IDK if I'll ever put it in a fic or anything, but the words "Eight-Legged Spider Hawk" spontaneously generated themselves in my brain as I was preparing for my evening ablutions.

My first reaction to this thought was that Peerless Cucumber absolutely roasted Airplane in the comments when this monster made its debut, because he thought that "Eight-Legged" and "Spider" were redundant. Airplane retaliated by introducing Six-Legged and Ten-Legged Spider Hawks in the next chapter, including important distinctions between the species.

I don't know about the six- or ten-legged varieties, but here's the lore I came up with for the eight-legged ones:

Appears very much like a very large spider with hawk's wings, it is often mistaken for one in flight or while hunting. Its movement on the ground, however, is unmistakable. These creatures line their nests with a particular type of silk that makes exquisite bondage rope.

The ten- and six-legged varieties probably have somewhat different venom or are more prized for their feathers or something.

Fandom: The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System
Summary: Shang Qinghua is in a meeting with Mu Qingfang about the innovative new peak first aid centers when they're interrupted by a disciple from the beast peak: Shen Yuan, an otherwise ordinary young man, has discovered yet another treatment for sex pollen that involves neither sex nor involvement with heavenly demons.
Mirrors: AO3 link
Wordcount: ~1900 words
Ships: None
Notes: Inspired by this post on Tumblr:

Post text

ceramicrambles:

Medical mystery Shen Yuan who literally every checkup has a new thing that should have killed him and Mu Qingfang is incredibly concerned

MQF: Shixiong, why is your blood purple?

SY: Oh right! it’s okay I was hit with the misty eyed-transfusion-curse-of-papapa pollen but I took the antidote so now I sprout a daisy every time I pee. It’s basically the closest thing to a cure haha and the only other treatment is heavenly demon blood so what are you gonna do, amirite?

MQF: what.

mikkeneko: mind you. I'm not saying Mu Qingfang is NOT concerned. But I also think that Known Mad Scientist Mu Qingfang would see an absolute golden opportunity in just following SQQ around with a notebook at this point

Thanks to ceramicrambles for both the inspiration and beta reading!
Fic: ( There's No Hippocratic Oath in Xianxia China )

I've been playing this game for just over a week now, and already the difficulty scaling is past where I find the rewards worth it. Most of the puzzles are around difficulty level 4 to 6 now, and I'm just not figuring enough of them out in the time limit I'm given. I'll still get some yarn when I finish the designated three puzzle set, but if I fail any of the puzzles, it's the lower quality yarn—even though the point total from all the puzzles, failures included, is higher than when I was playing the games on their lowest difficulty.

If I were getting more yarn per try, it might be worth it to me to keep playing. If the timers were more generous, it might be worth it to me. If I could choose which puzzles to play and which yarn to work towards, or if the difficulty scaling were a bit slower, it might be worth it to me. But at this point, I'll probably just play a few more days out of sunk cost fallacy driven hope, and then try to forget I even bought the damn game. Which is a shame, because I'd really love to have some sort of apartment-decorating game with the mechanics from the main room that I loved so much.

Honestly, I'd originally bought this game with the hopes of playing some of the puzzles with my niblings, but with how the game's set up, I'm not sure I'd even be able to reach all of the games, let alone be able to play in a way that didn't leave all of us frustrated in the end.

This disappointment aside, if Nintendo ever decided to put out a simple version of Voltorb Flip that works the same way as it does in HGSS, maybe for $2 or so, I'd buy that in a heartbeat. (They won't, they'd want to microtransaction and dark pattern the hell out of it, but that doesn't stop me from wanting it!)