What Is ORV?

The number one question I get asked on this blog, now answered better than ever. Today I am going to formally introduce you to Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint

To start off this recommendation: ORV might very well be my favorite thing I've read. Ever. If I could only reread one thing for the rest of my life it'd be this webnovel.

My elevator pitch is this: something with the cosmic-scale goofy video game nonsense and intricate setting comparable to Homestuck in its prime, paired with the deft emotional poignancy and emotionally-driven fights of Mob Psycho 100, topped off with the sort of compassionate and heartwrenching metanarrative of Undertale.

ORV is a love letter to it's own readers. ORV revels in the joy of losing yourself in fiction, even when it's the kind of fiction that tends to be considered lowbrow or worthless. It's something that dances the delicate line between recognizing the difficult nature of using media as escapism without condemning it. I've rarely seen anything else that accomplishes everything it sets out to do in its narrative with such remarkable precision. Frankly if you're reading a tumblr media recommendation post in 2023, I can almost guarantee ORV has the kind of meat you're looking for in a narrative, whatever that may be.

The story follow the antics of protagonist Kim Dokja, a 28 year old office worker on an expiring contract, whose only real joy in life is reading his favorite massively long and massively boring webnovel. One day, the novel’s events - worldwide deathmatches aired for the entertainment of mysterious higher beings called ‘constellations’ - begin playing out in reality in a sort of reverse-isekai. Kim Dokja, the only longterm reader of this webnovel, finds himself uniquely poised to succeed based on the advantages given to him by his knowledge of future events, but the webnovel’s actual protagonist, Yoo Jonghyuk, is a violent monster who will stop at absolutely nothing to complete his goals, no matter the cost to anyone else. Kim Dokja finds himself in a delicate dance of guiding the events of the story to play out more favorably than the version he read while trying to avoid being massacred in the fallout, all while trying to see it through to the story’s end. 

Below the cut I'll go into a more in-depth (but non-spoilery) explanation of what exactly makes ORV so unique and worthwhile, and what you're in for if you choose to read it.

Love how tumblr has its own folk stories. Yeah the God of Arepo we’ve all heard the story and we all still cry about it. Yeah that one about the woman locked up for centuries finally getting free. That one about the witch who would marry anyone who could get her house key from her cat and it’s revealed she IS the cat after the narrator befriends the cat.

Might I add:

The defeat of the wizard who made people choose how they’d be to be executed

The woman who raised the changeling alongside her biological child

The human who died of radiation poisoning after repairing the spaceship

The adventures of a space roomba

Cinderella finding Araura (and falling in love)

I don’t know a snappy description but the my nemesis cynthia story certainly lives in my head

hilariously, these are almost all in my fic tag. so, a compiled list from the notes (and some extras):

I am in love with you /p

What about the one with the princess locked in a tower learning to become a wizard? That’s lived in my mind for years and I haven’t seen it in a long time

Oh, love that story, adding it to the list: 20. Princess Talia and adding a few more contenders 21. Thyme 22. The Monster under the Bed 23. A Meaningful Death 24. Humans are unstoppable…until they aren’t 25. The Monster under the Fridge 26. Antler Guy 27. Cleric slamming healing spells

Adding a few more I remembered:  28. The Frog and the Scorpion 29. HSTHETE 30. The First Witch in the World 31. Imagine that Oceans were replaced by Forests  32. A Faerie taking a Name  33. The Dragon on the Farm  34. Synovus & Menace  35. Raising the Anti-Christ  36. Aliens vs. Flora & Fauna of Earth (pretty sure there are even more additions to the original post but I had this one saved)  37. Doctors without Borders…in Space!  38. The Villain-Wrangler  39. The Last Contact  40. The 100 Parent-Point Children  41. And the Heavens Wept  42. The Night Gentleman  43. The Serpent God and their Priestess 

44. No One Showed Up for the Last Storytime

Wow! @writing-prompt-s contributing to like half of these!

I can hardly take any credit for these stories! But I love sharing them. Unfortunately I cannot read all the prompt responses so please tag me if you want me to reblog a story that resonated with you so I can give it a little boost :)

Moments in time, preserved through sentiments Twitter | Ko-Fi | Patreon

Fun History Fact: The overwhelming majority of cowboys in the U.S. were Indigenous, Black, and/or Mexican persons. The omnipresent white cowboy is a Hollywood studio concoction meant to uphold the mythology of white masculinity.

Thank you.

I will always re-blog this

I think it was high school when i overheard some white girl put on her best semi-disgusted and confused voice and go “why do so many Mexicans dress up like cowboys?” and I had to be the person to tell her.

Why do you think the whites say buckero? Cause they couldn’t say vaquero.

