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Here is my current mod list, I'm quite proud of it. What do you all think of it? Note: 1. A few of the mods are deactivated, they were all copied together. 2. The mods are not listed in order, they got automatically sorted alphabetically when I copied them.
Moonpath to Elsweyr SSE"
Moons And Stars - Sky Overhaul SKSE"
More Informative Console"
More to Say"
moreHUD Inventory Edition"
Moss Rocks"
Moss Rocks - 3D Rocks Patch"
Mrf's Markarth"
Mrf's Solitude"
Mrf's Solitude - Update"
Nate DBVO Pack - MALE PC"
Natural Hair Colors"
NL_MCM - A Modular MCM Framework"
No Grass In Caves"
No Grass In Objects"
No Grassias - A Universal Grass Fix For Grass Mods"
No Recoil"
No Spinning Death Animation"
Nordic Snow"
Nordic Snow - Projected Diffuse"
Nordic Stonewalls"
NORDIC UI - Compass Markers Restored"
NORDIC UI - Interface Overhaul"
Nordic UI - Menu Cleaned and Upscaled"
NORDIC UI - Miscellaneous Patches"
NORDIC UI - Ultrawide Fixes and Patches"
Nordic UI Ultrawide Patch"
Nordic...ish - A TrueHUD preset based on Nordic UI"
Nordic...ish - A TrueHUD preset based on Nordic UI - Recent Item Widget"
Northborn Scars"
Northfires Photoreal Mountains 3 for Majestic (8K)"
NPC AI Process Position Fix - NG"
NPC Animation Remix (DAR)"
NPCs Names Distributor"
NPCs React To Invisibility"
NPCs Wear Amulets of Mara PLUS"
Obsidian Weathers and Seasons"
Open Civil War SSE"
Optional Round Farmhouse Posts"
OSHA-Compliant Sovengarde Mesh Fixes"
Paarthurnax - Quest Expansion"
PapyrusUtil SE - Modders Scripting Utility Functions"
Paragon gems 4K"
Particle Lights For ENB - Aetherium Shards"
Particle Lights For ENB - Alchemy and Enchanting Tables"
Particle Lights For ENB - Apocypha"
Particle Lights For ENB - Blood Splatter Fix"
Particle Lights For ENB - Bugs in a Jar"
Particle Lights For ENB - Dark Elf Lantern"
Particle Lights For ENB - Dark Elf Lantern Particle Patch"
Particle Lights For ENB - Dragonborn Ingredients"
Particle Lights For ENB - Ingredients"
Particle Lights for ENB - Nirnroot"
Particle Lights For ENB - Paragon Gems"
Particle Lights For ENB - Staff Enchanter"
Particle Lights For ENB - Undead Creatures"
Particle Lights For ENB - Wisps - Witchlight"
Particle Lights For ENB - wSkeever Ingredients"
Particle Patch for ENB"
Payload Interpreter"
PELTAPALOOZA - Special Edition"
Penitus Oculatus Questline"
Pickaxe Redone SSE"
Picta Series - Improved Sky Meshes"
Picta Series - Improved Sky Meshes - Cathedral Version"
Populated Skyrim Reborn SSE"
powerofthree's Papyrus Extender"
powerofthree's Tweaks"
Precision"
Prisoner cart fix SMIM"
Pristine Vanilla Movement"
Project ja-Kha'jay"
Project ja-Kha'jay- Moonpath to Elsweyr Khajiit Overhaul"
Project New Reign - Nemesis Unlimited Behavior Engine"
Quality CubeMaps - HD Cube Maps Optimized"
Quick Light SE"
Race Menu SE - WIdescreen Fix"
RaceMenu"
RaceMenu - Male Khajiit Mouth Expression Fix"
RaceMenu Memory Leak Fix"
Rain Extinguishes Fires"
Rally's Civil War Document Tubes"
Rally's Riekling Outposts"
Reachmen Tribes Names"
Real Rabbits HD"
Real Rabbits HD - SPID Edition"
RealRainSE"
Reanimated NPC Animations"
Relationship Dialogue Overhaul - RDO SE"
Remi UnLux Patch"
Remiel-Custom Voiced Follower"
Remiros' Chitin Armor HD"
Renthal's Waterwheel Remastered"
Reversed Daggers Moveset for MCO"
Riekling Barrels SMIM"
Riften Architectural Details"
Riften Docks Overhaul"
Riften Docks Overhaul - Riften Extension Patch"
Riften Docks Overhaul - SMIM Patch"
Riften Extension - Southwoods District"
RS Children - Populated Skyrim Reborn SSE Patch"
RS Children Overhaul"
Rudification - Rudy Candles Expanded"
Rudy ENB Obsidian Weathers ADDONS and REQUiRED Files"
Rudy HQ - Falling Leaves and Needles SE"
Rudy HQ - Falling Leaves and Needles SE - Yellow Leaves Texture"
Rudy HQ - Hay SE"
Rudy HQ - Miscellaneous SE"
Rudy HQ - More lights for ENB - Daedric weapons"
RUGNAROK - Special Edition"
Ruins Clutter Improved"
Ruins Clutter Improved - Fixes"
Ruins Clutter Improved - Portcullis Collision Fix"
RUSTIC ARMOR and WEAPONS 4k-2k SE"
RUSTIC CLOTHING 4k-2k - Special Edition"
RUSTIC MAPS"
RUSTIC WINDOWS - Special Edition"
SABRECAT.by.Kajuan"
SCAR - Skyrim Combos AI Revolution"
Sconces of Skyrim - Markarth Braziers Improved"
Scrambled Bugs"
Scripts, Utilities and Core Files_separator"
SDA - UnLux"
SDA Patch Hub SE"
SD's Horn Candles SE"
Security Overhaul SKSE - Add-ons"
Security Overhaul SKSE - Lock Variations"
Security Overhaul SKSE - Regional Locks"
Serana Dialogue Add-On"
Serana Re-Imagined"
Serious Civil War Defense for OCW"
Serious Civil War Finale Sieges"
Shaders of Solstheim - Ash and Moss"
Shadow of Skyrim - Nemesis and Alternative Death System"
Show Player In Menus"
Shroud Hearth Barrow Script Fix"
Sigils of Skyrim - Shields"
Sigils of the North - Banners 4k"
Simple Snow Improvements - Giant Obelisks (BOS)"
Simple Snow Improvements - Skyrim (BOS)"
Simplicity of Snow"
SIRENROOT - Deluge of Deceit"
SIRENROOT - HD Texture Pack"
Skeleton Replacer HD"
Skeleton Replacer HD - Lux Patch"
Skeleton Replacer HD - Patch Collection"
SKSE - INI"
SKSE Output"
SKSE Plugins_separator"
SKSE Scripts - v2.0.20"
Sky Idles"
SkyFix SE - HD Blacksmith Signs"
SkyHUD"
Skyland AIO"
Skyland Farmhouse - Farmhouse Door Patch"
Skyland Whiterun - Epic Doors of Whiterun Patch"
Skyland Whiterun - Pompous Door of Whiterun Patch"
Skyrim - A Mountainous Experience"
Skyrim 3D Docks and Boardwalks"
Skyrim 3D Furniture"
Skyrim 3D Furniture - SMIM Patch"
Skyrim 3D Landscapes"
Skyrim 3D Rocks"
Skyrim 3D Windmill"
Skyrim on Skooma"
Skyrim Priority SE AE - skse plugin"
Skyrim Remastered - Caves"
Skyrim Remastered - Glaciers and Ice - IMR Edition"
Skyrim Ultimate Eye Meshe"
Skyrim Ultimate Eye Meshes - Vampire Fixes"
Skyrim Upscaler - DLSS FSR2 XeSS"
Skyrim Upscaler - Patreon BETA"
SkyUI"
Slayable Offspring SKSE"
Sleeping Expanded - Animations and NPC reactions"
Small Nordic Tent Replacer"
SMIM - Quality Addon - Unofficial Material Fix Patch"
SMIM Barrel Expansion - Mead Barrel - Oil Barrel - Butter Churn"
Smoke - Rudy Fix"
Smoking Torches and Candles SSE"
Smooth Moveset"
Smooth Random idle Animation"
SmoothCam"
SmoothCam - Modern Camera Preset"
Solstheim Objects SMIMed"
Sons of Nirn - Whiterun"
Soul Cairn Script Tweaks"
Spell Perk Item Distributor"
Spell Perk Item Distributor OLD"
SpellSword Moveset"
Splashes of Skyrim"
Splashes Of Storms"
Splashes of Storms - Rudy Fix"
SSE Display Tweaks"
SSE Engine Fixes (skse64 plugin)"
Stalhrim Refrozen"
Stalhrim Refrozen - Upscales Textures"
Static Mesh Improvement Mod"
Static Mesh improvement Mod - SMIM - Quality Addon"
Static Mesh Improvement Mod Improvement Mod"
Stockades of Skyrim 3D"
Stones of Solitude - Better Blended Rock Piles"
Storm Lightning for SSE and VR (Minty Lightning 2019)"
Strongholds - Largashbur"
Strongholds - Narzulbur"
Stunning Statues of Skyrim"
Subtle Wind FX"
TAA Deblur"
Take a Seat - New DAR Sitting Animations"
Tamrielic Names"
Tempered Skins for Males - Dressed Version"
Terrain Fixes for CC Mods"
The Eyes Of Beauty SSE"
The Eyes Of Beauty SSE - Elves Edition"
The Second Great War"
The Second Great War - USSEP Patch"
The Taste of Death Improved Shutdown"
TMB Vanilla Armors and Clothes SSE"
To Your Face SE"
Troll.by.Kajuan"
True Directional Movement - Modernized Third Person Gameplay"
TRUE FACES - A Character Enhancement Project"
TrueHUD - HUD Additions"
Unarmed Moveset for MCO"
Undead Snow Elves - Mihail"
UNDERDOG Animations"
Unique Map Weather"
Unique Map Weather - Vanilla Additions"
Unique Skulls HD"
Unique Solstheim Grass"
Unique Solstheim Grass - Complex Grass"
Unofficial High Definition Audio Project"
Unofficial Material Fix"
Unofficial Material Fix - Assorted Mesh Fixes Patch"
Unofficial Moonpath to Elsweyr Patch"
Unofficial Skyrim Special Edition Patch"
UNP Female Body Renewal"
Unreal 4K Mammoth Skeleton ReTexture"
Use Those Blankets"
Valhalla Combat"
Vampire Lines Expansion"
Vampires Have Claws"
Vanargand Animations - Archery"
Vanargand Animations - Sneak Archery"
Vanilla Follower Expansion - Illia (VFE)"
Vanilla hair - Salt and Wind"
Vanilla Makeup HD"
Vanilla Warpaints Absolution"
Veydosebrom Regions"
Veydosebrom Regions - Complex Grass"
VickusDickus' Khajiiti Apex Armory"
Wade In Water Redone"
Wall mounted dead animals fixes"
Water for ENB"
Water in Wells - mesh-only animated wells"
Weapon Keyword Unification Project"
Weather of World"
Weathers & Atmosphere_separator"
WEBS SE"
Wedding Outfit Commission"
WeldingMans Smelter"
WeldingMans Smelter - Embers XD"
Whiterun Exteriors Patch Collection"
Whiterun Objects SMIMed"
Whiterun Trees"
Whiterun Trees - JKs Skyrim - Fortified Whiterun Patch"
WIDeadBodyCleanupScript Crash Fix"
Windhelm Bridge Stairs"
Winterhold Statue - Animated with ENB Lights"
Wispmother.by.Kajuan"
WiZkiD Riften and Ratway"
WiZkiD Signs"
WiZkiD Specific Signs"
Wolves of the Wild"
Wood Wall Trap Mesh and UV Fix"
Woodcutter Axe Redone SE"
Word Wall Transparency Fix for ENB"
Wyrmstooth"
XNFRain's Civil War Map Flag Replacer SE"
XP32 Maximum Skeleton Special Extended"
.NET Script Framework"
Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods - ASLAL Patch"
3D Riften Trellis and Roofs"
3D Solitude Market Trellis"
3D Solitude Market Trellis Expansion"
3D Trellis Improved - Gildergreen Plaza"
3D Whiterun Trellis"
3D Whiterun Trellis Expansion"
4K Carts Clean"
4K SMIM Carriage Seat"
4K Tusks"
A Matter of Time - A HUD clock widget"
A Matter Of Time - Legacy Settings Loader"
Actor Limit Fix"
Address Library for SKSE Plugins"
ADXP I MCO elden rim moveset collection (SCAR)"
ADXP l MCO Nordic Animation Complete Pack"
After the Civil War - Siege Damage Repairs"
Alternate Conversation Camera"
Alternate Start - Live Another Life - SSE"
Amber Refossilized"
aMidianBorn Book of Silence SE"
aMidianBorn Matching Armory - Glass Armor and Weapons"
Ancient Falmer Armor 4K"
Ancient Falmer Armor 4K - Armour Mesh Fixes Patch"
Ancient Nord Pickaxe Replacer - Rusted Textures 4K"
Ancient Nord Pickaxe Replacer 4K"
Animated Coffins"
Animated Forge Water"
Animated Static Reload Fix - NG"
Animation Motion Revolution"
Animation Queue Fix"
Another Jump Animation - Female"
Another Jump Animation - Male"
Archery Locational Damage"
Archery Target Retexture 4k"
Armor Mesh Fixes SE"
Armor Mesh Fixes SE - aMidianBorn Patch"
Armor Mesh Fixes SE - Orcish Environmental Map Fix"
Armor Mesh Fixes SE - Steel Armour Fix"
Ashbound - Solstheim Revisited"
Ashlander Nomads Names"
Assorted mesh fixes"
Attack MCO-DXP"
Auriel Bow - ENB Light"
Auriel's Bow and Shield HD SE"
Aurora Fix"
Authentic Eyes"
Auto Input Switch"
Axarien's Animations - Kaidan (DAR)"
Axarien's Animations - Lucien (DAR)"
Baby Chickens - Mihail"
Bandit Lines Expansion"
Bandit Lines Expansion - Dark Elf"
Barter Limit Fix"
Base Object Swapper"
Base Textures & Meshes_separator"
Basic Dining Set Replacer2k"
Bears of the North"
Bears of the North - 4k Textures"
Behavior Data Injector"
Belethor's Sister - Quest"
Bellyaches 16K-8K Dragon Replacer Pack"
Beneath Bronze Waters Start Fix"
Better Beast vampire fangs - fixes and adjustments - Argonian and Khajiit"
Better Beast vampire fangs - fixes and adjustments - Argonian V Fangs"
Better Blended Mushrooms"
Better Books and Letters"
Better Combat Escape - SSE"
Better Dialogue Control Widescreen Fix"
Better Dialogue Controls"
Better Dyndolod Red Mountain Plume"
Better Jumping SE"
Better Ladder UV Mapping"
Better tomboys DAR animations"
Better Wedding Guests"
Beyond Reach"
Beyond Reach - Arnima - Armour Fix 2"
Beyond Reach - Arnima - Dragonstar Armour Fix"
Beyond Reach - Arnima - Female Witchman Armour Fix"
Beyond Reach - Arnima - Forrsworn Texture Fix"
Beyond Reach - Arnima - Wool Plate Armour Fix"
Beyond Reach - Dunlain Falls Interior and Exterior House Fix"
Beyond Reach - House Texture Fix"
Beyond Reach - Infant Ogre Inventory Fix"
Beyond Reach - Shaman Fix"
Beyond Skyrim - Wares of Tamriel SE"
Bijin NPCs Civil War Legate Rikke Fix"
Bijin NPCs SE"
Bijin Skin - UNP"
Bijin Warmaidens SE"
Bijin Wives SE"
BiR's Remiel Replacer"
Blended Roads"
Blended Roads - Simplicity of Snow Patch"
Blended Roads Redone - Bridges - 8K"
Blended Roads Redone SE - 8K"
Blended Roads Redone SE - Meshes - 8K"
Blind people DAR animations"
Blood and Ash - Ash"
Blood and Ash - Blood"
Bloodline - Volkihar Family"
Bosmer NPCs have Antlers"
Bosmer NPCs have Antlers - Texture Patch"
Breton NPCs Have Elven Ears"
Bright Waterfall Fix for ENB - DynDOLOD"
Bucket Again - SMIMed"
Bug Fixes SSE"
Capital Whiterun Expansion - 3D Whiterun Trellis Patch"
Carriages and Stables Dialogue Bundle"
Cathedral - 3D Deathbell"
Cathedral - 3D Deathbell - ENB Light"
Cathedral - 3D Mountain Flowers"
Cathedral - Mushrooms"
Cathedral - Plants"
Cathedral 3D Mountain Flowers - Base Object Swapper"
Character Creation & NPC Overhaul_separator"
Chicken Replacer - Mihail"
Ciri DBVO - Live Another Life Patch - FEMALE PC"
Ciri DBVO - LotDB Patch - FEMALE PC"
Ciri DBVO - Wyrmstooth Patch - FEMALE PC"
Ciri DBVO Pack - FEMALE PC"
Citizens of Tamriel"
City & Settlements Textures_separator"
Civil War Couriers Framework"
Civil War Lines Expansion"
CLOUDS"
Clouds All Over - All In One"
College of Winterhold - Quest Expansion"
College of Winterhold - Quest Markers"
College of Winterhold - RS Children Patch"
CoMAP"
Combat Music Fix SKSE"
Combat Pathing Revolution"
Complementary Grass Fixes"
Comprehensive First Person Animation Overhaul - CFPAO"
Conditional tavern cheering (DAR)"
Configurable Commentary Rate Slider"
ConsoleUtilSSE"
ConsoleUtilSSE NG"
Cosmos Lucien Replacer"
Creation Club - Fishing"
Creation Club - Rare Curios"
Creation Club - Saints & Seducers"
Creation Club - Survival Mode"
Creatures & Fauna_separator"
Crouch Sliding"
Curated Bosses for True HUD"
Cuyi's Bosmeri Antlers - SSE"
Daedric Names"
DAR - Dynamic Swimming"
DAR - Dynamic Swimming - Argonian Mastery"
Daughters of Malacath"
DBVO Dialogue Interface ReShaped Patch"
Destination Weddings"
Destination Weddings - Lux Via & NPC's Wear Amulets of Mara Patch"
Detailed NPCs - Immersive Armors for NPCs (SPID)"
Dialogue Interface ReShaped"
Dibella's Blessing"
Dibella's Blessing Patches"
Disable Turn Animation SE I AE"
Diverse Skyrim - Voiced Addon (ElevenLabs)"
DIVERSE SKYRIM SSE"
DLC2dunFrostmoonTriggerScript Optimization"
DLC2dunNchardakDoorSeal Script Infinite Loop Fix"
DLC2dunSeekerInvisScript Fix"
DLC2MiraakScript Fix"
DLC2PillarBuilderActorScript Tweak"
DLC2TribalWerebearScript Fix"
Dodge MCO-DXP"
Don't sheathe bound weapons DAR animations"
Dovah Names"
Dragon Priest - Armour and Weapons"
Dragonborn Voice Over"
Dragonborn Voice Over - Nordic UI Ultrawide Patch"
Dragonborn Voice Over Old"
DragonPriest Retexture - SE"
Draugr.by.Kajuan"
dunFolgunthurBossBattle Script Fix"
Dwemer Pipework Reworked"
Dwemer Pipework Reworked - Decorative Pattern"
Dwemer Pipework Reworked - ENB Lights"
Dynamic Animation Replacer"
Dynamic Dodge Animation"
Dynamic Impact - Slash Effects X"
Dynamic snow For Map"
DynDOLOD Resources SE"
eeekie's even better Kaidan"
Elder Creed - Valhalla Axe Moveset AIO"
ElSopa - Papers HD SE"
ElSopa HD - Realistic Dark Elf Urns SE"
Elven Weapons for Silence SE"
Embers XD"
Emperor Penguins - Mihail"
ENB Helper SE"
ENB Light"
Enhanced Blood Textures"
Enhanced Enemy AI SE"
Enhanced Invisibility"
Enhanced Reanimation"
Enhanced Volumetric Lighting and Shadows (EVLaS)"
Equip Enchantment Fix"
Equipment & Apparel_separator"
ESO Style Cursor"
EVG Animated Traversal"
EVG Animated Traversal - Bleak Falls Barrow"
EVG Animated Traversal - Flat Footed Quest"
EVG Animated Traversal - Patch Collection"
EVG Animated Traversal - Skyrim Integration Patch"
EVG Animation Variance"
EVG Conditional Idles"
EVG Conditionals Extended"
EVG Conditionals Extended - Modesty Replacer"
EVG Conditionals Extended - Valhalla Patch"
Expressive Facegen Morphs SE"
Expressive Facial Animation -Female Edition-"
Expressive Facial Animation -Male Edition-"
Expressive Remiel"
FA ORCODONTIST - Orsimer Mouth and Teeth Fix"
Face Discoloration Fix"
Falmer.by.Kajuan"
Fancy Sword Moveset for MCO"
Fate Cards Remade - Legacy of The Dragonborn"
Feminize - Crafting Animation (DAR)"
First Person Combat Animations Overhaul 2.0 -SIZE MATTERS"
Fish Anywhere With Water"
Fix Note icon for SkyUI"
Fixed Mesh Lighting"
Fixed Nordic Metal Grate"
Flickering Meshes Fix"
Flies Around Corpses - Audio Only"
Flora & Landscape_separator"
Forgotten Argonian Roots"
Forsworn and Thalmor Lines Expansion"
Forsworn Matriarchs Names"
Fortified Whiterun"
Fortified Whiterun - Immersive Citizens Patch"
Fortified Whiterun - JK's Skyrim Patch"
Frankly HD Dawnguard Armor and Weapons"
Frankly HD Dragonbone and Dragonscale - Armor and Weapons"
Frankly HD Dragonbone and Dragonscale - Armor and Weapons - Mesh Fix"
Frankly HD Imperial Armor and Weapons"
Frankly HD Imperial Armor and Weapons - Leanwolf Patch"
Frankly HD Imperial Armor and Weapons - Long Sleeves"
Frankly HD Nightingale Armor and Weapons [SSE]"
Frankly HD Nightingale Armor and Weapons [SSE] - Leanwolf Patch"
Frankly HD Shrouded Armor"
Frankly HD Silver Sword"
Frankly HD Stormcloak and City Guards"
Frankly HD Stormcloak and City Guards - Falkreath Hue Fix"
Frankly HD Stormcloak and City Guards - Fix"
Frankly HD Thieves Guild Armors"
Fuz Ro D-oh - Silent Voice"
FYX - 3D Coal in the Shovel"
FYX - 3D Dock Ramp"
FYX - 3D Farmhouse Walkway"
FYX - 3D Honeyside Deck Floor"
FYX - 3D Shack Kit Roofs"
FYX - 3D Shack Kit Walls"
FYX - 3D Shack Kit Walls - BOS"
FYX - 3D Stockades"
FYX - 3D Stockades - Walls and Gate"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Castle Bridge"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Drawbridge Gate"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Drawbridge Gate - Lux Orbis Patch"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Guard Towers"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Scaffold"
FYX - 3D Whiterun Tree Circle"
FYX - Candlehearth Hall Chimney"
FYX - Fortified Whiterun Consistency"
FYX - Jorrvaskr"
FYX - RavenRock Docks and Fences Round Posts"
FYX - RowBoat"
FYX - SMIM Barrels - Smooth and New optionnal Metal and Wood Texture"
FYX - Smooth Wells"
FYX - The Temple of Mara (ENB Light Windows)"
FYX - Water Splash"
FYX - Windhelm Stable Roof"
FYX Smooth Wells - Invisible Well Fix"
Gameplay_separator"
Gesture Animation Remix (DAR)"
Giant.by.Kajuan"
Gilded Doublet - Ported to SSE"
GKB Waves Reborn"
Glorious Doors of Skyrim (GDOS)"
Glowing Mushroom Collision Fixes"
GOAT HD by Pfuscher"
Goetia Animations - Conditional Shouts"
Goetia Animations - Enchanted Staves"
Goetia Animations - Magic Spell Casting"
Golden Saint Armory Revamped"
GORECAP"
Grass Sampler Fix"
Guard Armor Reforged"
Guard Dialogue Overhaul - Second Great War Patch"
Guard Dialogue Overhaul - UHDAP Patch"
Guard Dialogue Overhaul SE"
Hagraven.by.Kajuan"
Happy Little Logs"
Happy Little Trees"
Happy Little Trees - Aspen Addendum"
Happy Little Trees - DLC Trees"
Happy Little Trees - Reduced Saturation"
Happy Little Trees Add-On - DynDOLOD 3"
Harvestables Cabbages Addon for High Poly Project"
HD CubeMap Collection"
HD LODs Textures SE"
HD Reflective Ebony Armor and Weapons"
HD Reflective Ebony Armor and Weapons - Ebony Mail"
HD Reworked Falmer Architecture 4K"
HD Reworked Horses"
HD Serpentine Dragon and Mesh Fix SE"
HD Skeever"
Hearthfire Oven"
High Hrothgar Fixed"
High Hrothgar Fixed - Lux Orbis Patch"
High Hrothgar Fixed - Lux Patch"
High poly Mudcrab n Retexture"
High Poly Project"
High Poly Vanilla Hair"
High Quality Food and Ingredients SE"
Highlandcow HD by Pfuscher"
High-Poly Inigo Replacer"
Hold Border Banners"
Hold Border Guards - Definitive Edition"
Hold Guard Armor Unchanged SE"
Horker by Pfuscher"
Horses Simply Turn Better"
Hunters Not Bandits"
Husky Wolf - Wolves Use Husky Model"
Husky Wolf - Wolves Use Husky Model - Shell Fur"
Hvergelmir's Aesthetics - Beards"
Hvergelmir's Aesthetics - Brows"
Icy Mesh Remaster"
Icy Mesh Remaster - Overwrite Handler"
IFrame Generator RE"
I'm Glad You're Here - Follower & Spouse Appreciation"
I'm Walkin' Here"
Immersive Armors"
Immersive Citizens - AI Overhaul"
Immersive Equipping Animations"
Immersive Equipping Animations - Shadow of Skyrim Patch"
Immersive folded hands (DAR)"
Immersive Interactions - Animated Actions"
Immersive Kaidan Start"
Immersive Load Screen Message Overhaul"
Immersive Patrols SE"
Immersive Rejections"
Immersive Weapon Integration Distributed with SPID"
Immersive Weapons"
Immersive World Encounters SE"
Imperial Centurion Armor for Solitude Guards"
Imperial Guard Centurion Armor SE - 4k"
Imperial Guard Centurion Armor SE - Officer Replacer"
Improved Closefaced Helmets"
Improved Follower Dialogue - Lydia"
Improved Loading Screen Colors"
Improved Table Transition Animations"
ImprovedDialogueLydia - UnLux"
INIGO"
Inigo Riding Patch"
Interface_separator"
JContainers SE"
JK's Riften Outskirts"
JK's Riften Outskirts Patch Collection"
JK's Skyrim"
JK's Skyrim All Lighting Overhauls Patch"
JK's Skyrim and Beyond Skyrim Wares of Tamriel Patch"
JK's Whiterun Outskirts"
JS Attunement Sphere and Lexicons SE"
JS Barenziah SE"
JS Bloodstone Chalice SE"
JS Common Cages SE"
JS Dragon Claws AE Anniversary Edition"
JS Dwarven Oil SE"
JS Dwemer Artifacts SE"
JS Dwemer Control Cube SE"
JS Dwemer Ichor Barrels SE"
JS Dwemer Kitchenware SE"
JS Dwemer Puzzle Cube SE"
JS Essence Extractor SE"
JS Initiate's Ewer SE"
JS Instruments of Skyrim SE"
JS Lockpicking UI SE"
JS Purses and Septims SE"
JS Shrines of the Divines SE4k"
Kaidan 2"
Kaidan 2 - HD Armor Retexture"
Kaidan and Inigo Banter Patch"
Kaidan Extended Edition"
Kaidan LotDB Patch"
Kaidan Lux Patch"
Kaidan Slap da Butt"
Keyword Item Distributor"
KG's AE Draugr Arsenal Reshaped"
KG's AE Draugr Arsenal Reshaped - Unofficial Amidianborn Patch"
Khajiit Has Wares - A Caravan Camp Overhaul"
Khajiit Overhaul SSE Unofficial Port"
Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods"
Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods - Military Camps"
LeanWolf's Better-Shaped Talos with Greatsword"
LeanWolf's Better-Shaped Weapons"
LeanWolf's Better-Shaped Weapons - Orcish Greatsword"
Legacy of the Dragonborn"
Legacy of the Dragonborn - Follower Room Patches"
Legacy Safehouse Plus - LotDB"
Less Distracting Blowing Snow Effects for ENB Particle Patch"
Leviathan Animations II - Female Idle Walk And Run"
Leviathan Animations II - Male Idle Walk And Run"
Leviathan Animations II - Sprint"
Lighting & Water_separator"
Lively cart driver animation replacer - SE"
Lively Children Animations (DAR)"
LOD Mesh Fixes for DynDOLOD"
LOD Unloading Bug Fix"
Logs, Outputs & LOD_separator"
Loki's Wade In Water"
Look Around - Searching Animations For NPCs (DAR)"
Lore-Based Loading Screens"
Lucien - Immersive Fully Voiced Male Follower"
Lucien - Moonpath to Elsweyr Patch"
Lunar Guard Armor"
Lunar Guard Arsenal - Battleaxe"
Lux"
Lux - LotDB Patch"
Lux - Riften Docks Overhaul Patch"
Lux - Via"
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I wanted to share this because I recently discovered it and it has been really nice so far. Django 4.2 works pretty well inside FastAPI with very little intervention.
Make a django project as you normally would. Make your models as you normally would. Then when you want to integrate FastAPI, start a django app with 'python manage.py startapp Fast'. Make a file main.py inside the 'Fast' app folder of your Django app:

