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openUnintentionally Unmasqued World? Literature
So a week ago, this Troper was sound asleep when he had a dream. This dream was ostensibly set in the world of Bitten, with a scenario that involved a Werewolf getting Drafted into the US Army during the Vietnam War. The Alpha of the Pack at the time was faced with a dilemma: Werewolves in this setting are involved in a very strict Masquerade in which all humans, even the Government, are explicitly forbidden from knowing that Werewolves exist (Werewolves are explicitly instructed to kill any human who watches them Change). This becomes impossible with a Werewolf getting Drafted; Draft-Dodging is illegal, going AWOL to Change is illegal, and killing any of your squad-mates for watching you Change is HIGHLY illegal, and the Government WILL come after you for doing any of these. And the Pack can't really do anything either because the Government WILL come after anyone who murders active service personnel of the Armed Forces. Then this Troper woke up, thought about this scenario, and came to the conclusion that this sort of airtight Masquerade would have been unsustainable under the Selective Service system; the existence of Werewolves WOULD be exposed if a Werewolf got Drafted.
And the thing is- the Government was simply Drafting a new Army recruit, they weren't even intending on exposing the existence of Werewolves, which the Army didn't even know about. Creating The Unmasqued World was simply an unintended consequence of the Army doing Army things.
The only other time I've seen this archetype, of a Masquerade being blown open by someone who was trying to do something unrelated, was in the Worm/Twilight crossover fanfic Twisted Masquerade, where Director Emily Piggot doing a background check on Charlie Swan could have exposed the existence of Vampires, and the Cullens had to do some last-minute string-pulling to keep that from happening.
How common is it for The Unmasqued World to be the result of an accident, carelessness, bureaucratic processes, unintended consequences, or pure random chance, rather than deliberate action? Is it common enough to be a trope?
openBorn yesterday as a sexy eighteen year old Literature
I find this trope is really common in Romantasies and Platform/({Webtoon}}s. Is there a trope name for the "Sexy born yesterday"?
openSupernaturally Nutritious or Power Up Food? Literature
In the world of KonoSuba, the flesh of Golden and White Dragons is a renowned power-enhancer for those who eat it. For example, it's mentioned in the 10th volume is that Gold Dragon flesh instantly raises the eater's level, whilst it's blood can be used as an ingredient in the creation of skill-up potions — valuable elixirs that instantly grant the consumer points to improve their skills and ability scores. This has led to both species being hunted to near-extinction to harvest their enhancing flesh and blood. However, both breeds of dragon can achieve full sapience — a minor character is a White Dragon who spends much of her time shapeshifted into human form. So, do they count as an example of Supernaturally Nutritious And Delicious or as Power-Up Food?
openHated for not being chosen to be killed Literature
Voldemort receives information that based on a prophecy, the one who can kill him will soon be born. Ultimately, 2 babies meet the known criteria: Harry and Neville. Voldemort decides that the prophecy refers to Harry, and kills Harry's mother in his attempt to kill Harry. Snape, who was in love with Harry's mother, hates Neville because if Voldemort had chosen him, Harry's mother would still be alive.
openMagic which only allows specific individuals through Literature
In one Harry Potter fanfiction, Snape works as a potion maker for Voldemort. To prevent other death eaters from damaging his work (as Bellatrix has already done), he sets up a special lock that he, and one other death eater he trusts not to harm his potion work, get through without any difficulty, but no one else is able to get in.
openDouble agent forced to do evil Literature
In the Harry Potter series, Snape is a double agent against Lord Voldemort. One fanfiction says that as part of this role, he was forced to do terrible things such as torture the Minister of Magic for information on where Harry is being hidden.
openBook edition with movie art Literature
Is there a trope for, when a book receives The Film of the Book or another adaptation, the book is reissued as a tie-in with the movie’s poster or artwork as cover art?
openTranslation detail contradicted in subsequent installment Literature
The first Harry Potter book mentions a "Blaise Zabini", no reference if this is a boy or a girl. While this works well in English, some languages require a gender even for this brief reference—for example, the Hebrew translation said this student is a girl. Then, book 6 makes it clear that Blaise Zabini is actually a boy.
openGet close to teacher's son to.get info from teacher about test Literature
One Harry Potter fanfic has a Hogwarts student who had previously gotten close to Professor McGonagall's son on order that McGonagall would give her the answers to the NEWT exam.
opennot like the other girls Literature
a YA female protagonist who's not like the other girls
openSon vanished from story Literature
Early in the second book of Samuel, King David's oldest 6 sons are listed in birth order. Later, after the death of David's oldest, the third son acts in a way which only makes sense if he were the oldest surviving son—and so does David's fourth son in the first book of Kings (the third son already having died in Samuel). There is no mention of David's second son anywhere after his listed birth.
openMulti-question to save on tickets Literature
- 1) A visual gag, where a character gets stuck in some loose substance (usually sand or snow) head-in, with only the feet dangling above the surface. The stuck character will then struggle to unstruck themself.
