Doing a rewatch of this series and I never realized how little interactions Janelle and Robyn have on screen. I'm not sure how often they interacted off screen but I'm betting not very much and I think it's because Janelle could see right through Robyn's manipulation. I don't Robyn is a mastermind but she doesn't have to be to be a skilled manipulator which she is. She knows exactly which buttons to push on Kody, Meri, and Christine. Meri she was a friend to, for Kody she feeds into his ego and plays the innocent wife he needs to protect while reinforcing his need for loyalty and keeping his occupied with sex, and for Christine, Robyn leaned into Christine's feelings of being jealous and less than, pretending to be a friend while also playing up how much Christine's "jealousy" (which was really her asking for equal time and emotional effort form her husband) hurt her. Janelle doesn't have those same buttons. She's pretty easy-going and was seemingly Kody's confidant even after Robyn joined. Janelle mentions how Kody said that he didn't consider himself married to Meri and how he wasn't attracted to Christine so she was still his confidant as late as like Season 15 or 16.
Meri seemed to be the head of the wives, as Kody seemed to favor her a lot early on, essentially letting her have the last word or the role of getting the other wives and children in order. Christine was undoubtedly the organizer who planned the holidays and events and made things special for the kids, while also being the primary caregiver for the OG13. Even Gabe mentions that he and his siblings used to go over to Christine's all the time while they were in Vegas, just to say hi or get food from her fridge and that's why she had such a hard in Flagstaff because she essentially lost all of her kids (she and the kids all seem to consider her a strongother figure to them). Janelle was the workhorse: she did the finances, worked very hard, and had the majority of all the sons (which I'm sure Kody loooooved) while also being best friends with Kody.
Robyn sabotaged each of them. She took over as Head Wife from Meri, systematically broke down each of the family's traditions and holidays that Christine had established and replaced them with her own so she was the "true Mom", and she took over being Kody's favorite...but she couldn't fully replace Janelle in Kody's eyes. Janelle was still important to him even until she separated from him and true to the insult Kody tried to use to demean her, all of Robyn's manipulations slid right off Janelle. I think it's why Robyn avoided Janelle and seemed very intimidated by her. Janelle doesn't have any visible buttons besides her kids and Robyn had beef with every single one of them, which is ridiculous as she's a grown woman fighting with children. Robyn yells that Maddie can move out if she doesn't want to sign the family statement, never forgave Hunter for not being happier when she was pregnant, and hated Garrison and Gabe for calling her out on making the COVID rules and monopolizing Kody's time and attention. The only thing Robyn could do was attack Janelle's kids and she sure did.
All said, Janelle never seemed to deal for Robyn's shit and seemed completely immune to the manipulation. I completely understand and have sympathy for Meri and Christine being swept up in it because I think they shared their insecurities in good faith that Robyn would be a friend and not the viper she is. The Teflon Queen let all the mud Robyn was slinging slide right off.
I'm not saying any of them are perfect and they've all made mistakes but I'm in awe of Janelle's ability to keep a level head and not let someone challenge her confident view of herself. One day I hope I'm as confident and self-assured myself. Wear that Teflon Queen badge with honor and you go Queen!!

Hi everyone! My baby is 10 months old and I’m wondering for those of you with similar aged babies how much your little one eats?
I feel like maybe I’m not offering my baby enough food lately. She’s very petite (10th percentile) but drs not concerned because she was 5 weeks premature and is still showing gradual growth. However she hasn’t been eating a whole lot. I’m new to blw and we have free purees from Wic. So we do both. She was not finishing the jars but I realized she definitely preferred blw and feeding herself and would eat bettemore those days. When I spoon feed her she fights a little lol. I just am in over my head as far as what to offer her and am new to being a stay at home mom (was working up until about a month ago) so it’s hard sometimes to prep and give “real” food.
I recently got reusable baby pouches so I could at least put the purées in there and she can have some control over feeding herself and today she loved that and ate way more than usual!
I also want to say I still breastfeed but throughout the day she would only eat 1-2 jars of baby puréed fruits/veggies/meat, nurse a couple times mostly for naps, have a couple small snacks (think yogurt melts/cereal puffs) then overnight she’s waking up constantly to nurse. Today she had like 4.5 jars worth of food in the pouches as well as nursing. (Of course mix in the days of blw where she eats more but this is just an example of a worse and more typical day)
I googled and realized woah! It seems like she should be having wayy more solids. So wanted to hear a sample of what a day’s menu looks like for your little ones! Please share any tips regarding blw/meal and snack ideas etc! Especially because I plan on weaning off the breastmilk around 12 months. To be noted for any tips as of right now baby can’t have milk/dairy products possible allergy still working on diagnosis but bad reactions.

This is the first episode of SS season 2. This is where the show has more of a sense of what it wants to be. The episode time is cut in half, and the number of songs per episode goes from 4 to 2. These changes help improve the pacing of the show. As with many TV shows, the intro has changed. The intro is where we first see the inclusion of the side characters' pets. While they don't appear in this episode, they will be very relevant in the sister episode. As always, these posts are filled with spoilers, so read at your own risk.
First, I need to discuss the elephant in the room that this episode goes entirely against what was established in the first season. This ep is about how Strawberry got Pupcake, which could have worked if it was set up as a distant flashback. Strawberry already has the friendships with the other humans and Honey Pie Pony in this ep, but in the pilot, she has Pupcake, and all her friends met him at the same time that they met Strawberry, Custard, and Apple. Speaking of, Apple Dumplin is not in this episode, and no explanation is given as to why. When it comes Apple, I get the sense that the writers only include her when they need a little child character, and forget about her the rest of the time. Okay, rant over. Now, we start the episode with Strawberry and Custard planning for a "Just for Custard" day, which is set to happen in two weeks. We're treated to a song from Strawberry about how much she loves Custard, and I'm sure cat owners feel the same kind of love for their own cats. Later that night, there's a thunderstorm, and Pupcake shows up at her doorstep. Strawberry, being the compassionate person that she is, lets him in. Naturally, Custard does not like him, since he is loud, messy, and full of energy. I wish we could have had some scenes where Strawberry trains Pupcake to behave himself, since his behavior was obviously stressing out Custard. The one training scene we do get is more about teaching him how to do tricks than for behavioral stuff. The lack of training we see has the unfortunate implications that Strawberry was enabling Pupcake's behavior and forcing Custard to just deal with it. Anyways, the next day, Strawberry asks her friends if they know anything about this dog, which they don't. Then Strawberry gets the idea for Pupcake's name by going to Angel Cake's house, where she feeds him cupcakes, even though some of them clearly had chocolate icing. There's also a scene earlier, where Pupcake is given a bowl of milk. I can't help but wonder if these scenes where the pets are given human food (in this and other episodes), would have given kids the idea to feed those things to their pets, which would have made them sick (or worse). This is one of the reasons why it's important to analyze the messages in children's media, so that they don't receive harmful messages (like how a bunch of little girls ended up in the hospital for kissing frogs). Okay, second rant over. Since no one had any information about Pupcake, Strawberry takes him in as a permanent member of her family, much to Custard's chagrin. During the aforementioned training sequence, Custard remembers her special day, and gets dolled up, only for Pupcake to come inside and get mud everywhere. Strawberry sends the pets outside to play so that she can clean up. In real life, that would be extremely irresponsible, but since we're inStrawberryland, it's totally okay /s. Through the second musical number, Custard laments about how Pupcake has, in her eyes, ruined her life. Pupcake tries to bring her a stick, but then she finally gets fed up and tells him to stop howling, which he takes to heart. That night, Strawberry tells the pets a story about a prince getting lost in the woods. Custard gets the idea to take Pupcake into the forest and abandon him there, which is uh... kinda sociopathic. Anyway, the pets go on a walk the next day. Pupcake is still upset by Custard telling him not to howl, and so he doesn't even greet any of the other people they see. Then, Custard takes him to Huckleberry Briar, and they both end up lost and it gets very dark and stormy. At feeding time, Strawberry realizes that her pets are missing, so she recruits her friends to search for them with her. While they're lost, the pets bond with each other a bit, and Custard develops some empathy for Pupcake since that was how life was for him before he found Strawberry. They can hear the human voices calling for them. Custard convinces Pupcake to howl so that the humans can find them, even though she'd previously begged him to stop. When they're home, Custard comes clean and apologizes to Pupcake. Strawberry reminds her that she never stopped loving her and that she didn't forget about their special day. Custard has grown fond of Pupcake, and so she tells Strawberry that she wants him to be there on her special day. I'll admit, that this is a wholesome ending. It seems like the pets have a better understanding of each other. In case you couldn't tell, I'm not a big fan of this episode, and I won't be revisiting it all that much. Most of the episode is just frustrating and unpleasant to watch.
Comment your thoughts below!