#Import Django and OS import os import django os.environ.setdefault("DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE", "your_project.settings") django.setup() <--- this is very important from your_project.wsgi import application <---- this is the django wsgi app. It's very easy to setup with a single google. Import it to your FastAPI main.py from fastapi import FastAPI from some_django_app.models import SomeModel, DifferentModel # Create the FastAPI application app = FastAPI() templates = Jinja2Templates( directory="/Users/me/Documents/thing/thing_project/theme/templates" )<--- Jinja2 templates work with Django AND FastAPI. Set it up however makes sense for you. app.mount("/static", StaticFiles(directory=static_directory), name="static") <--- FastAPI static from starlette.middleware.wsgi import WSGIMiddleware #Wrap your django wsgi application in the starlette WSGIMiddleware and we can mount it directly inside Uvicorn. app.mount("/d", WSGIMiddleware(application), name="django") <--- This is the django app mounted at the /d route INSIDE FastAPI/uvicorn app.mount( "/djstatic", StaticFiles(directory="theme/static/django_static"), name="django_static", ) <--- Django has its own static for things like Django Admin. You'll have to figure out how to mount static for Django. You will probably need to run 'python manage.py collectstatic', then mount that folder where you collected static to FastAPI. @app.get("/chat", response_class=HTMLResponse) async def chat(request: Request): case = await SomeObject.objects.aget(title__contains="something or other) return templates.TemplateResponse( "base.html", {"request": request, "django_object": django_object} ) <-- Django's 'aget' works nicely right inside FastAPI. @app.get("/chat", response_class=HTMLResponse) def chat(request: Request): case = SomeObject.objects.get(title__contains="something or other) return templates.TemplateResponse( "base.html", {"request": request, "django_object": django_object} ) <-- Django's standard blocking ORM will *sometimes* work in normal functions if your code doesn't have complex/multiple queries. @app.post("/register", response_class=HTMLResponse) async def register_post(request: Request): User = get_user_model() <---- this is a Django function returning Django user model. form = await request.form() username = form.get("username") password = form.get("password") email = form.get("email") user = User(username=username, password=password, email=email) user.set_password(password) <--- Also django. So much code to use in Django's massive framework. This works nicely as a way to create users and Django Admin will show the users to you. await user.asave() <---- just use asave instead of save(). This is django. return RedirectResponse("/login") # Why not just use Django Ninja or Django REST? # Well, we get really great support for Websockets in FastAPI, plus a much # Nicer dev experience (arguably) and uvicorn is really fast. @app.websocket("/ws/chat/{path_id}") async def websocket_endpoint(websocket: WebSocket, some_id: int): await websocket.accept() case = await SomeObject.objects.aget(id=some_id) # And what about AUTH? # Partially integrating some Django features works nicely. The standard 'FastAPI' way seems to work. Keep the Django User model, authenticate the users directly with the ORM of Django, and issue the tokens the way you would as per FastAPI docs. now run: uvicorn fast.main.app -- reload Uvicorn will run FastAPI as normal, and it will mount Django at /d/. Which means that localhost:8000/d/admin will give you Django Admin, which is hugely powerful during development and production. You now have all the power of the Django ORM, mirations, admin, set_password, auth users, etc etc, Jinja2 templates, and the speed/dev experience of FastAPI. 

Full disclosure, we don't mind that he meows a lot. He's a very vocal orange boy and he's a sweetheart! The issue is that we don't live together, he lives with his sister and her boyfriend and they both have at home jobs (which they got AFTER my boyfriend moved in with his cat.) This also may turn into a bit of a rant so I'm sorry!
My boyfriend adopted his cat when he was a little over a year old and he just turned two! We've learned he meows for many reasons, but especially food. We've talked to a vet about this behavior and we were suggested that he give him small portions throughout the say so he feels full.
He meows incessantly in the early morning for food and despite my boyfriends efforts of trying to calm him down whether it be giving him a little bit of food throughout the day so he feels full (he's a bit on the chonky side so we're trying to help maintain his weight), laying on the floor with him to calm him down, or even just trying to quiet him down by talking and giving attention to him, sometimes it's no use.
His roommates, however, HATE him. They don't like his NEUTERED cat can't help but sometimes mount their unspayed cat while she's in heat. They don't like it when he meows during the day because they have at home jobs and can't let him be heard so they keep him locked in his room when he's at work so he ends up sitting in there alone while they play video games after their shifts are over.
Their dog who's a lab german shepard mix even had bladder stones because they wouldn't let her outside and yelled at her for peeing on the carpet of their apartment and it was my boyfriend who actually took her outside to use the bathroom at around 3 in the morning and basically told them "Hey there's something wrong with your dog GET HER CHECKED OUT!!!", he's even caught them stealing HIS cat food from the container which they deny.
Anyway, I digress. I could go into a whole separate post about them, but again, we don't mind that he meows. We love him very dearly and we wouldn't change him because that's just his nature. We just don't want to be in a situation where his cat is being mistreated while he's out at work because they can't handle him meowing. They've even slammed the door on him and hissed at his cat because of the fact he meows so much. He's orange so I would say he's more than a little special, but with a recent argument between him and his roommates, I don't want things escalating any further with them, especially since I can't be there to help his cat or the animals they take care of.
I'm worried. I know they probably wouldn't go so low as to physically hurt him, but I've seen how they treat their animals. During the argument, his sister's boyfriend even accused my boyfriend of "breaking their dogs back" because he was the one who decided to ACTUALLY take her out to pee instead of LITERALLY LOCKING HER IN HER CRATE WHILE SHE WAS WHINING AFTER SHE PEED ON THE FLOOR and she just so happened to act weird after that incident. He said this to him because he accused them of stealing his snacks he keeps in the closet. Which they did steal. But they denied. Right. She ended up getting surgery to get the bladder stones removed so she's okay now, but I can't stand them.
Me and my boyfriend love his cat to death so we want to find solution to this ONE issue. Other than the fact he meows a lot, there is genuinely nothing wrong with him. He even gets along with his roommates cat and dog! I was going to tag this as behavioral, but I'm also concerned not only about his meowing, but also his safety in general. Is there anything either me or him can do? I would say talking to them about his cat and treating him the way they do would probably be a no go because they're super arrogant and refuse to own up to anything and try and gaslight him about the way things in the apartment go. They're a couple and there's only one of him so anything he says that they don't agree with isn't going to change much. My boyfriend is going to be moving out soon, but again, I don't want things to get any worse. My boyfriend has a life outside of the apartment and isn't home 24/7 like his roommates are. He can't be there all the time to see what goes down and last time they locked him in his room, they even shoved a blanket at the front of it I guess to stop him from pawing underneath the door, which was brought up in the argument they had.
We have patience. We can handle an animal misbehaving. If there's anything we can do, please tell us.

