#also if anyone is mean to cast I’m kicking you in the shins. they did great with what they had.

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

so, final verdict: I’m neutral on the Netflix live action avatar. It’s ok. It had some really effective scenes that made me super excited and cheering at my screen, and one particular scene that actually made me tear up, but also a lot of clunkiness and odd characterization and narrative choices that weakened the experience. Overall, it was decidedly average to me, but I’m really really hoping it doesn’t get cancelled. What a treat to see an entirely poc cast kicking ass on my screen. Now someone please give them a better script and dialogue for season 2.

[onlyseokmins]

fruit • h.j.s.

Pairing: joshua hong x afab!reader

Genres: smut (minors dni!), established relationship, movie night but not really heh

Warnings: shua being a lil shit, reader being sassy, eating of food/fruit, mentions of cum eating (m&f), prolly sex myths idk, oral (fem. receiving), edging, fingering, uhhh WAP lmao lmk if i missed anything as always <3

WC: 1.9k

A/N: hiii, I'm trying to fill up my masterlist w/ all the members even tho I have a few sitting requests but thought Joshua would fit perfectly for this scenario when I was eating the other night 🤭 BUT ALSO THIS WAS HOT IMHO 😭

You’re nestled into Joshua’s side, the back of your head resting on his shoulder and his arm curled round you. It’s how you’re able to feel the chuckle rumbling in his chest that he’s trying to hide. A whine of complaint escapes your lips when you nearly drop the chunk of fruit you’re trying to eat because of his jostling. Plus, now you know he’s not even trying to pay attention to the flickering television screen in front of you because this is not a funny scene in the slightest.

“What’re you laughing at?”

“Nothing.”

“Joshua,” you sit up to face him with a pout, “this is my favorite movie!”

“I know, babe. We’ve watched it like three times in the past month.”

“Four.”

He nods compliantly at the correction, your dark grumbling unable to prevent him from masking a fond grin. “Yeah, yeah. And we’ll probably watch it a couple more times, huh?”

“If you didn’t want to watch it tonight, you should’ve told me.”

“It’s not that, like you said it’s your favorite.”

“Then – ”

“I just like watching you more. Especially when you enjoy something.”

Joshua’s smooth talk can’t fool you after all these years together even if all you can do is roll your eyes. Likewise, when his thumb reaches out to wipe the sticky smear of juice off your lips, you remain (mostly) unaffected and fix him with a pointed stare that he steadily ignores.

“Why were you laughing? This scene is a guaranteed tearjerker no matter how many times you see it.”

“If you wanted a good reason to cry, all you had to do was ask. I could’ve provided a much more riveting alternative.”

“Joshua.”

“Fine, fine.” He sighs, knowing you might smack him when he tells you what’s on his mind. “I just find it cute… that you’re eating… pineapple.”

“Oh my god.”

He holds his hands up in surrender. “Baby, all I’m saying is you taste just fine as it is.”

“You are such a pervert, Joshua Hong. Can’t I enjoy some fruit in peace? There are grapes in here too!”

“Grapes. Grapes are good. Ahhh – ”

You ignore the way he groans your name in protest when you scoot down to the other end of the couch, clutching your fruit bowl and glaring his way. “You act like everything I do in life is to sexually please you or something.”

“I mean you did – ” He’s cut off again when you (gently) kick at his shin before he brings up any shameful memories. “Okay, okay! It was you who just had to ask when we could’ve watched the movie in peace.”

“Hard to when you’re giggling like a little boy because I’m eating pineapple, of all things. You definitely weren’t watching it, anyways.” You shake your head before muttering under your breath. “And if anyone needs to eat pineapple, it’s you.”

“What?”

“You heard me,” you chirp back and purse your lips.

“Actually, I didn’t.” The living room gets much darker when Joshua shuts off the television, the only source of light now the lamp behind him that casts a shadow over his handsome features. “Wanna say it again, sweetheart?”

“I was watching that.”

“Brats don’t get to enjoy things when they act up, you know this.”

The shift in the atmosphere makes your skin tingle but surprisingly, the annoyance wins over. “You’re being an irritation.”

“I prefer ‘irresistible’ but I guess you don’t agree with me at all. Apparently.”

“So, you did hear me.”

A beat of silence.

“Do you really think I taste bad?”

You give him an incredulous look, deftly dodging away when his hand attempts to reach inside your fruit bowl. “Although I love you very much, you can’t expect me to say that semen tastes good. Even I know I don’t taste all that great, either.”

“You’re very wrong and we could prove that right here, right now. You know I can eat you out for hours.”

“I’m not that turned on,” you can’t help but point out even as he pouts. “But you’re welcome to change my mind since you ruined movie night.”

Joshua’s quick to act, the couch creaking with his movements to successfully pluck the bowl out of your grasp – this time without argument. “I don’t think I’m solely the one who ruined movie night, but I’ll take full responsibility for ruining you, baby.”

His hands pull down your night shorts and panties in one go, an eager finger running tentatively along your folds. His eyebrow raises while a smirk forms on his lips as you cover your face in embarrassment at how wetness instantly gushes from your cunt, your body reacting predictably. All because it’s him – mixed with the expected promise that he’ll make you feel good as expected.

He coos your name, and you feel loved and worshipped in this most pathetic way possible while he shifts his body down yours, hot breath warming the top of your bare thighs. Soft lips trail sloppy kisses across them as his hands part your legs so he can fit his head through. Finally, he’s merely inches away from where your fluttering hole betrays you, clenching at nothing as he gazes in contemplation before swiping his tongue along it.

You let out a moan at the feeling, fingers reaching out to grasp at his hair. Slightly pulling him closer so his nose brushes against your clit causes your hips to buck up against his awaiting mouth. He chuckles at your impatience but gives in, obviously – your alluring scent makes his eyes roll back in delight.

It’s sinful how his tongue swirls inside you, plush lips brushing against you in all the right places, hands keeping your legs spread as wide as possible and bringing you closer to him. The wet sounds filling the room are accompanied by his grunts of appreciation although everything else is drowned out by the blood roaring in your ears and the moans escaping your mouth.

Joshua never fails to surprise you with how fast he can bring you to a climax. You feel it creeping up your spine, body tensing as it threatens to hurtle towards release. Too bad he knows the signs extremely well because he suddenly pulls away and white noise fills your ears as the feeling excruciatingly fades out.

“Shua,” you whine. Hands blindly searching for him so he can finish the job, but he’s moved past your reach.

“Right here, baby.” A reassuring kiss is placed on your nose. “Shh, shh,” he whispers in your ear when you find him and wrap your arms around his neck, trying to bring his body down to yours to grind against. But he refuses to budge, biceps flexing as he holds himself firmly above you. “You’re doing so good for me. Look at you, already begging from just a tiny bit of pussy licking.”

Tears sting your eyes at the painful ache between your legs. You know he loves it, the offer of making you cry in desperation always on the table and even though you hate giving into his sadistic satisfaction, Joshua does good on his end at bringing you to a mind-blowing orgasm – eventually.

He bends his neck down to kiss you, grinning at how he doesn’t have to run his tongue across your lips for access because your mouth is already open in acceptance. The taste of fruit you were eating earlier is replaced by the tangy flavor of your own cunt as Joshua’s tongue entangles with yours.

“See how sweet you are? How could I not get enough of this?” He licks his lips and eases the tip of a finger inside your warmth. “So. Fucking. Addictive.”

Each word is punctuated by an additional finger sliding and curling inside of you until you’re delightfully full. His thumb rubs at your clit but relief is short-lived when you tighten around him since he decides to leave you empty again.

You have tears streaming down your cheeks as you miserably watch him lick his fingers clean, maintaining eye contact with you the whole time. Once more, he makes you taste yourself with an open-mouthed kiss.

“Please, Shua.”

“What do you want, baby? Wanna taste how delicious you are when you cum on my tongue?”

You’re furiously nodding, at this point agreeing to however he’ll let you reach your much desired release. “Yeah. Please, please, please!”

“Hands to yourself then.”

Your clothed chest is heaving from sobs of anguish as your nails dig into the leather couch. Joshua is cruel. When his head returns between your legs, large hands hold down your hips while he places featherlight smooches on your pelvis and inner thighs, an occasional kitten lick to your leaking pussy.

He’s letting your climax plateau. Almost there but not quite. One step away from taking the plunge but he refuses to help you there as his darkened eyes stare tauntingly into your teary ones. He adores when his sassy lover is whiny but obedient. Submissive but teasing. Especially when you begin to play with your perky nipples that rub against your shirt, trying so hard to urge your release to snap.

“What did I just say?”

“Keep my hands to myself. Which I am. They’re not on you.”

Shiny lips from your wetness turn downwards in a frown. Technically you’re not wrong but that doesn’t mean he has to like it. Before you can get too carried away, he relents. Diving back down to suck harshly at your clit, plunging his long fingers deep into your cunt that would have had screaming in ecstasy if you weren’t already gasping at the searing orgasm that rips through you.

Your legs tighten in a headlock around him but it’s not like he’s complaining. Joshua’s mouth trades places with his fingers to lap at your delectable pussy that gushes from the powerful sensations, his own hips grinding down against the couch. Your quiet whimpers alert him of possible overstimulation and he places one last kiss against your thigh before cuddling your trembling body in his lap.

“You still with me, baby?”

“Mhm,” you nod and nuzzle his neck, “feels like I’m floating.”

He laughs, rubbing your back and waits for you to come back down to earth. By the time you do, your eyebrows furrow at the wetness on his jeans underneath that is definitely not from you.

“Did you…?”

“Yeah.”

“Really? I was gonna suck you off.” To say you’re beyond surprise would not be a lie because he usually has a tight leash around his control.

“Nah. I have to eat some pineapple first.”

“Joshua Hong!”

He snorts and kisses your forehead. “In all seriousness, that was just too hot to resist. Besides, I figured that would wear you out.”

“True. I think you sucked the life out of me, honestly.”

“Tasted like it,” he says while you grimace.

“Stop that. You’re disgusting.”

“But you liked it.”

“I… liked what you did, not what I tasted like. I think you’re delusional.”

“Delusional and in love with you, yes. Do I need to prove it again?”

You sigh, standing up. “No, because I’ll just believe you’re only pussy whipped. Now come on, let’s go shower and sleep.”

“Maybe I am. But I’m especially whipped for you first.” He follows you up the stairs before pausing in contemplation. “Hey, do you think the pineapple really works?”

“You better hope this shower doesn’t turn into a bath where I drown you,” you yell back, “so get your ass up here before I kick you out!”

[unhealthyfanobsession]

jealous cassian but this time instead of competing with high lords and sons of high lords what if it's a general from another court... this general could also be a lover of romance books and sweets ;)

I had a lot of fun with this one and I may have fallen a little bit in love with my own OC 🤷‍♀️

Nesta Archeron was not a force of nature. People loved to describe strong women as forces of nature, but that wasn’t her. That was Feyre. Feyre was brash and wild and unpredictable as a tsunami or an avalanche.

