Hey there!

I'm Zentauria, but you can call me Zen if you like. I chose that name because Sagittarius/the Centaur is my sign of Zodiac, in case anyone's interested.

The avatar wasn't made by me! Feif-chan drew it for me, and I can't thank her enough because I'm one of the most horrifying drawers in this lovely world.
Anyway, Feif-chan herself gave her account up a while ago, but you might find her art when you google her. She's amazing!

What's there to say about me?

I love talking to people and I'm real curious about other cultures, but it may come off as presuming. I'm not the kind of person to deliberately hurt other's feelings, but I have a condition, so to say. It makes me bad at dealing with people, but I work real hard on it, so I think I'm about 98% insensitive-remark-proof. No need to be afraid~

I've sworn off reviewing a while ago. Not completely, but you won't see me run rampant. It links back to the very same condition mentioned above. When I read fanfics, my head usually explodes with stuff I could say about them, but I've learned to keep my mouth shut. Because no matter how nice you are about it, in most cases "Please leave me some criticism so I can become better" is a total lie.

And I get that. Oh, don't I get that.

There used to be quite a rant in this place about the necessity of criticism and how an author should be able to survive without hymns and praise, just having fun writing. But it was too aggressive, so I deleted it and I'm glad I did. I still think that becoming addicted to reviews is not a good move, though.

Some stuff about my writing

I'm a very passionate writer, I've been doing it since... well, forever. I have a couple original works going, but something keeps pulling me back to fanfiction. I just love it too much, the community, the communication with the readers... It keeps me grounded, always showing me how I can improve and helps me not to get carried away.

I tend to write by the seat of my pants. It's not like I don't plan at all, but I write for fun and I'm not afraid of going off on promising tangents which hadn't been in the plan, or adding little details I think of spontaneously.

I like doing research, and tons of it. What interests me most is the psychological factor in characters, both OCs and underdeveloped CCs. But being on the Internet and all, I often feel the limits of the reader demographic. There is some stuff you just can't do when there are ten-years-old around to see it, and I often blue-pencil an OC two or three times because... too heavy.

A hobby of mine is taking overused concepts and put a new spin on them. Another thing I like to do is kicking Love Tropes in the face. Some stuff stops making sense once you actually let it play out, and I take great delight in exploring that.

Speaking of which: Romance is not my genre. I prefer writing Friendship and/or Angst. Slice of Life, too. When I do write couples, I stick around the platonic level of the relationship. Hugging and holding hands is fine, kisses are... sketchy. Lemons are boring.

My strength is character creation and development, and I often wonder whether people actually notice the more subtle quirks I use for humanizing my OCs. But I'm not a perfect writer, and my mortal enemy is description. Landscapes, outfits... you name it, I probably fail it. Names are slightly easier, but still a problem. I'm working on it!

I like playing with words. Watch out for witticisms, puns, tailor-made idioms and unusual euphemisms. (Swearing-wise, my works are very clean.)

I love messing around. Especially in works with a First Person narrator, don't take anything at face value. Things are taken for facts even though they aren't, perceptions are warped... Humans are imperfect beings, and if the narrator is human, there are bound to be mistakes. But I'm not the kind of writer who assumes that readers are stupid, mindless beings, so keep an eye out. ;D

Fun facts about my OCs

(I'm not going to write profiles here, but some background information, in case anyone is interested in how I developed certain characters.)

Weakling Blood (Avatar - The Last Airbender fic)

Kamina: The first time the idea of an airbender OC popped into my mind was after a long ATLA binge-watching night and the Gaang just snuck into my dreams. I dismissed it back then, with Aang being the last Air Nomad and all, and how thorough the Fire Nation was with tracking down the airbenders who escaped the Air Temple battles. It struck me again when I pondered how funny it would be if a Kainora child were an earthbender. Kai may be an airbender, but genetically, he's Earth Kingdom, so it's totally possible. And that means it's also very much possible that there are Air Nomad descendents who inherited airbending abilities from their great-great-grandparents or what. (That theory can actually be taken further: What if the new airbenders from LoK were Air Nomad descendents who had their abilities locked from the spiritual imbalance that the Hundred Year War caused, and then unlocked again by Harmonic Convergence?)
In the earliest stage, Kamina was Earth Kingdom, but I quickly realized that a Fire Nation airbender would make for a much more interesting character. The propaganda, conflicting loyalties, it makes for some emotional turmoil and a great basis for character development. Positioning her in the verse came rather easily, creating her family less so.

