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Cur chapter 15 “Angel Blood”

Ok so not gonna lie, probably the shittiest start to a new year ever.
I worked on new years eve and didn’t get to spend either christmas or new years with the person that supposedly is madly in love with me.
Oh but then of course she made it up to me by giving me another bug that was going around which was ten times worse than the bug I previously had in the space of a month.
Then my ex instead of letting me skype with the only person that truly matters to me on this earth on her birthday or christmas called the cops on me over an email. I almost spent the night in jail over an email.
So yeah, really feeling 2019 so far, at least it can’t get much worse, but I’ve been surprised before.
Ok so my life being a total shitshow is no big reveal here but I am happy to reveal one of the better chapters in terms of action mostly, I reread and it’s not as great as I am remember more mythology captured in a comic but it’s fun. And if your balls don’t swell during the call out section you have no balls to speak of metaphorically or otherwise haha.
Anyway start of a new year, optimism, all that.
See you…
–
 
Three days and nights the Firbolg and Tuatha De’ met on the field of battle at Moyturra. And each day despite the mental state and lack of sleep of the Firbolg it ended in defeat after crushing defeat for the Tuatha De’. Their weapons were light and beautiful but could not compete with the savagery of the men of the soil. Even exhausted as they were they fought with the brutality they’d known all their lives and the mighty weapons they’d crafted. The Tuathe were defeated as if the earth itself rose up and swallowed them.
 
“We can’t keep this up much longer” The druid Caserd croaked. “Can’t you see, the losses are too great.” He whispered harshly in the dim light of the high king’s yurt.
 
“We’re victorious” The high king said as he rapped his knuckles against the hard arm rest of his chair.
 
“I don’t like it, the spirits don’t like it, there’s something wrong. Each day we decimate them but their numbers don’t decrease. We vanquish our foes and they come back each day renewed, these are not ordinary men my king.”
 
“So I must make a truce with these usurpers, give them half of all we’ve built to avoid more death? This land is built on blood, this soil is damp with it.” Eochid hissed.
 
“That’s why they want it, there’s dark magic at work here I’m sure of it” Caserd whispered.
 
“My king” A guard shouted from beyond the yurt.
 
“What is it?”
 
“There’s an old goat herder who says he has news of the Tuatha de’ invasion, he says it’s important.”
 
“A goat herder?” Eoichid sighed tilting his head towards Caserd.
 
“What harm could there be?” The druid shrugged.
 
“I’ll hear your goat herder.” He said waving his large hand.
 
A moment passed and a slow shuffling could be heard outside of the tent. An elderly man entered draped head to toe in a long lambs wool cloak of grey and white. His beard shared the same color and was so long he threw it over his shoulder.
 
The man was very old and his movements were slow and measured. His face wrinkled with sagging jowl but not lacking in color. And his eyes retained a spark of youthful mirth as he smiled deferentially at the king attempting to bow his already bent back. Resting on a gnarled shalagh cane.
 
“Greetings high king, I be Fint-“
 
“There’s no need for formal introductions goods sir, tell me of your misadventures.”
 
“Sir what I have to say may shock you.”
 
“Well there’s no point waiting on ceremony.”
 
“The other day I was taking my goats out to the hill to pluck the crags of weeds and grass there. They like it up high ya see, climbing up there, the grass must taste better near those old stones. The portal stones they’re called.”
 
Eoichid watched wearily the old man through his fingers as he rested his head in his hand.
 
The old man licked his lips and looked for some signal for him to go on and when none came he went on anyway. “Well while I was up there wouldn’t ya know I couldn’t see into their camp or nothing. They did a good job placing it out of sight but I did see- it was after the battle.”
 
“You watched the battle?”
 
“Oh no sir, I’ve seen enough blood in my time.” The old man gave a knowing smirk. “No I saw what was after when they was picking up their dead, not one left there to rot. They gathered them all up and I thought it was to bury them, you know. Mightn’t it be their custom to bury them on the day of death I thought, but no.”
 
The old man became contemplative, his eyes narrowing and brows creasing into too many folds to count as he scratched his gristled chin. “There was this funny lookin’ fella with a big nose and pointy ears and glasses on.” The old man gesticulated all the man’s features one by one. “And he was ordering the men that was still living to take the bodies of the dead and dying. And to put them in the spring that runs off the Loch Arbhach, great for fishing.”
 
Again he paused and looked for some signal to continue which didn’t come. “Anyway they put them bodies in the spring and the long nose fella he sprinkles some magic dust in the water.” With his wizened hand he emulated the motion of sprinkling the dust. “I dunno. He says some magic words spins around and they walked alive again.” He pointed with his cane and took to a harsh whisper “I swear by the gods there wasn’t a scratch on them, they just walked out like they were taking a dip.”
 
“It’s as I feared.” Caserd sighed.
 
“You believe this?” Eoichid asked with a cool simmering rage.
 
“There magic surpasses our own greatly and they’ve tricked us.” Caserd deflated, bowing his head.
 
Eoichid bit the inside of his cheek and said nothing.
 
Caserd looked at his high king with lidded eyes and raised his hands emphatically. “Don’t you see, they’ve been wearing us down, they’ve been beating us in victory, tiring our men, whittling them off slowly. Everyday our losses are massive and they lose none, this can’t go on, we’ve already lost too much, what will you do high king?”
 
Eoichid rose from his seat stoic. With a savage cutting energy he crossed the room and clutched his Javelin in his two strong hands squeezing it. Listening to the noise of it creaking in his monstrous leathery hands.
 
“I will go.”
 
–
 
The men of the bag lined up on Moytura outside the Tuatha de’ stronghold. In front of their palisade wall they beat their shields in time casting a deadly rhythm. The sound; like bone on bone clattering, the impeding march of skeletons claiming flesh as their own.
 
“HERE I AM! THE BLOOD OF KINGS RUNS THROUGH MY VEINS! NO MAN CAN BE MY EQUAL!” Eochid bellowed at the top of his lungs, his high shield at his side and his javelin at his other. His armor consisting of hardened plates of black leather and bleached bone. His helmet fashioned from a fearsome rams skull, it’s horns protruding upward. “NUADA, I AM THE MASTER OF YOUR DESTINY!”
 