Nesta Archeron was a collection of cosmic power held tight and controlled beneath iron thick magic-infused skin.

Which made her an amazing general. All of that power and her amazing control. That was what was required to lead a legion.

Contrary to popular belief, Cassian was not a wild thing. He was not a good general because he was wild and elemental. He was a good general because he was in control. Because he woke up every morning and he didn’t flash his siphons around and try to beat anyone into submission. He trained. He fought. He lead by example. He flew at the head of his legions. He showed them the he was the best.

Mates were equals. It should have surprised no one that Nesta wanted to raise an army.

And she did. Oh she did. Nesta Archeron went to every court in Prythian and she picked up women who wanted to fight. She went down into the Court of Nightmares and took any women who wanted to fight with her. Freed them. Liberated them. Nesta planned on a small unit of females. By the time she was done she commanded thousands. It was the second largest military force in Prythian. Right after the Illyrians. Which was a nightly topic of debate. When she would surpass him. Cassian would be pissed if it happened sooner than a century.

Nesta was determined to make it happen by the end of the decade. Which was why she had set up this meeting with the new general of Spring.

“General,” the tall, pale man inclined his head, light brown hair falling over his brow as he did. “General,” he said it again, inclining his head in Cassian’s direction now. Lips tipping up in an amused smile and pale blue eyes sparkling with amusement. “To what do I owe the pleasure of having you both here?”

Nesta adjusted the knife strap around her thigh and moved into the room ahead of both males. “Cassian has decided to high-jack my meeting because he is intimidated by my success. His official reason, however, is that you are new and he comes to speak on behalf of the Night Court. To ensure that your goals are aligned.”

“Hmm, and you?” The general pulled out a chair at the head of the table and gestured for Nesta to take it. His breath tickled her neck as he leaned in to push the chair in after she sat. “What are your interests, Nesta Archeron.”

“Romance novels and chocolate cake, mostly.” Cassian laughed.

“Good taste,” the general smiled. “Hadley Minn?” a well-know romance novelist from Dawn. Sweet stories of proper young ladies falling in love and having missionary sex.

Nesta smiled just a little. “Sellyn Drake.”

He whistled low under his breath. “I like your style, Archeron.”

Cassian’s eyebrows drew together as he watched this male look over Nesta with a new type of appreciation.

“My name is Malakai.” The general reached his hand out first to Nesta, holding on a little too long and then to Cassian. Who squeezed his hand harder than necessary. The general just smiled broadly. “Call me Kai.”

“Well Kai,” Cassian leaned back in his chair, wings spreading out behind him. “What can you tell me about the Spring Court’s forces now that your court has got its army together enough to have a general?”

Kai just kept smiling. Kind and open. “And what would you tell me about your forces, if asked?”

“Absolutely nothing,” Cassian admitted.

“So no disrespect general, but…”

“I told him this was pointless,” Nesta rolled her eyes. “I, on the other hand, have something of actual use to discuss with you.”

“Happy to be of service,” the Spring general winked.

Cassian tensed up in his chair. arms crossing over each other and face going stone hard.

“Excellent. Now, I know your High Lord is a chauvinist, but I’d like to start by asking if you are too, because that will determine how I approach this conversation.”

The air tensed for a second. Cassian prepared to jump in between his mate and this male. Insulting someone’s High Lord… he’d be surprised if the male managed to just kick her out and not attack like a feral animal.

“Is she always this direct?” Kai’s smile never faltered. Not for a second.

“Talking to him instead of me answers that question,” Nesta muttered. “So, here’s what you’re going to-”

“I did not mean to offend you, General. I assure you it is my sincerest belief that females are just as militarily capable as males.”

Nesta narrowed her eyes. “So you plan to train females along with males in your new army?”

“Of course I do,” Kai shrugged. “Who would be stupid enough to give up half their military power because of their sex?”

“Spring is a small court,” Cassian said. “You only have one army. It gets more complicated when there are several. In the larger territories.”

“I see.”

“What he means to say is that significant parts of the Autumn, Night, Day, and Winter courts do not train their females to fight. Their main armies might, but different territories in the courts run that way. And actually Night and Autumn even their main armies don’t train females.” Nesta glared at her mate.

“They do now.” Cassian sighed, not needing to be reminded how long it took to reach this point.

“Ah,” Kai nodded, “you’re here to see if I planned to train the females and to take them with you in your liberation march if I said no.”

“I run an army that trains those other courts reject.”

“So I have heard, an extraordinary feat from an extraordinary woman.” His teeth glittered as he smiled, eyes entirely focused on Nesta. “I know you have your reasons for distrusting my High Lord, but he is trying. Trying to return this court to what it once was. I’m a part of that. Our army will train anyone who wants to fight. And it will protect the human/Fae border.”

Nesta blinked. That was…

“I fought in the war,” Kai nodded to Cassian. “I always admired how you fought at the front of your legions, General. You are the legend everyone claims you to be, but I have to admit…” He turned to face Nesta. “I accepted this meeting so that I could meet you.”

Cassian growled low in his throat. “How does this keep happening?” He muttered under his breath, low enough for Nesta to hear but not Kai. Cassian loved Nesta with his entire being. Heart, body, and soul. The problem was that, apparently, so did every other male in Prythian.

Nesta smirked, subtly reaching her foot out under the table to kick him in the shin for being a possessive brute.

“I met with Eris Vanserra last week. He commands Autumn’s armies.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake.” Cassian said that one loud enough for Nesta and Kai to hear.

“I mentioned I was meeting with you. I knew about your army, of course. But I asked him what to expect meeting you. And instead of answering he told me what you said in the High Lord’s meeting. About humans. I’m pretty sure his point was that I should prepare myself if I was trying to go up against a female who paused seven High Lords in their tracks, but… it is rare to meet a Fae who cares about humans. Truly cares.”

“Well I was one.” Nesta stared forward, unsure where this conversation was going.

“I know. Cauldron born. Phenomenal cosmic powers. Ability to bring us all to our knees if you wanted to. But instead you choose to defend humans and make an army of Fae the courts have cast off.”

“Nes knows how amazing she is,” Cassian cut in. Two fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. “Could you get to the point please?”

“I want to work with you.” Kai said, point blank, staring at Nesta.

“I bet you do,” Cassian muttered.

“I have my own army, general. I’m not interested in working for anyone else.”

“Not for. With. I want… my forces are beaten down. Their morale is weak. Faith is low. I… you brought the High Lords to heel and you started an army from nothing. I’d like your advice.”

Nesta swallowed. She’d accomplished amazing things. So many amazing things, but still… no one had ever asked her for advice. Help. Expertise. She was the novice. She… he wanted her help.

“My army is from all over Prythian,” Nesta said. “We train in the Night Court because the territory is massive and that’s my home, but… Spring doesn’t have the manpower to protect that border. Convince Tamlin to let me bring in some of my warriors to protect the human border and I’ll help you with whatever you want.”

“Deal,” Kai smiled, reaching out his hand.

Nesta shook it.

Later, after they took off and she was wrapped up in Cassian’s arms as they flew back to Velaris, her mate was stone faced once again.

“I swear to the mother, Nes, if he proposes to you I’m going to make what Feyre did to the Spring Court look like a Sunday walk along the fucking Sidra.”

[forthehpfanboys]

Soft Side

Pair: James Potter x Reader; he/him.

Summary: James doesn’t let his soft side show in fear of being teased and certainly doesn’t let it known that he’s been crushing on his best mates brother. But one day, it slips free, Sirius finds out and he gets to go stargazing- Not too bad.

Warnings: Cute? Lowkey trash?? I’m sorry- I tried-

Notes: So.. I had no idea what to put for the gif- so here’s this. I’ll edit this tomorrow. Pick your house!

~DO NOT REPOST ANYWHERE~

-

If there was one thing James Potter wanted to keep secret, it was his love for all things soft. Soft stuffies, soft people, soft blankets, soft sweaters- everything soft. He knew he’d be absolutely dominated by teases and jokes if his bestest of friends were to ever find out so he never let it show. That is until he met you. You managed to take his soft side and rip it from the deep confides of his soul and layer it above his loud, prankster personality. He loved and hated it. When he was with you, he just wanted to make you flower crowns or read to you during a thunderstorm by candle light.

The hardest part of all of this was you weren’t his. Not yet, anyway. You weren’t really dating anyone and chose to focus on your very important studies. While you weren’t necessarily the best friends with the group self proclaimed as the Marauders, you were blood related to Sirius, more specifically his younger brother. So that was just another kink in the chain of James’ feelings. 

I mean- who could actually fall for his best friend’s brother? Bloody James Potter. He thought sourly as he gazed at you across the dining table. Sirius had his arm wrapped around your shoulder, whispering gossip to you, probably about Snivellus or maybe Remus, but that didn’t matter. What mattered was how you covered your mouth and laughed into your hand. The raven haired student could genuinely hear you laugh, have that laugh be the only noise he hears until he dies, and he’d be content, hell, even happy about it.

“So, Potter? What’s the plan for today?” Sirius spoke up, returning said males thoughts to the blank paper laid across the table. At some point, your eyes had flickered to his, and he would swear to the heavens he could see the stars sparkling in your irises- even if that’s cheesy. 

“Well, I-” He closed his textbook quickly and slid it away from him. He didn’t really think this far ahead so he didn’t know. He ran his finger tips along the tan parchment that the Marauders desperately wished would show Hogwarts in its entirety to them. “I didn’t plan anything yet.” 

“Boo!” Sirius called out, smirking and winking at some Ravenclaw bird that passed by the table. “Ah, come on. I thought we’d go pick on Sniv-” He let out a groan, pulling his arm away from you to wrap them around his stomach, where you’d elbowed him.

“Stop calling him that, Sirius. He’s not a bad guy, in fact, he’s just like you, greasy hair and all.”  You snickered, watching your brother curl in on himself. That was another thing he really liked about you. You managed to reel Sirius back when he was going too far and control him, somehow. You were the only man Sirius ever listened too and it amazed James to such a degree. What magic did you hold that allowed you to stop this curly haired idiot and how does he get some? 

“Why not, Chortle?” James smirked, trying to shove the love-sick grin that was desperate to spread across his lips down into non existence. He let out his own laugh when you kicked his shin lightly. 

“Well, James, if you must know, bullying the kid for no reason is a major jerk move! Slytherin’s aren’t that bad!” You ignored James’ and Siruis’ gasp of shock. “Besides, you guys have got to stop giving everyone terrible nicknames!” You grinned at him, causing his cheeks to tint a soft pink. “All of your nicknames suck royal hippogriff!” 

“That is not true and you know it!” James flicked his dry quill at you, his eyes wide in fake shock. “I am the Nickname King at this table, (Y/n)! If you don’t like it, you won’t be a part of the Marauders anymore.” He genuinely thought it was a cute nickname- your animagus was a hyena, after all. He thought it fit.

