#Which omg that so rare in a Japanese manga

[asmodeusamaryllis]

Idk if I'm the biggest fan of using the trope 'no man can harm me! Alas I'm a woman ;)' being done vice versa so u can have a male protag n potentially show up all the women characters but I trust nishi that that won't happen 🤞

[takeshitakyuuto]

Trigun Book Club update volume 2/3/who knows

One more week until Trigun Maximum! Then my volume numbers won’t be off :’)

I feel like every time I sat down to read this time around, I got interrupted. Anyways, this is a long one, so buckle up

Ch 13. get his ass cobbler-san

Yaaaaaay ice cream on Vash! Me too me too!

Quite the introduction for Mr. Collarbones

I’m sorry that it’s just kinda funny to me whenever characters call Vash by his full name. That’s Mr. ヴァッシュ・ザ・スタンピード to you

Knives! Your reputation precedes you

I love when Vash puts on his shooting glasses and immediately my spotify switches to FFXIV battle music

Okay so maybe I kinda spoiled myself probably not really, since the beginning I’ve had the question (that the reader is obviously supposed to have) of why does Vash have such a big bounty on his head, but I saw someone say that he’s the Jesus character of Trigun and like. okay question answered I know enough about Christianity to fill in the blanks here, anyways with that it mind it’s really interesting to see how Vash mentions that his goal is to send Knives to hell

This guy kinda reminds me of that guy from Yu Gi Oh. Kaiba? Yeah Kaiba

12 pieces of coin, twelve assassins, twelve disciples. im making big brain connections here (joking)

There’s a ...head in that bag? [insert “so no head” gif]

Ch 13.5 [I think this is an extra chapter] i like the little background we’re getting on Vash and the visuals with him standing over the mass amounts of crosses like a graveyard is really cool

Alright cut it out Nightow we don’t need to get weird here

Even though I rarely read manga digitally anymore, I feel so spoiled with how much manga is published online nowadays. These very obvious scans of paper volumes is so much harder to read, I’m sounding out like half the words I read

You know that chapter of Kino’s Journey (okay I know you don’t bear with me here) where Kino goes to that country where everyone is obsessed with this one guy’s painting of tanks and they’re all like ���it says so much about war and society” and then Kino meets the painter and he’s all like “nah I just think tanks are really cool”. Yeah that painter is Nightow

Which is more elegant, this girl’s dress of Vash’s coat tails?

Has Vash always worn an earring? Have I just never noticed? I see but don’t look? How coquette

The interspersed English that Nightow uses always adds a bit of humor. I’m not even a translator but sometimes I think about what I would do with those bits. Would I keep it to make extra work? Would I translate it into a different language that’s more commonly understood than Japanese but not English (such as Spanish)? Translations are weird man....

Vash has the best pouting face of all time

Okay sorry I said a lot in that chapter but I don’t think any of it was serious. Not that that was a very important chapter anyways, other than the bits of world building we got at the very beginning

Volume three! Ch 14. Omg I see that big cross in the cover. Do we get to meet Nicholas Wolfwood himself? God I hope I’m right and he’s the one with the cross because I’m blasting this post for the Trigun Scholars to see. Blease be kind I know so little

Seems like this volume or at least this chapter is going to be a lot of Vash vs Kaiba

So we’re seeing Rem’s death scene and how it displays her love for humanity, sacrificing herself to save some, even if she can’t save everyone. And seeing that Knives has been a bit fucked from the beginning huh. And why Vash hates him so much (cue Losing My Religion by REM playing in the back)

Vash is typically painted as an angelic type of character (thinking back to chapter nine[?] with the angel/plant they met on the sand steam) so having him depicted more as a devil character is really interesting. They even called this his true nature, although that could just be this villain character giving him shit. I’m excited to see how Vash’s character is fleshed out in future volumes and how these seemingly two sides of him create a whole

Ch 15. I don’t know (yet?) if Knives’ plan was to kill Rem along with a bunch of humans but damn. backfiredddd

So this spirit/angel urging Vash not to kill must be Rem right? Since he said that if he kills here, she’ll be gone for real? I’m taking this to be more of Vash’s memory of her and not a literal angel or spirit

Ch 16. I was totally about to rag on them for having all this insane technology and Meryl still having to use a typewriter but then I remembered that this series is from what. the 80s? Earlier? Honestly who could’ve imagined the technology we’d have in just twenty years from then, it’s insane.

Oh that’s cool! Vash is called “Humanoid Typhoon” right? It’s usually written as 「人間台風」which literally translates to human typhoon but at the beginning of this chapter, Meryl calls him 「人間災害」with furigana instructing the reader to read it as “humanoid typhoon” (same as with the other times), however this translates to “human disaster” rather than typhoon

One coin part down, eleven to go...

We’ve finally officially established that Vash has a prosthetic arm, I was wondering when that was gonna happen

First of all what is Vash carrying with him second of all holy shit that panel of the person(?) nailed on the cross

That thing was set up specifically for him? Is this another one of the twelve assassins? I feel like I’m gonna get bored of this set up real quick if it continues on like this

oh man I’m struggling with the blurriness of this volume, I keep messing up さ and き in the furigana and if anything’s got a dakuten I’m a gonner

Ch 17. I bet these poor citizens see someone in an over the top ridiculous outfit and just think to themselves, aw man this bitch is about to blow up the city again. Good thing I renewed my insurance last month

Yaoi proportions are back!

Having the guy who’s pissing you off rip out his own still-beating heart with his own bare hands is pretty badass ngl

Is Kaiba (okay I know his name is Legato but this is funnier) trying to bring about the apocalypse or something? Or rather eradicate enough humans to be able to live peacefully, whether that means all humans or just the ones he considers “evil”? Right now he’s giving me a lot of Light Yagami vibes

Ch 18. Cross guyyyyyy hell yeah. You know, maybe you wouldn’t collapse in the street if you didn’t carry a big ass cross with you everywhere. Just food for thought

Wolfwood speaks in Kansaiben???? Help I’m falling in love it’s my one weakness in this world

I’ve decided that I never want to see Wolfwood written in katakana ever again.

Wolfwood just needs to say あかん and ホンマ and I’m already head over heels

I really like Wolfwood and I promise it’s more than just the Kansaiben! I love how nice he is and he seems to be able to read people pretty well and also he’s kind of a dork. But the Kansaiben helps too

Ch 19. Omg the one guy who I was immediately like 🫵 yaoi proportions ended up being Hornfreak. Yep that’s just how it is

Isn’t it so fun when words you learned from anime pop up elsewhere? There’s “human trafficking,” which I learned from Yona of the Dawn

Oh? It’s Dominique not Dominic? That explains the かしら. Honestly I do like Nightow’s style of “I can’t tell what gender this person is”

Nightow also really likes drawing Vash ass up this is not the time for a dirty joke

Oh my god hes going super sayan also oh my god im so stupid i just closed out of my trigun tab trying to switch jfc

Ch 20. The cat stepped on my laptop and flipped all the images omfg I am having such a time trying to read today oh my god I can’t get it back I guess I’ll just restart my laptop for now? holy shit

Yeah okay closing out of the site didn’t help, restarting my laptop didn’t help, all files were flipped, but luckily someone suggested clearing the cookies for that site and it actually worked. I am so bad with technology. What a ridiculous day.

I’m gonna be honest I don’t know how you all can read this in English, I could only figure out who was speaking based on the fact that Legato used だ where Wolfwood would’ve used や

Lol jump for your coin bitch (Vash I love you but it’s funny I’m sorry)

Wolfwood’s 「ちう」is causing me so much stress. What the hell does that mean, boy. Luckily I have friends in high places (Japan)

I’m so obsessed with the fucked up angel imagery here in Knives’ rebirth

Please no romance between Meryl and Vash please no romance between Meryl and Vash please no r

Guy who only reads shoujo manga: I’m getting a lot of shoujo manga vibes from this (no but really, there’s a bunch of artistic choices in Trigun that I mostly associate with shoujo manga, but I think it has more to do with the age of the manga. Probably Ikeda Riyoko’s influence)

Knives is such an overdramatic bitch, I love that

Angel Vash! The inherent danger of the divine! Although a god can be kind it can also be cruel! Power can be used in many ways and thus is its danger!

We’ve finally established that Vash and this power that Knives brings out of him is the reason why July Town was destroyed. This is probably also the reason why he’s got such a high price on his head

Also really enjoying the implications that these human forms aren’t Vash’s and Knives’ “true” bodies

Extra chapter. Thank god he didn’t shoot the egg oh my god. The irony of consistently taking the lord’s name in vain so much here (term used ironically but also because what else can I say) while reading Nightow’s bible fanfiction just now hit me

I admit it, I totally skimmed that. In my defense, it’s past midnight.

Final thoughts: Having officially finished up the original trilogy, that was pretty damn good! The ending was great (yes, I know there’s much more to go) and quite bittersweet. The pace really picked up for me in this last volume. My only main issue was just friction between me and the genre, which is no one’s fault but my own. I could definitely do for less action scenes, but again, my favorite genre is the “nothing happens” genre. I’m really excited to see where Trigun Maximum takes the series, especially in the ways that these angels/plants are developed. I’m also excited to see more of Knives and Wolfwood and especially how they both interact with Vash, since they obviously have extremely different perceptions of him. I’m not quite sure where the plot is going to go from here, since it seems like Vash took Knives along with him in his disappearance, but I’ll follow Nightow wherever he leads us in this series. What I’m not looking forward to is having to read more of Nightow’s handwriting. God. Even so, somehow it’s still not the worst I’ve seen from mangaka. Oh, also, there was significantly less of that black cat than I expected. I’ll just assume it comes back in Maximum. And (sorry these thoughts are so unordered) wow the art was so stunning, especially there at the end, that I definitely have half a mind to pick up the physicals for my personal collection. Especially with a fanbase revival due to Trigun Stampede, I’d be more shocked if it’s out of print than if it isn’t. Oh and one more thing, we went through three of the twelve coin assassins. Does that mean that we’re going to go through the other nine in Maximum? Also, I’m not quite clear on why Vash has to collect the coin fragments like this is Dragon Ball (disclaimer: never seen or read any of the dragon ball franchise). Was mystical object collection just a trend back then? What’s going to happen, or supposed to, when Vash gets them all? Hopefully this will become clear as the series continues.

[kaolinite91]

My review about One Piece Live Action (OPLA)

(Pic source: OPLA Netflix twitter)

Okaaay, you probably knew that I was one of old Nakama, since I've been following one piece for around 20 years (since elementary school haha)

And honestly when I saw the first plan about OPLA from Netflix.. I have a very great cynicism..because you know how baaaaad most of Hollywood anime adaptation were. The good anime adaptation which I think best was Gintama n Kenshin live action, but that's has major Japanese casts and in Japanese languange. But One Piece gonna have diverse casts..how scary. I really put my expectation bar..really...really low back at the time.

But then I saw the list of the casts and honestly, when I saw Inaki Godoy as Luffy for the first time, I kinda unsure and was like "hmm..let see his IG profile first", and I saw him somehow being naturally cheerful and goofy just like Luffy. And I saw his still from one of mexican drama where he looks really cool and badass. I was like " maybe this kid can be Luffy", my expectation kinda growing.

The cast for SH crew looks promising after I saw their profile..except from Taz because back then he has no IG yet. Very2 limited info from him. But after some times, I can see how he & the other cast really2 love the characters they are playing and worked hard for it. They were working with heart and it's shown..

Oda- sensei gives his thought about the adaptation too..and apparently he was the one who want the OPLA to be happened, tho he will be really strict about it. And I honestly I was starting to believe (I mean if the creator already said so), but great doubt still lingered in my heart.

Some months pass..finally the first picture of the cast with full outfits appeared, the first teaser during One Piece day..my expectation started to grew again. I got really hype tho people around me still really sceptical.

More info about how Oda approved Inaki as Luffy because his audition tape made Oda laughed. How Inaki got a strawhat from Luffy's seiyuu,Mayumi Tanaka, and all original anime seiyuu gonna voiced the chara in the live action too. He got a warm support from Shueisha and even met Oda himself and got a STRAWHAT from Goda? Well I started to BELIEVE!! I mean..this OPLA got support from the original source material!! How very awesome! I want this to succeed!

As a long time fans I got a secondhand nervousness.. I really want this live action to be successful. I already saw how the casts chemistry works really well during the interview etc..I want it to succeed!! I even shared a lot of the promotional media to my IG story which was rarely happened from me..hahaha

and after a bit more wait, the series released Yesterday at 31 August 2023. It's during weekday, on Thursday and the Netflix premiere in indonesia was at 14.00 wib. I applied for leave just to watched this Live action yesterday. How was it?? WORTH IT!!

I am so glad I love One Piece and so happy that my favorite manga got a very well made live action.

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SPOILER SPOILER

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Spoiler

Here're some of my faves things & moments:

- Many different approach in telling the story, so it felt fresh!! Because the main point were still conveyed but the location differ and some interaction between characters got adapted to catter the limited episodes (only 8 eps)

- many interesting new interaction!! Luffy and Nami interaction, zoro & nami, zoro & sanji etc..haha loves when SH crew appears

- I got teary eyes during flashback moments (Shanks gave his hat, Zeff advice to little Sanji, Bellemere moments 🥲🥹)

- Zoro very very cool and awesome..and honestly trying to rewatch with JP dub really made him even more WHOLESOME..omg

- when Sanji called Zoro mosshead

- when Ussop and Kaya kissed..hahaha (so there will be romance?)

- when Nami only hugged Zoro and Usopp & Sanji only saw from the sidewalk..

- love Nami theme song because it's pretty and sung by Aurora!

- loves the hidden easter egg: binks sake song, anime ost instrumental, mentioned Jaya, and story of Mobran Noland (even the story book!) Etc

- Garp denden mushi looks cute somewhow haha

- how Buggy looks super creepy like Joker hahaha but I love it! It's super interesting

- Helmeppo really annoying just like in the comic, Koby looks very similar with the comic counterpart too!!

- I love how the story combines SH POV with Koby as marine POV (which should be after vol 45), but it makes the introduction of the world more seamless and easier for the new fans ro enjoy

- JP Dub really a whole other experience!!! You must watch it at least twice I think! Hahaha original voice and JP dub!!

What I don't really like or can be improved:

- need more episodes, 8 was too short and made the story telling too packed.

-This also impacted the timing of the screen which supposed to build up the impactful scenes: like when Gold Roger dies,Zoro almost died from hunger, Shanks arm got eaten, Sanji's thankfulness to Zeff, Luffy's promise to helps Nami and when he yelled that Nami is his Nakama from Arlong park ruins.... it's not really highlighted. Kinda felt like just another ordinary scenes 🥹🥲😭

- somehow Luffy fight not really as dynamic as Zoro, so I kinda feel sad..but in east blue saga he still kinda weak(?) So maybe that's okay

- No Hachi in arlong park, no battle with Krieg...No usopp's little kids crew and somehow Merry died (I know he's more like NPC but it still sad because Kaya alone now)

- a bit more gory with blood etc

- Garp characterization...somehow a bit confusing. He seems a lot stricter than in the manga, and rarely laughing too.. which is okay. But why he really want to captured Luffy is still not understandable for me...? In vol 45 he just want to Meet Luffy as his Grandpa, but not sure in OPLA, is he still want to makes Luffy a marine? (Maybe I need to rewatch it). He contacted the Shichibukai to captured Luffy a bit stretched too..since Garp division in manga should be the part of marine who didn't believe in Shichibukai as 'protector of the sea'.