The beating of the shields came again like a wave of crashing thunder building to a cacophony.
 
Eoichid bellowed gripping his javelin and shield tightly in his balled fists.“GIVE ME YOUR KING, LET ME SQUEEZE HIM IN MY HANDS!” 
–
Angel blood
If you want to the rest of this epic chapter head on over to inkitt;
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Loverman chapter ‘The big dream’

So this is me attempting to get back into a normal routine and sort of failing miserably because that routine also includes lifting heavier weights than the balls of Jehovah. So I’m trying to fix my sleep schedule and also sleeping right through every alarm I set as my body tries to heal itself.

Anyway I hope you all had a great christmas and a snappy new years, both mine kind of sucked. Christmas just felt sort of flat and I didn’t feel christmassy at all, I worked on new years so that was a boner killer,

In other news found an awesome new videogame, the mad max game is surprisingly bad ass. Also my new relationship is sort of working out in a weird way. I paired her with videogames in case she reads this just to annoy her.

I don’t want to really go into detail because I’m conflicted I should feel terrible and I sort of do, it’s like I want to be happy while also being stomped on by life in the worst ways imaginable. I’m not saying that for sympathy, I don’t give a shit, it’s just a weird feeling approaching her birthday and feeling so lost and miserable and heartbroken as I’m completely shut out while also being at the start of could be a really happy healthy relationship. One that could actually work and isn’t just setting me up for supreme heart ache down the road.

Someone less of an idiot could maybe wash his hands of the whole thing and forget and just start over but I can’t.

Yeah I kinda wanted to start the new year off light and already fucked that up but hopefully my schedule will open up a bit this month and I can finally get Diana done and start sending her out into the world to get mercilessly torn asunder. I know I’ve been kind of procrastinating and putting it off for the longest time, just like I’ve been putting going to the next weight level in my training. But hey I did that and now I feel like a tenderised piece of meat haha. 

Maybe I can make good on that other stuff too and get a new job. But what the fuck am I even going to spend the money now that she won’t let me see her?

Hmm.

See you…

–

My mother’s old Chrysler pitched and yawed and creaked to a stop with that horrible ratcheting sound of the gear box unto imminent death. Which of course Ericcson not being familiar with it didn’t know exactly the right way it like to be touched. So as not to eviscerate the already ramshackle clutch. Held together with tape and prayers.

 

Still these concerns were beyond me, my main worries were now worms nesting in my ear and being unable scratch my nose. Not being able to turn the pages of the book or change the channel on the television was of particular concern. Forever doomed to just watch whatever anyone else wanted to watch.

 

The girl’s directions weren’t too bad. Although she might have recommended we bring a machete for our trip as the road leading to the house was intensely overgrown. So much so as to almost disappear into the trees.

 

The pornographer Lukas lived in a fairly large new England country house out on the east side near the river. Just a guess really, due to the sound of running water, that being the only sound I heard, no birds chirped nor foxes howled.

 

The house itself was in utter disrepair and looked most certainly abandoned. The face of it was once a white wood, the paint rotted and chipped and discoloured. All but one of the upstairs windows were broken, most likely by bored local children. The roof was tiled in grey slate with a red brick chimney which had collapsed into the attic. The front door was green and hanging off its hinges. A white picket fence surrounded the square building and traced the outline of a truly unruly lawn. Which had swallowed a very rusty looking push mower, most certainly its first victim.

 

Undettered by this Ericcson got out of the car slamming the door of the Chrysler as if to announce himself. He paused only momentarily to absorb a most ominious atmosphere. The building exsoothed a singular loneliness and gave off an almost abstract feeling of revulsion.

 

The autumnal trees behind the house were such deep oranges they almost looked like a mat red canvas against the house. They swayed lightly in the breeze and noiseless things that must have been birds leapt out of them and into flight.

 

Ericcson opened the fence gently and approached the door meaning to knock on the great green edifice. But instead he tried the knob and it was unlocked.

 

We entered, I of course hanging at his side in my bag.

 

But I could see out of a number of holes made in the bag for that direct purpose.

 

Now, being a disembodied head you’d think not much could shock me. But upon entering the house, expecting more filth and degradation as the outside advertised. We were instead greeted with a warming glow.

 

I wondered for a moment if Ericcon and I were seeing the same thing. From the outside it seemed like an abandoned run down shack and from the inside it was a living home of some humble opulence.

 

I could hear the lapping and crackling of a warm fire and the soothing tock of a grandfather clock

 

Ericcson it would seem was entranced and I dared not to wake him as he made an odd noise as if reacting to some unheard tone in a dream.

 

He walked slowly and cautiously towards the noise of the fire into the living, decorated as if a scene in a holiday greeting card. Real logs burned in the fire and wreathes hung over it and on the mantel there were pictures of a happy family although their faces I could not make out.

 

Ericcson walked bow legged and collapsed into an easy chair in the corner allowing me to slump down next to him on the carpeted floor.

 

I didn’t even notice the other person in the room until I heard the chinking of the ice in his drink.

 

“So nice of you to pay me a visit” The man said as he tipped the glass towards Ericcson.

 

He was an odd duck, dressed almost like a hipster mister Rogers; a brown sweater over a plaid shirt. His sleeves rolled up revealing elaborate tattoos, his face too was marked with scarification and tunnels in his ears. His eyes were a disturbing unnatural blue, altered somehow with pigment.

 

“I’ve come to kill you” Ericcson said flatly as if talking in his sleep.

 

“Is that right?” The man smiled and looked into his drink. “Lydia – the girl in the store called me right after you did, this is the only address she knows so I knew you’d come here.”

 

“It’s a trap then?”

 

“Not really, more like a check-up” He motioned down with his head “How do you like your drink?”

 

Ericcson looked down at his hand and saw a whiskey glass there and he jumped as if he suddenly felt like he was falling and dropped it on the floor. The tumbler landed with a dull thud and rolled towards the fire place.

 

“Too bad, that was good stuff” He took a sip of his drink and straightened in his wingback chair. “Well enough with the niceties, I’m sure Niall didn’t impress you too much but you’ll find us a little more prepared.”

 

“You’re Lukas?”