This is my first time posting so I’m sorry if it doesn’t make much sense or I’m trauma dumping a lot also a couple trigger warnings, I’m not sure where to start off with. Me and my mom used to be pretty close I’d say up until I started high school. Middle of eighth grade I moved to a new city so I was back to trying to find some friends. I’ve been moving around since I could remember, I used to live in Germany where I moved twice, then moved to the US around the Silicon Valley, moved again, and again and again now we’re here. I wouldn’t be explaining this part of my life if I felt like it didn’t have any weight in this situation. Middle school I found a friend, me and her got pretty close, stuck through Covid together. My mom hated her and not even two years into our friendship my mom started accusing her of stealing from us, being a bad influence and overall just being trashy. Her parents were in the middle of getting a divorce and she had a lot of things going on in her life. I dyed my hair red during this time too while being friends with her, she probably was a huge influence on me but that’s also because it was covid and I was bored and who doesn’t start irrationally bleaching and coloring their hair at 14. I think my mom thought she was a bad influence on that part too because she's the one that first started off coloring her hair like purple and pink etc. My mom never of course said anything to my friend but she made sure I would hear of her disapproval concerning her bad influence in my life. I stopped being friends with her freshman year since my parents banned me from having her over or going to her house, I couldn’t drive neither could she and hanging out at each other's houses was pretty much what we did 80% of the time. I was so frustrated and felt trapped because the only friend I really cared about was someone I wasn’t allowed to associate with anymore. I told her I was done being friends with her over text and blamed it on me just being in a dark place and breaking it off. She was confused and called me a week later about something personal but I just dismissed it. Granted there were other things going on in our friendship but I felt terrible about it especially since her parents were going through that divorce and I just left during such a sensitive time. I hate to admit it but I felt so much better since I started making new friends quickly and started sitting with a new group the next day. Mostly guys and other two girls, it worked out fine for the next year. Junior year my grades started dropping so my parents got stricter, started taking my phone, looking through it, screen time etc. I felt like it was a huge invasion of privacy since my mom would look through my texts. Me and my mom also started arguing weekly about whatever it was but when I mean arguing I mean like full on yelling for two hours down in the living room with no stopping. I can’t do anything about it because whenever I say something remotely disproving her so called “facts'' since she always speaks with so much authority on subjects she wouldn’t even know about I’m the one that has to quiet down from my fathers perspective, and I know this will be mostly about my mom but me and my dad have always been close even when we’re fighting within a week we at least make it up. We play the same sports, have the same humor etc. I understand this might look like us disregarding my mom and I know she cares and loves me yet in certain circumstances she doesn’t show it so of course there’s going to be reasons as to why I’m closer with my dad than her. For example I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 4th grade and of course I wouldn’t expect anyone to know that when you're low you need carbs or when your blood sugar is high you need insulin but my mom to this day still does not understand it. I wouldn’t care even if it’s my friend but as my mom you take so much authority over my life and who I can’t or can hangout with but you don’t know the basics of how I have to manage my life behind closed doors in the house that you and I live in every day. That might sound overdramatic but it’s just something I think about. Also growing up, I’m an only child by the way, I would always play by myself whenever we went on vacation for example to the beach etc. it was always my dad that came and played with me in the sand while at sharing his time with me and my mom so my mom wouldn’t gets upset over him leaving her to go play with me. Even now I notice how my mom would always make snarky comments regarding how my dad always treats me like a princess and cares too much over me. Anywho, since I know this is getting pretty long I’ll try to sum it up a bit more. I started liking one of the guys from that group, I would text him on a daily basis just about whatever. We were pretty awkward in person since I’ve never really talked to that many guys and I don’t think he really had much experience either so we stuck it to mostly phones, everyone else in the group also didn’t know. Once my mom went through my phone on one occasion that night, because she would collect it on some nights and read through my messages in bed she saw one message from that guy calling my mom bipolar and me responding with something like it’s fine like I still love her she freaked out. She told me to never talk to him again and that I’m a brat for talking about my family issues outside of the family etc. I honestly had nobody to talk to. The other two girls in the group didn’t really talk to me at this time, I later became really close with one of them though more on that later and I had no other friends in that town so it was really only him. He had a plethora of family issues that I couldn’t even imagine so I felt like he understood where I was coming from at times better than other kids with American parents. Not sure I mentioned but my parents were both born in Eastern Europe and grew up during heavy communism so that definitely affected them and their parenting style. Anywho, my mom sent me a paragraph to show to him, basically telling him to never talk to me again and that he has to apologize to her etc. After a couple months I think he took me out on a date. I'm not sure what to make of it since it was pretty casual. We just got ice cream. I told my parents that he was only picking me up so we could meet with the rest of the group when of course we’re not. The rest of the guys saw us downtown and found out about it. That kinda really sucked since I’m pretty sure one of them liked me so he got really mad and it kind of ruined the group dynamic. The guy I liked stopped talking to me a couple months in since I couldn’t really do much or go anywhere and dating as a result would be hard so he stopped really talking to me it was pretty off and on since I would get mad stop texting him and then he would try to get back texting at me and once I showed him I cared he’d stop. I was so mad at him and the situation that I refrained myself from talking to him, two weeks later he killed himself. I found out because one of the guys from the group faced me and told me. I went downstairs and started crying and formed the sentences explaining it the best I could, pushing a couple words out at a time. In that very moment I felt so hurt and vulnerable by what just happened my mom responded by just looking at me and saying that he had it coming for him since he probably vaped and drank. My dad ran downstairs since he probably heard me crying and the first thing he did without asking me any questions was hug me. For the first time ever he told my mom to shut up since her trying to ask me questions about how he died just made me sob harder. Over the next week my mom was pretty lenient about letting me go out. The next week she started asking what happened to him. Me and my mom were not close at all anymore at this time. You see mothers and daughters talking about guys or what dress they’re gonna wear to the prom etc in the movies. Me and my mom are not like that. On top of that I was overwhelmed with what happened and as someone does overthinking how things could have played out differently. Anyway I refused to tell her anything saying I was too uncomfortable and over the course of the next couple months of senior year she would get progressively mad and irritated at me to the point of arguing and yelling at me for not trusting her and telling her how he killed himself. I to this day told her nothing but she stopped asking. I don’t know how my dad feeds into this since he’s always so Switzerland about everything when I know I’m right in an argument between me and my mom, however when my mom has leverage he takes her side. Anyway, the beginning of senior year was rough. I hated being in that house and really started seriously considering the only options I felt like I had at the time. I started becoming closer to that one girl from the group earlier, spoiler alert my mom strongly dislikes her now too since she’s a liar and since she’s close with her mom but not her dad that means her parents are having marital issues and therefore her mom is a cheater etc. I don’t understand how she goes from one topic to another and sorts these things into her head. She’s my only friend that I’m really close with and I have been for the past these almost two so hearing this is very disheartening since I’m sending off senior year and I can’t do this again being so close to the end of the year. I forgot to mention but during homecoming I drank for the first time and I had one of my guy friends with his girlfriend and that friend that I’m not friends with drop me off. When he dropped me off he didn’t wave to my mom so she now thinks he’s a bastard in her words and disgusting and she deserves and apology for all the times he’s been over to my house etc. which I honestly think is insane because how do you always have so many issues over my friends and why are you so obsessed with 16 year olds, like you really have beef with high school kids as a 50 year old. Anyway the reason I bring that up is because I invited him over a couple weeks ago for some drills to help one of my other friends with mma since me and him used to wrestle and my mom got mad despite him not being there for me but for my other friends benefit. I’m not sure if this makes any sense. I'm trying to explain the issue best I can without saying too much. Anyway my friend, the one that I’m friends with now, the girl and that guy from the group that didn’t wave at my mom are both Latin so my mom started calling them cheaters and dirty etc when they had nothing to do with anything. This argument spiraled over me asking my mom if I can have a sleepover with those friends since we want to bring a new series on Netflix. Also during prom I asked my parents for 10 dollars since I already had twenty in my account and I wanted to buy hair stuff for prom. They gave me the 10 and I said how I was going to catch a ride with friend A so that when friend A picked me up but friend B that I did not mention in the plan picked me up my parents started calling and texting me. To give some background friend B has been close with me since freshman year, probably the only friend my mom has liked and also the only white friend I have not sure if that has anything do with it but there’s that. She’s really sweet and has been invited over multiple times to my house by my parents, they do really like her. Anywho yet since I didn’t mention that friend B was driving the car since my parents didn’t recognize the new car and knew it wasn’t friend A driving yet assumed it was indeed friend B but since I didn’t mention that they took all the money I had in my account which was only 30 dollars but it was what I needed to get my nails and hair gloss and hair spray for prom, I just started breaking down in the middle of target. I was so excited to get my stick on nails etc since I couldn’t afford to get the acrylics since I was paying for all my prom stuff for the most part. By the way I know that the 10 dollars was initially there so I understand taking away that but the other 20 I made selling my clothes on mercari and I had nothing else like no other cash nothing that was the money I worked on to get my prom stuff. It was mostly my dad actually that got mad at this point taking my money etc and than following a got a text from my mom saying I got what I was coming for by acting the way I have been. There were 3 others with me while I was at target so having three of my friends see me breakdown from me only having 14 cents left in my account was so humiliating. I ended up looking great at prom neither less so don’t even worry about that, my hair looked great and I found some old stick-ons in my laundry room and painted them white lol a couple of them popped off during prom but whatever. This has been really long and thanks to whoever spent their time reading through all of this I’m sorry if the read is a bit of a struggle but I just don’t know what to think or do of this situation. Keep in mind I’m 18 now, never have had a boyfriend, never have do anything, kissed, even held hands romantically etc. it’s one thing you know to not care about any of that but the thing is I do and I want to experience being a teenager and going out and going on dates and not worry about my mom flipping out on one of my friends. While we were in Italy one of the tour guys told her to move on the bus to make more room for others and she started cussing him out telling him to f himself etc for telling her a paying customer where to sit. Everyone started staring at us. I did not want to be there. I just kept my head down the entire time and didn’t really talk to my mom out of embarrassment for the next two days. Also after that prom incident I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere after as a result of go to friend B's birthday bash the next day so my mom texted her without my knowledge and told her not to tell me about how I’ve been acting up and one day I’ll learn when I’m her age but it will be too late and that I don’t know what I’m doing and finishing off my apologizing on my part for my behavior and I’m the reason why I can’t go to her party. Which I find so infuriating because one of the main reasons why I don’t tell my mom anything about my personal life is because I simply don’t want her to have that control of knowing what my life is like, I probably tell the teacher I TA for more than my own biological mother. The fact that she preached family issues in the family so heavily and that you should never talk about issues to others yet goes behind my back and tells my friend that my indecent behavior is the reason why I can’t go is so beyond me because where did your ideals go that you preached so heavily about. Every time I’m around my mom especially when she has her flares of anger I just start shaking like you know when you drink something with a lot of caffeine in the morning and you don’t eat anything so mid way through the day you just start getting jittery and anxious, kind of like that. Ok I think I’m done anyway thank you for tuning in cause I really have to start studying for human geo, thanks for reading up until here 🙂.

TLDR: Narcissistic mother-in-law is going no-contact until she can apologize for ruining mother's day and learn some fucking empathy to her first-time-mom daughter.
Ok daddit, thought I'd share my ongoing story with you all because we all love a good drama bomb.
Context: me & wife = late 30s, married 2 years (together 6) with a 10 month old baby (first child to both families). MIL (mother in law) = late 60s, divorced twice
~a month before Mother's Day~ My wife and I had been renovating the house. Nothing major, but we hired some contractors to extend the length of the living room by removing some walls and making the space bigger. The wife's and Is intentions are to get new furniture for the space and we already have a layout in mind.
Here comes the MIL, who IMMEDAITELY makes opinions on how the space should be decorated AND that we should hire an interior decorator to redesign the space (note, it's just a living room and not THAT big). Would also like to note, she didn't pay for our house and she certainly didn't pay for our renovations.
~the day before mother's day~ Wife and I purchased a couch and have picked out the decor of the living room via our own research, requirements, and the in-store interior designer consultant.
~Mother's Day~ Baby has a 101 fever, but is acting pretty normal all things considered. MIL and extended family are invited over for dinner and exchanging gifts. I shared our couch purchase with one of the family members and MIL IMMEDIATELY makes snide comments such as "the couch is ugly" and "I can't believe you bought that couch". Mind you, she's the one who suggested we get an interior designer, and per the store's consultant the style and color perfectly match what we're looking to do in the room. Wife begins crying and hides herself away from the family because of how her mother made her feel.
At this point, the kiddo is stable so I sit at the table and eat some dinner without the wife (she's in the other room crying). Some small talk among the family. Eventually the baby gets hungry so I move to the living room to feed her (more comfortable than sitting at the dining room table).
No sooner than ~10 minutes later the family begins coming over to tell me goodbye and that they're leaving after being over no more than an hour. Hyper confused, I learned that the MIL was upset that her daughter (my wife) RUINED HER mother's day by being upset at her disrespect and told the family to go home, which they did (probably to avoid drama). Now, I don't know what this "disrespect" was, but I can guarantee it was probably some misplaced motion in her head that we didn't behave the way she was expecting us to and got mad (imagine being rude to your daughter and pretending to be upset she got sad). That night, the MIL ends up texting my wife a storm about how ugly the couch is, how she can't believe we spent renovating the room, and every vitriol under the sun about our decisions over the last month. Surely some form of gaslight targeting my wife's uncertainty with making big decisions.
I also learned later that the MIL was upset that the gift I got my wife for mother's day wasn't sufficient enough and she was CONVINCED I would have forgotten (without any prior history of me forgetting gifts). Not to toot my own horn, but I like to think I've been an amazing dad taking care of my child, AND I asked the wife ahead of time what type of Mother's Day gift she'd want and got her something based on her suggestions. The MIL has this mindset that the more money you spend the more sincere the gift is and that's just not something the wife and I adhere to. We talk to each other, listen to what the other person wants/ needs, and go off of that.
Now, my MIL has a history of narcotism and belittling others by talking down to them, especially to her daughter. I won't bore you all with examples over the years, but lets just say I was absolutely livid. This was my wife's first official mother's day and it was ruined by her mom because she didn't like the couch we bought and somehow our behavior offended her despite her knowing we were going to purchase furniture on our own.
At this point we've told the MIL we aren't talking to her anymore until we're ready to have a sit-down chat (work, sick baby has been keeping us busy). Upon which, I plan on laying it out to her that her behavior about what the wife and I do is none of her business (especially since we're financing everything) and that her unsolicited opinions are grossly inappropriate and not needed. Unfortunately, given the MIL age I don't expect this to have any effect and given how long I've known her, I don't think it's going to make any meaningful progress to her being a better person. I've heard phrases from her saying "well opinions can be given freely" and I have some absolute bombs I am ready to drop on her if I feel the conversation warrants it, but I don't want to go down that road unless no other options are available.
We plan on having a sit down with her soon to talk about her behavior. Though I am convinced she's going to be pretending to be angry to justify her actions. But honestly, I might just tell her to sit on the floor since I know she doesn't like the new couch.
For all the years I've known my wife, I have seen this woman make her cry several times and I've kept my mouth shut. But watching my wife cry on my shoulder in front of our baby on Mother's Day was the final straw. I am absolutely willing to go no-contact and am willing to pay any sitter's cost to avoid relying on the help of my narcissistic MIL. But we need to have that talk and see how things go from there.

This is for a property I had built, I’m not sure I have recourse. The planned diagram indicated the trough would be a lot smaller while the installed trough was correct for the amount of litres I signed off on but the building contract does not show its dimensions.
I made the mistake of thinking the trough I signed off on would match the diagram.
Do I have any recourse?

So obviously thing from the dark continent can’t reach the human world naturally, otherwise the human world probably would have been destroyed or at least the presence of dark continent creatures would have been talked about on the human continents. Which means that someone brought the ant queen to the mainland, which is somewhat supported by the fact she was injured when first introduced suggesting capture or at least being hunted. For the theories sake we can assume that she was injured to prevent resistance while transporting her to the mainland.
It’s very convenient that the Queen ended up in one of the few nations with a large unarmed population, with little communication to the outside world, and that no large government (which would have contacted the hunter association) resides over really. It was the optimal environment to ensure the most any evolution with the largest time allowed before anyone that could actually do something found out what was going on.
Then during the extermination the efforts were hindered even more by the insistence of using temp hunters instead of qualified ones to kill the ants, something that gave them even more time to create ants and evolve. We all know who temp hunters are loyal to though as it is explicitly stated in the chairman election arc that Pariston is the person they are loyal to and who often involves them in issues.
That’s kind of my loose unresearched theory on the whole thing I came up with in the shower after finishing the anime today. And I know a little about the whole dark continent arc / succession war, but just that line about 18 hunters missing gets to me. It would just make sense if Pariston is sending people tho the dark continent what with his alliance with beyond netero if I remember right? I mean a guy sees an admittedly not that strong queen and what her species can do, jumped her with what we can assume is more than 18 hunters at the same time since only 18 are MISSING and doesn’t account for whoever came back from the dark continent alive (well maybe not alive actually that place kinda sucks), injures her and brings her back to the mainland and drops her off in a place that she can feed on easily with the maximum amount of time before she is noticed, and involved temp hunters while the pros are hunting escaped ants to slow down efforts even more and allow time for (I think at this point in the story) the king to get comfortable and make a plan. Then some mysterious force inside the hunter association who definitely isn’t hinted to be Pariston , captures the remaining not born ants and freezes them. It just all fits in my head.
But why did Pariston do this? I don’t really know but it’s Pariston so he probably just wanted to be a nuisance and maybe get some chimera ants out of it. And I’m sure he knew that there was a big risk with killing humanity with this but I don’t think he cares he’s Pariston.
The interesting thing though is that this is exactly what netero wanted, someone who would get under his skin and actively try to hinder him as his vice chairman, Pariston. So I guess in a way this is exactly what chairman Nestero should have gotten and wanted to get, but he probably enjoyed his fight so it’s fair.
That’s it thanks for letting me word hard my unresearched shower thoughts theory on your screen

