iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Sometimes you have to pause in discussing your mutual lover's self-sacrificing tendencies to point out your metamour's gaping lack of self-worth slash deathwish u_u

"It would be foolish to let it bother me. I'd have done the same thing, after all. I have my flaws, but," a reflexive flash of a smile at her, "I *am* just as much a knight of Mondstadt. I'd like to think I've learned a few things about chivalry."

"Kaeya, cutie, the entire time I've known you you've been looking for an opportunity to die for something you think is worth more than you are," Lisa tells him. "It's not the same thing."

He gapes at her a second, eye wide, before he pulls his shoulders up and straightens and closes into himself, mouth and eye both curving in a false smile. "That's quite an assumption, don't you think?

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 09/10/2026

I DID however have time to yesterday so I'm taking five minutes to at least reread what I got down then. This fic wasn't supposed to have a fourth sex scene but this sets up the later intercrural and orgasm denial later or something IDK it just hit me over the head and I had to write it

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

wible-wobbling SO happily rn between "local slowly-reforming criminal escapes abuser and gets found familied" and "guy with a girlfriend whose parents he helped get together now has to face those parents" and having so much fun. self-indulgence is IN this fall

"When's your birthday, Mr. Balor?" Reina asks him. "I'd be happy to make you something."

Balor freezes with his fork halfway from his plate. For a moment, surrounded by this family's good cheer, he recalls a snatch of song, the voice of a woman whose face he no longer remembers raised in a silly little birthday tune. That fades at once, though, into Wheedle's hands on him, sliding under his shirt as he murmurs into his ear about a *birthday present*. He takes a deep, deep breath and pushes the memory back again. That's not his birthday, anyway, just the one Wheedle had made up and told him to tell the Guild clerk so that he could be signed as an apprentice. If he ever knew the actual date, it's long lost.

He has to tell them something, though. The moment is stretching out; he can see Reina's smile starting to fade into uncertainty. Balor deliberately shakes his head, laughs, and tells her, grabbing for inspiration, "It's the tenth of Summer. I was just thinking, I've never seen it done, but if anyone could make a curry cake, I'm sure it would be you."

"Oh! You like curry?" Reina asks, her face clearing again. "You should have said! I haven't made curry for weeks, but I have everything I need for it in the cupboard."

"You think I was expecting this? I got home and suddenly she was just-" Varka starts to raise his hands in the air, realizes he's about to sketch out a vague shape that Seamus certainly won't want to see even vaguely, and drops them again. "She was a grown-up, gorgeous, commanding woman. I know she's your kid, but she wasn't going to be a kid forever."

"When you got home," Seamus repeats. "There was no inkling of this before? Not, perhaps, [ten] years ago?"

Aw, shit. Of course. Varka has no idea whom Jean might or might not have told about her own youthful crush and his failed attempt to blight it, but he's told one person and one only. Impetuously, without thinking, reeling with surprise and dismay and crashing into the office of the one person he knew he could trust with all his deepest doubts and innermost uncertainties, never registering until the words had already left his mouth that maybe Seamus wasn't the right person to tell that Varka had been propositioned by *his daughter*.

He'd justified it to himself at the time with the thought that, well, a parent ought to know. Now the comfort of that justification shrivels into dust.

100

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

also feat. Balor 🤝 Valen: the priority is that the medicine gets where it needs to go

"What do I owe you?" Valen asks, reaching for her purse, as he packs the bottles back into the box just as carefully as before.

"For the lot on your list, one thousand, six hundred tesserae. For the substitutes, take them gratis for now, and only pay me if they work."

"You can afford that?"

He smiles at her. "It's amazing how low prices go when you aren't giving the Guild their cut. I've already made my margins on your list."

"Have you," she says, but she's smiling. Picking up the box, she gives him another nod. "I appreciate the effort. And the discount."

Then she's off, heading towards Merri's stall, where Reina is presenting her with some kind of birthday treat. Balor watches her go with satisfaction. He'd made a good first choice; hammer down what she needs on a regular basis, and he imagines he can get her and his Algian supplier into a contract within the month. The goodwill from that will get him far in a tight-knit place like that.

He does wonder, though, if she was just speaking liberally of the non-Guild prices when she mentioned a discount, or if she'd actually figured that out.

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

I am having tremendous fun with this so far.

All the same, he gets back tired and sore and, more to the point, completely and miserably filthy.