 

“I already told you that” He said as he put his drink down with a clunk on a glass coffee table and then leaned back with his hands across his lap. His hands too were covered in obscure tattoos that looked like child’s drawings and he had odd jewellery on his thumbs. “But enough about that, we’re here for you Zane.

 

The doorbell rang.

 

“Oh that must be our guests”

 

“Guests?” Ericcson said sadly.

–

Check out the rest of the chapter right here on inkitt The big dream

 

0

New Dawn Fades

In this moment free,

Your shadow cast through the trees,

You’ll never be mine.

I feel so close to you,

Your image burned in my mind

still its not quite right.

A new sun rises,

But I’m left wondering still,

Of what might have been.

0

Red Dead Redemption 2 ‘now even more redemptiony’ – review

… it’s boring, the end.

No, but yeah but no, yeah. My brother played this before me and he was like “Eh it was kind of meh” and I just took that to mean it went over his head or he just didn’t get it or it was too slow for him because he’s not the quickest of cats at the best of times and he couldn’t get into kingdom deliverance or the witcher and he would never play something like dark souls. He’s not the kind of guy that likes in depth games that take a lot of skill and patience and grind so I just figured he wasn’t giving it a chance.

Because admittedly the beginning is slow as fuck. I mean it’s tedious and I didn’t know at the time that that pretty much sets the pace for the whole fucking game. You’re like ‘oh it takes a while to get going that’s all, it’s taking it’s time to build it’s world’ but it never gets going, it never gets off the ground, it just rolls around aimlessly the whole game hoping you’ll get distracted by all the side quests and mini games so you don’t notice that the plot and the characters are boring and unoriginal.

It’s like the game is a con artist and you’re asking it “So what’s the end goal? What’s the story about, how do the characters grow and why does this story need to be told in regards to red dead 1?” and the game is like; “Err… you like poker right?? I mean who doesn’t like poker?? Hunt or fish much?”

I usually like a game that takes it’s time and eases you into the game and lets you get to know the characters before everything begins and they start killing them off one by one for fun. But this game just goes on and on and on. And don’t get me wrong it has a lot of content, too much content, the game is almost too full, it gets to the point where it’s almost like filler and it’s why it took me ages to get this review out because the game is so bloated and the story is so filler heavy even without the side stuff it’s way too long.

The first thing I fought back against with my brother was the world, the world is very nice, someone went to a lot of effort to make it really beautiful and engaging so you didn’t mind the hours you’ll spend riding around on your horse to get to missions or just exploring. I found the hunting pretty fun. I didn’t play any poker which is weird because I played a lot in the previous game, the fishing was pointless if you ask me.

The mechanics are pretty similar to the older game, except they changed the dead eye system because in the older game when it gets better you get that terrible tagging system which ruins the fun of shooting people in slow mo if you ask me. Oh wow instead of shooting people you get to put a little ‘x’ on them and then your character shoots them, yay. But in this they reversed that which is a lot better and makes dead eye much more fun and useful. Although if I’m honest the game that did it best is Max Payne always and Call of Juarez let you control each gun individually when you went into slow mo, so you had a stick per gun and you could shoot two people at once, it was awesome. I don’t see why you can’t do that in this or have a trigger for each trigger. It would just make the shooting more immersive.

red-dead-redemption-2-looks-sick-T9fpo

Of course I went for total immersion, minimal hud, first person all the way but I never really felt immersed, I was always aware I was playing a game despite the attempt at grit and realism in the plot and world. I never really felt like I was in a slice of that time period like I did with Kingdom come deliverance, that game literally feels like a simulation someone put an rpg into.

One of the things that really brought me out of it was just the rockstar humour and also the modern day morality and race politics injected into the game, The game really goes out of it’s way to be anti-racist and it has so many occasions where it’s pointing out race or purposefully ignoring it and Arthur will tell anyone that will listen that he loves all races. It got to a point where it was ridiculous, he encounters a eugenicist the game was basically using as an alt right talking point machine. And Arthur basically comes back with the boiler plate “But I have friends who are mexican/black etc” and I was just like; “Aren’t you and all your friends robbers and killers though???” Scratches head emoji haha. Like huh?

It just makes no sense and totally takes me out of it, the whole morality and legal system of this game is pretty janky and it just kind of reeks of too many cooks in the kitchen. I mean I get that this game is sort of about america becoming less lawless which I’d like to remind you is exactly what the previous red dead was also about. But seriously, if you so much as sneeze in this game you’ll have cops crawling up your ass with a microscope, I’ve had people punch me and shoot me for bumping them with my horse and I get shot at by the cops for defending myself. And the morality system is like “Loot and kill all you want, except not these specific people”.

Why do I not lose honour when I loot a bad guy but I lose it when I loot an innocent person I didn’t even kill, it makes little to no sense. Why is there even an honor system in a game where I’m literally a criminal, it’s like here we are robbing a train, oh I’m losing honour while robbing people, right, and also getting a bounty despite wearing a mask, so what’s the point of the mask then?

Also the honour system seems kind of redundant, it really only unlocks certain outfits and gun customisation. I heard it changes some cutscenes but who gives a shit, does it change the ending? No? Then who gives a shit? So much of this game just seems to be there because it’s in other games and not because it’s good or serves the story.

I get that these are little things but they’re just dumb, these are things I’m getting out of the way because the real kicker of this game, the big problem is I don’t get why it exists. Well I do; money. It exists to make shitloads of money and honestly that seems to be the only reason.

The brass tacks of it is that it’s uninspired and I knew it was just from the title, the first game was just ‘Red dead’ because the main character is called ‘Red’ I think. The sequel is called ‘Red dead redemption’ because the main character who is not called Red is seeking redemption by tracking down the members of his old gang and this game is called ‘Red dead redemption 2’ because the main character is also not called red and is also sort of looking for redemption, towards the end of the game kinda. I’d be tempted to add a tagline ‘Red dead redemption 2 – now with 10% more redemption’.

