and murky. Cat became dejected, knowing she couldn’t trust the water anymore. She let tears fall from her eyes for a few moments, mourning her dreadful situation. Artemis was about to tease her crying, when she was interrupted by Cat slapping herself in the face. Cat told herself aloud that she had to get it together and plan her next move. She continued to scan the lake and her surroundings. She noticed a near consistent path of grassland heading west around the lake. She decided to head that direction, whispering to herself that “sailor boy” was sure to head that direction. She packed her things and started her journey west along the lake’s borders, with her sword at the ready.
Back in the commentator’s booth, Artemis noted her determination to find the District 4 tributes, speculating whether she had a crush on Mortimer. Luther diverted the topic to the lake. He educated the audience on the layout of the lake, showing through schematics that it spanned at least 35% of the entire arena. At the end of the lake was a thick accumulation of trees and brush the cameras refused to go past. When he and Artemis questioned Head Gamemaker Grimstone, he told them there was a hidden surprise on the possibility a tribute figures out a way across.
The two hosts began checking tabs on the surviving tributes. Olivine and Lionel (1) had split from the clearing and were in the south eastern sector. They watched from the safety of a couple trees as Andrei (2) and Wolvthorne (7) gathered supplies at the cornucopia. Surprisingly, Andrei was indifferent to his new ally having killed Nikita. The two debated their next move, Wolvthorne desiring to find Mortimer for revenge. Andrei admitted that while he was their biggest threat, he would have to put his grievances aside for them to survive the arena. Cameras diverted their attention to Carnelia and Logan (11) as they neared the southeastern perimeter. In close proximity was Horace (10) who was stalking them, using the trees and small mud banks as cover. Vista (3) had climbed up a tree and rested there. Wren (5) had struck up an alliance with Jassy (12) when the two crossed paths in the centre of the arena. Peggy (8) reached the northern perimeter and planted roots at the shore of the lake. John (9) had retreated west and was camouflaging himself with mud. He was nearly seen by Cat minutes into her trek west, but decided against confronting her upon seeing her sword. Artemis urged Luther to point the cameras to the District 4 tributes, which he obliged.
Mortimer had successfully distanced himself from the cornucopia. Cameras captured him diverting the supplies from one of his two backpacks into the other, discarding the empty one in the mud. It was around this time when the cannons sounded. The combined supplies included an empty water bottle, three fruit packs, a sandwich, a bundle of sturdy rope, a sleeping bag, and a small cooking pot. He was half a kilometre away from the lake’s southwest shore when he stopped walking. He turned around and asked the forest if hiding from him was really necessary. Pearl stepped out from behind a tree, asking how he knew she was there. He claimed that he spotted her dirty blonde hair poking out. He asked why she was hiding from him. Pearl asked if he was going to kill her. Mortimer was confused by this and questioned why he would kill her. Pearl defended herself by pointing out how much he hated accepting help from others and thought he would go lone wolf. Mortimer rolled his eyes, muttering “This again” under his breath. He put his right hand up and solemnly swore he wouldn’t kill her, for Gill’s sake. Pearl cautiously stepped out and thanked him. He asked what she had in her bag. She showed her contents, seeing a rain poncho, a water bottle, two apples, and a flint and steel.
Mortimer revealed his contents as well, noting the emptiness of the bottles. He suggested they continue going west, but Pearl pointed at a tall tree nearby. She said she would climb it and get a good vantage point. Mortimer didn’t object as she marched over to the tree and began climbing. While she was climbing higher, cameras noticed how antsy Mortimer was. In the commentator’s booth, Artemis said it appeared as if he was tempted to ditch her. Luther agreed with her observation, but didn’t believe he would just yet. Pearl reached seven metres in height and began surveying the arena. She reported to Mortimer that everything looked the same until she looked northwest and spotted the lake. Mortimer declared they would go there. She agreed and the two began their journey.
Out of nowhere, Pearl asked if he had anything against her father Alexander Riverstone. Mortimer claimed he didn’t and thought he was an honest working man. She retorted by asking for his reason to not accept his or anyone else’s help. Mortimer became annoyed by hearing this question for the umpteenth time, but Pearl insisted he explain. She already heard the story from Gill and wanted to hear his perspective, explaining, “After years of waitressing and hearing all the gossip, I’ve learned there is always another side.” Mortimer sighed and admitted he should’ve accepted his and Gill’s help as they had no gain in doublecrossing him. He cited his mother’s abandonment and the resulting playground bullying as the cornerstone reasons for him not trusting others. Pearl asked how old his mother was when she left, him answering six. Viewers weren’t aware of this detail and felt bad for him.
Before Pearl could press for more, the two had arrived at the lake. They noticed the murkiness of the water and surmised that it was unsafe to drink. Mortimer wondered how it was murky when it was crystal clear earlier. Pearl said she noticed the water became cloudy the second the cannons sounded, deducing that the water will become much more unsafe to drink as the death toll increases. The commentators and gamemakers were impressed with her accurate deduction but pointed out it was Jassy (12) who discovered it first though in a joking manner. Pearl however was more curious about the smell, comparing it to the sewage port at the Cardiff Cliffs. Mortimer agreed and pondered over what to do next.
Pearl climbed up another tree and spotted the stretching shoreline. Mortimer hypothesised how due to the unnatural shape and location of the lake, along with recent Hunger Games trends, there could be something in the northwestern sector on the other side. Pearl sarcastically commented, “Add a boat to the list of things we desperately need.” Mortimer’s eyes lit up and said, “Why not make our own?”, pointing out how they could construct a raft out of the sturdier trees and tie them together with rope, adding that being on the lake would keep them far from other tributes. Pearl admitted it was a good plan, but considered water as the utmost priority. When asked to test the water, Pearl gagged on the taste. Mortimer pulled out his pot and gave it to Pearl, telling her to start a fire.
Around the time Mortimer started his raft project, Cat was taking a break from all the trudging through the damp grassland. She held her only fruit pack in her fingertips and stared at it for several minutes. Viewers could tell she was speculating on whether or not to eat it. She decided against it and put it back in her backpack. She watched the still lake while licking her cracked lips to keep them moist. She dipped two of her fingers into the cloudy water and tasted the droplets. She instantly gagged and spit them out, using her sleeve to wipe her mouth. She then broke off a button from the backpack and stuck it in her mouth. Luther seemed impressed by this, educating the audience on this unique practice of preventing dry mouth.
Cat decided her break was over and stood up with supplies in tow. Suddenly, she heard voices coming from behind her. She listened carefully and recognized the voice of Olivine and Lionel (1). Cameras showed the two bypassing Andrei (2) and Wolvthorne (7) after the two journeyed north to hunt for tributes. While raiding the cornucopia, Olivine played with a pair of binoculars and spotted Pearl in the tree. The two decided to go after her. Cat frantically searched for a place to hide. There were no nearby upright trees and she didn’t have enough time to camouflage herself in the mud. So, in desperation, she burrowed her backpack in the mudbank and waded herself into the lake. Cat ducked her head underwater just in time for Olivine and Lionel to reveal themselves. Many viewers in Maximus Square were at the edge of their seats as the two careers initially began walking past Cat’s location. The situation was filled with more tension when the two stopped before moving out of sight. The two discussed their plan of confronting Pearl, knowing Mortimer is most likely with her. Lionel assured her that the two could take him together. Underwater cameras captured Cat’s face as she struggled to hold her breath. Based on the quality of the cameras’ footage, it appeared that Cat was able to overhear their conversation. Just when it looked like Cat was about to give up, the two careers finally resumed their journey west.
Cat thrust herself out of the water, taking in deep breaths. Supporters of Cat in Maximus Square breathed out in relief as well. Cat dragged herself to shore and flipped herself on her back. She laid there for a few moments catching her breath and wiping the mud off her face. When she held her arm up, she noticed a black spot on her forearm. She grabbed it, pulled it off, and turned it towards her. She instantly recognized it from its sucker and rows of teeth, straight from her studies in the fauna sector in the aquatic station. It was a black worm leech, a relatively new species introduced to the world through the crossbreeding of the European medicinal leech and the terrestrial leech. Cat’s face morphed into one of pure disgust and fright. It took all her inner strength not to scream when she looked down and counted eleven leeches on her legs and forearms. She shakily ripped the leeches off her body one by one, lip quivering as she did so. She tossed the leeches aside and crab-walked away from the shore.
Cat sat on a log for almost an hour, traumatized by the experience. After composing herself, she grabbed her backpack and was about to leave when she recalled Olivine and Lionel’s plan. Realizing Pearl and Mortimer were in danger, she pulled out her empty water bottle. Capital viewers were confused at first, expecting her to “run for the hills”. Their confusion turned to interest as Cat scooped up the leeches and put them inside her bottle along with some of the lakewater. In the commentator’s booth, Artemis was holding herself, cringing at the sight of the leeches. She wondered why Cat would pick them back up. Luther guessed she would use them either to help her allies or food, noting that the leeches were edible. Artemis squealed at the thought. As Cat was about to start moving again, a cannon sounded. It was revealed to be Vista (3) after she climbed down from her tree and decided to bathe in the river. She was also overtaken by leeches and screamed very loudly at the sight of them. Andrei (2) and Wolvthorne (7) heard her screams and found her writhing on the ground swiping at the leeches on her body. Andrei ended her suffering by plunging his sword into her head.
Two hours passed by without incident. Capital viewers still had some nuggets of tribute activity to entertain them. Carnelia and Logan (11) had successfully captured a handful of leeches and were attempting to cook them. Their stalker Horace (10) watched from nearby. The biggest area of interest was with the District 4 tributes and the approaching careers increasing the suspense in Maximus Square. While Mortimer was beginning the construction of the raft, Pearl boiled some water in the pot. She noticed her partner testing his rope on the logs he acquired and showing disappointment with it not being enough to secure the full measurements.
While the water boiled, Pearl gathered the moss growing off the trees and weaved some twine together. She tossed the twine to Mortimer and told him to test it out. She rolled her eyes at the look of skepticism on his face. She challenged him by asking why he was skeptical over some twine. Mortimer claimed he wasn’t suspicious of any malintent but was wondering why she would make it for him. Pearl simply stated, “We’re partners aren’t we?” Mortimer thanked her and tested the twine. He was satisfied with its durability and asked if she could make more. Pearl beckoned him to come to the fire. He walked over and was perplexed by the sight before him. The water still resembled the murky lake water. Pearl claimed she left the water to boil for ten minutes. Mortimer stuck his fingers taste tested it and spat it out in disgust. He said it wasn’t as bad tasting as the lakewater, but was still unsafe to drink. Frustrated, he went back to his raft while Pearl resumed making twine.
The two were unaware that Olivine and Lionel (1) were very close by and were able to pinpoint their location after hearing them talking. Lionel stepped forward and peeked his head behind a tree, ready to approach the unsuspecting Pearl. Pearl lifted her head to wipe the sweat off her face and was horrified to see him towering over her. She screamed at the top of her lungs and sprinted off not a second later. Lionel chased after her and swung his sword down toward her. Pearl shut her eyes preparing for the end, but only heard a single metallic thud. She opened her eyes to see the sword blocked by Mortimer’s trident.
Mortimer barked at Pearl to get behind him and she obeyed. Olivine made herself known brandishing a sword as well, having failed to secure a bow in the bloodbath. The arena and Maximus Square were quiet as the tributes slowly circled each other, Mortimer and Pearl taking measures to not be surrounded by their adversaries. Mortimer tried to make Olivine the closer enemy, knowing she was not nearly as experienced with a sword as Lionel. What he didn't know was she still had decent skills with the sword due to it being her "secondary weapon" that she decided to hide during training. Lionel swung first once again, his blade being caught by the trident. Olivine stepped in to strike while Mortimer was distracted. However, he spotted her and smacked her across the face with the back of the handle. She fell back into the water but before he could take advantage, Lionel went back on the offence.
The next three minutes kept the Capital at the edge of their seat. The two were evenly matched and trapped in a cycle of attack, block, and retaliation all while Pearl watched on, frozen to her spot. Lionel got his sword caught in the trident for the eighth time, but surprised everyone by twisting the blade downwards, pushing the prongs down and exposing Mortimer’s head. Lionel kept twisting in hopes Mortimer would drop his weapon, but he persisted. Just when it seemed like Mortimer was about to give up, he headbutted Lionel, dazing him long enough to free his weapon. Then in a swift motion, Mortimer thrust his trident up Lionel’s chin into his brain, sounding his cannon instantly.
Mortimer couldn’t celebrate for long as he heard Olivine charging towards him. She sliced at him in a frenzy, managing to cut his right eyebrow. She used this distraction to punch him in the face. Mortimer stumbled back a few inches, surprised by the power in her punch. Olivine brought her sword up high, ready to strike him down. Mortimer gave her a powerful uppercut, sending Olivine back three feet. The punch caused her to bite through her tongue, it falling to the ground. Olivine moaned in muffled agony at the sight of it on the floor as her mouth filled with blood. Mortimer thrust the trident in her chest. Suddenly, someone came rushing into the small clearing. It was Cat, having finally arrived to help Mortimer. She paused at the carnage laid before her and put her sword down. She said, “Guess you didn’t need help then.” Olivine’s cannon sounded seconds later.
The viewers in Maximus Square went crazy, cheering for Mortimer’s triumphant victory. In the commentator’s booth, Artemis and Luther were buzzing as well, the latter declaring this as one of the greatest fight sequences in the history of the Hunger Games. Historic documents reflected that sentiment as well. The cheering quickly died down, waiting to see his reaction to Cat’s sudden arrival. Mortimer furrowed his brows and backed her into a tree, saying, “You! You’ve been following us?!” Cat put her hands up and apologized for scaring him. She asked to at least explain herself. Pearl came to her defense and pleaded with him to hear her out. Mortimer relented and told her to spill.
Cat regaled her experiences so far, revealing the leeches’ existence and how she found them. Pearl rummaged through her things and pulled out the water bottle, but Cat warned her about the leeches inside. Pearl looked inside and identified the species, revealing they were edible. She walked towards the fire with the bottle. Cat turned back to Mortimer and told him, “I know you are reluctant to trust me, especially considering where we are. But seeing that I helped you with your training score and have something valuable to share, I think you need me as an ally.” Back in the Capital, Artemis said she admired Cat’s guts while Luther expressed interest in the dynamic they’re about to see, confident Mortimer would say yes. Mortimer looked back at Pearl inspecting the leeches, then the open backpack. He relented and accepted her invitation into the group, but warned he would end her if she did anything remotely bad.
Mortimer invited her to sit down by the campsite and go over what they learned. The small fire burnt out and Pearl was trying and failing to reignite it. Cat finally picked up on the rotten egg smell emanating throughout the arena. Mortimer noticed as well, claiming it was worse than before. Pearl asked if they noticed how it became worse the minute the careers died. The two were silent and realised she was right. Pearl speculated that not only will the water be rendered more undrinkable each death, but the smell will get worse. Cat compared the smell to the piles of feces left in Willard Alleyway by warmweed addicts and alcoholics. Mortimer suddenly had an epiphany. He realized that the rotten egg smell meant traces of flammable sulphur were present. Cat suggested they search for the source of the smell before it gets dark. The three fanned out. The search for the rotten smell garnered some moments of comedy. Viewers were laughing at the tributes picking up random objects and bringing them to their faces, left in tears at their disgusted facial expressions. It was ultimately Pearl who discovered the source, having explored the lake shore and found the source to be green algae barely touching the surface. She held her breath while collecting some and handing it to Mortimer. He wringed it off as much water as possible before shooting sparks at it with the flint and steel. After several tries, the algae ignited.
A fire was successfully crafted, and the trio resumed boiling the water. Cat speculated why boiling it wasn’t enough, recalling how it worked for Corpse Beckford in the 10th Hunger Games. Pearl suddenly squealed and stood up. One of the leeches escaped the bottle and began squirming on the ground. Mortimer picked it up and examined the creature. He noticed how sticky his fingertips were, his facing morphing into what Artemis coined as the “thinking face”. Mortimer used the tip of his trident to scrape some of the slime and thrust it into the pot. Cat was about to protest, but Mortimer recalled the species of leech and that it resided in the Rocky Shores neighborhood. He explained how the poorer citizens of District 4 would use the slime of discarded leeches to better purify dirty water. Cat commended him for noticing this and offered to ration the food for dinner. Pearl continued to create twine for the raft, but cameras noticed her constantly watching the nearby trees.
The sun was nearly out of sight and the water was still not fully purified. Mortimer was frustrated that the slime wasn’t enough. Cat told him to calm down and assured him they would figure it out. Pearl was still making twine for the raft when she cut herself with a tiny splinter entangled in the moss. Cat grabbed the first aid kit to bandage the wound before it became infected. Mortimer commented how he wasn’t aware therapists needed to know first aid. Cat responded, “Well, in a district full of addicts, you get a lot of practice.” Pearl asked her why she wanted to be a therapist like Phoebe. Cat explained how she used to be one of the young “zombies” hanging out in Willard Alleyway experimenting with new batches of warmweed. One day when she was thirteen, she had a respiratory attack. Her supposed friends were indifferent to her predicament and fled when Phoebe and peacekeeper escorts walked by. Phoebe spotted her, brought her to the hospital, and took care of her. In the commentator’s booth, Artemis was curious as to why she was dredging up traumatic experiences so nonchalantly. Luther guessed she truly moved past it and told her to keep listening. Cat further described a long conversation she had with Phoebe and how much it changed her life. After that, Cat strongly desired to get clean and was successful after nine arduous months. This was the part where Cat began to feel emotional. Cat explained that she wanted to help others get clean the same way she did, so no more kids are left to die in alleyways. She then revealed that when her mother died of an overdose, it was enough to convince her brother to get clean as well after years of begging. After years of dealing with erratic addicts, she claimed that no one scared her anymore, not even Mortimer. Mortimer apologised for being cross with her before, receiving an accepting smile in return.
While Cat bandaged Pearl’s wound, Mortimer noticed the small bottle of hydrogen peroxide. He examined it and put some droplets in the water. Suddenly, the cloudy substance in the water completely cleared. The three stared in amazement. Pearl asked who would test it first. Mortimer looked at Cat, who annoyedly said, “Fine I’ll do it.” She took a sip and said it tasted like water. After a few moments of no effect, Cat congratulated Mortimer for successfully purifying the water. Mortimer seemed really proud of himself. Suddenly, two sponsor gifts fell from the sky, one with a 4 and one with a 6. The D4 gift contained a mini chemistry kit with droppers, tiny bowls, and vials. A note attached read “I told you friends are the best - G”. The D6 bag contained a picnic of sandwiches and fruit. Pearl was ready to dig in, but Cat insisted they rest as the sun had fully set. Mortimer appeared disappointed, but admitted she was right. He volunteered to take first watch, blushing when Cat claimed he did so just to play with his new set. The two rested while Mortimer got to work purifying more water with his new kit. The portraits of the fallen were presented in the sky. The fallen included Olivine and Lionel (1), Nikita (2), Vista and Shoya (3), Terry (5), Jack (6), Laurel (7), Burlap (8), Ryetta (9), Mishti (10), and Neutron (12). This left 12 tributes remaining.

