Frank Sronce

@Mrzarono Love the scope of things.

Twilight of the Serpent Lords The runes were clear, the age of the serpent men would end in two generations, approximately 3,000 years. Sss'ru'tek the Diviner had performed the scrying incantation perfectly, hissing strange tones with his forked tongue and weaving glowing sigils with his scaled hands that would baffle all but the most erudite of his fellow sorcerers. This cantrip combined with fumes of smoldering Black Lotus and the consumption of a hominid pituitary gland had opened his reptilian brain to the deepest extrasensory perceptions and so there could be no doubt of his revelation. But still it had been a shock to know that the glorious empire would end, seeking further insight Sss'ru'tek contemplated the long history of his people; the age of the serpent men had begun millions of years ago when the emanations of an outer intelligence had entered the bodies of snakes, reshaping those bodies to walk upright and giving them the power to reason. Where there had been naught but fetid swamps for eons those first serpent men had seemingly overnight built towers of green stone. In less than a millenium the levels of magic and science were achieved and practiced as complimentary arts. Magnificent temples dedicated to the serpent gods Set and Yig had been among the first structures. In the Temple of Set dwelt mighty Satha, a serpent measuring a hundred feet in length and housing the earthly essence of the outer god. On the sacred nights the serpent men sacrificed dozens of hominids to Satha, dropping their squirming forms into the cavernous maw of the great snake. Once his hunger was satisfied Satha would hiss strange prophecies and though none fully understood their meanings each word was written on scrolls of yakith skin for future study. In the temple of Yig dwelt his avatar Nsa'aga-Ka whose form was much like the serpent folk except instead of legs his lower body consisted of a great serpent tail. Nsa'aga-Ka rarely spoke directly to his worshipers, preferring the company of the many snakes who slithered about the jeweled temple with him. The serpent men had not been the only power in those early days, the Old Ones and their Shoggoths still held portions of the southern continent and the Mi-Go operated mining outposts in various locations. The serpent men had fought these beings with weapons of earth shaking sorcerous power and secured the lands they sought to possess. There had been other wars over the eons, many times the Spawn of Dagon had attacked the coastal cities of the serpent men but the batrachian creatures had little in the way of weapons and instead sought to overwhelm with sheer numbers. The sorcery of the serpent men had obliterated their armies but always the survivors went back to the ocean depths to breed new hordes. Within the lifetime of Sss'ru'tek there had been conflict with the hated Yogah of Yag, an alien abomination who whose features combined the worst of the elephantine and a huge hominid. The creature was unknown to the serpent folk until they had sent a force to the eastern jungles to capture hominids as replacements for those lost in sacrifice, this had angered the Yaggite who apparently saw the pathetic things as his pets. Yogah had fought his way into the heart of the Serpent Lands slaying many noted sorcerers and warriors, into the very Temple of Set he came wielding a sword flaming with strange energies and threatening to take the head of great Satha. His pets were returned to him and a truce was made but incantations were set in stone so that someday Yogah of Yag would be humbled by one of the creatures he sought to protect. Sss'ru'tek ceased his ruminations on the history of his race and snapped his scaly fingers. His hypnotically trained hominids rose from their kneeling positions to begin clearing the laboratory of the mess the wizard had made when he opened the skull of the hominid to obtain the gland at the base of its brain. It pleased Sss'ru'tek to watch them work silently and efficiently as he pondered the fate of his race; in two generations the intellect of the serpent men would deteriorate rapidly to a near animal state on a level with the apish hominids they used as servants and as a food source. Sss'ru'tek surmised that a few rare individuals might be spared this fate but that handful could not maintain their empire and the magnificent cities that had stood for eons would crumble to ruins in a few thousand years. By comparison his scrying revealed that the hominids