- how Genzou not have importance to the plot as Nami's and Nijiko's father... He should be the reason for the pinwheel, but in OPLA Bellemere the one who made it.

- Bellemere's name in the EN subtitles only written as Woman.. during Nami episode her name never mentioned and only written in her graveyard (saaaad)

- Sanji needs more screentime!! Huhuhu he just started join the crew in EP 7 and the episodes already finished at 8...saaad. I need more of him too 😭

- the SH crew interaction very limited because of the packed pacing and short number of episodes. I wish they can be explored more. It's funny because the screentime got divided into coby, helmeppo and garp interaction too. They really felt like another main characters.

- how Luffy recruitted the crew also not really highlighted, thus it's a bit weird on why suddenly Zoro want to follow him as his crew. it's kinda felt random..

-Luffy a lot more...wise and mature? I wish he looks more goofy like how Inaki in his IG stories. And because not many interaction with usopp yet..his childish part seems not really explored?

Maybe that's that for now.. but TLDR. It's a fun & fresh live action and I recommend you to watched it and be a new Nakama!

For me OPLA season 1 score was: 8.5/10

Ps. Above was the objective score from me because I kinda particular.. but subjective score with EN dub was 10/10, for JP dub is 11/10 because I love how fun and fresh it is!! (I still rewatching it for the JP dub hahaha)

[kresnikcest]

uhhh hello. i was recommended xillia 2 as a cool (background) sibling relationship and pointed to your blog specifically, and i've been scrolling through your posts but i have absolutely no idea what's going on lmaoo ;-; uh. please, please don't feel pressured to if you're too busy or tired or just don't want to, but could you possibly direct me to some starting resources 👉👈

.......... i thought it was kaira but it was actually @asphaltaxismundi who recced me and x2 omg thanks <3 (i have also heard good things about FMA 2003, it's on my list for whenever i fall out of love with X2, but i third it!)

i'm warning you now though x2 is not a media you consume from start to finish because. yeah they're almost entirely built up in Japanese-only side material. if you play the game you'll be pretty disappointed, but the manga's English translation is incomplete... hhhhhhh

so i'm just gonna write you an abridged recap of them and if you're still interested i'll collect all the links to the translated stuff... be warned, this is LONG. i have so many feelings about them.

Ludger is 20, Julius is 28, Ludger's memory of things is that Julius raised him. They live together in an apartment in the big city with their cat, Rollo.

Ludger admires the hell out of Julius and wants to be just like him and join the company that Julius works for so he can follow in Julius' footsteps. His personality varies across adaptations/player choices, he can be quiet and polite or outspoken and kind of snarky but canonically he does always hold Julius in high esteem, even if he's mad at him for being secretive. And Julius is SO secretive.

Julius is supportive of Ludger and cares a lot for him, and especially adores Ludger's cooking. He's super popular with girls because he's high-key famous, but he's like. brocon of all time. Literally just adores the crap out of Ludger. He's like the archetypal sweet caring protective big brother character tbh.

(manga scans are by blasteriifx and the translation is by flagfighter unless otherwise noted)

(He seems quite stern when you first meet him in this setting, but he's actually like. the SOFTEST--)

I don't want to explain too much about Xillia 2 lore because I assume you just want the fun sibling stuff, but basically, their family is part of a clan of people called the Kresnik clan who can inherit special powers (called the Chromatus) that are necessary for completing what is called "Origin's Trial", and if they fail all humans will die.

The company that Julius works for, Spirius Corporation, is run by a branch of the Kresnik clan, and specifically by Bisley Bakur, Ludger and Julius' father (though Ludger's doesn't know he's their father).

Bisley is making the most concentrated effort to complete the Trial, but the Chromatus is rare (and using it will eventually kill the person) and he's very pragmatic about saving humanity and will do anything and use anyone to do so, including his family, and Julius discovers this eventually just before he meets Ludger which causes him to cut ties with his father and hate him.

(Not necessarily Bisley's fault though, Julius was born when he was 15 years old and the woman who would eventually become his wife, Cornelia, was 22 and his family tutor, so it's pretty much implied Bisley's family were equally pragmatic about things.)

So after Julius' mother dies working on the Trial (Julius eventually comes to believe Bisley sacrificed her, and canon sort of agrees with him), Bisley sleeps with Cornelia's sister Claudia (Ludger's mother), who runs away when she finds out her son will have a Chromatus, leaving behind Julius who she'd mostly been raising in his parents' absence.

One thing I haven't really touched upon is that Julius is fucked up as a kid, especially once Claudia is out of the picture. Having a Chromatus and working on the Trial involves going into alternate universes, and destroying those universes (usually by killing a specific person who's most different to the "real" world), so people who inherit the Chromatus are basically committing a lot of murder… Julius has been doing it since he was 11, and since the company line is "those worlds aren't real", he eventually gets into the mentality of "if the world is going to be destroyed, you can do whatever you want" so he and another teenager start competing to see who can kill the most people in the AU worlds.

Anyway, 13 year old Julius accidentally finds where Claudia and 5 year old Ludger are in hiding, and Claudia freaks out and thinks he's there to take Ludger back to Bisley. It's not even clear if she recognises Julius is her nephew, but she tries to kill him and Julius kills her in self-defence.

(My machine translation this time. Also his hair's the wrong colour, idk why none of the official art ever remembers that Ludger's black hair is dyed as a teenager. he's supposed to have all silver-white hair as a child)

(By the way, Ludger and Julius are half-brothers and cousins. This isn't relevant to anything except it makes their family tree look a little bit fucked up, which I personally find hilarious.)

Ludger gets amnesia from the trauma and no longer remembers his mother or her death. Canon gets questionable around here, but it's pretty universally agreed upon that Julius adopts Ludger so he can take advantage of using Ludger's Chromatus pocketwatch (which will make Julius more powerful).

He doesn't really care for Ludger himself, so they're pretty distant for two years even though Ludger just thinks his big brother is the coolest, but eventually...

You, my half-brother through our father, and my cousin. You who had lost your mother, the only family you had. I spoke to you warmly through the pain, I got close to you, and I took you home with me. I faked our blood ties to take your watch as my own, just so I could make myself stronger. I wasn’t worried at all about the fate of my very young relative. All I wanted was power. It was selfish of me. And still… You had burned your hands, clumsily preparing dinner. You waited for me to come home, looked straight at me and told me “welcome home” with a smile. It changed that awful me.

7 year old Ludger, wanting to make a small show of gratitude and make his brother happy, made a clumsy attempt at cooking. He discovered his brother’s favourite food, and presented him with a tomato dish. Julius had always been cold, but his lips quivered and he smiled, looking as though he was about to cry. Seeing that smiling face, Ludger finally understood that he was needed.

Or as I like to summarise it...

Julius: oh shit this kid loves me

And then he learned morals for him. And how could he not. Look at this sweet child

(flagfighter's translation)

SO. For the next thirteen years they grow pretty close and chill with each other and are wholesome and sweet and it's adorable because Ludger doesn't even have that much of a social life outside of Julius? Like it's mostly unintentional because Ludger needs to befriend the prequel game cast when he's 20, but after he graduates high school he stops talking to the two (2) shortlived high school friends he had and is more worried about...

(my machine translation)

Meanwhile you remember Julius is constantly lying for years and years about all the murder he's doing and that he killed Ludger's mother and Ludger knows NOTHING, he's just spending what free time Julius has off-work being cute and arguing Rollo's diet ;-;

“Only because you keep feeding him canned food when it’s not time for a meal. Don’t you think he’s gotten fat?” Julius picked Rollo up and nuzzled their noses together. “He’s saying you’re fat, but you look perfectly healthy to me, don’t you, Rollo?” “Meow!” “Stop that, if a cat’s fat it’s because of the owner. Do you know how dangerous it is to a cat’s health if they’re overweight, Julius?” Ludger’s lecture continued on, but Julius found his scolding pleasant. He took a sip of coffee and murmured that it tasted good, then diligently listened to his brother’s lecturing.

So Julius has been hiding Ludger's existence from official records to protect him from their father. When Ludger tries to apply to join Spirius, Julius sabotages him and rigs his exam so he'll fail. Ludger is bummed out but accepts that he couldn't make it and eventually gets a different job as a train station cook. Unfortunately on his first day the place gets attacked by terrorists and Ludger ends up meeting Bisley, Bisley sort of gloats to Julius that he knows Ludger exists now, and Julius just decides right then and there to murder him.

The manga adds additional context from Ludger's POV and i adore it for that ;-;

But yes, Julius is canonically ready to just murder the fuck out of their dad right in front of Ludger if it keeps Ludger away from the Trial. Which is already quite delightful... Then Ludger gets unknowingly dropped into an alternate universe where that version of Julius is trying to kill both Bisley and Ludger because Ludger met Bisley and admired him and chose him over Julius...

Anyway, after that, Julius is framed for trying to assassinate the CEO and goes on the run, while Ludger is eventually blackmailed into joining Spirius and using his Chromatus. Julius refuses to explain anything to Ludger and keeps trying to keep him out of things, which Ludger finds frustrating, and Ludger does find out that Julius sabotaged him earlier, but the manga makes it pretty clear that in the end they're both just worried about each other.

(revised machine translation proofread by yume-x-hanabi)

I won't recap the rest of the story, but I'll do a quick note that there's a lullaby Julius hums to Ludger called the Hymn of Proof.

(old not great machine translation but i can't be bothered to open photoshop and fix it)

Which btw in the game Julius describes as "a song about longing to see someone". This scene, btw, is immediately followed by Julius trying to kidnap Elle (the little girl Ludger befriends who is unbeknownst to both of them, Ludger's daughter from an AU world), because he can use her powers. I kind of love it when Julius switches between seeming so fond and sweet and then getting very serious.

But, ultimately Julius just wants Ludger to be happy. When he sees Ludger is desperate to save Elle, he understands that sentiment because he feels the same devotion to Ludger. The manga plays it out a little differently though...

Anyway Julius pretty much disappears from the plot after this point, and eventually returns for the endgame. I mentioned earlier that the Chromatus will kill its users eventually, and Julius is actually secretly dying, and once he dies he will create an AU world and disappear from the "real" world.

And near the end of the game, it's revealed that a specific human sacrifice is needed to reach the Land of Canaan (plot important place to complete the Trial) and stop Bisley and save Elle (who went with Bisley to protect Ludger), and the only options left are Julius or Ludger. Julius, of course, offers his own life, because he's already dying, and encourages Ludger to come and kill him.

Even for the sake of saving the world...

And well. Here I will leave you with the two ways this goes down.

Ludger refuses to kill Julius (bonus: unused dialogue)

Ludger agrees to kill Julius

Both are pretty tragic, but they sort of feed into each other. If Julius dies, the world he creates is a world where everything is peaceful and everyone, even Bisley, is alive, but if you pay attention to the NPC dialogue (not shown in the video) it becomes... very obvious that Ludger is not friends with any of the characters he is in the Prime Dimension, and that this is a world where Elle will never exist, not as Ludger's daughter or in any other form.

Which ties directly into the ending where Julius lives, and he admits a world where Ludger chose him over everything else is 'maybe' the world he wanted too.

And it FUCKS ME UP SO MUCH that Julius never ever EVER makes that known? Yes it's known he adores Ludger yes he tries to take Elle from Ludger (ultimately for pragmatic reasons, he needs Elle's specific powers, but I wouldn't say he's not not jealous that she's proof Ludger will leave him) but given he immediately changes his mind when Ludger is so attached to her he's willing to risk his life for her, Julius is NOT openly possessive over Ludger and that makes me lose my mind. Like deep deep down he does want Ludger all to himself but, consciously? What's more important to him is Ludger's happiness.

Meanwhile Ludger... loves his friends, certainly loves Elle, and it's easy to forget because Julius is so rarely relevant in the main story, but Julius is also so important to him. He didn't even want to leave Julius as an adult. Even if he agrees to kill him, it's devastating...

There is also a story parallel I didn't touch upon, which is Elle's father, the alternate version of Ludger. He also murdered his friends to protect his daughter from Bisley (who wanted to use Elle to save their world), but he also murdered his version of Julius, and years later he can say that in the end Julius only cared about protecting Ludger. It's uncertain because Victor isn't a very reliable narrator, but you can pretty clearly see where the parallels are that, Ludger can do pretty horrible things to protect the people he loves, and Julius can supersede Ludger's happiness in favour of keeping him alive.

(Mind you, X2 literally ripped me away from the depths of my SPN obsession and has now surpassed the length of time that my SPN rennaissance lasted, so I did initially go into X2 thinking Julius was perhaps controlling and Ludger wanted his own space, except... no... and it's devastating...)

But then we get the little fun bits of Bad Ending Ludger's thoughts and the guidebook summary and the staff commentary and the music that plays being called "the bond more important than anything else"...

I am so normal about them. They love each other so much.

I know you were specifically asking about sibling stuff but, yeah Xillia 2 all around is so good for non-romantic "I'm gonna murder people to save the person I love" feelings. Which is why if you looked at my recent posts it's not actually about the brothers 😂

anyway if you actually got to reading all this rambling you could maybe... reach out to me again... and i'll yell some more about them with actual sources and better explanations...

[meimi-haneoka]

(Sorry! Please forgive me!)

Gomenasai, my name is Akiho-Chan.

I’m a 27 year old British Otaku (Anime fan for you gaijins). I draw Anime and Manga on my tablet, and spend my days perfecting my art and reading my Japanese mangas. (Sailor Moon, Fruit Basket, Ouran High School Host Club)

I travel with my most beloved butler, Kaito-san every day, he is my most important person in my life, and I won't forget about him ever since I was a child. I love him so much because he is the one who took care of me and protecting me from those Squid clan members, and I have been getting better every day thanks to him.

I speak Japanese fluently, both Kanji and the Osaka dialect, and I write fluently as well. I know everything about Japanese history and their bushido code, which I follow 100%

When I get my Japanese visa, I am moving to Tomoeda to attend a prestigious middle school to learn more about their magnificent culture. I hope I can become an animator for Studio Ghibli or a manga designer!

I own several kimonos, which I wear around town. I want to get used to wearing them before I move to Japan, so I can fit in easier. I bow to my elders and seniors and speak Japanese as often as I can, but rarely does anyone manage to respond.

Wish me luck in Japan!

ANON THIS IS NOT THE TYPE OF ENGAGEMENT I WAS TALKING ABOUT PPFFTTTT LMAOOOO

Omg I cringed on several levels when I have read this 😂 leave my poor Akiho alone....

[courtesanofdeath]

[Black Lagoon Anon]

So I'll definitely have to tag you in any Black Lagoon posts I post.. Especially the rare posts. Because this whole fandom is already small as it is right now. But I have been hoping that the more people talk about it, the more people would be just curious enough to want to find out about the franchise in general too.

And I keep saying franchinse because I don't know.. Wait. Did you know that Sawyer and Eda really have own spinoff mangas. Because you'll also get a lot of backstories for Eda, Sawyer, Shenhua and Lotton.

But about the original manga. I don't know how you might feel about Li's character, you may like her. So she is the new female character in the next arc after Roberta's Blood Trail. I won't say more though.

And I could definitely see you liking Le Majeur.. She is the newest female character who was introduced in Dutch's backstory chapters. And that's all I'll say.

You will also learn more about Revy's time in prison, more about her backstory. Many more backstories.

I'm keeping details vague so not to spoil you more.

