#K: Seven Stories

[itsuki-minamy]

"K – LETTER STORY"

RED: "DEAR MY FUTURE SELF"

Translation: Naru-kun Raws: Ridia

Write a letter to your future self!

Anna watched the television program, which featured a scene from an elementary school classroom, without even thinking about it. Anna has never been to school. She is a Strain who has a powerful sensory ability, so she spent her days being a victim of experiments in a facility, and just the other day, she was rescued by the Red King Suoh Mikoto from "Homura" and came here.

On television, children write their questions and hopes for their future.

"Sounds interesting. Let's try it."

Totsuka, who was watching the same TV on the other side, smiled and said that.

When Totsuka thinks about it, he acts quickly. The reason he is a man of many interests is that he immediately does anything he has the slightest desire to try. Totsuka bought stationery and an envelope and gave them to Anna. Anna obediently accepted it.

"In how many years will you write to Anna?"

When Totsuka asked her, she thought silently. Anna's adult self was now too far away for her. For Anna, who has lived a tumultuous life from a young age and has just arrived in "Homura", the future seems to be within her reach...

"Five years from now?"

"That's great. Five years from now, Anna will probably be in high school."

He didn't think that Anna, who didn't even go to elementary school, would be able to attend high school, but he nodded slightly.

"What about you, Tatara?"

"Yes, I guess I should write too!"

After saying that, Anna watched Totsuka go down to the bar, then he went to his room and took a pen.

"Here, King, write something too."

"What do you mean?"

"Everything is fine. As long as it is written in your own handwriting, it is fine."

When Anna went down to the bar, she heard loud voices. Totsuka is about to give Suoh a pen while he drinks at the counter, and Kusanagi is polishing a glass and tidying up.

"If you can't think of anything to write, just sign it. Oh, I can think of an interesting King signature that I think would sell well."

"Don't sell, don't sell. What are you talking about?"

While she was there, Totsuka noticed her and greeted her.

"Anna, were you able to write the letter?"

She nodded and approached Totsuka.

"Did you write a letter to yourself, Tatara?"

"Eh? I didn't write it to myself. What I, or rather we wrote, was a letter to the future Anna."

Totsuka picked up the paper from the counter and held it up with the back facing Anna.

"Hey, we write too!"

Yata, who was sitting on the couch, raised his fist and said that happily. Kamamoto also shook his belly and laughed.

"It's like a message and it's fun."

"I made sure Saruhiko writes too!"

"You are very persistent, Misaki."

Totsuka folded the paper that seemed to have everyone's messages written on it and said, "Will you let me put them with yours?" and pointed to Anna's envelope containing a letter addressed to her future self.

Suoh watched the scene without thinking.

+++++++++++

"It's letter from the past."

When they got home from school, Kusanagi said that and handed an envelope to Anna.

Anna was stunned for a moment, then immediately remembered that event from five years ago. At that point, she entrusted the envelope to Kusanagi, who laughed and said, "I agree to deliver the letter in five years."

She accepted it gently and opened the seal.

[I don't know what to say to my future self, so I'll write down my current feelings, no matter what happens in the future, I'm glad I got Mikoto's red. I'm glad I came to this red place. That is what I think.]

That's what was written on the paper in childish and clumsy characters.

A lot has happened since then. Suoh and Totsuka are no longer there. Anna became the "King" who inherited the red of Suoh, and she also chose to part with the red by destroying the Slate.

Even so, she never felt any regret that betrayed her feelings when she wrote that letter. She also took out another piece of paper. There were messages written with various letters.

[How is the future Anna? Are you having a fun life? Anna is smart and she can do anything, so I hope you can do whatever you want. LOVE! Tatara Totsuka.]

[I'm sure Anna will be a wonderful big sister in five years. If you have any problems, please tell me in the future. I will always support you. Izumo Kusanagi.]

[Have you started laughing and talking? I don't know much about you yet, but I'm sure we'll be good friends in five years. Be careful! Yata.]

[Anna, have you grown up? You're probably still growing, so eat plenty! I'll tell you about any delicious restaurant! Rikio Kamamoto.]

[You don't have to deal with idiots forever. Fushimi.]

Looking at the letters on the paper, Anna's mouth went slack and she could almost hear his voice.

In the corner of the notebook, Suoh's name was written in a slightly deformed font, probably forced to write by Totsuka. With the same letter on that side,

[Live as you want.]

That was there.

Anna's expression looked like she was crying and laughing when she heard those words from someone who had lived the life he wanted and then passed away.

"It's okay. I'm living my life the way I want."