It’s just an uninspired title and it sums up the entire slog of a game. It’s just more of the same and what’s more it’s a pointless plot line just loaded with filler and uninteresting characters. I think the big problem with this game is the same problem GTA IV had, it’s trying to be taken seriously but also trying to keep that level of rockstar humour and wit and it just falls flat. Because you can’t do both, you can’t try to tell an engaging serious story about life and death and have stupid jokes and wacky characters it just ruins the whole tone. It’s totally inconsistent. It’s why GTAV was so successful, it got its tone down, the story and characters worked with in it and it was had a satirical message that resonated. There’s no satire in red dead really, it’s just sort of played straight.

Also the missions all feel really flat and kind of like they’re on rails, and there really aren’t any that stand out. There isn’t that one mission that you remember. It’s just white noise really. The story sort of meanders and goes nowhere and then it ends and then it carries on for like ten hours with a pointless epilogue about how John built his house.

This is what pissed me off about this game because its a prequel so the story really isn’t necessary. It’s what building on the world or the lore, it’s just wallowing and retreading. And the whole time I don’t understand why because the characters that you chase in the first game barely get any lines or do anything at all. In fact there are parts of the game where they just seem like idiot flunkies so it almost makes the previous game seem kind of dumb and pointless.

And obviously we already know what’s going to happen and who can die and who can’t so we’re expected to care about all these people we know are probably going to die or leave and it takes the sting out. Also none of them really get any character development or time spent on them. Unless you spend loads of time in camp reading their mail or just engaging in pointless pleasantries. Maybe that’s what the game expected you to do but I barely even went to camp because there’s a whole fucking world to explore, I’m not gonna spend my time pissing about talking to characters who are just gonna die anyway.

So my major gripe is that the games story is pointless, it adds nothing to the previous game, in fact it probably takes away from it. It’s like the Solo movie, we didn’t need to know where he got his blaster from or whatever, it added nothing, it’s just shameless money spinning. You could have just made a new game and instead you just made another one. I thought this game originally was going to be the most ambitious game ever and like how in GTAV you played three characters, I thought you’d get to spend time being all seven gang members and that would have been a fantastic way of getting to know them by being them and dressing them and giving them their guns. But no, none of that happens, you just play a guy was invented for this game just to *spoilers* get sick and die pointlessly.

Ok I think I’m done ranting about the shitty boring nothing burger of a story and now I’m gonna talk about the shitty boring nothing burger of an epilogue.

red-dead-redemption-2-after-4-years-with-all-the-released-dlcs

I don’t think I’ve ever wished a part of a game were chopped off and resold as dlc before. It’s an additional like 10 hours of literal filler just so you can kill this one guy and have a satisfying conclusion when you could have killed him 10 hours ago and saved me doing all those cow milking and horse shit picking up mini games.

It’s so pointless, and it’s just about John remarrying Abigail and building a house, and serves as like literal filler between the second game and the first. Why do we need to know how he built the house? And it brings in another gang to fight purely as filler combat to make the filler less boring. “Oh you’re trying to build a house but they kidnapped this guy or stole your tools, go shooty shooty bang bang them to make them stop”.

It’s pathetic.

But also it makes me wonder why you didn’t just play John again and then the story could have been about his romance with Abigail and actually interesting. And some of the major plot points are about his son and Abigail getting captured or whatever and I think it would have carried more emotional weight if you were playing as John instead of just going to help out. The only reason you play another character is because they could kill him off and try to pluck at your heart strings really feebly.

In the first game you really feel like you go on a journey, and I wish games would go back to locking off parts of the map because it really takes the fun of going to new places when you can just randomly go there early and ruin it. The first game you travel to mexico and all over and it feels like you went somewhere, in this game you feel like you’re just kinda moving around the map not doing anything. It’s not a journey, it’s just you go over here now, now you’re over here, yaaaaay.

Don’t get me wrong, Arthur is hands down the best character in the game but there isn’t a lot of competition. The game has zero interesting characters and no villains whatsoever. I get that it’s not trying to be a game with moustache twirling villains but anything is better than just having no villains.
I know people are gonna say “But Dutch is the villain” but is he though? Everyone is telling me that but honestly he just seems more like an idiot to me. Like someone who was just coasting on luck and charm and one or both ran out. I just kinda felt sorry for him for being dumb and optimistic.

Like it’s trying to be like ‘He’s a three dimensional likeable villain.” But what does he do that’s villainous really?

I dunno, this game just felt like a slog, even cutting out the side stuff, it’s too long, it’s bloated, there’s just too much going on and yes you can have too much of a good thing, that’s what this is. It’s content for contents sake, how much can we stuff into this one game.

This is basically the summer block buster game we all have to love and it’s just a big boring mess. But it’s come out after a couple of big publishers just shit the bed, bethesda and EA just completely fell flat on their face and despite being beaten by Black ops Red dead looks great in comparison to those massive failures. But honestly its emperors new clothes, it’s a soul less cash grab and I can’t help thinking it’s because they’ve been going to ubisoft route in terms of how they do crunch. I think the without a union the games industry is going to crash from people being overworked and underpaid to churn out empty lifeless sequels that eventually wont sell. Ultimately red dead 2 did well but I think people won’t be talking about in a month or two just like no one is really talking about spiderman anymore despite paying youtubers to tell people how great it is and giving away a free suit at christmas which should have been in the base game anyway. It’s still a really disappointing game.

But it really put me in the mood to play the Mad Max game which surprised me with how awesome it is despite getting no love whatsoever haha.

So final thoughts, this game isn’t worth your money or your time, wait til it drops in price or don’t buy it at all, it has nothing to add to the red dead lore or your life in any way, it’s just spinning its wheels for 300+ hours with nothing to say, if you value your time, do something else.

See you…

2

Snow flower

Your image frozen

I know it’s not snowing there,

Still you never age.

She borrows sweet words,

But for me she steals silence,

Her heart is ice now

She wraps you in snow

She doesn’t care who she hurts,

Bitterness is all.