Opal stood up with a sigh, grimacing at the pain along her back and arm. She looked down on the man crumpled on the floor. “Sorry Devona. But life’s a bitch.”
“...fuck you,” he mumbled.
Opal’s eyes widened slightly. “Man, he’s one tough cookie. Not much he can do now though.” She pulled the documents out from her bag to verify that they were still there, and then slid them into her jacket. She turned to leave before pausing. Something felt… off. Her eyes scanned the area and she tensed herself. Even with Opal being as alert as she could, she didn’t see the fist coming at her face until it was too late. Her vision spun as her head snapped back, feeling her feet leave the ground as someone slept her legs out from under her. She pushed herself off and jumped to her feet, only to be met with a swift kick waist. She tried to swing her crowbar but a hand wrenched her wrist to the side and a knee slammed into her stomach. She doubled over and felt her lunch struggle to the surface before she was promptly slammed face-first into the wall. She slid down like wet spaghetti onto the floor.
She turned her head to the side to watch the retreating footsteps as she waited for her entire body to stop aching. Devona, if that was his name, was already sitting up, wincing but very much functional despite the blood dribbling down his face. She could see the figure now crouching beside him, doing something with their hands. It took Opal a few seconds to realise that they were signing something.
-you alright?
Devona nodded, rubbing his bruised cheek. “Yeah, I’m fine, Harlow. Don’t worry about me.”
Opal would have sworn out loud, but the pain in her face was making it hard to speak. “Are you kidding me? They sent the damn wolf after these documents too?” Speaking of the documents, why was she after them again? She frowned and rooted around her memories like a child digging in the sand. Right, to sell the information within. Wow, she was scatter-brained. Probably to do with the ringing headache she had.
She had to get away. But with her current situation, a foot race would be a pointless endeavour. All she needed to do was get to her motorcycle parked a few metres away, and she’d be able to depart. She looked over the side of the roof and studied the area. Then she rolled over the side. She grabbed onto the railings by the side and yanked them off, managing to swing herself into a window after skidding down several metres. If she couldn’t outpace Harlow, then she could at least slow them down. She shoved herself to her feet and started to run, the sound of someone scaling the wall already behind her. She shoved desks and cabinets in front of doors as she ran, the only sound she could hear being her own footsteps and bated breath. If she got caught once, if she slowed down for a single second, she’d be headed for the rocks.
She turned the corner and felt that same shiver of anticipation run up her spine. They’d caught up to her, somehow. She readied herself and ducked under but still caught the edge of the hit as Harlow appeared from behind her. She grabbed an oil can and crushed it behind her back, spilling it down onto the floor. They rushed forward anyway, using the momentum to slam into Opal and throw her across the floor. This time it was her scrambling upon the oil to get up, grabbing onto the wall to try to pull herself up. She was instead hoisted up and thrown through the door and onto the clean floor of the corridor where she pushed herself up and began to run again. Something nagged at her but she ignored it, electing to get to the exit as fast as possible.
She finally shoved the door open and ran upon the gravel, finding where her motorcycle was parked. She kicked back the stand and revved the engine, tearing off as fast as she could while weaving for good measure. She relaxed her body once she reached the empty fields of high grass, shooting a final peace sign towards the dwindling buildings. She reached into her jacket and then realised that the documents were not there.
“God. Fucking. Dammit.” That conniving bastard. They’d probably stolen the documents during that final tussle, and the nagging feeling she’d so carelessly discarded was how strange it was that they didn’t continue to chase her. There was enough time to go back, perhaps she could -
There was a massive explosion from one of the buildings, loud enough for the windows on the neighbouring structures to shatter. On second thought, perhaps she’d let this one go.
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Claren soared through the air and slammed against the ground and wall, bouncing around like a handball. He pressed a hand to his head with a groan as he stopped, barely managing to dodge the glaive that slammed into the ground and sent a blast of lightning into the earth. As he looked, he could see that metal had been infused into the bone and flesh that comprised the glaive. Laurel came at him again, swinging her glaive again and again as lightning coursed through her body. Claren blocked her attacks, but he was forced to the defensive, the lightning preventing him from getting close.
He pushed forward nevertheless, grabbing onto the end of Laurel’s glaive as she tried to drive it into his chest. He didn’t know how much longer his shield could keep up, but there was no chance for him to take a moment to recover. He could feel the heat from the electricity scouring the air, not hot enough to injure but hot enough to hurt. His fist connected with Laurel’s face and sent her flying backwards before she launched herself forward with a burst of electricity, sending him slamming through the door and into a hallway. He didn’t have time to test if his bones were broken before she was launching herself into the air, electricity worming around her like a writhing cocoon. Claren rolled to the side to avoid her slamming into the ground, sending shards of concrete everywhere. His thoughts rushed around his head as he jumped to his feet and started the process again.
Claren didn’t have time to consider the ramifications of why her magic was so different to what it had been before. All he had was to try and hold her off for long enough to… what, exactly? Figure out a way to beat her? For backup to arrive? Have the crime lords escape? He almost laughed at that one - internally, of course. He barely laughed out loud. He’d dedicated most of his life to law and order, and here he was: potentially throwing his life away for a bunch of high-end criminals. The thought of it casted a bitter taste in his mouth and he could feel his teeth grit together. The sudden, uncontrollable action startled Claren enough to make him almost freeze up. He’d trained himself for years to hold in anything of that ike, and here he was, in the midst of battle yet unable to compose himself. He smoothed his expression again and hit Laurel across the head with a hook.
“You know,” Laurel managed between breaths while dodging and weaving, “this would be a lot easier if you just stood aside.” Her glaive gave her the advantage in reach, but Claren’s bubble provided him with enough manoeuvrability to get in and out.
“I mean,” she continued, “why bother trying to save people like that? They’re scum, or lower than scum. Just the greedy pigs of the world that managed to get enough money to stay on the top of the bottom.”
It was such a mirror of his own thoughts that he almost, for a second, considered it. He tried his hardest to push her words from his mind and levelled his gaze at her. “I don’t make deals with people like you. Not to mention, you already murdered the English council, so don’t pretend like you’re above them.”
Laurel scoffed. “Please, they were politicians. Barely even people.”
She stomped her feet and a wave of electricity radiated off of her, scorching the ground and furniture around her. She raised her hands and a scent of ash filled the air. Fire suddenly flared into existence all around her, bright and blindingly hot. Claren had to jump forward as he felt himself cooking alive from the fire that rose just a few inches away from him. Laurel opened her palm and a wave of flame erupted from her hand right towards Claren. He expanded his bubble just before it washed over him, keeping the scorching heat away. He rolled to the side and outstretched his hand into a finger gun. His shield was sucked around his hand and onto the tip of his finger, hanging there like a dew drop. It fired off and slammed into Laurel, sending her flying backwards. It shot back and wrapped around Claren just as another wave of fire rushed at him.
He dodged to the side as she swung wildly with her glaive, the blade lit by flame. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his yo-yo. Laurel guffawed as she saw it, her voice revealing the emotion that her mask was hiding.
“A yo-yo? Seriously?”
Claren’s shield flowed over the yo-yo and he lashed out with it, wrapping around Laurel faster than she could register. He swung the yo-yo around and Laurel followed, being slammed all around the wall and floor like a ball attached to a ping-pong paddle. He pulled and she spun like a top as the yo-yo retracted to his hand before crumping to the floor.
“That’s Captain yo-yo to you,” Claren said dryly. The bubble from the yo-yo started to wash over him. It wavered for a second, and then shattered. That was not good. But with Laurel out for the count, he should be able to wait out for his shield to form again.
Laurel stood up. Claren was momentarily taken aback. Someone who was without any physical enhancements should have been taken out by that assault. She stretched her neck and arms.
“Nice trick. Wanna see me do it?” She lashed out with a strand of lightning, faster than Claren could dodge and wrapped it around him. While it was much faster, it barely tickled his skin as it pressed against him. Then the strand of lightning erupted into flames, and Claren could feel his flesh start to bubble. She slammed him all around the room and the world began to blur, his vision flashing white intermittently from the agony of the experience. She brought him in close, spinning him around like a ribbon dancer would, and punched him in the face. He collapsed to the ground as the last of the fiery electricity stopped holding him up, body still steaming as his wounds hissed.
Laurel picked him up by the collar and dangled him in the air.
“Like I said. This would have been a lot easier if you just stood aside.” She was tall, tall enough that with the two of them at eye-height Claren’s feet couldn’t find the floor at all. She started to carry him towards the window and Claren thought about how high the mansion was from the ground as she threw him through it.
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Cirius had taken a quick break when he felt his eyes start to slide from their sockets. He excused himself to the bathroom, died, and then came back out as fresh as a daisy. Ignoring the incredibly confused and alarmed expressions of the crime lords, he continued to lead them out until they were in the front yard.
“Welp,” he said, “you can all go home now.” He heard some commotion from the mansion, and turned around. The noises stopped.
“Huh. Must have been the wind.”
The window shattered and Claren hurtled through. Cirius scrambled around the lawn and managed to catch Claren, taking the brunt of the fall as the man slammed into him. He was burnt heavily all over, and a hiss of pain escaped his lips as Cirius set him gently upon the ground. He looked up as a figure jumped down, landing on top of a car as electricity coursed around her. It was the woman from before, still brandishing her glaive and with her mask covering her face. Bauble, was it?
“Hey,” said Cirius, because he didn’t know what else to say.
“Hey,” she returned casually, leaning against her glaive onto the ruined wreck. She seemed to be trying to appear flippant, but too much of her weight was put on the glaive for that to be true.
“Did you do this?” he asked, gesturing towards Claren.
“Yep.”
Cirius nodded. “Not going to lie, Bauble, you suck. I kinda have to fight you now.”
Even with the mask Cirius could feel her glare. “First off, it’s Laurel. Second off, I don’t have time to waste on you.” She directed her gaze towards the crowd and waved her finger around. The crowd surged as if trying to disperse before she slammed her foot and sent a wave of fire soaring up to block them.
“Not you, not you, not you,” she muttered. “Ah, there you are!” The flames dispersed and the crowd backed away from the man she was pointing to. He looked around, as if for anyone to help. Everyone turned and ran towards their cars, getting in and driving away within seconds.
Laurel twirled her glaive and jumped down. “I’m going to kill you now, okay?” She dodged leisurely to the side as Cirius tried to tackle her, sending volts of electricity through his body with a casual backhand. She grabbed Cirius by the collar and threw him with a blast of lightning, hurtling him several metres away. The man turned to run and she shot out a small bolt of lightning, seizing him up and collapsing him to the ground. She stepped forward, scraping the glaive across the scorched grass before being slammed in the back. She whipped around to see Claren pointing his index finger, his face screwed up in pain yet eyes forced open.
“You really don’t know when to quit, so you?” she snarled. She hoisted her glaive into the air but was interrupted once again as Cirius popped out and managed to grasp onto Laurel’s leg. Before she could kick him off, he clambered up onto her back and clung to her.
“What the fUCKKK” she yelled, the yell turning into a screech as Cirius bit down as hard as he could on her shoulder. She wheeled around wildly, shouting curses to the sky as she tried her hardest to shake Cirius off. He continued to hang on, his fingers gripping tightly and only the gloves preventing his nails from sinking into her skin. Fire and lightning roiled off of her yet Cirius continued to cling on. She slammed her back against the mansion again and again. Cirius heard something crunch from within his body. Still holding on with one hand, he grabbed a disk from his pocket and tossed it into the air. Dropping down, he kicked at Laurel’s feet before running away as the disk exploded and sent debris tumbling down onto her. He ran to Claren and hauled him up, trying his best not to touch the deep burns. He turned his attention to the man who was still lying on the ground as if pretending to be dead. Cirius walked over while holding up Claren and kicked him in the side.
“Ah! Just kill me quickly!” he screamed before seeing that it was just Cirius. Cirius stared down at him.
“Just get up and help me support Claren.”
They managed to get into a building and barricade the door. Cirius propped Claren up against the wall as the man started to pace the halls.
“God, where are the guards! They should have stopped her!” he yelled. Cirius grabbed a pen and threw it at his head.
“Shut up. She’s going to hear us.”
“Hear us! Who cares if she hears us! She’ll find us anyway! We’re doomed!”
Claren slitted his eyes open. “Keep it down. I have a headache and it’s…”
“Killing you?” Cirius interjected.
Claren raised an eyebrow. “No. My wounds are killing me. My headache is simply a pain to deal with.”