This will be my first time ever openly sharing about my addiction; from the root cause to the effects and struggles that having a porn addiction has impacted my life to this day
So I just recently turned 21 and I'm beginning to look around and realize that for as long as I've acknowledged that I have a problem and need to quit, I keep feeding the addiction KNOWING that it's ruining my life. I'm going to split this post into 3 sections explaining the following stages: The root causes/early development, Progression of my addiction to current day, and Main struggles from my PA and how I go about everyday life to heal. Not exactly sure why I'm posting this but I just feel like it's something I need to let out. Hope someone can relate or give me their take on it.
The root causes/early development: So I believe that my PA manifested due to a few different reasons: Playing "doctor" with my sister as a child, early age porn exposure, and then using porn as a coping mechanism to deal with any negative emotions. So starting w/ "playing doctor", it first happened at a very young age, somewhere between elementary school to 6th grade. I think most people know what that is but to keep it short basically my sister who is a year older than me introduced my to basically role playing as doctor and patient. I wasn't sure if SHE even knew it was wrong but the point is, it happened. I genuinely don't think she was doing in an abusive way but I'll never know. I don't remember the small details of exactly how it happened but what leads me to think this was a factor that contributed to my porn addiction is that I know now as an adult that it's wrong, however as we "played doctor" I only grew to enjoy it and occasionally we took things outside of "playing doctor" - which is why I don't know what to make of it... Long story short it went from "doctor" to us making up our own games like "spy" where we pretended to fight each other as spy's, getting "knocked out" unconscious while she'd touch... and I specifically remember wanting to play these games in hopes that it led to that. But even outside of playing games I grew to wanting to touch her and act on perverted thoughts as a child that were NOT normal for my age or in general. And sometimes I would sneakily act on them - which as I'm reflecting on right now makes me think that me KNOWINGLY trying to be sneaky and act on perverted thoughts at that young of an age had to have carried on with me as I got older (contributing to my porn addiction).. And then the last thing that I vividly remember was when I was probably 10-12 years old is when again we were actually kind of aggressively play fighting, somehow ended up with each other's hands DOWN THERE mutually and we kept going on with each other until she made me.... yeah. And that was the last memory I had of what started out as us "playing doctor". Fast forward to current date since that last memory and we've never spoken about those experiences (more on that later). Going onto the actual exposure of pornography and WATCHING porn, I was exposed to it somewhere in between the same timeframe as when I'd play doctor and the last memory of us playing (somewhere between the ages of 8-12). I can vividly remember the scene that played late at night on the tv that my parents had left on (I shared a room with them). And then moving forward from there, somewhere in between I would find videos on YouTube of this "prank" channel where he'd go up to paid actors, bet that if he beat them in rock paper scissors that they'd have to make out with him. And as a young kid at the time seeing a girl in a bikini making out with a guy as he grabbed on her ass just made me horny and I learned to masturbate from there. And I cant think of a stronger dopamine hit for a 8-12 year old little me at the time than seeing those videos and pleasuring myself. After this, I'd hit middle school where I was bullied a lot, all while lacking social skills necessary to make any genuine friends or deal with the emotional turmoil of being bullied. Fast forward a few months and I think I just progressively began to normalize using porn as a coping mechanism - All the way from whenever I just got mad while dying repetitively on the videogame, to avoiding the fact that I hated my life everyday that I went to school. I'd use porn to receive that "good feeling" whenever I could. And I think my sexual addiction got worse when I began touching myself in the shower almost everyday in middle school to the imagination of the pretty girls that were at my school, even though I had neverarely talked to some of them. It was just a thing for me where every night I took a shower, I closed my eyes and fantasized about doing stuff with them. And then the cycles of me normalizing these things continued and eventually I found out about REAL porn sites.
Progression of my addiction to current day: So shortly after finding the real porn sites I entirely opted to use those as much as possible as the cycle continued. So by my freshman year of high school I was already using porn sites regularly. I remember during summer and winter breaks, sometimes I'd sleep at my grandmas and stay up all night switching from ejaculating to porn, to watching my favorite youtuber and streamers, to going back to jerking off. It was a multiple times a day/night occurrence OFTEN. Sometimes even during the middle of the day I'd pretend to use the bathroom but really I had a porn video pulled up and I watched until I was done. And as time progressed one video didn't exactly cut it for me. I don't think its that I couldn't get off to the first video, but more so that I just had the urge to see more and didn't want to nut yet. I didn't even know if I was purposely edging or not. I did not even understand that edging was a concept yet. Its just something that occurred naturally for me. And during all of this, I am still somewhere in the age range of 13-15. Consistently ejaculating to pornography, further exploring the more basic categories of porn like anal and lesbian. I think a notable memory was one of the first times I watched porn in the middle of work during summer break (extended family owns a construction company so I worked over breaks). It's crazy because in construction all we have are porta-potties that are always hot and nasty and the urge just came over me one day to pretend like I was using the bathroom and get one off before I went back... I don't think I even realized at the time that I had an addiction because this was still early high school. It was just something I looked at as a good feeling and whenever the urges came to me I took any chance I got to fulfill them. Even if I was sharing a room with a family member, I'd be as slow and quit as I could, touch myself under the covers, finish in my underwear and then showechange the next morning like it was normal. Moving forward, this type of behavior continues all the way throughout high school and the feeling of ejaculating just is not as intense as it use to be, so I look up ways to spice it up and I tried shit all the way from sitting on my own hand til it goes sort or numb so it "feels like someone else is touching you", to doing it in more risky places like my backyard outside when I was home alone and had my pants pulled down all the way, to whatever else I could try. Reflecting back, I just look at all these actions as the progressions of a sexual/porn addiction that is still developing. And this is how I rationalize the way I developed a porn addiction. Now it wasn't AWFUL in high school but it was getting bad. I realized that I had actually had a bad addiction that needed to be addressed a few months after graduating high school. From that point forward It was something that I had acknowledged was an issue but nonetheless, continued to do out of habit and as a continued coping mechanism. Whether it was from the lack of relationships, to my current life situation/direction I was headed in, or just any negative emotion - I used porn to release. Sometimes I'd even just do it out of boredom, not even because I had a dying urge to get one off. And then after that point of realization, I sat in "depression" for a few months still going about my everyday life until one day my dad mentioned that I should try therapy. He knew nothing about the addiction but I did let him know I feel depressed and the many struggles that I faced - which I believe is due to my porn addiction. So long story short, I go to therapy for about 3 sessions and end up dropping it because it just wasn't something I felt was helping or enjoyed (more on that later). From there to current day, I've gone at MOST one week periods attempting to quit porn and every time I relapse. From the age of 1 to-current day 21 years old, the progression of the categories of porn that I watch has grown and a few different fetishes like face sitting, femdom, and role play has increased. I don't NEED to watch these specific categories to get off, however these are ones I've found myself most recently watching and edging to, sometimes for 1-3 hours at a time, usually at night on weekends or before I fall asleep. And to take it a step further, I had started pouring money into camgirl sites, phone sex sites, only fans, etc.. I live with my parents still so it's not to the point that I'm broke and have no money, but still what the fuck am I doing putting my hard earned money into a porn addiction... (I'm a functioning adult on a pathway to financial freedom, more on this later).
Main struggles from my PA and how I go about everyday life to heal: So I believe that the main struggles with my porn addiction consist of: the inability/struggle to create and maintain healthy relationships, low self esteem, poor social skills, lack of motivation, and the cognitive dissonance of continuing my addiction to porn even though morally I believe it is wrong to lust over. I believe all of these struggles that come with porn are connected to each other - minus the cognitive dissonance. But everything else kind of stacks on top of each other. So my thought process is that I already dealt w/ low self esteem and confidence from a very young age, and porn just completely enhanced those problems and made it even harder to fix/work on. If you're anything like me and have watched videos on the sciences of porn on your brain, and possible struggles that we deal with, I'm assuming you know how it goes for the most part. I'd say I show symptoms of all effects of being a porn addict, however I've learned to "act normal" to an extent. Like YES I struggle to make friends and hold conversations with people in general but I can make it happen. Sure it'll be a little awkward depending on who I'm speaking to, but I feel like I act normal enough to not be a total outcast and all out weirdo around people. But I just feel like every relationship I have with anyone is extremely surface level or unfulfilling. I feel like as a person I lack so much substance and personality due to the fact that I never really put myself out there and learned social skills when I was coming up. My mindset was molded into something like "keep your head down and stay out the way" in order to avoid conflict. So I never really put myself out there to develop any type of super crazy/interesting personality. I work, play videogames, go to the gym, watch anime. I feel like there's not much else - which might also be a side affect of my porn addiction. Lack of emotion. And I refuse to call it depression. Kind of got red pilled by Andrew Tate Philosophy and it entirely HAS helped me. Maybe it's real, maybe it's not - because when I was fresh out of high school and hyper focused on the bad parts of my life, I felt depressed as shit. Legit like I couldn't do anything to fix it. And the more I identified as "depressed" the more I allowed myself to look for things in my life to confirm that belief. So eventually I went on a self improvement journey and just stopped allowing "depression" to hold power over me. Now I don't believe in it so it's not something that can hold me down in that crippling way. HOWEVER, I DO believe in just being in a shitty situation - which is what I feel like having a porn addiction along with it's effects and symptoms is. It's a shitty situation and I can either allow it to keep ruining my life OR I can get up everyday and attempt to fix it. And I refuse to play the victim card. Sure, I may have been exposed to some fucked up shit at a young age and used porn as a coping mechanism. There is no denying that it happened and that it may have been unfair and out of my control. YES, that's my problem. I may be a victim of pornography but I do not have to ALLOW it to continue to ruin my life. Easier said than done but it's definitely possible and I will not blame my lack of discipline or call it "depression" because I'm unable to quit. The way I see it is, there is a lot of shit that happened to me in the past that I have to come to terms with, and then I must come up with a plan to improve and learn how to be better. For example, struggling to hold eye contact with people, hold basic conversation with people (specifically women), find confidence within myself, become more social, etc... These are all skills that we can practice and learn. Simply by going outside and putting ourselves in uncomfortable situations that allow us to put the reps in. I believe that if I quit porn and start walking up to 10 strangers a day and try having simple conversations with them, in time I can only get better at being social and connecting with people. It's gonna suck and feel like shit at first, but I truly believe that it's a way to improve and get better. As I stand in my current situation I would say I have a lot of work to do but I'm still a functioning addict. I have friendships and relationships with family but they are very lack luster and I long for something deeper and more intimate. I know I'm not ugly and have the ability to pull a good looking girl, shit I've turned down this really pretty girl who always asks to hangout simply due to the fact that I feel like I'm gonna fuck it up and have bad social skills. And its getting to a point where friends and family are wondering why I haven't had a girlfriend in years. Overall its a lack of self esteem, which hinders me from being able to confidently put myself out there as a person who's deserving of love/companionship, which then makes me sort of self isolate and stray away from any type of connection or opportunity to be vulnerable. Which just leads me to feeling like a loser or someone that is undeserving of love because I'm just in a shitty situation. And yeah. Its kind of a self sabotaging cycle because I feel like I understand what's going on but I don't have the discipline and don't put the work in to get better. But that's just my two cents. This post was extremely long and I probably rifted off topic a few times and had my thoughts all over the place, and I still have a lot more I could give input about but this is the jist of everything
If anyone has a support group or needs someone to talk to, 1. I'd like to join the group, or 2. Feel free to message me for any support or conversation.

I'm back at it again with another hypothetical chapter. I know that the D&D chapter was just announced, but I was only halfway done with this by Tuesday. I was just a little late ;-;. Just like the previous post, any and all numbers, or lackthereof, are purely hypothetical general ideas.

Map: The Underdark

For the map, all that's needed is just simple ideas, and for this, I would like to see a chunk of the Underdark as a map, a large cavernous underground region full of dark energy and darker denizens. A section of the map, similar to Vecna's map, could be the Mind Flayer's lair.

The Psychic

The Psychic would be a D&D Mind Flayer, a telepathic monster with a squid-like face, and a taste for the intelligent. Power: Mental Dominion

The Psychic can use their vast well of psychic energy as a weapon or to bring forth allies. When your gauge is full, press and hold the Active Ability button to begin charging. When fully charged, press the Attack button to fire a mind blast, or press the Secondary Ability button to conjure forth an Intellect Devourer.

Special Attack: Mind Blast

Fire a short ranged blast of psychic energy, overloading your target, even through obstacles. Hitting a survivor will injure or down them, unless the blast went through an obstacle, triggering Killer Instinct for a short duration instead. (I imagine this working similar to Executioner's ranged attack, but without the injury possibility since it'd be less predictable.)

Special Ability: Intellect Devourers

A conjured Intellect Devourer will wander the map for a long duration and is able to vault over windows and pallets. It wanders at random, but is attracted to scratch marks, generators that are being actively repaired, and loud sound notifications. The Intellect Devourer will instantly detect any survivor that is not hiding in a small radius and begin pursuing them. During this time, it notifies the killer and its aura becomes yellow. It will continue to follow a survivor until it loses them, its timer runs out, or it becomes blinded or stunned. Additionally, survivors can grab and dispel the Intellect Devourer after channeling for a short duration, though this reveals their aura during and afterwards for a length of time. (The key part of the Intellect Devourers is that they don't deal damage and only give intel. As a survivor, do you risk the constant information feed of it following you, or do you dispel it, giving the killer stronger information. For non-D&D fans, Intellect Devourers are medium dog sized monsters that look like brains on legs.)

Perk 1: Unfinished Business

Your simpleminded foes can’t understand the satisfaction in completing one task at a time. Whenever a survivor stops repairing a generator without it being completed or blocked, their aura is revealed for a few seconds. After this perk activates, it goes on cooldown for 60/45/30 seconds. "The mind’s greatest weakness is distraction." — Unknown Scholar

**Perk 2: Unraveled Strategy

With each capture, their plan crumbles. Each time you hook a survivor, the auras of all generators that have progress are revealed to you for a few seconds. If a generator is completed during this time, all other generators become blocked for some time. "Disruption is the first step to domination."

Perk 3: Failure Cascade

Your menacing mind games cause mistakes to multiply. Each time a survivor fails a skill check, Failure Cascade gains a token. For each token, all survivors have a slightly increased chance of triggering a skill check, up to a maximum. Each time a survivor achieves a great success on a skill check, Failure Cascade loses a token. One mistake begets another…

Notes: I imagine the Psychic being a great M1 killer with a lot of information options. I know BHVR hates gen-control perks, but I feel that they provide ways to add control without just regressing.

Elias Greymantle

I know we all absolutely love Aestri, so please be gentle judging this survivor OC. For D&D buffs, he's a human cleric, though I feel that the perks make it pretty obvious. Bio:

“Elias Greymantle was a revered cleric, known for his unwavering faith and dedication to protecting the innocent. His life took a tragic turn when his adventuring party was ambushed by Mind Flayers, leaving him the sole survivor. Driven by grief and a vow to eradicate the abominations, he relentlessly pursued his quarry, always one step behind. During one such hunt, in the heat of battle against his foe, Elias was ensnared by the Entity and brought into its nightmarish realm. Stripped of his past and thrust into perpetual trials, Elias now fights to bring hope and protection to other survivors, using his divine gifts to combat the darkness and seek an end to the Entity's reign.”