I sent a Japanese clip for Gangsta. too, if you might be curious about the anime in Japanese. Since that was already mentioned you prefer Japanese. Which is fine. I don't think any characters have accents for this series that I know of. But it's so rare to find any videos for this series, regardless of language, so I've just sent any videos I can find. So another video.

Like I said.. A woman created this series, franchise - since there's a spinoff for one of the characters too.

This series is like Black Lagoon, but reversed in lots of ways. There are strong characters, including a lot of female characters. Some queer characters. But a lot of disabled characters too. There is also many of these characters who're of different ethnicities too.

The dark skinned woman you'd see, Alex, she is one of the mixed characters. Is part black, part Chinese, and part something else too. She's a mixed woman.

Doug is the young man with the dreadlocks, he is a half black man. He's black and white descent.

Galahad is obviously black.

Nicolas, who is the deaf man you've already seen, is actually half Asian from his mother's side.

Worrick is most likely European, at least of more of a European descent. Based on his appearance.

There are many other characters, but those were an example for you. And you already met Nicolas who's a canonically deaf character. His sign language that he speaks is the Japanese sign language if you may be curious. As someone who is considered disabled (by technicalities), I do enjoy seeing characters who are disabled. Especially the accurately portrayed.

And, just like Black Lagoon, graphic content will be happening. Especially in the manga. Including a lot of offensive languages. Just to warn you about that ahead of time. Oh! Another warning.. In the anime. I can't remember if it's the first or second episode, I'd have to let you know there is actually a sex scene.

And if it wasn't already obvious yet, the boys, Nicolas and Worrick are the main characters of this story. And Alex to some extent too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcmNVDWBkiU

oooh a spinoff for eda and sawyer sounds goood! sawyer is really cool and i really loved her scenes and her character is really interesting! i also love her character design! and i loooove eda so much !! so i'm definitely gonna check those out! and shenhua too omg ever since her introduction i loved her! and lotton too lmaaoo he's really funny and interesting so i'd love to learn more about him too! im excited to meet the new characters too! black lagoon has lots of fun and interesting characters so i can't wait to see more of them later on!

from the clips you've shared i can already see how diverse the gangsta characters are, which is super cool! it's rare to see characters with disability in anime, and especially in one of that genre, so that's really rad! nicolas seems so cool, i'm excited to see more of him when i get into the anime!

and thanks for the heads up about the graphic content! i'm definitely gonna watch the anime in sub, especially since i just saw that worrick is voiced by junichi suwabe who's one of my fav jp voice actors! lol

i'm really excited to watch gangsta and then read it later on! i have a feeling i'll enjoy it a lot. thank you so much for telling me about it!

[philosophicalparadox]

You are right 👍

And honestly it is SO refreshing to see someone explain this better than I ever could. Zabuza/Haku gave me the HC about Wakashudo-esque relationships being a Thing in Kiri, (as opposed to just being a thing between them) which when looking at the presented culture overall makes complete sense.

And honestly it’s one of the things that reallly frustrates me about not only Naruto, but anime/manga in the west in general. WE ARE NOT THE INTENDED AUDIENCE. At best we are a by-catch, except in some rare exceptions.

As someone in the Berserk fandom where there is an absolutely terrible deficit of people who have any cross-cultural understanding of the work at all, (maybe because it’s taking place in a pseudo-1420’s Europe, reasonably reliably at that, and DOES include references to a lot of western history and media, because Miura was a global literature professor) it’s just sooooooooooo frustrating to see western centric takes that completely ignore the fact that these series were not made for a western audience and don’t draw from the same well most of the time.

Mind, Shonen over the years has definitely made alterations to its tropes and modality to be more western-receptive, which is how we got My Hero and other very americanised “baby Shonen”, but Naruto ain’t one of them.

It’s also refreshing to see the authors own frustration, which is palpable in the work itself — Naruto really SHOULD have been a seinen, and it comes SO close at times that it blurs the lines a little. (Tree of death anyone?) But because of how media laws and other media related things work in Japan it’s not actually that easy to just dive in from one to the other; plus manga that have, in precedent, made that dramatic shift in genre don’t tend to do well, JoJo’s notwithstanding. In general, switching up your target audience is not a wise decision and no publisher will back you unless you’ve got serious clout. JoJo’s is such a long running manga/light novel series that there was less pushback on that, plus Araki just flat out didn’t give a shit.

Kishi couldn’t have been that flexible if he tried.

But besides that, Naruto came out right at the beginning of a counterculture movement in Japan, a renewed “westernization” that sought to bring feminism and equality notions into Japan which hadn’t been there prior. Social justice progress wise, Japan is about 20-30 years behind the US, which puts it about 50 years behind most other “developed” western nations. (See, Western Europe).

Unfortunately homosexuality is not very accepted in Japan; yes their attitude is different, but that’s not acceptance, just a different kind of prejudice. Japan is exceptionally xenophobic (racist) especially towards other Asians, but their idea of treating others differently looks more like indifference to a westerner, and indifference looks a lot like tolerance when violence is your primary frame of reference. Homophobia is the same.

(It’s not indifference at all, just a kind of passive aggression, which is really common in Asia at large, because of how the Shame/Honour culture thing works).

Don’t get me wrong, I would have loved for Kishi to go whole hog in a more modernish way, but as OP said 1. That’s not the reference material he was using and 2. He would almost certainly have been eaten alive by his fans and publisher for trying anything too obviously “Gay”.

I mean ffs have y’all ever looked in on the Japanese forums around this show? Or twitter? (Back when it existed in Japan). There’s always the Japanese version of a pearl clutcher in there whenever Naruto and Sasuke do anything remotely gay, and I remember perusing the internet after the anime added a filler arc in which Naruto and Sasuke end up “accidentally” kissing Again, (and get stuck to each other while needing to pee, which was arguably the worse infraction because “omg they have to look at each other’s peens????” ) and the Japanese fans went insane. Some in a good way, but man, some of those people were just mean. Homophobia on full display in there.

Nowadays it seems to be not as bad, but Japan still has a long ways to go before they’ll be as accepting as some of the 2020’s west. (Though with America running backwards that notion of overall western tolerance probably won’t last too long).

I get annoyed with the series and Kishimoto too, mainly because the worldbuilding in Naruto is objectively a hot dumpster fire of contradictions, but I also acknowledge that part of the reason for that is because Kishimoto got stuck trying to continue making a shonen series about some VERY not shonen topics, which limited his ability to be expansive, and that he was also working between the culture he grew up in (the 70’s-80’s) and the culture he was making the series in, AND trying to incorporate references that made a lot more sense to use in the 80’s when he was developing, which is when TV came to Japan as a household commodity and EVERYONE was working historical fiction and memoirs into TV dramas, making the entire notion of Samurai very popular, which additionally makes those references more obscure to a western audience, AND also trying to “disguise”, sort of, behind an acceptable, if slightly homophonic lens, the homosexual tendencies so his publishers could stay happy. (Which is why gay shenanigans are usually a source of comedic effect in Japanese media if they happen at all, because it’s safe as long as you’re making fun of it. Or they go the typical US route and only make the villains gay. Kishi arguably does this to Itachi and definitely presents that vibe with Orochimaru, though he comes across significantly more deranged and perverse, as does Kabuto, who is implied to be somewhat necrophilic, and even gets a “ew, but you do you” look from orochimaru himself about his habit of collecting bodies)

Point being, as I’ve said before, it’s very disingenuous to ignore the background and context behind the media you are consuming if you’re going to criticize or even analyze it. Mind you, I accept that not everyone had access to references to help understand any of this (I didn’t know about the references to Saikaku, though now that I see them presented like this it should have hit me in the face because I’m familiar with his works!), plus Naruto as a series looks VERY different to someone in its intended age audience than it does to adults with more experience and context for its contents, but still. Consider the angles. I see that crap ALL the time in the Berserk fandom, even the good non-dudebro side that acknowledges exactly how gay it actually is, because they miss the fact it was written in the 80’s by a man who grew up in the postwar period of the 50’s and 60’s, where attitudes towards homosexuality, women, war and other things I’ve seen fans tie themselves in knots about was very different than today.

(Not an excuse for the blatant sexism, but for its time berserk was actually quite progressive in a lot of ways.)

Thank you for the insight and letting me rant lol.

https://www.tumblr.com/weepingnightmarenaruto/775649233787387904/the-way-kishimoto-handles-narutos-trauma-is-so

What are your thoughts on this?

Hello anon!

Ngl this is one of my favorite ask I've ever received because it allows me to discuss something I've been meaning to for quite some time now.

Before I get into the topic that interests me the most, I'll give my observations on this:

Honestly Narutos childhood before the start of the manga needed to be explored more and Kishimoto should’ve given a bigger focus to how Naruto is because of it.

It was explored. Since chapter 1 and throughout flashbacks over the next chapters of the series, Kishimoto efficiently established and explored Naruto's childhood which explained why Naruto behaves the way he does. Kishimoto does not need to grab the readers hand and explain exhaustively so people understand Naruto's character. This manga is not hard to get to need all that.

But the way Kishimoto constantly shows how okay Naruto is with being mistreated as long as he feels they acknowledged him, is so sad. And I wish Kishimoto awknowledged how unhealthy this is.

This is where it gets interesting. It is true that Naruto isn't allowed to get angry at Konoha and is quickly resolved in the manga (although that particular paragraph was in reference to Sasuke). However, this has more to do w/ the fact that Naruto is a shonen and the power of friendship and loyalty overcomes everything, even Kishimoto himself expressed frustration at how naive the resolution of problems in shonen manga is, maybe if the series was a seinen he would've written with more nuanced about Konoha as a political and military entity that also happens to be the home of the child soldiers.

This is also part of the reason why the Kage summit arc pisses me off so much. Naruto lets himself be beat up by Karui over Sasuke, has a panick attack, rejects Gaara, gets on his knees to beg the raikage to pardon Sasuke etc. Like he should be able to emphatize with the Kumo ninjas over what happened to Killer Bee and he should value his friendship with Gaara more. Honestly Sasuke joining the akatsuki and trying to capture Killer Bee should have been a deal breaker to Naruto. And to top that off Naruto witnessing Sasuke trying to Murder Sakura should at least be one. Naruto forgiving people who mistreats him makes sense, but people mistreating the people he cares for should not be. The way Naruto treats so many of his friends over his obsession with Sasuke is so disappointing.

And this is what I wanted to tackle the most. Naruto fans do not understand Kishimoto's writing AT ALL. Idk if the op of that post is Asian or not, but it's become clear to me that Naruto fans don't know and have shown zero interest in getting to know Kishimoto's writing influences. And no, I'm not talking about Dragon Ball.

Kishimoto has shared with fans his interest in Samurai and the Edo period Japan several times, to the point the first manga he wanted to write when he was a highschooler, before he even won an award at Shonen Jump, was about Samurai but scrapped the idea because at the time mangas like Rurouni Kenshin and Blade of the Immortal came out and he felt there was no longer space for him in the highly popular sub-genre and also that he's own writing wasn't as good compared to the aforementioned works.

But that does not mean that we don't see Kishimoto's nerdy side come out in Naruto about Samurai even if it's a manga about ninjas. There's the obvious, we see during the 4th war arc an actual battle between two samurai warriors, we also know Naruto is established in a fantasy universe of feudal Japan with damyos (feudal lords) and all. The themes of honor and loyalty, quests for revenge, the overall kinship is present as well.

But for those who have read Japanese literature works from the 17th century, you would have noticed that Kishimoto borrows A LOT from them when he's writing his manga, especially for Naruto and Sasuke.

It's funny because SS and NH shippers, as well as Naruto stans who hate Sasuke and Sasuke stans who hate Naruto and even fujoshis who are used to cookie-cutter stories where seme and uke do nothing but fuck after a couple of meetings in a corporate setting or high school or whatever boring shit they like to read, use the following examples to show how toxic and unhealthy Naruto and Sasuke's relationship is, not caring about Kishimoto's literary references as usual.

Kishimoto writes a love story the way they used to be written centuries ago. He draws a lot of inspiration from at least two writers from this period Ihara Saikaku and Chikamatsu Monzaemon.

The first example is Haku and Zabuza's relationship, I'll speak about them before moving to Naruto and Sasuke to give more context on how homosexual love stories were written around the time. Although Zabuza is not a samurai but rather a ninja on the run, the relationship is clearly inspired on the wakashudo practices where an older man would take a child from ages 11-16 as his protégé to train him, feed him, give him shelter and take him as his lover until the child came of age and became a warrior at the service of the lord of the land himself. Those young boys must be of great beauty, Saikaku is constantly writing about how their beauty is what grants them the better masters over the ugly boys.

This is what Zabuza and Haku do. Zabuza takes Haku as an apprentice and they swear loyalty to each other till the death, because that's the other thing, if the circumstance presented, both master and apprentice would fight alongside each other, kill for each other and if necessary die for each other.

Many Naruto fans feel uncomfortable about the real nature of Zabuza and Haku's relationship and delude themselves into believing their relationship is actually one of father and son, lol how stupid.

Because Naruto is a shonen, we never see sexual acts being performed so Kishimoto instead shows us the attraction these characters feel for one another through suggestive dialogue and flushed faces.

Even Haku's sacrifice and Zabuza's final words are totally inspired in the works of Saikaku, where both lovers hope to meet each other in another world. Foer exambple, in one of Saikaku's stories The Boy who Sacrificed his Life in the Robes of his lover, the boy, Senjuro, who had pledged to love Sazen in this world and the next and knowing his lover was at risk of being ambushed and killed, disguises himself as Sazen sacrificing his life for him getting slashed from the back, after learning about Senjuro's death Sazen kills himself as well.

Very dramatic right? This other post also discusses briefly Haku and Zabuza and Kishimoto drawing inspiration from literary works from the Edo period [LINK]

Let's move onto Naruto and Sasuke. Is their relationship toxic and unhealthy? By today's standards it sure is. But by the standards of the 17th century is one of the greatest stories of male love ever told, I'm certain if Saikaku could read Naruto he would commend Kishimoto on his work. But this is something Naruto fans don't know and quite frankly most don't care about.

In the post you linked, OP expresses the arc that pisses them off the most (and most Naruto fans hate as well) is the Kage Summit arc where Naruto states his fierce loyalty to Sasuke no matter what, and I must laugh because if there's any arc that resembles the male love stories of the Edo period the most, it's that one.

It bothers most fans Naruto wanted to commit double suicide so he and Sasuke escape the burdens of their world and be free of them in the next one. This is a common theme in literature of 17th century Japan. Two lovers making up for their Confucian failings in this world seeking redemption in a Buddhist paradise (at the time Buddhism had made its way into Japan and it was very different from China and India's Buddhism, you can read more about it here).

Kishimoto has referenced Chikamatsu in Naruto, so he is familiar with his plays where lovers commit double suicide as the ultimate showcase of love. I believe Kishimoto felt more comfortable and had more freedom to reference Chikamatsu and not Saikaku because the former wrote heterosexual romances whereas the latter focused more in homosexual romances and Kishimoto was already walking on a fine line by this point.

These other blogs have written great posts on how Kishimoto incorporated the double suicide trope for Naruto and Sasuke [LINK], [LINK], [LINK]. So I don't think I need to delve any deeper into it, they did a great job themselves.

But this is what OP doesn't understand. Kishimoto is writing an epic, a love story for the ancient times. Sasuke doing all that and all this is kind of like a test, Naruto's devotion is being put through highs and lows and they must overcome them. It'd be good fanservice to some if Naruto would give up on Sasuke but that'd be pretty boring and writers of the Edo period would be rolling over their graves if Kishimoto did that, HA!