"Balor!" Josephine exclaims when he walks into the inn, nearly dropping her mop. "There you are! We've been so worried. What happened?"

"A little trouble on the road. Nothing I couldn't handle," Balor tells her, shrugging it off with a smile. "I would hate to get all this mud on your nice clean sheets, though, so I was going to go see if the bathhouse is open."

"I'm sure it will be. Make sure you're back for dinner, though. This is the third night in a row Reina's made curry for you."

Balor pauses halfway up the stairs. "She did?"

"You came back on Wednesday last time, so we thought you would this week too."

"Oh, I'm sorry to have put her out."

"Hemlock and I like curry enough to have eaten it anyway. Just make sure you ask her for it tonight."

"I will," Balor promises her. He ducks into his room long enough to set down the more valuable and fragile goods he doesn't want to leave in the cart overnight and collect a clean set of clothes to change into, then heads out to the bathhouse.

There's a dog waiting for him, but no sign of Juniper except for the sign on the desk. Balor looks at it and sighs.

There's nothing he can do about the oil already in the bathwater, but at least it's a cinnamon scent, and not the heavy florals Wheedle had liked to bathe him in.

The baths had always been luxurious, and Wheedle uncomfortably, disorientingly gentle. Whether he was washing an urchin's crust off Balor's skin on their first meeting, or wiping off whatever marks were left by the business partners he'd asked Balor to entertain, or simply making sure that he was well rid of the dust of the day before sliding into Wheedle's bed, he had always touched Balor like he was a gem he was polishing, or an ancient coin to be wiped clean. Like he was valuable.

When he was younger, when he'd first come into Wheedle's hands, nine or ten or eleven years old--they'd said he was twelve when he signed the apprenticeship papers, which *should* have made him nine that first gentle time, but Wheedle always talked about how starvation stunted growth--Balor had convinced himself that was affection. That Wheedle cared for him for his own sake, in his greedy wheedling way. It had taken him a humiliatingly long time to realize that Wheedle valued him the same way as any other of his treasures, as an object to be mortgaged at need, worth exactly as much care as it took to keep him useful as collateral.

100

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

quote reteeet with a pic of your favorite pokemon (wrong answers only)

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

I need to get back to the now year-old #luckaejean WIP I foolishly started posting as I wrote (there's a reason I don't do this), not actually because I feel bad about the delay or anything but because I'm two chapters away from being able to link this edit I made in the author's notes:

100

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

The end goal of this one is dragonfucking, but Jean can get yeeted into her own benevolent kidnapping first. :>c

"...get some fresh air," Dvalin can hear Varka saying as he wends his way up from the lake, over a rooftop and around a windmill. "Feel that breeze?" He leans out of the open window of his office and grins wide when he looks down and sees them coming. "C'mere, take a sec."

"If we finished this letter, you could take the afternoon off and go on outside," Jean says, coming up beside him. Then she sees them, too, and her mouth draws tight. "We really must-"

"Nah, I think *you* need some outdoor time first. And these guys agree." Varka catches her around her back before she can retreat, reaches down out of Dvalin's line of sight, and hefts her up and over the sill, into the air. She yips in alarm.

Atop his back, Barbatos laughs and strums his lyre. Jean has no glider on, of course, not in the office, but Dvalin lets his Anemo surge, and the wind rises at Barbatos' call, and Jean's won Vision glows bright as she propels herself away from the stone of the wall. She lands on Dvalin's back, easy and light.

"Don't forget to thank the Tianquan for the harbor records!" she shouts.

"I can write a letter, Jean! Don't bring her back until tomorrow. I promised Seamus she'd get at least twenty-four hours off. I don't know what he'll do to me if she doesn't, but I know I won't like it!"

They're not doing this for *him*, but Dvalin only rumbles in counterpoint to Barbatos' cheerful assent and twists upwards, turning away from the window before she can get it into her head to try and leap back. He makes sure he's well away from the city before he spreads his wings in earnest. Barbatos' lyre sings again, and a wind arises for him to catch, speeding them towards the coast.

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

There is a Tumblr post out there that reads something like "if you don't suck the strap what even is the point" and it lives in my head rent-free.

Diluc drops gracefully to his knees, catches her hip, and takes the shaft in hand, leaning in exactly as he would with Kaeya.

"Are you-?" Jean shivers with a rush of heat, but says anyway, "You don't have to. I won't feel it."