“First of all, I came up with the group name, you git! Second of all- no! Do not interrupt me! Second of all, I also came up with Moony AND Padfoot! You came up with Prongs! What the hell is a prong?” You joking yelled out, standing up and leaning on the table to poke his nose. James felt his blush double and was really praying no one noticed, but judging by the way Sirius was smirking at him, he knew. James’ eyes jumped between your brothers smirk and your dizzying smile.

“Well, I came up with Chortle.” James chewed on the inside of his lip, trying to ignore how his heart was speeding up in his chest. Please stop being cute- James let out a silent sigh of relief when you finally sat down and hoped your brother was smart enough to keep his mouth shut. The odds were not in James’ favor. 

“Yeah, and it’s Gods awful, Prongs.” Sirius spoke up, leaning over the table some. “Maybe something like ‘love’ is more fitting for him, hmm?”

“Watch it, Padfoot.” James spat out, his hands curling into fists under the table. This was what he didn’t want. He didn’t want Sirius knowing or Remus knowing and definitely didn’t want you know he was absolutely smitten over you. You’d probably laugh at him, or hate him, or never speak to him again and he couldn’t handle that.

“What? I’m just trying to help my best mate notice the obvious cru-” Sirius shut up the exact moment James slammed his hands down on the wooden table.

“Shut it, Sirius.” He spat out again before throwing one leg over the bench, followed by the other and storming out of the dining hall, shoving his way right past Remus, who had just walked close to the table. He ignored the soft brunette's call after him and the echoing ‘what did you do?” made by the same voice. He ran his hands through his hair as he walked out of the school. “Bullocks- that- Ugh- mangy dog-” He grumbled to himself as he strutted across the courtyard, ignoring the swooning birds on the sidelines and heading straight down the stone steps to the Black Lake. 

The young male in specks made a beeline straight toward the weeping willow, successfully ducking to avoid a branch before poking the knot on the bark to help it relax. He leaned against the harsh bark, his gaze casted over the reflective water. He let out a sigh, finding the harsh rays of sun far to warm for his liking. He took off his Gryffindor robe, throwing it onto one of the lower hanging branches before pulling his sweater over his head, forcing his glasses to become askew. 

Once they were fixed, he set the setter next to the robe and allowed gravy to pull him to the ground. He crossed his legs into a knot as he rolled up his sleeves, still trying to actively avoid the unforgiving warmth. The male was just happy the tree was providing a nice spot of shade for him to relax under. He pushed his glasses up again, a sigh leaving his lips while he pressed his back against the bark.

“Hey.” 

James whipped his head around, seeing you kind of popping out from beside the tree with a smile that had his heart stopping. 

“Hey! Wha- um- What are you doing down here? Shouldn’t you be reading or studying or doing some academic even though you get the best marks of our year?” As he spoke, his head slowly lifted and his back straightened up away from the wood; he didn’t want you thinking he was a slob. His brown eyes jumped around behind the lenses, before they settled on your absolutely captivating (e/c) ones. His eyes followed yours as you sat down next to him, shedding your house robe to relieve the warmth you were also feeling. He found himself staring at your cute lips and even cuter pink cheeks. Oh, Merlin, he had it bad. Under the shady tree, it felt hotter the closer you got to his side.

“Oh, well, I felt bad for Siri being an absolute twat and decided to apologize for him. So, I’m sorry on his behalf.” You spoke up, plucking a rock free from the dirt and casually throwing it to the water, enjoying the ripple it created. While your gaze was on the lake, his was glued to his cheeks. He took in a stuttering breath before boldly wrapping an arm around your shoulders and tugging you to his side.

“You didn’t have too, Chortle! I’m all set!” He casted a smirk in your direction, praying to Merlin his heart wasn’t audible from his ribcage. His eyes widened when the blush across your face increased ten fold. “You ok?”

“Huh?” You turned toward him, your eyes mimicking a doe’s in pure innocence. “Oh! Yeah, I’m good, just um- Warm!” You couldn’t stop looking at his eyes. God, they reminded you of the forest, not that you’d admit it to his face. He was struggling to turn away from your gaze as well. He felt his lungs physically stop moving when your eyes glanced down at his semi parted lips before popping back up to his, all of it happened so fast. 

“Caaann I help?” James found himself leaning in more, a genuine smile coming up to his lips. He subconsciously tightened his arm around your shoulder, his own eyes flicking down to your lips like it was some kind of signal that he prayed would mean something.

“I think you might be able too, yeah.” You whispered, leaning up ever so slightly. At this point, James’ noose was almost touching yours and he was wondering if you could see your reflection in his glasses, because he could see his own in your eyes. He wanted to say he moved in closer and connected your lips, but he couldn’t say for sure. Judging by how poorly you both actually aimed, you both surged forward. Despite James being desperate for the feeling of your lips against his, the kiss remained softer than silk. His hand cupped your cheek, gently sliding your lips to press against his more effectively 

James pulled away, his grin from before growing wider. His thumb ran across your red cheek. He reached for your hand with his spare one and grasped it as if it was an injured butterfly.

“How long?” His voice was quiet, but sounded almost too loud compared to the gentle silence surrounding the two of you. “When?” He had so many questions, but wanted to focus on the most important ones. 

“2 years now; since you and Sirius turned that one Slytherin statue red and gold.” You let out a soft giggle and leaned into the touch. James realized at this moment you were the softest member of your house and it only had him swooning harder for you. 

“Godric, I love you, (Y/n).” He let out a snort when your eyes widened. “What?” He let go of your cheek and opted for pulling you into his side, effectively starting a snuggle session. 

“Nothing! Just thought you forgot my name. I’m glad you didn’t!” You played with the males fingers. The seeker could never have forgotten your name. It echoed in his dreams, he saw it written in stars, and he heard it everywhere he turned. He literally couldn’t escape it. 

“I’d never forget the name of my love.” Forever the smooth talker. He smiled wider when you let out another bunch of giggles. He would never get tired of that sound. The two of you jumped when someone coughed. You both turned to see Remus and Sirius standing just off to the side, right outside of your peripheral vision.

“Hey! What happened to Marauders before my baby brother?” Sirius put his hands on his waist, a knowing smile spread across his lips. James groaned. He’d rather deal with a Devil's Snare. 

“I’m not your baby brother!” You cried out, your face turning redder than ever. You threw a small rock at your brother, watching it bounce pathetically off his chest. “Merlin.” You grumbled, curling into James’ side.

“Siri, be happy for them!” Remus hit the males chest with a book. “At least it’s out and they can stop swooning in secret.” The werewolf turned back to the new couple. “Besides, they’re cute together.” He stated before walking off, dragging Sirius away by his sleeve. 

“Wait, no, I’m not done teasing my little brother!” 

“Yes, you are. Did you know James had a soft side though?” 

The pair of voices faded as they walked back up the stone steps, allowing the couple to watch the lake reflect the beautiful scenery around it and just chat. The couple didn’t move until the stars replaced the sun and every constellation had been pointed out in the night sky. Sure, it was past curfew, but neither cared. They had each other.

[ladyloveandjustice]

The Westing Game Chapter 25

Westing’s Wake

WESTING ISN’T JUST SANDY HE’S ALSO BARNEY NORTHUP WESTING IS EVERYONE, EVERYWHERE, ALL THE TIME.

And Alice is the one starting to put the pieces together. A kid genius, this girl. I’m officially giving Denton his Douchebag name back because when a ten-year-old girl sobs over a man dying in front of her, saying he was her friend, his wonderfully compassionate response is “you should have remembered that before you kicked him”. But that at least turns out to be useful! Because Alice never kicked Sandy, yet he sported a conspicuous shin bruise. She did, however, kick Barney Northup. Then Theo comes in, noting that with Doug’s help, he figured out it was Sandy he was playing chess against. He also believes he was going to win, but Ford recognizes he made a move that Westing often tricked his opponent into doing before turning the tables. Westing sacrifices his “queen” to win the game. And then Ford realizes, in THIS game, the “queen” who was sacrificed might have been Crow. Meaning he has yet to make his final move.

Alice starts putting things together and looks over Westing’s will again. She pinpoints the “my ashes will be scattered to the four winds” and makes and connection to the “Windkloppel” name. She, Grace and Angela ARE Westing’s heirs by blood. But that’s only three. Is the fourth Windklolppel Crow? Does Westing still consider her one?

Or is there another one hidden? (IS VIOLET STILL ALIVE) (Okay I’m probably spinning a little out of control here I mean she’d have to be Sydelle or Flora I’m not sure that tracks) (DID WESTING HAVE A SECRET KID BESIDES VIOLET. OR IS THIS THE OTHER WIFE, THE OTHER MRS. WESTING?)  (WAIT IS VIOLET MRS. THEODORAKIS? DID SHE ASSUME A FAKE IDENTITY AND ACTUALLY MARRY HER GEORGE? IS THE GAME ALL ABOUT FINDING HER, THE FOURTH HEIR, RATHER THAN THE MURDERER?) (Look if I throw enough theories at the wall one will stick). And ashes scattered to the four winds- do they each have something of Westing’s?

Ford reveals the full story of Crow, and it’s pointed out it was weird to make her an heir and give her a chance to get rich. He could have just had the heirs hunt down Crow. I would think it’s because he wanted to torture her into confessing, but something tells me it’s more complex than that.

Alice notes the wording of the will. “The police are helpless. The culprit is far too cunning to be apprehended.” This doesn’t apply to Crow, really. But it might apply to Westing himself. The will says “Cast out the sinner, let the guilty rise and confess. The sinner and the guilty may be two different people. Sandy (Westing, the sinner?), “died” and was cast out. Crow confessed out of guilt.

As a side note, it’s Crow’s birthday today, yet Westing claims it’s fourth of July (the fourth heir, again? Will that be Crow’s present, finding her daughter is alive?). Sandy got a special birthday candle that burns for three hours for his wife from Alice. So Alice realizes she still has time. But she needs to find something she doesn’t have. But what could it be? I’m as stumped as anyone. But Alice has a plan. She’s all:

And prepares to call her first witness.

THAT’S RIGHT, IT’S TRIAL TIME. Please expect me to make a bunch of Ace Attorney references next post. You have only yourselves to blame, you should have known what you signed up for with me.

[introloves]

Moments of Love.

A collection of hybrid Yoongi drabbles.

Drabble no. 3

1 2 

Pairing: Hybrid! Yoongi x Reader (Ft. Best Friend Hybrid! JK.)

Word Count: 2k

Genre: fluff, just straight fluff

Warnings: a little bit of miscommunication, mentions of prejudices against hybrids, mention of self hatred

Summary: You hadn’t gone on a date in years, due to your insecurities and workload and now you felt comfortable with staying lonely, your best and childhood friend Jeongguk however, tries his hand at being a matchmaker. 

The newborn breeze of coming fall nipped at your nose, in attempt to shield yourself from the chilling air you brought your sweater closer to you. Your shoes crunching along the pavement, your anxiety rising to a ten as you checked the time once more. You were supposed to be at the café twenty minutes ago (twenty five was standard to be polite) for your date but thanks to your coworker having to go home early, you had to stay and close up shop by yourself.