Perk 1: Divine Protection

Divine energy shines down upon you and your allies when it is most needed. When unhooking or being unhooked, the survivor doing the unhooking also gains Endurance and Haste for a short time. Then this perk goes on cooldown for 150/120/90 seconds. Completing an altruistic action reduces the cooldown by 10 seconds. "In the light of the divine, we find our strength."

Perk 2: Retribution

You’re determined to fight back, even through insurmountable odds. After getting unhooked, Retribution activates. While active, stunning or blinding the killer will slow them by 10/20/30% and grant you 10/20/30% increased speed for 5 seconds. During this time, your aura and the killer’s aura are revealed to all survivors. Then Retribution deactivates.

Perk 3: Inspiration

Just your presence on the battlefield inspires others to strive for victory. When you are completing a cooperative action, you shroud your allies in protective energy. If you or other survivors also completing the action fail a skill check, no noise is made, but you lose an additional 6/4/2% of progress. Additionally, when either you or the other survivors stop the cooperative action, you each receive 2/4/6% Haste for 5 seconds. "With each task completed, we draw closer to salvation."

Notes: I imagine Elias as a strong support that has a number of ways to adapt to a situation. I have to be fair, and typing this a second time for the reddit post has made me realize just how uninspired his perks are, since 1 is just BT for the savior, and 3 is just a better Technician. Not to mention the accidental matching name with the real D&D reveal on Tuesday. (To be fair, I made this perk before Tuesday's reveal)

Conclusion

I appreciate everyone's time reading this and hope that the killer, power, and perks are compelling and creative. Please comment what you think so we can have open discussion. Thank you!

I think there’s something off about my campus
Hey everyone, I’m typing this on my phone so I apologize if there is weird formatting. Anyways, to get to the point, there’s something really off with some people on my campus. I have come seeking answers.I noticed it first walking home from my 7pm class last Wednesday.
To set the scene, most of the campus is tucked back into the woods a little, and my 7pm class is in the farthest building from the parking lot (further into the woods). I get out from that 7pm class around 9pm, so on cloudy nights like last Wednesday, the only lights on that long sidewalk are the lights radiating from the other buildings. Usually, there’s roughly 30 feet where it’s pitch black because the foliage is pretty dense. I usually walk back to my apartment with some classmates that live in the same complex as me, but I told them to go ahead of me while I finished the rest of the project.
After packing my laptop away, I started heading back home. It was roughly 9:30 at this point, and my brain was slowly shutting down preparing for the deep sleep that has yet to come.Walking down the sidewalk, I heard somebody not too far into the woods laughing like they’ve just heard the funniest joke ever. I immediately thought, “probably some Freshman walking the trails with their friends smoking weed”. Chuckling to myself, I put in my AirPods and picked a playlist for my journey back home.
When I looked up from my phone, there was the silhouette of somebody walking towards me. I have no idea how I missed them before, but honestly, it’s very possible they were just in a spot where the light wasn’t quite reaching them. A little unnerved, I shifted over to the left side of the sidewalk.
(Now I’m usually fine walking alone at night; I’m a 6’2 man who’s dabbled in the world of MMA. But something about this person gave me a primal feeling of unrest.)
When they shifted over to the left mirroring me, I felt my blood run cold. But alas, I had to keep walking because this was my only way back home. As I neared closer to the figure, I almost laughed at myself when I realized it was just some harmless girl walking towards the Murphy building. If anything, I’m the intimidating one to her.
This is where it really gets weird. She stopped as I was passing her and turned to me. Thinking she needed to ask me something, I took an AirPod out and asked “what’s up?”. After staring at me for an uncomfortable amount of time, she opened her mouth, and I kid you not, mimicked the laugh I heard moments before perfectly. Before I could chalk it up to it just being her in the trails earlier, I noticed something. Her mouth wasn’t moving at all. If I had left my AirPods in, it would just look like she was just opening her mouth and staring at me. She then shifted into a deep raspy laugh. She did all of this without moving her mouth at all; I couldn’t even see her throat moving as you would expect if someone was laughing. It was almost like she was some fucked up human-shaped gramophone. The feeling of absolute horror that came over me is something I’ve only experienced in my imagination. Before I could think to do anything next, My body began to run off some sort of primal instinct. With my legs burning, it took me about 10 minutes to get all the way back to my apartment and lock myself in relative safety.
I’m coming on here now to ask if anybody knows what I experienced? I have been hearing that same laughter outside my window every night since that night, I am too terrified to sleep well and have refused to go to any of my classes. Please I just want answers, I don’t want to keep living in fear.
Part 2:
Hey everyone, I’ve gotten some DMs telling me what it may be. I’ve heard everything from banshee to skinwalker. After further research I pray to god it was neither of them. I’m praying it was just some girl with a speaker playing some sort of cruel joke. I mean yes there are people who don’t like me on campus, I’ve made some enemies over the past 4 years. But, I just don’t understand what could’ve brought it to this point. I had to stop hiding in fear and go to my classes before my grades plummet, I’m almost done with my degree and only have a few more weeks. If I let some sort of stupid prank ruin my career, It would be everything I swore against to my parents.
A lot of you guys in the DMs were also asking what college I go to and what my name is. First I want to say sorry for not providing that information in the first post, I’m sure you can understand where my head was at typing that. So let me introduce myself, my name is Nick and In order to keep my privacy, I will only provide that I go to a midwest university.
I’m sure you may be wondering, “so did it just stop?”. I would love to say yes, but really things have just gotten weirder. Though, I am pleased to say that there is no longer laughing out my window every night.
Ever since that night, I’ve been noticing more things off with the people on campus. Now you may just think it’s paranoia, but just be patient and listen.
Yesterday, I decided to muster up all of my courage and go to class. Luckily my first class is at 10AM, when the sun is well in the sky, so walking across campus seemed much less threatening. When I sat down in my first class, I noticed something off with the girl that sits in front of me. Usually she’s chatty and excited to be in class, but today she just stared blankly ahead. I tried to say good morning and ask about her weekend, as we do every Monday, but she continued to have that blank stare. She did turn her head towards be, but her eyes read “lights on, but nobody is home”.
Thinking to myself, she may just be hungover, or going through the bout of college student depression. I decided to shrug it off and turn to the front of the class and get my notes ready. But the moment I turned around, I could feel it. Her eyes burrowing deep into the back of my head. When I flipped around to see if I was just being irrational, I quickly learned I wasn’t. Her eyes went from the blank glare, to the most enthusiastic face I’ve seen on her. It was horrible, it almost seemed like she was trying so hard to pretend she was thrilled to be in class and to speak to me. It was inhuman.
I’ve been on the internet long enough to catch on to the term “Uncanny valley”, and what I witnessed In my first hour gives me that same gut feeling I got when I saw that girl last Wednesday.
I was right to be uncomfortable though, I texted her after class to make sure she was doing alright. But her response only reignited the flames of deep fear burning in my soul.
I’ll copy and paste the messages here:
Me: Hey Is everything good? You seemed off in class today.
Steph SCI 101: Uh yeah, I’m fine. but I was not in class today, I’m severely hungover from Tanner’s party last night.
Me: Haha, good one.
Steph SCI 101: No I’m so Fr, are you okay?
Steph SCI 101: Are you trying to fuck with me or something?
Me: Nevermind, I’m sorry to bother you.
(End Of Texts)
Okay so I’m sure that this gives you all the same feeling of dread that it gave me but I’m sure scaled down a bit. This is where I have started to doubt that it’s a prank, because me and Stephanie are cool. There’s no level of hate for either of us, and even if it was some joke, we don’t know each other on that type of level.
Not only did this seem to happen in my first class, but in between classes while I was walking across campus as well. I walk past hundreds of faces in my many treks across campus, and I swear to you, at least 1/4th of the people I walked past had that same dead stare look. And the way they walked, god I hate even thinking of it. It was like they were an alien trying out their new body suits for the first time. The steps and the bends of their legs just seem so meticulous, dramaticized, and puppeteered.
I’m going to try to investigate further, because at this point my fear for my life is more of a reason to try and figure out what it is so I can try to stop it.
I’m no hero, and I’m sure as hell nothing special, but If I can know what to expect for another encounter, maybe I can avoid meeting the demise I have imagined.
Part 3

First off I would like to apologize for my 20-day hiatus. For those who were worried that curiosity killed the cat so to speak, I appreciate your concern. On top of my investigation, I have also had to go through finals and work for a boss who didn't believe in life outside of work. So let's start where we left off. I had a feeling that this task was left for me to solve. it may sound stupid, but let me explain why. That night, after my last post, I had a dream that further solidified my need to solve the mystery. I tried to write all that I remembered down the morning after so here is what I wrote. 

April 4th, 2024
I had a strange dream last night, stranger than usual at least. I awoke in the woods, laying face down in the grass with someone looming over me. I heard their footsteps flee rapidly before I flipped over. I found myself just off the trail where the “incident” happened, on the trail laid a girl, bloodied and motionless. When I got up to approach her, she was quickly dragged into the parallel section of the woods. Seeing this I turned and ran into the section of woods I was in. When my legs gave out I found myself near an old supply shed, worn and long abandoned. Searching for cover, I tried the door, which luckily gave after a quick pull. There I found a trapdoor which emanated a blue hue through the cracks. The only thought on my mind, survival brought me to throw it open and climb down. I clattered down the ladder and right before my feet touched the ground, I was pulled backwards by my shirt. That’s where I woke up.
I have always trusted my gut and having a dream that vivid gave me a sense of courage I did not previously have. I know where to start my search now. I have decided my best course of action will be to record my findings on a tape recorder app. After I finish each entry it will be uploaded to a cloud that will ensure if anything happens to me, the story will get out. I am packing my backpack now with a flashlight, glow sticks to mark my trail, and a machete I was gifted by a local in Mexico. All of my recordings will be uploaded below and auto posted after 10 days. Wish me luck everyone, I’m going to need it.
Entry 1: I have started at the only place that makes sense, the trail. It is currently 1:45 PM and I have plenty of sun left in the sky. I just needed to find exactly where to start my journey into the woods. Strangely it was very easy to find. I recall one of the trees having a funky twist near the middle of the trunk. Probably just some two lovebirds trying to carve their name into the tree and realizing there were softer trees to carve into. Anyways hiking further into the woods I believe I can see the shape of the shed through the branches. I wish you guys could see how dense these trees are so you can understand my struggle.
Entry 2: I made it to the shed, but unfortunately the floor in here is concrete. This really sucks for me because I have absolutely no idea where to go from here. It’s identical on the outside but I just don’t understand. Maybe I’m just delusional, which in that case what a waste of time and energy. I’m going to head back home and just start packing for summer. Maybe it’ll be best if I just forget about all of this and leave it behind me. I am graduating after all. Wait hold on what is this?? there’s a button behind one of these shelves. I am going to press it, but idk how it would work because this floor is seamless. I’m just going to leave this recording so if anything does happen I don’t have to worry about holding the phone the whole time. Holy shit, the entire floor is lowering. It’s a fucking elevator.
Entry 3: Okay so I’ve been going down this elevator for like 30 seconds, how far down am I going?.. Oh wait hold on, Im stopped… There’s a metal door with a padlock. Ig since I have the machete there’s only one thing to do, break it. Im going to use the blunt side so I don’t ruin this thing, I like it too much. the lock clatters to the ground after 3 solid hits. Well ig there’s only one way to go now, there’s no button to get back up so I pray there’s another way up. The metal door creaks loudly. Fuck I regret this, It’s dark and I can tell it’s a big area because it’s so echoey in here. I’m currently praising my past self for thinking about the flashlight and glow sticks. I need to find out what in the hell this place is and most importantly, if there’s a damn light switch.
Entry 4: God this place is terrifying I’ve been walking around the sterile white halls of this place for like 10 minutes and have found nothing, no doors, no light switch. I feel like a rat in a maze. Also scratch what I said about being glad I packed glow sticks, because my stupid ass only brought like 20 of these things and I’m already down to 5. Also I feel like I’m not alone, every now and then I’ll turn a corner and the glow from the previous glow stick quickly vanishes. I feel like it might just be because the darkness seems to envelop everything like a blanket. But I have that feeling that I’m being followed. You know the one, where you know somethings wrong you just can’t pin point what it is. Oh shit no way, there’s light, I think there’s a door or something up ahead.
Entry 5: Holy shit… It’s a lab, and worse, there’s people strapped too tables, completely naked and unconscious. I know they are alive because each of them are hooked up with a million different cords, and one of those are plugged into a heart monitor. This place is huge, there has to be at least 50 people on these tables.
“Hey you, you’re not supposed to be in here” yelled a man adorned in a lab coat.
“What are you doing to these kids you sick fucks.” I yelled back at the man across the lab.
In a haste the scientist rushes towards a red button, setting off a loud alarm, turning the lights to a flashing red. With no exit behind me, I could only do one thing... Rush towards him. My training kicked in as I launched into a flurry of calculated strikes. My first hit connected, a right overhand clean under his eye. The doctor stumbled back, but I didn't give him a chance to recover. I pressed the attack, keeping him off balance with a relentless barrage of punches and kicks. He fought back ferociously, but I was one step ahead, anticipating his moves and countering with swift, efficient strikes. We wrestled, the room around us becoming a blur of pain and adrenaline. I used the environment to my advantage, improvising weapons from the scattered medical equipment and turning the empty tables on my opponent. Pinning him to the ground, I laid down a harsh barrage of final blows. His face was a bloody pulp, unrecognizable. But I didn’t walk away unscathed, somewhere in the tussle, the scientist buried a scalpel deep into my stomach. With my adrenaline wearing off, the pain overtook me, sending me into darkness as I fainted from the blood loss and adrenaline dump. I awoke with my arms and legs strapped to the cold metal operating table. Before I could try to struggle, a face overtook my field of vision.
“Quite a fight you put up, you turned poor Dr.Samson into a soup” the looming face said with a chuckle. “You are the first person to put the pieces together and for that I am thoroughly impressed Mr. Hayes”
“Who are you?!” I said fighting at my binds. “Let me go!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that Mr.Hayes. You have seen far too much, and I definitely can’t have you running around telling the world what you saw here. Although nobody would believe you.” “And to answer your other question, I’m surprised you don’t recognize me… really take a moment and look at me” He said pulling down his face mask.
“Dr.Blackwood?” I said as I looked back on my freshman year biology class.
“Ding ding ding ding. We have a winner!” He said in a maniac joy.
“What are you going to do to me?” I asked.
“Well Mr.Hayes, first I’m going to sew you up from your little tussle you had with my late assistant and then I will put you under and cut into that skull of yours and take out a small piece of what we call in the science world your hippocampus. Then I will draw from that all of the necessary memories to create the perfect clone of you.” He responded.
“Why? Why would you need a clone of any of us. Why can’t you just clone someone willing to be apart of this?” I asked
“Because that’s no fun Mr.Hayes, the hunt excites me. Actually you’re lucky I didn’t get you the first night. Unfortunately my creation had a little bit of a malfunction and formed a wee bit of an attachment to you. I’m sure you remember the ruckus outside your window? Anyways I digress, I do this because everyone of you lowly students will go onto do mediocre jobs where you waste away at a desk. I must also add that with having a clone of you under my control, I can do anything and get away with clean hands. My plan with you originally was to have you go into the admissions office and steal every last cent all for me. On top of that I like the power, because one day I will have a clone of every student on this campus and eventually I will cause a revolt against our comedy of a government. Who will stop me, when I won’t even be on the front lines?” Dr.Blackwood explained.
“I will” I said freeing my last hand from the binds.
What he didn’t realize is that with all of this monologue and the questions I had been feeding him, I was slowly loosening my binds with each wiggle and movement in retaliation.
Lurching forward I grab onto his collar, pulling him into a vicious headbutt. The impact sent Dr. Blackwood reeling backward, his grip on consciousness loosening as he staggered. Seizing the moment, I lunged off the table, adrenaline coursing through my veins despite the searing pain in my abdomen. With a swift motion, I grabbed a nearby surgical instrument, holding it in a defensive stance as I faced my adversary. Dr. Blackwood, recovering from the blow, snarled with rage, his once calm demeanor now replaced by a feral intensity. The room seemed to shrink around us, the tension thickening with each passing second. This was my chance to stop Blackwood's twisted plans. As he lunged forward, I met his attack head-on, the clang of metal reverberating through the room. Blow after blow, we fought with an intensity born of desperation and determination. Despite my injuries, I refused to yield, driven by a fire burnt under me to protect myself and others from Blackwood's actions . In a final, swift move, I delivered a powerful front kick, sending Blackwood crashing to the ground. The room fell silent, the echoes of our struggle fading into the darkness. Coughing he sat in the corner laughing with blood spilling down his face. “You know that it’s too late to save any of these one lying on the tables. I would’ve released you, you know that right? I would’ve simply taken your memory from today out of your brain and leaving you in your bed to wake up thinking you had a fun night” he said with final resolve as he watched me grab the scalpel from the ground taking slow steps near him.
Looking down over him, It was my turn to laugh. Kneeling down to eye level with him I grabbed him by his hair and delivered a final message to him “Fuck you and your little science experiment” as I sliced deep into his throat watching the life fade from his eyes.
I eventually found an exit door, which lead me to a storm drain deep in the woods far from my campus. It took me 2 hours to limp my way onto a main road and flag down a passing car. Pulling over I was rushed to the hospital and later interrogated by some men in suits, my guess is CIA. Here I am now, writing my final entrance. I think I heard them say something about trying a new medical process on me to help me heal quicker