0

3 Ring Samurai Part 2 Chapter 7 ‘4 Sho Sho’

Bonjour,
Back again with more half assery as it is the season, I couldn’t do a blog on tuesday because I was busy and I cobbled together another haiku from a song I like. I don’t know why, I guess I’m just too lazy to come up with them on my own or maybe I just worry I’ll retread too much material and sometimes I can just find a song that captures everything I feel better than I could on my own. Also the rhythm really helps.
This is probably the last blog I’ll do til january, because I’ll be busy with work and christmas and because I haven’t had time to write on top of editing Diana for the last time. So I’m running low on material.
Although I was spent most of the day spamming mythology pages on fb of which I’m not banned on currently haha. I got some good feedback, I was called an ‘excellent bard’ haha. That pleased me. Probably the best people to drop that on. Especially since Celtic folklore gets so little love from literary folk obsessed with greeks and vikings.
Work has been hell, my personal life isn’t so bad apart from the other stuff, where my heart is heaviest. But I think next year things might really turn around. I’m gonna get a new job and if one of my books gets picked up that’d be great.
Had little time to read but what I’ve read of the second shadow pulp is pretty good. The shadow is at the very least really good filler, which I guess is the meaning of pulp. It’s not great but it’s not bad, like I’m not desperate to see what happens next but it holds my interest enough to want to keep reading. The writing isn’t amazing either, just serviceable. But maybe sometime soon I might write a shadow pulp myself. I do really like the shadow and how he’s written. Every appearance is meant to send a shiver up your spine and it really works. When he shows up everything changes, it’s great.
Still playing red dead 2 and I plan on doing a review, the game is just long and honestly pretty boring. It’s like the story and characters really aren’t very engaging. And it’s a prequel so you basically already know what’s going to happen you just don’t know exactly how. I honestly felt like the story of Assassins creed 3 was more compelling. I’m not kidding, that game had a good story. You knew your goals and motivations, and your villain and it felt personal and real. Red dead is a scattered mess, the story meanders and goes nowhere ultimately. Ha don’t want to spoil my review, but I think it’s one of those games that will be forgotten in a month. And if it hadn’t launched in between the shit storm kicked up by fallout 76 and battlefront v it would have got a lot more flack.
It’s shaping up to be an ok christmas, a little melancholy slipping in for reasons I can’t say but I have enough booze to wash that away this year, here’s hoping for some resolution next year.
To all the one and a half people that read this blog, merry christmas and a happy new year!
See you…
–
 
BOOM!
 
A cannonball turned the rest of the saloon into confetti showering Canard and Efron with debris.
 
Efron shook her red mop for debris and dust, coughed and looked up at Canard. She handed him the gun “It’s up to you I guess.”
 
He took it and let it hang at his side as he watched Pookie narrowly dodge a wrecking shot at his feet.
 
Pookie had taken to running along the rooftops for cover. Unfortunately the brothers were a lot more agile than their size had initially suggested.
 
The oldest stayed below from his firing position, arching up like a mortar, the middle brother followed Pookie up on to the rooftops.
 
The middle brother retracted and spat the wrecking ball at Pookie’s feet tearing huge chunks out of the roof of the building. A bemused post nuclear family sat around a scrappy dinner table looking through their new skylight.
 
“Err sorry” Pookie said.
 
But before he could react he heard the chain tighten, the middle brother swinging it by biting down on it and turning his hips and shoulders.
 
The ball slammed into Pookie’s gut and tossed him off the building. Luckily he landed on his head and was totally fine.
 
Pookie rolled onto his back, dazed from the first strike he looked up at the sun which had peaked and was slowly going down, the sky a bruised orange colour. The middle brother smirked and swung the ball over her is shoulder and muttered to himself “For Juan”. With all his abdominal strength he turned and swung the wrecking ball at a downward angle, meaning to crush Pookie like a bug.
 
Meanwhile the oldest brother circled around and was coming at him from the other side. Aiming right at him.
 
Pookie was unable to move, looking up at the sky as the ball eclipsed the sun coming right at him like a comet just coming over the pivot point of the swing.
 
A shot rang out and the chain snapped freeing the wrecking ball which shot off careening towards the eldest brother. The ball lodging itself with some force into the barrel of the cannon just as it was about to fire.
 
There was a deathly pause and then internal indigestion noises. A bead of sweat ran down the eldest brother’s brow right before the cannon backfired and tore him in half like a piñata full of sausage meat. The entire cannon exited his body taking most of his internal organs with it and leaving an exit wound the size of an elephant’s foot.
 
Another silence, the smell of cordite, Canard stood, feet planted holding the gun in his outstretched hand. “Why did I?-oh” He said as he looked at his hand and saw two smaller hands wrapped around it.
 
Efron smirked as she sat curled around Canard’s shoulder.
 
“What if the chamber was empty?”
 
“I would have fired again” She laughed as she climbed down off of Canard.
 
But her laughing was cut short. The moment her feet hit the ground a broken chain wrapped around her leg and yanked her like a tiny side of beef, dragging her through the loose dirt and sand.
 
Pookie groaned as he raised himself onto his side only able to watch as Efron was reeled in like a carp flopping on the ground.
 
The Middle brother slurping on the chain like someone sucking a giant piece of spaghetti with a huge unwilling meatball on the end.
 
It all happened so fast, Canard barely had enough time to react. He went for his staff but before he could even flick the blade out Efron was in the middle brother’s mouth with chain wrapped around her. The middle brother devoured her inch by inch, his jaw stretched wide like an anaconda.
 
Canard was so stunned for a second he forgot he was missing a leg and tripped when he took the staff away as a support falling face first into the dirt. It was like he was wading through custard, like it was all happening in slow motion for some reason.
 
He recomposed himself and tried to get to his feet.
 
The middle brother let out a vicious chuckle which was muffled by the person in his mouth. He put one finger over his left nostril and shot out a couple of giant buggers which hit the ground and exploding into a cloud of smoke.
 
Canard instinctually froze like a deer in headlights until the smoke finally cleared revealing him to be alone with a very sore clown.
 
“What just happened?”
 
“Nothing good” Pookie mumbled.
 
“What do we do, go after him?”
 
Pookie got to his feet groaned and said. “Nah.”
 
–
 
“Gosh darn it, I’m too late!” The dog faced boy cursed under his breath as he peeped through the little hole in the big top. The one he chastised Margherite for looking through only a couple of chapters ago.
 
The sun was going down, the meeting was emptying out. The heads of the clans going back to their little pieces of turf leaving only the icecream man and the Ringmaster alone in the big top. His icecream van was his home so he didn’t need to go anywhere.
 
