#Yes I know there's debate about whether no. 6 even is yaoi/shounen-ai and usually I would not classify it as such

[snowstories]

Look I know damn well Safu is going to lose because of sheer popularity disparity but I'd just like to get one thing straight: there is an objectively correct answer here and it's not Annabeth.

Yes, there is a subsection of fans who hate Annabeth for misogyny reasons, but the vast majority of fans adore her. Percabeth is the most popular ship in the PJO fandom. All m/m ships involving Percy are miles behind percabeth in popularity. Annabeth is a victim of fandom misogyny (though, let's be clear, she's still treated better than literally all the rest of the female cast), undervalued compared to the male characters and held 'accountable' for actions nobody would've blinked at if she was a guy, but she's not a victim of yaoi specifically. The people who hate on her just have male character/Percy-specific bias goggles.

Here's the AO3 stats, ok. Percy Jackson and The Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media types currently has almost 40,600 fics.

[Image: AO3 filter reading 'Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson (10930)'. End ID.]

That's the most popular ship, solangelo being second most popular, clocking in at about 900 fics less. Percabeth features in roughly one fourth of PJO fics.

This is the most popular m/m ship involving Percy.

[Image: AO3 filter, 'Nico di Angelo/Percy Jackson (2957)'. End ID.]

Also. Total number of fics in 'Annabeth Case Bashing':

[Image: AO3 tag search reading '1 - 20 of 49 fics in Annabeth Chase Bashing (Percy Jackson)'. End ID.]

I am well aware that most fics with character bashing aren't self aware enough to tag it, but still. Lol. Lmao, even. Even the most generous estimate of Annabeth hate vs percabeth ship fic make it crystal clear what's more popular.

Annabeth Chase is a popular character in an even more popular, fandom-dominating ship, who also has a small vocal minority of haters. She does not get her due for 'being a female character in fandom' reasons, but she's undeniably incredibly popular and does not get hated/ignored for being in the way of an m/m ship because her ship is far more popular than any m/m ship she could get in the way of.

Safu, on the other hand, is a canonical victim of yaoi. The m/m ship she's ignored in favor of is so big in the fandom many consider the ship and fandom to be synonymous. And also, the ship is, you know, canon. Safu's character, especially in the novels and manga, is underdeloped. After confessing one-sided feelings for Shion, she spends the rest of the series captured, experimented on, and, quite literally, torn apart. Do I think this was because she got 'in the way' of Shion and Nezumi? No; Safu's role in the story has little to do with that. Nevertheless, a large part of her character ends up being reduced to her crush on Shion and her role as damsel in distress, while Shion and Nezumi are off having relationship development. It's jarring, to say the least.

Even so, Safu is Shion's best friend; she's his main motivation for kickstarting the entire third act of the series, and facilitates the third act in other ways as well. She's ultimately still a side character (unlike Annabeth, who's a main character), but she's incredibly important to both Shion and the plot. In addition, the anime wildly improved upon her character development, undoing much of my issues regarding underdevelopment in the novels/manga despite her having roughly the same story role. Even in the novels/manga, though, she's an interesting character with a strong introduction.

Anyway. AO3 stats. There's about 1.2k fics in No. 6 - All Media Types. Nezumi/Shion features in roughly 1.1k of them, ie roughly 90%. Safu (the character, not any ship involving her) 147 fics total. That's roughly 12%. Her most popular ship, Safu/Shion, has five fics (less than 0.5%). The most popular platonic relationship featuring her (coincidentally, the third most popular relationship tag in the whole fandom) is Safu & Shion, clocking in at a whopping eleven fics (less than 1%).

Like. Come on. Safu is ignored in favor of the yaoi in a blatant, obvious fashion.

Look, I know Safu is gonna get swept by Little Miss Popular over there, but nobody is a worse victim of yaoi than female characters in yaoi fandoms.

TL:DR: If you vote for Annabeth you are wrong.

Round 1

Propaganda Under Cut

Safu

I am adding my vote because the yaoi may be canon in this one but Safu is still Shion's best friend and the way ppl leave her out of stuff sucks ass. Her character development was the ONE thing the anime had over the novels and manga but even the anime only fans won't look at her. She literally said "I want your sperm" out loud with her mouth in a train station to ask her best friend to date her. Weird girl extraordinaire who became bee jesus people need to stop sleeping on her for the guys.

She has a crush on Shion and makes it quite known She also asked for Shion's semen once

Neurodivergent queen! She autismed her way through puberty so hard, she thought her feelings for the protagonist Shion were purely sexual, until she spent time away from him to grow as a person

Annabeth Chase

I feel like fandom is kinda split on her with percabeth shippers loving her but any m/m shipper I've seen does not like her, really. She is my bae tho <3

Percabeth antis grind my gears so much because they never hate Percy, nono, even though he's arguably done more questionable stuff than Annabeth. Not everyone who hates her is doing so because of a mlm ship— the Perachel stans claim that Annabeth is a misogynist. However, basically everyone that isn't trying to ship her boyfriend with Rachel is trying to ship him with Jason, Nico, or her old friend Luke. They make her out to be this horrible abusive girlboss(derogatory) that she's simply... not. She doesn't insult Percy for having ADHD just because she's highly intelligent. She doesn't physically abuse him, and doesn't lay a finger on him outside of training. She's really devoted to him in a non-anti-feminist way. They just hate her for 'getting in the way' of Nico's convoluted attraction to Percy, or Jason's close friendship with him, or Luke's rivalry with him. But those relationships all flourish the way they were intended by the author: non-romantically. It's not Annabeth's fault for being intelligent or capable or jokingly snide or determined or any of those non-stereotypically-feminine qualities. She's just out here existing and people hate her for not being a man. Sorry for the rant.

She's canonically in a relationship with Percy Jackson for most of the books they're in, but he often gets paired in canon with other male characters, such as Nico di Angelo or Jason Grace. In fan fiction (especially yaoi focused ones) she's characterized as being a stuck up know it all, but she gets into plenty of shenanigans in canon and can be pretty goofy and sweet!

I think I may have accidently used fanart for Annabeth's picture, if you have official art of her, send it in!