Cirius chewed his lip. He needed a plan. Devona and Harlow were both off somewhere else, and he didn’t have time to wait for them to come around.
“Think, think,” he muttered to himself. An idea sparked in his head. It wasn’t very good, but it was all he had.
“You there,” he said, pointing at the man who he had thrown the pen at. “Uh, what’s your name?”
“Winston Haxter,” supplied Claren with a pained voice. “He’s the one I was supposed to be negotiating with.”
“I see, I see. What’s your discipline?”
“I, uh, can run well.”
Cirius hummed. “Super-speed, eh? Yeah, I can work with that.”
“No, I run at normal speed. But like, I don’t get tired. I can just keep running.”
“Huh. So you have infinite stamina?”
“Yeah. But like… just for running.”
Cirius hummed again. “Well, I can probably still work with that.” He stepped towards Winston and pointed towards a long hallway. “Alright, when she gets here, you’re going to start running down there.”
“What! She’ll kill me!”
“Come on man. Your magic is literally just running. You can outpace her. ‘Sides, I have a plan. Claren’s going to be at the end of the hallway, and he’ll bubble the two of you up. I’ll distract her and lead her far away where I’ll… I don’t know. I’ll figure it out.”
Winston stared at him. “You’ll die.”
“Oh, most definitely. In fact, probably several times! But hey, that’s just how it is.”
Winston’s face dropped even more, if that was even possible. “You’re absolutely insane. We’re all going to die.”
“Nope! Just me! Anyways, go wait by the hallway. Don’t want to lose any ground.” He walked over to Claren before Winston could protest. He sat down next to him.
“Hey.”
Claren titled his head down. “Mr. Walker.”
“You up for the plan?”
He shifted his body and winced. “I am. I don’t think it’s an especially good plan, but I don’t see a better way.” A strange expression settled over his face. It took a while for Cirius to discern it. It was discontentment, irritation, bitterness. Claren seemed to recognise this and swallowed the expression.
“You know, it’s not too late to toss Winston at her and walk away.”
“What did you say?” Winston called out.
“Nothing!”
Claren sighed and his shoulders sagged. “No. That’s not for me to decide. I have a job, and I need to do it.”
“Why? I mean, you clearly don’t want to protect him.”
Claren looked away. The two of them sat in silence before Clarne spoke up again. “I need to do my job because it’s… it’s not a good job. It doesn’t feel good to look people you know have done horrible, horrible things in the eye and shake their hand. To watch them walk away and know that you could have stopped them but… couldn’t. Or just didn’t. I won’t - I can’t let anyone else do that.” His hand reached up to the two rings on his fingers and twisted them - a golden band with a bright yellow gem and a silver band with a cool blue one.
Cirius stared at the ground. “Wow. That kinda sucks.”
Claren huffed a laugh. “That it does.” He shook his head. “Look at me, talking about my feelings while on the job. How unprofessional.” He staggered to his feet. “You should go and get prepared. Won’t be long until she finds us.”
Claren was right. The door was thrown off its hinges and a figure ducked down. The light glinted off the white mask as Laurel stood in the frame. She stared down across the room at Winston, who was doing a very good job looking like a deer in headlights. She cocked her head to the side. Winston bolted down the hallway, his breaths sharp and panicked. She blasted forward with a bolt of lightning, each step energised as she leisurely followed him.
Laurel ran down the hallway, every step bringing her closer to Winston. Cirius let out a silent exhale. It was time. All the doors along the hallway were open, and a short figure jumped out of one only to be met with an immediate blast of lightning so strong it sent the figure slamming back immediately. Laurel had anticipated a trap being laid. Unfortunately for her, Cirius had anticipated her anticipation. The makeshift, stuffed, humanoid doll wearing Cirius clothes smouldered, the string that attached it to the tripwire carefully hidden across the floor snapped from the sudden force of the lightning. At the same moment as she turned to unleash her magic, Cirius leapt from the opposing side and tackled Laurel, sending the two of them crashing to the ground.
Laurel grabbed him by the arm and slammed him into the wall, fire roiling off of her and washing over him. Cirius kicked at Laurel until he felt it connect with something hard and her grip loosened. He dropped down as he realised that his eyeballs had been burnt off. He scrambled around blindly for several seconds before a glaive tore through his chest and ripped him in half. A foot stomped on his head again and again until his skull cracked open and his brains were mushed upon the floor. Laurel stomped on the desecrated body again and again until blood and gore started to coat the cuffs of her pants.
“You know, I’m starting to feel a little insulted.” She whipped her head around and stared at Cirius, standing there perfectly fine.
“Wha- you-” she looked back at the corpse, then at Cirius. “I killed you!”
“You missed.”
She looked back at the corpse. “No I fucking didn’t!” She grabbed her glaive and threw it at him, slicing his face wide open along with the rest of his head. The top half of his head slid cleanly off and onto the floor.
“Missed again,” said Cirius from behind her. She gathered lightning in her hand and sent a bolt right through him.
“You should really aim better.”
“What the fuck!” Laurel screamed. “I killed you! I killed you several times!” “Yeah, I get that a lot.” He dodged the glaive being thrown at him again and turned to run. Laurel charged after him, each charged step leaving cracks within the floor. He ducked down as she ripped through the air, fire and lightning trailing behind her. She brought down a wave of flame with a kick, following it up by swinging her glaive as it crackled with lightning. Cirius ducked under, rushing forward through the flame and punching Laurel in the stomach. His gloves glowed for a second, a frosty cyan that pierced the air, and a blast of energy ripped out that slammed Laurel into the wall.
Cirius was hit with a wave of exhaustion. He’d died thrice in a row, and although there didn’t seem to be any limit on how many times he could die and revive, it certainly wore on him after a while. He needed to think of something to do. Laurel was already drawing herself back to her feet, her mask shifted to the side and revealing her cold, hard eyes that blazed with fury. His mind scoured all of what he knew of buildings like this.
“The boiler room! Of course! If I can get there, I can blow this place sky high and take her down with it.” He forced himself up and started to run, turning around briefly to wave at Laurel. As expected, she gave chase, her movements more akin to a rabid animal than a hunter. He ran through winding corridors and locked doors, barely dodging the stray bolt of lightning or fireball. He could already feel the exhaustion from dying and reviving thrice in a row; he’d be too tired to outpace Laurel if he had to die again.
He reached the door to the boiler just as Laurel caught up, tackling Cirius and sending him crashing through the old, rotten wood. She kicked him in the face as he slid across the floor, preventing him from righting himself. She stepped forward and pressed her foot down on his back.
“I wonder,” she said, “how many times can you die until it becomes too much? Is there even a limit for you?” Her voice was sing-songy and slightly manic, like glass about to shatter into thousands of sharp, sharp fibres. Cirius rooted around his pocket. He didn’t feel any explosives. He clicked his fingers and a spark flicked to life, the cyan light barely visible before fizzling out.
“I mean, if there is, I certainly haven’t reached it yet.” He clicked again and a bigger spark emerged. He managed to shoot it out of his index finger right towards one of the thermal tanks. The tiny spark travelled through the air, hit the tank and did absolutely nothing.
“Well. We’re screwed.” As Cirius started to lament his poor planning skills, Laurel’s head snapped up.
“What was that?”
“Uh. Nothing,” Cirius replied like the excellent liar he was. Laurel cocked her head. “Oh, so that sound from behind that thermal tank over there was nothing?” She lifted her arm and her hand flared with electricity. “Hope you won’t mind this, then.” She shot a bolt of lightning and hit the thermal dead centre. There was a beat of silence. “Oh, fuck.” A moment later, absolutely nothing happened.
“Oh. I really thought those were going to explode. Like, as soon as I realised I had blasted lightning at a thermal tank, I was all ‘that’s going to explode’.” She laughed. “Wow. That’s pretty funny.”
Cirius felt something brush up against the hand that was still in his pocket. He pulled it out.
“Oh hey! I still have an explosive disk!” He activated it, threw it at the thermal tank and the world exploded.
“-ey. Wake up.” Cirius blearily opened up his eyes. He was laid out across the floor next to what presumably had been the building. Claren was crouched next to him, snapping his fingers in front of his face.
“Oh, good. You’re awake.”
Cirius nodded and got up. He was so incredibly tired, but a sense of accomplishment filled his chest. “We did it.”
Claren nodded. “Indeed we did.”
There was a small silence before Cirius broke it. “Hey, about what you said before. I know it probably isn’t much, coming from me, but,” Cirius hovered his hand above Claren’s shoulder. “I think you’re really awesome.”
Claren bowed his head. “Thank you, Cirius.” He stared at the hand. “I’m sorry, what is this?”
“Well, I heard from bossman that you don’t like physical touch. So I’m doing this to show reassurance while still respecting your boundaries.”
Claren blinked. “That’s… pretty thoughtful, actually.”
“Hey, uh, am I safe to go now?” Winston asked, standing a few feet away and ruining the moment.
“Yeah, it should be all good,” Cirius responded before a bolt of lightning ripped through Winston’s head.
Claren immediately flared up his shield around the two of them, blocking the next bolt of lightning. Laurel, her mask half-shattered to show her furious eye, tuxedo torn with skin scraped raw underneath, and arm clearly broken staggered towards them.
“You clever, clever little fucker. You led me on quite the wild goose chase.” Her mouth twisted into a manic grin. “Typically, I’d just leave you be. But now? I think I’m going to kill the shield guy first and string out his body across the buildings here. Then I’m going to throw the little one in a box and toss him into the deepest, darkest part of the ocean.” She hoisted her glaive as lightning crackled around her, larger and more volatile than before.
Claren narrowed his eyes. “Cirius. Are you in any condition to fight?”
Cirius shook his head. “Going to be honest, this feels like a running situation.” As if on cue, a wall of flames erupted to life around them.
Something silent flew through the air. A thin, red line appeared over Laurel’s cheek. The crossbow bolt embedded into a wall. Laurel turned around and Harlow faced her, holding a crossbow aimed straight at her. There was a beat of silence as Harlow stared her down, their message held clearly in their hands. Laurel stamped her foot and a circle of flame enveloped her. When it cleared, she was gone. Harlow stared off towards the air, as if contemplating pursuing her, but turned to Claren and Cirius instead.
“I must admit, it would have been very useful having you here earlier.”
I was busy, they replied as they poured a blue vial over Claren’s wounds.
“Where’s bossman?” “Right here.” Devona popped into existence behind them and his eyes scanned the area. He looked down at the two of them. “Claren. You don’t look so good.”
“I could say the same about you. Broken hip?”
“Certainly feels like it. Cirius, you alright?”
Cirius flashed him a thumbs up. “You know it.”
“I’ll inform you of the details after I get these wounds treated,” Claren told Harlow. “I think I’ll be fine to walk on my own for now. I’ll let you know if I require any assistance.”
They made it all the way back to the original drop-off point and called Axon. After Claren explained a basic overview of why they were so late and Harlow was forced to promise to describe everything that happened, the portals opened up. Claren waved Harlow and Cirius through but held Devona back.
“Yeah? What’s up?”
Claren hummed. “Cirius was… the only reason that I survived. If it wasn’t for him, then I wouldn’t be here right now. He may seem strange and irrational, but-”
“When push comes to shove, you can count on him.”
Claren nodded. “It took me a while to realise that. But from what I’ve heard from Axon, you seem to be able to put up with Cirius’s less serious side very well. How is that?”
Devona scratched the back of his head. “I don’t know. Guess I’m just used to it.”
“I see.” Claren bowed his head. “Goodbye, Mr. Verdant. And do get that hip checked.”
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“Jamie, no! That’s a terrible idea!”
“Come on, Vivian. It’ll be great! I’ve constructed the perfect plan!”
Vivian folded his arms. “Oh yeah? And what is that, pray tell?”
“Alright, so, in order to make our own water-slide, we steal all the blankets from all the houses and wet them. We tie them together, and then we attach it all around the town and slide around! It’d be amazing!”
Vivian stared at his twin sister with a mix of disbelief and amazement. “And how are we going to attach it all around the town?”
She faltered. “I’ll… I don’t know. I’ll think of something.” She clasped her hands together. “Come onnnnn Vivi, please!”
Vivian sighed. “Fine. Just this once,” he replied, perhaps for the fifteenth time.
“Yay!” Jamie slung her arm over his shoulder. “I promise you, this is going to be awesome.”
“I’m sure,” he responded dryly, but he couldn’t hide the small grin on his fsce.
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Laurel Pariah was pissed. She winced as she jolted her broken arm, and she felt how her entire body radiated with pain from every movement she took. The wind was howling, so she didn’t hear the footsteps approaching until they were right behind her.
“You’ve returned,” the figure said brightly.
“That I have.”
The Dreamer hummed, and Laurel shifted her gaze to see him picking at his nails. “Did you achieve your mission?”
“I did. I just ran into some… complications.”
The Dreamer chuckled unkindly. “I can see that.” He cocked his head to the side, his expression hidden behind a mask decorated with white stars. “You broke your mask again. They’re not going to be pleased if you keep doing that, you know?”
“They collapsed a fucking building on me. What do you exp-”
The Dreamer put his hands up. “Hey now, hold your horses. Yes, yes, opponents were tough yadda yadda. I get it, I really do. Sucks to get your ass beaten so often, doesn’t it, poor little baby? I mean, I wouldn’t know, but still.”
Laurel grit her teeth. “Go fuck yourself.”
The Dreamer laughed. “Well then, I’ll see you later, Demon of Babel. Toodles!” He walked away, deep into the thicket of trees until he vanished from sight. Laurel kicked at the dirt before turning to walk away too, leaving only the wind to howl to an empty sky.