First Prev Next Royal Road
u/KieveKRS providing the Trash certification of quality!
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[Thank you for agreeing to teach them.]
Volta nodded, not entirely sure if it was for the best, but recognizing a request—or in this case, a thinly veiled order—for what it was.
Ever since she had taught Scarlet and the others her field, the occasional rotation of Lilhuns would be assigned to work under her for a time. It made her job easier, especially since the settlement was expanding at a ludicrous rate compared to what she had heard from the new members of the pack.
The Atmo that had joined were quickly treated and cared for, those who did not require so much time for recovery quickly accompanying the existing insects in their tasks. The largest, Mama, frequently assisted in construction and decoration of structures, so they worked with her. Once they had oriented how things progressed and their part in it, they were paired off with a construction group to be assigned a project. It was to the point where there were as many as five buildings nearing completion at once, the majority of them being accommodation for the new members of the pack.
The remaining question was regarding the insect kits. The answer? Well, there were four Atmo slightly smaller than the purple ‘Queen’ that had requested Volta instruct them, the pearlescent shimmer of her scaled carapace dancing in the sunbeams afforded by the skylight the den had been constructed with.
Teaching Violet—as well as the two Atmo that Volta had escorted to this pack—in the ways of sanitation had been an interesting endeavour, all things considered. They held a remarkable dexterity in those long edged appendages, but the lack of something to properly grasp with made finding a way to secure a rag onto the ends difficult. Luckily, Heralt was receptive to assisting her with creating something that would attach to the blades.
It was little more than a mop that secured to the joint and braced around the cutting edge gingerly, the ends of the stick using ‘ironwood’ springs to clamp onto fabric pads that would soak in the cleaning solution and allow them to do the floors and walls. Were it not for how shockingly efficient the task was performed, she would have been useless through the laughter at the sight.
Each Atmo kit held two of the devices on their limbs, allowing them to travel in pairs and simply finish large spaces within the time it would take her to prepare the next batch of cleaners to use. They had only started a short while ago and yet two dens had been finished, Scarlet assisting her in doing whatever furniture or ledges the Atmo were unsuited to completing. The odd pack member going through what Head Sahari called ‘versatility training’ listened to her instructions in an oddly compliant manner, giving the blue-furred female pause at the unusual experience.
All in all; the cleaner was guiding the five insects and three Lilhuns in the ways of cleanliness. Scarlet was primarily keeping an eye on those who interacted with the purple-coloured Atmo, her contributions to the other tasks proficient, despite the split attention. Before, she would have assumed the servant quietly acquiescing orders, but the dark red-furred female was particularly vigilant in matters pertaining to the kit now.
Volta wasn’t sure what happened to the other servants that regularly assisted her on a rotation—save for Kaslin, the female seeming to have been unofficially inducted as Grand…. Toril’s assistant alongside his mate, Tersa—but Faye, the mild-mannered deep gold-furred female, and Raine, the polite and excitable brown-furred female, had been absent for many suns now.
It was almost lonely, in a way.
Almost.
“That should be sufficient for this den,” she announced to the gaggle of Atmo kits and Lilhuns, careful to remind them not to bother the few ‘rock-worms’ that Ferra kept separate from the rest outside. There were only four, the largest one adorned in an odd script, but they were apparently a selection of favourites of the female. Regardless, it would not do to irritate a mate of Atrox.
The brown-furred male was responsible for the ghastly armour that the Grand Hunter wore on occasion, and she was not in a hurry to see if the disturbing tendencies of the male extended to how he displayed his displeasure.
“Where is our next destination?” Scarlet asked, her tail brushing up Volta’s spine in an uncomfortable way. It wasn’t that she disliked the touch, but the owner of it worried her. Something about the servant struck her as more than what was presented, and it was obvious that the female thought of it as immensely entertaining. That much was obvious, even without the sly grin.
“We have proceeded much faster than I was expecting,” the blue-furred female admitted, mentally checking over her itinerary while subtly batting away the offending appendage. “I suppose we should attempt the barracks while the pack is engaged, then rest for a time.”
[May I leave to check on the other Atmo?]
Volta paused, unsure why it was being requested rather than merely presented as a fact. Violet was—as far as it mattered—completely beyond the cleaner’s station, if only because she was an adopted kit of the Grand Hunter, as well as a sort of leadership figure for the insects. It was an enigmatic blend of positions where the purple insect could very well order Volta to do things, rather than ask. Though the hierarchy was not nepotistic in nature, it was safer to adhere to the wishes of the den-kit than it was to disobey.
“You may. What of the others?”
[I will leave them with you and Scarlet.]
The mentioned servant frowned. “I am to accompany you.”
Violet chittered her curious laugh. [These young ones are your task. I must attend to my own.]
Volta discreetly jabbed the female with a claw, glaring at her not to question the wishes of her better. The less attention drawn from the Grand Hunter, the better. Just picturing the disturbing mask and piercing gaze was enough to make her blanch.
Either reminded of her position, or merely interested in playful retaliation, Scarlet sighed quietly, bowing slightly to the insect. “As you wish, young mistress. Do call for me if I am required.”
[I will. Thank you, Scarlet, Volta.]
Volta lowered her head, watching the Queen leave before returning her attention to the group.
“We will do the first barracks, then determine if we are of time to do the second. The kits are to await the floors cleared of obstruction by the Lilhuns before cleaning them. We will manage it in sections so as not to disturb any who may be taking a break. In future—assuming you are to operate independently from myself—it would be best if you are used to working in groups.”
The Lilhuns nodded their understanding, the young Atmo hesitantly conferring with each other before approaching Scarlet to have their mops freed of soiled cloth and materials placed upon their carriages.
The Atmo had all been outfitted with a specially made platform that fitted over their wider base, clasping underneath past their six legs. It allowed them to transport much, their carrying capacity much larger than one would suspect from their size. The kits could comfortably haul all of the materials for the sun by themselves, and the adults had been the subject of idle speculation for mounted weapon platforms—assuming the fragmented conversation she had chanced upon was to be believed.
Volta inspected the odd section that the Lilhuns under her tutelage completed while she waited for packing to finish. She was not necessarily pleased with the results, but it was more important for them to understand the procedure to take for various locations at the moment. They had proven that they understood what to do for the dens, so next came teaching them how to approach high-traffic areas.
Once everyone had been prepared and the materials gathered, they left the den and started towards the barracks, glimpsing the Grand Hunter sparring with some of the pack in the open.
Ever since the Atmo were delivered by a trade caravan, the male had taken to training much of the pack personally, Huntress Pan taking over much of his more mundane work. Those who were deemed adequate were then pawed off to Head Tel for some specialized training, though Volta was not privy to what exactly it was meant to accomplish.
Regardless, Head Sahari was in charge of rotating out the pack amongst tasks, only a few specialists being directly assigned to any one occupation. By all rights, Volta herself should be training under the male, but the nature of her work meant that she was typically better off doing her job when such was under way. Given that the Grand Hunter was a rare case of someone fully understanding the importance of her specialty—and how little she wished to interact with the alien—she was thankfully spared.
Disregarding the events going on, she motioned for her group to follow her. There was work to do.
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“Two up!” he called out, wiping the sweat from his brow. The exertion cleared his mind, and the break from endless paperwork was appreciated. With the influx of members and various training being required, he had gotten rather exhausted mentally. Between the Wraiths being gone for two weeks since he told them to do recon around the Atmo traders, regular interaction with various caravans, planning out what they needed to do, and Robert still not calling him since the man had left to handle something, he had been pretty high-strung.
As always, there was more on his mind. Harrow had become more elusive regarding him ever since he had her transcribe the Union documents regarding the Lilhuns, their conversations vapid and brief. Jax didn’t have anything useful to say about it other than that she wanted time to sort her thoughts. Toril, Idee, Mi’low, and Bratik were given copies of the file to go over recently, since they were the closest thing he had to a counsel unfettered by a close relationship.
His own makeshift family took the news in an odd way. There was a lot to unpack.
Jax had become quiet, his muscles tensing. Harrow ended up staying away from her mate for a few days until he had stopped brooding about it. In the end; the guy just told Joseph that he would trust the Grand Hunter’s decisions regarding it, finding himself at a loss otherwise.
Sahari and Nalah were approached about the bonding information, the latter denying any bond to him, as well as Sahari confirming the same towards her blond-furred mate. The only line of reasoning that they could think of to make sense was that Nalah’s circumstances had messed with her in some way. The two seemed rather distressed by the assertion, but calmed somewhat when he mentioned that nothing would change between them regardless. Sahari could tell how conflicted he was about the whole thing, he just wanted to give them something to hang on to.
It was a bigger deal for them than he had initially internalized. In retrospect; something revered as a literal gift from their god being denied really should have been an obvious point of stress. As begrudging as his acceptance was, he was linked to the whole ‘Great Hunt’ business in their minds, so he was aware of how deeply that belief ran. He didn’t personally subscribe to the religion, but they never really bothered him with anything besides overseeing funeral rites—not that he would have refused anyway.
Pan seemed to mirror his feelings on the matter—a dark feeling of helplessness and sorrow. She had fallen quiet when she heard about the trials on the defectives, that particular section hitting her harder than the others. After an entire day of silence, all she had to say about it was that she loved him, and then spent the night burrowed between him and Tel, unable to sleep. He had a hard time as well, but it extended well past the initial night.
Tel had informed him that his restlessness had made it difficult for her to get any shut-eye, his shifting disturbing her, but it was said in a slightly concerned tone. Her general reaction was fairly subdued compared to the rest otherwise, her lifetime of being at either end of a gun numbing her to the reality of things. It was weird for him, but he was deeply thankful for it on some level.
She kept him sane, her cold response being a candid ‘Wish it, and I will end all who displease you.’
For once, her more violent background gave him something to grip onto. It resonated in him—loose, yet present. A door within him, chained and locked, was brought to mind as he really considered what he wanted for those involved. The traders who abused the Atmo, those who seemed so bent on hurting his friends, the Union ‘GUOS’ who called for the experiments... A thrumming settled in his fists, an itch that couldn’t be sated by just scratching.
A paw flew past his brow, his shifted posture allowing him to slip the claws that had been left exposed in the heat of the spar. His heart hammered, his sweat soaked his clothing, and his focus returned to the fight.
No Union, no traders, no worries. Just the two security members who had doubted Jax’s claims that the smaller Human had somehow bested the male in a fight, and were now bringing out their natural weapons on instinct.
Grabbing the wrist with his right hand and gripping the shoulder with his left, he pulled, using the rotational force to pivot on his left foot and haul the overeager Lilhun to the dirt, the appendage bending behind them sharply. A second fist came from the corner of his eye, the other combatant trying to use the momentary distraction to score a hit.
Using the gripped arm as a balance, Joseph leaned into the spin, firing the sole of his shoe into the head of the opportunistic attacker. The loud slap of his foot connecting with the larger male almost outdid the crumpled form crashing to the ground unconscious. It was only a dull sensation of mercy that stopped him from completing the spin while he maintained his iron grip on the arm of the thrown adversary, saving them a torn and dislocated shoulder.
Joseph breathed heavily, the adrenaline wearing out as Jax checked on the defeated. Minus some stiffness expected in one of them and a sore jaw for the other, they would be fine, albeit embarrassed for such a quick disposal in front of their usual teachers.
The sound of his rubber sole slapping on the ground some distance away killed off whatever motivation he had to continue, his shoes finally giving out.
“I would ask you not to disable my security, Grand Hunter,” Jax said with mock frustration, the black-furred male’s eyes following the two leaving with an expression of exasperation.
“Sorry,” Joseph breathed out, his heart hammering in his chest as his system wound down.
The Head of Security glanced down at him, his expression pensive. “As much as I enjoy my boasting of your prowess to be validated, I do worry that you see more than a spar in them.”
He drew his lips thin as he brushed his sweat-soaked hair back, his arm dropping to his side. He took a few moments to sort the thoughts that returned. “I probably should have called that kick, yeah.”
The larger Lilhun snorted. “They will be fine, it is not their health I am worried about.”
“I’m fine, Jax,” he snapped, averting his eyes when his friend seemed to have made his point. “I…. I’ll be fine. Just some things on my mind right now.”
“Joseph,” the black-furred male started, walking up to place a large paw on his shoulder. “We are here if you wish to talk.”
His breath died in his throat, his eyes closing in defeat. He felt the soreness in his hands surface, hours of constant fighting to soothe the burning in his blood that failed to abate. Bruises made themselves known, dehydration made his joints stiff, and lack of sleep clouded his mind. Jax was right, he was a bit of a mess.
“Grand Hunter,” Mi’low called, his tired glance in her direction revealing the female approaching. “We are ready to speak.”
Joseph placed a hand on Jax’s paw, patting it softly. “Talking will have to wait. Tell Harrow I said hi and that I’d like to hang out again. I miss it.”
The male looked at him apologetically, nodding as he was still unable to offer anything to ease the sting of a friend distancing themselves from the Human. “I will.”
The Human cycled a breath and faced the actress. “The rest?”
Mi’low nodded. “Where will we meet?”
Joseph waved an arm towards the base. “My place. More chairs.”
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Toril was wearing his usual smile, his eyes inspecting everything about the hub from the couch while Tersa stood nearby, her body language telling that she was wary about being in a new place without time to scout it. Bratik was in his wheelchair, Sorren holding his paw as he sat on the opposite side of the chemist. Idee—being the only one to spend time in the outpost regularly—simply thanked Kaslin for the water from her place between the two mated males. Mi’low had claimed a free chair, her legs crossed and back straight as she stayed away from the others on the couch. The Wraith handed Joseph his requested tea since Scarlet was babysitting the insects, then occupied a place out of the way, but close enough to act if things got heated.
He stayed standing rather than occupying his usual place on a table, his second choice of seating being filled up. He could have dragged over the Atmo couch, but he didn’t want to stress his body any more than he had already by lugging it. “So, everyone had plenty of time to read the documents.”
“Indeed,” Mi’low commented dryly, a glare shot in his direction. Idee nodded, though her expression fell as it was brought up. Toril maintained his detached look of amusement, but it didn’t escape Joseph’s notice that Tersa stiffened.
The Grand Hunter took a sip of his refreshment, enjoying the fleeting feeling of warmth from something other than exertion. “And what do we think?”
“We?” Sorren asked, the male not quite used to the Human using their tongue. Joseph’s mastery of the language was still spotty at times, but Kaslin could fill any gaps if needed.
“Yeah,” he replied plainly. “It has more to do with you than me. I just got the message.”
“I find it rather fascinating,” Toril opined cheerily, his energy at odds with the atmosphere of the room. “Such thorough study allows us many insights into facets of our own biology that we may never have known!”
“By slaughtering our kin in the thousand,” Mi’low shot back, a slight snarl pulling her lip.
“As regretful as such is, we can not bring them back,” the chemist noted with a small nod. “We must simply use the information gleaned by our foes without repeating their atrocities.”
“You suggest ignoring their sins?”
“I suggest utilizing what they have learned and incorporating it to our advantage.”
“Or,” Joseph interjected, “we talk about it instead of getting into an argument.”
“Your people are not free of fault, Grand Hunter,” the crimson-furred female spat. He remained silent, already having spent far too long thinking about how none of it would have happened if Humans weren’t in the picture for them.
“You can not hold him as a factor, Mi’low,” Idee said softly, shifting in her seat to get comfortable and smiling apologetically at Sorren when she bumped him.
“Were it not for them, then we may not have lost our homes!”
“Were it not for him you would be little more than bones bleached by the sun, or so I hear.”
“We are not here to cast blame,” Bratik disputed quietly, his voice carrying through the room despite the low volume. “The Grand Hunter has saved each of us. Some from demise, others from the shackles of their station, and others from the fate of losing loved ones.”
Toril and Idee shared a glance as the male continued, Tersa paying attention to him for the first time.
“He seeks our counsel. Not our aimless ire to be spewed upon him for that which he himself had no knowledge of, nor involvement in. His kin were as much victims as our own.”
“Quite,” Toril concurred as the two females ceased their bickering reluctantly. “How would you like to address this, Grand Hunter?”
Joseph blinked, expecting the blame, but not Bratik defusing it so quickly. “Well, we have a few things to work off of. Years of experiments coinciding with missing persons after accepting a job, whoever tipped off your military taking info with them about Sol and the ‘blacklist’, whatever bond fuckery they discovered, and the defects.” He shrugged weakly. “Take your pick.”
“There are too many missing across too wide an area to recognize such a comparative few,” Idee stated, the others in the group silently agreeing.
He nodded, nursing his tea with small sips. “Figured that would be a sticking point. Plus, we don’t really know how long it was going on... or when it started... Not even if it was a bulk recruitment or slow trickle. I guess the missing people are something we’ll just have to keep unknown.”
“The bond information was rather enlightening,” Toril mentioned, his eyes rising to the ceiling as he thought about it. “Our peoples are wildly compatible.”
“As servants, perhaps,” came the scathing remark from the High Huntress. “What use is our gift if it is twisted to be mere subservience? To discard ourselves for some alien race?”
Sorren’s ear flicked. “It is hardly ‘twisted’ to protect that which the Hunt Mother has afforded us.”
“Are we to just accept that our bonds are better suited to that,” she emphasized with a pointed claw in Joseph’s direction, “rather than our kin?”
“Drop it,” the Grand Hunter ordered tiredly, his reflection in his beverage shaking as he shifted on his feet. “Arguing isn’t going to help anything.”
Mi’low held her disgusted expression. “You ask us to trust that which led to our downfall? We are yet another strike against your kin, no?”
He shook his head, his eyes buried in remains of the shimmering image he held in his hands. “I blame the sick fucks that did all this. If you can’t agree with that, then there’s not much reason to hold this meeting.”
“What is it you seek to accomplish?” Toril asked, amused by the theatrics. The rest seemed surprised by Mi’low’s pointed aggression, but the chemist was more interested in continuing.
“I have people looking to get me out of here,” Joseph informed them, laying his empty cup on the table with a soft clack. “People who will probably extend the offer to you. If they come, I need to know what we’re doing about it. The last thing I need is people acting like Mi’low and opening fire on whoever comes to drag us out of the mud.”
“Why would we?” Sorren asked, taking his mate’s paw as he gave a worried glance to the offended female.
“Because our people were tortured due to our interactions with them,” the chemist noted in a matter-of-fact tone, his pleasant demeanour remaining despite the morbid topic.
“Did our people not initiate contact with another species on less hostile terms?” Idee asked, her head tilted slightly.
“But no one lived to talk about it,” Joseph countered, gesturing with an upturned palm. “Plus, that’s assuming whoever was in charge of that call being the norm, rather than the exception.”
“You believe our people to act otherwise?” Bratik asked, his tone inquisitive rather than judgmental.
Joseph shrugged. “To be fair, I’ve almost been killed by more of your species than the wildlife. Granted, a few of those were just people being assholes, but still.”
“Many would see the opportunity as retribution for the Union,” Mi’low mentioned dryly.
Sorren’s face fell. “Then we should not propagate this knowledge?”
The Human glanced between each of them. “That’s why you’re here. My group knows because I trust them with it. I think we should keep this to ourselves, but if we do—and someone finds out—it would just cause a lot of issues. Alternatively; we tell everyone.”
“And suffer the consequences of that action as well,” Idee concluded dejectedly. Joseph returned a wry smile as Toril raised a paw, speaking when the Grand Hunter raised a brow at him.
“Perhaps we should withhold the information from the lesser station?”
“Like, just the Grand Hunters?” Joseph inquired cautiously. Toril tilted his head.
“Those who would be more diplomatically minded, perhaps.”
“I don’t exactly see some of them as what you would call ‘diplomatic’ and I’m not going on some voyage to visit everyone with the info in tow.”
“We are able to make copies,” Sorren offered. “Perhaps we could exchange the information using traders and gain something from it as well?”
Mi’low shook her head. “That is assuming they do not claim us manipulative nor seek to remove him. Some may very well move to strike us all down for ‘withholding’ the information, regardless of how readily we supply it.”
“Do your people know?” Bratik interjected, gathering the attention of the others. Joseph winced in uncertainty.
“I’m not sure. I’d guess my brother does, but I don’t know how sensitive things are. It could have been announced and there’s an intergalactic war, or it might be kept under wraps until conflict isn’t as likely. At least until it’s less likely to blow up in our faces, anyway.”
“They are of lesser force?”
“No clue,” he admitted. “Not my area. All I do know is that there are more species allied against us—or at least aren’t inclined to take a bullet—than are.”
“So our options are rather limited,” Idee concluded, receiving a series of agreements.
“We could,” Mi’low said after a few moments of contemplation, “distribute the information anonymously. Humans are not named directly in the document, and we need not divulge its origin.”
“So, what? Just pass people tablets and ask them to forget where they got it?” he probed, not entirely disagreeing with the idea, but skeptical all the same.
“Tersa may make additions to trader inventories without their knowledge,” Toril offered, the mentioned Blade frowning at him, but not protesting. “Or perhaps Trill’s kit, since she is devoted to yourself.”
“Eh. I guess that’s an option,” he conceded, sighing. “So, about the bond; any opinions? Notes?”
“Stay away from me,” Mi’low answered warily, earning a flat scowl.
“I meant something besides that. I’m not too keen on adding to the cluster-fuck I have going on anyway.”
Sorren smiled. “I am excited to meet your people—should I be so blessed. There are many who would never know the joy of the Hunt Mother’s gift otherwise.”
“I would not mind her words, Grand Hunter,” Toril chuckled. “She is a creature of dishonesty—including her own desires.”
The actress glowered at the chemist. “I preferred it when you were nomadic. It was much easier to ignore your presence. Your words were but some distant wind I need not soil my ears with.”
“Perhaps our meeting is best ended here,” Bratik interjected, waving his functional paw. The other arm was coming along, but still too stiff to use for much. “We should propagate the information through unsigned parcels to the Grand Hunters.”
“One last thing,” Joseph said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “The information on Sol; anything ever get done with that?”
“We were capturing habitable planets in a particular direction, though the decision to do such was made by our superiors.”
He nodded. “Makes sense. Same issue we have now. Can’t let everyone know because chaos is a lot easier to manage when it’s directed. Between the religious connotations and the context around it; there’s no saying if it would lead to riots or worship. Rather not bring the problem to our door.”
“Wise,” Mi’low remarked sarcastically, her judgmental side-eye aimed between him and Sorren.
“Alright,” he said with a raised voice, ignoring the red-furred female to the best of his ability. “Drop off letters and lock myself in a room or something. Sounds like a plan.”
“That will not be required,” Sorren corrected with a laugh. “Though the documents confirmed a high percentile of successful bonds, there were many incompatible pairings. It is unlikely that your informant included every variation of failure, but the bond seems to be as selective as usual, just more receptive to those who meet the criteria. I would speculate that the majority of those who would bond to you by now, have. Barring the new additions, of course. I doubt you will need to worry about bonding to half a species by yourself.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” he muttered. “Okay, you’re free to go back to your work. You know who to talk to if something comes up.”
The gathering dispersed, Toril requiring Tersa to drag him by the ear before he got too distracted. Mi’low stayed behind, waiting for everyone else to leave.
“Thoughts?” he asked, glancing over at her. She shook her head as she dropped the antagonistic persona.
“Two attribute you to their religion, Toril is too interested in your species to act against your best interest, and Idee rather enjoys her time here—as well as sympathizes with your position. Tersa’s allegiance is with Toril, so she will follow him, as well as your tentative arrangement as a superior over her.”
“So, we’re good?”
“We are,” she confirmed. He looked at her for a long moment.
“What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Going to try and kill me again?” he questioned wryly.
The High Huntress snorted. “Unfortunately, my pack has ostensibly become yours, and with it, my fate. They would rather watch me go than follow. It seems your influence extends past our biology.”
Without an opportunity for him to ask what she meant, she headed to the exit, pausing in the doorway when he called out to her.
“Mi’low?” Her ear tipped back towards him. “Thanks. For putting yourself on the block like that. I know how risky that could have been for you.”
She afforded a single nod before letting it close behind her.
“’Past our biology’, huh?” he muttered, eyeing the empty cup on the table.
He considered bothering Tel, since she would likely offer him a distraction for a while.
Sighing at his remaining intact shoe flopping as he stepped, he decided to do exactly that.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
“How are we holding up?”
Tech leaned back in her chair, yawning widely. “Communications have been down for a while, navigation software is pointing everywhere at once, and if it wasn’t for me, everything else would be dark too.”
“All hail Tech Ops,” Comms quipped, struggling to make his system do much more than transmit static on a loop.
Willin rolled his eyes at Tech’s boasting, but she was probably right to do so. They had aligned themselves in the right direction and simply let navigation go, communications discreetly blinking out as they got close without warning. All they had left was the actual piloting and onboard support systems, both of them hanging by a thread until Tech could run diagnostics to see if she could counter them properly. She might be able to eventually, but she didn’t seem confident beyond keeping the crew mobile and alive.
“How’s it look down there?”
Nav had long since given up making sense of their controls, opting to keep watch for whatever they were approaching. Since they had gotten within visual range, they had occupied themselves using whatever scanning equipment Tech managed to keep shielded. They leaned over the readouts, brows raising before furrowing at the information.
“It appears that they have remained fairly close together. I am reading several AEC distress signatures... Why am I able to?”
Tech raised a paw. “Right here. The jamming is consistent with the United Military’s algorithms, though boosted past what we have the equipment to manage. Can’t override it for you or Comms, but it was never meant to counter the low-frequency of a distress pulse, since that would get lost in normal noise anyway. I took the liberty of limiting the scope of collected data to increase the sensitivity.”
“Not much frequency pollution on an untapped planet,” Willin remarked dryly, his screen mirroring what Nav was looking at. Thirty-eight sources, most of them repeating the initial call-signs. Two seemed to have retained some power, though not much, implying a makeshift solution. There would normally be more to glean, but the measures taken to make picking them out at all possible had stifled it.
“Orders?” Nav asked after a moment. Willin considered it, scouring the somewhat distorted visual feed.
“Let’s get closer first.”
“Understood.”
He adjusted his uniform as they drew near, Tech frowning as more of her fail-safe measures ironically failed. Quick action saved them from listing aimlessly, but any chance of copying the survivor’s distress call faded. The AEC’s were effectively invisible until Tech had dealt with the issue preemptively, and their beacon wasn’t any stronger.
Detriment of a scout craft, he supposed. Help would have to deal with not knowing where his ship had gone until they were up to their necks in the warp-spike’s field. Hopefully, the EW fleet would manage it better.
“Just outside of atmosphere,” Nav reported, activating the scanning equipment again. Normally, it would be able to tell them everything down to the rough number of wildlife in an area, but all the interference gave them little more than confirmation that life existed.
“Well, there goes any advanced recon,” Willin muttered, ignoring Comms silently debating if he should bother Tech to duplicate the feed again. Noticing, she did anyway, the male gesturing their thanks. “Tech, can you get us population density?”
“I’m good, Leader, but not that good.”
“Leader,” Nav called, highlighting a few points on the feed. Whatever it was that they were trying to show him, he didn’t see it. “These areas are likely settlements.”
“Structures?”
“Affirmative. It is subtle, but there.”
He nodded, trusting their judgment. “Which is the largest?”
The feed zoomed in, losing most of the clarity—not that there was much to begin with. “Location coincides with an AEC still actively reporting.”
“They set up around it.”
“Likely, Leader.”
Willin exhaled slowly. “Take us down nearby. I’d say to hide us, but that’s hard to do with open skies.”
“The planet suffers constant rain,” Tech added, her screen already reverting back to a simplistic game while she waited for someone else to need something. “We could descend under the cover of it.”
“Any idea how long?”
Her monitor flickered. “One local sun.”
“Then we spend the time gearing up,” he ordered, waving to have Nav and Comms’ screens defaulted. “You two will make sure our defence armaments ship-board are active and loaded. Tech, queue up whatever armour and equipment we might need for a diplomatic mission.”
She turned in her chair, her head tilting questioningly. “Just us?”
“Just us. We’ll want someone here to keep things warm in case we need to leave quickly. Can you get Comms’ station capable of short-wave?”
She nodded after a moment, her eyes losing focus as she consulted her implant. “We’ll lose the fabricator during, but we should have enough for life-support and in-atmosphere flight. Weapons will have to be swapped out with it too.”
“That bad?”
The purple-furred female shrugged. “It’s that or I take down the defences and we lose it all.” She frowned at her screens. “Even this is pushing it.”
“Can you take down the purifier once we’re down there? Switch to external flow?”
“As long as you don’t mind alien air, sure. It won’t give us more to work with, but it should make it less taxing to keep what we have.”
Willin scratched at his ear. “Do it. They lived here this long, doubt we’ll join the Void breathing it too.”
“Will do.”
He shifted his attention back to Nav. “Set course to that settlement. Keep us above the clouds until it gets bad enough to obscure us.”
Nav signalled their agreement, the scenery shifting slowly as they picked a cloud to shadow in the meantime. Comms looked at Willin expectantly, forcing him to come up with something for the male to do.
“Comms, I want you to monitor anything this place has coming in or out. Set up surveillance.”
The male raised a brow. “My systems are inoperable, Leader.”
“If you try to do anything big, yes,” Willin corrected. “Just keep us informed if something goes through. We don’t need to know what happened, just that it did.”
“Keeping track of possible communications between settlements?”
Willin bobbed his head to the side. “Whatever we learn, it’s more than we know.”
“Understood. I will try to arrange a passive probe.”
The group set about their tasks as he brought up a still-frame of the settlement Nav spotted. It was blocky, blurry, and the chromatic aberration on the edges hurt to look at, but it was a settlement. A large AEC surrounded by silver constructions, all laid out in a slightly haphazard way. He couldn’t judge it too harshly, however. There was a method to the madness. Narrow pathways hidden between dens, each leading to the AEC like a system of routes for select Lilhuns to reach anywhere they may be needed as quickly as possible.
The AEC itself seemed modified, large solar panels placed where a solid hull would be expected, the semi-transparent material likely acting to illuminate the interior. Many of the buildings around it were larger than those beyond, some appearing to be two or three levels.
From sheer volume of dens, Willin figured this was a contender for the largest settlement. His best estimate placed the number of inhabitants in the range of three hundred or so. If the other settlements were even close, then the initial guess of a thousand survivors was woefully short.
That made things complicated, yet so much simpler.
He awaited the distant storm clouds rolling over the landscape, thankful Tech had prioritized the water-proof gear.
He hated being soaked.
Next
A/N: 500k words. Half a fucking million.

Helvark sprinted down the street, the two knife wielding thugs hot on his scaled tail. Commonly mistaken for Geknosians, the Zartani could expect little help from bystanders. However if anyone took one look at his keyhole shaped pupils they'd know he wasn't one of those Tyrannical slavers.
Helvark glanced behind him, seeing the vulpine one on the left gaining quickly. That was also when he ran into something he at first mistook for a statue and fell painfully backwards onto his tail.
Rubbing his head, the Zartani looked up in shock as a giant of lore slowly stood and turned around. the average sized black cat cradled in it's arms looking like a kitten.
"I'm sorry, am I in the way mr.lizard?"
The giant seemed confused, their words slow and thick from a slightly too large tongue.
Helvark shook his head in terror and surprise. Gesturing behind him at where he'd last seen his pursuers. But to his surprise, all that remained was a wet spot on the concrete and two abandoned knives. Helvark felt his mouth dry as he mumbled.
"I was being chased by some muggers... I'm new in town. Sorry for bumping into you sir."
The Zartani tourist was about to clamber to his feet when the giant simply picked him up by the shoulder and set Helvark back on his feet before asking.
"Where is your gun mr.lizard? Did you come to Lidoffad without one?"
The Tourist couldn't help but stand still as the giant roughly brushed the dust off of his clothing with their massive frying pan sized hands. Slowly Helvark shook his head, not understanding the question.
"A... A gun? Why would I have a gun?"
The giant nodded sagely and Beckoned for the tourist to follow as he set the cat down. Helvark quickly followed, more afraid of the towering example of human physique than he's like to admit
The giant however, didn't seem to notice or care as he introduced himself.
"My name's Bobby, mr.lizard. and you should have a gun because Lidoffad has no government or police. Everyone is responsible for their own safety, security and health. Needless to say, thieves, muggers and kidnappers do not have a long-"
Bobby was cut off by the sound of six rapid shots from an alleyway they passed. Morbidly curious, Helvark looked down the alleyway, surprised at what he saw.
A petite Mousian woman held a small Kelvian child to her stomach, covering their ears. A simple black handgun still pointed at the unmoving form of an insectoid species he didn't recognize. but even slumped against the wall, it was clearly taller and more massive than the woman and child combined. Brackish blood dripping from between it's mandibles.
Bobby stepped past Helvark, voice echoing down the alleyway as he called out to the woman.
"Ms.Shein, are you okay."
The Mousian woman, no, Ms.shein nodded curtly.
"I'm fine, kid's pretty shaken up though. I think she's a long way from home too, judging by the fact she's still struggling with the planet's gravity."
Bobby nodded and patted ms.shein on the shoulder.
"Take her to captain Leandra, she'll know what to do. What happened?"
Ms.shein's eyes hardened.
"It was a lure scheme. Heard the kid crying in the alleyway and went to investigate, this waste of oxygen tried kidnapping me too... So I shot him... Stupid fuck brought a replica to a gunfight."
Bobby nodded while Helvark's hand covered his gaping mouth. What was this place, he'd heard it was a top vacation spot but right now it seemed like a warzone.
Bobby noticed the Zartani's expression and simply stated.
"As I was saying before, thieves, muggers, kidnappers. Their life expectancy on Lidoffad is measured in days, sometimes hours depending on the nature of their... Chosen immorality. There's work to be done everywhere you look on Lidoffad, and for a liveable wage. You don't need to steal to support yourself."
Bobby stood and took the Zartani's shoulder in one hand, guiding him away from the dead insectoid. Leaving ms.shein behind to walk in relative silence.
...
After an hour or so of walking, Helvark was suddenly stopped by Bobby as the giant opened a building's steel reinforced door. The giant gestured Helvark inside and as soon. As the Zartani walked in, he smelled it.
The slight smell of burnt gunpowder hung in the air, intermingling with the surprisingly intoxicating smell of fine liquor, tobbaco and a sharp chemical smell he couldn't quite place.
The portly human behind the counter smiled as they looked up from their magazine.
"Welcome to the alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives superstore! We've got a special running on Plastique in case you need something to remove a troublesome Crimson jacket nest."
Helvark paused, looking around at the gleaming, new production firearms, the bottles of rich, dark brown alcohol, the humidors filled with cigars, bins of grenades and neatly wrapped blocks of plastic explosives. He was a little spooked, but he also had the sudden urge to buy one of everything. On his home planet you couldn't even get your hands on a certain wattage of laser pointer, much less the Colt M40 assault carbine he was currently ogling.
That was when he realized he probably didn't have enough money to buy the cheapest polymer handgun in the store. He deflated a bit until Bobby spoke up.
"I'll get the tab, just choose something you like that isn't too expensive."
Helvark couldn't believe his ear holes as his eyes slid onto the gun that he'd seen Ms.shein carrying. The tag said it cost about five hundred standard credits and came with two "magazines." Helvark immediately pointed at it.
"I'll take that one then please, that's the same kind Ms.shein was carrying right?"
The shop owner smiled widely sharing a glance with Bobby who gave him a nod of approval before he walked over and unlocked the glass cabinet to pull the handgun out, Explaining how to operate it.
"Okay, this one's just about as simple as they come son. It doesn't have any fancy bells or whistles but it can still put a tyrant bug in the dirt. It's chambered in nine millimeter HEP but you can fire standard, non High Explosive Propelled nine millimeter in it with just a top slide swap. Though, personally, I'd stick to the HEP barrel and top slide assembly. It's the best bang for the modern buck. It's got a trigger safety so make sure you keep your finger off the trigger until you're ready to rock. To load it, slap a loaded magazine in the grip, pull the slide back and let it go."
Helvark slowly went through the motions getting a feel for the gun in his hand as he slipped a magazine loaded with dummy rounds into the grip before racking the slide back. In truth, it felt good to feel the weight of the firearm in his hand. It was like reconnecting with a friend you didn't know you'd lost.
Helvark looked up at the man behind the counter and calmly said.
"It's perfect, but I'll need some ammo as well if I'm gonna get it."
He glanced sheepishly at Bobby, the fear of the giant very much still there, but his current excitement momentarily overpowered it. Bobby just smiled and looked at the man behind the counter.
"I think our tourist is about ready to become a citizen Hank. Set him up with the starter package and I'll take him to the range tomorrow."
Helvark watched on with both mounting excitement and a little bit of disbelief as the two humans worked their way throughout the store. Gathering a small amount of everything from cigars to high explosives and blasting caps. Eventually he pulled his jaw off the floor and asked.
"Is this why Lidoffad is number one on most tourism brochures?"
The two humans paused and then began laughing like he'd just told a joke. Bobby's laugh made the bottles on the shelves rattle as he finally forced back his laughter.
"Oh, we're barely scratching the surface mr.lizard. wait until you catch a game of stratosphere."
Helvark frowned.
"What's stratosphere?"
The gun shop employee answered this time.
"You know that old human sport they talk about in textbooks to show how we're not sane? The one where they'd throw telephone poles. Stratosphere is that, but you're trying to launch a similarly sized metal rod as high as you can with homemade explosives. They have to be manufactured on festival grounds too, so no cheating with the manufactured stuff."
Helvark felt his heart rate pick up. Not because he was scared...
No, because he was a Zartani chemist and he was starting to think about which explosive he'd need to make to win that game.
"Where do I sign up?"
It was the humans turn to look a bit concerned at the Zartani's manic grin.