I think there’s something off about my campus
Hey everyone, I’m typing this on my phone so I apologize if there is weird formatting. Anyways, to get to the point, there’s something really off with some people on my campus. I have come seeking answers.I noticed it first walking home from my 7pm class last Wednesday.
To set the scene, most of the campus is tucked back into the woods a little, and my 7pm class is in the farthest building from the parking lot (further into the woods). I get out from that 7pm class around 9pm, so on cloudy nights like last Wednesday, the only lights on that long sidewalk are the lights radiating from the other buildings. Usually, there’s roughly 30 feet where it’s pitch black because the foliage is pretty dense. I usually walk back to my apartment with some classmates that live in the same complex as me, but I told them to go ahead of me while I finished the rest of the project.
After packing my laptop away, I started heading back home. It was roughly 9:30 at this point, and my brain was slowly shutting down preparing for the deep sleep that has yet to come.Walking down the sidewalk, I heard somebody not too far into the woods laughing like they’ve just heard the funniest joke ever. I immediately thought, “probably some Freshman walking the trails with their friends smoking weed”. Chuckling to myself, I put in my AirPods and picked a playlist for my journey back home.
When I looked up from my phone, there was the silhouette of somebody walking towards me. I have no idea how I missed them before, but honestly, it’s very possible they were just in a spot where the light wasn’t quite reaching them. A little unnerved, I shifted over to the left side of the sidewalk.
(Now I’m usually fine walking alone at night; I’m a 6’2 man who’s dabbled in the world of MMA. But something about this person gave me a primal feeling of unrest.)
When they shifted over to the left mirroring me, I felt my blood run cold. But alas, I had to keep walking because this was my only way back home. As I neared closer to the figure, I almost laughed at myself when I realized it was just some harmless girl walking towards the Murphy building. If anything, I’m the intimidating one to her.
This is where it really gets weird. She stopped as I was passing her and turned to me. Thinking she needed to ask me something, I took an AirPod out and asked “what’s up?”. After staring at me for an uncomfortable amount of time, she opened her mouth, and I kid you not, mimicked the laugh I heard moments before perfectly. Before I could chalk it up to it just being her in the trails earlier, I noticed something. Her mouth wasn’t moving at all. If I had left my AirPods in, it would just look like she was just opening her mouth and staring at me. She then shifted into a deep raspy laugh. She did all of this without moving her mouth at all; I couldn’t even see her throat moving as you would expect if someone was laughing. It was almost like she was some fucked up human-shaped gramophone. The feeling of absolute horror that came over me is something I’ve only experienced in my imagination. Before I could think to do anything next, My body began to run off some sort of primal instinct. With my legs burning, it took me about 10 minutes to get all the way back to my apartment and lock myself in relative safety.
I’m coming on here now to ask if anybody knows what I experienced? I have been hearing that same laughter outside my window every night since that night, I am too terrified to sleep well and have refused to go to any of my classes. Please I just want answers, I don’t want to keep living in fear.
Part 2:
Hey everyone, I’ve gotten some DMs telling me what it may be. I’ve heard everything from banshee to skinwalker. After further research I pray to god it was neither of them. I’m praying it was just some girl with a speaker playing some sort of cruel joke. I mean yes there are people who don’t like me on campus, I’ve made some enemies over the past 4 years. But, I just don’t understand what could’ve brought it to this point. I had to stop hiding in fear and go to my classes before my grades plummet, I’m almost done with my degree and only have a few more weeks. If I let some sort of stupid prank ruin my career, It would be everything I swore against to my parents.
A lot of you guys in the DMs were also asking what college I go to and what my name is. First I want to say sorry for not providing that information in the first post, I’m sure you can understand where my head was at typing that. So let me introduce myself, my name is Nick and In order to keep my privacy, I will only provide that I go to a midwest university.
I’m sure you may be wondering, “so did it just stop?”. I would love to say yes, but really things have just gotten weirder. Though, I am pleased to say that there is no longer laughing out my window every night.
Ever since that night, I’ve been noticing more things off with the people on campus. Now you may just think it’s paranoia, but just be patient and listen.
Yesterday, I decided to muster up all of my courage and go to class. Luckily my first class is at 10AM, when the sun is well in the sky, so walking across campus seemed much less threatening. When I sat down in my first class, I noticed something off with the girl that sits in front of me. Usually she’s chatty and excited to be in class, but today she just stared blankly ahead. I tried to say good morning and ask about her weekend, as we do every Monday, but she continued to have that blank stare. She did turn her head towards be, but her eyes read “lights on, but nobody is home”.
Thinking to myself, she may just be hungover, or going through the bout of college student depression. I decided to shrug it off and turn to the front of the class and get my notes ready. But the moment I turned around, I could feel it. Her eyes burrowing deep into the back of my head. When I flipped around to see if I was just being irrational, I quickly learned I wasn’t. Her eyes went from the blank glare, to the most enthusiastic face I’ve seen on her. It was horrible, it almost seemed like she was trying so hard to pretend she was thrilled to be in class and to speak to me. It was inhuman.
I’ve been on the internet long enough to catch on to the term “Uncanny valley”, and what I witnessed In my first hour gives me that same gut feeling I got when I saw that girl last Wednesday.
I was right to be uncomfortable though, I texted her after class to make sure she was doing alright. But her response only reignited the flames of deep fear burning in my soul.
I’ll copy and paste the messages here:
Me: Hey Is everything good? You seemed off in class today.
Steph SCI 101: Uh yeah, I’m fine. but I was not in class today, I’m severely hungover from Tanner’s party last night.
Me: Haha, good one.
Steph SCI 101: No I’m so Fr, are you okay?
Steph SCI 101: Are you trying to fuck with me or something?
Me: Nevermind, I’m sorry to bother you.
(End Of Texts)
Okay so I’m sure that this gives you all the same feeling of dread that it gave me but I’m sure scaled down a bit. This is where I have started to doubt that it’s a prank, because me and Stephanie are cool. There’s no level of hate for either of us, and even if it was some joke, we don’t know each other on that type of level.
Not only did this seem to happen in my first class, but in between classes while I was walking across campus as well. I walk past hundreds of faces in my many treks across campus, and I swear to you, at least 1/4th of the people I walked past had that same dead stare look. And the way they walked, god I hate even thinking of it. It was like they were an alien trying out their new body suits for the first time. The steps and the bends of their legs just seem so meticulous, dramaticized, and puppeteered.
I’m going to try to investigate further, because at this point my fear for my life is more of a reason to try and figure out what it is so I can try to stop it.
I’m no hero, and I’m sure as hell nothing special, but If I can know what to expect for another encounter, maybe I can avoid meeting the demise I have imagined.
Part 3

First off I would like to apologize for my 20-day hiatus. For those who were worried that curiosity killed the cat so to speak, I appreciate your concern. On top of my investigation, I have also had to go through finals and work for a boss who didn't believe in life outside of work. So let's start where we left off. I had a feeling that this task was left for me to solve. it may sound stupid, but let me explain why. That night, after my last post, I had a dream that further solidified my need to solve the mystery. I tried to write all that I remembered down the morning after so here is what I wrote. 