would begin to advance in intelligence and the sorcerer estimated that in time they would become the dominant race on the planet as the Old Ones died out and the Mi-Go had returned to their outpost on Yuggoth. The hominids had completed their task and Sss'ru'tek was quite pleased with their work, he gave them leave to go to their warrens below his tower for the remainder of the night by hissing a few simple phrases they could understand. The hominids gibbered with glee, Sss'ru'tek knew this was not because of pride in their well done work but instead the joy came from the anticipation of cannibalisticly devouring the remains of the hominid Sss'ru'tek had sacrificed to obtain the gland. Such simple creatures, easily manipulated and energetic when given the promise of reward. It was hard for Sss'ru'tek to conceive of a world where they were supreme. After pondering the upcoming apocalypse a blasphemous solution came to Sss'ru'tek, but it was the only solution he could devise; if the fate of the his race was to devolve into mental extinction then it must be mingled with the species destined to continue the slow climb up the evolutionary scale, the hominids. Sss'ru'tek prepared himself by imbibing strange potions that would alter his genetic code to be compatible with mammalian species and selected a hominid female of exceptional intelligence and a slightly less repulsively hairy appearance than the others. When the potions had taken effect the hominid female was brought to the laboratory. Some instinctive fear activated in the female and she sought to flee in wild eyed panic but two male hominids restrained her upon a jade altar. Sss'ru'tek's ophidian eyes gazed deeply into the female's and she ceased her struggles, she no longer saw a snakelike nightmare but a strong hominid male who would take her to live in freedom like their wild kin. Sss'ru'tek ordered the males to release her and they stepped a few paces away and sank into their customary kneeling positions, one of them could not resist his baser instincts and cast a lecherous glance upward hoping to witness whatever act his master was to perform. Disgusted by the mammal's transgression Sss'ru'tek struck the bracelets he wore on each wrist together, they emitted a blue flash that melted the hominid's eyes from his skull. The sorcerer instructed the other male to drag the shrieking beast down to the warrens and allow his brethren to feast on it as they wished. At last the laboratory was quiet and Sss'ru'tek set about his great experiment. In nine months the female hominid gave birth, not to a leathery egg but to a screaming infant. It was a magnificent creature with a body very similar to a hominid but the head of a serpent, Sss'ru'tek was greatly pleased with both the newborn and his own thaumaturgical genius. However the female was repulsed and horrified by her offspring, she refused to allow it to suckle. Displaying astonishing magical ability and intelligence the infant projected a hypnotic glamour that made it appear as a comely hominid child. The female was beguiled and gathered the creature to her breast to lovingly nourish it. The serpent-hominid spawn grew strong and matured rapidly, Sss'ru'tek taught it as much magical lore as it could absorb but he could see it would never have the sorcerous ability of the paternal species. This creature would be destined to hide among the hominids, using cunning and manipulation to advance the children of the serpent as the hidden masters of the coming race of mankind, until a time perhaps eons hence when the stars would come right and that emanation of outer intelligence would again enter the serpent to restore their full power and glory. Well pleased with the path he had set for the continued existence of his people, Sss'ru'tek rested. His rest led to a deep restorative sleep and for days his mind drifted along paths of dream fantasy until a strange nightmare disturbed his torpor. The nightmare had been disturbing; in his dream a huge hominid had made himself a king among the inferior creatures and this savage put to the sword all of his serpentine spawn. Sss'ru'tek was briefly agitated by the nightmare and for few moments hissed in mindless anger like the true serpents dwelling forever in muck and slime. Then he realized it was but a dream and composed himself. Quieting his mind with the reasoning that even for a seer such as himself not all dreams are prophecies, Sss'ru'tek drank a potent elixir of Black Lotus that would send him to a deeper and dreamless sleep.