When they were alone, he put his feet up on the table and grinned.
 
“So”
 
“So what?”
 
“Want me to ice’im?” He laughed.
 
The Ringmaster said nothing.
 
The icecream man laughed “It’d be poetic, don’t you think?” He chuckled.
 
“He’s more use to me alive” The ringmaster said coldly.
 
“Oh so this was part of your master plan all along?” He smirked a little too wide, his lips were thin and cold looking almost non-existent, two thin bloody streaks on an icicle.
 
“Something like that” The Ringmaster smiled jovially, but not with his eyes, his eyes were fixed and issued a silent threat.
 
The icecream man let out a little breathy laugh and took his feet off the table. “Don’t you forget, you owe me” He stood and looked around the big top. “All this is cos of what I done for you” He leaned forward on the table. “And it can all go away like that”. He clicked his bony fingers.
 
“Are you threatening me?” The Ringmaster asked.
 
He smiled trying to look innocent, shrugging his shoulders “Just reminding is all.” The icecream man laughed and started to walk away. “Now if you’ll excuse me, those kiddies aint gonna get the sweet stuff theyselves”.
 
He climbed into the cab of the icecream truck, the suspension straining under him. That tinkling off key music started up again with the engine as he slowly drove away.
 
The dogfaced boy had no idea what was going on but watched as the Ringmaster sneered and spat on the ground, cursing silently.
 
“What the heck was all that about?” He whispered to himself.
 
–
 
If you liked this chapter head on over to inkitt to read the rest of it and the previous chapters. 4 sho sho
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County line

Hoping nothings changed

Your pain is never ending

That its still the same.

You never even tried

You never tried to love me

Did I have to do?

You know I’m coming

I think I can see the lights

Cross that county line.

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Cur Chapter 14 ‘Love thine enemy’

Ok so instead of a poem I have this beauty of a chapter as we finally get into the meat of the story.
This is the stuff I was encouraged to hold back for the purposes of a reveal and I wont really know how it works until I get some feedback or I do a solid read through.
But this is when we get into the heart of the first invasion, the real folklore not the shit I made up to go around it haha. I mean there’s a lot of that but this is the real dope and I love it. I love the mythology, I love the whole story, it’s great and I hope you do too because I’m too busy to get anything more up tomorrow. But believe me the next few chapters are gonna be coming hard and I can’t wait for you to read them.
See you…
–
 
Many years ago when the land was known as Inish Alga, the noble isle.
 
The goddess Tailtui kissed him and her lips were as sweet and as sour as the first blackberry of spring. Her body was as firm and as warm as a log on the fire in front of which they made love. Her body crashing against his like a falling tree she kissed him again with an intense urgency. Looking into his eyes she whispered a blessing and a curse “As long as I love you, you shall never die.”
 
The fire blew out and cloaked the room in inky blackness. A deep silence and a rattling scratching noise came from the fireplace.
 
“What is it Eoichid?” A silken voice asked.
 
Eoichid pushed her off of his large frame and strode towards the fire place. He stoked the embers stabbing at them with a poker his naked broad back to his woman. He could hear the scratching more clearly. It was a skittering noise in the chimney.
 
“Just a bird trapped in the chimney” He stated his voice flat and stern as his jawline.
 
Then all of a sudden a thunderous crash and a great black bird hit the embers scattering sparks and hot ash in an explosion of chaotic furry. The bird cawed and sqwarked and flew about the room. Eoichid’s ears pricked as he finally noticed a dull metronome of flapping wings and cawing. He went to the window and the sky was black with their fetid wings. Their vile bulbous black bodies blotted out the sun as they flew as if shoulder to shoulder.
 
Eoichid woke in a sweat, he turned to look at his wife Tailtiu still sleeping, her nose wrinkled as if she smelled something loathesome. Her auburn hair like a bed of autumn leaves. Her face was pale and lovely like freshly fallen snow. Her features that of a faun, or nymph, a slightly upturned nose, light pouted lips and speckled cheeks.
 
He got out from under the furs of their bed and put on a robe. He fumbled out of his bed chambers without waking the goddess and took a lit torch from a sconce in the hall. He walked down the circular stone steps into the druid’s quarters.
 
The druid’s quarters were dank and dusty. The smell of booze and bone dust covered by the sweet scents of lavender and thyme permeated the tapestries on the walls.
 
The room was dark but the outlines of skulls and books and dirty bowls could be seen amassed on the many counter tops and spilling from reliquaries. The piled stone walls were covered in a thick layer of dust.
 
“Caserd! Caserd! are you awake you old fool?” Eochid lit up the old druid’s face with the firelight.
 
The old man spoke without moving his eyes. His face potmarked and covered with an ashen beard. “I’m always awake my lord high king.” He opened just one eye in his wizened face “Is it bad dreams sire?”
 
Eoichid stood motionless at the foot of his bed, the torch held low. “I need you to read the bones again”
 
“As you wish my king” The old druid climbed out of his bed in his night robes and cap and by the light of the King’s torch he placed a candle on the ground. Next to it, a cup of water and another cup in which he poured alcohol.
 
He sat with his legs bony crossed on the stone floor and took a deep breath closing his eyes and then dropped a single piece of silver into the bowl of water.
 
“The bounty of the deep” The old man whispered hoarsely.
 
He clapped his hands and the candle lit. “The rising of the light”
 
He dipped his finger in the water and touched his forehead.
 
The druid gazed at the flame and cleared his throat “Between fire and water, I find my balance”.
 
He then lifted the cup with the alcohol in it. “I drink to the holy powers of the world- I drink to the ancestors – I drink to the land spirits – I drink to the shining goddesses and gods – To all the beings in all the worlds – In land sea and sky below and on high – I drink this cup of fellowship.” The old druid then threw the liquid to the back of his throat instantly causing a fit of coughing.
 
When the coughing fit subsided he took a swig from the jug from whence he poured it and cleared his throat again. He scrunched up his face and taking a handful of bones he threw them into a pewter dish.
 
He moved them around a little and squinted at them and then moved them around again. He looked puzzled for a moment and turned back to his stone jug and took another long pull resulting in the same amount of coughing as before.
 