There’d been another shooting today, in some dainty little cafe downtown, in the places tucked so neatly away only people who had visited there their whole lives went. Pete Cordell sighed to himself as he stepped past the shattered glass. Once, the scene inside the cafe would have made his stomach turn. These days, the sight of eviscerated bodies and rooms painted with blood barely fazed him. The entire cafe was ruined, bullet holes riddling every surface imaginable. He whistled, low.
“They must have used up ten mags to do this much damage,” he observed out loud.
“Hey, you’re finally here!”
Pete looked up at the new voice - a man he’d worked with for a bit under four years now but still barely knew anything about - Wesley Smith. “Crazy shit, isn’t it? You’d think it was an action movie in here with the amount of bullets they dumped.”
“I’ll say,” Pete grumbled.
“That ain’t the weirdest shit though. Come over here.” Dividing the cafe in half was a massive sheet, and Wesley brushed past it as Pete followed. He stared.
On the ground was a gun - which wasn’t the first thing to draw his attention. What did draw his attention was the pool of blood on the ground, way too large for any normal injury to have caused. He moved his gaze around and his jaw slackened. Slumped against the wall were the remains of a black-robed man - although remains were generous, considering all that remained was a single arm, a head, and blood-soaked garments. The wall behind the remains was cracked and severely dented, as if something great and powerful had rammed into it. A few feet away, a body had its head entirely gone, nowhere to be seen, with only a spray of blood, a stain of flesh and the same deep impact on the wall where the head should have been.
“Pretty freaky, right?” Wesley’s facade of bravado wouldn’t have fooled even a child. “Makes you feel like you’re in one of them horror stories, you know?”
“I’ll say,” Pete repeated, coughing to get rid of his shaky voice. A buzz from his radio drew his attention, and he held it up to his ear.
“All officers to the station now. I repeat, all officers to the station now.” The voice on the other end was… strange, but Pete chalked that up to his wracked nerves.
He nodded to Wesley and ignored the strange feeling in his stomach. “Alright. Let’s go.”
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A few days later, Pete was flipping pancakes in the kitchen. His wife came up behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist as the kids squabbled around the table.
“Had a good sleep?” He asked as she rested her chin on his shoulder.
She hummed in affirmation. “How was the latest case?” she asked.
He frowned. It’d been another shooting, in some dainty cafe downtown, and he’d… hang on, what had he done? Before he could strain himself too much, a memory slotted into place and he relaxed.
“Oh, nothing special. Nothing special at all.”
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It was just a few minutes into the breaking of dawn that a massive clanging woke Devona up. He shot out of the bed, not falling out of the bed but instead scrambling for the lightswitch as he got to his feet. His brain pushed past the fight or flight instinct that had shattered his sleep and he relaxed again as his memories came back. A few months into WICCA’s formation, during the time that they had been starting to talk to each other for purposes other than business, they’d headed over to Cirius’s abode.
“And here is my bed!”
They all stared at the bare mattress lying upon a metal frame, only a thin scrap of fabric and something that was barely a pillow upon it. The rest of the apartment wasn’t faring much better, with only a mini-fridge in the kitchen and one of each bathroom item. The walls were a murky grey with the wallpaper peeling, and there was a stench of alcohol in the air.
Axon let out a whistle. “Damn, you live like this?” Her expression turned solemn. “Seriously, though, these conditions are pretty rough.”
Cirius shrugged. “Eh. Could be worse. I used to just find a dumpster that wasn’t full and sleep in there.”
Devona sucked in a breath. “That’s… really bad.”
Cirius gave another shrug. “Some dumpsters aren’t that bad actually. Getting chased away with a broom for being an intruder or like, getting shot, is worse.”
“Well, moving on from that depressing bit of background, you could for sure get a better apartment with how much you’re being paid,” Axon interjected.
Cirius’s eyes widened. “I could?”
“Yeah, man. You know how much money you have. It’s all in your bank account.”
His eyes widened further. I have a bank account?”
“What do you mean? I sent the details to you through your email…” Understanding dawned across her face. “Goddamn it.”
There was a crash outside of the apartment, drawing their attention towards it. Devona walked open to the door and gingerly opened it to reveal two men tussling upon the ground, swearing angrily at each other.
“Hey John!” exclaimed Cirius cheerfully as the man on top lifted his fist and slammed it on the other’s face.
Devona stepped forward with his hands held out placatingly in front of himself.
“Alright, now, let’s calm-”
Devona was interrupted as he was talking by a fist swinging straight towards his face. As he reeled back, another hand was already closing over it and forcing the assailant down. Harlow stared down at the man they were forcing down with a singular hand, watching as his expression strained to continue to look defiant through the pain.
They pressed down further, causing the man’s expression to shift into pain as he hammered onto the floor with his free hand, hollering to let him go.
Devona gingerly placed his hand on their shoulder. “Hey, I think that’s enough now.”
Harlow raised an eyebrow at them. He tried to punch you.
“Well, he didn’t punch me.”
Harlow tilted their head but let go of the person, allowing him to run off with a bruised ego and most likely a bruised wrist. The other man got up and staggered away, the smell of alcohol fresh in the air. Devona let his hand drop as Harlow watched them go, wiping their hand upon their cloak.
After that, Cirius had thankfully used the money to get a proper apartment. Or rather, several proper apartments since he kept getting kicked out. And now he had found himself inside Devona’s new house. Devona sighed and rubbed his eyes to get rid of the tiredness, heading down the stairs to see what the commotion was all about. Cirius was sprawled upon the floor, his pillow several feet away, the couch he was staying on half tipped over and his blanket looking like it had been attacked by a savage animal.
He waved. “Hey bossman.”
Devona stared. “How.”
“Well, you see, I kinda woke up. And stuff was like this.”
Devona sighed and picked Cirius up. He held him like a cat, with his hands underneath the arms as Cirius’s legs dangled, and plopped him down onto the couch after pushing it down with his feet. He began to clean up the rest of the mess. Cirius shot to his feet instantly.
“I could-”
Devona waved him off. “It’s fine. It’s early, just try to get some more rest in. I’ll get another blanket.” He continued to clean up in silence, blinking the sleep from his eyes. He turned and Cirius was still sitting up, shuffling his feet awkwardly.
“Well, if we’re not going to sleep again, why don’t we eat breakfast? I’ll get the cereal.”
They ate together in silence, letting the sound of chewing fill the air. As Devona was thinking about setting up a garden outside, Cirius spoke up.
“Sorry for the blanket. And for waking you up. And-“
Devona raised a hand. “I told you, it’s fine.” Internally, he frowned.
“Was Cirius still hung up about that?” He had noticed an uncanny silence, but he had drawn that up to tiredness. Speaking of, was Cirius even tired? Cirius had been wide awake every time Devona had gone to bed, and wide awake when Devona awoke. One time, Devona had walked blearily down the stairs to get a glass of water in the dead of night, and almost got a heart attack from Cirius suddenly talking.
“So, what’s the mission for today, bossman?” Cirius interrupted his train of thought, rocking on his chair and back to his usual bounciness.
“Well, if you read your email, you’d know,” Devona deadpanned before relenting. “It’s just an attendance to some event that acts as a cover for underground dealings. While Claren deals with negotiations, we mingle with the crowd unless Harlow needs some backup. They’ll be off stealing some documents.” He polished off the last of the cereal. “We should get some more rest before the mission. Don’t want to be too tired.”
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Claren and Harlow were already there when Cirius and Devona arrived. They were all dressed in suits again, like they had been at that party months back. Claren took a few seconds to assess their outfits. Before the mission, Claren had talked with Devona, telling him that he would stand out too much. His height was the most obvious, but according to Claren his posture was ‘too subdued and open to pass as a crime lord’. Instead, Devona would be with Harlow, finding the documents, while Cirius would be a possible back-up to Claren. Really, it was because it was doubtful that he would be able to carry out a stealth mission.
Devona went over to greet Harlow. After exchanging conversation, he grabbed Harlow by the shoulder and the two of them vanished. Claren adjusted his suit, the light glinting off of the two rings on his fingers. “Well, you can go and mingle with the party. If I’m in trouble, try to cause a distraction.”
Cirius nodded thoughtfully. “Explosions?”
“Try to keep those to a minimum.”
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Cirius was mingling, but he was not mingling happily. The people really did hold themselves in a different way than Devona did, with pushed up chests and little hand waves. Everyone who talked to him seemed to need to suddenly leave, so Cirius was currently standing by the food table chomping on dishes.
“Real boring party,” a voice drawled.
Cirius turned. He tilted his head and stopped biting down on the plate. Leaning up against the table with an easy casualness, dressed in a full tuxedo with bowtie and tailed coat, the speaker plucked a grape from the stem and popped it into her mouth. Her rainbow scarf swished as she swivelled her head to look down at him, and her mismatched eyes were lit with amusement. She seemed familiar, but Cirius couldn’t put his finger on why. “Wouldn’t you say so?”
Cirius thought about this. “Eh, it’s alright. I remember one time I blacked out at a party like this and woke up in a bathtub filled with ice.”
She threw her head back and laughed. “You’re a pretty funny guy,” she snickered, waving a fork at him.
Her smile tapered into a grin, and her eyes narrowed. “But in my opinion, this party could really use some better entertainment.” She pulled a mask over her face - one of a white demon with small, pointed horns, and drew a glaive from her back. She threw it. The glaive soared through the air, and Cirius watched as it trailed dried intestines through the air before embedding itself deep inside the chest of one of the guests. Screams tore through the air and Cirius remembered that murder was not good.
“Claren, there’s been a murder! That’s not good!” he yelled, his voice drowned out by the din of panic and magic. The woman dodged past beams of energy and fire, grabbing onto the handle of the glaive and swinging it in a wide arc around her, carving into anyone unfortunate enough to be nearby. Claren burst out from the room, his eyes narrowing and shield wrapping around him as soon as he realised the situation. He pressed up against the wall and then shot forward, like a rubber ball that had suddenly been decompressed. The woman’s cackling was interrupted as he slammed into her full force, sending the both of them crashing across the floor.
“Laurel Pariah. I didn’t expect you to show your face again so soon.” Cirius was close enough to hear them, and it helped that everybody had either ran away or died.
“So, my reputation precedes me,” Laurel responded brightly, kicking Claren off and swinging her glaive right at him. He raised his arm and it glanced off the glimmering shield, giving him an opportunity to land a blow at her gut. She stumbled back and he struck her across the head as she was darting backwards. Her glaive sliced through the air but ricocheted off of Claren’s shield, and he grabbed the bladed end to bring Laurel in closer. She kicked at him, causing her leg to bounce back and almost knock her over, only being held above ground by an uppercut directly into her stomach. She managed to stagger backwards, coughing.
“Wow, you really don’t play around do you?” she wheezed. “I didn’t expect to use my magic so soon, but I guess it can’t be helped.”
Claren moved back, tilting his head towards Cirius. “Go herd the people outside to safety. I’ll deal with her.” Cirius flashed him a thumbs up and headed in the direction of panicked shouts. Claren’s eyes scoured the room, as if looking for whatever Laurel may use against him. Speaking of Laurel, something strange appeared to be happening to her. Her skin seemed pale, almost bright. No, definitely bright - glowing, in fact. Before Claren could register it fully however, Laurel pivoted with a kick and sent a bolt of lightning slamming into him.
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The two of them had gotten past security with ease, Devona stealing documents from right under noses and Harlow repeating the pattern of fingerprints upon keyboards. The two of them were currently sitting upon beams, dangling their legs high above the ground.
Just a few more, and we’ll be out of here soon.
Devona tilted his head to the side. “These people really love to party, huh.”
Harlow chewed their cheek. Well, it’s sort of a coping mechanism. Unlike the more recent sorcerers like you and I, these people grew up in a society wholly made from those who possess magic. There’s a certain sense of… superiority within those places. To them, death was less of a constant presence. That was until the Scourges came. Suddenly humans, magic or not, were all pushed down a level on the food chain. That sudden shock of mortality, paired with the changing landscape of the world, is certain to cause some stress. They leaned backwards on their hands. Not to mention, it’s a pretty good cover for criminal activity.
Devona hummed. “Yeah, the world's a chaotic place.” He bowed his head slightly. “Do you think we can win? Against the Scourges, that is.”
Their tongue traced the inside of their mouth as they mulled, an action mirrored from others despite their mouth never being used to talk. It’s unclear. We don’t even know where the Scourges are coming from or what they are. There could be only a small handful left in the world, or there could be legions waiting to invade. We manage to push them back, but not without loss. The Scourge at Scotland was one of the weaker ones. The teleporting Scourge was one of the less destructive ones. And yet they managed to cause so much devastation. They tilted their head to meet his gaze. But I think we’ll win.
Devona smiled. “I hope so.”
How’s it going with Cirius at your place, by the way?
Devona scrunched up his forehead as memories came flooding in. “Well, he doesn’t eat unless I make him. Or really visit the bathroom since he doesn’t eat. I don’t even think he sleeps, at least not most of the time. I’ve also never seen him change his clothes. He seems weirdly nervous at times though. He’s probably destroyed like five of my blankets by now. He keeps giving me heart attacks at night by scurrying around the house. He tried to cook once and blew up the entire kitchen. I’m not even exaggerating, he had third degree burns all over his skin. Took me ages to patch him up, especially with him refusing to remove his clothing.” Devona sighed and noticed Harlow’s expression. They had a bemused expression on their face. “What is it?” You’re quite an attentive person, that’s all. They turned their gaze elsewhere. The last of the physical documents should be three doors down on the rightmost corridor.
“What will you be doing?”
Attending to my own business. I’ll meet you afterwards.
Devona nodded and vanished, leaving Harlow alone underneath the clouded sky.
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The hierarchy of the world was simple. At the bottom were the plants, the insects, the ones who barely fed themselves and were gorged upon or crushed by a wayward hand. On top, edging them out were the small predators, the mice and shrews of the world. And above them this and this and that until up on top the world, the pinnacle of power, was humanity. Of course, there was division within humanity. Some believed it to be race, or gender, or sexuality, or any other sort of arbitrary difference they’d use to hold a sense of superiority over others. But the true division, the fissure that stretched across like the mouth of a god, was magic.
Opal Pact was currently walking upon the tightrope across that fissure. To live in a world of magic without any of your own was common, given how billions of people did it, but to know about magic and to live in its world was less so. Of course, it was a lot less dramatic than her mini-monologues in her head, like the one about hierarchies, had made it seem. Most would expect fabulous displays of power, magic that could bend and buckle nations. Instead, they got people who could throw fancy balls that were basically slower, less effective bullets, or throw fireballs which were once again slower, less effective bullets, or become pinnacles of physical brawn who were immune to bullets and who were as susceptible to chemical warfare as anybody else. Even the ones who held incredible power weren’t immune to a knife in their neck in the dead of night. The point was, Opal was less of walking upon a tightrope and more of peering into a secret party and inviting herself in. Besides, if those unedited videos of cities’ destruction were anything to go buy, humans weren’t the top of the food-chain anymore, magic or not.
She whistled to herself, the tune of some forgotten song as she twirled a crowbar between her fingers. She knocked on the door to the security room and then smashed it open, interrupting the guard who was in the middle of trying to figure out why several of the cameras had stopped working. The smashing of the crowbar into his face sent several of his teeth scattering, and he collapsed onto his desk. He’d be fine, probably. Opal mentally shrugged with that thought and pushed him off the wheely chair, letting him flop onto the floor as she took a seat. She grabbed a can of oil from her bag and poured it out the door, letting it run down across the hallway. The tinted plastic she’d stuck to the lights before she’d made her entrance were just yellow enough that anyone who came rushing in wouldn’t have time to notice the oil until it was too late.
Opal slammed the door as shut as she could, kicking her feet onto the table and popping a piece of gum into her mouth. She chewed, letting the sugar flare upon her tongue as her fingers ran across the keyboard. There was a sound of people yelling, then the sound of bodies slamming against the wall and floor. She stretched her arms behind her head, kicking off of the desk to avoid the blast of energy that ripped right through the door. It was shoved open and Opal pushed off the wall towards the attacker, pulling out her taser and jabbing it into his stomach. He staggered and then slipped, falling chin-first onto the floor. She stepped off of the chair and kicked it, sending it bouncing around and knocking down the few guards who managed to remain standing. She slid across the floor, using the slickness to her advantage to weave past grasping hands and past the oil. Grabbing a matchbox from her hand, she struck a match and held it loftily between the fingers. The effect was immediate, with all the guards scrambling across the floors on either all fours or trying their best to stand up. She tossed the match to the oil-slicken ground and slid into the next room. The oil wasn’t flammable.
The oil eventually rubbed off from the friction, leaving Opal to walk along the floor. She eventually found what she came for. She smashed the lock off of the door, the alarm already having been disabled by her in the security room. She popped her bubble of gum and pushed the door open. Standing in the room, looking incredibly confused, was an incredibly tall man. He stared at her, the documents on the desk in front of him. She stared at him. He stared at her. She grabbed the tablecloth and threw it over his head, snatching up the documents as he stumbled back.
Opal dove out the door before the man could get his bearings, skidding across the floor and breaking into a sprint. She pulled out a bag of marbles and tossed it behind her, spilling the contents all across the floor. She used the crowbar to jam the door behind her shut, running past the winding hallways. The exit wasn’t far, and soon she’d be able to hop on her motorcycle and be scot free.
She wheeled around the corner and almost collided into a group of sorcerers. She could tell they were sorcerers since they immediately threw blasts of energy her way as she ducked behind the wall. One of them charged forward and punched the wall where her head had been. He lifted his arm to strike again and then vanished.
“Huh?” The other sorcerers seemed equally confused. Something appeared from nowhere and smacked into the face of one, leaving the last to look around panickedly before the frying pan knocked him out. The man from before appeared out of thin air, looking much more annoyed than he had before. He waved his pan at her face.
“Alright, who the hell are you?”
“Invisibility, probably. Strong as well if he managed to bypass the crowbar so easily, or crafty if he found another way to track me,” her mind supplied.
Opal rooted around for her spray-can. “Who am I? Oh, no-one really. Just a gal trying to make her way in the world.”
The man narrowed his eyes. “Would you be willing to hand over the documents?”
Opal pressed her thumb and index to her chin. “Eh, probably not.”
He sighed. He vanished right as Opal lifted her spray can and sent a blast of black into his face. She broke into a sprint, shoving the documents into her pocket as she continued to dash.
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Being short certainly had its shortcomings. Cirius couldn’t shout louder than the clamour, so he climbed onto whatever surface he could find and grabbed onto a plate and a fork. He scraped the prongs along the ceramic and the screech was loud enough to catch everyone’s attention.
“Alright, alright, listen up! I’ve been told to get you guys out of here, so that’s what I’m going to do.”
The people still seemed panicked and extremely suspicious. One of them aimed a hand full of fire at him. “Who the hell are you? And why should we listen to you?”
“You guys are running around too much! Look, that guy has other people standing on top of him!”
“Help.”
“In an emergency situation, it’s always good to have someone to direct everyone else. People tend to panic and move erratically, so having a leader allows the people to calm themselves down and move in a controlled manner, minimising the risk to themselves and each other,” Cirius recited. He felt a dash of smugness for remembering the entire thing.
The people did not seem very impressed. They stared up at him with confused and vaguely disgusted expressions.
“Anyways, the point is, we’re going to leave now.”
“What about the people back there!” one person exclaimed. “I have a husband who’s possibly dying right now!”
Cirius frowned. “What did he look like?” “He had- he has blonde hair, is wearing a suit with a blue tie-”
“Oh, I think I saw who you’re talking about!”
“Really? Was he alright?”
Cirius scratched his head. “Uh, well, if he can survive without his head on then he should be good.”
“What the hell is wrong with you!”
“Come on, man!” “Why would you say that?”
Exclamations and cries of dismay rose up from the crowd and suddenly everyone was yelling at him.They started to throw plates and utensils at him, throwing insults along with them.
“Alright, alright, let’s just calm down,” he tried to say over the clamour. A plate smacked onto his head and dazed him for a second. Frustration bubbled in his chest as the people kept on yelling and yelling and the noise built up and up until the frustration melded into anger and burst from him.
“Shut up! Shut up, all of you!” he yelled, his own voice barely rising above the chaos. He grabbed a plate of his own and threw it into the crowd. “I’m trying to save your goddamn lives you idiots!”
Something bright came flying at him and he felt his body light ablaze, the fire rapidly spreading over his clothes and flesh. A silence fell over the crowd, their expressions now of shock and bewilderment rather than outrage. He moved his head towards the one who threw the fireball, the slight movement drawing gasps from the people around him. He jumped down from the table and walked towards the attacker, everyone else clearing a wide berth around him. He dug his fingernails into his bubbling flesh, tearing deep and causing blood to spill out, dampening the flames with a hiss. Blood dripped onto the floor as he flexed his hand before pulling his arm back and punching the elemental in the face. His hand practically exploded, spraying gore and viscera all over the man’s features. He fell to the floor with a horrified scream, too distracted to notice Cirius lifting a chair until it was already coming down on his head. Cirius patted down his body, ripping away at skin where the fire refused to die out. He turned to the crowd - or at least, the blurry outline of the crowd.
“So, are we ready to go now?” he asked brightly. He lifted his hand to scratch at his face and felt bone. The crowd nodded, subdued. “Pick that guy up, by the way.” He turned to the exit and they all followed suit.
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Devona was not having a good time. He’d managed to avoid most of the spray, but he’d needed to wipe away at his eyes before they stung too much. He floated past the groaning guards on the oil-slick floor, up the stairs to the upper floors. Marbles were strewn across the ground, and one man was rolling around while clutching his spray-painted eyes. The window on the far end was smashed open despite the latch being unlocked. Peeking his head around, he could see the perpetrator running along the rooftop, sticking her tongue out at the people on the ground. She grabbed an egg from her pocket and slung it at the head of one, exploding it all over his face as he tried to grab his gun.
She ducked down and slid along the tiles as bullets fired above her head, grabbing the side and swinging down into the window. A few seconds later, a chair was flung out and slammed into the remaining guards. A guard rushed up to the window next to Devona, pulling out a machine gun. Devona wasn’t a fan of excessive violence against his enemies, so he introduced his face to a frying pan. At the same time, the thief, as Devona had dubbed her, was thrown from the window. She managed to grab onto the curtain and ripped it as she slid down the wall, landing with a thud onto the ground. Standing there in the doorframe, holding onto ruffled documents as air swirled was a guard, more filing around her with magic swirling in the air.
Devona felt movement behind him and phased out, dodging the blast of energy that would have taken off his head. He grabbed the guard and phased them out with him, using their newfound weightlessness to throw them as hard. All eyes snapped to the man as he flew through the air, giving Devona enough time to swoop down and phase out the thief.
He dropped the two of them on the roof of the building overlooking the guards as they looked around in surprise. The thief immediately got to talking.
“So, you can phase out, huh? I thought you might have been a Neoteric, seeing as you look less out-of-touch than a lot of other sorcerers. Do you have a cool name for your discipline?”
Devona glanced at her. “It’s incorporealism.”
She rolled her eyes. “Bo-ring. You develop a whole branch of magic and you give it some lame name like that?”
“It’s not- whatever.”
She sighed and rolled her shoulders. “Why don’t we make a truce?” she said suddenly. “Just until we get the documents. Especially since they see us now.”
Devona looked down just in time to weave to the side and let the lightning pass by him. There was a woosh of air and all the guards were upon the roof, one of them still holding the documents in her hand.
A gust of air, a blast, and several bullets connected with nothing as Devona vanished. He grabbed one guard and threw them off, lashing out with only his foot physical and kicked another guard right in the stomach. Weave, dodge, strike, move back, more forward. The movements weren’t as fluid as they could have been, and he winced from a graze across his arm, but it wasn’t long before he and the thief were the only people still standing upon the roof.
She raised an eyebrow at him. “Wow. Not bad. You’re quite the combatant.”
Devona started looking around for where the documents had fallen, turning his back to her. “Thanks.”
“What’s your name by the way?”
He lifted up one of the unconscious bodies. “It’s Devona. Yours?”
“Bergeron.” A strange name, but Devona wasn’t one to judge. “Say, I’ve just to ask, why did you save me back there?”
Devona frowned. “Is it not enough to not want to see another person die?”
She hummed. There was a bit of movement from behind him, and Devona phased out as a taser struck where he had just been. He phased back in, lashing out with a pivot and kick that slammed into her gut. He grabbed his pan and swung it at her head, clipping only her hair as she ducked down and he withdrew his body as she jabbed with her taser again. He slammed his pan onto her arm before she could reel it back in. Her taser dropped and Devona managed to strike her across the head, sending her stumbling back. She clutched his arm as if it was broken and Devona faltered slightly, just long enough for her to lash out with another hidden taser and hit him right in the gut. She grabbed onto her crowbar and smashed it against his head, with him managing to only slightly dodge the impact. He phased out again and grabbed her by the arm, throwing her against the wall. He stumbled, his vision turning white as rivulets of blood ran down his nose. Before he could recover he felt the crowbar slam into his hip and his legs buckled. The cool metal of the taser pressed into his back and jolts ran through his body.