Another element Kishimoto borrowed from Saikaku's literary works is the willingness to commit seppuku for your loved one. We see this with Madara and Hashirama.

In Saikaku's story Nightingale in the Snow two young boys, Naiki and Dannosuke, seek to become the lovers of the samurai Tonai. When Tonai demands proof of their love for him the boys show themselves willing to commit seppuku in front of him, Tonai shocked by their devotion accepts them as lovers.

The scene is similar to Hashirama also being willing to kill himself in front of Madara per his request, hoping Madara would accept him and trust him and his clan. Madara just like Tonai, is shocked by Hashirama's actions and stops him just in time, accepting him and joining his clan with Hashirama's, just like Tonai accepted the boys.

Which leads me to Kishimoto's *actual* finale for the Naruto series, the chapter he had planned and envisioned for 15 years, chapter 698. It's also been discussed by another blog how the theme of the battle Love vs. Power and the panels are a homage to Devilman's own final battle [LINK]. But what interests me in particular about chapter 698 in relation to Saikaku's work is how mutilation of your own body has also been a common trope in Japanese male love literature as proof your devotion.

Kinda like Naruto willing to lose his arm to Sasuke hoping to finally reach his heart (and did!). Sasuke would also go on to refuse a new arm, keeping himself mutilated as a reminder of Naruto's devotion for him.

Something that surprised me at first but then it made total sense to me is the brotherly troth found in Saikaku's works. Usually when a Samurai took a young apprentice, the samurai was old as shit (40-60 years old) and the young boy would be anything between 11-17 years. But there were times when a younger man would engage in a relationship with another man close in age, (although for us in modern times a lot of them would still be considerable age-gaps).

Saikaku for example, wrote the love story between Sazen, a 28 year old and Senjuro, a 17 year old, because of their not so big age-gap, these two lovers considered each other "brothers". They formalize their relationship by having sex, considering it the consummation of their brotherly troth.

When Sazen believes Senjuro had betrayed him for another man he's heartbroken Senjuro might had broken his vows of brotherly love.

So in Edo Japan homosexual relationships between two men close in age were considered similar to that of brothers, or at least brought the men so close they would consider one another brothers. Something very important to keep in mind is that none of these men are actually blood related.

In another of Saikaku's stories They Waited Three Years to Die, Kikui the younger man, considers his lover, Uhei to be his elder brother.

It seems that in this period of time there wasn't a clear divide in the type of love a man might profess another man with whom he is in love and has sex with, and the type of love two blood-related brothers felt for each other. Again, this is not condoning incest, it's more so how they saw male-male romantic relationships as deeply intimate they rivaled the bonds of blood-related people.

I had already made a post on what I believed Kishimoto meant with his whole "more brothers than blood-brothers" deal he has going on with Naruto and Sasuke [LINK]. But now I understand where it comes from. It really has nothing to do with actual incest (or pseudo-incest or spiritual-incest or whatever the fuck antis come up with) but him drawing inspiration from centuries old literary works on homosexual relationships. After all Naruto being set in what's clearly fantasy Edo feudal Japan, it makes sense Naruto the character would have a similar view on his feelings for Sasuke.

Finally, another thing I found very interesting is how in Saikaku's works he always makes sure to let the readers know how beautiful a man (usually the bottom of the relationship) is by comparing his looks to those of a girl. For example, in his story Implicated by his Diamond Crest, Saikaku writes Tannosuke is so beautiful people thought he was a girl when he was seven years old.

So funny how Kishimoto does the same with Haku and Sasuke, such pretty beautiful boys people think they're girls.

Kishimoto is so insane, this old man really thought he could get away with all this, uh? or maybe he was hoping people would notice.

So going back to OP's post linked, what they and most Naruto fans complain about is that Kishimoto writes seeking to emulate the writing of 17th century authors rather than a 21st century one. So a lot of things that for us are toxic and unhealthy, were symbols of passion and loyalty back then and that's how Kishimoto sees them and seeks to express them in his own work. This is why it's so important to keep in mind author's intentionality when engaging with some art or media work. What is Kishimoto trying to say with his manga? what are his references, influences and inspiration? which works parallel his own? There's a reason why every creative is always telling us the media they consume and their favorite art, because we are seeing pieces of them reimagined in their own new work.

I'm really proud that I managed to make this post only considering Japanese works and not adding Western ones for direct parallels between Naruto and other pieces of literature. But this sentiment of wanting to fight alongside your loved one, killing for them and dying by their side is pretty much universal in homosexual literature, especially from the ancient times. You can also find this celebration of homosexual love in Ancient Greek and Roman literature too, Achilles and Patroclus being the most famous example.

The lyrics of Taylor Swift's song You Are In Love, fit pretty well this same sentiment those men centuries ago were trying to describe as well.

Like yeah, imagine you've been sent off war, women stayed in the city and you're left with nothing but the company of the men you're gonna fight alongside and quite possibly die alongside too. Of course you'd love them, in every way a person could possibly love another one, because those men are your brothers.

The screenshots I used for this post are from Ihara Saikaku's book The Great Mirror of Male Love.

[iamlittlelostsoul]

Twst scenario: Loneliness at its best...

TRIGGER WARNING!

my masterlist!

A bit detailed explanation of a dead rotting body, insects, blood

To cool off hehe cause my exams are coming up and am really stressed out so posted one more hehe...SOoo here's another self-aware angst twst au!

This is inspired by this video documentary I watched about how the cleaners deal with the situation, watch it if you want! It really saddens me that I knew there were some cases like these but watching a video about it made me cry so much;^; also the videos are both Eng subbed so you'll be able to understand them... Japanese ver. korean ver.

Platonic Self Aware!TWST boys x fem!Reader

Summary: Mc lived a very lonely life with only a game called Twisted Wonderland to be their only source of light and happiness not knowing the characters are aware that they were but game characters yet they still loved them.

Tiny rays of sunlight peaked through the windows curtains of a very run-down house.

It doesn't even look like a place a person could live in yet there is one residing in it.

Their neighbors would always talk about them, some looked at them with pity, while most of them doesn't even give a shit yet all of them never even bothered communicating with them nor trying to lend a hand after all they aren't their business after all.

The house owner would probably be the only one they commonly interact with which is mostly reminding or asking for the payment for the house.

Another would be the delivery guys that would deliver the fast food, cup noodles, and snacks that they would be ordering.

Yet the whole community rarely NO sees them come out, the last time they saw them go out was mostly would be just to take out their trash yet lately they've never come out anymore making their home an absolute mess and smelling like shit.

Nowadays they would just send a small envelope which would be delivered to the house owner containing the payment while when taking their food deliveries they would often just open the door ever so slightly and would just hand out the payment and grab the food immediately.

They were a stuck in just like a character in their favorite game but they are probably much worst than him.

Their house was a mess both inside and outside but the outside was fairly better than the inside.

With all the stacked-up manga, magazines, comics, books, and most commonly...garbage. Their house was filled with bags of chips, bottles, fast food containers, and cup noodles Everywhere!

That floor can't be seen anymore!

They couldn't bother cleaning.

Why should they?

'As if someone really cares about them...Ah, wait! There are!' That is what they thought as they quickly scavenged for their phone underneath all the pile of books and mainly trash, upon finding it they gave out a sigh of relief.

"Phew...If they were to see my mess...they would immediately scold me so damn much, haha. Now, who among them would be greeting me today!" They said as they quickly tap the logo of their favorite game.

"...I'm home!" They said as soon as the home screen came in, Azul came in and greeted them.

They squealed in delight. "OMG-AFGOGJBEJBOE AZUL!!! God, I fricking love you~! You cute little octobaby!"

Because of their constant simping, squealing, AND rolling around in the really small space left in their whole house which was their bed they never noticed anything odd and thought it was absolutely normal. Like how the characters would sometimes blush, show various emotion that wasn't even programmed, or the fact that the lines and things they would say would change.

Like simply right now Azul greeted them with the normal greeting whenever they would log in along with some other lines like "how are you my darling angelfish? You look absolutely stunning but do sleep like seriously look at that eye bags. You are starting to look exactly like an angelfish!"

"Aww! The game producers are fricking amazing at adding these lines! This isn't even an Otome game!!! BUT how did they know that I have eye bags? Mmh...maybe they assumed that most of their players have eyebags or something? Oh well...it was actually really comforting. So thank you Azul."

Little do they know from behind the screen the rest of the cast are ready to throw hands as soon as they heard it and saw that huge blush creep on the Azul's face. He is absolutely embarrassed after all a very dear friend had just complimented him!

"Great Sevens! I hate how he always wins whenever we would decide by playing Uno!" Ace complained.

"Shut up you got second place meaning on the next day you'll be the one to greet them next AND it was because you cheated!" Deuce whispered and shouted.

"Ohh, please! Then would you like to switch place with a certain pouty snake, Shishishi"

"No way! Why are you even helping him, Ruggie-senpai!"

"He promised to make me 3 boxes of donuts Oh, I'm just feeling like helping him!"

"We heard that you know...If you wanted to help him SO badly why don't you just switch with him instead."

"Mmh...maybeee NO"

"Fnayah!! Can't you all stop complaining! You all are so annoying!"

"Ohh! Look at that wittle Tanuki! He'll never have a chance to be displayed at the login, home screen, and have a card. Pfft-AHAHAHAHA! How unlucky!"

"At least they draw me far too often that they do with you all! An I am not a Tanuki!!!"

"Can't you all quite down! If you continue to do so they might find out and delete us like our other version." Riddle scolded them.

"The English ones?"

"Yes, the English ones! Who else?!"

"They got caught and were deleted!" They all shouted.

"Well, they didn't get caught their phone storage is full, and can't download more data for our upgrades. Soooo they got yeeted. #Eng twst got yeeted so we could get updated lmao." Cater wheezed a bit at the fact that they finally won the rivalry! though he WILL miss the eng Cater oh well as long as they have Mc and they don't need to share them with their other version.

Their day continued with lessons, vignettes, exams, events, and the main story which was Idia's time to get therapy.

They did their best to impress Mc and surprise them more! And of course, they would constantly change some of their lines and tried to communicate with Mc yet today was another day they would confide to them about their life although they aren't the ones on their home screen they could hear and see everything.

Which is something that Mc continuously ignores.

After staring for a long time at their screen mc paused for a while and slumped in their bed, their phone on top of their chest.

"Sigh. You know, you guys are my only friends and family. I wonder so many times if you could actually hear me and see me which would make sense but is also very silly. If I had a chance to make a wish it would be for you guys to be real. I felt so connected to all of you yet at the same time I am not." They said with a sad chuckle.

"Today is actually my mother's birthday yet I have nothing to offer to her. I'm too afraid to contact her along with the others that are very dear to me because... I am too afraid they might see me as a disappointment, I was an only child... so my dad is a very strict man and expected me to become a doctor/engineer/lawyer for success and stuff like that...and here am I living a shitty life jobless, a full-time freelance artist because I ain't listening to him, and the only thing keeping me sane is none other than you guys! All of you meant so so much to me...Thank you so much."They said as they wiped the tears they are shedding.

In a few minutes, they soon fell asleep with their phone still in their hand.

They stared at them sadly as they wish they could hug them right now all they could do was listen to their rant and chat with her a bit without being too suspicious.

"Do not fret child of man. We will soon find a way to either bring you here or bring us to you."

"YEAH! Then we could do many things together!!" Epel said excitedly.

"But of course, first of all, we are going to fix their trash like a house then help her regain their health and do a lot of skincare to fix their skin and train them to become a much decent man/woman." Vil stated.

"Oui Oui~ Mon Chéri! We will soon reunite and make a multitude of memories together!"

Every single day was similar to the last one yet Mc was starting to log in less they tried to figure out why, so Idia hacked into their phone and devices, and found out why. They were lacking finances and were finding ways to earn for their living expenses.

They were really concerned for them yet He/she still continue to log in even in the middle of the night, that they only have 5 hours of sleep A DAY! They had no sleep!

The NRC boys along with the staff tried reminding them, calling it out. But day by day it goes terrible to worst to so much more worst!

They aren't even eating anymore! Not just a day or two! It started with them eating only thrice a week then once, then thrice a month! and it continues to worsen so much more!

The boys couldn't do a thing! Warning or reminding them was of no use! Which leads them to work harder in finding a way to connect to their world. They didn't even notice that they've been logging in lesser and lesser till it came to a point that they didn't for a whole 2 months straight...

"What is happening! They haven't logged in for 2 months! Jamil what do we do! What do we do! Are we going to get deleted like our other selves?!!" Kalim frantically said.

"Calm down Kalim! I'm sure they won't...They must be too busy."

"Idia, did you finally find a way to hack their camera even if the device is turned off?" Lilia asked.

"I-I will soon! Ortho and I are looking through it but we did find out that their phone has a 90% battery charge which means it could possibly be on shut down but we are almost close to turning it on!" He reassured eyes remained glued on his PC as he tries to hack their Mc's device.

"WHY DID THE HUMAN TURN THEIR PHONE ON 'SHUT DOWN'! DO THEY NOT KNOW HOW MUCH THEY'RE AFFECTING WAKA-SAMA!"

"Sebek please tone down...And please stop lying I know full well that you are definitely worried about them much more worried than for Malleus-sama."

"I-"

After 30 mins Idia jumped with joy as he ran carrying his tablet to the screen of Mc's phone!

"Finally I got it!!!"

"You did!" They all shouted as they scrambled to Idia which made him uncomfortable but tried to remain calm since it was for their Mc after all.

"It should open for about 5 mins." He said with a proud grin.

After 5 mins the screen lit up as they all celebrated.

"IT TURNED ON!!!"

They all brace themselves as Idia started unlocking Mc's phone and opening their app. So they could finally greet their Mc.

Yet they could not see them...

"Ehh!! Shrimpy's phone must have been under their pile of garbage again!" Floyd complained.

"Now now Floyd. Calm down."

"Sigh. Their home is a big trashbin far more worst than Savanahclaw's dorm, I wish I could go there and clean their mess so this won't happen again!"

"Wtf. did you say you shitty ass herbivore!"

"Maybe I could use a little magic and teleport it to the stand near their bed. " Malleus suggested.

"If you can do that why can't you just clean their whole room up!"

"If Malleus did wouldn't Mc feel spooked? They live in seclusion after all who would clean their house? They might live in paranoia later on." Lilia commented.

"Not the time to argue about Mc's trashy room, Malleus-san just proceed with teleporting the device."

They all agreed as they watch in excitement as Malleus teleport the device to their Mc's bed.

They all readied to cheer Mc up once again!

But what they saw would forever haunt them as the sight made them shiver down to their bones.

"That-that can't be..." Kalim said as he lost the strength to keep his body in place, sitting on the floor eyes still glued to the screen.

"That...That is not my henchman! It can't be! NO! They do not look like that! They-they do NOT look like some lump of flesh with their bones out! Nor do they have those pests!" Grim shouted as he tried his best to control his tears from falling...

All of them could not take their eyes off the screen looking at other rotting flesh of their companion. Even Jamil who despises insects so damn much couldn't help but stare emptily...

"How can this happen..." Riddle asked as he leaned his body to Tre for support.

"They...presumably died because of starvation." Jade responded with a straight face though he could not hide the crack in his voice which was very uncharacteristic of him yet it was reasonable...