You could feel your face burn hot at the thought, this was your first date in… a long time. School and work were the only constant in your life and had been for a while, romance and any attempt to woo anyone was pretty much the last thing on your mind. Well, that and your insecurities... but it was easier to blame it on your work load.

Your friend Jeongguk however, decided that he was going to play matchmaker after a miserable night you had. You had cried into his chest while you told him that you found yourself utterly unloveable and that the person you saw in the mirror was nothing but an ugly amalgamation of everything you hated. The day after, he proudly proclaimed that you had a date with one of his older friends. He thought you two would make perfect company, you apparently had already met him multiple times, but it was hard to recall, anytime you hung out with him and his friends it was hard to keep track of the six other individuals that were always in his orbit. He proudly boasted about how it was a genius idea, his excitement was always infectious and since you knew you were in good hands with him you agreed to, it was time for a change in your life.

Jeongguk knew in his heart that this was probably his most brilliant idea. Both your personalities would mix well, and maybe just maybe, the offhanded comment about your nice smile that Yoongi had once made after seeing a picture of the two of you together had been a big factor in this set up. Jeongguk then told you about his friend, a producer from what you could recall, and this immediately piqued your interest. You were studying music and it was basically your lifeline, finding someone with your shared interest would be fun. Even if nothing romantic spawned from this outing, it was always good to make friends, and you desperately needed some. Jeongguk didn’t count, he was practically family anyways. So you decided to trust him and he planned everything for this ‘blind’ date with vigor.

You neared the coffee shop, it was small and cozy. Bulbs of lights shinning softly against the sunset, the small breeze now picking up strength. The scent of caffeine did nothing but heighten the nausea you were experiencing thanks to your nervousness...

You could back out, you thought to yourself. You could make up some excuse, you were already this late. But you decided to take the leap of faith and follow through with this. Giving yourself a mini pep talk, you whipped your shaky and sweaty hands against your jeans and tugged the door open.

The shop was close to empty, there was only a couple sitting to the corner of the store, settled comfortably against each other and one more person sitting with their back faced to you. A fuzzy, bright blue beanie adorning their head. He was dressed in jeans and a black and white stripped top. Seeing no one else who could be this elusive friend you walked towards him. You tentatively made your way to them, hoping this was actually Jeongguk’s friend.

“Y-Yoongi, uh Min Yoongi?” You questioned, hands fiddling with the hem of your sweater as you stood there.

The man with the beanie turned to look at you and your heart all but stopped beating. He was beautiful, the soft light of the café complimented his shiny skin, his eyes even softer with the atmosphere the glowing lights casting a warm hue to his eyes, a pretty shade of pink tinged his lips that were currently pursed, you gulped as you looked upon his beauty.

As he looked at you, he wasn’t faring any better. The cold tinged your cheeks and nose, he sighed in relief at the sight of you, dread and embarrassment was chewing at him at the thought of you standing him up. From the few times he had seen you around Jeongguk, he remembered your sweet smile and soft eyes. He had told him about your eyes and how cutely they twinkled when you laughed which made Yoongi all that excited to meet you formerly.

When Jeon offered to set a date with you, the cartwheels his heart was doing was a testament to how much he was looking forward to this. He had arrived ten minutes early, making sure to grab a good spot for the both of you, but as time went on and five minutes turned into almost half an hour, Yoongi had all but given up. He was kicking himself in the ass for not grabbing your phone number from his classmate. But now that you were in-front of him and his beating heart was pounding against his rib cage he really thought you looked much more beautiful up close and not stuck to Jeongguk’s side, you and him were almost always glued to each other, his bigger frame always dwarfing yours. For a bunny hybrid Jeon was surprisingly built like a tank, Yoongi had always teased him, asking him if he was sure he was a regular lop eared bunny and not from the giant lop lineage. He thought he would ease up on the teasing after seeing you nervously wring your hands and he thought it was the cutest thing ever.

“Hm, you must be Y/N.” He smiled, the corner of his lips curled ever so slightly. He looked tired, a drowsiness that was almost tangible clung to him, you wanted to die at the fact that he had waited for you here for so long. He stood up, his height shocking you, with a face as doll-like as his, the way he towered over you brought a hot chill to creep all over your face and neck this time.

You bowed immediately as he reached his full height, your eyes looking down at your shoes. He was nothing short of the most pretty man you had ever seen, but his eyes held an intense and predatory gaze. You had only encountered this aura from hybrids, especially from the feline lineage.

“I’m so sorry. I had to close up by myself, a coworker got sick and she had to leave early. I really tried getting here on time but I got lost along the way and-“ his chuckle disrupted your rant.

“Hey it’s fine, I’m glad you showed up.” His voice was like pure honey and you noticed he had a small purr to it.

He tilted his head down as a greeting, the large beanie that was placed on top of his head twitched, your eyebrows furrowed as you caught sight of the movement, the action was quick before you met his eyes again. His sharp eyes caught the look of confusion however and he guarded himself. Of course Jeongguk would forget to include a rather crucial thing about him to you.

While Hybrids weren’t all that different from those who weren’t the prejudice around them was still there. Just like anything different, some accepted them for who they were, and some didn’t.

“Ah, the kid forgot to tell you huh.” He laughed dryly. He didn’t want to be an asshole, but with past experiences, just because someone looked kind and soft on the outside, didn’t mean it stopped them from being horrible people. You looked up at him, confusion still present.

“Tell me what?” You asked, he simply grabbed the beanie he was wearing and tugged it off. His fluffy hair beautiful and black and tumbled down to his forehead. Sitting atop his head were two equally inky ears, very similar to those of a domestic cat. You then also realized that the top he was wearing was oversized, presumably to hide a tail that accompanied his beautiful ears.

“Oh.” You said. You being the painfully awkward person you were didn’t know how to progress beyond this or how to pick up on the fact that Yoongi looked extremely uncomfortable so you just looked up at him, quite dumbstruck. Now noticing the very obvious feline features he had.

“Yeah, oh.” He stated, just waiting for you to walk out of the café, but as you stared on at him with a small smile and big round eyes he figured that he had misread the situation.

A beat of silence passed until he finally sighed out,

“I’m getting the feeling that you’re okay with me being a hybrid.”

“Well yeah of course I am, am I not supposed to be?” You asked, now grabbing a chair to sit directly across from where he was sat, you were also tired from your shift after all.

Yoongi felt quite dumb at that moment, something he didn’t feel quite often. He always prided himself on being a self proclaimed genius and of course he could back up said claims but the fact that he couldn’t quite read you stunned him.

“No it’s not that it’s just that… well never mind.” He sat down as well, looking at you with a soft smile on his face. You both settled down and you once again began nervously playing with the hem of your sweater, using it to keep yourself preoccupied and so you wouldn’t openly drool at the beautiful hybrid sitting directly across from you. You laughed a bit at his reaction to you having none to his “reveal”.

“Yoongi, Jeongguk’s a hybrid isn’t he?” You questioned, of course this situation could take a turn, you knew he was being guarded due to the abuse hybrids often experienced but that’s not who you were.

“Yeah he is.” Your fingers bravely took a hold of the little pamphlet with the drinks they offered and began looking for the tea section. He simply looked on at you.

“We grew up together, his parents adopted me when I was little. His parents… two hybrids raised me. I know that doesn’t mean I can’t be a disgusting person... but that’s not who I am.” You simply stated, wanting him to know you didn’t pose any malice.

He seemed to visibly relax at your words, the iciness between the two of you slowly melting. He didn’t know how else to react but decided that two words were sufficient in how he felt,

“Thank you.” He whispered and you just smiled.

“It’s starting to get colder isn’t it.” Yoongi spoke, his hand coming up to scratch at his ears, after being tucked into his beanie all day it felt nice to have them out in the open.

“Yeah it is, the colder weather’s my favorite. I cant wait for shorter days-” You said, taking a look from the menu to the cup of coffee he had been drinking before you got there. It was already down halfway and you still felt super guilty for making him wait that long.

“I can buy you another one.” You offered, motioning down at his drink, “for making you wait.” You added sheepishly. Yoongi was a sucker for coffee and he certainly wasn’t going to decline an offer from someone as pretty as you.

The rest of the date was spent talking about each others interests and career choices, you had learned that he was producing his own music and that he had already built quite a following and connections with artists, you sat there completely in awe as he spoke about his music. He was trying to make it big in the industry and he was dead set on being the biggest producer in Korea. You hadn’t listened to any of his tracks, but the way he talked about music you knew he was in love with the art, you knew he would make it big.

The both of you were surprised with how easily you talked to one another, the conversation was never stagnant nor awkward.

Towards the end, you began yawning more and more and while you both didn’t want to end the date you knew that you had to go back into the normal world once again. But it was easy once you two realized that this wasn’t going to be the last date. And after a swapping of phone numbers, a hug that had you dizzy and two Uber’s later, you and Yoongi were both recollecting the date with hot cheeks and a smile on your faces.

That night as you fell asleep, you couldn’t help but feeling more loved than you had in a long, long time. His smile playing over and over again in your mind. He had looked at you like he thought you were the most beautiful person in the world, his eyes never left yours... even as you spoke with a small stutter and sweaty palms. He looked intrigued by you, and you felt safe with him, whatever imperfections you thought you had didnt matter, they weren’t at the forefront of your mind, he was.

You sent him a goodnight text, signaling that you would be more than open to having another date with him, you were the most brave in that moment than you had been in a while, the thought of seeing him again helped you as your thumb hovered over the ‘send’ button for a second. And before you completely knocked out, you sent a thank you text to Jeongguk.

Yoongi still couldn’t calm his racing heart, the way you looked at him while he was shyly talking about his music engraved into his eyelids. His already trembling heart once again jumped as his phone screen lit up, seeing you send him a goodnight message and knowing you were willing to go on another date with him put a smile so big it hurt on his face. He typed out, ‘I’ll be counting down the minutes till I see you again doll x” and called it a night. He knew you had stolen his whole heart and he was willing to give it to you on a silver platter.

[secret-engima]

Some Random Reasons I Really Like the Boruto Anime.

(because yes it has it’s problems but honestly I’m tired of trying to enjoy my fandoms with everyone whinging that it’s “not as good as the original”. As if the original two Naruto shows weren’t utter dumpster fires with moments of Pure Awesome to keep it alive and half the fandom isn’t there solely to pick through Kishimoto’s junkyard world building looking for shiny bits to incorporate in their fanfics.  Which is not to say I don’t like the Naruto shows, but seriously ppl you can’t whine about how bad the fillers and slow pacing and weird world-building of Naruto was only to turn around and scream that Boruto is horrible of TRYING TO BE DIFFERENT. Let’s inject some positivity in here. Anyone who has no need for Boruto positivity can kindly move on with their lives and let me have my shiny fandom. Moving on.)

-Reason 1. Mitsuki exists. He is Best Boi™ and I adore him.