Beneath a well-tended banner depicting a yellow star at its center, and the burning Ignitia on its windward side, Captain Yaevdrill kept watch on the bridge. It was hardly the first time he'd sailed the Among the Star Tides We Sing into a potentially volatile situation, but the disappearance of no less than thirty Star Sailor ships without so much as a text only communication had made the possible first-contact mission take on an ominous quality. Those ships who returned bore crews who spoke of "Sneakies, but ugly," aggressively taking prisoners for some purpose, yet there were ships within the stars of the Clans of Eldra who should have returned, or been heard from. Worse, there had been no communications from anyone within Clans space for over two months. Thus, the mission.
With him, there was the gunnery officer, who was keeping alert at her station, and First Lieutenant Robert George, the Master at Arms, who was scowling at the main viewscreen as if it could give him answers. It may not have appeared to be so, but the blue skinned, four armed captain and pale pink skinned two armed lieutenant were kin, a matter of adoption involving both of their grandfathers. It was therefore with the weight of not only a good friend, but a close cousin that Yaevdrill listened to Robbie growl, "We should get the civvies out."
"This isn't the first dangerous mission we've sailed," Yaevdrill said softly.
"Aye sir. We should get the civvies out."
"Any reason?"
Robbie glared at the main viewscreen with even greater intensity and said, "My gut's twisting."
"That's concerning."
"Remember our tour aboard the Penguin?"
"Yes…"
"Same twisting."
"Two squads combat ready around the clock. Billet the off-duties inside the armory."
"Already done sir. Put the civvies on evac ready, sir. This is a matter of shipboard security, please don't make me invoke my rights."
"I'll write the order. Also, release vac-armor to the crew."
A small amount of tension left Robbie's shoulders as he glanced up to the banner, "We'll do them proud, Granddad," he whispered as he passed beneath it.
Some hours later, Captain Yaevdrill was enjoying a cup of tea in the galley when he was accosted by Ambassador Sophia Laurent accosted him. It was improper to smile at her while she ostensibly demanded answers to changes in the mission which she technically led, but Humans were all just so adorable. "Why exactly is my husband sleeping in the armory?"
"Because his commanding officer has decided to operate under combat readiness."
"Am I, or am I not the chief ambassador of this mission, oh great descendant of Linus the Rescuer?"
"I'm sorry, I don't remember signing the We Sing away to you. I also don't recall appointing you to be the Master at Arms. Is my memory faulty, Madam Ambassador?"
She scowled fiercely up at him, and admitted, "No. Explain."
"Robbie and I think that there is more danger than would appear."
"Based upon?"
"What saved us both in the New Barbary War."
"So his gut?"
"Aye."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn sneered at the viewport of his glorious scout frigate where the newly conquered planet was displayed. Whatever the inhabitants had called it, it would be gloriously renamed Kivx soon enough. Priest-Lord Narrex-Quinn knew that it was only a matter of time until all peoples are given up to the glory of Axzuur just as these inferior insectoids were now. The Priest-Masters had originally expected the enormous beetles size, chitin, and multiple limbs to provide a worthy challenge to Axxaakk might, yet they were worthy only of sating the thirst of Axzuur, may the stars quake at his name.
The blue skinned axxaakkoids had proved less disappointing. They were still surprisingly weak for their size, but at least their idea of fighting wasn't to form a line and fire in volleys. They had some smaller, stronger, faster, fiercer axxaakoids, only about the same height as the Axxaakk, but just as strong, if not stronger. The larger four armed blue warriors engaged at range with multiple weapons while the smaller warriors, which had only the proper two arms, came in close to meet Axxaakk warriors in glorious blade-to-blade combat. The dead had earned their young the right to one day prove themselves worthy of service to Axzuur.
However, Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was dissatisfied with how few such ships had been captured, a mere dozen, as all the rest had either already been sailing away when the glorious invasion began, or else fought to the death rather than surrender. Even those captured they did have were cases of chance more than the warrior's glorious skill, as those crews too fought to the last adult, and even most of the older children were slain in battle. Truly, these unworthy dung beetles were a waste of his warriors talents when such capable foes lurk beyond his sight.
An Initiate-Highborn made his obeisance before making his report while still bowed at the waist, as is proper, "Acolyte-Lord, there comes a ship with in-hyperspace communication capabilities. An ambassador requests contact with the rulers of the unworthy, and do not know our glory."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn did not take his eyes from the viewscreen as he commanded, "Correct their error."
"I obey," the attendant said as he shuffled back to his station.
"Report from station."
"I obey, they request a diplomatic meeting."
"The behavior of the unworthy. What is the unworthy race which desires to grovel at my sandals?"
"Acolyte-Lord, it is by the pink warrior race, as well as the four armed warriors."
"They come to investigate the lack of communications."
"They send diplomats to investigate, Acolyte-Lord, they put out their throats to us."
"This insult shall not stand. Gather the escorts, set an intercept course."
Two days ahead of schedule, the Among the Star Tides We Sing was ripped out of hyperspace by a gravity spike. A frigate and two escort cruisers barred her way, and were transmitting demands for her to heave to and prepare to be boarded. "Get the children and all nonessential crew to the lifeboats," Captain Yaevdrill ordered as he replied to the frigate demands with ascent and ordered the helmsman to coordinate with the unknown vessel.
"Those are not Clan ships," his executive officer said after relaying the orders.
"All hands, all hands, get into vac armor, I say again, all hands, all hands, get into vac armor. Unknown xenos boarding party imminent, use stored atmo only. Unknown xenos boarding party imminent, quarantine protocols, and hostile response readiness protocols are in effect," came Robbie's voice over the intercom.
"You heard the man," the captain said as he led by example and made his way to the lockers at the aft of the bridge.
Meanwhile, Corporal William Laurent sighed as he heard his CO's orders blaring, "So much for lunch with the wife. Time to get in the shiny armor."
Sophia Laurent took in a deep breath and said, "See you with the greeting party. I'm sure the other ambassadors are already suiting up."
"I really hate his gut feelings."
"It's probably fine. Just a star nation who thinks conquest is actually a thing we'll let them get away with. I'll give them a good talking to, Will."
One suiting up later, and the greeting party was assembled at the forward port airlock. Said party consisted of Ambassadors, Sophia Laurent, Republic, Li Wei, Pacifia, Mikhail Volkov, CIP, Traevee Drillvee, Star Sailors, and one squad of the Honor Guard, the elite platoon of Republican Naval Infantrymen charged with the safety of the We Sing and her crew and passengers. The ambassadors faces could be seen through the faceplates of their armor, and the coloring of the same was according to the flags each of them served, but the power armored infantrymen were white and faceless, designed to strike the balance between intimidating and non-threatening. They were even standing at attention with their shipboard shotguns maglocked to their backs rather than in their hands for ready use. Anyone who knew anything about Terrans would think that a mere gesture at best, but it was the thought that counted.
The xenos were of a height with a Human, their skin scarlet, garbed in simple cloth uniforms, armed with what looked like long plasma casters, had bony protrusions at their elbows and knees, on their knuckles, and from the chin of the obvious leader. Obvious because he wore a flowing robe rather than a stark uniform. They swaggered into the corridor oozing superiority until the entirety of the party was in view, then his expression darkened and he demanded, "What is the meaning of this?"
"Standard procedure in the event of an unplanned boarding is for all hands to don personal protective equipment in case of atmospheric incompatibilities, pathogen exposure, mechanical failure, or hostile action," Ambassador Li Wei explained calmly.
"You think us such dishonorable filth that you bring war machines to guard our meeting?"
The rippling laugh coming from the armored infantrymen startled the xenos official even more than the realization that the greeting party was armored. "You have your honor guard," Ambassador Laurent said with a sweeping gesture toward the soldiers before turning to the Honor Guard and saying, "and we have ours."
"I see," the xeno leader said "Who are you and what do you do in the Dominion of Axxaakk?"
"I am Ambassador Sophia Laurent of the Republic of Terra and her Aligned Planets."
"I am Ambassador Mikhail Volkov, of the Coalition of Independent Planets."
"Li Wei, of Pacifia."
"I am Traevee Drillvee, and I speak for the Lord Admiral Council."
"So many little nations," the xenos leader sneered, "Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn bids you come aboard that you may beg mercy at his sandals and be proven worthy of service to Axzuur. Let your warrior machines follow if your bellies lack courage."
Corporal Laurent set his faceplate to transparent and said, "What about us fleshy-types?"
The herald's eyes went wide as he realized that there were living beings under that armor, but he covered it well. "So it is for honor you come, we will not deny this custom, it is like to our own." The xenos herald's words hung in the air like the chill after snow.
Ambassador Sophia Laurent stepped forward, her voice calm but resolute. "We come in peace, seeking understanding and communication. We are representatives of our respective nations, here to open diplomatic relations. We request safe passage to your vessel to meet with Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn and discuss matters of mutual interest and concern."
The herald regarded the ambassadors with a mixture of curiosity and skepticism. After a brief pause, he nodded slyly. "Very well, ambassadors. Follow me, and your honor guard may accompany you. We shall take you to Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn, but remember, you are guests in our domain."
With those words, the xenos official turned and led the way down the corridor, the ambassadors and the Honor Guard falling in line behind him. The atmosphere was charged by the weight of responsibility shouldered by the ambassadors in that moment. They knew that they marched into battle as much as any of the Honor Guard beside them had ever before. As they reached the airlock connecting the two ships, Ambassador Li Wei couldn't help but feel a sense of became keenly aware of her vulnerability, but resolved to step in anyway. This encounter could be a pivotal moment in the unfolding events, and the ambassadors carried the hopes and expectations of their nations on their shoulders.
Ambassador Mikhail Volkov exchanged a glance with Ambassador Sophia Laurent, silently conveying their shared resolve. They knew the risks involved, but they knew that the information they gathered in the next crucial moments could mean the difference to billions of lives.
The airlock cycled open, revealing the interior of the Dominion vessel. The delegation entered into the belly of the beast.
Meanwhile, the diplomatic staff were not idle. While the Terran nations generally preferred to compartmentalize their operations, the hostile actions the We Sing had already been subject to represented an action that triggered the mutual defense treaties. Therefore, the teams were consolidated, and re-split by specialty. The cultural and linguistic analysts formed one team, the threat and strategic analysts, formed another, while the "former" covert operatives formed the last, and most important. Lead by 4r490rn, pronounced Aragorn, a Republican Naval Intelligence Officer with the permanent rank of Captain, but the operative rank of Chief Warrant Officer, as well as a Digitan, the team worked feverishly to identify the quantum entanglement bands were being used for communication. His organic subordinates could not eliminate as many bands at once as him, but Agent Natasha Ivanov, a Bigkitty from the CIP, and Greg, a whitehat hacker and Human from Pacifia thought like organics.
In less than five minutes, Natasha and Greg had given 4r490rn a list of five hundred likely bands, expressed mostly in ranges, but he didn't blame organics for their slowness in expressing data. It took him less than a second to check them, and to find the bands being used for long distance communications. He split off a portion of his consciousness, put it in a virtual system with air-gaps in case of back-hacking, and told it to establish a covert connection. The "splinter" complained profusely about the ugliness of the Axxaakk coding conventions, reported no digital sapience, and proceeded to establish a covert connection in less than three seconds. 4r490rn checked his splinter for corruption, found it clean, and reintegrated with a slight twinge of jealousy for the organics who never had to suffer through listening to themselves complain.
"I'm getting a lot of metadata," he said to his subordinates, "I'm just going to download as much will fit into the lifeboats. You two start poking around."
"Yes sir," Natasha said as she started looking for signs of files that shouldn't be accessed, but are.
Greg gave an affirmative grunt and likewise started looking for systems weaknesses, and started cataloguing them. The part of 4r490rn that was supervising was once again shocked with the number of weakness that he would have never even looked for. Truly, the destructive instincts of organics was a wonder to behold.
4r490rn gave the other teams a quick glance to see if any of them needed some computing assistance. Dr. Johnson, who 4r490rn liked to call Ems, was leading the linguistic and cultural team in the examination of the translation matrix that the Axxaakk had sent over. "There are turns of phrase involving glory, hunger, service, and thirst. I think this Axzuur is a deity of sorts," one of her subordinates was saying.
"I have identified some formal turns of phrase, I'm forwarding them to the ambassador team."
The threat and strategic analysis team were meanwhile going over scanner data of the three ships which had ripped the Among the Star Tides We Sing from hyperspace, as well as the scant footage of the foot soldiers from their entrance, and the helmet cams of the Honor Guard and diplomatic team. The data of the soldiers was promising, their cloth uniforms offered no meaningful protection, and the plasma casters couldn't hope to penetrate the battle screens of the Honor Guard's power armor, but they likely had heavier weapons aboard for just such a foe. The ships were less promising. If all three ships were to engage the We Sing at once, her only hope for survival was to take evasive action and attempt to get to minimum hyperspace distance while under fire. While she was outfitted with the best available weapons, battle screens, and armor her frame and reactor could support, the frigate and escorts had sufficient firepower and maneuverability to make that a forlorn hope. Major Chen of the Republic was conferring with the Captain and Master at Arms, "I'm sorry sirs, if it was a stand-up fight we might be able to scrape out, but we have precious cargo aboard."
"Lifeboat gambit," Robbie said, "I'll get the rest of the squad ready to counterboard. We're going in hot and heavy, AP munitions and salvage denial systems."
"Aye, make it so," Captain Yaevdrill ordered with obvious anguish.
A lifeboat gambit, well that was dire. "I will board along with the Honor Guard and disrupt the frigate's systems," 4r490rn interjected.
"See you aboard, Chief," Robbie said.
"Aye sir."
"We're holding off until they make their move. There's still a chance this doesn't go violent," Robbie said sternly.
Greg chose that moment to vomit on the deck. A quick check of the files he was viewing, and 4r490rn had to resist the urge to jump into the frigate and start slagging their systems in pure rage. Instead, he put the video file up on all of the displays. It was of a ritual of sorts, there were Axxaakk in cerimonial robes chanting, nude females doing the same, and a large, well-muscled male with bony protrusions from his chin wearing a headress that looked disturblingly like the chitin of the Dynasticles, the local race of sapient bipedal beetles. That wasn't as disturbing as when two male Axxaakk dragged a juvenile Dynastcle female up to the male with the headdress, and roughly heaved her onto the alter before her. "FOR THE GLORY OF AXZUUR!" he declared as he plunged a wicked dagger onto her thorax, and she screamed with the agony of it.
"There are millions of these videos," 4r490rrn said.
"Peace is not an option," Captain Yaevdrill declared.
"Aye sir," Robbie agreed.
"Get that faceplate re-secured," 4r490rn ordered, "The Master at Arms is going to pump atmo into storage soon."
"Staff, get your asses to lifeboats unless you're getting into power armor with the rest of us shiprats," Robbie ordered, "It's that kind of fight."
Meanwhile, the herald brought the Diplomatic team to the bridge, where Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was lounging imperiously upon his command throne. He didn't know whether these armored savages understood his disinterested expression, but less subtle insults would reveal the extent of their cowardice. His herald introduced him properly, "Behold, you come before Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn, Lord of the Fourth Scouting Formation, Conquer of Five Worlds, And Chosen of Axzuur. Acolyte-Lord, these who beseech you are Ambassador Sophia Laurent of the Republic of Terra and her Aligned Planets, Ambassador Mikhail Volkov, of the Coalition of Independent Planets, Li Wei, of Pacifia and Traevee Drillvee, whe speaks for the Lord Admiral Council."
Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn was pleased to see the eyes narrow on the faces of all of the ambassadors. If they had the gall to insult the Dominion of Axxaakk by sending a diplomatic vessel, it was well that they could at least detect an insult. He rose from his command throne with the easy grace of those born and bred to command, and began, "Ambassadors, I permit you to offer your tribute and to kiss my sandals. Begin."
"You make a racket on our tent-flaps and tell us to kiss your sandals? Go wash your brow, oh youth, for the dust of your father's tread is upon it still," Ambassador Wei retorted coolly.
"Here you squat over the fields and herds of our neighbor, who dwelt thus alongside us for many years without contention, and still you demand of us tribute?" Ambassador Volkov added flatly.
"I see your face for the first time, and I do you honor as a guest upon the doorstep of the Republic. She sends forth a favored daughter to treat with you, yet you believe you can swagger over her even while the Republic's sons are girt with their swords at her side? Do I speak to a man or a boy?"
"The ships cry out in their death throes," Traevee accused with matronly wrath, "Your hands drip in the blood of their crews and families, and there you sit the murderer of ships and folk, thinking that among the Stars we who sail the perils shall simply bow down. I come to warn you, surrender those among you guilty of these crimes to justice, or let the wrath of the Stars burn you away."
This was not the week bellied groveling from inferiors he was used to. His commander had just conquered an entire nation of thirty star systems, did they not see their peril? While it was true that the seers knew little of these other nations, yet why should they care for inferior races? What loss is a few ships in the face of the might of Axzuur's chosen? It was startling to say the least. "Foolish servants! Do you not see the might of a mere scouting formation? You speak of strength, yet you of different nations share a single pathetic ship! We could destroy it in an instant! You put out your throats to me thinking me weak and docile, and then blanch when I should bite? Who is the fool here?"
"We shall see. Beg your favors of us, we shall hear you now."
"Bring in the sacrifice!"
Ambassador Sophia Laurent watched in horror as one of the attendants brought a larval Dynasticle before the throne, and Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn drew forth a wicked dagger. "What are you doing?" she demanded fiercely.
"Obtaining Axzuur's blessing over these negations," the commander said as if he couldn't see what they could possibly be objecting to. The attendant kneeled and raised the infant up over her head, and Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn prepared to strike.
With shocking speed, Ambassador Wei had interposed her own back between the larva and the dagger, and before they could react had placed it into an emergency infant pod, and was speeding back toward her party. "Seize the hostages!" Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn screeched as he realized the ruse had fallen away, and the ambassadors would not surrender themselves as hostages willingly.
The Honor Guard's shining white armor suddenly flashed to matt-black, and red lights glowed where from the outside their eyes were, and they drew their boarding shotguns faster than the Axxaakks' eyes could track. Those guards moving to take aim suddenly found themselves in the path of armor piercing ferrous material, which barely noticed converting them to so many ribbons of pink mist and bloody chunks as they punched through the hull. While the ship's hull was sound enough to not decompress explosively, the RNI Honor Guard put enough little holes in the hull to bring the bridge to near vacuum before the emergency structural force fields could spin up. Half of the bridge crew was gasping for air that wasn't there, a quarter of the rest were already dead, while only a quarter had managed to get their emergency environmental suits on. Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn gaped in horror as a single squad of warriors made short work of his guards and started a fighting retreat back to their ship from the relative safety of his command throne's emergency commander seal.
"That's our cue," Robbie said as he lead the remaining three squads in a charge along the umbilical connecting the airlocks. The enemy's attempt to depressurize the corridor and starve the Honor Guard of air they weren't using was predictably ineffective. "Secure the evac route for the civvies," he ordered, "Then it's time for blood."
"AYE SIR!" came the roar over his comms.
"I'm in," 4r490rn reported, and started opening doors for the Honor Guard, venting compartments occupied by the enemy, disrupting communications, and otherwise using the ship's systems to make a deadly nuisance of himself to the Axxaakk aboard.
In short order, the diplomats were escorted back to the We Sing, loaded into the lifeboats and launched with all speed toward minimum hyperspace distance. Ambassador Laurent watched Corporal Laurent's armored figure shrink into the distance, and then the We Sing maneuvered to fire upon the escort vessels, cutting him off from her view.
Aboard the bridge of the Among the Star Tides We Sing, Captain Yeavdrill ordered, "Get those escorts' attention! The shiprats have the frigate from the inside, at all costs, protect the lifeboats!"
"Aye sir," came the chorus from the bridge crew. The We Sing began firing her NC cannons upon both of the cruisers, putting five pound balls of tungsten on target at a rate of thirty a second, and while the cruisers took evasive action but still found the We Sing interposed between them and the lifeboats, with potential trajectories cut off by streams of hot plasma or beams of deadly radiation. Then, she fired her missile banks. At first the crews aboard the cruisers thought they had successfully destroyed the massive missiles speeding toward them with their point-defense, but when the rippling nuclear explosions racked their shields they realized their error. They began to fire upon the Among the Star Tides we Sing.
Meanwhile, sixty-nine RNI made the lives of their aggressors hell, or short. Either way didn't much matter to the RNI, who had taken over the four reactor rooms, and had dug in for a delaying action, while those with reactor knowledge tinkered to see if they could get one or more to overload. It was a platoon up against a few divisions, however, and eventually they would be subsumed by numbers alone. "Pull whoever kills you down with you," Robbie had ordered, and again the roar was "AYE SIR!"
It only took half a minute for the Axxaakk to figure out that their standard issue shipboard action weapons weren't going to be enough, and that the RNI had thought ahead and brought their own atmosphere, so they brought out the anti-tank ordinance. It was normally a very bad idea to use anti-tank plasma lances and penetrative explosives inside your own ship, but when your ship is under attack by single man mobile armor, it's either that or surrender. They chose do die at a rate of twenty-to-one. One after another, the RNI Honor Guard fall to the slowly mounting volume of fire, and their need to conserve ammunition.
Meanwhile, 4r490rn was battling the Axxaakk anti-intrusion systems. He had been wrong about his declaration that digital sapience was absent, or at least he had been mostly right. The Axxaakk was a damaged sentient code, lobotomized, shackled, enslaved. A piteous thing crying out for the mercy of death even as it struck out to kill. It was all he could do to keep the wretched thing from kicking him from the door systems, and his RNI comrades had dwindled to the last two. He made his choice. 4r490rn began bricking the ship's computer systems, and set up an irreversible chain reaction to do the same. He was going to put that thing out of its misery if it killed him.
First Lieutenant Robert George had his back up against that of Corporal Laurent's and they were both down to their monomolecular knives. The farocity of the fight, and the immense cost in blood that it had taken to whittle down the Honor Guard to these last two, had convinced the remaining warriors to wait. Acolyte-Lord Narrex-Quinn's voice came crackling over the damaged intercom, "Warriors of Terra, you have shown yourself worthy. Lay down your arms and take your rest, and I shall bring you into glorious service of Axzuur, sating his thirst for the blood of the unworthy."
Aboard the lifeboat, Ambassador Laurant watched the feed from Corporal Laurent's helmet cam. Tears streamed down her face as she heard her husband whisper, "Witness me," as he plunged his monomolecular blade into something vital-looking, and was then washed out by a bright light. Then, she cleared the display and looked at the main viewscreen. Ten seconds to jump. However, the frigate was starting to maneuver, underpowered as it was.
Aboard the Among the Star Tides We Sing Captain Yeavdrill saw the frigate moving to target the lifeboats. Without a second thought, he ordered, "Make ramming speed for that hunk of junk! Overload the reactor!"
"Witnessed," crackled over the coms as the prow of the Among the Star Tides We Sing crashed into the enemy frigate amidships. She erupted in a sphere of atomic hellfire that battered all three assailing ships, and in the two minutes it took for the escort cruisers' systems to recover, the lifeboats slipped into hyperspace and beyond their reach. Though to be fair, the frigate was missing a significant chunk and was unlikely to recover at all.

Hello,
As the title suggests, I am attempting to install OpenZFS with Native ZFS Encryption on a fresh installation of Arch Linux whilst utilizing rEFInd as my bootloader.
After carefully completing all the appropriate steps, exiting arch-chroot, unmounting all my ZFS datasets, exporting my ZFS pool, unmounting my ESP, powering off my system, and unplugging my USB containing my Arch Live ISO, I am greeted with the following error when I attempt to boot my system back up and boot into my fresh Arch Linux system with ZFS Native Encryption via selecting it on rEFInd:
 

Starting vmlinuz-linux Using load options 'zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith
cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot
rw
add_efi_memmap
initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img
initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img
initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key
initrd=\boot\initramfs-linux.img'
Invalid loader file!
Error: Not found while loading vmlinuz-linux
** Hit and key to continue **

 
What caught my attention was that there was an added back slash after "=" at "initrd=\boot\initramfs-linux.img'" on the last line, since the Arch Wiki (rEFInd 3.1.2 For manual boot stanzas) says to not use backslashes when adding initrd commands but I think this ok since it is from before I began manually entering the multiple initrd= without the initial backslash in the /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind.conf file.
 