Killer: Timelord
Power: Time Manipulation press M2 for 0.5 seconds to activate Time Manipulation for 8 seconds, when it is active, every survivor perform actions (everything included, running, vaulting, repairing etc.) is done at 66% of original speed. Killer does everything (same as survivor actions) at 80% of original speed. Time Manipulation instantly ends when gets stunned, blinded or performs M1.Time Manipulation has a cooldown of 15 seconds or 10 seconds when he hits a survivor during Manipulation. (cooldown is displayed on survivors profile but only killer can see it)
Secondary Power: Spacetime Dash After hitting 4 survivors with M1 during Time Manipulation, second power activates. Hold secondary power button for 2 seconds to charge it, when fully charged a mapwide noise is created. When fully charged you can let go off button to dash for 8m through walls (same rules as Nurse, no going throught borders etc.) and survivors hit with this ability instantly go down (how many hits left to activate is displayed down left near power icon).
Perks:Growing Strenght: each time you hook a unique survivor gain a token
1 token: you get an increase in the speed of picking up and putting down Survivors, breaking pallets and walls, vaulting through windows, and damaging generators by 10%
2 tokens: M1 cooldown is shorter by 10%
3 tokens: your terror radius is decreased by 8 meters
4 tokens: every survivor's aura is revealed to you each 40 seconds
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Hex: Thrill of the Trial: when every survivor is alive, their repair speed is reduced by 15%, when any survivor reaches struggle phase this is reduced to 10%.
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Destroyer of Hope: this perk activates for 120 seconds when 2 gens are remaining and depending on how many survivors are left you get following bonus
4 survivors: their repair speed is reduced by 15%
3 survivors: their repair speed is reduced by 5%
2 survivors or less: no bonus
​
Survivor:
John Whittak (lore in one sentence is that she was meant to fight Timelord and destroy him lol)
Perks:
Help from the future: first opened chest guarantees you to get ,,Star Tracker'' limited item (when in hand, hold M2 for second and release it to see killer's aura for 5 seconds and item is destroyed). Spawns an additional chest in the trial
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I got your back: stunning or blinding a killer grants you a token, when healing someone press active ability button to consume a token and instantly heal 50% of progress. Progress of healing that you healed someone can't be regressed.
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I will do it: after being chased for 30 seconds, gain a token up to 6 tokens. When repairing a generator press active ability button to lose all tokens and add 5% of progress for each token.
Killer gameplay changes:
Added a FoV Slider
Shadowborn: survivors now ,,glow'' (the same as you are playing Freddy or Dredge)
Monitor and Abuse: when outside of chase your TR is decreased by 12m, when in chase your TR is increased by 12m (FoV bonus removed so other aspect or perk was changed)
​
Survivor gameplay changes:
Survivors repairing speed can't go lower than 70% or normal speed
After 15 minutes of trial pass, survivors repair speed is increased by 3% per minut (a nerf to combat excessive and long 3 gens)
​
Killer twix... I mean tweaks
Trapper: after hooking a survivor, two furthest traps will arm themselves
Wraith: increased movement speed when uncloaking by 5%
Nurse: starts the trial with 0 blinks
Myers: survivors gradually regain their stalk when they perform conspicous actions
Freddy: Survivors start the trial asleep
Slinger: increased movement speed to 115%
Nemesis: amount of points required to reach tier II were reduced by 1
Blight: starts the trial with 1 token
Wesker: after being unhooked, infection won't progress until you perform a conspicious action
I know that it's a lot of changes but please tell me what you think about it!!