-Reason 2. The characters are not carbon copies of their parents, but neither are they polar opposites. They have some of their parent’s traits and some of their own unique traits and honestly it’s so refreshing to have a show that isn’t “Main Character X Take 2: This time with a New Color Scheme”

-Reason 3. Have you SEEN how many girl characters there are in this show? Even if most of them are side characters? Have you SEEN the fact they can actually DO STUFF other than flip their hair and whine about boys? One of them can use seals! And has CAT POWERS!! Another one was the antagonist of the first story arc! And was actually cool! And also got reformed rather than just being yote off the nearest cliff! The main female character is actually useful without being either a whim or a jerk!

Reason 4. The school system has been revamped in ways that make SENSE. The Naruto cast (especially Iruka as the new headmaster) looked back on their early life and went “You know what? It’s REALLY DUMB that we were so unprepared for shinobi life. Let’s change that.” And they did! Students actually learn water and tree walking BEFORE they get thrown into life and death situations! They know jutsu other than the Basic Three! They get to know basic sealing and learn that Summoning jutsu exists! There’s a student who knows medical ninjutsu, so that’s obviously an optional course or something kids can take! They also have an option to NOT BE NINJAS. If they decide partway through they don’t wanna be ninja’s, there’s a civilian middle school program incorporated into the academy! Do you know what that also means? Civilians who get to know BASIC SELF DEFENSE. So even if they aren’t Ninja, they at least know how ninja work and how to not Insta-die the next time someone breaks into their village!

Reason 5. THERE’S AN INTER-SCHOOL TRANSFER PROGRAM. Way to show just how tight the alliances of the different villages are. Even if it’s only mentioned here and there, it’s SUCH a cool thought with so much fanfic potential.

Reason 6. Chocho, flipping, Akimichi exists. Yes, she can be a little annoying with her running gag of “I’m so pretty” but like- SHE IS ACTUALLY PRETTY. And she knows and can use the clan jutsu really well! DO YOU KNOW HOW EASY IT WOULD HAVE BEEN for them to either make her utterly hideous and go “Hur hur look at the fat girl thinks she can actually be pretty lol” OR make her constantly whimpy and shy and lacking any confidence at all because “oh look at the poor girl, she’s FAT so she must feel UGLY all the time, and have no confidence because what FAT PERSON has any confidence unless they’re delusional?” Both of those would be so freaking stupid and defeating. But INSTEAD they make Choho 1. pretty and 2. self-confident. She dresses nice, she looks nice, she’s not stick thin like say, Sarada, but she is actually pretty and she OWNS it. She owns her love of food, and her clan jutsu, and just- herself in general. And yea they use it as a running gag sometimes when she plays it up a little too much, but like- there’s a body positivity character! Right there! Who is also a girl who kicks butt! One of the biggest complaints I’ve seen of the naruto show is that the girl characters are flat and useless and underused save for like- Tsunade. Here you have a useful girl who is also body confident! And that’s not even touching on Sarada “can use both super strength and the sharingan and owns this fact” Uchiha.

Reason 7. Boruto’s issues are not his dad’s issues. There are ... lots of “kid sequels” i’ve seen/read/heard of where all the problems are basically the main character’s problems rehashed. And yeah, the villains so far are that I’ve seen are callbacks to the main show, BUT. EMOTIONALLY. Boruto’s issues aren’t the same. Boruto doesn’t have the “nobody likes me I must earn their respect” issues Naruto did. Or the orphan issues. He has a loving mom, he’s a loving big brother (who makes mistakes and does argue with his sister, which #realistic kthanks), and he is popular. Being alone isn’t his problem. Being unpopular or hated isn’t his problem. His problems are that he doesn’t know how to bond with his always-busy dad (which- of course Naruto is always busy, that’s just the show writers continuing the Overworked Hokage gag from the original show, and yes Naruto uses his Shadow Clones to help with it but come ON he’s running a military force AND a booming village) and that he hasn’t had the same life experiences Naruto had at that age. He’s learning to mature in a different way. If Naruto and Naruto Shippuden were about children who grew up too soon in a brutal ninja world, then Boruto is about kids who grow up in the AFTERMATH of that world. The world where their parents never want their kids to suffer like that and so, just a little, coddle them. It’s kinda like the aftermath of the big wars. The kids who grew up during that war are adults now and their kids have COMPLETELY DIFFERENT life experiences and priorities. It’s just how it works, and I appreciate that.

Reason 8. We have a girl Uchiha who wants to be Hokage. I love the Naruto and Naruto Shippuden shows, but it got ... a LITTLE tiresome that Naruto’s dream was also the dream of both his dad AND his mom and I think also kid Jiraiya at one point? Like- it seemed like at that point the show was going “Of course you want to be hokage! It’s in your blood!”. Boruto couldn’t care less bout being the next Hokage. He’s lived what it’s like to be the Hokage’s kid (something Asuma, if he’s still been alive, could have sympathized with I’m sure) and he doesn’t want to be that person. Sarada on the other hand has lived the live of having no real dad figure until recently, and as such Naruto’s “all the village is my family” motto really rings home with her. She wants to be the next Hokage, not Boruto, and frankly that’s refreshing.

Reason 9. Shino the teacher. I’m pretty sure this is a controversial point but honestly I really liked this. I do have some issues with how the og characters are portrayed (looking at you Kiba and Anko), but Shino I have no issues with. This is an intelligent, helpful boy who grew up struggling to bond with people and who grew up with people constantly interrupting him/not listening. And this gag does make its frequent appearance in Boruto, but that’s not Boruto’s fault that’s actually a case of the show being consistent with its predecessor so, you know, go blame Kishimoto for how his students didn't listen to him in the early episodes. BUT. As the episodes go on, it’s so clear the students do love and respect their teacher. They wouldn’t talk to him if they didn’t. They might not see him as a terrifying warrior, but he’s their TEACHER. Even Mitsuki comes to respect Shino, going out of his way (spoiler) to fight Shino in the graduation exam because Mitsuki saw Shino as someone worth testing himself against. Mitsuki. Orochimaru’s “perfect clone bby”. Thought Shino was badass enough to fight. And also on the student body in general, OBVIOUSLY they listen to him off screen, because if they didn’t then they wouldn’t have learned the things they did and have actually succeeded in the graduation exam, now could they?

Reason 10. Naruto and Sasuke are still utterly epic WITHOUT stealing the spotlight the moment they come on screen. I’m not that far into the show, so maybe that changes, but from the arcs I’ve seen (mostly the Shin arc), Naruto and Sasuke are utter powerhouses, but they don’t ... they don’t just hax the show. In the same way Jiraiya didn’t hax everything and steal the spotlight from Naruto, neither do Naruto and Sasuke, but we still see they’re awesome (after all, they were perfectly capable while fighting all the Shins, and just- the moment one of them got a look at Kuruma it was OVER and it’s SO clear in that moment that Sasuke and Naruto were holding back because they didn’t want to kill a bunch of kids. Naruto or Sasuke on their own could have MASSACRED the Shins, but didn’t, because they’re former protagonists (and reformed antagonist in one case) like that.

So... tl:dr Boruto is not Naruto or Naruto Shippuden but considering all the massive plot holes and world-building errors that happened in those shows, as well as the utter lack of use of its female characters, that’s not a bad thing! Boruto has some stuff wrong with it, and some things that I can see annoying/ticking off fans who had their heart set on another path, but the show has potential, the characters are utilized much better than I expected, and as someone who did not grow up on Naruto and so doesn’t have shiny nostalgia glasses spot welded to my face, I think it’s a really good show.

Honestly if it wasn’t a sequel of such a monolith, childhood-forming show, I think it wouldn’t get NEAR as much hate, and the fact that it gets such flak because it dares have its own unique take on the post-Naruto Shippuden years rather than trying (and inevitably failing) to cater to the whims of every single fan out there makes me sad. If you want to see more of Naruto’s world and see female characters actually get some cool moments to themselves, then give it a try. If you’d rather go with your own Naruto HCs for what happened at the end of the war, then that’s FINE, just don’t get mad at those of us who enjoy Boruto for the glorious animated fanfic AU it is.

[frekydeki]

Oh my god! The saleos fic got me crying like a pig! The angst was so so good! But please, can you continue it and give mc and Jumin a happy ending together?😭 There must be an explaination for what Jumin did like he was drugged or drunk and thought the woman he was with was mc (which he truly loves and care)

Hohoho… I hope this satisfies you ;) Thank you for the message, it gave me a lot of motivation to write this second part!!

I’ll also hand out a warning that there is attempted sexual assault in here so please read at your own risk.

Saleos pt 2

Part 1 is here :)

Summary: Forgiveness was easy for you to give… But that night, you were having trouble figuring out how to do that for him.

Pairing: Jumin x MC Reader

His birthday, was actually the next day. Reflecting on it the next morning, you wished you hadn’t been so childish. You wanted to have something over that woman, something that put you closer to Jumin than she would get that night… And for some reason, it was that you knew his birthday and she didn’t… A stupid consolation after you thought about it. That woman had Jumin in a way that you never would. Who were you kidding, even a strange woman from a company dinner was closer to Jumin than you.

Your heart just kept breaking over and over again. 

“Hey, space captain.” You snapped your gaze to the drink that was placed into your empty hand, and trailed your eyes up to the red head grinning down at you. You hated that his smile never reached his eyes. 

“Hey.” You softly called back. You patted the seat next to you for Seven to sit down; he happily obliged. 

“What’s on your mind?” You couldn’t help the way your eyes trailed up to the man just across the room. Those onyx eyes bolted to yours, like he knew you were looking at him, and your heart crawled into your throat. You took your gaze away quickly, almost ashamed to be in love with man who was with another woman. 

“Nothing.” You squeaked.

“Oh ho ho.” Seven’s grin drifted into your line of sight, that mischievous glint in his amber gaze making you a little anxious. “Lover’s quarrel?” Giddiness broke out in a grin on your own lips, and you lashed out to smack his arm playfully with a loud giggle. Before realization dawned on you; you aren’t lovers. 

“No…” You cleared your throat, “Nope. Nothings wrong.” You were back peddling quickly, trying to get away from that conversation. The red head next to you placed his hand to your hair and ruffled it quickly; you couldn’t get mad, you didn’t have your hair in an updo with any pretty pearls or anything. You just combed your hair and left… You didn’t have the energy to do anything else. Not that it would’ve mattered, you looked nothing like that woman from last night.

“Ah. I see.” The air was thick between the two of you. You were still trying to lick your wounds like a hurt puppy, and Seven was definitely trying to scheme a way to put that spark back into your eye. 

“Hey… I think I’m gonna turn in for tonight. I’ve got a lot of homework to finish up.”

“So soon? It’s not too often that we all get together like this, ya know?” Seven’s voice was unusually soft. You shot him an unsure smile. You knew you didn’t get the chance to see everyone like that often, but you felt like you couldn’t breathe. You’ve caught his eye so many times throughout the night, and each time you thought you were going to collapse from a heart attack. You nodded again, ignoring that your head was starting to spin because of the alcohol. You sat your drink down lightly.