What seemed to be left of their dear friend's body was a skeleton with only clumps of flesh left with lots of red bloats on the decaying flesh while dark black and greenish body fluid stains their beddings even on their walls and windows tiny dots of body fluid and fat scattered there courtesy to the flies.

Tons of maggots, cockroaches, beetles, spiders, ants, flies, and so much more... are seen all over the corpse there were even eggs of those pests on the body and probably all across the room...

Proving that they must have died about a month ago...

What concerns and hurts them, even more, is the fact no one has yet to discover the girl's/man's body. No one noticed the putrid smell from their place nor did they even bother to check on the...

Their mother, father, neighbors...none!

They all couldn't help but cry, some hid it either by looking back, covering their face or was looking down letting their hair cover their face as tears falls down on the floor, some of them were sprawled on the floor wailing and shouting as some others hug them near as they cried all together, the staff soon came upon hearing the commotion occurring in the main screen and saw the reason why those students filled with pride cried and wailed sorrowfully.

They couldn't help but steel themselves, they were the adults, after all, they shouldn't be a bad example and cry in front of their students who were in too much shock and pain. Their tears would have to wait till they reach their respective rooms where no eyes will lay upon them and see them weak and defenseless.

They ushered the students back to their dorms and called it a day. no classes for possibly a week to mourn their loss.

The terrible news reached up to RSA too, they too mourn for the loss of a person they consider their friend.

The boys were all out of character, Ramshackle was a mess, Grim tried to burn down everything since everything in that run-down dorm reminded him so much of the dead...

All of 7 dorms none of those who'd witnessed the body of their friend and companion.

None of them could work and do what they would normally do while some of them worsen so much more like Idia, he wouldn't dare step out of his room anymore, and would constantly check on the body to confirm if Mc was...you know dead and if it has finally been discovered; Another example would be Leona and Vil both who would always remain somewhat composed would burst out crying and shouting in their room and would practically destroy everything they grabbed on; Another would be the Octavinelle trio, Monstro Lounge rarely ever opens and if they do it would only be for a short amount of time since none of them are fit to work; Even Diasomania took a very huge blow and would constantly suffer from a very heavy thunderstorm.

It took 6 more months for the skeleton to be discovered through the phone of Mc was already dead, but Idia was still able to hack through the cameras to watch their friend after all it was the only thing they could do for him/her.

The community's reaction to the body is either pity for the unfortunate death of a very lonely man/woman, whilst some had a look that expected it to happen and doesn't even care much, the only thing they cared is to dispose of it and be able to sell the home AGAIN.

At least the cleaners have a heart! They at least offered a prayer and respected them as they clean the whole place.

Some of the valuable items of Mc along with the phone they're at were brought to their family along with some photo albums & pictures. The family was in shock but accepted the fact that Mc was dead so in a few days, they cremated the body of their son/daughter and buried it while keeping a few in a small jar they hid along with their belongings.

They stared at the tiny jar kept beside, fully accepting their fate that...Mc would never come back and that they would never be opened once again and be able to spend time with the friend that gave them a purpose and loved them.

As they thought something remained echoing among their minds...

...Was this punishment for breaking the system? Because of simply discovering that Yuu was not actually the one helping them but a lonely yet charming girl/boy finding comfort in the game that gave them life... And all they ever wanted was to repay the friend that accepted them for who they are by breaking some rules to make them smile, lessen their burdens, and make them feel that they are worth something and they have a home, people waiting for them to show up even if it is in a fictional game. Ah..., The world is really such a cruel place & life is so cursed...

Fin...

[hxhhasmysoul]

i binged sk8 the infinity at the weekend and i enjoyed it a lot. for a show with an ai robot skateboard and tricks that would be 100% deadly irl it’s a surprisingly grounded show.

like yes, the costumes and personas of the background characters are over the top, the villain is extra as hell and creepy af in a truly anime fashion. the skateboarding power moves are there to emphasize that this is a sports anime true to its genre. it’s all super entertaining in this classical sports anime way with really stunning animation moments. and yes, one of the protags is super gifted and becomes a top tier skater in ridiculous time.

but the skating actually feels grounded despite that. the non power move things they do are real things skateboarders do. their boards have these visual styles that feel right, there’s this street aesthetic to everything, including street art stickers. and it’s all filmed like a rl skateboarding video, like the creators watched a shit ton of those and really understood the visual language of that. (yes, i do love to the street art aesthetic in all its forms)

the other thing that feels grounded are the characters. the background ones are more comic relief and they also have these personas when they skate - i have no clue if rl skateboarders do that actually or was this done due to the anime conventions and for entertainment value - so they are extra at times and don’t get that much development but they are also endearing. the two that feel more grounded are the honorary straight, shadow, he’s such a fun character, and the brat miya, he’s got such perfect middleschooler energy. 

the grounding kind of falls flat for me with the villain, my attitude to him very much mimics langa’s attitude. the dude is a great skater but he’s also weird and cringe so he’s not really interesting. i loved how langa was all the time: i really don’t give an f about your creepy personal issues, i’m not going to react to that, i just find you upsetting because you hurt my friends and also an interesting skating challenge. when they rolled out the villains back story my thoughts were: i know that’s meant to be sad and it kinda is but i also don’t care about you, now go to jail. no the subtext kink dynamic with the other guy you have going isn’t really doing it for me either, go to jail.

where the character writing shines is with the main two. they don’t have personas, they are just themselves in their daily life and during the underground skateboarding events.

reki is enthusiastic and passionate but also vulnerable in a way that’s relatable. his crisis feels very real in a teenage depression kind of way, or even an adhd rejection kind of way - though i’m not saying i think he has adhd in canon, i try not to diagnose characters, it just felt very relatable to me, a person with adhd, in how it all played out. and how the crisis is in reki’s mind very much about langa but the little detail of how it affects others was just so good. like how depression is so self-absorbing.

langa is quiet and not great in social situations but he’s very much present. he’s not standoffish and above it all, he’s really there taking everything in even if he’s sometimes slow to react to social situations. but he’s really focused on reki and attached to him and it’s just such a strong relationship. and it’s really cool how langa asks for advice and talks when the situation demands it.

because omg they talk it out like people, and that’s just rare in media period, not just manga/anime which can be extremely emotionally constipated due to its cultural background - i don’t mean that all japanese people never talk openly about their emotions or that they never had until recently or whatever but there is a certain culture of understatements in japanese language and it influences such things as pop culture cliches which deal in exaggeration and super exposing of cultural ideals. tangent aside the conversation was super real, awkward and it hit just right.

this is much longer that i planned. so just honorable mentions.

the anime really is there to cater to the shipping crowd. the two mains are very much implied to be a thing by the text of the show, and i think some creators also implied that though i’m not 100% on that. but i don’t think the show’s going to say it in open text in the following season(s) because it’s still a shonen anime. it can go fanservice all it wants but an openly queer protag in shonen is imho decades away. the rest of the cast is eyecandy very much made to cater to the female/queer gaze. while the og japanese version is subtext, though very loud subtext at times, about it, the dub apparently took it and ran with it and made it very queer.

it’s set in okinawa and that means the world to me. and it also gives a certain unique aesthetic to the show.

[jgfiles]

hello. idk if you're still active or not, but im still asking after all since im really really curious. i wanna know your opinion about the difference skill between Miyoshi and Kaminaga, like their strength and weakness. i hope you read and answer this omg please. thank you!

Sorry, for the late reply, when I'm on holiday I've hard time accessing to my pc...

As for your question... hum... it's a bit difficult to figure out the differences in abilities between Kaminaga and Miyoshi as everyone's main abilities aren't specifically referred, nor they're compared.

D Agency clearly gave them all the same preparation, although it's reasonable to assume as each of them is a different person, they probably have strongest and weakest points.

I can give you my headcanons for them based on what the anime, the manga and the novel seemed to focus on, but I've really no way to know if those are their stronger or weakest points.

I tend to think Miyoshi is the best at D Agency at using guns (with Sakuma being the best at using Katana) due to the following official image (though the image's purpose might be just to repreaent the clash between the two of them, Sakuma tall and broad in uniform and with a traditional Japanese sword, Miyoshi, much smaller, in a suit and with a modern gun).

I also assume Miyoshi also has a deep knowledge of arts, not just because he played the role of an art dealer in "Coffin" but also because he looked at Millais' Ophelia on an art book and, according to the movie he was born in Paris and raised in Venice, both cities of art.

Both him and Kaminaga are pretty good at swimming.

I can't really tell if Miyoshi and Jitsui got there before Kaminaga and Amari or viceversa but I'll place them in the group of the 4 fastest swimmers.

Miyoshi, Amari and Fukumoto are the three who're best at dancing.

As far as my headcanon go Kaminaga is good at fencing (along with Tazaki)...

...resistant to drugs and good at acting he can make up the most outrageous things.

He likes litterature (Yuuki gives him a book and the reference to vampires is possibly tied to Bram Stoker's "Dracula"). He's good with a camera and with machinaries.

One of the official cards for JG implied Kaminaga likes to drink and behave in a not appropriate manner when he does. Considering though how he can handle well being drugged and his characterization in the drama cd I think it's more than Kaminaga has fun pretending he loses control while he's drunk than that he actually loses it.

Miyoshi instead likes to remain always calm and collected.

The drama cd implied Kaminaga is more popular with girls than Miyoshi (and very prone at flirting).

The drama cd depicts a younger Kaminaga who was more prone at believing at things than Miyoshi, so it's possible to speculate that while Miyoshi is and was always a cynical person, Kaminaga merely became a realist growing up. Miyoshi cures his own person much more (he's canonically stated as a narcissist, with scenes in whcih he fusses over his hair and his waistcoat is a more elegant model than Kaminaga's), while Kaminaga is canonically more mischievous.

While in Joker Game vests are always a colour slightly different from the suit (it’s usually slightly darker), in Kaminaga’s case this is much more obvious as his suit is brown but his vest is yellow. A suit with an unmatched vest was considered a rare and more casual look.

A manga cover implied both Kaminaga and Miyoshi like to play billiard (the settei for the anime showed there was meant to be a billard in D Agency).

...and official info said they're both willing to take leadership of the other D Agency members.

In a drama cd, when the cast is divided in two teams, Sakuma’s team which has Sakuma, Fukumoto, Odagiri and Hatano is defined as far superior in terms of physical strength and unity to Miyoshi’s team which has Miyoshi, Kaminaga, Jitsui and Amari. While it’s hard to exactly establish how strong Kaminaga and Miyoshi are just with this, this might mean strength isn’t their strongest point.

In the movie Kaminaga is Yuuki's secretary while Miwa Shiro speculated Kaminaga would become the new D Agency boss after Yuuki (though as Miyoshi by then is dead this doesn't tell us if Kaminaga is better than him or not).

Overall, I think they're mean to be more or less evenly matched and most is left to headcanons and speculations so it's hard to say for sure which are their real strenght and weaknesses therefore, as I said, most of what I listed is based on my headcanons.

Sorry if I couldn't be more useful than this and thank you for your ask!

[anonmeansanon]

OMG Gokudo crumbs!! Thank you for the scrumptious meal. The way you described Gojo,,,, I can't wait to be infuriated/infatuated with him and be all like "what the fuck is wrong with him" in both endearing and angry tone, especially now with my current obsession are dumbass men who will do dumb shit just to get a single tiny itty bitty attention of their SO (esp in latter parts (I'm assuming) where he will have to jump the wall that is Rinko's belief in men in Yakuza) . Love the angst flavor of the "I believe you, I understand what you are saying, no I don't trust you" type of thing. I also love the exploration of Toji and Rinko's relationship in this AU. I definitely did want more crumbs of them especially when in Another Level Rinko realized that Toji wanted her to spy on the clan for Megumi and the Shibuya arc Toji appeared in front of Rinko and was all like "All grown up huh?" my small brain went 'He cared for her no matter how small it is even if Rinko is terrified of him🥺🥺🥺' (admittedly I am a Toji apologist so I see things with flowers around him (EXCEPT WHEN HE ABANDONED MEGUMI AND TSUMIKI 😡but he's just so hot idk what to do)).

( i tried to tone it down but I also ranted for a bit hehe)

Also!!! THE STRUGGLE WITH THE AGE IS SO FOR REAL! Like when I first read this which was like years ago (6 or 5 yrs ago i think damn never thought I am THAT dedicated) it was like fine for me but then now that I am older I'm also iffy about it?? I think the 201x era is the weird age gaps manga or the underage mangas were hype like dengeki daisy and faster than a kiss ones. But also the characters don't really act their age and most of the time don't look like their age??? Can't believe my guy is 17 who can't wait to be 18 just to get married ASAP. Since they are like in their 3rd year of High school I just assumed that they were like 18 but when Kirishima asked Yoshino to get married when he is 18 to say I am flabbergasted would be an understatement(👁️👄👁️). Kirishima just acts so mature and so yakuza (with a body of not a 17 year old boy or at least I never had any classmate with that type of body) I always forget his age 😩😩😩 The grandpa too!! Like THAT many mistresses (this I get) in such a young age (this im????) . (Ngl I love Kirishima because of the duality and complexity he has, and most especially when they explained how he really fell for Yoshino? I love the he fell first and is falling harder troupe so much)

Idk man the characters are so unhinged in their own way and I think that's why I stayed because it's so unique that they are giving me these flavors of Yakuzaness in various levels of ????? Questionability and stayed true to it. Me getting very invested with them prolly is because with these types of AUs the bar is so low but they exceeded it so much. ESPECIALLY YOSHINO OH MY GOD SHE'S MY FAVORITE PROTAGONIST TOO!!! Like she's not too OP who can do whatever she wants and be badass all throughout (so not a marysue) but when needed she can and she will stand up for herself and all the things she is proud of (so not a damsel in distress). The way she just slams the 4M yen to Kirishima just to prove a point? Instant in love for me, get in line Kirishima. She's so well thought out??? Which is v rare esp in Japanese manga.

Typically (esp in the ones who has like isekai themes or time travel or even body transfer ones) the female protagonist will have these strong backgrounds but they will like suddenly vanish once the ML or anyone with XY chromosome appears just to emphasize their fragility or some shit. I hate the most when they are so forgiving??? After all the atrocities they had done to her??? Or like when they are like injured because of their stupidity and then the ML solves it for her but while the ML is busy solving it for her she just suddenly says she will help??? And asks the help of the 2nd ML???? Babygirl this is why you are injured why are you so stupid 🙄. Peace was never the option when you are downright degraded out of your humanity.

This is also probably why I love Rinko so much especially the character development she had. She is a badass (and stupid but that stupidity gave us Goinko so) from the first encounter with Gojo but as chapters grow she just proves herself that no she ain't just some chick that Gojo fucks " just for funsies". She has her times of level headedness but also stupidity and I think a great balance of character that I really enjoy reading. She is a girl boss but not too much that she also has her time of weakness too so you can't help but to root for her. She earned everything she has now with her own sheer will and determination, through her blood sweat and tears, all the while battling mental, physical and social problems (cannot be me). I know I should write more but I just can't express enough how much I love her I'm sorry it's hard when English is not your first language.

Again, thank you for the insights on the Gokudo au!! Also thank you for explaining with relating it to RWTGI, I feel like I understand them better and their roots. I know I said I can't wait, but really, take your time with it. I know I can wait patiently for it! 💕

Hello! If you don't mind me recommending something,,,, I'd like to recommend "Raise Tanin ga ii" if you still don't know it.