Did a full rear fender swap + side plate eliminator. Tail light has integrated turn signals. Fender was painted locally, he used “John Deere Blitz Black”… almost a perfect match.

If you’re an FP&A manager or above, I’d be extremely interested in your professional development choices.
I’ll share a couple of courses I’m currently taking:
Udemy Company Valuation Masterclass by John Colley. The instructor has done hundreds of valuations and has over twenty years of experience in investment banking. He covers all types of valuation methods including DCF. So far so good.
Wall Street Prep Excel Crash Course. TBH, it’s been a bit of a slog to get through it. They are determined to teach you how to use excel without a keyboard. Some of their suggestions are a bit of a wash efficiency-wise: to get to the cell format dialogue box, is CTRL-1 really that more efficient than mouse right click and selecting Format Cell. On the other hand, if you want to format the column widths for your highlighted range of data, I did find the tip to use ALT-H,O,I to be incredibly useful and something I now use regularly.

Good morning! My husband and I were passed down a 1983 John Deere 116. We have looked online to try to find a compatible bagger to go with it without luck.
Does anyone here have any knowledge or experience finding a bagger that will work for this model?

The black domes, they were pocket dimensions, which were completely detached from the material world. Bound to the stream of souls, flowing inside the ephemeral branches of the world tree, they presented a personal hell for each person cast into them. They are a limbo of regrets, the hell of one’s own making, places where the living meets the dead.
There’s only so many ways to elope them. One must either reconcile with the restless souls, or join them, succumbing to their rage and regret that they carried into their afterlife. After all, to even get there, one must possess unparalleled strength and resilience; and only those who had caused deaths and destruction on their path to greatness can even hope to get to this trial.
Freia, Flare, the First princess of Jioral. For some – a good friend, lover, and companion. For others – a nightmare embodied, a vessel of divine powers, a force to be reckoned with. She had many enemies: princes and princesses felled by her authority, treacherous servants and greedy nobles, the knights, who opposed her corruption, slavers and bandits, destroyed on her quest for redemption and restoration of herself… But there were more. Children she had burned, serving her kingdom, women who perished by the tides she conjured, men that had been torn apart by raging tornados of her making, elderly that were buried under the rubble she created…
And how did she oppose them?
“Flagella terram et vescere inimicis meis, o magnum tempestas ignis!” The sorceress chanted, spinning her staff above her head. Then, right before the raging mob reached her, she hid from them behind a vortex of fire. One move and this wave of heat would incinerate everything and everyone in this accursed realm. But…
“TRAITOR!”
“DON’T HIDE FROM US, FLA-A-A-ARE!”
“COME TO US, SISTER!”
“YOU WERE NEVER ONE OF US!”
“USURPER!”
“GIVE ME BACK MY MOM!””
“THE FALSE PRINCESS!”
“SUNNARI (die)!”
“THE DAUGHER OF A WHORE!”
“YOU SHOULD’VE ROT IN THE SLUMS!”
Curses and jealousy, bitterness and hatred. The chorus of tortured souls surrounding the fiery boundary couldn’t be silenced even by the roaring flame. There couldn’t be any redemption.
“I’m sorry for all of you, who unjustly died by my hand!..” And even though there were people deserving their apologies, those who had to perish in favor of Flare’s political ambitions, those she sacrificed to appease her tyrannical father…
“THEN JOIN US, FLARE!”
“PAPA! WHERE ARE YOU?! GIVE HIM BACK!”
“REPENT, BITCH! DISPELL YOUR WITCHCRAFT!!!”
“But I won’t give in to you!” The pink-haired woman exclaimed, absorbing mana into her staff. “Furthermore, there’re those of you I will never regret killing! And there are those, for whom I must live! I MUST GET OUT OF THIS PLACE!!!” Then, she slammed the lower tip of her weapon into the floor made of the absolute darkness. Instead of wailing, being consumed by fear, guilt, self-loathing, and, ultimately, perishing, Freia sundered this entire “world”. One magical strike from her, and cracks of white and gold covered the entire dome. The wall of fire faded, but when the vengeful spirits rushed forward to maul their prey, they crumbled into piles of black salt. “I’m so… so sorry!” The girl lamented, kneeling near the remains of children, whose future she stole. “But I… I must move forward. I must save…”
…
Sparks and crackling, whistle and dazzling – time and time again the surge of lightning breached through the veil of darkness.
“UO-O-O-O-O-O!!!” A guttural scream filled the oppressive silence under the dome. Eve Reese, so childish and bashful, so eager to prove herself, now wore a stone mask of indifference. “Nira-a-a (no-o-o)!!! Yuarmta (I won’t forgive you)!!!” Cornar yelled, held still by at least seven shadows, he had been tortured, killed, bruised, smitten by the raging element of lightning. No longer did the girl see him as a threat; no longer did she cower at the feet of her former husband. Maybe, Eve was condemned to getting back her memories as a means of punishment, something that would make her sympathize with this petty little tyrant…
“Yuarm yau (I don’t need your forgiveness).” The Me-ua kahul spoke, looking at her crackling right arm, trembling with power and guilt combined. Not for forsaking her would-be-spouse, not for becoming Panakea’s pawn…
These souls, these loyal shadows – turned out, she never called upon them… until the very end. Her subjects, her brethren… Eve feared that if she let them out, they would tear her tyrannical husband into little pieces.
“Haa… Haa…” And now, she had to choose. To turn around and let someone else fix her problem, or… “Haa… HAA!!! HAA!!! HAA!!! SUNI (I’ll kill you)!!!”
A Punch to the maw, to the chest, through the ribs, to the heart! He didn’t die! He couldn’t die here! This scumbag of a man, this monster just wouldn’t go away! No matter how much pain she caused him, no matter how many times she slit his throat, broke through his torso, shocked him with spells, cut him with magical light…
And what of Cornar?
“A-A-A-A-A!!! A-A-AGH!!! HA-HA-HA-A!!! NA SHENBATA, SETOAN (you can’t get rid of me, woman)!!!” The son of Hakuo never relented. He relished in his immortality, laughed through the hellish torments Eve inflicted upon him. The skinned lion spotted a weakness in Eve’s heart, and he pressed at it, as if breaking the girl would get him back to the world of the living…
No, he wanted to take Eve to the world of dead.
“Gha-a-a-a… Agh-h-h…” The queen-to-be grabbed her forehead, her rugged breath not only siphoned all the focus out of her, threatening to cast the girl into a pit of despair, it also deteriorated her control over the mana she wielded. Unlike the city of salt, there was enough ambient magic to harvest here, but doing so would require skills, precision, and, most importantly, personal discipline and control over one’s own mind.
“Praibi, orna Iblis (Drain yourself, my Iblis)!” The prince of Batnara shashu tribe provoked, feeling the grip of the shadows losing its strength. A little more, and he’d be free… A little more…
“Hm…” But Eve wouldn’t relent. She once again covered her arm in a coat of magical lightning. She would never surrender; the queen would never let anyone treat her like a slave ever again. Not after Keyaruga’s perseverance taught her a lesson of resilience. Not after his gentleness, however tainted by his wounds, showed her what true love should look like.
She took a swing, prepared to strike…
“…” But then, two winged shadows stopped her hand. Amda and Sana, they were barely recognizable in their spiritual forms… but Eve would never mistake her parents for anyone else. They couldn’t speak, yet they still communicated with their daughter through other means. Emotions, wishes, urges – they never wished such evil to befall their daughter, but what they hated even more – was to see their child descend into the same pit.
“I… I don’t… have to?..” They asked her to stop, to let them relieve her of that burden. “B-but!.. No! You will die!” The girl snarled, grabbing her parents in a hug. She knew what was to come – her mother, father – they wished to sacrifice themselves to drag Cornar back to the afterlife. But that… wouldn’t that mean she’d lose them all over again? Wouldn’t…
“…”
“Yes! You’re dead! So what?! What do I?..” The feeling of pain and powerlessness engulfed the verdant woman. Barely had she found the strength to stand before her fallen tribe, before those who she desired to see the most now left her.
“YOTJAR (finally)!!!” With Eve’s will getting weaker, so did the shadows of her ethereal court. Her tyrannical husband finally broke free, slamming and stomping her shadows, as they fruitlessly tried stopping him. Amda and Sana Reese hugged their child for the last time… and now they stood up to defend their precious daughter. That is… the least they could do.
…
Freia broke inside another dome. From the outside, they looked like bright constellations of stars, formed on the points of a massive, galactic-scaled pentagram. The personal chamber for each of the contenders. One was broken from the inside, collapsing inwards, into a black hole with an orange halo – this was Freia’s dome. There were four more. Two were dimmed, two still shone brightly. The Hero of Magic travelled through this empty space, lit by numerous distant stars. In her current form, things like speed, form, and time – none of them mattered, aside from her destination. And now, she had to choose one of the two luminous chambers.
…
What is true power? Does one determine this abstract concept by the weight one can lift with their muscles? Maybe it was the charisma necessary to lead the masses? Enough money to influence others? Authority earned or inherited?
“Well-well-well…” Whatever the answer truly was, Ellen had none of it right now. No strength to fight, no troops to hide behind, and certainly – those who opposed her now had little if any need of whatever amount of gold she now carried.
“WENCH!”
“TANOUTUR (murderer)!”
“NEZAH (why)?!”
“MERA RIVARO (my life)!..”
“YAU MA (how dare you)!”
“YOU’LL PAY FOR WHAT YOU’VE DONE, BITCH!!!”
Oh, they came for Norn. There were hundreds, if not thousands of them, some she could recall from her Murian and Teuteccain campaigns – the series of expansions past the great wall; others were the court warlords she and John unseated in her ascension; rebellious villagers too came to exact their revenge on the younger princess, after her demons decimated them; and there were the victims of Buranikka’s carnage. This was the mountain of corpses Norn Clatalissa Jioral used to climb onto the very peak of political power…
“Now then, what do you want from me? An apology? Maybe my penance?” Even now, surrounded by countless dead souls, whose entire being now revolved around their grudge, the girl wouldn’t let herself be crushed by their rage. Not mentally, at least.
“DIE!”
“MAN WOR YAKSI (give me your eyes)!”
“SUFFER, YOU MONSTER!”
“I JUST WANTED TO LIVE!!!”
And so, hundreds of voices began howling in unison. So passionate, so eager to share their hardships and aspirations, that Ellen actually started pitying them a little. So many words, so much pain in them.
“Haa… I guess, that something like this was bound to happen someday. Well…” Instead of listening to the rest of the traumatizing nonsense and wailing, the crimson-headed cutie just began… to simply undress. “I don’t have the power to struggle, I can’t break out of here, and all of you came here for me. So go on. Rape me, maul me, kill me, do whatever you want. I’ve already done everything I wanted.” Ellen, now naked and completely defenseless, stretched out on the ethereal black floor, looking into the endless black void above her. The raging souls now came closer and closer, dozens of faces now loomed above her, as their hands reached out to grab the fallen warlady and tear her apart. This… was the end.
Keyaruga, Setsuna, sister… I hope you won’t miss me too much.
And so, she closed her eyes. Time to finally die.
…
…
…
There was no pain, nobody dragged the girl around, not even a single blow fell upon her. Ellen was… safe?
“A-A-A-A!!!”
“UGH-H-H!!!”
“YOLA-A-A-A-A (it hu-u-u-urts)!!!”
Slice and dicing, the ripping of flesh and clattered bones, “death” of a sort, dealt to the undying, torment for the tormented who themselves wished to inflict suffering upon her – someone kept the restless souls away from the princess. Someone precise, fast, and masterful with his tools of mayhem.
“Haa, is that you, Organ?” Ellen asked sullenly. Denied her excruciating retribution once more, she could only cover her tightly shut eyes with her palms.
“How did you know, Your Highness?” Indeed, it was him. As brutal as he was gallant, the deceased demigod was the only one out of these dead souls, who spoke to her, and not wailed at her like some sort of a beast.
“I know only two men, who’d come for me here, and the other isn’t so discreet, you moron.” The young general replied, opening her eyelids. The first thing she saw was the Champion of Jioral, covered in black blood. His prized amber eyes were no more, only black gaping holes were there instead. “Why’re you here? Do you want a piece of me for yourself?” The girl asked, still unwilling to stand up. Honestly, she felt robbed at this moment. This would be such a fitting end for her, but no! “Don’t tell me you’ve just barged in here to… Pff! PROTECT… me.” The second princess spat these words through her painfully clenched teeth.
“First things first, Lady Norn, I suggest you cover your shame and cease this indecency.” The warrior spoke, piercing and slashing the mob with his sword, impaling them with his hidden blade, tossing them back with his kicks. He was far from his prime form, and so, wounds and sores, cuts and lesions were left on him, as he, alone, overpowered dozens of raging men and women, keeping them away from the girl he swore to protect. Indeed… “Forgive me, princess, but I made a vow to your mother, and death is hardly a valid reason to…”
“YAKS… (giv…) A-A-A-A!!!”
“…to renounce my…”
“DOKI-I-I (step away)!!!”
“…loyalty to her!”
Despite everything, no matter the odds, Hawkeye continued to push back the angry spirits. He couldn’t dodge, as every missed blow could land on the lady, he couldn’t step back, as she needed protection more than any time in her life, and, certainly, sustained by this oppressive dimension, he couldn’t die. He couldn’t kill anyone, as they just rose anew from their own black blood, but the man couldn’t retreat.
“He-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh-heh…” The princess chuckled, curling her torso in order to sit up. It hurt her stomach, but the girl persevered nonetheless. “Why am I always surrounded by stupid stubborn men, who just can’t help but dingle their balls before me? Seriously, a dead man, upholding a promise to a dead woman, how much more ridiculous can this get?” The girl scoffed, pulling back her panties, bra, and whatever she left lying around, back on. After all, why even bother now? “Be honest, idiot! What do you want from me?”
“I came here…”
Slash, backflip, tackle, toss – Organ Trist twirled around his commander, pushing back everyone, who came too close to his prized princess.
“…to ask you, Lady Norn!..”
Shoulder slam, side-kick, a flurry of bloodshed embodied in the son of Artemis!
“…to save my…”
Stabbing enemies with that hidden blade, crushing their skulls with the handle of his blade, ripping their eyes out and tossing them away – however useless this double-sided brutality may seem, Hawkeye had purpose, skill, and, most of all, conviction, that allowed him to push the mob away.
“…daughter! Save Marianna!”
After all, what can be stronger, than a father, eager to protect his dear child?
“And you think keeping me alive will help you with that? You, moron, this bloated pigeon trapped me here! I have only one way out – fucking death!” The second princess, now properly clothed again, yelled however loud she could. Unable to comprehend the reasoning behind this idiocy, the girl just stood there, pulling her crimson hair. “Also, you’re severely mistaken! I’m not Norn! Norn’s dead! My name is…”
“…Elly! Elly-y-y!!!” Barely had the princess opened her mouth; before the dome had been breached from the outside. The Hero of Magic emerged above the ground. She levitated, using magical blue flames; she secured her sister by forming a wall around her, a barricade made from powerful ice spears. The sorceress even went so far as to send one into the undead Champion, it was one he easily avoided, though. “Step away from my sister, Organ!!!” The raging magician demanded, pulling her sibling towards her with a gust of mystical wind.