“Yeah… I think it’s time I turn in.” You concluded. Standing, you tried to hide how unbalanced you were; you weren’t too drunk but… maybe you should’ve been a little more sober while walking home alone. When you met Jumin’s gaze, however, you just knew it didn’t matter. You didn’t even want to talk to him. You were pulling away from the man you loved in every way possible. “Night Seven.”

“Do you want me to walk you back?”

“No it’s okay… I’m close to here so it shouldn’t be too awful.”

You should’ve really taken Seven up on his offer now that you think about it. Now that your in the empty streets, alone, and slightly drunk, you’re realizing a lot of things you shouldn’t have done. You shouldn’t have been so damn emotional about something that’s none of your damn business. Since last night you’ve been plagued with regrets, and right now, letting your emotions get the best of you is the biggest one. Because you know you’re being followed, and the only thing you can think of doing is call Jumin. But before he answers, there’s a hand on your wrist, yanking your phone away from you.

“Please stop.” You breathlessly whine as you try and take your hand from the harsh grip on your wrist. You aren’t too drunk to understand what the men mean when they laugh about taking you home. But your world is swaying and it’s getting harder for you to try and keep them away from you. You stumble back against the chest of one of the men, and his arm reaches around you and latches onto your breast. Terror squeezes your breath from you and you stare widely down at that hand. Your arms and legs are going numb. A whimper comes from you as you begin to feel entirely powerless, like a wounded dough being circled by vultures. 

A hand pushes your eyes up to stare into brown eyes, his mouth trembling just above your own. No. You don’t want anyone but Jumin to kiss you. 

“Don’t.” You wheeze, trying to get yourself loose from his grip on your jaw. “Stop.” You demand. 

“You know what they say boys…” One shouts with a crooked grin, “When a woman says no, she actually means yes.” You gasp loudly when he slams his lips atop yours, and pries his tongue into your mouth. You want to vomit. You don’t think much about anything except getting that leech off of you, so you kick him as hard as you can in the shin. When he stumbles away with a loud yell, you throw your head back, hitting the other one in the mouth. 

You make a run for it, a drunken, stupid run for it. You don’t register the pain of being pulled back by your hair, until you’re staring into the raging eyes of one of the men; his breath comes through a clenched jaw.

“You’re really going to regret that.” A tear runs down your cheek, and for some reason you’re begging Jumin to follow you. Just for once, you wish he’d do a little more than call. You feel the sting and ache on your jaw before you realize that you were punched and on the ground. How many men is there? You only remember three at first, but now theres… Seven? No… You’re seeing stars as your struggling against the sleeze crawling on top of you.

“Stop.” You weakly cry. And just like that, his weight is gone from on top of you. A hand yanks you up, “Stop, stop, stop, stop!” You cry against their grip.

“MC! MC, it’s me!” You know that voice. You turn your eyes up to those onyx eyes that you know so well.

“Jumin.” You whine, your mouth contorting into a loud sob. You’re glued to his chest in seconds, refusing to let go, and it almost feels like he doesn’t want to let you go either. His arms are tightly looped around you, pulling you closer - like you couldn’t get close enough - and reminding you that you’ll be just fine. You relax a little, inhaling his cologne; his embrace feels so safe. 

So why does her red hair flick into your vision? Why do you remember that not even twenty four hours ago this man was holding another woman like this? Why do you remember this now? And why is it enough to have you pulling away from him slowly, your eyes dulled and lips pulled down in a frown. The pinch in your cheek and mouth was easy to ignore compared to the burning in your stomach. 

“I want… to go shower.” You whisper to him. You feel disgusting. Inside and out. Outside you’ve been violated by a stranger, inside you’ve been violated by the man closet to your heart. You think you want to burn it all off with a hot shower.

“MC, you shouldn’t be alone.” Jumin gently advises. You shake your head; he’s right. He’s so right it pisses you off. You cast your gaze up to his slack features and nod curtly.

“Then you’ll stay with me?” You watch his mouth part slightly and a red hue takes place on his cheeks. No… Because he has another woman waiting for him… A bitter smile washes over your lips and before you can think about it, your resentment pours from your lips, “That woman… You’re going to meet her again tonight?” He raises his brow and tilts his head.

“I have no such plans.” He nods and places his hand to your lower back. “I will stay with you.”

“We’ll take care of these three, you make sure MC is safe.” Seven calls as he waves you both off. Zen stops his raging around the men to give you a thumbs up and a grin with bloodied knuckles. V, his hands clenched onto the shoulders of the men so tightly his knuckles are white, smiles at you gently.

“Yeah, you rest easy! And drink some water, too.” Yoosung chimes with tears on his cheeks; he’s ever the emotional drinker. Jumin pushes you toward your apartment building and into your own quickly and without a word. He stops just inside the door, looking at the small room, all the pictures of the RFA displayed around.

You stop next to him and stare hardly at your wood floors. 

“MC, are you troubled by the event that transpired last night?” Your tongue gets knotted as you look widely up at him. In shame you look down to your tangling hands. 

“No.” It’s a whisper, a cracking whisper.

“You’ve been distant with me, MC. I wish you would tell me what’s troubling you.” 

“Nothings troubling me.”

“Why are you crying, then?” 

“I’m really shaken.”

“Then why haven’t you spoken to me all day?”

“Because-” you’re jealous. Because you really are troubled by what happened last night. 

“MC,” His hand grazes your cheek gently, and he puts himself in front of you, “What is wrong?” You selfishly indulge in how wonderful his touch his, how gentle; he was like this with that woman last night.

“You were gentle with her like this too? Right?” You clench your jaw, unable to help seeing them together. You put your eyes back down, looking at the scuff mark on Jumin’s expensive shoes; it’s probably from kicking that man off of you. “You know, I’ll be okay alone tonight. I’ve sobered up a lot and I just want to -”

“I was unaware that you… Would be hurt by my being with someone.” You shut your eyes at his words… Like he’s confirming it. “Had I known I would not have brought her home.” No. In reality, you have nothing to do with it. You just need some time.

“I just need some time… To process everything and understand my… My feelings.” You mumble up to him.

“Why do you always shut me out?” He huffs down to you. “When we met, you encouraged me to express myself, to understand and embrace my emotions. Why do you always back away from me when it becomes too much MC?” His breaths are becoming heavier, his eyes even more irritated. “Is it because I am too much to handle? Am I not trustworthy to hear your worries? Am I not enough for you?”

“What? No, that’s-”

“Then what is it? MC?” Your calm and collected Jumin is gone, all his logic has flown out the window. Right now, you’re wondering who’s been wrecked with more emotion. “You call Yoosung over every little thing. You tell him good morning, and cry to him, and express everything to him that you cannot to me. What does he have that I do not?” You stare widely up at him, tears freely coursing down your cheeks.

“Why are you turning this back on me?” You lightly whisper. “Why are you acting like I’m the one who brought a stranger home, reeking with their cologne and letting them shove their tongue down my throat? I’m not the one who did that! You did, Jumin! You brought some woman home and had the audacity to act like you cared when you saw that it hurt me!” At this point, your sobbing and pressing your finger to his chest, like it was going to dig down into his heart and hurt him as much as he hurt you. 

“And I have only ever been true to you. I have only ever been open and honest to you. I’ve only ever seen you Jumin! How dare you try and pin this on me!”

“You don’t understand what I’m saying, MC.”

“No, I don’t Jumin. I don’t understand what you’re trying to say at all. What could you possibly be trying to t-”

“I’m jealous, dammit! I’m jealous that you always go to Yoosung. I’m jealous that you let him touch you so freely, that you spend so much time with him, that you laugh with him; I hate that he is so much closer to you than I am.” You clench your jaw. Your heart softens only a little for him, but you can’t forget that he was with another woman just last night. 

“Imagine if you knew I had sex with him.” Jumin’s eyes light dangerously and he flicks them to yours.

“What do you mean to say, MC?” His voice was low, but you could see how scared he is of your answer.

“If you knew that Yoosung knew me so intimately, you’d feel just as terrible as I do right now. Because I know you had sex with that woman. I know that she knows you in ways I never will.” You both stare at each other in silence. One sobbing uncontrollably, and the other refusing to let the tears spill over. You cover your eyes with trembling hands, ignoring that Jumin falls to his knees and takes your free hand into his own.

“How…” Your weak voice shatters, your quaking hands running to cover your quivering, chapped and chewed up lips. Inhaling a deep breath - the air feeling so much harder to pull in through your swollen throat - you continue to question the red eyes of the man on his knees in front of you, “Did we end up like this, Jumin?” 

All your memories are bright with him. Only twenty four hours ago you were head over heels for him, you couldn’t get enough of him. He put you on cloud nine, made you forget all of your woes… But now, he’s hurt you so much and it wasn’t even deliberate. It terrifies you thinking about just how terrible it would be if Jumin went out of his way to hurt you.

“MC… I want… That dinner, I had too much to drink. That woman was feeding into my every desire, physical touch, excitement… The desires I have long had buried. She was only half as beautiful as you, and everything I did was consumed by thoughts of you.”

“Jumin…” You don’t want to hear a play by play of his night with her… You don’t want to hear anything.

“Please, I’d like to say this. When you saw me with her, I was - I am - filled with such a sense of dread, of shame, that I just simply couldn’t continue. Once I ensured that you were okay and safe at your apartment, I sent that woman home.” His pushes his eyes back up to your own, “I did not have any relation with that woman, MC.” 

What?

“With that being clarified, I want to say that I am completely, hopelessly in love with you. There is no other woman I could possibly be with, and I understand that very well now.” He presses his lips to your knuckles and continues, “Please don’t pull any further away from me, MC.”

Wh… what?

“So… Wait…” Suddenly, you can’t hug him fast enough. “I love you too.” You bury your face into his shoulder and quickly, frantically say, “That’s why I went to see you last night… Because I wanted to confess to you and-” You sound terrible when you talk and cry but you don’t think Jumin cares. He simply pulls you closer to him, and smiles widely. 

Gosh… It really was your Jumin with that woman last night.

[dessiekarma]

My Harem is Entirely Bad Boy Types (Kirisaki Daiichi x Reader) Pt. 3

Chapter Three: Get That Girl a Megane!

 “No no no. You seem scared of the ball. Remember follow through with your wrist. Okay better, now try again.”

 Hara was surprised at the voice coming out of the gym. The team never practiced during study period but the instruction as well as the sound of sneakers squeaking was undeniable. Peaking his head into gym he squinted to see (Y/N) and Matsumoto assisting the rest of the second-string players.

Matsumoto had a weird place with the team, he was in the first string but not part of their web. He was down for their rough plays but also usually wanted nothing to do with them outside of basketball and well that worked out just fine for everyone.

 It was, however, a shock to see (Y/N) here helping him out. Hara and the others for that matter tended to forget that Kirisaki Daiichi had over twenty players total.

 “Hey girl!” Hara whistled for (Y/N), knowing it would annoy her. Sure enough she turned her head slowly to cast him a frustrated look before sighing and walking over.

 “Whadya want Hara? I told you not to call me girl.”

 “And I told you not to call me Hara, we should be on first name basis by now.”