April 4th, 2024
I had a strange dream last night, stranger than usual at least. I awoke in the woods, laying face down in the grass with someone looming over me. I heard their footsteps flee rapidly before I flipped over. I found myself just off the trail where the “incident” happened, on the trail laid a girl, bloodied and motionless. When I got up to approach her, she was quickly dragged into the parallel section of the woods. Seeing this I turned and ran into the section of woods I was in. When my legs gave out I found myself near an old supply shed, worn and long abandoned. Searching for cover, I tried the door, which luckily gave after a quick pull. There I found a trapdoor which emanated a blue hue through the cracks. The only thought on my mind, survival brought me to throw it open and climb down. I clattered down the ladder and right before my feet touched the ground, I was pulled backwards by my shirt. That’s where I woke up.
I have always trusted my gut and having a dream that vivid gave me a sense of courage I did not previously have. I know where to start my search now. I have decided my best course of action will be to record my findings on a tape recorder app. After I finish each entry it will be uploaded to a cloud that will ensure if anything happens to me, the story will get out. I am packing my backpack now with a flashlight, glow sticks to mark my trail, and a machete I was gifted by a local in Mexico. All of my recordings will be uploaded below and auto posted after 10 days. Wish me luck everyone, I’m going to need it.
Entry 1: I have started at the only place that makes sense, the trail. It is currently 1:45 PM and I have plenty of sun left in the sky. I just needed to find exactly where to start my journey into the woods. Strangely it was very easy to find. I recall one of the trees having a funky twist near the middle of the trunk. Probably just some two lovebirds trying to carve their name into the tree and realizing there were softer trees to carve into. Anyways hiking further into the woods I believe I can see the shape of the shed through the branches. I wish you guys could see how dense these trees are so you can understand my struggle.
Entry 2: I made it to the shed, but unfortunately the floor in here is concrete. This really sucks for me because I have absolutely no idea where to go from here. It’s identical on the outside but I just don’t understand. Maybe I’m just delusional, which in that case what a waste of time and energy. I’m going to head back home and just start packing for summer. Maybe it’ll be best if I just forget about all of this and leave it behind me. I am graduating after all. Wait hold on what is this?? there’s a button behind one of these shelves. I am going to press it, but idk how it would work because this floor is seamless. I’m just going to leave this recording so if anything does happen I don’t have to worry about holding the phone the whole time. Holy shit, the entire floor is lowering. It’s a fucking elevator.
Entry 3: Okay so I’ve been going down this elevator for like 30 seconds, how far down am I going?.. Oh wait hold on, Im stopped… There’s a metal door with a padlock. Ig since I have the machete there’s only one thing to do, break it. Im going to use the blunt side so I don’t ruin this thing, I like it too much. the lock clatters to the ground after 3 solid hits. Well ig there’s only one way to go now, there’s no button to get back up so I pray there’s another way up. The metal door creaks loudly. Fuck I regret this, It’s dark and I can tell it’s a big area because it’s so echoey in here. I’m currently praising my past self for thinking about the flashlight and glow sticks. I need to find out what in the hell this place is and most importantly, if there’s a damn light switch.
Entry 4: God this place is terrifying I’ve been walking around the sterile white halls of this place for like 10 minutes and have found nothing, no doors, no light switch. I feel like a rat in a maze. Also scratch what I said about being glad I packed glow sticks, because my stupid ass only brought like 20 of these things and I’m already down to 5. Also I feel like I’m not alone, every now and then I’ll turn a corner and the glow from the previous glow stick quickly vanishes. I feel like it might just be because the darkness seems to envelop everything like a blanket. But I have that feeling that I’m being followed. You know the one, where you know somethings wrong you just can’t pin point what it is. Oh shit no way, there’s light, I think there’s a door or something up ahead.
Entry 5: Holy shit… It’s a lab, and worse, there’s people strapped too tables, completely naked and unconscious. I know they are alive because each of them are hooked up with a million different cords, and one of those are plugged into a heart monitor. This place is huge, there has to be at least 50 people on these tables.
“Hey you, you’re not supposed to be in here” yelled a man adorned in a lab coat.
“What are you doing to these kids you sick fucks.” I yelled back at the man across the lab.
In a haste the scientist rushes towards a red button, setting off a loud alarm, turning the lights to a flashing red. With no exit behind me, I could only do one thing... Rush towards him. My training kicked in as I launched into a flurry of calculated strikes. My first hit connected, a right overhand clean under his eye. The doctor stumbled back, but I didn't give him a chance to recover. I pressed the attack, keeping him off balance with a relentless barrage of punches and kicks. He fought back ferociously, but I was one step ahead, anticipating his moves and countering with swift, efficient strikes. We wrestled, the room around us becoming a blur of pain and adrenaline. I used the environment to my advantage, improvising weapons from the scattered medical equipment and turning the empty tables on my opponent. Pinning him to the ground, I laid down a harsh barrage of final blows. His face was a bloody pulp, unrecognizable. But I didn’t walk away unscathed, somewhere in the tussle, the scientist buried a scalpel deep into my stomach. With my adrenaline wearing off, the pain overtook me, sending me into darkness as I fainted from the blood loss and adrenaline dump. I awoke with my arms and legs strapped to the cold metal operating table. Before I could try to struggle, a face overtook my field of vision.
“Quite a fight you put up, you turned poor Dr.Samson into a soup” the looming face said with a chuckle. “You are the first person to put the pieces together and for that I am thoroughly impressed Mr. Hayes”
“Who are you?!” I said fighting at my binds. “Let me go!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that Mr.Hayes. You have seen far too much, and I definitely can’t have you running around telling the world what you saw here. Although nobody would believe you.” “And to answer your other question, I’m surprised you don’t recognize me… really take a moment and look at me” He said pulling down his face mask.
“Dr.Blackwood?” I said as I looked back on my freshman year biology class.
“Ding ding ding ding. We have a winner!” He said in a maniac joy.
“What are you going to do to me?” I asked.
“Well Mr.Hayes, first I’m going to sew you up from your little tussle you had with my late assistant and then I will put you under and cut into that skull of yours and take out a small piece of what we call in the science world your hippocampus. Then I will draw from that all of the necessary memories to create the perfect clone of you.” He responded.
“Why? Why would you need a clone of any of us. Why can’t you just clone someone willing to be apart of this?” I asked
“Because that’s no fun Mr.Hayes, the hunt excites me. Actually you’re lucky I didn’t get you the first night. Unfortunately my creation had a little bit of a malfunction and formed a wee bit of an attachment to you. I’m sure you remember the ruckus outside your window? Anyways I digress, I do this because everyone of you lowly students will go onto do mediocre jobs where you waste away at a desk. I must also add that with having a clone of you under my control, I can do anything and get away with clean hands. My plan with you originally was to have you go into the admissions office and steal every last cent all for me. On top of that I like the power, because one day I will have a clone of every student on this campus and eventually I will cause a revolt against our comedy of a government. Who will stop me, when I won’t even be on the front lines?” Dr.Blackwood explained.
“I will” I said freeing my last hand from the binds.
What he didn’t realize is that with all of this monologue and the questions I had been feeding him, I was slowly loosening my binds with each wiggle and movement in retaliation.
Lurching forward I grab onto his collar, pulling him into a vicious headbutt. The impact sent Dr. Blackwood reeling backward, his grip on consciousness loosening as he staggered. Seizing the moment, I lunged off the table, adrenaline coursing through my veins despite the searing pain in my abdomen. With a swift motion, I grabbed a nearby surgical instrument, holding it in a defensive stance as I faced my adversary. Dr. Blackwood, recovering from the blow, snarled with rage, his once calm demeanor now replaced by a feral intensity. The room seemed to shrink around us, the tension thickening with each passing second. This was my chance to stop Blackwood's twisted plans. As he lunged forward, I met his attack head-on, the clang of metal reverberating through the room. Blow after blow, we fought with an intensity born of desperation and determination. Despite my injuries, I refused to yield, driven by a fire burnt under me to protect myself and others from Blackwood's actions . In a final, swift move, I delivered a powerful front kick, sending Blackwood crashing to the ground. The room fell silent, the echoes of our struggle fading into the darkness. Coughing he sat in the corner laughing with blood spilling down his face. “You know that it’s too late to save any of these one lying on the tables. I would’ve released you, you know that right? I would’ve simply taken your memory from today out of your brain and leaving you in your bed to wake up thinking you had a fun night” he said with final resolve as he watched me grab the scalpel from the ground taking slow steps near him.
Looking down over him, It was my turn to laugh. Kneeling down to eye level with him I grabbed him by his hair and delivered a final message to him “Fuck you and your little science experiment” as I sliced deep into his throat watching the life fade from his eyes.
I eventually found an exit door, which lead me to a storm drain deep in the woods far from my campus. It took me 2 hours to limp my way onto a main road and flag down a passing car. Pulling over I was rushed to the hospital and later interrogated by some men in suits, my guess is CIA. Here I am now, writing my final entrance. I think I heard them say something about trying a new medical process on me to help me heal quicker

I think there’s something off about my campus
Hey everyone, I’m typing this on my phone so I apologize if there is weird formatting. Anyways, to get to the point, there’s something really off with some people on my campus. I have come seeking answers.I noticed it first walking home from my 7pm class last Wednesday.
To set the scene, most of the campus is tucked back into the woods a little, and my 7pm class is in the farthest building from the parking lot (further into the woods). I get out from that 7pm class around 9pm, so on cloudy nights like last Wednesday, the only lights on that long sidewalk are the lights radiating from the other buildings. Usually, there’s roughly 30 feet where it’s pitch black because the foliage is pretty dense. I usually walk back to my apartment with some classmates that live in the same complex as me, but I told them to go ahead of me while I finished the rest of the project.
After packing my laptop away, I started heading back home. It was roughly 9:30 at this point, and my brain was slowly shutting down preparing for the deep sleep that has yet to come.Walking down the sidewalk, I heard somebody not too far into the woods laughing like they’ve just heard the funniest joke ever. I immediately thought, “probably some Freshman walking the trails with their friends smoking weed”. Chuckling to myself, I put in my AirPods and picked a playlist for my journey back home.
When I looked up from my phone, there was the silhouette of somebody walking towards me. I have no idea how I missed them before, but honestly, it’s very possible they were just in a spot where the light wasn’t quite reaching them. A little unnerved, I shifted over to the left side of the sidewalk.
(Now I’m usually fine walking alone at night; I’m a 6’2 man who’s dabbled in the world of MMA. But something about this person gave me a primal feeling of unrest.)
When they shifted over to the left mirroring me, I felt my blood run cold. But alas, I had to keep walking because this was my only way back home. As I neared closer to the figure, I almost laughed at myself when I realized it was just some harmless girl walking towards the Murphy building. If anything, I’m the intimidating one to her.
This is where it really gets weird. She stopped as I was passing her and turned to me. Thinking she needed to ask me something, I took an AirPod out and asked “what’s up?”. After staring at me for an uncomfortable amount of time, she opened her mouth, and I kid you not, mimicked the laugh I heard moments before perfectly. Before I could chalk it up to it just being her in the trails earlier, I noticed something. Her mouth wasn’t moving at all. If I had left my AirPods in, it would just look like she was just opening her mouth and staring at me. She then shifted into a deep raspy laugh. She did all of this without moving her mouth at all; I couldn’t even see her throat moving as you would expect if someone was laughing. It was almost like she was some fucked up human-shaped gramophone. The feeling of absolute horror that came over me is something I’ve only experienced in my imagination. Before I could think to do anything next, My body began to run off some sort of primal instinct. With my legs burning, it took me about 10 minutes to get all the way back to my apartment and lock myself in relative safety.
I’m coming on here now to ask if anybody knows what I experienced? I have been hearing that same laughter outside my window every night since that night, I am too terrified to sleep well and have refused to go to any of my classes. Please I just want answers, I don’t want to keep living in fear.
Part 2:
Hey everyone, I’ve gotten some DMs telling me what it may be. I’ve heard everything from banshee to skinwalker. After further research I pray to god it was neither of them. I’m praying it was just some girl with a speaker playing some sort of cruel joke. I mean yes there are people who don’t like me on campus, I’ve made some enemies over the past 4 years. But, I just don’t understand what could’ve brought it to this point. I had to stop hiding in fear and go to my classes before my grades plummet, I’m almost done with my degree and only have a few more weeks. If I let some sort of stupid prank ruin my career, It would be everything I swore against to my parents.
A lot of you guys in the DMs were also asking what college I go to and what my name is. First I want to say sorry for not providing that information in the first post, I’m sure you can understand where my head was at typing that. So let me introduce myself, my name is Nick and In order to keep my privacy, I will only provide that I go to a midwest university.
I’m sure you may be wondering, “so did it just stop?”. I would love to say yes, but really things have just gotten weirder. Though, I am pleased to say that there is no longer laughing out my window every night.
Ever since that night, I’ve been noticing more things off with the people on campus. Now you may just think it’s paranoia, but just be patient and listen.
Yesterday, I decided to muster up all of my courage and go to class. Luckily my first class is at 10AM, when the sun is well in the sky, so walking across campus seemed much less threatening. When I sat down in my first class, I noticed something off with the girl that sits in front of me. Usually she’s chatty and excited to be in class, but today she just stared blankly ahead. I tried to say good morning and ask about her weekend, as we do every Monday, but she continued to have that blank stare. She did turn her head towards be, but her eyes read “lights on, but nobody is home”.
Thinking to myself, she may just be hungover, or going through the bout of college student depression. I decided to shrug it off and turn to the front of the class and get my notes ready. But the moment I turned around, I could feel it. Her eyes burrowing deep into the back of my head. When I flipped around to see if I was just being irrational, I quickly learned I wasn’t. Her eyes went from the blank glare, to the most enthusiastic face I’ve seen on her. It was horrible, it almost seemed like she was trying so hard to pretend she was thrilled to be in class and to speak to me. It was inhuman.
I’ve been on the internet long enough to catch on to the term “Uncanny valley”, and what I witnessed In my first hour gives me that same gut feeling I got when I saw that girl last Wednesday.
I was right to be uncomfortable though, I texted her after class to make sure she was doing alright. But her response only reignited the flames of deep fear burning in my soul.
I’ll copy and paste the messages here:
Me: Hey Is everything good? You seemed off in class today.
Steph SCI 101: Uh yeah, I’m fine. but I was not in class today, I’m severely hungover from Tanner’s party last night.
Me: Haha, good one.
Steph SCI 101: No I’m so Fr, are you okay?
Steph SCI 101: Are you trying to fuck with me or something?
Me: Nevermind, I’m sorry to bother you.
(End Of Texts)
Okay so I’m sure that this gives you all the same feeling of dread that it gave me but I’m sure scaled down a bit. This is where I have started to doubt that it’s a prank, because me and Stephanie are cool. There’s no level of hate for either of us, and even if it was some joke, we don’t know each other on that type of level.
Not only did this seem to happen in my first class, but in between classes while I was walking across campus as well. I walk past hundreds of faces in my many treks across campus, and I swear to you, at least 1/4th of the people I walked past had that same dead stare look. And the way they walked, god I hate even thinking of it. It was like they were an alien trying out their new body suits for the first time. The steps and the bends of their legs just seem so meticulous, dramaticized, and puppeteered.
I’m going to try to investigate further, because at this point my fear for my life is more of a reason to try and figure out what it is so I can try to stop it.
I’m no hero, and I’m sure as hell nothing special, but If I can know what to expect for another encounter, maybe I can avoid meeting the demise I have imagined.
Part 3

First off I would like to apologize for my 20-day hiatus. For those who were worried that curiosity killed the cat so to speak, I appreciate your concern. On top of my investigation, I have also had to go through finals and work for a boss who didn't believe in life outside of work. So let's start where we left off. I had a feeling that this task was left for me to solve. it may sound stupid, but let me explain why. That night, after my last post, I had a dream that further solidified my need to solve the mystery. I tried to write all that I remembered down the morning after so here is what I wrote. 