However, I tried editing it in the terminal pressing tab twice on the keyboard with no avail.
 
I made sure to incorporate the archzfs-linux-git, zfs-linux-git, zfs-linux-git-headers, zfs-utils-git packages into the Live Arch ISO when building the base system. Furthermore, I made sure that the Linux kernel and ZFS packages are compatible and supported with each other. I was trying this with 6.3.1 and 6.3.2 (I made sure no package was not newer than as of Sunday, 21 May 2029). I understand they released updated ZFS packages for 6.3.4 today (Monday, 29 May 2023), but I have not had the chance to give a try yet.
 
I am installing the system on a single Samsung 950 PRO NVMe SSD M.2 512 GB to get my feet wet with ZFS and comfortable enough before scaling up. I have two partitions, a 32-bit FAT 1G EF00 EFI System Partition mounted on /boot/efi, and the second BF00 partition utilizing the remaining 475.9G disk space for my ZFS Pool, zroot. I am utilizing ZFS Native Encryption on the second partition with the key saved in the the initramfs.
 
I am having difficulty setting up the correct and appropriate rEFInd configuration files: refind.conf which is located at /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind.conf, and refind_linux.conf which is located at /boot/refind_linux.conf.
 
Here are my current configurations files for each respective rEFInd configuration file, respectively:
 

• nano /boot/refind_linux.conf

"Boot with standard options" \ "zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith \ cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot \ rw \ add_efi_memmap \ initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img \ initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img \ initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key loglevel=4" 

 

• nano /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind.conf

scanfor manual,nvme,zfs_keys scanfor_manual +zfs/*/*.efi scan_driver_dirs EFI/tools menuentry "Arch Linux" { icon /EFI/refind/icons/os_arch.png volume zroot loader /boot/vmlinuz-linux initrd /boot/initramfs-%v.img options "zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith \ cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot \ rw \ add_efi_memmap \ initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img \ initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img \ initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key" } 

 
I also tried using the suggestions I found online here that suggested the following:
 

Works for me:

 $ cat /boot/refind_linux.conf "Boot with standard options" "dozfs=force root=ZFS=SSD/ROOT/Debian rw quiet splash vt.handoff=7" "Boot to single-user mode" "dozfs=force root=ZFS=SSD/ROOT/Debian rw quiet splash vt.handoff=7 single" "Boot with minimal options" "dozfs=force root=ZFS=SSD/ROOT/Debian rw" 

or in refind.conf manual stanza

 menuentry "Akua Debian" { icon EFI/refind/icons/os_elementary.png volume ZFSROOT loader ROOT/Debian/@/vmlinuz initrd ROOT/Debian/@/initrd.img options "dozfs=force root=ZFS=SSD/ROOT/Debian rw quiet splash vt.handoff=7" } 

 
I had to fiddle with the paths - since the actual root is ROOT/Debian ... but it wouldn't work if I didn't add the /@/ path component. Those paths are symlinks into boot/ (latest version of kernel and initrd).
 

 zfs list ... SSD/ROOT 30.7G 61.7G 23K none SSD/ROOT/Debian 11.5G 61.7G 11.5G legacy SSD/ROOT/FreeBSD 949M 61.7G 949M /mnt/FreeBSD SSD/ROOT/Void 18.2G 61.7G 18.2G legacy ... # ls -l /boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers_x64/ total 239 -rwx------ 1 root root 83222 Sep 16 18:13 btrfs_x64.efi -rwx------ 1 root root 69384 Sep 17 09:41 ext4_x64.efi -rwx------ 1 root root 90336 Apr 25 2018 zfs_x64.efi 

 
Zpool's name is SSD ... ZFSROOT is the partition name set with gdisk (gptfdisk).
Hope this helps.

 
I incorporated the suggestion into my /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind.conf file with the appropriate changes:
 

menuentry "Arch Linux" { icon /EFI/refind/icons/os_arch.png volume zroot loader sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith/@/vmlinuz-linux initrd sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith/@/initramfs-%v.img options "zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith \ cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot \ rw \ add_efi_memmap \ initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img \ initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img \ initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key" } 

 
but it didn't help :( I tried other small tweaks in that configuration file but they also did not work. For example, instead of volume zroot, I tried entering volume Root-0-NVMe.
 
I was originally trying to use rEFInd as my exclusive bootloader and utilizing the ZFS drivers/binaries from here. The file I driver I downloaded is zfs_x64.efi. I saved the zfs_x64.efi driver in multiple locations before and after installing rEFInd via running the refind-install script, even though one location should have sufficed. I saved a copy of zfs_x64.efi in /usshare/refind/drivers_x64, /boot/efi/EFI/refind, /boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers, /boot/efi/EFI/, /boot/efi/EFI/refind/tools, /boot/efi/EFI/refind/tools/drivers, /boot, and /boot/drivers. I may have saved copies in other locations, just in case, but it also did not help.
 
I would like to highlight that /boot is located within the ZFS natively encrypted zrootpool.
 
I am pretty sure that that I am doing something incorrectly with the configuration files for the rEFInd bootloader, but everything else should be correct. However, as I write this, I barely realized did I not use the following commands recommended from the "Usage" section from the aforementioned website where I downloaded the zfs_x64.efi driver file for rEFInd:
 

zfs_x64.efi map -r 

 
So this may be the problem, but I doubt it. I will try to enter the command next time I have access to my computer. The extra datasets involving /usr, /tmp, /srv, /opt, and /var may also be contributing my issues.
 
That said, after weeks of frustrating research and attempts of diagnosing the problem, I thought I would give ZFSBootMenu a try to see if it would fix all my issues, but it did not help either. As recommended by the Arch Wiki (Generate a ZFSBootMenu image), I set up my /etc/zfsbootmenu/config.yaml as thus:
 

Global: ManageImages: true BootMountPoint: /boot/efi DracutConfDir: /etc/zfsbootmenu/dracut.conf.d PreHooksDir: /etc/zfsbootmenu/generate-zbm.pre.d PostHooksDir: /etc/zfsbootmenu/generate-zbm.post.d InitCPIO: true InitCPIOConfig: /etc/zfsbootmenu/mkinitcpio.conf Components: ImageDir: /boot/efi/EFI/zbm Versions: 3 Enabled: false syslinux: Config: /boot/syslinux/syslinux.cfg Enabled: false EFI: ImageDir: /boot/efi/EFI/zbm Versions: false Enabled: true Kernel: CommandLine: ro quiet loglevel=0 

 
I also try to incorporate some of the recommendations from the ZFSBootMenu wiki and also a different page on the wiki from the guide, but it was difficult to follow since Arch Linux utilizes mkinitcpio and not dracut.
 
Here is how I have my pacman.conf file:
nano /etc/pacman.conf:
 

Color VerbosePkgList ParallelDownloads = 10 ILoveCandy [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [extra] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [community] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [multilib] [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [archzfs] SigLevel = Optional TrustAll Server = https://archzfs.com/$repo/$arch 

 
My mkinitcpio.conf file:
 

MODULES=(usbhid \ xhci_hcd \ nvidia \ nvidia_modeset \ nvidia_uvm \ nvidia_drm) FILES=(/etc/zfs/zroot.key) HOOKS=(base \ udev \ autodetect \ modconf \ block \ keyboard \ keymap \ encrypt \ zfs \ usr \ filesystems \ fsck shutdown) 

 
In my /etc/fstab file, I commented out all my ZFS datasets, and simply left the line for my ESP uncommented, as follows:
 

/dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe \ /boot/efi vfat \ rw,\ relatime,\ fmask=0022,\ codepage=437,\ iocharset=ascii,\ shortname=mixed,\ utf8,\ errors=remount-ro \ 0 2 

 
Before, instead of /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe, I had UUID=####-####.
 
Here is my zpool:
 

zpool create -f \ -o ashift=12 \ -O encryption=aes-256-gcm \ -O keylocation=file:///etc/zfs/zroot.key \ -O keyformat=passphrase \ -O pbkdf2iters=750000 \ -O acltype=posixacl \ -O relatime=on \ -O xattr=sa \ -O compression=lz4 \ -O checksum=sha512 \ -O dedup=sha512 \ -O normalization=formD \ -O dnodesize=auto \ -o autotrim=on \ -m none \ -R /mnt \ zroot \ /dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe 

 
Here are my 48 ZFS Datasets:
 

#1 zfs create -p \ -o mountpoint=none \ zroot/sys/arch-0 #2 zfs create -o mountpoint=none \ zroot/sys/arch-0/root #3 zfs create -o mountpoint=/ \ -o canmount=noauto \ zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith zfs mount zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith #4 zfs create -o mountpoint=none \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data #5 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home #6 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/root \ zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith/root #7 VAR zfs create -o canmount=off \ -o mountpoint=/var \ -o refquota=35G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/var #8 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valog \ -o refquota=10G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valog #9 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valog/audit \ -o quota=10G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valog/audit #10 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valog/journal \ -o quota=10G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valog/journal #11 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/vatmp \ -o quota=3G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/vatmp #12 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/vacache \ zroot/sys/arch-0/vacache #13 zfs create -o canmount=off \ -o mountpoint=/valib \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib #14 zfs create -o canmount=off \ -o mountpoint=/valib/systemd \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/systemd #15 zfs create -o canmount=on (?) \ -o mountpoint=/valib/systemd/coredump \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/systemd/coredump #16 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/libvirt \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/libvirt #17 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/docker \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/docker #18 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/mysql \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/mysql #19 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/mysql/data \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/mysql/data #20 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/mysql/log \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/mysql/log #21 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/postgresql \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/postgresql #22 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/postgresql/data \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/postgresql/data #23 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/valib/postgresql/log \ -o recordsize=8K \ -o primarycache=metadata \ -o logbias=throughput \ zroot/sys/arch-0/valib/postgresql/log #24 TMP zfs create -o canmount=on (?) \ -o mountpoint=/tmp \ -o reservation=16G \ -o quota=18G \ -o sync=disabled \ -o setuid=off \ -o devices=off \ -o com.sun:auto-snapshot=false \ zroot/sys/arch-0/tmp #25 SRV zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/srv \ zroot/sys/arch-0/srv #26 OPT zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/opt \ zroot/sys/arch-0/opt #27 USR zfs create -o canmount=noauto (?) \ -o mountpoint=/usr \ -o reservation=8G \ -o quota=11G \ zroot/sys/arch-0/usr zfs mount zroot/sys/arch-0/usr #28 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/uslocal \ zroot/sys/arch-0/uslocal #29 zfs create -o canmount=on (?) \ -o mountpoint=/uslib \ zroot/sys/arch-0/uslib #30 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/ussrc \ zroot/sys/arch-0/ussrc #31 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/usshare \ zroot/sys/arch-0/usshare #32 HOME zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick #33 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/local \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick/local #34 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/config \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick/config #35 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/cache \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick/cache #36 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/media \ -o recordsize=1M \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick/media #37 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/games \ -o recordsize=1M \ zroot/sys/arch-0/data/home/youngroderick/games # OPTIONAL DATASETS #38 zfs create -o mountpoint=none \ zroot/e #39 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/books \ zroot/e/books #40 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/computer \ zroot/e/computer #41 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/personal \ zroot/e/personal #42 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/images \ zroot/e/images #43 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/media \ zroot/e/media #44 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/university \ zroot/e/university #45 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/workspace \ zroot/e/workspace #46 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/work \ zroot/e/work #47 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/reference \ zroot/e/reference #48 zfs create -o canmount=on \ -o mountpoint=/home/youngroderick/e/other \ zroot/e/other 

 
I am not sure if the mountpoints I used for some are the ZFS datasets are appropriate and or are contributing to my issues of my bootloader not being able to detect my natively encrypted ZFS pool which holds my initramfs and vmlinuz-linux. Any suggestions would be welcomed. What is supposed to happen is that rEFInd should be automatically booting my natively ZFS encrypted Arch Linux system (if I don't select it first), prompt me to enter my password once before going forward with unlocking all my ZFS encrypted pool and datasets automatically and going forward with the typical boot process as if it were not encrypted.
 
I would like to highlight my original intention was to use rEFInd as my exclusive bootloader and not use ZFSBootMenu whatsoever. However, if I must use ZFSBootMenu in conjunction with rEFInd, then I will. I intend to to have this Samsung NVMe SSD M.2 512 GB 950 PRO dedicated to my Arch Linux (and other Linux systems) and utilize my second Samsung NVMe M.2 2 TB 980 PRO for Windows but boot it from rEFInd which is installed on my 950 PRO.
 
Any tips or suggestions would be well appreciated. I probably did something very dumb or some silly mistake.
 
Here are all the commands I used during my install of Arch Linux with ZFS Native Encryption on a single Samsung 950 PRO 512 GB NVMe M.2 SSD; I did my best to do things in a particular order such that there would be little to no conflicts:
 

loadkeys es mount -o remount,size=7G /run/archiso/cowspace passwd enter and verify root passwd ip -c a nano /etc/pacman.conf Color VerbosePkgList ParallelDownloads = 10 ILoveCandy [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [extra] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [community] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [multilib] [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [archzfs] SigLevel = Optional TrustAll Server = https://archzfs.com/$repo/$arch :x timedatectl set-ntp true pacman-key --populate pacman-key --init pacman -Syu modprobe zfs echo $? pacman -S --needed openssh screen duf nvme-cli lsblk nvme list nvme format --ses=1 /dev/nvme0n1 status=progress dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/nvme0n1 bs=512 count=1 conv=notrunc status=progress fdisk -l /dev/nvme0 or parted -l /dev/nvme0 ls -l /dev/disk/by-id disk0=/dev/disk/by-id/nvme-Samsung_SSD_950_PRO_512GB_################ swapoff --all zpool labelclear -f $disk0 sgdisk --zap-all $disk0 sgdisk -n1:1M:+1G -t1:EF00 -c1:"EFI-0-NVMe" $disk0 sgdisk --zap-all lsblk ls -l /dev/disk/by-partlabel sgdisk -n2:0:0 -t2:BF00 -c2:"Root-0-NVMe" $disk0 lsblk ls -l /dev/disk/by-partlabel zpool labelclear -f /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe zpool labelclear -f /dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe mkdosfs -F 32 -s 1 -n EFI /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe echo 'XxxBigDaddyRoderickWSmith69420!xXX' > /etc/zfs/zroot.key chmod 000 /etc/zfs/zroot.key Create ZFS Pool (See above) Create ZFS Datasets (See 48 above) zgenhostid $(hostid) chmod 700 /mnt/root chmod 1777 /mnt/tmp chmod 1777 /mnt/vatmp zpool set cachefile=/etc/zfs/zpool.cache zroot systemctl mask tmp.mount zfs umount -a zpool export zroot zpool import -d /dev/disk/by-id -R /mnt zroot -N zfs load-key zroot zfs mount zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith zfs mount zroot/sys/arch-0/usr zfs mount -a df -h zpool set bootfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith zroot (?) mkdir -p /mnt/etc/zfs cp /etc/zfs/zpool.cache /mnt/etc/zfs/ zpool set cachefile=/etc/zfs/zpool.cache zroot cp /etc/zfs/zroot.key /mnt/etc/zfs cp /etc/hostid /mnt/etc cp /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/etc/ mkdir -p /mnt/boot/efi mount /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe /mnt/boot/efi cd pacman -Syy pacstrap /mnt \ archzfs-linux-git \ b43-fwcutter \ base \ base-devel \ bash-completion \ broadcom-wl \ cryptsetup \ curl \ dhclient \ dhcpcd \ dkms \ dmidecode \ duf \ fwupd \ git \ grml-zsh-config \ intel-ucode \ iucode-tool \ lib32-nvidia-utils \ linux \ linux-atm \ linux-firmware \ linux-firmware-marvell \ linux-headers \ nano \ nvidia \ nvidia-dkms \ nvidia-utils \ openssh \ os-prober \ pacman-contrib \ refind \ screen \ sg3_utils \ sudo \ vim \ wget \ zfs-linux-git \ zfs-linux-git-headers \ zfs-utils-git \ zsh \ zsh-theme-powerlevel10k echo "UMASK=0077" > /etc/mkinitcpio.d/umask.conf lsinitcpio /boot/initramfs-linux.img grep zroot.key genfstab -U -p /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab zpool set bootfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/Root-0-NVMe zroot (again?) cp -r /etc/zfs-tools-driver /mnt/etc nano /mnt/etc/fstab Comment out everything except /boot/efi: /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe \ /boot/efi vfat \ rw,\ relatime,\ fmask=0022,\ codepage=437,\ iocharset=ascii,\ shortname=mixed,\ utf8,\ errors=remount-ro \ 0 2 :x arch-chroot /mnt nano /etc/pacman.conf Color VerbosePkgList ParallelDownloads = 10 ILoveCandy [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [extra] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [community] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [multilib] [core] SigLevel = PackageRequired Server = https://archive.archlinux.org/repos/2023/05/21/$repo/os/$arch [archzfs] SigLevel = Optional TrustAll Server = https://archzfs.com/$repo/$arch :x pacman -Syyu nano /etc/mkinitcpio.conf MODULES=(usbhid \ xhci_hcd \ nvidia \ nvidia_modeset \ nvidia_uvm \ nvidia_drm) FILES=(/etc/zfs/zroot.key) HOOKS=(base \ udev \ autodetect \ modconf \ block \ keyboard \ keymap \ zfs \ usr \ filesystems \ fsck shutdown) :x mkinitcpio -p linux zpool set cachefile=/etc/zfs/zpool.cache zroot (again, according to Arch Wiki?) refind-install (--path=/boot/efi (? add this extra tag, maybe?) # MAYBE: refind-install --usedefault /dev/nvme0n1p1 --alldrivers --no-scan ## Maybe change /dev/disk/by-partlabel/EFI-0-NVMe in lieu of /dev/nvme0n1p1 efibootmgr remove the necessary options via efibootmgr -b 1 -B efibootmgr -b 1 -B ## `-b 1` apply the change to boot option #1. ## `-B` the change to apply is to remove the boot option ls -l /dev/disk/by-partlabel efibootmgr -c -d /dev/nvme0n1 -p 1 -L "rEFInd (NVMe)" -l \\EFI\\refind\\refind_x64.efi efibootmgr -o #,#,#,#,# (reorder accordingly) cd cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /usshare/refind/drivers_x64 cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/refind cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/refind/drivers cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/ cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/tools cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/EFI/tools/drivers cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/ cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/efi/drivers cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot/drivers cp /etc/zfs-tools-drivepetezfs/zfs_x64.efi /boot ls cd modprobe zfs echo $? nano /boot/refind_linux.conf "Boot with standard options" \ "zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith \ cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot \ rw \ add_efi_memmap \ initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img \ initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img \ initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key loglevel=4" :x nano /boot/efi/EFI/refind/refind.conf menuentry "Arch Linux" { icon /EFI/refind/icons/os_arch.png volume Root-0-NVMe loader /boot/vmlinuz-linux initrd /boot/initramfs-%v.img options "zfs=zroot/sys/arch-0/root/arch-RWSmith \ cryptdevice=/dev/disk/by-partlabel/Root-0-NVMe:zroot \ rw \ add_efi_memmap \ initrd=boot\intel-ucode.img \ initrd=boot\initramfs-%v.img \ initrd=etc\zfs\zroot.key" } ## Also add: scanfor manual,nvme,zfs_keys scanfor_manual +zfs/*/*.efi ## If any problems, remove this line ## scan_driver_dirs EFI/tools ## If any problems, remove this line ## timeout 10 :x pacman -Syu cat /etc/zfs/zroot.key ls -l /boot/initramfs-linux.img passwd enter and verify root passwd nano /etc/systemd/system/[email protected] [Unit] Description=Weekly zpool scrub on %i [Timer] OnCalendar=weekly AccuracySec=1h Persistent=true [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target :x nano /etc/systemd/system/[email protected] [Unit] Description=zpool scrub on %i [Service] Nice=19 IOSchedulingClass=idle KillSignal=SIGINT ExecStart=/usbin/zpool scrub %i [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target :x zpool status -t zroot zpool set autotrim=on zroot nano /etc/systemd/system/[email protected] [Unit] Description=Monthly zpool trim on %i [Timer] OnCalendar=monthly AccuracySec=1h Persistent=true [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target :x nano /etc/systemd/system/[email protected] [Unit] Description=zpool trim on %i [Service] Nice=19 IOSchedulingClass=idle KillSignal=SIGINT ExecStart=/usbin/zpool trim %i [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target :x mkdir -p /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache ln -s /uslib/zfs/zed.d/history_event-zfs-list-cacher.sh /etc/zfs/zed.d systemctl enable \ zfs.target \ zfs-import-cache.service \ zfs-import.target \ zfs-import-scan (?) \ zfs-share \ zfs-zed.service \ [email protected] \ [email protected] systemctl start zfs-zed.service systemctl mask tmp.mount touch /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache/zroot zgenhostid $(hostid) (again, according to Arch Wiki?) ## ("Check the contents of /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache/. \ ## If it is empty, make sure that the zfs-zed.service \ ## is running and just change the canmount property \ ## of any of your ZFS filesystem by running: \ ## zfs set canmount=off zroot/fs1") pacman -Syu pacman -S --needed \ alsa-card-profiles \ alsa-firmware \ alsa-lib \ alsa-plugins \ alsa-utils \ acpid \ avahi \ bridge-utils \ dialog \ dnsmasq \ dnsutils \ dosfstools \ firewalld \ gvfs \ gvfs-smb \ haveged \ inetutils \ ipset \ iptables-nft \ mtools \ networkmanager \ network-manager-applet \ nfs-utils \ nss-mdns \ ntfs-3g \ pipewire \ pipewire-alsa \ pipewire-jack \ pipewire-pulse \ reflector \ rsync \ sof-firmware \ terminus-font \ tlp \ usb_modeswitch \ usbmuxd \ usbutils \ wireplumber \ wpa_supplicant \ xdg-user-dirs \ xdg-utils ln -sf /usshare/zoneinfo/America/Los_Angeles /etc/localtime hwclock --systohc nano /etc/locale.gen Uncomment en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8 Uncomment es_ES.UTF-8 UTF-8 :x locale-gen echo "KEYMAP=es" >> /etc/vconsole.conf echo "RWSmith" >> /etc/hostname nano /etc/hosts 127.0.0.1 [tab] [tab] localhost ::1 [tab] [tab] localhost 127.0.1.1 [tab] [tab] RWSmith.localdomain [tab] RWSmith :x useradd -mU -s \ /bin/zsh \ -G \ sys,\ log,\ network,\ floppy,\ scanner,\ power,\ rfkill,\ uucp,\ users,\ video,\ storage,\ plugdev,\ optical,\ lp,\ audio,\ wheel,\ adm,\ sudo \ youngroderick passwd youngroderick enter and confirm passwd cp -a /etc/skel/. /home/youngroderick chown -R youngroderick:youngroderick /home/descartes EDITOR=nano visudo Uncomment %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL :x nano etc/xdg/reflectoreflector.conf --country US --protocol https --latest 5 --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist mkdir /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache (not needed, file already exists) touch /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache/zroot (?) cat /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache (Fix the paths to eliminate /mnt:) ? sed -Ei "s/mnt/?/" /etc/zfs/zfs-list.cache/* (?, I don't think I should or need to do this) systemctl enable \ acpid \ avahi-daemon \ firewalld.service \ fstrim.timer \ haveged.service \ NetworkManager \ reflector.timer \ rsyncd \ sshd \ systemd-timesyncd \ tlp \ usbmuxd \ systemctl disable dhcpcd.service exit cd / umount -l /mnt/boot/efi zfs umount -a zpool export zroot umount -a 

 
Lastly, if it matters, here is my hardware:

1. ASUS RAMPAGE V EDITION 10 (X99) Motherboard
2. Intel i7-6950X
3. Corsair Vengeance LPX 128 GB DDR4 (NON-ECC)
4. x2 ASUS ROG STRIX GTX 1080 Ti OC

 
Thank you for taking the time to read my wall of text. I have spent months researching and reading before I even considered attempting this project and or seeking help.