Mizulon: Or just Mimi. I knew I wanted a firebending sibling for Kamina. It happened to be a little brother because... reason. I just do that a lot, I like writing young boys. He acts as a foil for Kamina - he loves his bending, and he's plenty good at it. Outspoken and joyful, absolutely convinced of his nation; he is what his sister wants to be. When naming him, I kind of had Azula lurking at the back of my mind - just like her, he's named after Firelord Azulon. If you squint, you find some more parallels, but he's way nicer than his princess.

Judai: O-M-Goodness, if agony has a name, it's Judai. Where do I even start? He's a character I came up with on the fly, just as much a spontaneous idea as the arc he appears in. He was an on-off-character, his sole purpose was exposition. He was so on-off in fact that I didn't even bother giving him a name... until Kamina asked. Even then I didn't really think about it. I happened to be reading a Zootopia fic with a genderbent Judy before, and her/his new name is Judas. As brains go, they tend to give out the freshest answer to a problem, and it's not a long jump from Judas to Judai. In the beginning, I even tended to misspell Judai as Judas. The name Judai itself is the original Japanese name of Jaden Yuki (=Yuuki Judai) from Yu-Gi-Oh GX... and I don't even like it. Neither the name, nor the anime.
But I soon came to realize what great potential the character held. The oldest slave in the cell, still recovering from a punishment and with a very good idea what's coming to him. I wanted to do a bit more. Which was where I hit the psychology limits of the Avatarverse.
Judai was an antagonist at first. The antagonist is the character in a story who actively thwarts the protagonist's plans, and that doesn't necessarily mean villainy. As far as Judai was concerned, Kamina was a suicidal moron who couldn't get the direness of the situation through her thick skull, and protecting her from her own stupidity quickly became a pain in the butt. So far, so written. Once she tried to escape, however... Well, his actions in chapter 16 are very much a last-minute-switch. The original draft had him less than helpful: Twisted by fear and without any fight left in him, his goal wasn't escaping anymore - it was avoiding punishment. He was supposed to drag Kamina back into the cell, lock it from the inside, throw the keys away and then berate Kamina for putting herself and everyone who wouldn't be able to resist the temptation of a seemingly easy but ultimately doomed escape. I can't expect potential twelve-year-old readers to comprehend why he would do something like that, now, can I? I also think it would have been too cynic for the original ATLA tone I'm trying to keep. Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is For Kids? Perhaps, but I like the way Judai has turned out. From Mr. Exposition via antagonist to a Love Interest to be reckoned with. Talk about a Breakout Character... That's what you get for doing more pantsing than planning, I suppose.
Edit: Yeah, I kinda went there by now. Because I would have exploded otherwise.

Family Right Or Wrong (Disney-Pixar's Coco)

Tavia Aguayo: Her full name being Octavia Ernesta Guadalupe Aguayo Coronil, I absolutely hope I didn't overdo it. But Spanish names look like that. Three out of five names are more or less random - I liked them, so I picked them. The name Ernesta is a reference to a canon character. You know which, and if you don't, you missed out on an awesome movie.
Guadalupe is, in short, the patroness of Mexico, but it's actually more complicated than that. I really recommend checking out the name's background, it's very interesting!
I briefly considered making one of her last names Campana. It means "bell," which would have been funny. But it also felt kinda silly, so I left it.
Tavia was a handful to create. Apart from trying to get Mexican naming costumes right, there was a whole other bunch of cultural things to consider, starting with the fact that 20th century Mexico didn't really care about illegitimicy. Half the population was born out of wedlock, and it didn't really matter. In fact, it was quite usual for celebrities to have a bunch of children and know it. So I suddenly needed a reason to hide it, and I wasn't too keen on going down the Rivera route of "NEVER MENTION THIS MAN!" Because we've seen it all before.
I've done research on instruments (Mexican music has a dang wide assortment of guitars!), traditions, family life, ethnicity (Awesome diversity, folks!), history... Phew. And let's not forget Mexican slang, which is another monster in and of itself. But such is language. We've all seen it from English.
I suspect most of the things I learned will never come up in the story proper, but they're handy to know.