[mizuki-nikki]

"all you ever do is cling on to things. you'll never be able to go anywhere unless you learn how to let go."

mishakuji yukari to yatogami kuroh

(the feelssss 😭🤍)

[reineydraws]

he's murdered, resurrected, live! ✨️✨️ catch six seven batkids as a sparkly tudor-style pop idol group in my six the musical au for the @batfam-au-zine

PRE-ORDERS open 'till May 19! get your copy here!!! ➡️➡️ https://batfamauzine.bigcartel.com/

[t3nt3rh00ks]

did i mention i wrote an almost 50 page doc on queer coding in k project

if some of it is inaccurate that's because I was not thinking in the order of the series and writing whatever came to mind lol/didn't rewatch the longass show/i'm not even finished it

ignore grammar and spelling i can't be fucked to edit it

[ridiasfangirlings]

ridia, what's your opinion about k series (starting from season 1) being rated quite low by many people due to the fact that they feel like the story is lacking and poorly created? (i disagree with this but most of the reviews in google about this anime said so) :D

Obviously I don’t fully agree either, though I can kinda see where those reviews come from. For one thing I think the real meat of K is and has always been in the side materials, the anime works as a standalone but most of what makes the series really good is in the novels, manga, short stories, etc. So from that standpoint I can see why people feel the anime is lacking, because there’s a lot of character work and even worldbuilding that gets shunted off to the side materials (quick, anime only people, tell me exactly what Anna’s powers are!). 

Starting with season one specifically, I think that season is hampered by the in media res opening and the fact that it does take a while to get going. I know on my first watch I was confused by various things throughout the season, and because it’s so hard to grasp the basics of the setting and what exactly is happening at any given moment it means you miss a lot of the good stuff that the season is doing. There’s some definite chaff that could have been trimmed here and there — episode four comes most to mind, where we spend a lot of the time with the Silvers establishing Shiro’s alibi that almost immediately gets thrown out the window right afterward, or how the first couple episodes spend a good bit of time on Homra trying to hunt down the gun that killed Totsuka even though that plot thread ultimately goes nowhere. I personally found that season one works a lot better on rewatch, when you’re not hampered by trying to figure out things like ‘so is Neko actually a cat or actually a girl’ (which is a notable issue, I distinctly remember when I saw Missing Kings in the theater the girl behind me was explaining the series to her companion and incorrectly called Neko a cat that turns into a girl instead of the other way around). One of my favorite things on rewatch is seeing how they laid the clues for the mystery of Shiro’s identity and how you can see various characters figuring things out, Munakata in particular I didn’t even realize on my first watch is slowly piecing together what exactly is going on with Colorless and the Silver King for most of the latter half of the season. But reviewers generally only watch the season once, so it’s easy to miss the best parts of the mystery and feel ultimately like the show is lacking. 

Missing Kings is short enough that I think it’s basically fine just as it is, it does what it needs to for the story and I don’t have much room for complaint on that one. Return of Kings on the other hand I can definitely see why the reviews are meh on that one because even I’m pretty meh on that season. The pacing issues for ROK are honestly just really killer. I mentioned this even when I was reviewing the season as it aired, I feel like the plot of ROK was mostly brainstormed as ‘x episode needs to end on y moment,’ and a lot of the early episodes especially feel like they’re stalling for time in order to end on a particular beat. I think it just really kills the pacing and makes the first half feel overly slow and the second half too rushed, the season does its job in closing out the series but I can see why people find the story lacking in this one (I actually think the novelization did a good job of correcting some of these issues oddly enough, it even gives Neko a proper storyline instead of the weird half-aborted one she gets in the season proper). 

I’ll also touch on the Seven Stories movies too, I think these have the pacing problems you’d expect out of trying to make longer novels into short movies. LSW especially is just really disappointing, it cuts out the entire back half of the novel (when that back half is basically the whole point of the novel) and trims down a lot of the early stuff too, LSW the novel has issues with sidelining Yata for Fushimi and the movie version just does that tenfold. R:B I also think really speeds through things in a way that it feels a lot flatter than thinner than the novel. Side Blue kinda works (and is deeply weird and kinda horny for some reason) I think owing to the novel itself being a bit uneven due to how early it was written, the movie actually streamlines a lot of the time spent on side characters like Hidaka in order to focus on the more important Munakata/Zenjoh dynamic. Memory of Red is I think by far the best of the Seven Stories movies precisely because it picks a story that fits perfectly in the runtime it’s given, it doesn’t feel stretched but doesn’t feel rushed either. In general I feel like you can kinda see how Gora is a team made up largely of light novel writers, because they shine more when they have time to really focus on the story they want to tell and don’t have to be bound to the pacing of an animated series/movie.

[doyouknowthisanime]

Do You Know This Anime?

[katierosefun]

bro . .  . the ai voice technology thing is so incredibly creepy like. do. do we not see this as a problem in this age of recording people without their consent and just blasting it all over the internet. are we not thinking about like. the potential pitfalls of fake evidence. are we. are we not concerned about this

[streetcornertwoam]

OH my god...

I just actually had to go back relisten to the last several minutes of the latest ep ‘cause...I can’t believe I didn’t get the hints...

the fucking robes... ‘servant of the seven’ ‘one of seven in battle’...even BUMBERSHOOTS! 

goddammit Justin McElroy I’m so furious but I’m cackling

[flal12]

Nagare

[lisutarid-a]

[itsuki-minamy]

Here are my 2024 K Calendars! I hope you like it!^^

English // Spanish

[mizuki-nikki]

as always, my favorite anime characters and clan all the time.

fushimi saruhiko, munakata reisi and the scepter 4 ✨🤍

the anime ended long time ago but re-watching it still gave me mixed feelings 🥲

one of the best anime in my life 🥺

[bandousama]

[scaredbunny]

my mom had a tumblr