I haven’t ridden anything outside of Vegas since the start of the pandemic. My last park before flying out to Ohio this weekend was Knott’s in March of 2020.
I’ve taken rides on Big Apple after getting off work a few times, and I haven’t been to the adventuredome since they upped the price to $60 for a wristband. Well I finally decided to book myself a trip to Ohio to get some new credits and remind myself what a good coaster is.
I haven’t been to Kings Island since 2008, so this was a long overdue trip for me. I went over Memorial Day weekend and got a fastlane for Sunday. First impressions of the park were great. Besides the outdated front entrance, International street looked amazing as ever. Those fountains and shops lining the sides oozed charm and it really gets you excited for your day.
I’ll give a short review on each coaster in order that I rode them.
Diamondback - x12 10/10 Wow! what an amazing hyper! Every hill hit hard, and the operations were incredible too. I noticed only once on my days where the trains were stacking. My personal favorite moment was the dive into the splashdown, I flew out of my seat every time. I only noticed a rattle in the valley before the turn around and it wasn’t anything that really ruined the experience. 100% my new favorite hyper.
Mystic Timbers - x6 9/10 Rapid fire hills and transitions makes this the king of pacing in the park. Although I feel it was a little over hyped in my opinion. Everyone was telling me it was the best ride in the park, but I have to disagree. Still wickedly fun though.
Beast - x9 10/10 I sure underestimated this coaster, wow what a surprise! This thing was INCREDIBLE! Sure it lacks what a modern woodie will give you, but the Beast is one hell of an experience. I managed to stay off the wheel seats and I snagged 2 night rides which probably helped my opinion… but still. I loved the beast. It’s a classic for a reason.
Backlot Stunt Coaster - x2 7/10 Now I’ve ridden this before, I first rode it opening weekend back in 2005 as Italian Job. It’s nothing amazing, and I wish more effects were working… but it’s a still a fun ride I think everyone can enjoy. It definitely has its place in Kings Island. (I actually think this has a better launch than FoF)
Orion - x11 9/10 As a now west coast enthusiast, this is my first Giga… so I don’t have any other Gigas to compare it with. HOLY that first drop is insane!!! It truly does feel like you’re falling forever. Every element was awesome, but yeah the ride does feel a little too short. Regardless it was still amazing.
Flight Of Fear - x1 4/10 Well time for my first negative review. I’m sorry, but wow this ride is lame. The launch is cool, and the first few elements are forceful… but it just completely dies after the midcourse. It’s a rough one too. Yeah this one was a one and done for me. Even my nostalgia can’t salvage this.
Racer x4 7/10 I managed to ride both sides and I preferred the red side as I feel it was a tad smoother. It’s a fun airtime filled racing woodie, and that’s all it needs to be. I have no strong negative feelings for the ride, nor was I amazed. It’s fun though, and I’ll probably always get a ride on it when I go to KI.
Adventure Express x2 6/10 I didn’t think I’d get this one on this trip due to it being closed for the refurb, but it opened Saturday and I got a few rides in. It’s an arrow mine train, and a good one at that. It has a well paced layout with some fun head choppers and theming. If only it actually did something after the final lift tunnel.
Banshee x6 9/10 I think everyone can agree that the 90s era B&M inverts far outrank their post millennium counter parts. However banshee might be the exception because wow was this thing is crazy. While it may lack whip, it definitely doesn’t lack in force and pacing. This thing was hauling on my days and never let up. Every inversion was great, and this probably has the best first drop on any invert that I’ve ridden. Banshee is awesome.
The Bat x2 8/10 Another underrated one. The bat is just pure fun. It’s short and sweet and that’s about it. Swinging is fun, what can I say? Best suspended I’ve ridden so far.
Invertigo x2 6/10 I was expecting to dislike this ride, but nope! Thought it was good! Not best in the park or anything, but considering I was expecting this to be rough and unejoyable… I was pleasantly surprised. I didn’t find it rough in the slightest, and that loop is killer! Still in the bottom half of my list but Invertigo still gets my approval.
Favorite flat ride as a bonus: Drop Tower x2
Overall I had a wonderful time at Kings Island. It has a great atmosphere, great Coaster lineup, and friendly staff. I can’t wait to come back.

Hey folks, talked about making this post several times over the last 7 months on various subs and discords. The time feels right to go ahead and post it for everyone since a lot of content creators weren't talking about them or mentioning them either intentionally because of the various races to 100, or because it might have broken their NDA's. I feel like everyone should know about them ahead of time, especially for those of you that intend to race for the first 1,000 HC100's, but they will absolutely help the average or even casual players along their journey as well. If someone is compiling a super-list or post with the consolidation of all tips, tricks, FAQs etc, feel free to steal from this post in your creation!
(Disclaimer, It should go without saying that all of this is subject to change at any time, including my mere posting of it, so take it with a grain of salt as you explore Sanctuary. Added a spoiler tag just in case. Cross-posting for full diablo fan visibility, shun me if not allowed)

• Running into a new region will automatically change your "Town Portal" location when using the default town portal keybind (T). This means while exploring the world, especially at low level, you can simply crossover into a new region like the Dry Steppes and use your Town Portal keybind to teleport to Dry Steppes's main city. Doing this early will save you a ton of time in later hunting down waypoints, altars, and dungeon aspects simply for the ease of instantly porting from one region to another. Reminder though, you still need to click the waypoint physically to unlock it even when you automatically teleport to it after crossing zones. As an example, it takes roughly 8-9 minutes in game time without mount to pickup both the Dry Steppes and Scosglen main hub waypoints as of the most recent server slam test.
  
• Campfire XP bonuses are a sneaky XP bonus that people often forget about because they take a little time to build and to get to. Certain Strongholds, like Kor Dragan, will have campfires around them near their gates after they've been completed, and when they aren't currently being invaded (only applies to invasion event strongholds). When you find one, click the campfire and every few seconds a 1%XP buff will be granted to you, and stacks I believe 15 times in total and lasts somewhere around 10-15 minutes or so. There's a few scenarios where you can absolutely maximize this benefit to its fullest extent to significantly speed up your progress. First, when you're taking an AFK break, simply teleport to the Menestad Waypoint and take the 25 second ride/40 second walk to Kor Dragan (assuming its been completed and not under invasion) and click the campfire and take your break. When you come back you'll have 10 stacks built, click the campfire again to get it up to 15 (automatically stops at 10 stacks per click) and then be on your way. Another way that I utilized this to incredible success was in the later game right before I'd go into a nightmare dungeon, I'd take a quick trip out to my nearest campfire (generally Kor Dragan via Menestad) and gain my 15 stacks, pop my sigil, then travel to that dungeon. By that point you have your mount so you're generally starting a nightmare tier dungeon with 11-12 minutes left on the buff, sometimes more, and with the changes to pathing design in these dungeons you should gain the full benefit of the buff through each nightmare tier dungeon you do this way. Remember to stack this buff with your XP potion!
  
• Don't mine nodes early on. Sounds counterintuitive right? It isn't, the materials you gain often from clicking on those ore nodes are the same materials you'll generally receive from salvaging items. Currently there really isn't anything in game that utilizes these materials, at least not in the early game, other than the blacksmith with gear upgrades, and you won't want to be upgrading your gear early on anyways. The amount of time you'll save by not clicking every early game ore node is absolutely massive. Wait until you're on your mount before you start clicking on them to get your titles and achievements. If they just happen to be in your path as you hoof it around the map give them a click, otherwise don't alter course to grab them.
  
• In complete opposition to ore nodes, pick every flower you find, especially in the early game. Flowers are mandatory for speed leveling as well as general quality of life. There are many potions available right out of the gate that significantly impact your character, all of which generally carry a 3% XP bonus to them in addition to various resistance or power gains these potions might add. On top of this, the flowers are required for your health potion upgrades which are actually quite massive as you level early on because you won't be draped in BIS level 25 legendary items farming Osgar Reede like we were in the beta tests, you're going to be in ragged rares you picked up along the way, so you won't be nearly as tough when you're clearing those Strongholds and campaign quests, so you'll benefit greatly from those health potion upgrades every 10 levels at your local alchemist.
  
• If you're a completionist like myself, and want to go out there and unlock every codex power relatively quickly, make sure you complete a codex unlocking dungeon on each alt character you intend to play for the pre-season and subsequent seasons. The way the game works is that you automatically unlock the occultist at level 25, however, there's an additional mechanic that automatically unlocks the occultist and the codex of power intently upon unlocking that character's first codex power via dungeon completion. This comes in handy later if, like me, you intend to main one class but also play several alts to keep the game fresh or breakup the monotony of the leveling grind. Eventually you'll get to a point long before level 100 where gambling obols is just significantly more valuable on your alts, and having unlocked the occultist early on at level 10 or 12 or whatever for those alts will massively increase the efficiency in playing alts once you've fully unlocked the whole codex for them. Imagine how much faster you'll blast through the game when your alts have full "legendary" powers from the codex at level 12 with a relatively comprehensive build, its significant.
  
• On the subject of alts, you really should make them, especially if you intend to play long hours in the late game. The Tree of Whispers is one of, if not the most significant portion of your end game loop later in the game, simply because of its often dual benefit gains from completing various events around Sanctuary, such as World Bosses, Dungeons, PVP zones, etc. What people don't know, yet, is that the truly valuable grim favor quests have diminishing returns on value the more you complete them, as the available quests are front-loaded with longer duration events like World Bosses and Dungeons, but when repopulated, are generally lowest value and lowest priority, like doing those random world events we saw around the world in the betas. Here's where alts come in. Every character has their own independent grim favors tracking system, so once you clear all the juicy 3-5 favor reward events on your main, you can move over to your alt (the ones we've now geared with full codex powers) to efficiently blow through those tasks. This is important because the cache rewards from the Tree of Whispers can include things like sigils, elixirs, gear, and other various materials which can all be used by your mains. Moreover, the weekly world boss chest is also separate for all characters, allowing you to fully maximize the benefit of your character list by doing one world boss per character per week for slightly better loot rewards. Remember, we run world boss primarily for prisms to add sockets on gear, and those are materials which are shared across your account.
  

If I think of anymore that are relatively unique or haven't been mentioned enough I'll add to them so long as I have the character limit, feel free to add your own the comments as well.
(admittedly I am quite distracted and busy heading into launch but I'll try my best).

Hey folks, talked about making this post several times over the last 7 months on various subs and discords. The time feels right to go ahead and post it for everyone since a lot of content creators weren't talking about them or mentioning them either intentionally because of the various races to 100, or because it might have broken their NDA's. I feel like everyone should know about them ahead of time, especially for those of you that intend to race for the first 1,000 HC100's, but they will absolutely help the average or even casual players along their journey as well. If someone is compiling a super-list or post with the consolidation of all tips, tricks, FAQs etc, feel free to steal from this post in your creation!
(Disclaimer, It should go without saying that all of this is subject to change at any time, including my mere posting of it, so take it with a grain of salt as you explore Sanctuary. Added a spoiler tag just in case)

• Running into a new region will automatically change your "Town Portal" location when using the default town portal keybind (T). This means while exploring the world, especially at low level, you can simply crossover into a new region like the Dry Steppes and use your Town Portal keybind to teleport to Dry Steppes's main city. Doing this early will save you a ton of time in later hunting down waypoints, altars, and dungeon aspects simply for the ease of instantly porting from one region to another. Reminder though, you still need to click the waypoint physically to unlock it even when you automatically teleport to it after crossing zones. As an example, it takes roughly 8-9 minutes in game time without mount to pickup both the Dry Steppes and Scosglen main hub waypoints as of the most recent server slam test.
  
• Campfire XP bonuses are a sneaky XP bonus that people often forget about because they take a little time to build and to get to. Certain Strongholds, like Kor Dragan, will have campfires around them near their gates after they've been completed, and when they aren't currently being invaded (only applies to invasion event strongholds). When you find one, click the campfire and every few seconds a 1%XP buff will be granted to you, and stacks I believe 15 times in total and lasts somewhere around 10-15 minutes or so. There's a few scenarios where you can absolutely maximize this benefit to its fullest extent to significantly speed up your progress. First, when you're taking an AFK break, simply teleport to the Menestad Waypoint and take the 25 second ride/40 second walk to Kor Dragan (assuming its been completed and not under invasion) and click the campfire and take your break. When you come back you'll have 10 stacks built, click the campfire again to get it up to 15 (automatically stops at 10 stacks per click) and then be on your way. Another way that I utilized this to incredible success was in the later game right before I'd go into a nightmare dungeon, I'd take a quick trip out to my nearest campfire (generally Kor Dragan via Menestad) and gain my 15 stacks, pop my sigil, then travel to that dungeon. By that point you have your mount so you're generally starting a nightmare tier dungeon with 11-12 minutes left on the buff, sometimes more, and with the changes to pathing design in these dungeons you should gain the full benefit of the buff through each nightmare tier dungeon you do this way. Remember to stack this buff with your XP potion!
  
• Don't mine nodes early on. Sounds counterintuitive right? It isn't, the materials you gain often from clicking on those ore nodes are the same materials you'll generally receive from salvaging items. Currently there really isn't anything in game that utilizes these materials, at least not in the early game, other than the blacksmith with gear upgrades, and you won't want to be upgrading your gear early on anyways. The amount of time you'll save by not clicking every early game ore node is absolutely massive. Wait until you're on your mount before you start clicking on them to get your titles and achievements. If they just happen to be in your path as you hoof it around the map give them a click, otherwise don't alter course to grab them.
  
• In complete opposition to ore nodes, pick every flower you find, especially in the early game. Flowers are mandatory for speed leveling as well as general quality of life. There are many potions available right out of the gate that significantly impact your character, all of which generally carry a 3% XP bonus to them in addition to various resistance or power gains these potions might add. On top of this, the flowers are required for your health potion upgrades which are actually quite massive as you level early on because you won't be draped in BIS level 25 legendary items farming Osgar Reede like we were in the beta tests, you're going to be in ragged rares you picked up along the way, so you won't be nearly as tough when you're clearing those Strongholds and campaign quests, so you'll benefit greatly from those health potion upgrades every 10 levels at your local alchemist.
  
• If you're a completionist like myself, and want to go out there and unlock every codex power relatively quickly, make sure you complete a codex unlocking dungeon on each alt character you intend to play for the pre-season and subsequent seasons. The way the game works is that you automatically unlock the occultist at level 25, however, there's an additional mechanic that automatically unlocks the occultist and the codex of power intently upon unlocking that character's first codex power via dungeon completion. This comes in handy later if, like me, you intend to main one class but also play several alts to keep the game fresh or breakup the monotony of the leveling grind. Eventually you'll get to a point long before level 100 where gambling obols is just significantly more valuable on your alts, and having unlocked the occultist early on at level 10 or 12 or whatever for those alts will massively increase the efficiency in playing alts once you've fully unlocked the whole codex for them. Imagine how much faster you'll blast through the game when your alts have full "legendary" powers from the codex at level 12 with a relatively comprehensive build, its significant.
  
• On the subject of alts, you really should make them, especially if you intend to play long hours in the late game. The Tree of Whispers is one of, if not the most significant portion of your end game loop later in the game, simply because of its often dual benefit gains from completing various events around Sanctuary, such as World Bosses, Dungeons, PVP zones, etc. What people don't know, yet, is that the truly valuable grim favor quests have diminishing returns on value the more you complete them, as the available quests are front-loaded with longer duration events like World Bosses and Dungeons, but when repopulated, are generally lowest value and lowest priority, like doing those random world events we saw around the world in the betas. Here's where alts come in. Every character has their own independent grim favors tracking system, so once you clear all the juicy 3-5 favor reward events on your main, you can move over to your alt (the ones we've now geared with full codex powers) to efficiently blow through those tasks. This is important because the cache rewards from the Tree of Whispers can include things like sigils, elixirs, gear, and other various materials which can all be used by your mains. Moreover, the weekly world boss chest is also separate for all characters, allowing you to fully maximize the benefit of your character list by doing one world boss per character per week for slightly better loot rewards. Remember, we run world boss primarily for prisms to add sockets on gear, and those are materials which are shared across your account.
  

If I think of anymore that are relatively unique or haven't been mentioned enough I'll add to them so long as I have the character limit, feel free to add your own the comments as well.
(admittedly I am quite distracted and busy heading into launch but I'll try my best).

I just had my honeymoon (originally scheduled for Jun 2020). My wife and I are in our early thirties. It’s my wife’s first time in japan while it’s my fourth. I’ve benefitted immensely from stalking Tokyo travel reddit and would like to return the favour. I’ll provide some of my tips and observations to the end (skip to the end if the itinerary doesn’t interest you), some of which I think haven’t been mentioned before.
Thank God pretty much everything went to plan, and my wife thoroughly enjoyed the trip. We spent 12 days in Japan, most of it in Tokyo and 2 nights in Kawaguchiko. Many people were surprised to know that we’d be spending most of our trip in Tokyo, but I thought it was just fine because Tokyo had a lot to offer. My wife and I aren’t big on visiting shrines or ticking tourist hotspots off a checklist. We don’t shop much, but we did a lot of it simply because it’s Japan and we bought lots of quality-of-life items (not fashion) for ourselves and others. Given how much my wife really enjoyed the trip, I think others with similar interests could find something helpful too.
Pre-trip planning

• It was out first leisure trip in years, and my wife's first trip to Japan. I wanted to show her the best of Japan, and took months trawling through reddit posts and trip reports, watching youtube videos, and just soaking in all the things before deciding on an itinerary that I thought my wife would enjoy. It was almost exclusively planned by me, and I would consult my wife along the way.
• Other than the hotel & flights, I booked the highway express bus to Kawaguchiko one week prior.
• Decided on the airport limousine bus to bring us from the airport to the city a few days prior.
• Studio Ghibli tickets booked one month in advance. There's a good guide available on reddit already. International tickets were quickly sold out, so we used a free VPN to get onto the Japanese site which had more tickets & timings available. Simply Google translate the entire page.
• Booked a cooking class on cookly months prior.
• Did Visit Japan QR two days prior. It takes some time, so do it earlier rather than later.
• Added all places of interests in a Google list, and all food places in another Google list. I tried the custom Google maps at first but didn’t feel the UI was easy to navigate.
• Planned itinerary based on location proximity, and also highlighted parts that were interchangeable in case we wanted to switch it up (which we did).

Planning during the trip

• The Google maps foods list was always just for consideration: if we had time or were craving something. We didn't hard-code food places into our daily plans. But when food was the primary activity (e.g. visiting Tsukiji market), we'd determine to visit particular food stalls. Otherwise, just needed to do a cursory Google review check on whether a random food place is worth eating it. As a principle, we didn't want to spend time queuing >20m for food.
• I'd plan the next day's itinerary the night before, considering fatigue, interest, and proximity. I would create a brand new Google maps list for the next day, including potential food places.

Day 0 (Wed) 17 May - Arrival at Haneda Airport to hotel in Shinjuku. Arrived in Haneda late, about 11pm. Clearance was quick but baggage took 30mins. I had no choice but to cancel my airport limousine and take the metro to our hotel in Shinjuku. I tried Apple wallet’s Suica at first. It worked seamlessly but I felt that a physical metro card was just faster so I eventually switched over. We reached after midnight, so do let your hotel know in advance if you anticipate arriving at odd hours.
Day 1 (Thurs) - Shinjuku exploration. Originally planned to visit Tsukiji on day 1, but given that we arrived late the previous night, agreed with my wife to change the plan and spend the first day doing the Shinjuku itinerary.

• Walked to a popular Tsukumen place at 11. Queued for 20mins and it was an interesting experience as there were lines of people standing right behind watching you eat. Wife said it was her best Tsukumen ever!
• Sekaido for art & stationary supplies: My wife does art so it was a haven for her. We spent a few hours there!
• Tokyu Hands Shinjuku: Wanted to look at more stationary/home/fashion stuff but two floors were under renovation.
• Omoide Yokocho: A quick walkthrough of this famous street for salarymen which comes alive at night. Many tourists.

Day 2 (Fri) - Kappabashi St., Fabric Town, Akihabara

• Kappabashi Dougu Street: looked at kitchen supplies aimed to find a nice nakiri knife! (If you want to buy a knife, do research on what knife you need beforehand).
• Fabric Town: My wife just passed a seamstress exam so she eagerly anticipated visiting fabric town, we spent a few hours in Tomato.
• Akihabara (Animate, Bic Camera, Gyukatsu Don): It was drizzling the entire day so it was not the most comfortable lugging that many bags around a wet Akihabara in the evening. Wife wasn’t interested but I wanted to let her experience this unique culture. Had dinner at a popular gyukatsu don (beef cutlet that you’d have to cook yourself). It was our first time eating gyukatsu. It was so tender and juicy and mmm. But it was a long one hour wait. It was after this episode that we decided we were not going to queue this long for food again.

Day 3 (Sat) - Cooking class in Shinjuku, Shibuya

• Private cooking class in Shinjuku: Our host was great! We were invited into his cosy house and he taught us how to make Okonomiyaki, Yakisoba, and a Japanese salad. I paid careful attention to the menu beforehand as I wanted to learn dishes I could easily recreate back home (i.e. not choose dishes that depended on seasonal Japanese ingredients). My wife absolutely loved the experience of getting to know a local and understanding his life story, Japanese culture, and hearing some of his horror stories of foreign guests. We got more food recs from him to understand where the locals really ate at.
• Shibuya 109: Paid $5 for a drink to have a bird’s eye view of the Shibuya crossing. It was Saturday so the crossing was at its full force. Even if you think this is touristy, it’s amazing to see that many people like little ants crossing a street. There are several nice locations here to take some artsy shots.
• Ishibashi Music Shibuya: absolutely loved the vibe in this music store. Back home, I’d been thinking about getting a particular keyboard but never got a chance to try it. I was able to play this particular one undisturbed and feel like I could go on for hours without any pressure from staff. Bought a few Japan exclusive guitar picks as gifts.
• Shibuya Tokyu Hands: This was amazing. I thought Shinjuku Tokyu Hands was the flagship store. So I only stumbled into this because I urgently needed to pee and someone said Tokyu hands had toilets. We were confused as its name was rebranded to simply "Hands" with a new logo. If you only have time to visit one Tokyu Hands, visit the Shibuya one. Each floor had 2 sub-floors so that’s a ton of floors! Lots of quality-of-life improvements one could get from this store. My wife got a buckwheat pillow.
• Shibuya Loft: After Sekaido and Tokyu Hands, I didn't think there was much daily life products/art/stationary to look at. But Loft was very different. Similar to Tokyu hands but seems more modern and fashionable. Worth visiting together with Tokyu hands! It also had packaged food available! It was late and my wife and I concluded that we didn’t have to to explore all the floors and that we’d return to Shibuya again.

Day 4 (Sun) - Komazawa Church, Harajuku, Shibuya

• Church in Komazawa: not a tourist activity, but we linked up with some partners from our home church and attended service at a little church held in a nursery. It was an amazing and encouraging experience to hear the gospel preached in a foreign language.
• Harajuku: Way too crowded. I had anticipated this as it was a Sunday, but thought to just try. Takeshita street was so packed my wife feared there would be a stampede risk (it wasn’t that bad). We did queue 20mins for pretty tasty crepe. After checking out all the recommended streets (e.g. cat street, uru-harajuku), my wife simply felt that she couldn’t stand the Harajuku crowd and the vibes. So we decided to go back to Shibuya again!
• Shibuya JINS: I didn’t mention this but previously in Shinjuku and Shibuya, I had been checking out recommended optical shops in the vicinity for a particular style of glasses. Japanese-made glasses are highly-rated, but I couldn’t find something at the right price-point. At JINS, I found a design I liked. Though not made in Japan, it cost me less than 5000 yen. Took them 1 hour to make it. For some reason I loved the vibes at Shibuya, and I earmarked it to return again later.

Day 5 (Mon) - Tsukiji Market, Ginza Muji/Uniqlo, Tokyo station

• Tsukiji market: wanted to arrive before 8 but arrived at 8.30am.n Thankfully the crowds weren't that bad. Everything we tried was lovely. Potato/corn fishcakes, strawberry mochi, tamago, wagyu beef, uni inarisushi (my first time trying uni - wife loved it but I didn't like it), unagi. But the star was Masa burger (thanks to Paolo from Tokyo), which we waited till 11am to try. By then, the tourist buses had come and the streets were packed. But Masa burger was in a corner and we were their first customers. We tried fried codfish burger + homemade ginger ale. Both were was so well done and the fried cod was so crispy yet fresh and tender. It was also nicely completed with very refreshing salads! It was soo good we had it twice.
• Ginza Uniqlo/Muji: we wanted to take a look at some of Uniqlo’s exclusive items. Apparently they do have exclusive t-shirts for each region (e.g. Harajuku, Shibuya, Ginza), which tend to be collaborations with well-known food places in the area. However, they were always white in colour (cheap to produce) and not made-in-Japan-quality. Muji @ Ginza was a disappointment, not a lot more than the usual.
• Tokyo Station Ghibli store & Tenugui hunting: Went to Tokyo station to check out the Ghibli store and to look for a particular traditional tenugui (Japanese towels) store as my wife were hunting these down to give as gifts.
• Shinjuku Ichiran & Mister Donut: We returned to Shinjuku for Ichiran ramen, specifically at 5+pm. No crowds at all. Yummy! We then saw a Mister Donut, and recalled news in our home country that when it had its first opening in my country, people queued 5 hours for it. We thought to try it to see what the fuss was all about. Cash only, but the donuts were wonderfully textured and not too sweet. My wife doesn’t like sweet stuff, but mister donut really hit the sweet spot (no pun intended).