Basically the premise of it was the MC, a female born in a yakuza family is to be married off to their rival clan who's a bit,,,,red flag thats the tamest i can describe him lmao. ML actually reminds me of how you described gokudo Gojo would be like, infatuated with the FL but still sluts out lmao (if i remember correctly I have been busy lately and I was supposed to send this earlier but my social anxiety made me procrastinate lmao im sorry)

I think this can be a good manga reference (?) for gokudo au also, the manga actually had explanations of how women work within the yakuza (yes they are to be protected and part of the clan, no they are not part of the decision body and stuff like that) which is a plus. Also the toxicity of everything esp with being a yakuza at all?? *Chef's kiss*

Sorry for overstepping if I did but your work has and is always amazing! I adore your every work (and I'm sorry for not leaving much comments i am not very articulate with words, if I could multiple kudos your work I WILL STILL NOT BE DONE EVEN TODAY) Thank you for your works!!!

DON'T GO GIVING ME A NEW ADDICTION. DON'T DO IT.

it's too late I'm going to read this.

AHHH. BUT THANK YOU FOR THE RECOMMENDATION!! I REALLY APPRECIATE IT.

AND THANK YOU FOR THE COMPLIMENTS. I CANNOT EXPRESS HOW GRATEFUL I AM 🥹💕

[cafeleningrad]

The anon is frustrated because shoujo manga, a genre more or less equivalent to YA, tends to feature much more complex and nuanced storytelling. For every middle school romantic comedy there's something sparkling with imagination, and the very best series have outstanding artistic and intellectual value not only among manga but literature as a whole. In general, Japanese works seem much more cerebral, while American works seem to celebrate antiintellectualism.

Good morning, Anon :) Are you summarizing the reason I got into anime/manga as teen? Because during my teen times the staff at the local bookshop or librar recommeded me stale love story after stale lovestory. After reading halfway through I had to give the books back out of frustration but when reading Kodomo no Omocha, Inuyasha, or Otoyome Gatari, I noticed how good romances can actually be if the characters matter.

More or less, yes. Following the frame I set up in a previous ask of YA as marketing label directed at teen readers, Shoujo and Shounen would fit into the category right away (although it’s a more a marketing label and has no age limit for readers ;).) As I specifically talked about the romantasy formula targeting girls, Shoujo approximates it even more.

Yes, I agree on the target audience equivalency, mangas/animes having a much better track record of writing engaging stories. There may be many issues with the manga/anime community however it’s noticable how many guys in there are not ashamed even outright positive to talk about their interests in shoujo story. I mean, where else can you say “I haven’t watched [famous romcom] yet” and the next ten replies by guys are “OMG, YOU have to watch [famous romcom], it’s perfect and so cute, the main character is so adorable! You’re missing out on something great!” (yeah, it’s about Toradora ;) Or cheer on a female lead without any fanservice in the story like Yona of the Dawn? How so? Not because the stories are tailored to main audiences as well, shoujo is in it’s commonly saccharine style, heavily romantic and heavily emotion driven tone falling into a category often associated with highly feminine style. No, the stories are perhaps very feminine yet appealing in writing. The reason I personally can stand 98% of romance stories  because I think romance is the hardest genre to nail down well. In theory the concept in simple: The writer creates two characters then entering a (romantic) dynamic getting the reader intrigued to read about. But that requires at least appealing characters who work in interesting ways together. And following that thought, yes, Shoujo is genre in a medium much more capable in writing characters who’re appealing to audiences. I don’t think shoujo stories are necessarily more clever in plot (Ouran High School Host Club reaches for it’s plot, Yona of the Dawn’s only creativity in fantasy-romance story lies in having it set in medieval Korean setting which is rare in Japanese manga - don’t get me wrong, I love YoD, Ijsut want to make a point) however I don’t believe plots need to be outlandishly clever in concept BUT the writing needs to be genuine and good in craft. A competent story telling leads the reader logically through a story, stories invested to be earnest are so much more memorable than one serving as reader insert fantasy. Let me put it like this: In theory Nana could be any slice-of-life, coming-of-age-story, Violet’s motivation in Violet Evergarden seems rather simplistic yet the strenghts of these stories are a sincere approach to investigate emotions behind decisions, the characters being significant as people with wishes, insecurities, thoughts and growth rather than replacing an entire personality by a cool gimmick and a quippy oneliner every other character around them could’ve said. To branch out: Shounen could fall easily into the trap of “person with cool power who says entertaining oneliners”, however many titles care to give their characters downfalls and hurdles caused by themselves as people.

This is where the hook of shoujo writing comes in. When it comes to entertainement categories terms like “cerebral” seem a bit out of place for the specific teenage-audience entertainment niche (not that stories for a tee audience can’t be intelligent but m understanding of the word made me immediately think of Death Note xD) although I believe to understand your choice of word

Note: About the general mention about Japanese media vs. Western media in matters of anti-intellectualism, I half agree but I get the sentiment. There’re enough anime I wish I haven’t watched their first three episodes, too many releases of the 349th idol show, enough US shows, movies and books I genuinely like, the recent trend of smaller and Indie-movie US-productions are downright capable to good, and the Isekai genre in it’s current state can please fade out as soon as possible as it’s not even repetitive but as lazy as the MCU formula as well as sexist. As mentioned in another message, Anime/mange are just another form of media like books, shows, podcasts etc. although heavily marked by elements from the country in which they’re produced. STILL I still agree with you on broad terms because the current state and yet too many of big productions are... bad. Well, I was the person writing a three page essay why I passionately hated Disney’s latest animated feature... Okay, to be more clear at the current state US movie landscape (except for only very few productions) is in tired shambles. Loaded and ever only investing in well known franchise titles is as secure as it’s self cannibalistic. No innovation in the stories since none needs to invent anything as brands are enough to ensure at least lukewarm criticism and at least enough income to cover production cost. Currently the landscape is over-saturated with big brand franchise titles or linked to big movie titles from good days past, all working with the same success formula. Maybe more people begin to nag on the MCU however there’re enough fan discussions as well as revenue for every new MCU related show and movie even if they’re quality in writing and editing decreases. Help, any movie made by big corporations wouldn’t have earned half as much money or critiques if the movies were made by other studios, because the brands on the movies alone work a massive amount of good will without effort. Every show or movie not linked to franchises is something, something super hero but any kind of concept twist imaginable (In that regard Isekai is the equivalent to the superhero genre :P). The only contemporary good take I saw was the Boys because it goes into the criticism of superheroes as “Übermesch-fantasy, mass production of the US-exceptionalism-narrative, celebrity culture - all other variations of superhero story can be mildly entertaining yet fall flat as they’ve nothing to talk about but their genre and desperately trying hard to be “not like other superhero stories”. Not only superhero stories, also all those following a style of better sucessful titles on masse.These stories are like chewing gum. They may sell with new, even outlandish flavours, in the end the the taste vaporizes rapidly and you chew on something leaving a stale taste in your mouth. But now, a safe formula still sells safely and with success because it ultimately doesn’t challenge anything. Anything disrupting the peace of security is a threat - such interruptions can be named as anything controversial. It doesn’t even have to be deep. No matter if you liked the last Jedi, none can deny Rian Johnson wanted to try something new. The dsruption form Star Wars fan viewing habits was massive. Even more controversial would be choice or conflicts which are ambiguous in result or fronts - just see how GoT cannbalized itself by thinking Martin wrote a story about good vs. evil, in the end dumbing down a story about opportunism, hunger for power into “dragon lady evil because ... Leni Rifenstahl shots I guess??” (and let’s not talk about the stupid takes within the fandom about perceived villainy...). Within an industry milking the same old cashcow, none currently none would dare disrupt the landscape with bold takes or thoughts - ambiguity, challenging questions are the most risky thing to do, possibly.

[kimyoonmiauthor]

Barnes and Nobles Bookstore Report 2020 on Diversity

For those who are new to this... What I do every year since I was 13 was go to the bookstore, usually in summer and take an overview look at what is being shelved and sold. This, of course, changed with the internet. It’s a way for me (and maybe you) to get a sense of what the industry is and isn’t doing, particularly with diversity. I also check local bookstores (But my local one is closed due to covid this year). I usually note what has an hasn’t changed. It’s something that authors should be doing anyway. I don’t do it more often because it’s usually depressing. And I don’t do it near holiday seasons, since that can skew the book selection unfairly. So I usually pick a non holiday-heavy month and one that will not skew my numbers (like say, February, which is Black History Month) I pay attention to the following: - Where the books are shelved. - How many times a book is shelved (in different areas) - Who gets the most real estate and a rough guess as to why. (Usually because they are white cis and male.... no lie) - Which diversity gets the most real estate - What are the labels on the shelves and if those are separate or different from previous years. - I generally skip the children’s section since there is a yearly report for that. - Demographics of the area visually apparent v. numbers of the area itself. Who are they supposed to sell to (and usually failing to sell to) Blame the Anthropology... I’m well-trained to look for such things. - All Bookends and displays. - I usually look at all sections of the bookstore and take notes, in order. - If I have access to internet, then I also look up the authors, if I can to find out their diversity and spread. - I also take lots of pictures.

These are my notes for this year.

Demographics of the area outside of the bookstore: About 50/50 with the majority being Latinx (Black and Latinx mainly) Mostly women. (It was early, though--maybe white) Last demographics of area 2010, granted 36,226 (71.1%) White, 2,573 (1.3%) Black, 531 (0.3%) Native American, 31,434 (16.4%) Asian (6.9% Filipino, 5.4% Korean, 1.3% Chinese), 122 (0.1%) Pacific Islander, 12,146 (6.3%) from other races, and 8,687 (4.5%)  (Latinx is around 17%)

The first two bookcases at the front of the store, were mostly white cis male authors. In the new author case, this was true, as well, and mostly had well-knowns.

Considering the Latinx population, I’m always kinda feeling like why aren’t there more Latinx books on the shelves?

White and black authors. But the black authors are only there because of Black Lives Matter, which feels like it’s catering to the white people who want to know what this is about, rather than the demographics of the bookstore itself. The Magazine section, Vogue, in particular did have PoCs on it.

- The Art History Section is and always is really white. I could count the PoCs on the shelf of 6 tall shelves on one hand. All of the How to draw Manga books are by white people. I know this because I’ve looked up the authors in the past. And it’s not that Japanese don’t publish books in English with instructions, BTW... so I always find that a bit strange, especially since the author they choose doesn’t really have a manga style 100% but mixes in American Comic books. (But that’s a separate thing.) They mostly had known PoC artists, acceptable to white people. - The Cookbooks don’t cover Africa. They had one African American cookbook which interested me. (Labeled Soul food and had a Black author), but the books mostly were for “French” in the international section. A few Korean (2-3) and I didn’t spot many other regionalities. I looked for Indian, for example.

- There were SFF books front of the store, which surprised me. Might be because there were PoC authors and the majority were PoC. (Also Black Lives Matter skewing) - All of the seating was removed (probably because of covid) I usually use it to sort through books I want...

- No Surprise, the same location for featured “classics” as last year and all but one were written by white men. The token book? Arabian Nights. I’m not sure that really counts since it was compiled by a white guy. (Believe me, I had thought like where is Jorge Borges? Marquez? etc) Most of the authors were white cis and het too... - The recommended section... by looking, mostly white cis het men. - Danielle Steele was shelved in General Fiction section. Actually several genres were shelved together there. Some Science Fiction, Some Fantasy, Some Romance, Some Historical Fiction, etc. There was no special section for Historical Fiction. (Not popular? Used to be back in the day...) There’s no LGBTQIA, women’s or African American section, even in the non-fiction. I have mixed feelings about taking it out of the non-fiction section. I like it combined in the Fiction section. They also took out all of the sub labeling except for major transitions. (Labeling individual shelves as containing something) - Diminished Latinx books in the Classics (Shelf) section. This has not changed... and it still ticks me off how white and cis het (also leans towards male) it is. - Increased black authors overall. Octavia Butler was Shelved twice, for example. Toni Morrison got a bookshelf all to herself (probably because of her recent passing). Nnedi Okorafor actually showed up on the shelf. Rena Barron was triple shelved--once at the front of the store and in two sections of the bookstore... So apparently B&N have a lot of faith in her book. - Overall, improved balance between men and women (except in the classics and recommended sections. I feel stabby about that.)

- The covers were a lot less offensive overall. (Though I had a few head scratchers on why that cover for that book, but that’s getting into graphic design quibbles) The PoC books actually had PoCs on the cover. And some of the covers were redone to have PoCs on the cover. There were no sexualized women on the out turned books. The Mystery/Thriller books, for example, has a trend of being symbolic and drawn. Kinda felt like I was staring at the old Chick Lit.

- There were less books shelved overall, because of the shelving practices of out turning the books so people could see the covers. (Even less than last year)

- The Romance Section ticked me off since I could count the amount of PoCs on the cover with one hand. But the covers have improved a bit. Jim Hines won the cover war... There was ONE LGBT book and ONE interracial book. It’s like PoCs don’t fall in love at all. What gives?

- Science Fiction and Fantasy were separated again. The amount of shelves for YA and SFF were about equal. (Which drastically changed from last year). This meant that the genre fiction was mostly equally shelved. (Mystery/Thriller might have gotten a smidgen less). The Science Fiction section was astoundingly male cis het. I even looked for authors I knew who were queer/poc, etc and couldn’t find them. Anne McCaffrey was gone completely, BTW. Oh and JK Rowling didn’t make it to the main shelves (She was in the audiobook section). lol Someone was mad. So win one, lose the rest.

- All of the “recommended race” books were written by People of color and well known. Win~ But all on black-white relations except one. (A book on my wishlist, but I pre-promised myself to not buy anything... so it was difficult to leave that one behind...) - The people with the most shelving were Shakespeare (Got his own section), Stephen King, and I forgot the third author, but he’s male cis and het too... Yeah... I know. And yes, there are authors more prolific than these authors too in history who are also PoC. - All of the books were from known and popular authors rather than unknown authors, mainly. Not like that rare find where you’re browsing and you go, “OMG, never heard of this person before.” So for me, who likes to browse and find that rare find it’s not as fun. I’ve found books pre-internet that were like that in Barnes and Nobles no less.

Overall: Improved, but I have this irking feeling the increase in black books is specifically to the Black Lives Matter movement. They care more about publicity than the cause, otherwise, other PoC groups wold have gotten better rep. Also kinda sad at the lack of LGBT. The widest diversity in the store is still YA. And as every year, I’m super sad about the lack of rep for Latinx. Seriously, didn’t you give it a thought that you might be in an area that’s not white? (I know the “But you could complain” thing... but it never worked in the past either and I have written to corporate, just so you know.) I pretty much left with this feeling of elation that it was improved, but this feeling of sickness that they were still, STILL catering to white people. (Cis het, etc). Yeah, depressing enough to want to marathon several PoC shows to undo the implicit bias type of feeling. And this area, as shown isn’t lacking in PoCs. Also, kinda have to state, I wish it was more like a treasure hunt... sometimes that’s the best part of going to a bookstore. Disappointed about the lack of a non-fiction LGBTQIA... kinda had a wish the Julie Sondra Decker might show up in that section. My ace little heart. I took 108 pictures as photo proof of my assertions (Again, Anthro training). BTW, Rena Barron should thank her publicist for convincing for the triple shelving...

[jeidafei]

D.Gray-Man Vol.26: Komui’s Lounge (Extended) 4/5

>> Part 1 <<

>> Part 2 <<

>> Part 3 <<

Question 20: How many types of headphones does Marie have? And do they function differently?