 “Kazu-chan.”

 “Not that either! Whatever! What are you doing in here anyway?”

 “Managing the team. What else?”

 “You know this isn’t really the team right?” Hara whispered cattily. “I mean most of them aren’t bad but they’ll only ever get to play an actual game once all of us graduate.”

 “I know you guys are the main players but there’s a lot of first years on the team. They’ll inherit it, and don’t you think its better to leave a legacy as opposed to just graduating and letting the team crumble.”

 “I don’t really think about that sort of thing and I don’t think Hanamiya cares. Come on, you’re supposed to being doing stuff for us. Besides what do you even know about basketball?”

 “I did date a basketball player, ya know? I mean I would never be able to play an actual game but I’m pretty good at shooting. That’s a foundational skill so I might as well teach these guys, right?”

 “I guess, hey where’s Mako?” Hara said as if the thought suddenly popped into his mind.

 “Umm right here.” (Y/N) said with a quirked brow, pointing to the baby sling around her torso. “Did you not see him?”

 “Oh I guess I just didn’t notice. Good job finding a way to carry him around while you’re busy.”

 “Well yeah I needed to, since you suck so badly at taking care of him.” (Y/N) said poking Hara’s side.

 The male was about to retort before a ding on his phone caught his attention. Opening the text, he was greeted with an image of a scantily clad girl. Without thinking about it (Y/N) tiptoed to see his phone and whistled.

 “She’s hot! Is she your girlfriend?”

 “No, she’s not and don’t nonchalantly call other girls hot!”

 “Why not?”

 “Because you aren’t a lesbian!”

 “Says who?”

 “W-what? You had a boyfriend!”

 “Hmm I guess I did. You’re so funny to tease Kazu-chan!” The girl exclaimed with a laugh before giving him a wave and heading back to practice.

 Hara frowned as his manager blurred back into the background of players. Blinking his eyes hard a few times he sighed and closed the door to the gym.

 ‘So can you come over tonight?’

 The lavender haired male looked down at the text message from the girl in the picture and mulled it over. Scrolling through his camera reel he sized up his options.

 ‘My parents are overseas on a business trip, so we have the place to ourselves.’

 Welp that was good enough for him. She wasn’t his first choice but she’d responded the quickest with the least hassle.

 Typing out a quick response, he shoved his phone back into his pocket and made his way out the gym.

~~~~~

 “What’s with all this?” Seto asked motioning to the dozen new charms and button dangling from (Y/N)’s backpack.

 She looked up from her phone quickly to see what her friend was pointing at before quickly returning back to her screen.

 “My new obsession! He’s a character from Paranormal Payphone. Basically, it’s a new game where these boys call me from a payphone at certain times of the day and he’s my favourite!”

 “What’s so great about this character in particular?” Hara asked grabbing at the small figure on the zipper.

 “Besides the fact that he looks like Imayoshi.” Furuhashi retorted tiredly, before his own comment snapped him out of it.

 Everyone including (Y/N) was looking at him in disbelief. It was an unspoken rule that they avoid mentioning him around the girl, unless she brought him up first. They’d learned the hard way that when mentioning anything to do with Tōō there was a 50/50 chance she would cry.

 Surprisingly no tears came to (Y/N)’s eyes, instead she wrinkled her nose and let out a scoff.

 “I don’t see it! And I will not let that deter me from loving my best boy!”

 “Well clearly you have a type.” Hanamiya said sizing up the buttons. He’d never played the game nor even heard of it before now but with otaku shit…you could kind of tell which characters were assholes or not.

 “Hmm? I just think he’s cute is all! Like those glasses for instance! I always end up falling for the megane characters. Kyoya Ootori, Rei Ryugazaki, Austria, Tenya Iida!”

 The guys listened to her ramble off a long list of glasses characters.

 “She talking so fast, I didn’t understand half of what she just said.” Seto remarked as the girl slowed down to think of more characters.

 “I’m pretty sure she named a whole ass country in there.” Hara laughed blowing a large bubble.

 The guys were almost amused by the girl’s stupid antics and none of them noticed the sudden milk carton that came flying towards their table. It was only after they noticed their manager tense up from the sudden impact on her head that they all, without thought, got up from the table threateningly.

 “Who the fuck threw that!?” Hara snapped out casting a glance to (Y/N) who looked stunned as milk dripped off her forehead and down her back.

 Only after their initial defensive move did they notice a girl on her knees not to far behind where (Y/N) was sitting. Her tray was splayed on the ground, after having apparently tripped.

 “Sorry! I should have watched where I was going!”

 “That’s okay!” (Y/N) said wiping the liquid off her face. “No use crying over spilt milk after al-”

 She stopped midsentence as she turned to the girl who had not gotten up off the ground. The boys all noticed an unspoken exchange between the two. Yamazaki watched the situation like a hawk not prepared to let the girl take a step closer to (Y/N).

 “Hopefully you get yourself cleaned up, I’m sure you hate being…dirty.” The girl said with a smiling face but snark laced in her voice. With that she walked away and the guys looked back and forth between the two.

 “There’s no damn way she tripped, you know that right?” Seto asked finally taking a seat along with the rest.

 “Yeah I know but it’s not surprising.”

 “Because she’s Y-”

 “I went to middle school with her. We had some bad blood between us and I thought she’d gotten over it. I didn’t even know she went here. I didn’t think anyone I used to know before came to this school.” (Y/N) said looking more and more concerned as she spoke.

 “Before what?” Hanamiya asked analyzing the girl’s face.

 “Before highschool! I was so cringey in middle school!” (Y/N) said now back to her normally cheerful self. “But I’ve been here for a few months now, I wonder what triggered her to suddenly lash out on me.”

 “Probably because she’s Yam- oww! Fuck!” Hara called out rubbing his shin from under the table, clearly having been kicked.

 “It doesn’t matter. I just… Oh no! My plush got all wet.” (Y/N) said lifting a sopping wet miniature plush of the character she’d just been fangirling over.

 All of the guys suddenly felt a pang through their chests at just how sad her voice had sounded.

 Getting up from the table, Furuhashi walked over to the girl’s side of the table and extended his hand to her.

 “Come on, let’s go wash your clothes and your Jaeyoung plush. We have a washer and dryer in the gym.” He said smiling at her, hoping to get her sad face a little brighter.

 Sure, enough she grinned back at him before taking his hand and disappearing out of the lunch room.

 “How did he know the character’s name!? Why didn’t I think to take her to wash her clothes?” Yamazaki cried out as the two disappeared from sight.

 “He probably goggled it while she was fangirling. Clever bastard.” Hara said kind of impressed with Furuhashi.

 “You do know this is your fault, right?” Hanamiya asked Yamazaki who looked completely offended. “Don’t act so shocked. You know the real reason Mai went after (Y/N) and then you didn’t even stand up for her.”

 “I didn’t do anything!”

 “Exactly. Don’t wear your heart on your sleeve and then be surprised when certain people notice.”

 “Whatever, I’m gonna go take care of this.” Yamazaki said storming off from the table in the direction of the girl who left earlier.

~~~~~

 “What the hell is she wearing?” Hanamiya asked trying not to look at the girl sitting on the bleachers.

 “The back of her skirt had gotten wet too. She needed to put something on while it was in the wash.” Furuhashi explained.

 The flustered male glanced over to where (Y/N) was swinging her legs with the number 4 Kirisaki Daiichi jersey on.

 “Why’d you have to use mine?!”

 “You’re the shortest.”

 “I’m only one inch shorter than Yamazaki!”

 “Yeah but you’re thinner and a whole size smaller. This was the only thing that came closest to fitting her.”

 (Y/N) was leaning back on her elbows, her eyes not leaving her phone and Hara’s eyes not leaving her. After a few minutes she turned to him with a quirked brow.

 “What?”

 “You’re not wearing a bra.”

 “I was but the milk soaked all the way through. What’s it to ya?”

 “I can see a lot through the sleeves of the jersey. I can also see that you must be pretty cold in here after your shower. You look good.” Hara said with a teasingly seductive voice.

 “Yeah? Push that dry over processed hair out your face and you could probably enjoy the view even more.”

 “Bitch.” Hara grumbled as he patted the baby sling around his chest. Smirking he thought he’d try again. “So, no bra huh? Do you have any panties on underneath those basketball shorts?”

 “Why don’t you check for yourself? Maybe we’re wearing a matching set.” The girl deadpanned back, this time not even tearing her attention away from her phone.

 Hara grew red in the face and began to sputter.

 “Stop teasing him (Y/N), you know you have your anti-pervert shorts on under that.” Furuhashi said coming up to pat the top of her damp hair.

 “Damn, how does it feel to have a girl as quick and snarky as you?” Seto asked Hara with a laugh.

 “It’s cause she’s a otaku! All of those types are huge perverts!”

 “You’re hardly fit to be calling someone a pervert.” Hanamiya spoke up, finally able to gain his composure over the manager wearing his jersey.

 “I’m not a pervert. All you guys wish you could pull a different girl a week like I do.”

 “More like you can’t keep a girl for more than a week.” Seto chuckled tossing a basketball up in the air.

 “Why are you guys always picking on me! We’re supposed to be a team!”

 “Speaking of teams. Hey stupid, you’re coming with us to the Seirin vs Rakuzan game next week.” Hanamiya said to the girl.

 “What why would we go to that?”

 “Because Caps is obsessed with Kiyoshi.” Hara remarked only to receive a hard fist in his ribs.

 “Fuck off! It’s because I want to see just how well a team that beat us does.”

 “That’s understandable. I guess I can have my driver take me to the-”

 An obnoxious ringtone cut the girl off from her thoughts. Pulling her phone out she looked at the name and groaned. She appeared to be hyping herself up before hitting talk.

 “Hey Shoi-chan.”

 All the guys suddenly snapped their heads up at the cutesy nickname. Shoi-chan as in Imayoshi Shoichi?

 “I’m ummm with my team.”

 The reprimanding on the other end of the phone was hard to make out but clearly a voice of disapproval.

 “Did you just call me to bitch at me or did you actually need something!?” (Y/N) said with a scowl, startling the guys who had never really heard that tone from her.

 “Umm that’s fine, I guess. When? Okay. At the usual place? Sure, I’ll see you then. Bye Shoi-chan.”

 “Do you actually still talk to that guy?!” Hara exclaimed barely waiting for her finger to lift of the end call button.

 “Well yeah. I was a part of his team for a year and regardless of anything, he’s still really important to me.” (Y/N)’s voice sounded gravely serious and held a deeply sad tone. The brimming of tears in her eyes got blinked away quickly but it was clear to see their shared past was hurting her.

 “He doesn’t like us.” Seto responded glancing down at the manager.

 “I know. But…it wasn’t just my ex ya know? My entire team at Tōō didn’t agree with me coming here and definitely didn’t agree with me joining the team. After the breakup, nearly all of them called or found me to try and talk some sense into me.”

 “And Imayoshi asked you to meet with him, right?” Hanamiya asked.