“Spit it out” Eoichid erupted impatiently.
 
“Black wings” The old man sputtered. “I see a sky covered in a blanket of black wings”.
 
–
 
The next morning Eoichid looked out on the balcony of his chambers. He watched as slow creeping mist covered the mountains of Sliabh an Iarainn to the west. Looking out at them from his capital of Tailtin, named for his wife and goddess.
 
The mist remained for three days and three nights and the high king watched it with cool trepidation. Until the third it cleared but in its place a mighty ship crewed by shining people stood on the mountain.
 
They slowly advanced westward toward the sea of Ulster. A messenger was sent forth from both tribes.
 
–
 
Sreng the mightiest champion of the Firbolg, rode his black horse up the hill carrying the shovel headed javelin of the Firbolg. A long rounded shield on his back and an iron club on his belt to parlay with the outsiders. On his shield was the crest of Connacht, the sword arm and black bird. He wore a multicoloured patchwork cloak and a heavy hide jerkin. He was large and broad shouldered with a weathered face and long black beard and hair.
 
The shining one stood on the hill, he was small but fair of face with long golden hair with no beard and carried a sharp thin spear.
 
The sky was dark slate grey, a light mist covered the ground and a strong wind blew them both and speckled rain. The green hills stretching on forever, sheep in the fields grazing calmly, a squat crow sat on a high stone next to the hill sqwarking to itself.
 
From the hill Sreng could see the mighty capital Tailtin. Hundreds of smoke stack round houses surrounded by a huge wall of timber and the fort that was the high king’s keep towering at the top of it.
 
The shining one spoke and his voice was like honied water, calming but firm and constant, delicate but sure. “I am Bres the beautiful of the Tuatha De’ and I offer you glad tidings, brother.”
 
Sreng stopped at the bottom of the hill to look at the stranger. His skin was pale almost silver and translucent in color, his features sharp and his ears slightly pointed at the top. He wore a light and loose tunic with his arms and chest exposed revealing strange blue markings which seemed to glow when the light hit them.
 
His eyes too were strange, they were a bright amber color. There was a moment before Sreng decided to speak.
 
“I am Sreng of the Firbolg”. He bellowed, his eyes lidded and searching.
 
“So we share the same tongue – cousins perhaps?” Bres smiled jovially and carelessly.
 
Sreng stared trying to hide hide amazement for a moment in silence.
 
“My people talk of our ancient predecessors walking this, our ancestral home, is it that I look at a ghost of our past?” Bres jested with a mocking smile.
 
“I am no ghost” Sreng said as he continued to study the stranger’s weapons as he’d never seen anything like it before.
 
They looked strong and deadly sharp but were thinner than any weapon he’d seen. He could barely fathom how something as thin as a goose feather could be a weapon at all.
 
“You like my spear? Here, take it if you like.” Bres tossed the spear sideways and it floated through the air weightlessly. Sreng caught it in his huge hand and his eyes widened as he took it in and felt that it had almost no weight. He gawped at it in amazement as he ran his finger over the fine point and sharp edge and saw blood. He sucked his finger and looked up at Bres.
 
“You can keep it, we have many more” He grinned. “I wouldn’t mind taking a look at that one on your back.”
 
Sreng thought for a moment before deciding it was only chivalrous to do the same. He slid his javelin out of the doe skin and tossed it at Bres as one would a log onto a fire.
 
Bres caught it in one hand and swung it about himself as if he’d handled it a thousand times before. Cutting through the air with the savage recurved blade and stabbing the air with the rounded shovel point looking down the hefty haft.
 
“A good weight to it” He said as he jostled it playfully. “How do you get this metal to behave?”
 
“Our forging techniques are a guarded secret.” Sreng said gruffly.
 
“I see”
 
“Why is it you’ve come?” Sreng asked.
 
“Oh didn’t I say already?” Bres licked his lips and grinned. “We’re home”
 
“What is it your people want, be clear so I may return to my king.” Sreng said curtly, letting some irritation slip into his voice.
 
Bres pursed his lips and tapped his fingers along the haft of the rugged javelin.
 
“Half”
 
“Half?” Sreng spat.
 
“Half the island” Bres smiled playfully but he was not joking.
 
“You wish me to relay this to my king, High king Eoichid Mac Erc? That you want half of all that is his?” Sreng said almost dumbstruck by this boldfaced arrogance.
 
“I can do it myself” The voice came from close behind Sreng.
 
Sreng blinked and saw the shining man on the hill was gone and next to him stood a reflection of himself staring back at him carrying his own javelin. In an instant the javelin came down and cleaved Sreng’s mighty head from his shoulders. His head had rolled halfway down the hill before his body fell.
 
“Babd, did that please you?”
 
The crow shone and changed into the form of an elven woman wearing a deep red silken dress, her lips two were kissed as such.
 
“Yes my lord”. She cooed.
 
“Take the spear and the body back to Nuada, Dian Cecht will most likely want to study both.”
 
“Yes my lord”.
 
–
 
“Half!? HALF!?” Eoichid shouted his voice booming around the stone walls of his audience chamber. His face youthful and handsome as it was, twisted by rage and in his eyes a battle tested ugliness dwelt. “They come into my land, the land we fought and bled for. The land we built from nothing with our own hands, the very soil carried on our backs from that cursed land that slaved us and he wants HALF!?” The veins on his neck stood out like the branches of a tree and so to the scars on his face were licked by torchlight.
 
Sreng knelt before him, his eyes fixed on a spot on the floor as Eoichid paced back and forth.
 
“Never” Eoichid whispered. “NEVER!” He bellowed. “If we give them half this day they’ll take all from under our noses tomorrow.” Eoichid walked over to his throne, which was a simple chair made of ash with a gold leaf trim and the coat of arms relief. The slim beautiful spear of the Tuatha de’ draped across its arm rests. He snatched it up off his chair “And what is this? A chariot ornament, a giant whore’s hairpin” He said as he snapped the clean wooden haft over his knee and threw the two pieces into the fire.
 
The high king calmed himself and addressed his champion. “Sreng, you will ride out at first light and ask them what field of battle they wish to die on. We’ll meet them with shovel or pick or fork if they like but they will never have this land.”
 