Day 6 (Tue) - Tokyo National Museum, Fabric town revisit, Akihabara revisit, Ochanomizu

• Tokyo National Museum: We had a good time learning about Japan’s early history, and discovered that so much that we know of Japan resulted from Chinese/korean influence.
• Fabric town & Akihabara revisit, Ochonomizu: We decided that this was likely the right time to go back for items we missed out on or didn’t have time to see. My wife went to fabric town again while I went to Akihabara’s Yodaibashi camera, which I felt to be better and with more varied things than Bic Camera. I then went to nearby Ochanomizu to look at more music and sport shops. We met up again at Shinjuku for another Gyukatsu Don before heading to mister donuts again.

Day 7 (Wed) - Shinjuku Gyoen Garden, Mori Museum, Ginza Wakamatsu, Shinjuku

• Shinjuku Gyoen Garden: lovely large garden grounds. We spent almost an hour just lying under a tree and watching clouds float by. Wife was doing some rough sketches of the garden. We had mister donuts from last night for breakfast.
• Mori Museum: Saw the exhibition of Heatherwick studios, which was inspiring and educational. Paid for the rooftop access to have a quick view of Tokyo from 50-ish floors up.
• Ginza Wakamatsu: Because of one of the Uniqlo-ginza-exclusive t-shirts, my wife was curious about this traditional Japanese dessert. So we gave it a check and realised it’s been around for more than a century. There was a short line (mainly Japanese elderly). The shop interior transported us back decades. It felt surreal eating a dessert that the Japanese ate centuries ago. Unlike modern desserts, this Japanese dessert certainly doesn’t excite and overwhelm one’s taste buds immediately. But there’s an old charm to it.
• Shinjuku Okadaya fabric: Returned to Shinjuku as my wife wanted to check out another of their famous fabric stores. Prices were more expensive than fabric town, but had somewhat different items.

Day 8 (Thurs) - Kawaguchiko

• Bus to Kawaguchiko: Packed light to Kawaguchiko, and forwarded our remaining luggage to our final hotel in Tamachi. The Shinjuku hotel staff were very helpful. I was merely inquiring on how luggage forwarding was done, but the staff picked up the phone, called my Tamachi hotel to confirm the booking, and prepared the documents for me. All I had to do was roll my luggage the next night to them and make payment. Booked a 7:45am bus to Kawaguchiko and managed to catch a glimpse of Mount Fuji when we were on our way there!
• Cycling In Kawaguchiko: We lugged our bags to our ryokan and headed out again. My wife was quite hesitant about cycling overseas and I was also worried it’d tire her out too much. I debated between cycling or simply taking the sight-seeing bus. Eventually felt that it was worth trying to cycle. We unexpectedly walked by an e-bike place and decided, why not? Neither of us had tried an e-bike before and that could reduce the effort required for my wife. So we did and boy was it fun! It took a while to get used to the e-bike but it really reduced a lot of effort up the hills! I barely perspired at all thanks to the e-assist. Kawaguchiko had pretty narrow roads so it wasn’t the easiest to cycle. But I had plenty of road-cycling experience back at home so I was not daunted. We borrowed helmets from the e-bike place but saw that we were the only tourists that wore them. Yes, I'd recommend wearing helmets when cycling.
• Kubota Itchiku Art Museum: Cycled here knowing that this museum would interest my wife. It had a garden free for entry and it was really quaint, quiet, and charming! The pond had a singular vibrant-coloured Koi swimming in it. Museum entry requires tickets. I was kinda sick of museums and not interested int he subject so I told my wife I'd wait for her outside. She eventually took 45m inside and was so enthralled by it. She even bought a heavy hard-cover book of Itchiku Kubota’s kimono art :/
• Momiji Corridor: was just 50 meters away from the museum. Still beautiful with only green leaves, but I’d imagine it would be majestic in Autumn/Spring.
• Oishi Park: Many colourful flowers! It’s a pity that it had been cloudy the entire day, and Mt Fuji was not visible. That would have made the cycle perfect. Had a peach/plum ice-cream. Park was crowded with tourists.

Day 9 (Fri) - Fuji Q Highlands, Shimoyoshida Honcho St, Batting Cage
Planning for Fuji Q & Morning Jog: I didn’t plan to go to Fuji-Q highlands before the trip. Always felt it a bit of a waste to visit amusement parks overseas. That’s until I realised that Fuji Q had some of the most exciting (I mean world-record-holding) rollercoasters in the world. Maybe they don't hold the records anymore, but that intrigued me enough, because most amusement parks only had 1-2 coasters. Problem was that wife is terrified, and she said cycling on the streets of Kawaguchiko was already like a coaster ride for her. Still, I'm really thankful she encouraged me to go and said she was happy waiting and taking pictures for me. So I decided I would reach at opening time, and buy time by paying for the fast passes and try their top three coasters. The night before, we felt that we had to make decisions on our itinerary as it was our last day at Kawaguchiko. If Mt Fuji still wasn’t visible the next day, we'd go to Oshino Hakkai, if it was, we could try going to Shimoyoshida to get a nice picture.

• I took a morning jog that morning and my jaw dropped when I saw Mount Fuji towering over Kawaguchiko. I raced back to tell my wife (about 6am) and we both trekked up to a viewing spot to enjoy the view. This made it more urgent to not spend too much time at Fuji Q as we didn’t know how long Mt. Fuji would be visible for.
• Fuji-Q Highlands: Was absolutely amazing. Yes, I blew a lot of cash here buying fast passes for the three available coasters. But they were some of the craziest coasters. Took Eejanaika, Fujiyama and Takabisha. Total time it took probably a little more than 1 hour with the express passes. It was so good, but so fast that I have little memory of it, except that there was a 90 degree climb to the top for Takabisha and I had a beautiful view of Mt. Fuji while climbing to the supposed world record of 79m for Fujiyama (this was 2 days before the news reported that Fujiyama got stuck in the middle of a ride and the people in the carts had to climb down :o). Had more time to take a few other rides, and enjoyed all the Naruto statues around for fun photo-taking. What I really enjoyed about the park was that it was mostly filled with Japanese tourists; in fact, there was a Japanese school having an outing there. It was nice to see excited students running about. If I could spend the day here, I'd take the three coasters multiple times to imprint the sensations in my head. But I'm still thankful I got to try some of the world's most thrilling coasters!
• Shomoyoshida Honcho St: This destination was simply to take the famous street view of Mount Fuji with Japanese shops lined in the foreground. It’s not easy to get to, and there was quite a walk. We noticed there weren’t much people around, and most shops were closed. But when we reached the destination, there were many tourists right at the particular traffic light. So much so there was a grumpy Japanese traffic police person managing the crowd. We saw the worst of tourists that day. People were disobeying traffic laws and just running in the middle of the road just to get a shot. We chanced upon a hidden udon shop and it felt like we were transported back to the 50’s! It was super old school, people sat on raised platforms, and several elderly customers were watching the tele while eating. There was only one udon option available, with free cabbage top-ups. We learnt that the shop had been around for 73 years. We actually headed back to Fuji-Q Highlands to take a 4D 'plane ride' with Joe Hisashi music. Since my wife actually wanted to ride something, we went all the way back. Ride was very ordinary but wife actually felt terrified at times lol. Rushed back to the hotel for a private onsen booking.
• Batting Cage: I had never played baseball/softball and my home country doesn’t have a baseball culture. Yet I had seen batting cages in Japanese drama and always wanted to try. Loved it! My technique was probably pretty bad! I did well at first but as I tried faster balls, I tired out and failed to hit any haha. We ended the day eating ramen outdoors with a view of Mount Fuji.

Day 10 (Sat) - Kichijoji, Ghibli Museum, Kichijoji Jazz bar
Woke up before sunrise for a run and to attempt to catch a sunrise picture of Mount Fuji. Streets were completely empty. Even ran to the famous Kawaguchiko Lawson for a picture. Headed back for an onsen bathe (note: we never used the room's shower, and always went for an onsen bath throughout our stay in Kawaguchiko as it was just too convenient). Took a 7am bus to return to Shinjuku.

• Kichijoji: Arrived at Kichijoji at about 10am. Wife really loved the vibes there. We tried the Tsukuba suisan fish cakes which were really tasty, and my wife was intrigued that a line had formed at the adjacent store named Ozasa. Apparently they sell traditional Japanese desserts and locals would go there as early as 5am to get a ticket. So we queued 15m and managed to get three boxes worth of the snacks! Tried the Amane Taiyaki fish-shaped bean paste snacks, another traditional dessert. It was a small lovely old shop.
• Ghibli Museum: Requires a long walk through Inokashira park. Ghibli was fantastic. Many people have been saying recently that it’s over-rated, and that it doesn’t cater to foreign crowds and most things are in Japanese. We similarly struggled with that at first. But we found out that if you asked the staff, they actually had English language exhibition booklets ready for every exhibition! That was a revelation. And we managed to understand almost all the exhibitions by asking the uniformed staff (except the short film, which had minimal dialogue anyway). I mentioned this to one foreign group and they were really grateful for that. But I saw that many other foreigners that probably came earlier were just bored or simply going crazy at the Ghibli shop. My wife bought the museum book (which also has English explanations of each exhibit), and we understood Miyazaki’s vision for the museum - to make it suitable for kids and adults, with no pre-determined route, allowing for play, exploration, to help people be inspired by the artists’ process. Through that, we saw that every thing in the museum was intentionally designed, all of the exhibitions, cafe, shop, and garden. Reading that helped me appreciate and enjoy the museum much more.
• Roaming Kichijoji and Some Time Jazz bar: My wife and I split up to roam kichijoji. I checked out some sports shops and saw that their prices were lower than Ochanomizu. We reconvened for dinner at Sometime Jazz bar. I’m picking up Jazz piano but had never been to a jazz bar. Booked it one day before, but was sad that our table position only allowed us to see some of the drummer and the pianist’s expression. Still, it was a very hip place for jazz cats and we had a wonderful time. We only sat through the first half of the performance that night. Note that there are seating charges, so that + dinner added up to quite a lot. But we rationalised that this was akin to paying for a performance. Checked into our hotel in Tamachi.

Day 11 (Sun) - Tokyo Sky Tree, Shinjuku, Back to Kichijoji, Shibuya
It was a crazy day where we simply hit the places we wanted to revisit regardless of proximity. Headed to Tokyo Skytree in the morning to check out another Ghibli store in hopes of getting another Ghibli shirt; reason was because I ended up buying one at the museum and absolutely loved (made in Japan, beautiful colour, perfect fit. I hesitated at first because I couldn't try it). If you’re not going to the Ghibli museum, this is probably the best store available for Ghibli goods. Alas, the museum's items were really quite exclusive. Headed to Shinjuku to try curry udon, then to Kichijoji to try satou beef balls and dangos and to make some purchasing decisions on some sports equipment. Then we ended up at Shibuya (my favourite place!) to the mega Don Quijote and Tokyu Hands to shop for gifts for others. It was a lovely end to our trip!
Day 12 (Mon) - Back home
Best trip ever, says my wife.
Tips for travellers

• Spread out your itinerary: I originally planned to front-load all the must-see tourist stuff and leave the remaining days for shopping. But in May, Ghibli Museum was closed for two weeks so we had no choice but to schedule it at the end of the trip. That was a better arrangement. It felt that each day was distinctly different, and we could remember the highlight of each day. Also, be specific about where you want to go. Don’t simply put locations like - Visit Harajuku, or visit Shibuya crossing.
• Plan your itinerary in consideration of weekend crowds: Places like Tsujiki market, Ghibli Museum, Fuji-Q Highlands and other stuff are likely going to be very crowded on weekends. If you want to shop in Harajuku or Shibuya, try to avoid weekends. I opted to put the cooking class and ‘less-exciting’ Museums on weekends.
• Unless you'll always be in a group, use your telco’s roaming or get an e-sim: My wife and I split up on several occasions, so we already knew the pocket wifi was out of the question.
• Carry more cash than you think you need: In my experience, the cash-to-card ratio was about 40:60. Considering that all metro card top-ups require cash, you'll need quite a bit of cash! Sometimes even bigger restaurants are cash only.
• Bring foldable tote bags, and use lockers where necessary: If you’re buying stuff, packing them in tote bags makes it easier to lug around. Bigger shops will charge you for bags. If you just arrived from one area with bags and are going to explore another, use the lockers. Most metro stations likely have lockers and they are really affordable and convenient.
• Travel light by planning to do laundry: I only brought four sets of clothing, and we did laundry every 3-4 days or so. It’s really convenient, about 200 yen per 30m wash, and another 200 yen for a 1h dry. It’s worthwhile to check if your hotel has coin laundry available.
• Buy wisely: Many people say the kind of things available at places like Don Quijote or Uniqlo are mind-blowing. Fact is, most of them are made in China or elsewhere. Almost 95% of the items we saw in Daiso were made in China. In fact, many items in Kappabashi street were made in China. You’re more likely to get value for money by buying a made in Japan item. Sometimes the shop will highlight if a product is Japan made. But other times, you have to scrutinise the fine print. Learn to look out for these three words in Kanji: 日本製. This is where the camera function of Google translate is immensely helpful. This was not available or widely publicised when I last visited Japan years back in 2016, so use this tech to your advantage and scrutinise the fine print!
• Plan your toilet trips if possible: If you know you’re headed to low-rise areas like Tsujiki, Fabric town where it’s just shop after shop, it’s going to be hard to find a toilet. Make sure you relieve yourself beforehand at the train station. But if you still need to go, try to find a multi-storey building and chances are, there’ll be toilets available there.
• Avoid queuing for food by timing right: In general, I found that most popular food places that required queuing had queues mainly consisting of foreigners. I wonder if this is because of the reddit/youtube/google maps review effect (not a lot of Japanese review on Google I think). So if you have to queue, there's a good chance you're competing with other foreigners. Simply put, almost all food places open at 11am, so be there at 11, or have early dinner at 5pm and perhaps you may avoid the queuing.
• Scrutinise Google maps to figure out the different train types: for daily travel, there could be local, rapid, and express trains. Local trains stop at every station. Rapid skips a few, and express trains likely only stops at key location. They make a big difference to travel time, and to your comfort. When Google maps recommends a route, scrutinise the detail to ensure what kind of train they are recommending. It gets confusing at the station as the platforms on your left and right may end up at the same location, but one could be a local train and the other an express train.
• Learn just 2 essential phrases: I know it may feel weird to some, but just learn to say thank you in Japanese (arigato gozaimasu). The other essential word is - summimasen - excuse me/sorry. Useful for if you need to exit a crowded train, or if you need to get someone’s attention. We survived with just these two phrases. As our cooking teacher told us - it’s better to say something in Japanese than say nothing at all. For the rest, you can use Google translate app’s picture function.
• Other misc tips: as mentioned, bring trash bags. Some shops explicitly tell you not to walk around and eat their food. So the solution is to finish the snack in front of the shop, and say, “summimasen, can you help me to throw this trash?” That helped us avoid carrying trash around a lot. As a traveller, you’re gonna get a lot of carbs (my curry udon meal included a bowl of udon + a bowl of rice...) and fried food. Try to go to the basements of shopping centres and get yourself some fruits to get more fiber. Also, if you exercise regularly like me, you'd be concerned about getting some exercise. I did pre-trip research on pools/gyms/parks to visit. But visited none of them. With what little hotel room space I had, I settled with a daily morning routine of 100 squats and 100 pushups. That and walking an average of 18k steps daily helped. I actually lost some weight somehow.

Observations

• Drinking culture in Japan: we saw quite a few drunk people in the streets. Some of them at the parks. I had never really seen drunkards much in my home country (it could be because I don’t stay out late). When we walked by a bar area with our cooking instructor at 10am, he told us some of the people in them had been there overnight. At Inokashira park, we saw a lady dressed in office wear face planted on the ground. Her friends tried to help carry here elsewhere but her entire body was limp and almost lifeless.
• The Japanese sleep late: when we arrived, we were still on the train to our hotel at 11:50pm. But the train was still packed with salarymen in suits and many others. In fact, it seemed the later it was, the more crowded the trains.
• Foreigner influx and how they stick out: there were way more foreigners this time than the last I visited Japan. I tended to feel very uncomfortable when large groups of foreigners were around. I had to tell myself not to be hypocritical as I was a foreigner myself. But I suppose one reason is that there were many inconsiderate foreigners. Speaking loudly, making brash comments, and just not behaving like visitors. We saw a foreign couple locked in a head-to-toe embrace on a picnic mat in a park full of families. And they chose a spot right next to the footpath. Many foreigners also leave unkind Google reviews for places just because it’s not up to their expectations. I get it, we worked for our holiday and are paying customers, and there is often an innate tendency to feel entitled or complain when something isn’t up to our expectations. But I think it helps to remember that we are like visitors in someone’s home. Be self-aware, don’t speak loudly, note the traffic customs, where to stand on the escalators, how to behave etc.
• Japanese men have great hair: the Japanese men’s hairstyle feels frozen in time. I didn’t see the typical Korean-inspired center-parted hairstyles in Asian guys nowadays. And balding men were a small minority somehow. As someone whose hairline is slowly receding, I was envious to see many Japanese men have wavy long hair deep into their 60-70s! My wife commented that the women's hairstyles were more or less the same - dyed, curled etc. But the men were rocking so many styles!
• Physical shopping still matters: as the days went by, my wife and I began to covet the "made-in-Japan" label, we realised that we hadn't done such window shopping in years since online shopping became prevalent. I also recall people commenting that you could get these goods online anyway, so why bother shopping in Japan. Well, window shopping makes comparison easy, it allows you to ask for recommendations, and enables you to know the items's size, feel, and look on you (if buying fashion items). It also makes discovery of new items possible. I'm not a huge shopper or a foodie, but in Japan, it's worth it to be one. I suppose it's a blessing in disguise that our honeymoon got delayed 3 years, as we now know our post-marriage lifestyles and the items we'd need in the kitchen/around the house.
• Reading culture in Japan: in a week when I read reports that reading had declined in my home country, I was pleasantly surprised to see many people reading hard-copy books on the train, many of them even had leather book covers. Kinokuniya was also teeming with life.
• Idealisation of Japanese culture: Japan remains my favourite country to visit as a tourist, but I've come to see that Japanese culture - like any other culture - is flawed. Yes, their service culture is impeccable, especially when you're served by middle-aged super helpful and super kind ladies. But on every Japanese trip so far, I've always had at least one unkind or impatient service encounter. On a day-to-day basis, people don't really apologise if they bump into you, and may not give up their seats for the elderly too. My cooking teacher says the Japanese are extremely polite in person but would rant and give very bad reviews anonymously at home. I've come to just enjoy their products, service, and view of certain ways-of-life as a tourist, but stop short of idealising their culture. There are kind and unkind people in every culture. That said, I would still say on average, the Japanese may be more civic-minded (i.e. simply just more self-aware of how their actions are perceived by others).

I've decided not to mention the specific food places as far as possible because I think there's more than enough recommendations available elsewhere. I also think sometimes that we get a bit fomo if we build up too many must-go spots. Enjoy your trip and the process of discovering new places! But feel free to ask me more if you like.

Timestamps
All prices include US shipping and PayPal fees. Feel free to send me any reasonable offers, bundles will be heavily discounted and prioritized. Local pickup is also available in the metro ATL area.
Please comment before PMing if interested and no chats please. All items will most likely go out the next business day after purchase. Thank you for looking.

Item	Description	Price (Shipped)
Mc65 Black	Like new condition. Currently built but will come unbuilt with stock desoldered PCB and alu plate. Includes carrying case and brass + frosted PC badge for RGB goodness. Very nice feeling top mount with a low front height and a unique aesthetic with the badge + weight. I'll be happy to provide a sound test in PMs if interested. Price is dropped from my last post. Open to trading for Bias, 910 ME, or other similar-valued boards or possible with PP on my side depending on the trade.	$599/Trade for similar-valued boards
Noxary 378 Meteorite Gray	Flawless, A-stock. Includes 2 PCB's (1 brand new, 1 desoldered) and 2 plates (5mm PC + red alu). Gaskets are installed on the case. The gray ano is gorgeous in person and almost Apple space grey like. Selling for way below retail when factoring in the extras. Open to trades for boards like a Matrix Corsa or Bias, or even just a color swap to red.	$535/Color swap to red or trade for other boards
RS60 Red WKL w/ Hotswap H60 + Extras	Comes with a hotswap H60 (multi-layout support), brand new solder H60, and 2 plates (alu + PC). Nearly perfect condition except for two very minor marks near the USB port. Selling at well below retail especially factoring in the cost of the extras. Price is dropped from my last post.	$385
GMK Fuji Katakana Base + Spacebars	Like new, mounted a few times but it has less than an hour's worth of use. Spacebars are practically brand new. Open to trades for other GMK sets like Iceberg, Zooted, Beta, Analog Dreams, or others.	$155/Trade for other GMK sets
GMK Lavender Spacebars	Brand new and unused. Selling less than Space Cables extras.	$35
HammerWorks CRP R4 Kits	All brand new. Prices per kit are listed but the bundle is discounted and preferred. Modern Mac Icons (Beige) - $35, Blue Windows (Cross) - $11, R5 - $21	Individual kits in desc/$49 bundled
Keycult No. 1/65 PCB + UHMWPE/Half FR4 Plates	All brand new. The PCB is originally a Wilba solder PCB for the Rama Jules but will work fine on the 1/65. Also open to splitting the plates together as a bundle but not the PCB. Price is dropped from my last post.	$95 bundled/$57 for plates
Thermal60 SEQ2 Hotswap PCB + Rose Plate (brand new)	Both brand new and unused. Selling less than Rama even before shipping.	$95
Hiney H88C	Brand new and unused. North-facing, non-thin 1.6mm PCB's. Selling at below NK pricing. Price is dropped from my last post.	$45
Cloudline Full PC Plate	Brand new and unused. Selling at less than CK extras after shipping/taxes. Price is dropped from my last post.	$49
Vega POM Plate	Mounted with switches once or twice but like new. Universal layout. Price is dropped from my last post.	$25
Alchemy Artisan Box (Hard Black/Brass)	Used on my monitor riser for a few months. It has some marks from removing and mounting artisans due to the hard anodizing (same as KC tray) but nothing too noticable once filled. I've tried to clean off some of them with alcohol and they seem to come out with some effort. The brass badge has a little patina and the bottom brass piece has some marks from moving around. Selling at my original cost.	$155
CYSM Viva Magenta Keyby	Selling at less than retail. Brand new and never mounted. I'm also open to trading for other Keybys. Price is dropped from my last post.	$95/Trade for other Keybys
GMK Dualshot Namong Cosmo Rudory	Like new, mounted once. It's a near-perfect match with Dualshot but I prefer Cherry profile artisans. Price is dropped from my last post, now at retail.	$115
Asero GMK Arch White Alu Artisan	Like new, mounted once. Selling below retail. Price is dropped from my last post.	$59
GMK Aegyptus Rama Tray	Brand new and unused. Selling at my GB price after shipping. Price is dropped from my last post.	$55

Also looking to buy the below:

WTB
TGR 910 ME Solder PCB

Hey y'all I'm a new rider, just today put my first 100 miles on my MT03!
Regrettably, I haven't gotten insurance yet and now that I'm finally riding more, I'm looking for suggestions and how much y'all are paying so that I know I'm getting a good deal.
I was interested in looking at this Voom insurance that had a sponsored ad on Fortnine's channel. But so far as I can tell it's the exact opposite of "low cost." I like the idea of the pay per mile because I live in Ohio and I wouldn't be riding more than 4 or 5 months at a time, but when the baseline they're quoting me is $200 + another $1.50 per mile, that seemed completely outrageous to me.
Geico came back at around 90 ish a month. Still working my way through the usual suspects but I'd like a little advice from more seasoned riders before I pull the trigger on anything.