April 4th, 2024
I had a strange dream last night, stranger than usual at least. I awoke in the woods, laying face down in the grass with someone looming over me. I heard their footsteps flee rapidly before I flipped over. I found myself just off the trail where the “incident” happened, on the trail laid a girl, bloodied and motionless. When I got up to approach her, she was quickly dragged into the parallel section of the woods. Seeing this I turned and ran into the section of woods I was in. When my legs gave out I found myself near an old supply shed, worn and long abandoned. Searching for cover, I tried the door, which luckily gave after a quick pull. There I found a trapdoor which emanated a blue hue through the cracks. The only thought on my mind, survival brought me to throw it open and climb down. I clattered down the ladder and right before my feet touched the ground, I was pulled backwards by my shirt. That’s where I woke up.
I have always trusted my gut and having a dream that vivid gave me a sense of courage I did not previously have. I know where to start my search now. I have decided my best course of action will be to record my findings on a tape recorder app. After I finish each entry it will be uploaded to a cloud that will ensure if anything happens to me, the story will get out. I am packing my backpack now with a flashlight, glow sticks to mark my trail, and a machete I was gifted by a local in Mexico. All of my recordings will be uploaded below and auto posted after 10 days. Wish me luck everyone, I’m going to need it.
Entry 1: I have started at the only place that makes sense, the trail. It is currently 1:45 PM and I have plenty of sun left in the sky. I just needed to find exactly where to start my journey into the woods. Strangely it was very easy to find. I recall one of the trees having a funky twist near the middle of the trunk. Probably just some two lovebirds trying to carve their name into the tree and realizing there were softer trees to carve into. Anyways hiking further into the woods I believe I can see the shape of the shed through the branches. I wish you guys could see how dense these trees are so you can understand my struggle.
Entry 2: I made it to the shed, but unfortunately the floor in here is concrete. This really sucks for me because I have absolutely no idea where to go from here. It’s identical on the outside but I just don’t understand. Maybe I’m just delusional, which in that case what a waste of time and energy. I’m going to head back home and just start packing for summer. Maybe it’ll be best if I just forget about all of this and leave it behind me. I am graduating after all. Wait hold on what is this?? there’s a button behind one of these shelves. I am going to press it, but idk how it would work because this floor is seamless. I’m just going to leave this recording so if anything does happen I don’t have to worry about holding the phone the whole time. Holy shit, the entire floor is lowering. It’s a fucking elevator.
Entry 3: Okay so I’ve been going down this elevator for like 30 seconds, how far down am I going?.. Oh wait hold on, Im stopped… There’s a metal door with a padlock. Ig since I have the machete there’s only one thing to do, break it. Im going to use the blunt side so I don’t ruin this thing, I like it too much. the lock clatters to the ground after 3 solid hits. Well ig there’s only one way to go now, there’s no button to get back up so I pray there’s another way up. The metal door creaks loudly. Fuck I regret this, It’s dark and I can tell it’s a big area because it’s so echoey in here. I’m currently praising my past self for thinking about the flashlight and glow sticks. I need to find out what in the hell this place is and most importantly, if there’s a damn light switch.
Entry 4: God this place is terrifying I’ve been walking around the sterile white halls of this place for like 10 minutes and have found nothing, no doors, no light switch. I feel like a rat in a maze. Also scratch what I said about being glad I packed glow sticks, because my stupid ass only brought like 20 of these things and I’m already down to 5. Also I feel like I’m not alone, every now and then I’ll turn a corner and the glow from the previous glow stick quickly vanishes. I feel like it might just be because the darkness seems to envelop everything like a blanket. But I have that feeling that I’m being followed. You know the one, where you know somethings wrong you just can’t pin point what it is. Oh shit no way, there’s light, I think there’s a door or something up ahead.
Entry 5: Holy shit… It’s a lab, and worse, there’s people strapped too tables, completely naked and unconscious. I know they are alive because each of them are hooked up with a million different cords, and one of those are plugged into a heart monitor. This place is huge, there has to be at least 50 people on these tables.
“Hey you, you’re not supposed to be in here” yelled a man adorned in a lab coat.
“What are you doing to these kids you sick fucks.” I yelled back at the man across the lab.
In a haste the scientist rushes towards a red button, setting off a loud alarm, turning the lights to a flashing red. With no exit behind me, I could only do one thing... Rush towards him. My training kicked in as I launched into a flurry of calculated strikes. My first hit connected, a right overhand clean under his eye. The doctor stumbled back, but I didn't give him a chance to recover. I pressed the attack, keeping him off balance with a relentless barrage of punches and kicks. He fought back ferociously, but I was one step ahead, anticipating his moves and countering with swift, efficient strikes. We wrestled, the room around us becoming a blur of pain and adrenaline. I used the environment to my advantage, improvising weapons from the scattered medical equipment and turning the empty tables on my opponent. Pinning him to the ground, I laid down a harsh barrage of final blows. His face was a bloody pulp, unrecognizable. But I didn’t walk away unscathed, somewhere in the tussle, the scientist buried a scalpel deep into my stomach. With my adrenaline wearing off, the pain overtook me, sending me into darkness as I fainted from the blood loss and adrenaline dump. I awoke with my arms and legs strapped to the cold metal operating table. Before I could try to struggle, a face overtook my field of vision.
“Quite a fight you put up, you turned poor Dr.Samson into a soup” the looming face said with a chuckle. “You are the first person to put the pieces together and for that I am thoroughly impressed Mr. Hayes”
“Who are you?!” I said fighting at my binds. “Let me go!”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that Mr.Hayes. You have seen far too much, and I definitely can’t have you running around telling the world what you saw here. Although nobody would believe you.” “And to answer your other question, I’m surprised you don’t recognize me… really take a moment and look at me” He said pulling down his face mask.
“Dr.Blackwood?” I said as I looked back on my freshman year biology class.
“Ding ding ding ding. We have a winner!” He said in a maniac joy.
“What are you going to do to me?” I asked.
“Well Mr.Hayes, first I’m going to sew you up from your little tussle you had with my late assistant and then I will put you under and cut into that skull of yours and take out a small piece of what we call in the science world your hippocampus. Then I will draw from that all of the necessary memories to create the perfect clone of you.” He responded.
“Why? Why would you need a clone of any of us. Why can’t you just clone someone willing to be apart of this?” I asked
“Because that’s no fun Mr.Hayes, the hunt excites me. Actually you’re lucky I didn’t get you the first night. Unfortunately my creation had a little bit of a malfunction and formed a wee bit of an attachment to you. I’m sure you remember the ruckus outside your window? Anyways I digress, I do this because everyone of you lowly students will go onto do mediocre jobs where you waste away at a desk. I must also add that with having a clone of you under my control, I can do anything and get away with clean hands. My plan with you originally was to have you go into the admissions office and steal every last cent all for me. On top of that I like the power, because one day I will have a clone of every student on this campus and eventually I will cause a revolt against our comedy of a government. Who will stop me, when I won’t even be on the front lines?” Dr.Blackwood explained.
“I will” I said freeing my last hand from the binds.
What he didn’t realize is that with all of this monologue and the questions I had been feeding him, I was slowly loosening my binds with each wiggle and movement in retaliation.
Lurching forward I grab onto his collar, pulling him into a vicious headbutt. The impact sent Dr. Blackwood reeling backward, his grip on consciousness loosening as he staggered. Seizing the moment, I lunged off the table, adrenaline coursing through my veins despite the searing pain in my abdomen. With a swift motion, I grabbed a nearby surgical instrument, holding it in a defensive stance as I faced my adversary. Dr. Blackwood, recovering from the blow, snarled with rage, his once calm demeanor now replaced by a feral intensity. The room seemed to shrink around us, the tension thickening with each passing second. This was my chance to stop Blackwood's twisted plans. As he lunged forward, I met his attack head-on, the clang of metal reverberating through the room. Blow after blow, we fought with an intensity born of desperation and determination. Despite my injuries, I refused to yield, driven by a fire burnt under me to protect myself and others from Blackwood's actions . In a final, swift move, I delivered a powerful front kick, sending Blackwood crashing to the ground. The room fell silent, the echoes of our struggle fading into the darkness. Coughing he sat in the corner laughing with blood spilling down his face. “You know that it’s too late to save any of these one lying on the tables. I would’ve released you, you know that right? I would’ve simply taken your memory from today out of your brain and leaving you in your bed to wake up thinking you had a fun night” he said with final resolve as he watched me grab the scalpel from the ground taking slow steps near him.
Looking down over him, It was my turn to laugh. Kneeling down to eye level with him I grabbed him by his hair and delivered a final message to him “Fuck you and your little science experiment” as I sliced deep into his throat watching the life fade from his eyes.
I eventually found an exit door, which lead me to a storm drain deep in the woods far from my campus. It took me 2 hours to limp my way onto a main road and flag down a passing car. Pulling over I was rushed to the hospital and later interrogated by some men in suits, my guess is CIA. Here I am now, writing my final entrance. I think I heard them say something about trying a new medical process on me to help me heal quicker

Just so I can bring everyone to the same page of context before actually starting the story.
World of Darkness: A setting of TTRPG’s that take place in a darker grittier version of our reality, where supernatural creatures such as werewolves, vampires, wraiths, mages and so on, exist and hide from the public eye creating their own means of protection, politics and secret societies to protect themselves against humans.
Werewolf the apocalypse/Werewolf 5th edition/Werewolf 20th edition: Is the setting/system where you play as werewolves and fight the enemies of the spirit of earth Gaia. Werewolf 5th edition is the newer system and werewolf 20th edition is an older system.
Vampire the masquerade/ Vampire 5th edition/ Vampire 20th edition/VTM: It’s the World of darkness system where you play as a vampire sneaking through the shadows of cities and feeding on humans. Vampire 5th edition is the newer system, Vampire 20th edition is the older system.
Storyteller: It's the World of Darkness way of saying “Dungeon Master”, the one that runs the campaign/Chronicle.
Flaws, Merits and Backgrounds: I can explain them as essentially D&D feats but with levels to it that determine how mechanically strong the “feat” you picked up is, I can mention one where you can make bullets bounce off surfaces to hit targets and it decreases the difficulty for hitting a target behind cover or being so shockingly beautiful that you gain extra dice when you are trying to seduce someone. Backgrounds are like feats but that need to be explained by your backstory, like magical pacts, riches or even spirit pacts. And flaws are mechanical and role-play disadvantages that you need to pick on character creation, like having an enemy or being illiterate.
Actual story:
So, I’ve been a forever Storyteller ever since I got to know World of Darkness and I was aching to drop the whole responsibilities as a Storyteller and for once enjoy this rich urban fantasy setting as a player thrown into the night as any of the multiple splats. So, I saw that someone just posted a werewolf 5th edition chronicle and applied, Werewolf 5th ed is not my cup of tea, but I’m the type that is desperate enough and open minded enough to just go ahead and try any system that I can get my hands on, so when the Storyteller of that chronicle dmed me the link to join his discord server I was just overjoyed.
I started interacting with other players, they all seemed pretty nice and I even started to plan a shared backstory with one of the girl players that was pretty nice to me (I’ll call her Avery, as she is part of the horror story too). So as me and Avery were planning the shared backstory we started to wonder what some of the merits and backgrounds mechanically did within the setting as I wanted spend all of my 7 merit points (everyone gets 7) into a specific advantage called spirit pact where I essentially made a pact with a powerful spirit to make them my companion and give me a minor supernatural ability/edge, however, how fantastical these edges and how the spirits behave varies from storyteller to storyteller as some like something more fantastical while others prefer something more realistic, so I reached out to him to get some more context on how crazy I could make the pact.
Several days passed and he didn’t replied my question at all, nor any other ones I made as I wanted to know if my knowledge about werewolf 20th edition lore would help at all (Werewolf 5th edition and Werewolf 20th edition have big lore differences despite being set in the same universe, so I needed to know to not metagame and/or ruin continuity) but well, I thought that he was just a busy guy, I mean, he was also running a Vampire the masquerade game in the same server, so I was just planning on tackling these doubts I had on Tuesday when the session started. But, then I saw one of the players in the server asking for help on how to set their character sheet as apparently they were lost on what to do, so I went ahead and offered to join VC with him and run him through the character creation, I’ll call this player OZ and he is the star of this cheating story.
So as I joined VC he just asked me how the Gifts, rites and renown system works, with Gifts and Rites being the akin to werewolf magic and renown being what you use to cast magic per say. After that he said he didn’t had no other doubts and so we started a conversation in world of darkness as a whole, there he showed me that he had pretty extensive knowledge on how Vampire the Masquerade functioned, telling me old lore related to Vampire 20th edition such as a specific bloodline of the Tzimisce vampire clan (that instead of their trademark flesh crafting ability had an extremely powerful blood magical superpower) and he even told me that he participated on several vampire chronicles before in the past and well, since he seemed to know what he was doing and there was a big, pretty simplified how to make your character summary right on the first page on the “how to make your character” section, I thought that he’d not have any other issue, as character creation (at least in the 5th editions of World of Darkness books, in my opinion.), got pretty simplified and are the types where if you understand how to create one character you can created all. So after some more talking and a friendly remind that I’m also a regular storyteller that loves to help newbies and so my dms are always open, I left the call.
Oz posted his character sheet on the server for the Storyteller to review and approve and well, he did within a literal minute of him posting it (something that at the time I didn’t noticed as I doing something else and well an experienced Storyteller could’ve noticed if he did anything wrong within a minute, so I really thought he didn’t do anything wrong and simply attended to my business). However, on Sunday Avery decided stop procrastinating and finished her character sheet, finally the whole crew had their character sheets done and since they were publically available I decided to take a peak and see what we as a pack would have as our arsenal and so on. However, when I looked into Oz’s sheet things got a bit rocky.
So, to start to addressing the problems I’ll say that Oz didn’t use a regular werewolf 5th edition sheet, no, he used an abomination (aka a vampire werewolf) sheet to actually make his character to begin with and not only that, he was way, way too op for a werewolf that just had their first change. And how OP you might ask? Well, I started to question him about it and he said that he picked a skill distribution called “Specialist” a skill distribution type that offers the following: One skill at four points, Three skills at Three points, Three skills at Two points and Three skills at one point, a skill distribution that makes your character very good at something, good at some other areas but lacking in several others, however, Oz in this particular moment has the following distribution: One skill at four points, five skills at three points, six skills at two and three skills at one and aside from that, instead of having spent 7 merit points he had spent 10 and for some reason he had also 4 specialities allocated all on his physical skills, something that is just not possible at character creation as the book specifically say that you can only add new specialities on these specific skills Academics, Craft, Performance, and Science IF you actually bought them upon character creation something that he totally didn’t do.
I know this must be hard to imagine how much stronger he was than the rest of the party, so to bring it down to a more digestible context, the amount of xp you’d need to get to get that strong is Storytellers in werewolf 5th edition are recommended to give out the following amount of XP per session:
Participation = gives you 1 XP
Perform something remarkable during the session = Gives you 1 XP
Use a Skill, Gift, or other Trait in a clever or critical way =Gives you 1 XP
“Tell me something important your character learned this session.”= Gives you 1 XP
Conclude a story within the greater chronicle = Gives you 2–3 XP
This means that if he concluded all of the requirements above he’d get a minimal of 6xp and a max of 7 xp. However, not all session you can use a gift in a creative way, not all session you can perform something remarkable and not all session you conclude an important story within the chronicle, this means that great majority of the time we’d be getting 2-3 XP per session, yep, no World of Darkness game is the type that you go from zero to hero and with that in mind, he’d need (if my calculation are correct) 114 XP to actually level up his PC to be that strong, something that it would take 35-40 sessions to normally get.
When I started to question him how he exactly got so many skill points and merits he said that the storyteller approved of his character and that he just filled stuff up. I proceeded to just inform him the right skill spread for specialist and what he did wrong on his sheet and he said that he’d fix it despite the fact that the storyteller approved of his character. After that 40 minutes passed and there was silence of both the storyteller and the player just so he’d post a new character sheet, this time containing the spread of One skill at 4 points, Three skills at 3 points, Six skills at two points and three skills at 1 point, with his merits still being 10 points and still keeping the 4 specialities. At this point I started to think that he was trying to sneak some extra skill points, specialities and merits through me, because there is no way he didn’t understood what needed to be fixed when my message has attached to it literally a print from the core rule book with the details on the specialist skill spread and what he needed to change was literally:
“You have 10 merit points instead of 7, you have one extra HP that you shouldn’t have, (Hp is calculated by adding Stamina + 3 and his stamina was 3, he has 7 hp there when he should actually have 6), you still have 6 skills at two points instead of what specialist gives (3 skills at 2 points). You have 4 specialities even though you didn’t pick Academics, Craft, Performance, or Science that are the only skill trees that actually give you free specialities, otherwise you’d just start with 1.”
At this point I started to reach out to Avery and ask for her opinion on that, so she pinged Oz and the Storyteller on chat only to ask thing like “have you guys read the book” specially because he was trying passively aggressively shift the blame on his google search that apparently “mixed up werewolf 20th edition character creation rules” that he had just “skimmed through the book due to a lack of time, that he had “no help at all creating the character and had no idea on what he was doing”. I just want to emphasize that me and Avery were not trying to intimidate him at all, nor try to get a confession out of him or anything, our questions were just about if they (OZ and Storyteller) read the book or not and about what fonts Oz used to generate that character. I was really trying to give him the benefit of the doubt and believe that he was just very misguided by some crazy algorithm and coincidence, but it was a very hard pill to swallow when you consider his previous knowledge about world of darkness system, the fact that I found a full fleshed out character creation guide on Youtube by simply typing “Werewolf 5th edition character creation guide” on Youtube at the fact that he used “I thought you didn’t want to stay on VC with me by your tone of voice” when me and him the other day were having such a lovely chat and I told him multiple times that my DM’s were open in case he needed any help and if he didn’t want to bother me he could’ve just asked help on our discord server instead of making his super Saiyan werewolf. Now, at this point of the story you’d think the Storyteller would’ve at least said something, right? But hah, no, look at the tittle again, he was just DEAD SILENT.
Oz then proceeded, while we were talking, to post his last character sheet update for us, reducing his merit points to 8, and his skill points to the following: 1 skill at four points, 3 skills at three points, four skills at 2 points and three skills at one point. At this point he was either fucking with us or straight up ignorant of the rules completely, so me and Avery wanted to talk to him over VC and explain the rules to him in case he was actually just a newbie completely lost on how it all worked and if he was actually a cheater, talk to him to stop doing that and offer him new solutions for his character in case he wanted a better skill distribution, he refused to join VC with us because he was “working” until late despite his discord saying that he was playing League of legends. So instead me and Avery decide to join early before session (that was supposed to be the day after all of this happened), settle what happened and properly help him make a character, and well he agreed to it.
So fast forward to the following day, the Storyteller remained completely silent through out the whole night, morning and afternoon and two hours before the session I simply pinged Avery and Oz to see if they could join VC so we could talk it out in about 1 hour, OZ simply left the server without saying anything and I stared at my computer screen for 2 minutes before I went out to do something else. After that me and Avery joined VC a bit before session started and hang out and talk about the situation… Almost a whole hour passed and the Storyteller or any of the other players didn’t even hop on VC, it got to the point where the Avery sent a message to the Storyteller and just then he hopped on, the first thing he said? “Sorry guys, I was on another session that I joined this week and I didn’t thought it’d take this long”.
I never got so mad in my entire life, I’ve been a forever Storyteller for the past years and I was so excited to actually be the PLAYER, but despite that I needed to keep civil. Me and Avery informed him of the situation that Oz was most likely cheating, and the Storyteller said that “He was going to talk to him” not even knowing that Oz had left the server almost 3 hours ago, me and Avery just proceeded to ask him what he was going to do next and he said that he was going to call out the whole chronicle, so me and Avery just proceeded to tell him how disappointing the whole thing was and give him a few words of advice on how to improve before we left VC. Later the same night he announced that he wanted to retire from world of darkness as a whole and tried to pass the responsibility on running his vampire chronicle for someone else, after that I just left that server and friended Avery.
Now, I guess it’s time for me to go back hunting for chronicles. Wish me luck everyone and hope you enjoyed my little story.