"Oh, no, he has to." Kaeya's amusement doesn't quite hide how intently he's watching.

Diluc rolls his eyes. "As if you don't want to."

"Naturally." Kaeya gives a flourishing little half-bow. "But I'll be generous. You can go first."

"Gracious of you," Diluc says, deadpan, and leans the rest of the way in.

110

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

if the thing that breaks through my writing malaise is some period cunnilingus with a guy I am blithely making as canine as possible, then honestly that's *hilariously* on-brand

"I'm afraid I'm not feeling well."

"Oh." He stops short, sounding disconcerted. Then he shifts his grip, hand sliding to spread wide across her stomach, right over the ache between her hips. "Monthlies are still that rough on you, huh?"

"How did you know?"

"Uh. Haha, well, about that...." He lets go, stepping back; Jean steadies herself and turns, trying not to miss his bulk at her back. The Grand Master runs a sheepish hand through his hair. "You know the whole thing where I had Boreas' soul in me for a little while? It might've left a few pawprints behind. I always had a good nose, but it's gotten a *lot* sharper."

The blush this time isn't anything as pleasant as ardent heat, just a sheer wash of embarrassment and shame. "You can smell it?"

"The blood, yeah." He shrugs. "Hey, don't look like that. Wolf stuff, right? It doesn't smell *bad* or anything. Really good, actually. It's been a real struggle focusing on anything else since I got that first whiff this morning. Which doesn't mean we've gotta do anything, if it's hitting you that hard," he adds quickly, hands up. "But I've had a few women tell me a drink helps loosen things up, and you never did finish that bottle of wine from the other night, so you could at least come up and have some with me before you head home."

Jean opens her mouth to refuse; she's heard the same from friends, but all wine during her courses has ever done for her is make her lightheaded and even more likely to faint. Then his first words catch up with the last, and curiosity pushes practicality aside. "You- the smell- Are you saying it's... appealing?"

Not something she ever would have said, nor has heard from another lover. Neither Eula nor Lisa had been squeamish in the way Jean had been told a man would be, but their willingness to touch her in her courses--and Jean's to return the favor for Eula, having learned how such intimacy could ease the ache--had been just that, willingness and affection. They'd certainly lacked the intently focused hunger in the Grand Master's eyes.

"Why wouldn't it be? I always liked it on women even before this, when I got close enough. Now that 'close enough' is across the room, it's even better. On you, anyway. I mean, I noticed it on Phonia and Elowen this week, so I can tell with anyone, but wow, *you* smell.... Like I said, I've had a lot of trouble focusing today."

He's still looking at her the same way he had this morning, the same way he had that first night, with an intensity of desire that makes crystalflies spiral in her stomach. The tightness between her legs was already there, coming with her courses as it always does and not necessarily bearing any desire or pleasure with it, but the shiver in her gut at that look is making it feel promising instead of just another part of that whole ache.

120

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 05/06/2026

I sat down in the least comfortable seat in the house to ensure I got up quickly.

A tuxedo cat, curled up asleep on a bench, with her head resting on a sitting human's thigh.

030

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

(and the unreasonable anger, of course:)

"Because you were too afraid of losing her, too?" Lisa asks, more sharply than she intended. "How *did* that work out for you, cutie?"

All she can think about is how Jean had spun those fantasies, delicately never saying *'our wedding,'* barely even feeling Lisa out, so clearly afraid that she, with all her duties and burdens and overwhelming schedule, wasn't enough. And how Lisa had always teased, never quite letting the conversation deepen, enjoying the game and the chase and sure they had all the time in the world to play it out before she reeled Jean in.

She should have proposed so much earlier. There would have been other games she could have played.

"How did that work out for *you*?" Kaeya says, fast as if he'd known her very thoughts, soft and smooth and unerringly sharp.

For a moment his smile has an extra twist, a cruel one, and she can see the anger flaring in his eye. It matches her own, crackling in her throat.

Then his smile fades entirely, and he shakes his head. "She knew my reasons. They were good enough for her. We talked about... other things, after that. We planned a lot of trips we pretended we would have the time to go on someday, once the Grand Master got back."

Lisa carefully swallows her anger. "She did hang quite a lot on the Grand Master's return."

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

me: I need to hiatus from Genshin for a while because it's gotten way too entangled with RL hurts and if I don't separate them it might be ruined for me forever. also me: but where do I put all the grief anout losing things I loved except the Genshin fanfic?