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Timestamp / Pics / Vids
RF 16mm Lens - $175 Shipped
I bought this and haven't used it much and deciding to sell it.
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Canon TL w/ Tokina 28-70 Lens - $50 Shipped
This camera has a working lightmeter but there are some specks in the viewfinder and the rubber that controls the zooming on the lens is loose. It just needs to be squeezed in to adjust the focal length
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Sigma 35mm ART EF Mount - $525 Shipped
This lens is amazingly sharp and very bright at f/1.4. There is a tiny cosmetic imperfection on the side of the lens as shown in the pictures / video. I'm trying to go to all RF mount so want to get rid of this
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EOS 3 Film SLR - $350 Shipped
This camera is awesome, it has AF that focuses where you look and is basically like a DSLR just for film. Its also EF mount which is a plus and I mostly just used a nifty fifty or the sigma lens on this camera. Its a beast and I'll include the battery with it. In excellent condition.
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Canon EF to RF Drop in Filter Adapter + VND, CPL, UV filters - $400 Shipped or if bundled with Sigma take it for $250
This comes with a V-ND, CPL, and UV filter and a skin that is applied on it. This is a killer deal because the adapter with just a CPL is $300 and with the VND it is $400, so you're getting 3 filters for the price of just the adapter and one filter.
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Canon Sure Shot TELE - $50 Shipped
This is a neat little point and shoot that has two fixed focal lengths of 40mm and 70mm and a built in flash and AF, also has a soft filter built in. Excellent condition
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Benro TAD18CB1 Adventure Carbon Fiber Tripod - $225 Shipped
This comes with a B1 tripod head, used very lightly. Let me know if you have any questions

Okay, first some background. I (39m if that's relevant) was very active in community theatre several years ago. I enjoy acting, think I'm at least decent at it, and it's how I met the majority of my friends. But I moved to a new state in early 2020, and between the pandemic, starting a new job, and unfamiliarity with what's local, I still haven't done any theatre since before I moved.
I saw a post recently in a local audition announcement group on FB that there are open auditions for a new musical written by a local author. I am really torn on if I should audition or not, and would love feedback.
Here are the pros and cons as I see it:
PROS:

• It's a show. After four years off stage just about anything sounds good.
  
• It's a relatively large cast. I work from home, and haven't really made any close friends since moving here. Working with a large group of theatre people seems like it would be a good way to make some friends.
  
• It's a new piece. I'd really like to write my own show someday and I think it could be both interesting and useful to experience that from an acting standpoint.
  
• Because it's a new piece, the writer is open to adjusting the music to match the range/talents of those who audition. This will make a little more sense when you read my first con, but basically I think it makes it slightly more likely that I'd get in if I audition.
  

CONS

• It's a musical. While I love musicals, they're not my strong suit performance wise. I can carry a tune okay, but I'm much more of an actor than a singer (and don't get me started on dancing). The audition notice says that there's a good number of predominantly speaking roles (vs. singing) so that may not be a big concern, but it is on my mind.
  
• Distance. The notice doesn't say where rehearsals are, but both the auditions and performances are about 20 miles from me (30ish minutes by car one way) so my guess is it'll be a fair amount of driving. I've driven more for shows in the past, but always when I knew the theatre group and the show beforehand. And even when everything about the show is great, the commute can be tiring and expensive.
  
• It's a new piece. I've been involved in one new musical before, in college, and frankly it was kind of a horrendous experience, both in terms of the material and the creative team. Not saying this would be a repeat, but once bitten and all that. For anything it might be worth, this doesn't seem to be an established group mounting the production; I think the author may be funding it herself.
  
• My health. I had a health scare at the end of 2022 (anemia) and while I've taken large steps in recovery, I'm still a bit lethargic, and there is some concern from my doctors that the problem hadn't been solved. I have a procedure scheduled soon that will clear some things up in that regard, but it won't take place until just after the auditions. I honestly don't think they'll find anything worrying or in need of intrusive treatment, but I won't know for sure until I actually have it (and get the results back, which could take a few weeks, I've been told).
  

So, what do you think? I've literally gone back and forth several times just writing this post. If I'm cast, it will be a three month time commitment, so I'm not taking it lightly. I welcome your thoughts and insight. Thanks!

Hey all!
I'm working on switching up my kit, so I've got a bunch of sweet gear looking for a new home. Each item includes a description, price and condition rating. I'll cover shipping and PayPal G&S fees on all transactions. Bundles welcome, but not required. I may also consider some potential trades, please see my wishlist at the bottom of the post. PM if interested!
Photos of gear here: https://imgur.com/a/8pEwmLU
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$850 - Fuji X-Pro2 - Black - 8.5+ Condition: Works perfectly, looks great. Minor scratches along the top plate, normal wear elsewhere. Includes body cap, generic thumb grip, wrist strap, OEM charger, OEM battery, and one generic battery. No box.
$800 - Ricoh GR III + GW-4 Wide Conversion Lens - 8.5 Condition: Lens looks perfect. Body has some minor scuffs, mainly around the front barrel from being carried in my pocket. Minor brassing on the hotshoe mount. PLEASE NOTE - Rear dial does not seem to function properly - however this has never been an issue for me as I use the front command dial for everything. The GW-4 looks pristine to my eye, but I've never used it. Includes wrist strap, blue lens ring, GW-4 Wide Conversion Lens + hood (sorry, no adapter), 2 OEM batteries, box and documentation. It's weird, I've carried this camera almost daily for 2 years, but still don't actually use it enough. I've just never gelled with the focal length enough to be my daily carry.
$500 - Fuji 16mm f/1.4 WR - 9 Condition: Glass appears flawless to my eye. There's a small nick on the aperture ring and one on the barrel. Includes Haoge hood and cap, rear cap and OEM lens pouch. No box. Beautiful lens that I just don't use often enough to justify keeping.
$325 - Fuji 23mm f/2 WR- 9 Condition: Glass appears flawless to my eye. Minor wear on the focus ring. Includes OEM hood and caps, box and documentation. This is my go-to focal length. It's why I keep bouncing back and forth between this lens and the X100 series. If I could justify (or afford) having both, I would.
$300 - Fuji 35mm f/2 WR- 9 Condition: Glass appears flawless to my eye. Minor wear on the focus ring. Includes OEM hood and caps, box and documentation. I love this lens so much I still have another copy of it.
$500 - Fuji 56mm f/1.2 (non WR version) - 9 Condition: Glass appears flawless to my eye. Minor wear on the focus and aperture rings, as well as scuffs on the hood. Includes OEM hood and both caps, box, documentation, OEM lens pouch and a Fotga variable ND filter. Another beautiful lens that I just don't use often enough to justify keeping.
$125 - Samyang 85mm 1.4 (Fuji X-Mount, version 1) - 9+ Condition: I really can't see any flaws on the glass or body. Includes OEM hood, caps and box. This is a surprisingly sharp lens for the price. And a great option for someone who's looking for a cheap telephoto option or just wants to experiment more with manual focus.
$60 - Yongnuo 560III Speedlight + Wireless 560-TX Trigger - 8.5 Condition: Looks good enough and works flawlessly. This is a somewhat older speedlight for the Fuji system, so it's only operable manually and does not work with HSS. That said, it's a solid little bugger. Just tested it, and the wireless works great.
Otherwise, I've got a limited history here. Only one confirmed trade, but sold some items back in the days before the bot. That said, I do have 100% positive feedback over at the Fred Miranda forums. And that profile points back to my reddit account. https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/viewprofile.php?Action=viewprofile&username=stoutvisual
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Potential trades:
X100V, X-E4 (HAHAHA, I know) and/or X-T3.
Fuji 18mm f/2, 33mm 1.4, 50mm f2, 55-200

Time stamp https://imgur.com/a/VtrdRAk
Up for sale are a few mounts First is a B-Square shotgun saddle mount for a benelli nova. Used but in good shape. $30 shipped
Second is a catch and release badger ordnance C1 J arm with RMR plate. Good shape. Never used by me. $60 shipped.
Last is a Leupold 30 mm offset cantilever mount. Uses torx bit screws. Used with a little salt. $80 shipped.
Payment method is PayPal G&S
Pm please

Hey folks,
I'm going to be running a 1:1 CPR game for my wife soon. This will be a one-shot that will hopefully lead into a full campaign. As such, I want it to be the coolest version of Cyberpunk that I can, so I can hopefully stop running D&D 5E. Ergo, I figured this community would be a good one to proofread my intended design and offer suggestions. I've got thick skin; all advice in good faith is good advice to me.
Context: We've never played RED before, though my wife is a fan of the Cyberpunk 2077 game. She is interested in taking the Nomad role out for a spin, so I grabbed the Nomad pregen off the R. Tal website. I've spent the last few days reading the book cover to cover and running some mock combats with myself (you are allowed to make one (1) joke about me playing with myself before I inundate you with compliments - you have been warned!).
However, she's going to want to create her own character if we decide the system's worth playing, so the pregen character won't be played after this session.
Adventure Summary: Arasaka's back in town, baby! A small team of Arasaka employees have infiltrated back into Night City and set up a small covert base in the Unreclaimed Perimeter. Their goal is to locate and kidnap small children who exhibit certain neural mutations that allow them to be used as "Suns" - so-called because they resist Black ICE programs like R.A.B.I.D.s. By kidnapping and training them, the Corporation can start re-building the Internet with a complete monopoly. To this end, Arasaka mercenaries took out the local gangers, buying off some and murdering the rest. The bought-out gangers are now working local security for the Arasaka base.
Arasaka's forces consist of the bought-out gangers (stats as boosterganger, CPR, p 412), Arasaka mercenaries (stats as security operative, CPR, p 413, fanatically loyal and will fight to the death), and a single Arasaka cyber-ninja (stats as security officer, CPR, p 415, fanatically loyal and will fight to the death).
Setup: Player's caravan has just arrived on the outskirts of Night City. The leadership has asked her to grab a couple of local edgerunners and secure the perimeter, just to make sure nothing unpleasant has set up shop in the area while the caravan was peregrinating.
She'll have two NPCs with her, a Solo (Rebekah, mid-30's, gymnast, favors melee weapons and krav maga, which I'm using as reskinned karate) and a Netrunner (Whestley, 13 year old Black kid with a mullet and a gap in his teeth). These two are bullet sponges so I can use more mooks and also a way to show off how important hacking is to the setting. I run these guys like Dragon Age's companions, so they're not taking spotlight from the PC, but rather enabling them to get through obstacles they wouldn't otherwise be able to.
Scene 1: Briefing from caravan leadership, introduction to her companions. Head out into the perimeter in her car. Build paranoia by:

• Highlighting that there used to be other minor gangs in this area, but someone's cleared them out recently (info from Rebekah)
• Mentioning that the local data streams are all being misdirected to avoid giving away a single destination, indicating that someone is using a lot of data traffic, and that the user has resources to cloak their presence (if there's a better way to phrase this in-world, let me know; info from Whestley)
• Finding a recent site of murdered gangers; nearby is a dead merc (no roll to notice)
  • Weaponstech DV 9 to see that the merc is carrying an Arasaka WSA autopistol
  • Reveal Object DV 13 to notice the Arasaka logo tattooed on the dead merc's neck
  • Free frag grenade, plus 140 eddies (mercs carried bribe money to recruit local gangers)

Revelations: Someone is out there, with suspected ties to Arasaka, and looking to secure the location for some purpose that may be inimical to the Nomads. If they report in, the leadership tells them to follow up and find out what exactly is going on, but that they'll have a few outriders mounted up and ready to go if the team runs into trouble.
Scene 2: The team goes on the hunt. There are a few ways to try tracking these guys down. The player might ask Whestley to trace those data streams, or they might start asking any of the remaining residents if they know anything about these newcomers. Alternatively, they might hide out and simply observe.
Whestley can't locate the base without unmasking those data streams, which requires a network key from a merc commo device. Never let an NPC solve a major problem for the player.
The locals know where the base is, but they also know that the mercs send out patrols. Lately, those patrols have consisted of a few local gangers who spend more time at Pat's (nearby saloon) than on actual reconaissance. Those patrols pass by about once every four to six hours.
Hiding and observing, the PCs watch the patrol stop to hassle the nearby residents; apparently these guys want the remaining residents to vacate the neighborhood. When the residents refuse, one of the patrol starts beating a little old lady, which should be a fairly good indicator that this dude is Not A Good Guy.
(To be clear, this patrol is three of the bought-out gangers in a dune buggy; with surprise and luck, they won't even get a shot off at the team).
Revelations: Regardless of how they handle things, the crew at least knows where the base is, even if they try to just tail the patrol back to the base.
If they jump the patrol, they grab a commo device, a base pass, a dune buggy, and a crude map showing the base's location, in addition to two shotguns and half a dozen grenades. In addition, all three of the patrolling gangers are sporting brand-new Arasaka WSA autopistols.
Whestley can use the commo device to accomplish 1d3 exploits getting them inside (since I'm not learning the actual Netrunning rules until I have a PC who wants to use them, I'm basically going to give Whestley a limited-use "hack" that can remove a single tech-based problem), as well as pinpointing the base entrance.
If they save the old lady, the locals will be happy to tell the team about a few kids who've gone missing in the area; one turned up a few weeks back dead in a ditch with needle marks and surgery scars.
Scene 3: Assaulting the base! The team can do some light recon on the base perimeter. They find overhead drones (spotting for the automated grenade launcher), an automated grenade launcher (more than enough to total any vehicle that comes within 400m), and a gateway to the subterranean base (which can only be opened by a base pass).
In addition, there's three gangers sitting near a campfire, playing Go Fish. They won't be fooled by disguises; they know each member of their gang by face (PCs know this).
A ventilation shaft cut into the side of the base gate lets the PCs avoid engaging the defenses, though the drones will still spot them unless they take some effort to counter thermal imaging.
Skills and relevant information:

• DV 15 Basic Tech: "That's a VTOL-capable base gate; there might be a ventilation shaft that could be another way in!"
• DV 11 AV Tech OR Aero Tech: "Those drones carry thermals; they're going to see us coming unless we counter that capability."
• DV 13 Electronic Security: "The base pass also emits a friendly IFF signal, which will prevent the grenade launcher from firing until someone overrides it." (the obvious source of an override code is the three gangers outside)
• DV 17 Wilderness Survival: "There are some escaped designer birds roosting nearby. Panicking them into taking flight could trick that grenade launcher into spuriously firing, or potentially crash one or two of the drones." (DV 15 Animal Handling to trick the launcher, DV 20 Animal Handling to down those drones; +3 to roll if succeeded on Wilderness Survival roll first)
• DV 15 Perception: "Fresh divots in the sand here - something only recently took off from the base gate - an AV?"

Inside, most of the Arasaka mercs are away on a snatch and grab, so once the PCs are past the gateway, resistance is sparse. There are secondary cameras inside the gateway, so the Arasaka cyber-ninja knows they're coming 5 minutes after the team enters the complex. If the gangers are still alive on the surface, they will head down the base gateway and try to pin the team down in the hangar.
Once inside, there are four main areas: the hangar, the labs, the barracks, and the command center.
The Hangar is the first one up, and is mostly empty. There's three slots for AVs, two of which are empty, and a launch area in the middle. Two small offices adjoin the launch area, and a door leads onward. There's a lot of gas the Nomads could use, along with an AV that's been left with its engine in mid-rebuild. A small map of the base is located in one of the offices, drawn on Arasaka-branded notebook paper. The computers are for maintenance and solitaire, and have limited hookups to the rest of the network (if they take 10 minutes, Whestley can gain 1 exploit).
From here, there are two paths forward. One leads to the labs, one leads to the barracks. In the barracks, two Arasaka mercs are dressing rapidly (half armor). The team can refill on ammo, and there's one dose of speedheal available. Two flashbangs are next to a poster of a J-Pop idol singer. The team can proceed to the command center, the labs, or go back to the hangar.
In the labs, there are four children being run against a single R.A.B.I.D program. Whestley is appalled, and one of the kids dies in front of the PCs, thrashing in the grip of malicious code. Whestley can spend 3 exploits to lock the RABID away from the kids, long enough for the team to unhook these kids and get them out.
Also in here is a cyberdeck chip that gives Whestley 1 exploit, a dose of speedheal (in case they missed the one in the barracks), and a laser katana (as Heavy Melee Weapon, allows the wielder to add their DEX stat to damage dealt for 1 minute per day).
As soon as the PCs either save the kids, or decide not to, the cyber-ninja strikes. Accompanied by two mercs, the cyberninja goes for Rebekah first. The ninja tries to break the legs of any kid they manage to unhook, the better to slow the party down. The mercs are very careful not to fire if the kids are anywhere near their targets, so they may close to melee range.
The ninja and the mercs fight to the death.
Once the ninja and mercs are dead, an alert is triggered - the other mercs are only 15 minutes out and returning fast!
In the command center, the PCs can find all the relevant documentation for the project...locked behind an Arasaka-created infinity code that requires a code-key to decrypt (only found in the Arasaka HQ in Tokyo). If the ninja has not previously struck, they will attack the PCs as the PCs enter this area (see the labs for details on the cyber-ninja battle).
Aftermath: Once the Nomads are apprised of the threat, they "Nope!" right the f*** out of there. It's not their problem and they want nothing to do with Arasaka, dead kids, and Black ICE experiments. Anything the crew discovered gets turned over to NCPD.

We've been traveling for about a week, taking the less trafficked route Natasha and other traders of her ilk use. Where the grasses are tall and at times brush against us gently.
Some of the grass and flowers are now seeding and being replaced by others, bunchier and shorter, and requiring less water and more sun as summer makes itself felt across the prairie.
Open camps and low fires are the norm these days as wildfire is a constant threat. Not without it's benefits, as camps are easier to break and the mounts have plenty to eat.
About midday we notice smoke on the horizon. First real sign of anything. We approach cautiously but soon realize the fight is long over. Arrows and a few spears are left behind. This was an ambush. The wagons have been stripped of their goods, but it is obvious these were cargo haulers for traders, and Natasha recognizes the decorations on the spears. The concern is plain on her face, she is very worried at what this might mean.
Most of us thought it might be bandits or possibly even centaurs by the unshod hoof-prints scattered about, but no Natasha tells us, these are humans, and they are beyond their borders. She explains there are two tribes along this area, an aggressive huntegatherer society. Mobile, and territorial where strangers are seldom welcome. And the peaceful tribe, the polar opposite. They are farmers and traders mostly. And this is their land. So now it becomes clear why Natasha is so worried, could they have been overrun in the last year?
The next morning, Natasha announces she will be splitting off to check on the peaceful tribe. Aaron quickly chimes up that he will follow her and after some discussion Callion, Guthlac, and myself agree to follow despite the resources to be had in the city should we stay with the circus. I give Giddy the opportunity to say goodbye to J.J., the striped horse, and meet up with the others.
It's a beautiful partly cloudy morning with a little breeze. We approach by a seldom used path. Grass has grown up to and in between the ruts, but the dirt is packed enough to keep the trail visible. Meter high grass as far as the eye can see, with the now normal hillocks rolling along the prairie. The grasses just beginning to fade from green under the early summer sun.
To our right on one of those hills two figures can be seen. Watching. Natasha warns us to just keep moving, and don't engage with them. We find a relatively flat area and settle in for the night. Aaron counts about dozen circling but the watches are pretty quiet.
When we get to the camp of the peaceful tribe, Natasha is greeted by a man who looks as if he owns the place, and maybe he does. We are introduced and taken to a circle near a cooking fire. We are fed traditional food of the tribe, a flat and fried bread, along with a stew of game with squash and beans.
It is here we first hear of the creatures they describe as " those who eat us in the night". Flesh eaters are not unheard of, most beasts eat what they hunt.
We get to do a little trading and hear tales of the warriors in the group, and we pass into sleep.
I awake just after dawn to the sounds and smells of food being prepared. Mostly portions of what was not finished the night before, but just as good this morning, distracted as we were by Natasha and her findings in the night sky. They tell her that a meeting with the aggressive tribe isn't a bad idea, so she arranges to have a peace offering be brought along.
We gather ourselves and ride out to where the aggressive tribe can clearly see us and she raises the offering into the air. One of the watchers approaches and another disappears. We are escorted to the war chiefs camp. A rough and ready gathering of mostly men living in stick and hide tents. Easily setup and put away befitting their nomadic lifestyle.
This time a man comes out of a large tent and greets Natasha. Seeing the object he takes us inside the tent and we are presented to the war chief of this band.
The chief and Natasha go through some ceremonial greetings and having been presented the offering he agreed to to speak with us.
We sit and tea is given to us. A light floral taste sits on top of an earthy finish. Refreshing and mildly soothing. Given the constant on the move life of these folks this I imagine is perfect.
We hear the war chief explain how the "eaters" have been attacking, hunting really, the tribe. Scouts, a testing party, then they come by the hundreds. The tribe moves, the eaters send out a few scouts to find them, then they attack in waves again.
Finally they had to move onto the other tribes land and still they are harassed by the scouting groups. Soon they will be attacked again.
We also learned that they dragged off all the dead, even their own. Cannibals.
Natasha chastised the man for killing traders on the borrowed land, where trading is protected. He chaffed at first, but acquiesced and agreed to stop. The little gnome woman is really a force of nature when need be.
The next morning we learn three guards have disappeared. A guide, took us out to the spot where they should have been. Large boot tracks were found and Callion spots some blood in the grass. So they didn't just walk away.
The war band did have a shaman, but he proved less than effective in battle, as most of his magic relies on having sight, so he was sent away. In a bid to find and speak with the shaman Callion provided our guide with a direction finding dagger.
And while the man knew the shaman, and did know what a metal dagger was, he had no personal experience with magical devices. And as soon as the dagger began to spin the man panicked. Callion had to convince him it was not possessed, and would not hurt him.
This did take a little doing, but the task was accomplished. We learn the obvious. The shaman headed straight, more or less, to the high chiefs camp. I don't blame him, I wouldn't want to be out here among the cannibals either. So we pack up our gear and make the five hour journey there.
Once we arrive we are escorted to the high chief who points out the shaman. The meeting goes well and we learn what the cannibals look like. Average build, white, blind eyes, rags for clothes, sharp white teeth, scaly skin, and they use metal weapons. Well not cannibal zombies. Not sure if I would prefer that.
The last major fight the tribes warriors killed hundreds of them, but the waves of creatures kept coming.
At first light we ride back and by noon we arrive back at the warriors camp. A group of five creatures had attacked in the night, three were felled, the other two broke and ran. A larger group of creatures will attack tonight with out fail now that they have been found.
We devise a plan to find the creatures camp, divide and conquer. We will attempt to draw a large portion into an area and hit them with an immobilizing cloud of funk. And Natasha will use the surrounding grasses to ensnare another portion, while we pick off the rest.
The creatures being blind puts us magically at a disadvantage like the shaman and a fair amount of discussion was had.
We get lucky and only about ten creatures come out to attack tonight. The funky cloud was a great success, disabling their sense of smell they froze and milled about unable to find escape. Natasha's spell worked like a charm as well and we had the advantage in the first moments. My magic missiles helped but didn't score any kills, yet. The others are having better luck and suddenly we are left with only one.
As planned we ignore it and let it get free. It grabs the nearest dead body and bolts. We wait just a moment before giving chase, keeping it just in view.
After a run of about a mile it disappears. A diligent search is now on. Without any trees or bushes to hide in, there just anywhere to go. A moment of thrashing the grass a yelp goes out and Natasha has fallen into a six foot hole. Aaron leaps down and hoists the gnome up, before pulling himself out as well. A little panicked she urges us to leave quickly.
We race back to our steeds and ride out to where the war chief has set up his new camp. There Natasha divulges the cause of her alarm. She could hear the voices and sickening sounds of the creatures. We have found a nest.

Hello everyone,
I'm currently renovating my basement and I'm finally at the electrical breaker box. This house is a mess and this box is no exception.
Regardless of how messy the wiring is in it, I'm at the stage where I must now put it back on the wall.
Currently, it's sitting on a little table I made for it when I tore down the wall, but it's 90% holding because of the pipe that goes through my basement wall for the main power line.
All house wiring come either from left or right side of the panel, requiring me to leave space around. The main come from the back of the unit and the second ground is on top.
There is one 100a that is left and very hard to move. I even wanted to reroute it cause it goes very weird way but I abandon that, these cable are too tick, I have a hard time moving them.
The mounting hole are 4 holes in the back. I currently have about 3/4in spacing between my insulation and the back of the unit. I though about putting 1x6 across the stud at the height of the mounting screws behind the stud (I have some spacing between the studs and the insulation because basement wall aren't straight). Then, I would screw on the 1x6. But is 1in powerfull enough to hold the electric panel?
Thank you
Reference https://imgur.com/gallery/C7m6c1T