My mum was an alright mum growing up I guess - she fed us, sent us to school/activities, did the best she could. When I got pregnant she seemed so excited to have a grandchild, bought a set of baby goods for her home saying it’s so we can spend time at her house too without troubling ourself to lug everything to her home. We live about 15 minutes away from her. She is WFH but offered to take care of my son when I was still pregnant, saying she didn’t want her grandson to be sent to daycare so early (My ML was only 60 days). We didn’t want to burden her so still looked at a few daycares, but she insisted so we stopped the visits. Fast forward to when I gave birth and things couldn’t be more different than what we expected. Her initial excitement died down, and I still remember how she treated me during my most sensitive time postpartum. We stayed at her place the month after I delivered as she invited us to so she could help with baby (which was the biggest mistake ever). The first thing she said when I came home wasn’t to give me a hug saying the normal “you’ve done well”, but she looked at my postpartum belly and said “why is it still so big? Mine wasn’t this big”. The first night as clueless parents we struggled with latching and my baby cried the whole night, not once did she come in to check on us. But the next morning she said “wow what a fussy and difficult baby”. She then without any apology, said she can’t take care of my son and he’s “too difficult”. He wasn’t btw, napped like a dream for 2 hours each time, drank his milk (we switched to Exclusive pumping) without issues and was even on a good 3 hourly feed schedule with regular nap times in between. So we panicked and had to find a daycare last minute, and luckily we managed to get into one last minute.
I confronted her then, she apologised and I thought things would improve.
Fast forward now my son is 18 months old, and she seems to have no desire to want to be involved in his life. We have always made an effort (as we don’t get along with my husbands side, so wanted my son to at least have 1 grandparent in his life). We have always been the one to initiate meals, we have always tried to spend weekends at my mums place. But when we show up, she sometimes leaves us at home as she has other plans (lunch/massage plans/ her latest hobby which is filming YouTube videos). I understand she has her own life, but I started to get more and more upset that she just didn’t want anything to do with us. She has never on her own initiative said she wanted to spend time with us, and if we didn’t come over to hers she would never come over to ours. My son would be calling out for her to play with him, and she would be glued in front of the computer screen editing her videos the whole day.
Anyway one month ago I had enough so confronted her again and quit all family WhatsApp groups. She never never once reached out to me despite knowing why I was upset, and today I found out she blocked my phone number on WhatsApp.
It is just so frustrating to be in this situation, is there just no hope to her changing.

I feel so bad for Sarah Newlin and I’m sick of people defending how the writers treated her and the fate they gave her as Pam and Eric’s slave. So here's an essay deconstructing some common talking points against her.
The Sarah Newlin-Hitler argument doesn’t hold up:

• I’ve seen people compare Sarah to Hitler due to her ambitions of genocide towards vampires and placing of them in a prison-camp. Here’s the thing; You can not compare the Vampires of True Blood to a real-life oppressed class because Vampires are inherently and legitimately harmful to humans; They literally have to feed on people to survive. Couple this aspect of their nature with the fact that we consistently see that many of them can’t or won’t control their urges and blatantly disregard the value of human life, or in fact, enjoy harming human life, and it is completely reasonable for people like Sarah to fear or dehumanize Vampires. If pigs could imprison us in a camp for slaughtering and eating them, would it be fair for us to villainize the pigs? No, because we as a species make them into fuckin' bacon, pork, and sausage everyday. The show tries to push a vague allegory about how anti-Vampire discrimination is supposedly akin to racism, homophobia, etc. but this simply does not work. No real life minority inherently harms empowered classes like Vampires do Humans.

Other characters are anti-vampire and don’t suffer like Sarah does:

• Hitler argument aside, it’s also important to note that Sarah didn’t even start the campaign to exterminate vampires, Governor Burrell did. Yet, Burrell dies fairly quickly by Bill’s hands. Contrastingly, Sarah is tortured for the rest of her natural life.
• Steve Newlin, who led the Church of the Sun until he got turned into a vampire, also gets a painful but quick death, even rubbing his gayness for Jason in Sarah's face as a last laugh. Despite Eric killing him, Steve still has some sort of agency over his ending and it’s even portrayed as a triumphant moment because he uses his final words to insult and get back at his “evil” ex-wife, even though he was literally just as, if not more, “evil” and actively anti-Vampire as her before being turned.
• Shit, let’s even look at Jason. In Season 2, he indoctrinates himself into the Church of the Sun and wants to exterminate vampires just like Sarah does. He also consistently swings back and forth between empathizing with vampires and wanting to destroy their species throughout the overall course of the series, like when he goes full vampire-hunter in Season 5 and 6. The only difference between Sarah and Jason is that she actually had the means to enact her anti-vampire plans through being the wife of Steve Newlin and side-ho of Governor Burrell.
  • Both Jason and Sarah are impressionable people with underdeveloped moral compasses. But, because Jason’s the main character’s brother, and apparently just too lovably dumb to think for himself, the show gives him a pass and allows him opportunities to learn from his mistakes without serious consequences.

Sarah's fate is cruel in the greater context of her arc:

• The writers allow Sarah to escape retribution when the Vampires overthrow Burrell’s camp in season 6, just to extend her torture into the next season.
  • Sarah goes into hiding and finds peace and growth after assuming her false-identity of Noomi, only for her new life to be brutally uprooted when the Yakonomo Corporation, along with Eric and Pam, come after her. Sarah has her new boyfriend and later her entire fucking family killed at a point in her life where she is shown to be a genuinely changed person who regrets her past.
  • Sarah visits Amber, her estranged vampire sister who’s infected with Hep V, apologizes for disowning her, and heals her with her cure-infused blood. When Eric tracks Amber down, she even insists that Sarah is a good person at heart and begs him to not hurt her only to be staked and killed by him.
• Sarah is humanized for so much of Season 6 and is given multiple hope spots, only for her to be subjected to a cruel and torturous fate.
  • Eric and Pam secretly keep Sarah prisoner at Fangtasia, where vampires pay to feed on her, while also managing a wildly successful, lucrative, and legitimate corporation that distributes synthetic versions of Sarah’s blood as a cure to the Hep V pandemic. They replace the Yakonomo Corporation and the True Blood product itself, and live happily ever after as Sarah is doomed to rot in their club’s basement for the rest of her natural life, long forgotten by the world. Slowly going insane, Sarah is haunted by visions of Steve (as if to imply that she wronged him when the reality was that he was an abusive and cruel husband to her before he became a vampire that she imprisoned at her camp), and when her hallucination of him tauntingly asks her what she’s thankful for on Thanksgiving, she replies “nothing,” before bursting into tears. Sarah is truly broken and miserable, meanwhile we see shots of all the other characters living happy lives and communing for Thanksgiving dinner as peaceful music plays in the background.
  • Pam’s actress said in an interview, “[Eric and Pam] are gazillionaires, Sarah Newlin is being tortured. It was like the Old West: the bad guy gets it, and the good guy gets away with the girl and everything.” We’re not meant to feel bad for Sarah, but to revel in her pain and feel fuckin' righteous about her torment. We’re supposed to feel like Eric and Pam are part of the “good guy” group while Sarah, the “baddie” gets punished. But that simply isn’t accurate.
    • Pam and Eric, despite being part of the protagonists in the show, are evil, sadistic vampires. They enjoy causing pain to humans and satiating their blood lust by slaughtering innocent people. They’re disgusting rapist-murderers, and have been for over a century. The least malicious relationship they have with a human is with their Fangtasia bartender, Ginger, who they have emotionally manipulated and abused for decades. They are not “good” people, or “heroes” despite the narrative expecting us to disregard their vile nature that's been explicitly shown and alluded to time and time again. So, where’s their comeuppance? Where’s their torture? Why is Karma only reserved for Sarah Newlin, a religiously indoctrinated woman who has been around bad influences her entire life?

Hi all! FTM to a 4 week baby girl and just wanted to ask how you time your pumps? Planning to have a set schedule of pumping 1x a day so I can create a small stash whenever I have to step out for errands. Currently feeding on demand so it’s hard to time when I should pump, I also do hand expressions while feeding and I’m able to get around 1-2oz per session but seeing less than an oz when I tried to pump after my morning feed (around 6 am)
Any advice would be super helpful! :)

My baby is 8mo and for the first 6 months he was great sleeper. Falling asleep feeding around 7 or 8pm. Waking up ~2 to feed and in the morning around 6 or 7am. Life was great. After 6 mo something changed forever. Initially I thought its a growth spurt, it will pass. It didn't. I don't mind him to fall asleep on breast, I find it natural. Sometimes he still does at 7pm but in the night he wakes up min 3 times and he doesn't sleep for hours. During the day I'm capable to put him down to the crib with no problem. In the night, impossible. Anybody has been trough pattern like this? Any advice? Just wait trough?