"Speaking of the Knights' ceremony. I got," Kaeya says, and pauses, swallowing hard. He's visibly hungover again, though he'd seemed admirably sober since the last such meeting; Commander Frederica frowns disapprovingly, and Barbara does too, looking more than usual like her mother. "A letter came from Grand Master Varka yesterday afternoon."

"That quickly?"

"Captain Eula sent Sir Mika directly on from Dornman Port when she picked you up. And it seems that the wind was particularly favorable, both to Nod-Krai and back home." He forces a ghost of a smile, then drops it in the face of the Commander's unsoftened frown. "In any case, he's told me to give

her a full Grand Master's honors."

Oh. Oh- of *course* he has, generous as he is. And that's followed by another pulse of anger, bitter in her throat. Jean has done so much, given so much, labored in his absence just as she had labored under his carelessness when he was still here, never complaining and always respectful even though she could do the job twice as well as he. It shouldn't take *generosity* for her to be given those honors. Though that would be the only spirit in which she, always respectful of their superior, would have taken it.

Commander Frederica sucks in a sharp breath. For a moment, Lisa can see the tears glittering in her eyes.

"All from the Knights or the Church," Kaeya says. "I'll handle the Knights, and Brother Dahlia told me he'd handle the Church's end. They worked quite closely together in running the city's courts, after all. As for decorations and the formal wake... Master Diluc has volunteered to handle the expenses and labor for both, so we can avoid the extra delay."

Lisa hadn't thought once of Master Diluc since this all started. He was Jean's friend, too, though Lisa has never spoken to him more than casually, except that one time during the Black Fire Affair. She *had* asked him once to prepare a special cocktail for Jean's birthday--her throat closes at that memory, the way Jean had smiled in delight. His

graciousness feels far more a genuine kindness than the Grand Master's generosity.

Though she would have hoped he might cut Kaeya off last night before he ended up in the state he now is. Perhaps he had kept it from getting any worse, but still.... Lisa swallows down her peevishness. She wants to be peevish about everything and everyone, the way Barbara looks small beside her mother, how evenly Commander Frederica speaks, Kaeya's hungover state, the Grand Master, Master Diluc--none of whom likely deserve it. They would all, except possibly the Commander, forgive her if she voiced it, given the circumstances. But Lisa is also older and wiser than them all, except possibly the Commander again.

110

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

This is a cat checkpoint: show the most recent cat photo on your phone.

A tuxedo cat crouched on the edge of a bed.

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

I think I mixed up coal car and caboose but you said "quickly" so I decided not to try again:

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

Genshin: torture works, here's several characters using it successfully me every time I can wedge it into a fic: ACTUALLY-

"Aren't you going to interrogate her?" the Operative at the back demands.

Several children giggle, not kindly. "You don't use torture for <em>that</em>," a small girl chides her. "It doesn't get you reliable information. You get that from subterfuge. You torture people to set an <em>example</em>."

Father smiles just a little. The tip of Lynette's tail twitches, but she has no reason to be jealous. They are all Father's students, in one way or another.

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 05/03/2026

writing something deliberately Very Het for once and actually enjoying it a lot! my aversion to that has always been a sticking point in writing Jean, badass who canonically secretly longs for romance, and while making her the butch is usually a good solution it turns out so is a 30-year age gap.

"It's still," Jean starts to say, and then he's cupping her jaw and tilting her head up and kissing her again, and she's lost the words in the heat of his mouth and the scrape of his stubble and the way his hand lies against her cheek.

"It's fine, Jean," he tells her, pulling back to smile down at her. There's that same gentleness in his eyes, and amusement in the corners of his mouth. "We won't hurt it. I won't hurt you," he adds as he reaches for the last unloosened laces of her blouse.

Which Jean had never imagined in the first place, never once feared he would. But confidently as he moves, there's a deliberateness to it that tells her he has imagined it,

has feared it--maybe has had it happen, some time in his past. He can't hurt her, is Jean's first thought. She may not be his equal in brute strength, but she knows she's match enough to him to keep herself safe. The thing that makes butterflies skip through her as he touches her, though, is that he *won't*. He's holding himself back, all his vaunted strength made gentle just for her.

So she says, "You wouldn't," instead of *'you couldn't,'* when she reaches out to squeeze his bared arms and then pulls him down for another kiss. One he doesn't resist, though he could, if he wanted, make himself immovable. He doesn't want to resist.