I dunno if I reblogged this before but fuck it, y'all gon learn today.

Teach the children.

also, cowboy culture was hella gay. like, write-poems-about-your-cowboy-partner gay.

IF people acknowledge it, they play the necessity card– there weren’t any women out on the range, so they had to “resort to men.” this claim completely erases 1) the romantic (not just sexual) writings of actual cowboys, 2) the acknowledgement of cowboys’ potential homosexual activity by writers at the time, and 3) the possibility that some men would deliberately become cowboys with the intent to seek out homosexual encounters.

no one wants to admit it, but cowboy culture was just. so inherently gay.

Im here for the gay POC cowboys

👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿👆🏿

Support your local gay cowboys

Supposedly, at dances with a higher number of men than women (or no women), men in the mid/late 1800s US west would signify their willingness to take the woman’s role in a dance by tying a bandana around their upper arm.

Do with that information what you will.

I DIDNT CHECK TH E SONG FULLY BEFORE POSTING THIS I FUCKED UP

congratulations!!! through doubt, you have unlocked backstory!!!

imagine, if you will, innocent, overly-trusting me listening to the mario galaxy ost and getting to the honeyhive galaxy theme, and thinking “wow! this song would go great with a pokemon walking gif!”

a brilliant idea! i immediately search up the song, and oh, how naive i was.

the third result is very official-looking!! a perfect candidate for a quick youtube rip–it’s just a meme, it won’t hurt anybody.

the first few second autoplay, and it seems legit! i quickly copy the url and download the file, then make the post

at this point, i haven’t seen the gif along with the song i’d intended to put with it, so i have a listen!!

and let me tell you, the surprise i got,

this is now rowlet’s theme

there’s something really special about finding an old post you remember and seeing it has several new additions. it’s like aw, the post grew up :)

reblog to give the pervious person a nice rock

Have a nice rock

reblog to give the pervious person a nice rock

Have a nice rock

a new little penguin has joined the huddle

@tetsuskei HEHEE

the way this gif took tumblr by storm a decade ago

When I was in middle school I got in a fight w my friend abt whether or not this was weird. I was like “why are they knocking their heads against each other like that” and then my friend was like they’re fucking cuddling freak. When I got in a relationship later and nuzzled my partners face for the first time I felt like a fucking virgin for criticizing these women who had already been through so much

the director of god of war 2 and god of war 2018 really just has a tiny horse in his bed

I thought he was making a dumb witcher joke nope thats an actual horse omg

skeleton of cave bear in Bears Cave, Romania

wonder why it’s called that

This sent me down a massive historical rabbit hole, but, long story short: it’s called Romania because there were once Romans there.

wow millennials are glued to their i-phones and laptops so much they cant even be bothered robbing in person anymore!!! maybe these trust fund babies should stop phishing credit cards while sitting on their butts and go out there and put some elbow grease into their thievery!

I know exactly what happened. Because it happened to me.

I trained for years to be a con artist. I told my friends and family that I wanted to be a magician, but that was just a cover for why I was constantly practicing sleight of hand. 

In junior high and high school, I would shop lift a bunch of candy on my way to school, sell it to kids at the morning break, and use that money to run a crooked poker game at lunch.

Finally, when I was 19 or 20, I felt I was ready, and I picked my first pocket. I was on the bus, bumped a guy as I passed down the aisle, got his wallet, super clean.

In the wallet was several hundred dollars. A huge first score, I had been hoping for a couple twenties. I sat there looking at the, like, 400 bucks, thinking.

That was my rent at the time. We were both on the bus. It was likely his rent too. Lord knows the only reason to carry that much cash on the bus is you’re on your way to pay a bill. We were both on the bus, you know? That’s not someone I was comfortable stealing from.

I tapped him on the shoulder and told him “hey i think you dropped this” and gave it back to him with all the money still in it. It was the first and last time I ever picked a pocket.

Picking a rich person’s pocket is a loosing game. They probably have credit cards and not cash, those credit cards probably have the best anti-theft measures their bank can provide, and you probably can’t get close enough to those people to pick their pockets unless you’re already rich yourself.

The people who’s pockets you can reliably pick are the people around you. The people who are also on the bus, who are in this same shitty situation with you.

As wealth inequality becomes more drastic picking pockets has very clearly become “stealing from other poor people” and it’s not satisfying. I want to steal from Google and Apple and Fox and Facebook and General Mills and Hershey and Tesla. Not the person next to me.

Wow. This post went from funny to a life lesson in a way I wasn’t expecting, amd I’m not sorey at all.

See, unlike the capitalist elite, common criminals have a sense of morality and empathy.