Me Right Now On Day 58 Waiting For My Period To Come After Experiencing Cramps And Other Pre-period Symptoms

why aren’t people talking about Rafayel’s bombastic bedroom eyes

like they literally are the reason I started playing the game

me after liking posts from 10 years ago because the fandom dead af

literally Xavier and he's proud 😌

What Rafayel hid in Chapter 2 and what does it mean? Analysis & Theory

Someone pointed out in Reddit that Rafayel hid something from MC during chapter 2 when he was trying to look for his "collection log".

Spoilers for the Chapter 2, brief mention to chapter 8, Addictive Pain anecdote and some later mentions about Ebb and Flow and other memories.

The original post in Reddit, thank you OP for pointing this out!

During chapter 2, MC investigates Rafayel's involvement in Raymond's behavior and deducts that his paints might have part in his erradic mental state. When Rafayel offers to show his collection log, he seems to notice something, hide it with his body bit more, glance at MC and show the log in his hands.

Why did he do that?

His body language screams "OH SHI-" when he notices the lime green note. It's just a note, and it's not like MC would be able to read it from where she is standing. I think it is a small hint towards how Rafayel has planned the entire meeting with MC beforehand - which in my mind, this chapter does allude to many times.

I already wrote a theory on their "first meeting" about how Rafayel didn't intend taking Reddie home. I didn't mention explicitly that I believe that he has planned all their meetings in the main story quite meticulously, aside a few details that don't go his way - for example with Reddie.

I think this note was supposed to make "the collection log" easily findable for Rafayel, so he can play along in his plan. He just didn't account for MC being so close, and possibly seeing the note herself, so he panicked to cover it up. Then he realised MC probably won't even notice the note, but tries to tuck it subtly out of view.

Did he really plan all this?

I really want to point out all the ways how Rafayel is manouvering MC along his plans during the main story so far, but I'll focus on this particular chapter for now. He is really good at manipulation - but in this chapter and many other moments, his facial expressions do reveal a lot. Unfrotunately Tumblr lets me post only one video per post, but if you go look the main story, you will be able to notice these things from these few chapters.

At first, he looks bit stern, like he is ready to tell someone off from barging in the studio without a call. After once he realises it's MC, he smiles quite widely considering someone came to his home uninvited. Not to mention that I don't believe a second him knocking the ladder was an accident...

Rafayel looks surprisingly happy about the fact that Thomas let MC have the coral stones from his office. I don't know if Thomas is in with his plans or not, but for now for the sake of not going into another rabbit hole, I'll just say it's possible, but probably not.

If you have read Addictive Pain anecdote, you know that Rafayel used his blood to experiment on paint pigments to get some kind of desired effect from them. The coral stones seem to be reacting to his blood, and he's smirking here because he's demonstrating to MC that he has valuable connections in this case. He already knew the effect his blood would have with the coral stone.

After the battle, before he makes the offer to MC to be his bodyguard, he smirks after MC agrees to listen what he has to say.

Something I want to point out too - notice the "collection log" he had? It's actually an invite to the nest. He doesn't have an actual collection log. Technically he is not lying when he said "I'll happily give you what I have in my hand right now" - he did give an invite to the nest for MC in chapter 8. He just showed it way before hand the actual Hunting Day took place.

One last detail about how he managed to play MC like a fiddle during this chapter - he smirks in the end once he says "the door's over there". He's very pleased with himself. He managed to lead MC to believe that the only way to continue this investigation is to play along with his demands and become his bodyguard.

What a smug b....

... He is a siren, after all.

A lot of his memories and other moments highlight how masterfully he manages to make MC believe she is in control, but eventually he flips it completely around. During Ebb and Flow, after MC inspects his scales, it seems like she is in top of things with her little "You have to call me master" play - but then Rafayel turns it completely around, making her fall into his trap and takes control of the situation. In Gem affection, he lets MC to play around with him until he flips her over. This same theme repeats in several memories like Tipsy Invitation, Omnipotent Perception and Extreme Dose as well.

This exact story moment is probably the first moment we see this in action in a more convoluded way - he peaks her curiousity, controls the conversation and makes MC feel like she doesn't have any other option than play along with his game. It's also visible in the main story later, if I manage to make posts of the other chapters as well.

What if the note was something else?

Another thing that I'm thinking about is that it could be hint that the book the note is sticked to is some kind of marker for his notes about her from the times when he stalked her. I don't really have much to go on with that, but it's a possibility. All we can really deduct from how he reacted is that he probably didn't want MC to see whatever he was hiding.

On a more humorous note, it also could be the sketchbook every artist has and wants no one to see... Not that I have a such sketchbook or would know anything about that *cough cough*

Hi guys !

Just wanted to speak up for a bit about an issue I've seen on here. I won't give any names for obvious reasons, but I've seen users commissioning fics (asking for money against writing fics) and aside from the fact that it's against Tumblr's Policy, if you've been in fandoms since before 2020 you know why this is problematic for fandoms as a whole.

While asking for help is always okay to do if you're struggling, basically selling fics is not and if you don't know why (which is okay, the LADS fandom is fairly new and its fanbase as well so not everyone knows everything), let me explain it.

Fanfictions are and must remain free for the simple reason that, because it is based on existing licences to which we do not own the rights, profiting off of it is considered theft of intellectual property and breach of copyrights so it's, well, completely illegal.

The only reason companies are tolerating fanfictions' existence is BECAUSE it is free, it is a gift from a fan to their community. It is a work of love, not made for monetary gain but to share the love of a work with other fans of that work.

There have been instances of people trying to profit off of fanfics before, resulting in lawsuits that impacted the whole community of the fandom that it concerned (thinking about Anne Rice, Warner Bros, Patreon users being banned, the mature content purges on Fanfiction.net...).

The balance in fandom spaces is more fragile than we think, they are safe spaces because we created them with the same thought of protecting those spaces by respecting implicit rules of decorum, not profiting off of fics being one of those implicit rules.

We already know the original content of Love&Deepspace is heavily censored because of Chinese censorships and that Infold is greedy so imagine how they'd react if they knew people made money off of their work. It would not go well for anyone involved and the consequences for the community as a whole would be catastrophic.

Imagine if somehow this was the straw that breaks the camel's back and it brought some governments' attention on fanfiction, enough for them to make up laws to ban fanfiction altogether. No one wants that to happen. No one.

So please, if you happen to be one of those people and you're reading this. Don't be selfish. Think about the greater good. Don't ruin everyone else's safe place for your own personal gain. Thank you.

the sexual tension between me and the alternate reality i daydream about

Ice skating date 🥰

Readers reading and daydreaming to escape the real world, because reality is shit :

this is so unnecessarily funny to me lmao