120

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 28/10/2025

What a milestone to hit during (and because of) Kinktober XD

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 15/10/2025

I meant to add a Graphic Depictions of Violence warning on this but forgot so I'll cop to that, but I'm still kind of looking at this like, what is this list of demands :/ "It changes what is going on in the scene" what is going on in the scene is torture? I don't see how it changes that?

Part of an AO3 comment, reading: I think this might need a gore or mutilation warning. And I need to know if Tighnari's tail and ear can be fixed with some sort of magical healing. Does he know that? It changes what is going on in the scene if it is a permanent thing.

110

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

My new Genshin Impact OC, who came to me in a dream

020

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

Just finished the second of probably four drafts total and feeling very wriggly that I can't share it yet with the recipient, so have a snippet here where they don't follow me and won't see it.

Jean's first sight, when she walks back out of the ruins, is her archon sitting in a tree.

"My lord Barbatos," she says, breathless with relief. "Are you- did you-" She cuts herself off, unable to form the question, though all she can think of is the way that the statue had blazed with Anemo's light and then been gone when that light dimmed.

He grins at her. "Well done, Master Jean. Care for an apple?" He plucks one from the bough above him and holds it out to her.

Jean isn't surprised to be offered that instead of an answer. She takes it from him; it behooves her to be gracious, and not to press her archon

for answers he doesn't want to give. "Thank you, Lord Barbatos."

"Thank *you*. A duty well-done deserves a reward! Though don't think an apple is all I can afford. Before we return to our own breezes and blue skies, why don't we watch a Liyue sunrise?"

His good cheer makes it impossible for Jean, despite the darkness and rot of the ruin behind her, not to return his smile. "I would be honored."

She eats the apple on Mt. Tianheng, Lord Barbatos sitting beside her, while they watch the sun rise warm and golden over Liyue Harbor. Its flesh is crisp and sweet, like fresh breezes laden with summer flowers, like her archon's laughing eyes.

130

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 17/08/2025

Heroforging blorbos from my brain (a holy daughter sent, as part of a peace treaty, to marry an enemy king who is actually his own 'dead' twin sister in disguise--it's complicated). I love them so much. For a little more detail: www.tumblr.com/beingatoaste...

A closeup of a dark-skinned, black-haired woman with glowing gold eyes, in flowing white-and-gold clothing and wearing gold jewelry.

A longer shot of the dark-skinned, black-haired woman.

A closeup of two near-identical pale-skinned, dark-haired people, a man in a crown and furred mantle and a less-adorned woman.

A long shot of the same pale-skinned, dark-haired pair.

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/05/2025

Just watched this pony hork a bird.

010

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 31/03/2025

Poppy found me very tiresome today.

A black-and-white tuxedo cat lying on a blanket, yawning with her tongue curled out.

000

Lyse McToaster @birdzilla01.bsky.social · 20/02/2025

A Fredrica-and-young!Kaeya piece in which Fredrica repeatedly stares down signs that Diluc might be abusing Kaeya... and then walks away. A little bit of a dealing-with-shit piece, but also I'm genuinely nervous about the reaction to putting even possibly abusive Diluc in the Diluc-and-Kaeya tag.

"I told you, Diluc wasn't there," Kaeya says, too fast again. "He's never burned me."

"And he's never hurt you any other way? Jean's mentioned that the two of you spar."

"No. I'm too fast for him to hit," Kaeya says, with unthinking pride. "I've gotten a touch on him twice, and he hasn't gotten *any* on me yet."

"Impressive," Fredrica says, and sees him preen. "And he's never tried to hit you outside of sparring?"

"No, never." Kaeya is tensing up again, not so disarmed as she'd hoped by the praise. "I like Diluc. He's nice to me. He wouldn't hurt me."

"Then what happens if you embarrass Sir Diluc?"

Kaeya flinches like she'd landed another blow, freezing a moment on his feet before he stumbles back into his own guard. His eye narrows. "I won't embarrass him."

He dives at her again, too quickly, and she can see his feet tangle as he moves. Not enough to fall, but more than enough for Fredrica to step aside, not even bothering to parry his blade, and watch him stumble forward in a movement he only could have recovered from if he'd hit resistance. She swats him across his buttocks with the flat of the blade before he can find his feet.

"Touch," she shouts again, and gives Kaeya a moment to recover. She can afford it.

210