As soon as someone tells you that your problems are caused by a powerless, impoverished minority, know this: THEY ARE LYING TO YOU.

The Trump lawyers are experiencing the meme

I understand that trying to convince someone who has spent their entire life constructing insane conspiracy theories—built on a foundation of staggering ignorance mixed with an astronomical level of self-importance—is pointless. However, that being said, as a Ukrainian, I have a couple of questions for RFK Jr.: Who, exactly, by the end of 2013, forced the "neutral, democratic government" of Viktor Yanukovych to push Ukraine into nationwide mass protests and armed clashes in central Kyiv? Was it a CIA conspiracy that made Yanukovych’s Kremlin-backed mafia clan (better known as "The Family"), led by a twice-convicted former street criminal, the most corrupt and criminal regime in Ukraine’s history? Did USAID build ultra-luxurious residences for Yanukovych at the expense of Ukrainian taxpayers and hand over all key financial flows of the country to his inner circle, including an unprecedented scheme of mass robbery through the supply of Russian gas at inflated prices? Was it the CIA that forced Russian officials, political strategists, and Putin himself to pour billions into installing their “neutral” puppet Yanukovych and establishing open control over his policies as far back as 2004? Was it the CIA or USAID that spent years making Russia blackmail Ukraine with gas supplies and threatening economic sanctions, forcing it to abandon European integration? How did it happen that, after years of blatant lies, Yanukovych and his "neutral democratic government" suddenly decided at the last moment not to sign the EU Association Agreement in Vilnius, leaving Ukraine on the brink of complete absorption into Russia’s Customs Union? How did the CIA manage to make Putin personally promise Yanukovych a $15 billion bribe, including a $3 billion "loan" in exchange for rejecting the EU association? Who exactly, and by what means, in the United States forced Yanukovych to unleash a violent crackdown on student protests in Kyiv, triggering mass outrage? In response to his regime’s brutality against “our children”, nearly a million people took to the streets in Kyiv—were they all paid by the CIA too? Were they also part of a global conspiracy? I ask because I was there, Gandalf, 3,000 years ago—in December 2013, on the streets of Kyiv, among a million Ukrainians who were fed up with Putin’s corrupt, lying puppet who thought he could spit in our faces, beat us in our own streets, and get away with it. Earlier, in November, I was among a handful of young university students and lecturers who actually initiated pro-EU rallies in the city of Mariupol -- and honestly, I don't remember getting any money from the CIA for wishing to live in a prosperous, democratic, west-aligning Ukraine instead of a declining client state shithole under Kremlin foot. So, amid mass protests across Ukraine, how did the CIA make Yanukovych and his gang push through the dictatorial laws of January 16, which, in true Kremlin style, banned freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and the right to protest—effectively declaring outright repression, which ignited even greater fury across the country? How did the CIA force Russian officials, like Putin’s advisor on Ukraine, Sergey Glazyev, to directly pressure Yanukovych into using armed force against protesters? How did they make entire regions and local governments refuse to obey his criminal clique? Who commanded the armed police and criminal gangs that carried out a bloodbath in central Kyiv and attacked protesters across the country? Who forced Yanukovych and his mafia to do this to Ukraine—until the country rose up, broke free of their control, and forced him to flee with his stolen billions—only for him to later beg Putin to invade Ukraine from the safety of Russia? Who did all of this? The CIA? The FBI? The NSA? The CDC with polio vaccines and 5G towers? Biolabs? Victoria Nuland and her cookies? Men in Black? Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars? The Dunning-Kruger effect is the plague of the 21st century, and it is actively undermining the West.

@Mrzarono To be fair, the Old Ones didn't have a perfect record creating life forms either.

Many homunculi were created by hyperborean sorcerers using the formulae of life left by the Old Ones. But those sorcerers were human and could not fully grasp the science of the Old Ones making their creations as imperfect as their understanding. Many abominations were set abroad in the land and some abide even unto this day, undying and hideous to the eyes of man.

A series of comics of Photoshop tools as superheroes: A mega-thread (1/7)

In 1968 Finland banned for profit education, the few private schools that exist in Finland have to reinvest any profit they make or pay it back to parents. It has been in the Top 3 in education for the last 20 years. There should be no profit in education or healthcare.

@shotRoHi Seriously? That's insanely stupid of them. If you like an artist commission the work from them.

@shotRoHi I'm sorry to hear it. I hope even vague venting helps.

@shotRoHi Assassins have been dispatched. Please abstain from all feelings of guilt or embarrassment until they arrive.

@shotRoHi @CBAlan777 I think I'll start referring to it as "generated images".

@CybercatArt I don't do adopts so I'm no expert, but it's a nice, original pose and the pet is a cool addition.

A new adopt I'm working on. What do you think of it? Does this have more 'character' and 'uniqueness' than my typical adopt? Thanks! #furryart #furry #adoptable #fantasyart

@_dailymagic_ Making that game with you guys was an amazing experience. Great to see it mentioned again!

🪄 We recently discovered the LAST COPY ON EARTH of ManaSurge - out of print since 2016. It's vibrant, quick playing, competitive magical card game where wizards fight for possession of the mystical World Crystal! 2-6 plyrs, 30 min. ManaSurge: buff.ly/3L2AZSa

@allcopymel @MoreGamesPls You might like Chibi Heroes- players assemble teams of heroes to take on quests and acquire fame. Full disclosure, I made the game so I’m biased. :-)

@RGibsongirl As someone who used to do code reviews for a living, they're supposed to be supportive and iterative, not destructive. Honestly, I doubt that the story is real.

She. Is. NINE. And she wrote a fucking GAME. At nine, I was writing excrutiatingly bad poetry. Buy the girl a crown, and teach her serious coding if you're that fucking particular.

@TrashMobMinis I like the idea of the party struggling to defeat this infamous dragon that's been terrorizing the valley only to learn that they haven't been fighting it at all. Just a skin that it left behind years ago.

@TheJayBell Board board game game.

Come to our playtesting tables @emeraldcitycon starting Thursday at 4pm and through Sunday! You'll find us on the 4th floor in room 433. Playtest a game, give feedback, and get entered to win game prizes!