Marie: Now I only have the latest model the Science Division developed for me. I keep it on at all times except when I go to bed.

Bak: I’ve contributed to the design as well. (ahem)

Marie: Did you? Thank you, Supervisor. 

Lavi: But you’ll hear countless noises and voices from a considerable range all the time, right? Isn’t that exhausting? 

Wisely: What!? You’re able to hear that much!? Where’s the respect for privacy?

Allen: Shut up about privacy, you.

Marie: Well, it was rough before I got used to it. I trained myself to listen for only important sounds from among countless noises. I’ve come to the point where everyday noises from people doing their chores and talking mostly just flow right by me, and since then I haven’t been “listening in” on anyone. 

Link: Aha. You really are a true man of character, Noise Marie. You’d better take notes, Walker.

Allen: How did this come to me?

Link: Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how you threatened me with Timcanpy’s recordings.

(T/N: I don’t remember where the omake in which this happened is, but it was the recording of Link when Timothy possessed him on the Louvre’s roof and made all those funny faces and slobbering in the Phantom Thief G arc.)

Question 21: I’m curious about the length of time Krory can maintain his enhanced capabilities and the amount of Akuma blood needed. And also whether it is possible to extend his activation time by training, etc.

Bak: As of now he can drink blood from Akuma up to Level Three, and can stay activated for 10 minutes with 250ml of blood. Looks like he’s also experimenting to extend that time with support from the Science Division. 

Lavi: Wouldn’t drinking more blood extend the activation time?

Bak: No, it wouldn’t. On the other hand, drinking less than 250ml will shorten the activation time to around 3 minutes.

Marie: When you said he can drink blood from Akuma up to Level Three, is it because he hasn’t experimented with blood from a Level Four yet?

Bak: Well, since obtaining blood from a Level Four is next to impossible...

Wisely: Ho ho ho. Indeed, indeed ♪.

Allen: Seeing Krory enjoying Akuma blood that much really does make you wonder whether it really is delicious, after all.

Link: Don’t try it out, Walker.

Question 22: Does Miranda always carry sweets with her while on a mission? And does she have a favorite flavor?

Link: I’ve heard that since her Innocence requires stamina, she’s come to carrying sweets at all times to supplement her calories, but about the flavor...

Marie: Miranda said she likes minty flavors.

Allen: Are you sure? Miss Miranda always gives me sweets whenever my stomach starts growling, and they’re always fruity flavors like strawberry or pineapple.

Lavi: That’s just coz you like fruit-flavored candies, isn’t it, Allen?

Marie: Haha. So she’s packing fruity candies just for you as well, huh.

Allen: Eh!? Is that so!?

Bak: By the way, whenever Lou Fa learns you’re coming to our branch, she’d always prepare Mitarashi dumplings, Walker.

Allen: Eh!? Now that you mention it, there really did seem to be Mitarashi dumplings around whenever I go to the Asian Branch.

Wisely: What!? If you really loved eating that much, then why didn’t you accept Tikky’s invitation to feast back then?

Allen: It’s not feasting that I have a problem with; it’s that Curly-Head. He’s the very man who tore a hole in my heart, have you forgotten? Do you expect me to enjoy a meal with such a groping pervert?

(T/N: Er, Allen...I think your point is a little off here...)

Link: So you won’t let your appetite win in that case, Walker?

Allen: Yes?

Link: Nothing. That’s a relief. 

Question 23: So before Lavi became an Exorcist, he fought with a dagger?

Lavi: Eh? What’s this?

Wisely: They’re probably talking about that time back in the Ark. When you were in Road’s dream, remember?

Lavi: Ohhhh, so that was it. Wait, how come you know about that?

Wisely: La-de-dah♪

Marie: Lavi’s an all-rounder, like Bookman, right?

Allen: What on earth is that?

Marie: Those who can make use of any weapon depending on the situation.

Lavi: That’s because as Bookmen, virtually all our logs are of war zones. So Gramps trained me to be capable of handling any situation, and that training also includes martial arts.

Link: What are you most skilled with?

Lavi: Hmmmm. I like cudgels best, I guess.

Allen: You’re always fooling about whenever we duel-train, Lavi, and I’ve been thinking perhaps you’re no good. Kanda beats you in a blink, you see. 

Lavi: Aaaawwww. Come on! It’s such a pain to fight seriously!

Bak: But back then, when you were dueling with Fō, you seemed quite serious, though.

Lavi: I wouldn’t call that a duel; Fō was coming at me like she’s dying to kill me, damn her. How could I not take it seriously!?

Allen: Yeah, Fō does mean it when she fights, doesn’t she. 

Bak: She’s more a berserker than a guardian deity, that one.

Link: I see. You will not get serious unless it poses a certain level of threat to your life. 

Question 24: Are Nea and the 14th the same individual?

Wisely: My my. Is this reader mistaking something here? “The 14th” is just the alias the previous generation of Noah bestowed upon Nea. There is only one Nea. 

Link: Though Nea himself doesn’t seem fond of it; he’s said it is “a nickname given out of distaste”. Guess I’d have to be careful from now...

Allen: Huh? Careful of what?

Link: Would you like some mango juice, Walker?

Allen: WEE-HEE!

Bak: I’ve been wondering. Why isn’t he called “The 14th disciple” like the other Noahs but simply “The 14th”?

Wisely: Perhaps that is the distaste Nea was talking about. As has already been revealed in the Gray Log Fanbook, Nea has no Noah Memory, and for that very reason, the other Noahs may have treated him as the black sheep of the family. Well, I guess I’ll leave you here with a cliffhanger until the boy uncovers Nea’s secrets in the main narrative. 

Marie: He has no Noah Memory, so he couldn’t reincarnate like the other Noahs, and that is why he implanted his memories within Allen?

Link: Exactly when did he implant them within you? Do you really have no idea, Walker?

Allen: Told you; I really don’t know! It’s said to be around 35 years ago! I’m sixteen, remember? I didn’t even exist then!

Wisely: ..............

Lavi: What the heck are you grinning about, Three-Eyes?

Wisely: Nuffink.

(T/N: OMG OMG OMG OMG OH MY FREAKING GAWD WISELY DID YOU JUST FREAKING CONFIRM THE PAST!ALLEN THEORY WITHOUT SAYING A SINGLE WORD???!!!)

Question 25: Allen’s left eye should have become able to project the image of the Akuma souls to others, but it seems nobody apart from Lavi has seen it. Is it deciding itself whether to let other people see the souls within the Akuma?

Lavi: Ah, that...Just remembering it still gives me the creeps even now.

Allen: Back then when Lavi and Krory said they could see the Akuma’s soul, at first I was definitely sure the curse has strengthened in power, and from now people other than me will be able to see the souls, too. But after that, nobody ever saw it again. Looks like it’s just a one-time thing, after all.

Lavi: It was right after your damaged eye resurrected with the curse’s power, right? With your eye being in an unusual state like that, anything can happen. Me and Krorykins were just unfortunately caught up in the curse’s rampage. 

Allen: Well, it’s a relief, anyway. After all, it’s not a pleasant sight to behold. If it ends with you not having to see it anymore, I’d say it’s for the best.

Bak: I’m interested, though. As part of the Science Division, we welcome any information on the Akuma.

Wisely: So am I. For even my Demon Eye cannot see souls. In what state are they, the souls within Akuma?

Link: How could you say these things like it doesn’t concern you when you’re on the very side creating Akuma?

Marie: Must have been hard getting used to seeing those souls, huh, Allen?

Allen: When I first saw one, I was so scared I couldn’t even bear to look. But Master was patientーWell, for him. “Those things aren’t scary”, he’d scold me; they were once living humans just like us, and they’re just screaming for me to save them, after all. It took a long time, but just like that, little by little I became able to look at them. 

Question 26: What do Kanda, Allen, Lenalee and Lavi smell of? Lenalee would probably smell very nice. Well, she’s a girl after all; she’s definitely using perfume and the like, right?

Marie: Hmmmm. Kanda’s scent? Soap is the closest bet, I’d say.

(T/N: Sensei, considering the general negative image of D.Gray-Man as a Yaoi manga may I say this is not a wise move? *laffs*)

Allen: And me, Marie? What about me?

Marie: You usually have a sugary smell about you, Allen. Like dessert.

Lavi: Because there’s always crumbs all over your clothes, Allen.

Allen: Lavi’s eyepatch gives out whiffs of Fabreeze.

(T/N: the popular Japanese brand of air-freshener/deodorant spray.)

Lavi: Oi! Don’t say stuff from the old Instagram page! Some readers won’t get it!

(T/N: In Hoshino’s old Instagram there’s a drawing of Allen spraying Fabreeze at Lavi’s face for some reason. I don’t remember the caption. She’s also reposted it on her new Instagram just to clarify this joke. Maybe it’s just that he never/rarely takes off his eyepatch for cleaning and it’s moldy and sweaty...?)

Marie: Hmmmm...as for Lavi...he smells of tobacco a bit. 

Allen: Yeah! Just like Master’s scent.

Lavi: Ah, Gramps’ cigarettes, huh? I’m aware of that. 

Wisely: Bookman is a heavy smoker as ever. A wonder his lungs are still holding out even at his age.

Marie: I think Lenalee usually has a flowery scent, though.

Bak: Yes, she does! Lenalee-san smells like sweet flowers!

Allen: Bak-san, keep your voice down! If Komui-san hears you, we’d be in for big trouble!

Lavi: Lenalee doesn’t use perfume, and still she smells so nice.

Allen: There’s this thing she uses. You see, a while back I was talking to Lenalee about having more scars or something, and she said; “This works wonders, you know.” and gave me some of this thingーkinda like Body Oil? Could it have been that oil’s scent? The scars would fade if you keep rubbing this oil on them, from the looks of it. It smells wonderful when she’s putting it on me.

Bak: SHE WAS PUTTING IT ON YOU, WALKEEEEEEER!? (snaps)

(T/N: Trust me I had a really hard time keeping this one from becoming Fifty Shades of (D.) Gray or Silence of the Lambs for that matter...)

Allen: NO ULTERIOR MOTIVE! REALLY!

Lavi: Body oil, huh...ah, my heart’s gettin’ all weird just hearing that.

Link: What’s with that dirty look on your face, Bookman Jr?

>> Part 5 <<

[skirak]

The Ultimate Introduction to Hosoya Yoshimasa Part 1 [Everything you should know about Hosoya Yoshimasa #3]

37th Birthday Special

10 February, the ultimate day as a certain baby turns 37. Time really flies... I still remember creating posts for his 36th bday last year in my main account @akaskira

This is taken from a Chinese source: PukiWiki 

Translated by me!

Introduction

Source: 新R25 Interview (Japanese)

Hosoya Yoshimasa [細谷佳正]

Born 10 February, 1982 in Onomichi, Hiroshima.

Height of 175 cm (5 feet 7), Blood Type B

Left hander.

Was a member of Mausu Promotion till 1 July 2014 and has been Freelance since.

Nicknames include Yosshi (used by Ono Yuuki), Posoya-kun (used by Sugita Tomokazu)

Called Hosoyan by fans and Hikasa Yoko

According to himself, has rarely been given nicknames.

Favourite food includes sea urchin. Likes to drink but doesn’t smoke.

Likes ghost story and horror movies but gets scared as hell in haunted houses (click for link!)

Probably can see ghosts - many colleagues have heard real ghost experiences from him.

Okamoto Nobuhiko once said he wanted to go to haunted house most with Hosoya as his reaction is interesting

In the world of Male seiyuu Singers, he is considered to be of mid-high ranking.

Used to do busking and released his own songs.

Sang albums for character Shiraishi Kuranosuke in “Prince of Tennis”

The first album “Medicine or...?” got 7th in Most Daily Played and 10th in Most Weekly Played. The second album “Poision” achieved 3rd in Daily and 6th in Weekly [Oricon Style]

CD or LIVE, his performance is worth a praise. His condition has been good since his first performance, “Prince of Tennis Hundred Song Marathon”. He then received praise for his singing plus dancing in FESTA 2009, and also is the first from Prince of Tennis to have his very own solo concert and album in 2010.

Doesn’t really sing as his characters, so the songs you hear are all his own style.

Seiyuu with the same experiences as him include Tsubasa Yonaga, Kaji Yuuki, Okamoto Nobuhiko etc.

One of Mima Masafumi (Director of audiography)’s favourite seiyuu. It’s like wherever there’s Mima there’s Hosoya

Experiences

High School 

Used to be in fencing and acting clubs, and quit fencing for acting.

Was in a leader position in acting, but didn’t know whether to pursue it.

After that, watched “Martian Succesor Nadesico: The Motion Picture - Prince of Darkness” recommenced by a friend and decided to be a seiyuu as he was inspired by Yamadera Koichi’s character.

Voiced in the remake Space Battleship Yamato 2199 as Katou Saburou, fulfilling his dream of voicing with Yamadera.

Achieved Best Supporting Character Awards in 2014 and 2016 tho he has no luck in MC

Characteristics

Has a natural mid-range voice, therefore often gets cool / calm Sports Captain roles. To other people, Hosoya can also be seen as a man who’s calm with few words.

Because he started as acting in Western works, he’s better at “natural calmness” performances rather than exaggerated.

Mostly voices young characters from straightforward to cold ones. Also can voice as some bad “Uncle” (Ixion Saga DT as Pet)

Basically after Takamatsu Shinji’s (animator) favourtism, his image has disappeared (this is a compliment)

Maybe because Hosoya’s tone is a little plain (Hey!!) he rarely voices as MC but as supporting roles (MC’s friends etc)

For some reason, always voice some “big Brother” characters and recently, 80% of his roles are muscular guys

Accepted more roles as he grew popular.

Voiced as an insane character in a game “Princess Arthur” and received praise for it.

Before that, also voiced incanely in “Edel Blume” but the game wasn’t good so it wasn’t popular

Common traits of his characters: glasses, prideful, disses, dialect.

Real person is a helpless dork which is totally different from his characters, so may surprise people who don’t know him well.

Started by dubbing in Western shows / movies, so isn’t known in ACG (Animation, Comic, Game) community until his role as Shiraishi.

One of the few who dubs a lot in both ACG and Western films, where he voices in almost every season.

Often receives dialect roles (Osaka, Fukui, Hiroshima etc). Says that his voice is like a plain Ochazuke (rice with tea).

Has very few R18 works.

In BLCD, only appeared for a passerby and never a seme/uke role.

With the exception of Miyano Mamoru and Irino Miyu who both have acting backgrounds, Hosoya being famous even without a R18 character is considered as really special.

People may mistake Hosoya as voicing in more shoujo themed anime due to his popularity with women and large variety, but he actually focuses more on dub and shonen works.

Hosoya EVERYWHERE

In 2016 October, he accepted roles from 12 more works out of his normal ones, and with different varieties as well.

Probably because of overperformance, he hurt his throat and took a break from 23 April 2017 to August 2017.

Personality

Speciality: plays guitar and likes shooting

Is bad at technology so doesn’t have Twitter or personal blog (except link)

Known as the most woman-like male seiyuu.

Ogata Megumi: “Among male and female seiyuu, the one with most girl powers is Hosoya Yoshimasa.”

Actually also wants to be popular so often asks tips from other male seiyuu

A member of Mizuki Nana’s female team

Proved by a lot of people that he loves to talk about love.

Self-claimed masochist. Is actually also very masochistic

Gets nervous easily and sweats a lot. When he’s nervous, he always speak incoherently / stammers so he’s often teased by others.