“Ghh! Oh, hey there, Friea!” The fallen warlady spoke, bracing herself against the dizziness her brief flight had caused. Still, this didn’t look good. The last time those two met, Hawkeye severely injured the pink-haired girl, and she just wouldn’t live through it again, unless two gods appeared to help her. This time, though, it was her turn to be a deity-savior.
“Get away! You’ve bested me once, but this time, I can crash this entire realm down onto your head!” The Hero of Magic promised, putting her staff between her sister and her enemy.
“Aw shit, this just gets better and better…” The little genius lamented, nervously shaking her head. Not only was her glorified suicide rudely interrupted, but now this situation threatened to kill her sister as well. Still…
“Elly, Elly… Ellen? Ellen the Adopted?” Despite Freia’s expectations, Organ Trist was more interested in the new name she called Norn, rather than anything else, really. He already had his fair share of battles, after all. “Ho-ho-o! I guess, in the end, you really did become the better version of yourself! And the ‘brother’ in question – is that sir Keyaru?” The blinded man asked with the same smugness he once boasted with in his grandiose life.
“What’s the point of answering you now? Aren’t we just traitors to you?” The heroine replied with every bit of animosity she had in her. “Hold on, Elly, I’ll get you out of here.” Freia stated, charging her staff with the magic that shaped this entire “world”.
“Heh, aren’t you afraid of what that damn poisoned pigeon might do to you for breaking her rules?” The crimson-haired cutie scoffed, witnessing the entire black dome covering with cracks.
“I don’t care about her rules! All I want is to see you safe!” The sorceress spoke with even more defiance toward Caladrius than Norn ever had in her. If needed, she would challenge this feathered nightmare to a duel, anything, just to save her family.
“I see…” Hawkeye uttered, kneeling before the two girls. All that time, rather than monitoring Freia’s moves, his supernatural senses were aimed outside, to make sure no restless souls cross the fence of magic ice. But now… “I see your eyes, Princess Flare, they’re just like hers. I’m sure; you’ll make Lady Reeharoze proud of you yet.” Now, before he once again departs to the other side, there was one last thing to tell them. First praise, then a claim… “Lady Ellen, I beg of you. The life of Marianna now lies in your hands.” …and finally a plea. With all that said, Organ Trist crumbled, his body turned into black salt. And with it, the entire realm began to collapse in itself…
“Hold tight, Elly…”
…
And now, there was only one dark dome left. Arguably, the worst of them all, this particular world was to be the prison for Keyaruga… or his cemetery. No doorways to run into, no windows to jump from. He was alone, trapped with hundreds of those who were slain by his hand. Those poor bastards – the restless souls, their minds were so obsessed with hatred, and their grudge – powered by the sheer immortality of their ethereal blackened bodies. This was hell in its purest form. The question is – a hell for who, exactly?
“YE-E-E-E-E-EAH!!! IT’S HEALING TIME!!!” Keyaruga snarled and began splattering blood all over the place. Everyone who was touched by that substance became horribly mutated – their heads bloated, their muscles strained so much, they crushed their very bones! “WHAT’S WRONG?! KILL ME!!! KILL ME NOW!!!” The man demanded, dancing around his would-be tormentors with his blade, blessing his foes with the exquisite gift of perpetual agony! Saber in his right hand, Georgius on his left, one complementing another.
Despite what the lad asked, nobody could bring him down. His immortal flesh defied any blade, his bones healed in an instant, his mad frenzy alleviated any pain.
He thought he could kill his enemies for the second and final time, give them proper death in the most excruciating manner. He was wrong…
“DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE! AGAIN! AND AGAIN! AND ALL OVER AGA-A-A-A-AIN!!!” The hero yelled chopping off heads and severing limbs! He killed so many, he couldn’t even count the slayings! He murdered the same people over and over, each time their agony being more exquisite then the last!
Kill a man once, he won’t even notice, his rage will only rise! Kill him thrice – he’d waver! Five – and the seeds of fear are sown. Ten – and he’s broken completely!
Keyaruga just couldn’t help himself, he hated these scum so much, he just couldn’t contain all his passionate hatred. It was so strong, that the feeling of pure, raw, primordial wrath transcended every possible modification he had put into himself.
“A-A-A-A-A!!! UGH-H-H-H-H!!!” A soldier was weeping, hugging his boot. “S-S-S-S-SPA-A-A-ARE ME-E-E!!!”
“YO-O-OU!!! I remember you!” The healer spoke, raising the cretin by his neck. “My first kill! You watched me being raped, drugged… BEATEN!!!” The man yawped, slicing off his upper face with one nimble slice. “AND YOU NEVER!!! EVER!!! EVER FUCKING HELPED ME!!!” The lad, tainted by black and red blood, slammed the sentry into the ‘floor’…
“A-A-A-A-A!!! PLE-E-E-EASE!!!” …and gleefully sliced off his arms, ignited sparked his left armored hand into a gauntlet of blazing heat!..
“GU-GHH-GUU!!! UA-A-A-A-A-A-A!!!” And finally, cauterized the wounds, just so that the retard wouldn’t die too soon.
“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU LOOKING AT?!!!” The crazed avenger yelled, grabbing Leonard, so conveniently nearby, weeping. “YOU SAID, I’VE DONE NOTHING FOR THIS FUCKING KINGDOM?! I’LL SHOW YOU, WHAT I CAN DO NO-O-OW!!!”
And so he did, the madman rested his two fingers on the sadist’s forehead. A second passed, and a purple spark had announced the richest form of suffering.
“Oh… U-u… Uo-o-o-o-o-o… Khh…” Indeed, although it wasn’t as vocal as previous ones, Keyaruga was more than pleased with the result. He knew of a human having specific nerves, specifically for reacting to pain. And he just overloaded them. Toxic spiders, dangerous medusas, venomous snakes and scorpions – all of them could do that with their poisons. Hell, even Keyaruga could brew neurotoxins. But damn, this thing had one ultimate merit compared to all of those – the instant effect, so potent, in fact, that the victim can’t even cry out from the excruciating pain!
“He-e! That’s a neat trick.” The lad mumbled, approaching a maid, lying on the “floor” like an embryo. Flare’s bodyguard shivered and sucked her thumb, completely lost to this twisted world. Just one little touch… “Pam! You’re already dead!” Keyaruga sneered tapping his armored fingers by her temple.
“Uh… Uh… Ugh… W… Wha-?.. A-A-A-A-A-A-AGH-H-H!!!” The woman grabbed her skull, but it was too late. All the blood, bile, and even marrow now came into her brain, bloating it, up until it burst in a fountain of black blood and shining entrails.
“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!! I FUCKING LOVE IT!!!” The deranged healer laughed so loud, and his presence was so overwhelming now, that nobody even dared to come close to him, let alone attack, unless they wished to become a victim of a new twisted experiment. Oh, their fear, this agonizing panic! They’re giving me a fucking boner! I wanna fuck! I want a woman! Oh, this! This will do nicely!
And so, Keyaruga dropped his saber, unfastened his belt, ripped the dress, slapped that ass which he had found, grabbed it, pushed it in! The woman with a blackened tail was slowly dying of blood loss, but that barely concerned the lad. He grabbed her pelvis and began to move, so fast, so frantic, and so mindless, that no one could see a human in him. No-o, this was a wild beast, slamming his bulging cock into the defenseless female, too tired to react, let alone resist somehow. She wasn’t even tight, just barely warm, but even that was enough. A few minutes of such suffering inflicted on her, and he came, this was a brilliant orgasm, deeply perverted, and twisted to the very core…
Oh, that’s the fucking best! I love it so much!
Keyaruga grabbed her hand, wiped his penis with it, pull back his pants, and…
I don’t remember her. I wonder, who that is.
He pushed the body, rolling it to the back.
“Ha-a-a… Hello again, Kailia…” The mad lad recognized her instantly. An agent, sent to find and assist Eve Reese in her quest, hired by someone named Carol. But that alone wouldn’t be enough to get Keyaruga to brutally rape her. “You’ve killed my Norn, but I spared you. Heh, after Kali left, I tasked you to ward off whoever they sent after my Eve, but… It seems like you’ve failed. Really, really sad.” The healer spoke, resting his left hand on her dying flesh, recovering it in an instant. And just like that… “Oh, fuck!” She nearly stabbed him with a knife. Gods only knew where she got it from… “Sit still.” But then, Keyaruga just pressed his finger on her forehead, and completely shut down her limbs functions. He pitied her… but could do nothing for this miserable leopard woman.
“Haa… Damn, it’s getting boring here.” The hero lamented, picking up his weapon of choice. At this point, he just put it back in its sheath. Only then did he spot a couple of new faces in the crowd of weeping bastards. “You there! You don’t look like you should be here. What’s… wait…”
“STAY AWAY FROM ME, MONSTER!!!” The woman cried, she was weeping into her man’s now tainted shirt.
“Heh! He-heh! No-no-no-o! Oh no-o-o!” Keyaruga frantically shook his head, unable to believe what he just saw. This was the worst. This… “Anna! Kurt! What… What’re you even doing here?! I… I avenged you! You shouldn’t have…” His parents were there, they stood among the thugs, slavers, robbers, bandits, zealots, murderers… But they… they weren’t one of them…
“You killed us, traitor. You raped my wife, after everything she’s done for you. You’re disgusting little shit!” The mighty harvester told him, pointing his war-scythe at the hero. The only thing that held him at bay, though, was his spouse, loudly crying with black tears pouring from her eyes.
“Heh… You… really think I’d…”
“No. But you’ve proven it.” Kurt spoke with the coldest possible rage in his voice. Keyaru’s cruelty couldn’t be doubted, after all. Not after everyone he maimed this day. “I don’t give a fuck, what the hell is wrong with you, but I’ll slice your guilty ass as many times as I need.” The older man spoke, pushing Anna aside. And then, he lunged.
Kurt struck as a true warrior – he was swift, accurate, precise – his war scythe – basically a reforged farming tool, grazed Keyaruga’s torso, cut his leg, he even stabbed his foster son through his chest. But… there was no blood.
“Calm down, you two.” The hero demanded, stoically taking hit after hit, like the heavy glaive-like blade was nothing. While Anna crumbled to her knees, lost in her weeping, Kurt wouldn’t stop attacking. “You can’t kill me, I’m immor-…” Barely did the lad say so; before his foster father grabbed the handle in a wide grip, and just swept his head off with one precise strike.
“NO-O-O-O-O-O-O!!!” Strangely enough, despite all of the delusions his parents had about him, Anna just couldn’t stand seeing her child being killed so brutally. “A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A!!! WHY-Y-Y-Y-Y-Y-Y-Y?!!!” As Keyaru’s head rolled on the ground, the thugs, at least those who weren’t affected by any of hero’s inventive afflictions, started to get rallied again.
“You had it coming, you ungrateful dipshit!” Kurt spat through tightly closed teeth. He couldn’t watch, couldn’t face what he had to do with his adopted prodigy. Even if he was a criminal. Even if…
“I really did…” But the bastards weren’t enjoying the show for too long. Right when the healer seemed to fall, a new body started to grow from his neck-stump, the clothes, the pouches, the weapons – everything turned into ash just to materialize again on the proudly standing conqueror of death itself.
“What devilry is this?” Kurt’s reaction was understandable. A mix of fear, anger, and disgust, was all over his tainted face. In turn…
“KEYARU-U-U-U!!!” Anna just dashed forward to hug her child. No matter, how disgustingly atrocious his resurrection was, without even looking at the beheaded body that now lied nearby, the woman just went ahead and embraced the lad. She… didn’t seem to be in her right mind, even for a dead soul.
“Anna, I… I…” The shivers began taking a hold of him. His hands, his knees – they trembled so much, this simple touch he though he lost forever, this… This was enough to make him cry. “I’m sorry… I’m so, so, so, so-o-o sorry!..”
“DIE, FUCKER!!!”
“THAT YOU HAVE TO SEE ME DOING THIS!!!” Keyaruga yelled, grabbing Leonard by his wrist. Just a little pressure – and he dropped his sword, the weapon faded into nothingness. Then, the man pushed Anna back, punched his foe in the gut, and proudly showed his captive to his family. “Haa… He-heh! He-e-e… This… This is Leonard, Flare’s… right hand…” The hero spoke, this time trying to maintain his sanity, as his parents now cautiously looked at him. “I… I came from the future! I had to rewind time’s flow itself… Because Flare was evil, and he…” Then, the man put his hand onto the barely struggling imbecile, thus transforming him into Keyaru, the motionless child, whose entire mobility, except for breathing, was shut down for the ease of what he was about to do. “I killed Flare! And he took my guilt. Then…” Afterwards, the healer went ahead and summoned raging flames upon his free hand. Kurt and Anna watched motionlessly, as he placed the magic-shrouded palm onto his ‘own’ face, burned it, scourged the blackened flesh with the sorcery he ‘learned’ from Flare… “My trick was revealed, and he headed out to our village, looking just like me. The rest… you know the rest.”
And finally, Keyaruga dropped the motionless doll, unable even to cry out from the excruciating pain the Hero of Healing inflicted upon it. He then faced his parents, still shocked by such a display of merciless brutality, they couldn’t even properly reply, this entire spectacle of bloodshed, mayhem, rape, torture, demonstration of immortality, and now – proofs of metamorphosis – all of that left them utterly silent.
“Kurt, Anna… I’m so sorry I couldn’t save you… But I can’t let you, or any one of these fuckers keep me here! I… I have a family! Freia, Setsuna, Ellen, Eve – I so wanted you to meet them… But you can’t now. You… might not believe me, and I understand that.” The red-eyed lad uttered, as his posture slouched more and more, along with his fading bravery. “This is what it’s like to be a man! I must be strong! I have to be ruthless now, so that nobody would challenge me in the future!” The man added, now turning his back to his foster parents. He stood straight, he stretched his shoulders, took a deep breath, and… “LISTEN HERE, YOU FUCKING MONSTERS!!! WHAT YOU’VE FELT NOW IS BUT A TINY BIT OF WHAT I’LL DO TO YOU, ONCE I’M FUCKING DEAD!!! NOW YOU WILL GO INTO THE DEEPEST PITS OF HELL, AND WHEN YOU’RE THERE, PRAY I DON’T FUCKING DIE ANYTIME SOON!!! BECAUSE WHEN I FINALLY KICK THIS SHITTY BUCKET, I’LL FIND EACH OF YOU, AND WE’LL BE PLAYING FOR THE WHOLE OF ETERNITY!!! BUT WHY WAIT, WHEN WE CAN HAVE SOME FUN NOW, HU-U-U-UH?!!!”
The speech was told, the impact made. His words were so zealous, so passionately intimidating, that the weeping fools now reached a whole new depth of despair.
“GET US OUT OF HERE!!!”
“SAVE ME-E-E-E!!!”
“HE’S THE DEVIL!!! DE-E-EVIL!!!”
“UA-A-A-A-A-A-A!!!”
“KUUNDA (I’m so scared)!!!”
“HE-E-E-E-E-ELP!!!”
And so, this entire crowd, this mob of immortal corpses, just ran away. Everyone, who could still stand on their feet, began fleeing in panic, trampling each other in the process. What they failed to notice, though, is that the dome is endless only for its main victim. Everyone else just came up against the invisible wall.
The Trial of Heart – its goal is twisted, to be certain. To pass it would mean releasing the dead souls from their grudge toward you. A saint would shift it to forgiveness, but the deranged avenger pumped so much fear in those criminals, that their hatred was replaced by the purest and most animalistic terror. Still, with the task done, the souls began to dissipate in a white light. They would finally be free…
“REMEMBER!!! YOU’VE NOT SEEN THE LAST OF ME!!! WE’LL MEET AGAIN, YOU FUCKING SHITBAGS!!!” Unfortunately for them, though, Keyaruga’s long shadow still loomed above them all. And such, even in relief, the crowd continued to cry, to sob, to wail, to…
“Keya… ru…” But not all left because of dread. When the avenger turned around, his foster mother, crumbling into white flakes, stood on her tiptoes to give him a last kiss on the cheek. “You’ve grown… so much…”
And so, she faded. Kurt quickly followed, although it wasn’t forgiveness or benevolence that filled his raging soul. No, it was an impotent acceptance. He saw Keyaruga as a mirror, in which he saw himself, before he deserted the royal guard and found himself in Alban.
“Someday… you’ll follow my path…” And this was what the man spoke at last, dropping his war-scythe to the ethereal ground. With no souls to redeem in the most twisted of ways, the dome of blackness quickly turned insufferably bright.
The Trial of Heart had been passed.