To be continued with other fics when I have the time.

I'm taking requests for Avatar - The Last Airbender, Legend of Korra, Coco and Zootopia. But you have to be patient with me, inspiration can't be forced.

Conditions for requests would be:
- nothing rated above T
- word count shouldn't be higher than 8k (I'm very busy with my own stuff)
- NO BESTIALITY!!! (My, my, that I actually need to say this... Zootopia blurs the lines a bit, but I'm still not entirely comfortable with the idea.)

My favourite characters from Inazuma Eleven:

Matatagi Hayato (whether dark-side-form or not doesn't matter)

Matsukaze Tenma

Saryuu Evan

There are much much more characters I like, but this three are the ones I'm crazy about. They're all from GO, but well... Why not?

Pairings I like:

Tenma x Aoi (They just belong together!)

Endou x Natsumi

Aki x Ichinose

Fei x Beta (No, I'm not smoking!)

Konoha x Kusaka (So cute!)

Ibuki x Sakura (They don't do that much together, but they have much in common. Still not smoking!)

Yuuichi x Yuuka

Yeah, I'm not that big of a shipper, which is mostly because I don't like male-slash that much. I've seen so much garbage, so much fetishizing of gay people and romanticized abuse in m/m-fics that I can't even! My brain started linking male-slash directly to all that's toxic about fandom, so my enjoyment of even the most tasteful gay romance will be ruined forever.

Plus, there are characters who are confirmed to be straight, and I don't see any reason to make them gay.

So much about shipping for Inazuma. There are plenty other ships I support outside my Inazuma bubble, though. Like:

Magi: AlibabaxMorgiana (And now it's canon! Thanks, Ootaka!), SharrkanxYamuraiha, TotoxOlba (Their babies are not cute, but I'm still excited about them!)
AladdinxKougyoku is a thought to get used to, but I kinda like the idea. I wish there had been some more tease for them.

Zootopia: JudyxNick, but I'd also like to see JudyxOC pairings. These are rare. Or JudyxFinnick. NickxOC is something I treat with caution, because Nick's complicated. Well, and then there is that crazy ship of Chief BogoxDrill Sergeant Polar Bear which a friend of mine kicked off and infected me with.

Avatar TLA: AangxKatara, ZukoxMai, SokkaxSuki, UrsaxIkem (basically any canon pairing you can find), LeexKiyi (Remember the kid from "Zuko Alone"? Yeah, I'm talking about him. And Zuko's half-sister. Who'd think of that?)
Currently questing for the ultimate Zutara fic. I want to understand this popular ship, but the majority of Zutara fics apparently can't make do without derailing/killing/demonizing Aang and/or Mai, or even Zuko and Katara themselves. Anyone with recommendations?

Legend of Korra: KaixJinora (Cuteness Overload, those two), BolinxOpal, VarrickxZhu Li
I don't ship KorraxAsami. I don't hate it, either, but it left me more than dissatisfied. I'm putting all my hopes into the 'Turf Wars' trilogy. I really want to see the greatness of Korrasami, but so far, I plain and simply don't.

Soul Eater: SoulxMaka, BlackStarxTsubaki, KimxOx, SteinxMarie
I don't ship Kid because I don't think it makes sense. He's a Shinigami, after all, he'd outlive anyone anyway. It's really sad if you think about it. (Besides, he's already married to symmetry.)

The Legend of Zelda is a monster. On the Toon side of things, it's Zelink/Telink all the way. So it goes for OoT/MM and BotW. TP is Ilink. ALBW has me on the fence as far as Link is concerned, but yay for Hildavio! Side characters I ship are JolenexLinebeck, KafeixAnju, LuluxMikau and BethxColin. (And I love the Yeti couple. They're super cute!)

Yeah, basically canon shipper, really. Not a passionate one, though. Romance is not really my kind of thing. AlibabaxMorgiana may be my Magi OTP, but it doesn't mean I hate people for shipping HakuryuuxMorgiana or TotoxAlibaba. So again, leave me out of shipping wars, if you'd please. Much appreciated.

Okay, now have fun with my stories. Or the ones I like. Or whatever you're planning to do now. Just don't forget that life is there to enjoy it!