- 2) Alice is overdressed, but that's exactly what makes her even more attractive to Bob. Effectively, showing less making character even more sexy. I already checked Theiss Titillation Theory, but that's not it.
- 3) SELF-SOLVED, it's Mysterious Past Bob has ambiguous background and we never really learn any details about him, even if he's the main character.note In the context it is needed: Bob is good friend with some theoretical physicist, but not a scientist himself. He wears combat boots and military jacket, but isn't a soldier nor some adventurer (yet). He is familiar with many things related with practical engineering, but he is not an engineer. He can (barely) ride a horse. We mostly learn about him as the story unfolds and he has (or not) specific traits or skills, but we never learn what was his dayjob - if he had any - or who he really was prior to the start of the story
All three needed to work with Technomagia i smoki
Edited by TropiarzopenOriginally one work Literature
The Books of Samuel, the Books of Kings and the Books of Chronicles were each originally written as a single book, ultimately split due to length (in the case of Kings, at a completely arbitrary location).
openMagic tree buildings? Literature
Is there a trope for this? What's it called when there's a race of magic-using characters (like elves or unicorns) who live in a forest, and they use magic to coax or make the trees, vines, bushes, and other plants in the forest grow into the buildings and dwellings they need? Like, the walls of a building aren't made by cutting and hammering planks of wood into place, they're grown naturally (with magic) out of the existing trees and plants, and you technically are inside the still-living tree.
I think it's happened in Eragon and the Inheritance Cycle (elves), but it's also described in the "Book of Lore" entry for Oleander for the video game Them's Fightin' Herds. https://www.mane6.com/book-of-lore-archive/2525-2/
"Through the generations, they have used light magic to shape the trees into structures, spiraling to the sky in graceful, wooden columns, with branches twisted into delicate woven patterns. The most beautiful of these structures is their primary temple, The Sacred Grove."
"The young one makes her way across the room, her lion’s tail swaying groggily, to a table that seems to have grown from the ground."
https://www.mane6.com/characters/Oleander/
Is there a name for this trope, where buildings and furniture are grown out of the existing plants using magic?
openTrope for a ridiculously understaffed or underequipped outfit? Literature
I got the idea from a trope ‘One-ship Navy’ currently on the launch pad. The trope covers one heroic ship doing all the work, apparently. But it got me thinking, there must be a trope somewhere that applies to the whole ‘navy’ being literally one ship, and a pretty crappy one too…
So I am looking if there is a trope already where an outfit with a real fancy title on second look turns out to be a ridiculously understaffed or under-equipped sorry excuse for a department or assignment. May be the ‘Navy Command’ you are posted to is literally just one WWII era patrol boat, or your fancy new job title entails looking over a paper archive that no one ever uses anymore along with an archivist that has been on the job since the last century. Whatever it is, if you ever had high hopes for your new command, suddenly you realized you actually have been promoted away or even set up to fail.
Anybody knows of such a trope?
openOutgrow the need for magic Literature
Not sure how much media this is a trope in, but definitely a trope in coming-of-age novels, both realistic (Harriet the Spy) and fantasy (Narnia, etc.)
The powers/resource/tool which propels the story turns out to be a crutch, or just a teaching device, or has undesirable consequences. Maybe it just has a limited number of uses (Half-Magic, Black And Blue Magic). At the end of the story, the protagonist(s) realize that they no longer need it; they have the confidence to use Mundane Solutions or have matured enough to face their fears, etc.
NOT a Magic Feather. In this case, the thing they outgrow is very real, NOT a placebo effect.
openComputer glitch Literature
Something goes wrong with a computer making the protagonist making protagonist have to make a hard decision

One of the characters in Our Share Of Night came from an unrelated short story by the same author, and I was interested in potentially adding this information to a Trivia page, but I couldn't find anything similar enough to it. I tried checking on on Flowers for Algernon or The City We Became and the only thing I came accross is Adaptation Expansion, but doesn't quite fit since the book in question is not exactly an expansion of the short story.
Edited by alittlebook