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69,958 Words Later: My 2025 AO3 Year in Review

Wed, 31 Dec 2025 15:40:00 +0000

Taking a look at my Archive of Our Own stats page for 2025, I published a total of 69,958 words of fan fiction this year. Wow! In this post, I reflect on some of the stories I’ve published.

Top Five Works

The stats page also lists my top five works of the year by view count.

1. Phantom Eye Syndrome - 8,646 views

Fandom: Honkai: Star Rail
Pairing: Aventurine/Dr. Ratio
AO3 Link: Phantom Eye Syndrome

Excerpt:

Games I Played in 2025

Fri, 26 Dec 2025 14:06:00 +0000

In no particular order. Games with a ★ before their title are my personal highlights.

Keeping up with three live service games prevented me from finishing too many single player games this year, but I’m having fun, so it’s all good.

Memories are the Prelude to Dreams: Aventurine & Dr. Ratio Analysis

Tue, 23 Dec 2025 13:53:00 +0000

When you bid farewell to loved ones, you should cry while they can still hear you. That’s the only way they’ll know just how many people love them.

Honkai: Star Rail version 3.8! I was very excited for this patch because I love Penacony. The patch did not disappoint, and there was so much juicy Penacony lore. Plus, I love Firefly and the Stellaron Hunters, Robin and Sparkle got more fleshed out, and Constance is a really cool character.

ZZZ 2.4 | On the Precipice of the Abyss

Thu, 27 Nov 2025 23:10:00 +0000

Using truths whispered by the dead to expose the lies of the living: that is the standard by which I enact judgement. But this time… I want to use the words of the dead to gift a truth to the living.

I love Zenless Zone Zero more than life itself. The 2.4 story was a bit of a hot mess, but I loved every second of it. The devs are charging up for 2.5!

HSR 3.7 | As Tomorrow Became Yesterday

Thu, 27 Nov 2025 22:07:00 +0000

Everyone’s still working so hard. I’m the only one who’s crying… that wouldn’t be romantic at all, would it?

I have been ridiculously busy this past month with writing exchanges. Here are my belated thoughts on the Honkai: Star Rail version 3.7 Trailblaze Mission. I’ve had more time to reflect, I suppose, since I finished it a while ago.

Before getting into spoilers, I ended up pulling both Hyacine and her light cone! She’s very powerful and fun to use. It’s always funny watching her yeet that unicorn into the stratosphere. Unfortunately, I lost my 50/50 for Cyrene and am not really interested in anyone in the next version, so I will stockpile my jades for Stonehearts.

ZZZ 2.3 | Memories of Dreams Bygone

Thu, 16 Oct 2025 22:36:00 +0000

What happens when an insecure group of online roleplayers find themselves in a living nightmare?

…More tragic backstories, of course!

Here are some of my thoughts on the new story quest.

I loved this patch. Awesome new environment, cool new bosses, and Banyue being super cool, Sarah being Sarah. The only thing I haven’t done yet is Lucia’s Agent Story.

Spook Shack is great. As a terminally online nerd, it’s refreshing to see that kind of character played straight: just a group of friends having a good time together! I liked that about Astra Yao as well; it felt more organic for Wise and Belle to meet her in person after befriending her online as Chaotic Fried Rice.

HSR 3.6 | Back to Earth in Evernight

Fri, 03 Oct 2025 14:31:00 +0000

How much are you willing to sacrifice? Everything.

What a patch. Some quick, sleep-deprived thoughts:

I never realized how much I missed Dan Heng and March until the trio reunited. I don’t have a problem with the other Amphoreus patches, but it feels refreshing to focus on the Astral Express crew after so much time with the Chrysos Heirs. They have so much more trauma to unpack now as opposed to before.

I Ripped the USA Apart for $12.50

Fri, 30 May 2025 21:02:00 +0000

Content Warning: Starvation, trauma.

I’m not asking for pity. I’m not asking for anything. Just sharing some things that I have no one else to share with.

Surviving Each Day

In March, I tore a map of the United States of America apart with my bare hands.

It was a souvenir from 2008, a collector’s item — a sturdy slab of cardboard that showcased 50 state quarters that I had collected back then. Every slot had its proper coin, wedged permanently into place.

Volunteering with the OTW again

Fri, 09 May 2025 17:05:00 +0000

Nine years ago, in 2016, I volunteered with the Organization for Transformative Works, the nonprofit behind Archive of Our Own.