Sreng nodded and didn’t say another word.
 
“You’re dismissed.”
 
–

Read the rest of the chapter on inkitt Love thine enemy

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Loverman Chapter 6 ‘Ask for Lucas’

Heyo,
Gonna be another quick one sadly because I spent most of today christmas shopping and I’m probably not going to be doing poetry or more blogging this week because this month is really busy for me, at work and obviously in my real life.
I was kidding myself when I thought I could get Diana done this week or the next, it’s gonna carry through to next month. I just don’t have the time to get in depth on it. I’m not just dotting i’s and crossing t’s I’m totally restructuring it and that takes time and a lot of concentrated effort. But it’ll all be worth it in the end I’m hoping. Otherwise I’m pretty much as fucked as I suspect. The spectre of doubt is looming hard and let’s just say I’m not feeling the christmas spirit one little bit. 
Just more confused and deranged as time goes on. I really don’t know what I’m going to do if this isn’t it, well I know but I don’t like it.
Fuck me, this is a grim christmas, was last year this grim? Probably not. Last christmas I had plans to go see the only person that matters to me and this year I don’t have the money and it’s my own stupid fault. I really fucked up. I just need one win. I miss her so much.
–
 
What we learnt from Letho was feeble, as it appeared Ericcson’s true quarrel was no amateur braggart. Letho guarded his identity with much more zeal as we could ascertain not even a physical description. The way he described it, it appeared they’d met on some role playing forum devoted to some obtuse writer of cult fame.
 
With some peculiarity they’d struck an ospicious bargain to meet masked at Ericcson’s house. Then to carry out the crime never having met in person without their masks. Coming in separate cars and leaving alone after committing the crime.
 
It seemed very strange to me but upon remembering my circumstances it didn’t seem too far out of the realm of possibilities. It had occurred to me Ericcson could not be the killer of his wife and most if not all of what he said was confirmed by this complete stranger. If his testimony could be verified as correct through the inhuman torture Ericcson inflicted on him.
 
There was something that gave me pause, a moment of strange clarity as Ericcson asked him softly and grimly why he did it. There was almost a moment of confusion, as if the question was obvious or didn’t even occur to him. His eyes rolled in his head and glazed over for a moment before he looked at Ericcson with a stark dumb cow-like expression before saying “Huh”.
 
Although he didn’t prove totally useless, a quick turnover of his pockets turned out a card from an erotic bookstore on the other end of town. There was a small note written on the back in pencil that said “Ask for Lucas”.
 
A thorough search of his phone elicited a series of messages from someone only listed as ‘L’ in his contacts. It seemed like no minor coincidence. Was it possible that one or two of the accomplices had broken the bonds of their anonymity packed and made contact in the real world unmasked? Or at the very least planned to do so.
 
It seemed altogether likely and since Ericsson and I had little else to go on it was pertinent for us to at least call the number. And do as the note had instructed; ‘ask for Lucas’.
 
Stealing himself away in some small coffee shop closer to the edge of town, the town of which was littered with them. Full to the brim with all manner of social outcasts all tapping away with their heads down under woollen hats. Sadly I lacked a notion for directions even when my head was attached to its body. After the separation it was much harder for me to orientate myself despite the fact it seemed to be more important than ever. I couldn’t say where exactly we were with what little I could see from the hole in the bag. I could smell the coffee and the lonely desperation of its patrons. The nasally cries of adolescents asking for increasingly innane concoctions of coffee all containing soy.
 
He began to punch in the number on the card of Letho’s phone, of which we had commandeered as at present he had no use for it. The image of his deflated corpse passed in front of my eyes suddenly but I felt no tinge of guilt or human sorrow. Just a pale flash of rememberance, a filing away of a person. In my memory he sat hunched, looking flat and pale and dull. His eyes and mouth inhumanely stretched in indescribable horror as a black ichor dripped out of every orifice. A wrinkling of my nose was the only reaction and an odd sinking feeling as I knew I would have to see more. Much more before the day was through riding as I was on the right hand of the devil.
 
He held the phone to his ear listening as it rang. It rang two or three times before a nasal voice of what could have been a teenage boy or a young woman answered and uttered the vile name of the place she worked. A vapid disgusting pun relating to sexual acts I feel no need to glorify in my notes. Needless to say she said them with some shrill glee that peaked at a dull metronome having said it many times before. Each time losing it’s charm and comic timing for her.
 
“Hi this is Debbie, what fantasy can I fulfil for you today?” She said. Her voice was hoarse and unfeminine.
 
“I was told to ask for Lukas”
 
“Lukas isn’t here today”
 
“Do you know when he’ll be in?”
 
“Jeez, I dunno, why don’t you ask him?”
 
“Do you have his house number?”
 
“He’s the boss, of course I have his house number but I’m not gonna give it out to every random guy that calls.”
 
“He’s an old friend of mine.”
 
“Oh yeah? How many piercings does he have in his face?
 
“Seven”
 
“Wrong answer asshole, he doesn’t have any piercings- in his face”. And with that she slammed the phone down and the line went dead.
 
“Well that was unproductive” I said.
 
It didn’t take him long to find the seedy little hole in the wall, sandwiched as it was between a dry cleaners and another damnable coffee shop. A small flat single storey boxy building with blacked out windows and a stainless steel door.
 
Ericcson pushed it open with me swinging by his side. A chinchy chime rang over the door. Looking over the racks overflowing with the worst smut and degenerate filth there was a girl flipping through the pages of a magazine.
 
Ericcson had taken now to wearing something of a disguise but sunglasses indoors in my opinion did little to detract attention. But it seemed he’d also gained some sensitivity to light with his new found, I’m reluctant to say ‘powers’.
 
He marched briskly to the counter stopping not one second to cast a curious gaze at the layers of smut and filth covering all four walls. I almost felt a little thankful that I had lost all urges relating to these acts with losing the relevant appendages. Viewing them in this form made my non-existant stomach churn, acts both degrading and unsanitary to say the least. It boggled the mind that there was such a species with as little taste and decorum as this. That almost took it’s reproductive act as some sort of sport or sad melancholy cynical joke.
 
–

If you want to read more of this chapter head on over to inkitt Ask for Lukas

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