Hey y'all! I've been posting here quite often since my MIL moved in and I'm grateful for this sub to let me blow off some steam. Here comes a wall of text because this is my one way of venting!
For a recap, my MIL is 78. She's always been the selfless angel type every time I've seen her prior to moving in. She was always hyper polite, always cooked drawn out amazing meals just for us, and got to spoil my son for our visits. Sure, she's old fashioned and a little batty in her own quirky way, but was always incredibly courteous and doting.
So, long story short, MIL was kicked out of her home where she paid next to no rent her entire life. Her sister (92 and still kicking) owned it until it recently went up for sale due to having multiple strokes and no longer being capable of managing it. MIL is broke. She only gets minimal social security every month. She's relied on her son, my husband, our entire marriage to solve her problems, financial or otherwise. He has taken care of her siblings as well out of love and not because he's obligated. It's been a rollercoaster of dementia homes, stories funeral costs, and nursing homes for as long as we've been married. We didn't want her to go searching for section 8 housing on such short notice, nor could we afford to get her her own place. She also lived about a 2 hour drive from hell away.
Our solution seemed simple. We went out of our way to rent a new home with an extra bedroom for her and one for her sister for when we may be able to employ a part time home nurse. She swore she would help out with her meals in between and I would take care of diapers when the nurse was off the clock. We thought, hey, it'll be a bit of a learning curve, but she's so sweet, there's no way we won't find a groove and get a little extra help with the kids. I was 32 weeks pregnant when she moved in. It seemed like a no brainer to get grandma to enjoy the birth of her second grandson and save us a fortune on elder care at the same time. We thought she would be happy to be with her son and his kids in a nice neighborhood.
I detailed it in my first post here, but long story short, MIL shocked me with her inability to adapt. Fist thing I noticed was that she had debilitating cataracts to the point where she's basically blind. She holds up a magnifying glass inches away from literally everything to see. On top of that, she's also basically deaf. We are taking care of these things but it's taking time.
But it went beyond that. She has no hobbies. I caught her staring at the TV on the "are you still watching" page as if there was a show on. She must feel like she's staring at a wall all the time every day. She has no interest in doing anything else except for chores.
BUT. She will only do these chores HER way and becomes extremely offended if I try to show her how we like to do things/ask her nicely to let me, say, let me put my own laundry away. I showed her how I like to fold my clothes and she smiled and pretended to listen, then literally IMMEDIATELY continued folding them the way I asked her not to. Multiple times to the point where telling her again would be too awkward. I literally picked then up and refolded everything she did one after another right in front of her and she just continued. She's also so blind that she was putting my bras in the pile with my son's shirts... and when I asked her to let me sort, since she mixed everything up so badly, she ignored me again.
Lastly, she undermines our parenting a lot. I've always been a believer that grandma gets to spoil the kids a bit more than parents, but my son (8) is on the spectrum and he is the type who has only made many of the strides he has due to our strictness in making him care for himself when capable. He's smart but can be lazy when things are done for him. He can't be babied or he regresses. Everything he knows how to do he had to be pushed into doing for himself, but he always learns to love the independence once he masters these life skills. I caught MIL literally spoon-feeding him within the first week. She was wiping his butt and now he leaves streaks in his underwear, waiting for somebody to wipe him. She dresses him. She brushes his teeth. These are all things we have worked tirelessly in getting him to do for himself. And when I politely remind her that this is not good for him and to let him be independent, I can tell that she gets mad.
All this time, MIL has proven herself to be the type to smile to my face and then slowly boil over her grievances. She will smile at me and then blow up on SO like he's her scapegoat. Lately, that simmering resentment has finally boiled over, and that's kind of the point if this post.
Here are some things, not limited to, that have slowly accumulated and eventually set my MIL off:

1. The other day, she cooked sausage links. She forgot to put the raw ones away in a ziploc bag so, overnight, they went bad and turned rock solid having been exposed to the open air. I saw them in the fridge and said "oh, please remember to put them in a bag! It's okay though, it's just a couple pieces of sausage!" It was a non-thing. Within moments, she teared up and ran to her room to cry. I followed her to reassure her that mistakes happen, that she can't beat herself up over nothing. Nobody doesn't make mistakes. She insisted that no, this was a huge deal.
   
2. She was sucking her teeth excessively a week ago. So loud that it sounded like she was eating a bag of chips with her mouth open. SO said "hey ma, don't forget your tick!". She ran to her room to cry and said that she felt like she lived in a big dark hole. It was very sad to hear her say that. I felt bad, but this was something we talked to her about before with no issue. Suddenly it's a HUGE problem. I personally have a thing where certain excessive mouth noises just obliterate my mood. I can't help it, it's genetic as far as I can tell, but I still do my best to tolerate the occasional teeth sucking. But this? It's nonstop and LOUD. Unlike anything I've heard before. Louder then smacking gum by a LOT.
   
3. The day we got home from the hospital after a traumatic preterm birth, the first thing she did was complain that it had been a week since she wanted to get her eyebrows waxed. We had to stay in the hospital that entire week and I guess she took that personally. Never mind the excessive pain I was in coming home for due to complications.
   
4. I asked her nicely multiple times to try and limit the amount of candies and cookies she put in the pantry while I acclimated to my PP diet. She can still have them, but I asked her to store them in her room for now, because my success in dieting is directly correlated to how many temptations I have at home and she will usually only eat a single cookie out of a box a day (so they last forever). She has instead taken it upon herself to build a small stash of candy bars and cakes in the pantry, of which she has eaten NONE. She then offers me foods she knows I can't have and then gets upset with me for denying them, as that's "impolite".
   
5. She would douse herself in perfume multiple times a day. Perfume makes me physically ill to the point where I had to go lay down with nausea and headaches whenever she did. Some helpful redditors pointed out that it would be toxic for my baby, so we asked her nicely to tone it down for the sake of the newborn's health. She freaked out and said that she had no control over her life. I felt bad about this one, as I know she enjoys her perfume a lot, but it was just too much. Her room still smells like a thick musk and I just don't go in there.
   

Now, this is the big blowup...
Today, a repairman came to fix a piece of furniture. MIL asked me if she should take the dog outside so he didn't bother him and I told her no, the dog will calm down after a moment of excitement, but she was free to go outside anyway if she wanted to. I thought she went out to enjoy herself- she does it often and says she likes the sun. Well, the repairman left while I was pumping breast milk and hubs was feeding our new 2 week old. She eventually came in about 5 minutes after he left and BLEW UP. She was crying, yelling us that it was SO RUDE to not come and get her immediately. We told her that we thought she was out there in her own accord but she didn't listen. SO kept saying "it was only five minutes, we have had our hands full and we didn't know", and she stormed out of the house for two hours. I was supposed to go to sleep (newborn schedule) but stayed up because DH went out to chase her and talk.
During this talk, since I was not around, she let it all out. Said she lives in hell. She's mad at ME for pointing out how the sausage went bad. Says I should've never mentioned it, let her leave it out as much as she wanted, and that it was rude of me to correct her. She used the phrase "I know you have kids with her so she's not going anywhere" and my husband defended me, asking her wtf I had done that was so wrong and if I should've eaten bad meat just to please her. He told her that, if she couldn't live with us, she wouldn't make it with anyone else who didn't bend over backwards, which she denied. Apparently she expected us to let her do literally anything she wanted and says that she "walks on eggshells" around me because I ask her not to baby my son (I'm watching all of my hard work crumble before my eyes with how she treats him and I will NOT stand by and watch my son wither away into a helpless blob). She said that it wasn't fair that the dog had rules and the cats don't, going so far as to pantomime a hunched over servant, to which SO had to explain that cats are incapable of learning manners the way dogs are and the dogisn't allowed to just jump on people and beg for food. She thinks him having a crate is cruel and unusual. She even said that it makes her upset when I don't jump out of my seat and shout an enthusiastic "Good morning!!" when she wakes up.
Forget that I've been up since the wee hours taking care of a newborn. Forget all of my pains and aches, my disfigured and bloody nipples from trying to find the right pump, and my also being on a strict diet. Oh, and forget that I'm in MY OWN HOME where I shouldn't feel like I have to feign enthusiasm every time I see a family member. It's not like I'm rude! I always smile and put on a chipper tone no matter HOW I feel. But, on the days where my pains are just too much, when I'm dizzy or dealing with a migraine, she takes personal offense to my smile not sparkling in the sun. How dare I be somewhat stoic but still polite!
I went to sleep after she got back (we talked about it at length until then) and, when I woke up to pump, she was gone. Apparently she went to bed early in a huff. On Saturdays, my son looks forward to a "sleepover" in her room. He looks forward to it all week. He was just getting ready for bed and my husband was explaining to him that it probably wasn't happening tonight. He ended up opening her door loudly and we had to pull him away and reprimand him for opening her door without knocking, knowing that she was asleep.
Well, after he did that twice, I went over to him to console him and tell him that we would make up for it. She BURST out of her room and started yelling at us: why won't you let him have his sleepover?!
We told her that we thought she was sleeping, as per what she said (she apparently even said goodnight to my son when she went to bed), and that regardless, he shouldn't be bursting into her room without knowing that she was awake and willing to have this sleepover. She just kept yelling, not listening: WHY are you not letting him stay with me?! It's Saturday! He ALWAYS sleeps in here!
And ultimately, he got to go have his sleepover after we were completely undermined for trying to teach him manners. I'm glad that he got to, he didn't deserve to be shafted, but how dare she make US the bad guys for not letting him force his way inside when we thought she had specifically wanted to be alone?? I was already annoyed with HER for going to bed without him on his special day, but instead she made a whole show about how we were keeping him from her and how she was the big savior in the end!
After all this, DH is fuming. I've never seen him this mad at his mother. He loves her tremendously. He's bent under backwards for her multiple times over the course of our marriage. He's taken care of EVERYTHING in her life. But now that she's pointing fingers at him and treating him like he's the bad guy, he is OVER it. He said to me that, if she has anther unfair outburst like that, he's gonna tell her to call around and find somebody willing to house her, because she's out of here. She's destroying our newborn period. We won't get these days back.
But what gets me is that... I think that's what she expects from him. She expects him to just dish out 2k per month of his own money, of his children's money, to get her her own apartment where she can wander around like Mr. Magoo and eat rancid sausages to her heart's content. It's almost a powerplay. The initial plan was to move her sister in, save a fortune on elder care, and she would help keep her sister company since I'm not bilingual and they were spending every day together before she moved in with us. But she just... stopped talking to her sister altogether? It's so bizarre. It's like she randomly decided to drop her from her life when she moved in with us and it's clear that her sister is hurt by this. When we ask her, she just goes "oh, I don't know :)" or just makes a dismissive "mmm".
But she won't talk about anything. She won't listen to our side of anything. She just wants to explode, bitch, and then pretend it never happened in a cycle. She expects us to just grit our teeth and live in hell with her when our lives are supposed to be happy right now with the new baby. She thinks that burying problems and periodically freaking out is the right way to live and everything else is rude. I can't even enjoy my newborn. I have angry MIL sitting beside me, staring depressedly at the wall for hours on end every day. I can't so much as be a parent to my oldest anymore without incurring her silent ire, which she unloads on DH when they're alone. If I try to talk about it with her, it's all "don't worry about it, everything's fine :)".
What gets me, what I take personally (since I'm thinking that the rest may be dementia or something), is how she treats our family finances like a bottomless bank. She thinks that DH is Scrooge McDuck with a pool of gold despite me telling her about our struggles and how DH has literally been crying over the whole situation with her sister. She KNOWS that our financial plan was to save money on her living costs and on her sister's elder care because we can't afford to take care of everybody, but DH loves her too much to just stick her into section 8 (which takes time, too). BUT, she wants us to buy her her own apartment ANYWAY as well as forgo the plan on saving five figures a month on her sister, all while treating us like trash for not allowing her to bulldoze the household. Who is this woman and what has she done with the MIL I knew?! If we don't get to live out our plan as intended, I will hold this against her forever, and there will be no reconciliation. DH understands. He thinks I've been more than understanding and that it's MIL who is acting like a dictator while claiming to be the victim.
TLDR: MIL thinks that the normal course of life is to endure misery and never talk openly and honestly, so she expects us to wallow in her own personal Hell beside her for a long as she will live. Does not believe in reconciliation, seems to have zero consideration for others in any capacity (except our dog?), and makes unreasonable seen like the understatement of the century.
Oh, and I've gotten a lot of advice on my aunt in law's elder care in the last couple of threads, so not a lot is needed! DH has been on top of it and all suggestions were things he already considered and knew about. It's rather complicated and i can't get into it here, as this is just meant to be a rant. We have an elder care lawyer who is helping out.
As for assisted living for MIL, that's apparently not going to happen without significant costs until she meets certain cognitive thresholds, which she has not yet. So, it's either section 8 (and I'm petrified of letting her live alone, tbh) or another small fortune to get her out of the house... I think we need to find a relative willing to take her, because with my kids, she's turning my once bright and sunny household into a goddamn war zone.

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