This month, I’m returning to the OTW, but in a much smaller committee this time. I’m excited to work with them and hope to bring a positive impact to the community.

(And of course, as a disclaimer, all of the views expressed on this blog are mine alone and are not intended to reflect the opinions of the OTW as a whole.)

New Year, New Website (Again)

Tue, 07 Jan 2025 13:26:00 +0000

Happy New Year! I wasn’t happy with this website’s previous layout. Today, the new layout is finally ready. I’m using the lovely Hugo theme Gokarna, which is similar to the old theme but much more streamlined for my particular use case.

I’ve removed the comment sections from the blog for now, but I might bring them back later. I’m keeping an eye on the Giscus project, just in case they add Gitlab support.

How did I not know about CMS?

Thu, 05 Dec 2024 18:06:00 +0000

I always hoped there was some kind of front end I could edit my blog from instead of manually creating text files and then pushing them to Gitlab. Today I found out about Sveltia CMS and have integrated it into the backend of pent.blog. I’m writing this post from it right now, so hopefully it works!

So far, the UI looks pretty good. I still need to configure a bunch of things. I can’t figure out how to get cover images to work because of the way they work in Hugo, but I’ll figure it out eventually.

October 2024 Life and Website Updates

Wed, 30 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Life Updates

After completing a 30 day writing challenge for Final Fantasy XIV in September, I was very eager to get back to working on my Honkai: Star Rail fan fiction.

On the night of October 12, I finally finished and published chapter five of Phantom Eye Syndrome. The chapter follows Aventurine’s near death experience and ends in the same way as the canon, with him choosing to live when confronted with death.

#FFXIVwrite2024: A Retrospective

Fri, 11 Oct 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This September, I participated in the #FFXIVwrite2024 challenge, where participants publish a Final Fantasy XIV fan fiction every single day based on a given prompt. The prompts were not set in advance, so participants truly only had 24 hours to write and publish their works.

Unfortunately, I found out about the challenge after it had already started. Still, I managed to post a fan work every day, ending the challenge with 25 works.

Welcome to my new website! Migrating from Jekyll to Hugo

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Welcome to the brand new pent.blog!

When I tried to install Hugo (the software powering this website) on Windows a couple of months ago, I couldn’t get it to work. On Linux? No problems. First try. It just works! ™️ Unsurprising, I know.

I created this website because I was starting to accumulate up a bunch of tiny, unused static websites that could have been merged into one. From now on, I’ll just put my public writing projects here and organize them with tags.

Final Fantasy XIV Roleplaying Information

Fri, 17 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0000

About Me

Hi! I’m Tango (or Pent) and I’ve been writing and longform roleplaying for about 20 years now! I like doing shortform roleplay as well, but mostly enjoy elaborate story planning and the inclusion of multiple characters.

I tend to gravitate towards dark topics, but will avoid bringing them up with no warning or consensual planning. I enjoy writing adventure and found family bonding stories too, but am open to pretty much any genre.

Zumi Asclepius [RP Profile]

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Listen to mine verse as I recite a poem about the rising walls of Sharlayan whilst I cleanse thy body of corruption. The poem hath nothing to do with thine injuries, but is good to hear nonetheless.

Profile

Name: Zumi Asclepius
Age: 157
Height: 5'11"
Race: Viera (Veena)
Gender: Viera male
Pronouns: He/him
Birthplace: Dalmasca
Occupation: Apothecary, Minstrel
In-Game Job: Bard
In-Game Name & Server: Zumi Asclepius · Exodus (Primal)

Personality

Charismatic · Knowledgable · Strange · Legendary

Angel Eventide [RP Profile]

Wed, 06 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

If you get scared or lonely… Give yourself a Pom Cure! That always cheers me up… A little bit. Mwah!

Profile

Name: ~~Kiht’a Levin~~, ~~Mister~~, Angel Eventide
Age: 23
Height: 5'4"
Race: Miqo’te (Keeper of the Moon)
Gender: Cis male
Pronouns: He/him
Birthplace: Garlemald
Occupation: Clown for Cirque d’Eventide
In-Game Job: Blue Mage
In-Game Name & Server: Tango Mango · Exodus (Primal)

Personality

Showman · Selfless · Naive · Caring · Obedient