Always at the bottom of the food pyramid.

In Free, was bullied by “predators” Miyano Mamoru and Suzuki Tatsuhisa.

Nobunaga Shimazaki: “Sorry—”

Hosoya: “We’re not gonna lose like this!!”

Masafumi Mima: “In Knb, 50% of seiyuu were new and perhaps to calm their berves they decided to tease someone. That someone is Hosoya. Even though he’s the captain, his reaction when bullied is priceless.”

Known as the natural dork, which often comes into topic when he’s not around.

Has a weird way of thinking sometimes.

Often leaves audience and cast speechless (and is usually made fun of later), but can tell he means what he says, and usually still has a good relationship with others.

Likes to not look at the camera in pictures, affecting people around him. Fans have also started to imitate it.

Easy to go along with and humble.

Often calls person with “san” behind and uses respectful language (formal)

Depending on atmosphere, he does call people by their first name and vice versa.

People he calls first names include Ono Kenshou, Osaka Ryota, Ishikawa Kaito etc.

“Will go crazy in unreasonable situations” - Hikasa Yoko

Too many sports roles. Fans often say he can “hold an Olympic on his own” and those roles are still renewing.

Some include tennis, Basketball, baseball, soccer, Volleyball, piano, drums, judo, karuta, Swimming, rugby, ice skating.

Fans often check if he’s voicing in new sports anime - and it’s a common habit.

Seems to also notice himself and talks about doing them sometimes.

Relationships

Male Magnet.

Attracts both senpai and junior’s appreciation.

Accidentally stepped into a gay bar and was almost harassed.

Even Fukuyama Jun, who doesn’t work with him much, would mention him from time to time.

Kamiya Hiroshi: “He’s a good kid who’s too serious.”

Has many hidden fans in the industry. Ishikawa Kaito has played his songs directly from his phone before.

Others

Likes girls who’s younger but mature big Sister type omg that’s me

Seems to like... boobs, D-cup in particular.

Had a defect where he was born with six fingers on his right hand but had the extra surgically removed.

Was a fan of the manga “Ushio and Taro” so was very happy when he voiced Akiba Nagare in it.

To be continued

I’ve kind of run out of space so I’m going to do a separate post later. For now, I’m so glad I decided to rewatch anime or I wouldn’t have found out about this adorable dork who made me who I am. I just came back from Japan after studying there for about 4 months, and it had just been the best knowing we were in the same country, breathing the same air, almost living in the same city. 

While I didn’t manage to go to a Hosoyan event, I would definitely go at least once just to “meet” and see him live. 

I love him with all my heart and wish him the best in everything.

[hella-slow-writer]

Trying Something

An NSFW smut tyvan requested by @demonic--disaster on bbs shipping discord. I was intended to post this after It’s too gay to be fucked 3 (minicat) but today is BBS Rare Pair Time so i decided to post this first! :)

Characters: I Am Wildcat, Vanossgaming Pairing: TyVan Rating: NSFW smut. Kinda pwp.

Hope y’all enjoy this!

After a long day of recording another Fortnite video, Tyler can feel his body is heating up all of a sudden. Maybe it's because it's been days since the last time he had sex, or maybe it's because of an annoying fan who can't stop yelling about "OMG I SHIP U TWO SO MUCH XDXDXD" sent him a book (It's called a doujin or something? He has no idea) on twitter, maybe it's because he felt curious to try something that the characters in that book do. The point is, right now he just need to take care of his need, not with his hand but with his boyfriend who is also recording some videos in another room.

He gets up and walked to the Canadian's room who is now yelling and laughing about something. A little flame of jealousy flickered inside him because of how much Evan is having fun with his friends, but eh, that's kinda pathetic so he brushed those possessive thought off his mind. Why does he have to be jealous and angry when Evan’s clearly having fun with their friends? I mean, he knows Evan wouldn't be that easy to leave him. He had 'ruined' him by making sure he can only feel good with him after all.

The American moved closer and wrapped his arms around the Canadian's neck, who jolted in surprise. He glances up towards the larger man with annoyance. "Jesus, you scared the shit outta me."

"Sorry." the other chuckled before he buries himself in Evan's soft, raven-colored hair. Technically nuzzling the other hair with his face while one of his hand trailing over his chest.

Evan gasped from the touch, hand holding Tyler's wrist tight. "N-Not now. I-I'm recording."

He can hear his friends asking him what the fuck is he doing, but that doesn't stop Tyler's hand from rubbing his hardened nipple over his t-shirt. Evan's spontaneously bought his hand to his mouth, trying to hold his moans from coming out. Tyler always knows where his sensitive area is. This is not their first time after all, and it can be a problem because the larger man loves teasing him. Like what happens right now.

"Evan..." he can barely heard his name being uttered by Tyler so huskily, as his body’s shaking from the sensation of having his sensitive nipples pinched and rubbed, and this is bad because their friends can hear him moaning and whimpering if he doesn't stop the call.

"S-Sorry... a-aah, i gotta go!" Evan's pretty sure their friends can hear that moan slipped from his lips, fortunately he ends the call before anyone can say anything about it. He moved Tyler's hands away from his body and spin his chair around to face the larger man. Brown eyes glaring at those mischievous blue eyes.

"You dick."

Annoying grin plastered on the American’s face made Evan want to punch him so badly. "Let's go to bed."

Hearing his boyfriend said that in a low, almost-growl voice, Evan knew that isn't a request or such. That's an order, and to be honest he do feel a little bit turned on. He can feel lust starts building up inside him, and he do feel aroused because it's been a long time since they had sex. So with one fast move, he quickly removed his headset and stood up before he planted his lips on the other man's, kissing him hard.

Tyler's hand moved up to the other's neck until he tangled his hand on Evan's black locks, pushing his head forward, deepening the kiss. He can feel Evan's hand pressing his chest, leading him out of the room while he keep kissing him with vigor, until they finally reached their bedroom.  Evan quickly pushed the larger man to sit on the bed, sitting on his lap before he give the American another kiss. The kiss is passionate and full of desire, and Tyler grinned against his lips, knowing how much the Canadian want this.

Wet tongues fighting for dominance, muffled moan can be heard from the Canadian as Tyler's hand moving south, holding his hips while Evan's hands holding the larger man's shoulder. Their breath are heavy when they break their kiss, a trail of saliva connecting Tyler's to Evan's red, slightly swollen lips. The American pulls the shirt the other's wearing over his head with ease, throwing it to the side until it hits the wall before he attacked the other's neck. He can feel his boyfriend’s gripping his shoulder tighter as he nipped on the skin.

"Fuck." Evan curses when he felt Tyler's other hand pinching his hardened nipples, his most sensitive area. His hands now wrapped around the American's back. He missed this feeling, having his boyfriend marking him as his, touching him so sensually and rough at the same time on his sensitive area.

The action went on a few minutes, Tyler nipping and licking on Evan's neck until visible red marks appeared on his skin while the Canadian moaned at the feeling, fingers occasionally brushing over the American's back, telling him to go faster or slower. However, Tyler decides to stop for some reason. And Evan gave him a disappointed sound.

"Why did you stop?"

Tyler's blue eyes staring at Evan's half-lidded gaze. He looks like he’s about to say something before he shook his head and glanced down. This action makes Evan curious about what happened to his giant boyfriend.

"What? What are you trying to say?" asked the Canadian, fingers now trailing over the American's soft, brown locks. But the other only shook his head as a reply.

"It's fine."

Tyler then leaned forward, intending to silence the shorter with another kiss (and also because he can't help but wanting to kiss him again). Evan moved quicker though, he bought his hand over the other's mouth before he can trap him into another passionate kiss.

"Seriously, what are you trying to say?" he asked again, voice full of curiosity and annoyance at the same time.

The larger man removed the other's hand from his mouth before he gave him a glare. "Nothing! Jeez, can you shut the fuck up and let me kiss you?!" Tyler retorted, but Evan wouldn't buy it.

"No, you can't continue until you tell me what's wrong." the Canadian said, arms crossing in front of his chest and Tyler groans in frustration.

"Are you fucking kidding me?!" the other's yelled. This is just the worst thing happened to his life, all he wants is to have sex with his boyfriend after not getting that sweet ass for days and now he will leave him hanging? His boyfriend really is a jerk.

But then, he WOULD let him continue if he tell him what's in his mind. But fuck no, he wouldn't do that. That is too embarrassing and weird...

Well, it’s not THAT weird but it's still weird! And Tyler doesn't want to tell Evan that because Evan would probably tease him afterward like he usually did!

But ugh, he can feel his pants tightening. Heat pooling around his stomach as lust and desire burned inside him, and he would literally 'die' if he doesn't do anything to take care of those feeling, those need. So with one long, deep sigh of frustration, he glanced up. His eyes gazing upon the Canadian's beautiful eyes that staring at him with stern look.

"Okay, fine! My fucking God, what a dick."

Evan grinned victoriously, letting out a chuckle before he kiss the man in front of him on the cheek. "I just want to know what's been bothering you."

Tyler sighed again. His hands reached for his pants' side pocket, grabbing his phone before his fingers touches the screen. He looks serious for a second, as if what he will show to his boyfriend is like a top secret documentary. But after searching for a few seconds, he bring the hands his phone to Evan. "I... I want to try this with you."

Evan furrowed his eyebrows, looking confused before he grab the phone and take a look it. "What the fuck?" he murmurs as Tyler buries his face on his hands, face turning red from embarrassment.

The phone is showing a page of some Japanese comic book (manga if he remembers correctly), where there is two characters. One female and one male.

The male is laying on top of the female's lap, which Evan realized that the female has a pair of really big boobs that Evan knew is impossible in real life (at least without surgery and such), along with thick thighs. The male’s sucking on the female's nipple while his hand’s pinching the other.

The female’s brushing the male’s black hair while her other hand's jerking the male's leaking cock up and down fast. The male showed a great pleasure from that action while the female’s moaning and squirming,

Evan stared at the image for a moment, then stared at his embarrassed boyfriend in front of him. He kept glancing towards the phone and his boyfriend for a few seconds before he erupted into laughter, to which Tyler responded with rage, telling him to shut the fuck up.

"See?! This is why i didn't want to show you!" Tyler shouted angrily, snatching his phone from the other's hand and throw it to the side of the bed. He lightly punches the Canadian's shoulder when Evan wouldn't stop laughing.

"O-Oh, you fucking weeaboo, Is this what you do when we're not having sex? Jerking off to a manga or whatever the hell that called?" Evan teased between his wheezes, and Tyler give him a death glare.

"Of course not, you dumb fuck. Some crazy fucking fan sent it to me on twitter." he replied grudgingly, ruffling his hair in frustration. He looked away, refusing to meet Evan's gaze

Wiping away his tear from too much laughing, Evan pulled the larger man closer to him before giving him a small, quick peck on the lips. It's kinda cute to see Tyler getting embarrassed because of this. He himself doesn't really care about it, really. It doesn't look bad or weird, it's basically just nipple play and a handjob. Both of them are usually done within their sex round, and he loves when Tyler’s just biting and sucking on his nipples, so he has no problem if Tyler wants to do that with him.

"Alright, let's try it." The Canadian's blunt statement made hos boyfriend stares at him with surprise, as if he just told him he's pregnant or something.

"Are you serious?" The American asked, eyebrow rising as if to say is he really serious about that. He isn't sure if this is one of Evan's joke or he actually wants to try it as well, but he really hope it's the former because he can feel his pants getting tighter and tighter, along with his almost-uncontrollable lust.

Evan nodded in confirmation as he gets up and sits on the bed. "Yeah, don't tell me you don't want to?" with playful tone on his voice, the Canadian signaled his boyfriend to lay on his thighs.

The American looks dumbfounded, before he crawls over to the bed where his beautiful lover is. He stared at the Canadian's hesitantly, in case his boyfriend decided to say 'haha jokes on you!' or something similar. They had a relationship for years now, and he knew the other likes to playing tricks on him, so he stares at him suspiciously because of that.

Evan rolled his eyes. "Do you want to do it or not? C'mon, big boy." the shorter male said and with one hesitant look, Tyler lay on the bed with his back against the mattress, while he rest his head on Evan's lap.

Tyler can see Evan's pecs up close here, and he really want to starts licking and sucking on that brown, hard buds. He can feel his breath getting heavier each time he stares at his boyfriend, so he look away. However, his body jolted in surprise when he felt Evan's hands trailing over his crotch. Palm pressing against his clothed erection, sometimes along with a squeeze. And it makes Tyler bury his face on the Canadian's pecs.

The American wastes no more time. He latched his lips on the other's tan skin, giving nips and kisses trailed down to his abs. He can hear Evan gasped and let out a whimper from his action, while squeezing and rubbing his clothed erection. When he felt Evan unzipped his pants, he lift his hips up so the other can took his pants, along with his underwear off.

Eyeing at the big, thick erection, Evan can feel himself at the sight. It always amazes him how large and hard the American is. It's so hard, and he loves everything about Tyler's dick. The veins on it, the size of it, how hard it is, he loves it so much. Even when he wrapped his fingers around the organ, it felt like he was gripping a rod or something.

Tyler shuddered as he felt cold air on his crotch, he finally took one nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue and licking around it which caused Evan to moans in pleasure. He kept on licking before he felt the Canadian's hand on his hard member starts moving up and down at slow pace. Muffled moan can be heard from the American's, which sent a pleasurable zaps running through the other's body. It felt so fucking good, the sensation drove both of them crazy in no time.

When he feel the motion on his dick starts getting faster and faster, Tyler's licking turned into sucking on the sensitive area, and loud moan slipped from Evan's mouth. The larger man's hand starts moving to tease Evan's other nipple, fingers brushing over the hardened buds before he pinch it hard. Evan gasped and cursed in surprise on that, and he starts using his finger to press and rub the leaking precome over the head. The action makes Tyler buckle his hips up, practically fucking Evan's hand wrapped around his dick. The mind-numbing pleasure had fully consumed them as they both lost in their pleasure and desire, showing no sign to stop.

This action went on several minutes, before both reached their peak. Evan was first, the sensation of having his sensitive area sucked and pinched hard made him came with a loud cry of Tyler's name, he made his pants wet from the orgasm. His body went weak right after that, although his hands still moving fast up and down on Tyler's hard cock, determined to bring the American to his orgasm.

Tyler came with muffled moan on Evan's nipple, his cock twitching couple times before spurting jet of sperms a few times, coating his belly and the Canadian's hand with his thick essence. His body shaking, and he bites on the nipple as he rode out his orgasm.

Harsh panting and heavy breath can be heard as they both rest. They haven't even 'fuck' yet and they already had one of the most intense, best orgasm of their life. They silently thanked thay 'crazy, annoying' fan for sending those cursed manga to Tyler's twitter. They wouldn't have this pleasure if they didn't send Tyler that.

Tyler leaned back. He let go of Evan's nipples from his mouth and his hand. the small buds is now red and hard from what Tyler did. He then sit up in front of the Canadian, who looked so sexy in his post-orgasmic state that it made Tyler aroused once more.

"How is it?"

Evan smirks and stare at him with half-lidded gaze. "That... was amazing."

Hearing that, the American cupped the Canadian and bought him into another kiss. Evan's wrapped his arms around Tyler's neck, and Tyler's hand tangled themselves on Evan's hair. Their kiss is slow and passionate, full of love and desire. Moans can be heard from both of them before need for oxygen make them parted away. They can feel their erection sprung up again after the steamy make-out.

"Round two?"

"Round two."