 “Yeah he says he wants to talk. All this time has gone by and he’s never tried to come find me to talk to me face to face just over the phone. I need to see him. I…miss him.”

 “Then you should go. It’s not like we’re gonna try to stop you. We’re a bunch of cheating, violent bastards but we aren’t going to tell you who you can and cant talk to.” Hanamiya said with a shrug. “Just think for yourself. You’re an idiot but you’re not clueless, so don’t let him think for you got it?”

 “Yeah I know you’re right.”

 “So where are you guys gonna meet up?” Furuhashi asked as nonchalantly as possible.

 “Juniper café, why?”

 “Just curious.”

~~~~~

 ‘Why are we even here?!’ Hara text the group message before slamming his head on the table.

 ‘Because I want to know what exactly Imayoshi is gonna tell her. Nobody asked you to come you know?’ Furuhashi responded quickly

 ‘What’s with you guys and the huge spike in interest over (Y/N) recently? I thought it would die out eventually but you guys are falling for her hard!’

 “Well I liked her from the start!” Yamazaki joined in, sipping a cold tea.

 ‘I just think she’s cute, never gonna have a chance with her but I had nothing better to do today.’ Seto finally typed out, drinking a cup of what was probably just 15 espresso shots.

 ‘She could make an interesting self-selected candidate for me.’ Furuhashi added in.

 ‘Candidate for what?’ Yamazaki asked, much more chill after accepting the fact that he was not alone in his pursuit of (Y/N).

 ‘I don’t want to say until I know for sure.’

 ‘What about you Hanamiya? You’re being awfully silent on why you’re here.’ The orange-haired male typed out quickly.

 ‘Not for that idiot, that’s for damn sure. I’m here to make sure Imayoshi doesn’t put shit in her head that will cause problems for ME. Besides I want to know who she really is when she doesn’t know we’re around.’

 ‘Why is she running so late?’ Seto asked before peeping over the bench, where Imayoshi had been waiting for about ten minutes now. His back was to the team and they figured if they stayed down and quiet (Y/N) wouldn’t notice they were there.

 “Sorry I’m late! There was a sale on manga at the bookstore down the block!” A familiar voice called out as she burst into the room.

 ‘That explains it.’ Nearly all the boys text at the same time.

 “It’s no worries. I got you, your usual. Did you find anything good?”

 “Thanks. I was able to find a few things…umm why are you staring at me?”

 “You’ve gotten so much more beautiful in the few months I hadn’t seen you.”

 Seto pretended to gag as the rest of the team rolled their eyes.

 “Stop it, I look the same.”

 “No, you look happier…and that isn’t easy for me to admit. Ohh what’s this?”

 “Oh umm this is Mako.”

 “My my I leave you alone for a few months and you’re already a teenage mother, so soon after a breakup. Were you cheating?” Imayoshi said in a teasing voice. “Mako. I’ll assume my sweet little kouhai is the father?”

 Hanamiya made a move to stand up and fight when the other guys grabbed his limbs to drag him back down to seating position.

 “It’s a project I’m doing with Hara Kazuya.”

 “The gum munching kid with the hair in his eyes?”

 “Yeah…”

 There was a silence that washed over the table and the guys held their breaths wondering who would speak next. Surprisingly it was Imayoshi.

 “Look, I’ll get right to the point of why I came here. I want you to come back to Tōō with me. The team misses our little cheerleader, even Aomine asked about you the other day.”

 “I do miss you guys but I won’t leave them.”

 “The bad boys of KiriDai? Why exactly are you so stuck to them? Hmm? You detested them as much as the rest of us when you saw the Seirin game. What changed? Don’t tell me its simple physical attraction, you’re much smarter than that.”

 “I guess when I first saw that game…I thought they were bad people. But now I think…I know…sometimes good people do bad things. I think that deep down they’re good people. They’ve done horrible, really horrible things but they’ve also been really good to me.”

 The team was more or less stunned by (Y/N)’s honest answer.

 “‘Deep down they are good people?’ You sweet girl, I’ve told you a million times over that there’s no such thing as a good person.”

 Hanamiya felt the same chill run down his spine as the one he had when he first met Imayoshi. He’s said that very phrase to him as well.

 “I don’t believe that Shoi-chan.”

 “Because you’ll take it personally. You desperately need to think that you’re a good person and that your m-”

 “I don’t need to think anything. I know who I am, and I’ve made peace with that.”

 “But you haven’t made peace with the other half, have you? Ahh its to be expected, you’re young after all and with the life you’ve had you need to cling onto something. I came to you because I really am worried about you. Your insistence on staying with this team is self-destructive, I would go as far to call it self-harm. You know they’ll hurt you…haven’t you been hurt enough?”

 “I have but not by them. Not yet.”

 “Then don’t give them that chance. You know our fears aren’t unprecedented. Think about it, since going to that school and associating yourself with them, has anyone tried befriending you? Does anyone try talking to you when they don’t have to? You’re alienating yourself. You’re giving yourself a reputation and isn’t that the exact reason you left Tōō?”

 “I left Tōō because I have a goal and to make it happen, I need connections.”

 “I see, you’ve told yourself that enough times to actually believe that’s the reason. Stop punishing yourself, stop trying to fix broken people, and stop letting others hurt you.”

 “But Shoi-chan…YOU hurt me. All of Tōō did. You guys saw what was happening to me there and nobody said anything. You were all afraid to get involved, all too worried about yourselves. You told me to ignore what the people said but you never tried to make them stop.” The guys heard (Y/N) take in a shaking breath and couldn’t figure if she was crying or just about to.

 “Someone threw milk on my head yesterday and every single one of the KiriDai boys got up ready to fight someone. One of them even helped me get cleaned up.”

 “They all have you tangled deep in the spider’s web, don’t they? Once you realize that, you’ll never get out. They can predict exactly how you’ll react and change their personalities to be exactly what you want them to be. It’s not just a basketball technique, it’s a manipulation technique. You really think you’re something special to them? Think they’ll hurt anyone who crosses them but not you?”

 The boys could hear the whirl of the coffee machine and the chatter of other patrons. They could hear the cars outside and even (Y/N)’s shallow breathing before a sudden sharp intake.

 “I’m not anything special…but they wouldn’t hurt me unprovoked. Because I’m not trapped in their web, I’m part of it!” The boys felt the movement of (Y/N) push up out of her seat.

 “KiriDai is everything you say they are but they’re also a team. They may not give a fuck about anyone else, but they at least give half a fuck about each other and that’s already more than you can say for Tōō. They won’t hurt me, because I’m one of them and if anyone from Tōō is not okay with that…then I’m not okay with anyone from Tōō. Thanks for the coffee Shoi-chan.”

 The guys ducked their heads a bit as the girl stormed out of the café. They heard a deep sigh followed by some chuckling from Imayoshi’s table.

 “She’s hard-headed. I’m surprised you stubborn bunch have been able to handle her for as long as you have.”

 Most of the boys bristled, save for Seto and Hanamiya who had long since figured Imayoshi knew they were there. Standing up from their seats they turned to glare down Imayoshi who was giving them his signature creepy smirk.

 “How could you sit there across from her and tell her how shitty we were when you wouldn’t even defend your own girlfriend. You give her your emotionally abusive ‘leave your friends or I’ll break up with you.’ bullshit and yet you think she’s better off going back to school with you? Her shitty ex who wants to control her?” Yamazaki ranted out, saying everything he was gonna dream of saying later.

 “‘Shitty ex?’ Such a foul mouth with so much anger behind those words. Don’t tell me you’ve already developed an attraction to her? Is that why you’re keeping her around? To use her?”

 “I would never do that!” Yamazaki belted out.

 “No, I suppose even (Y/N) wouldn’t give you the time of day. None of you are really her type, after all. But I don’t blame you for falling for her, she is quite the catch. Not that any of it matters, she’ll come back to me and Tōō soon. It’s only a matter of time you see.”

 “And why exactly would you believe that?” Hanamiya asked with a deep scowl.

 “If I’m not mistaken, in a few months you’ll have a scrimmage with Yosen. It’s in your very nature to go about your usual rough play. (Y/N) isn’t a ref, she will be able to see every despicable and clever trick you pull. I wonder if she’ll still think you’re good people then?”

 Imayoshi slipped through the group and made his way to the exit before turning around with that smirk.

 “Do remember that she was mine first and I will get her back.” With that Imayoshi was out of the building and turning the corner as the Kirisaki Daiichi team stared after him.

 “How did he and (Y/N) actually date? What does she see in him?” Seto asked wondering how that couple could have ever worked out.

 “It’s because he’s a megane.” Furuhashi commented flatly.

~~~~~

 “Wow Furu you look so good!” (Y/N) exclaimed while burping the baby on her shoulder.

 Furuhashi gave her a small smile as he adjusted his glasses. They were the first two to make it to the game and were waiting outside for the others.

 “What the hell?!” Yamazaki exclaimed as he saw Furu.

 He and Hanamiya made their way towards them, both donning a pair of glasses. (Y/N) stopped patting Mako’s back to gawk at the three bespeckled males. Covering her mouth with her hand she left out a soft snort.

 “Did I miss a team memo? Why are all you guys wearing glasses?”

 Furuhashi and Yamazaki glared at each other, neither having anticipated the other to pull the same stunt. Hanamiya rolled his eyes and cursed his fate for the suspicious situation.

 “Since the game was gonna be crowded, we figured we would have to sit pretty far. The guys needed the glasses, so they wouldn’t miss anything.” Seto said, stepping out of a pretty nice car and waving to the driver to take off. He didn’t seem to have had the same idea as the others.

 “Ahh that makes sense! Hara should be in there already, holding out seats for u-” The girl didn’t get to finish her sentence as purposeful shoulder came and crashed into her own. Whipping her head around the girl snapped her tongue.

 Tōō stood not more than a few feet from her and Imayoshi had a teasing grin on his face. The rest of the team looked like they couldn’t actually believe (Y/N) was even standing next to the KiriDai team. Not turning her head, (Y/N) shot a hand out to grab Furuhashi as he had already taken a threatening step towards Imayoshi.

 Her hand delicately wrapped around the male’s wrist didn’t go unnoticed by the members of Tōō. Imayoshi sighed before chuckling his mean-spirited laugh that (Y/N) always hated.

 “That’s kind of cute, isn’t it? You’ve got your pet tarantula on a leash. To think you changed pets from an obedient puppy to this creature.”

 “Is he referring to himself?” Seto mumbled with a grimace. “More like a feral cat.”

 “Is that a baby?!” Wakamatsu suddenly bust out, taking notice of what (Y/N) was holding. The whole team snapped their eyes to her arms. Some looked baffled while certain people looked genuinely concerned. “No way, is that the real reason you went to Kirisaki Daiichi!?”

 (Y/N)’s face held no emotion and she gave no comment before charging past the team knocking her own shoulders with Imayoshi and a nervous looking brown-haired kid who had been avoiding eye contact with KiriDai the entire time.

 “Ehh my sweet little (Y/N), that was rude. Not even a word to poor Ryo. Looks like you boys are reverting her faster than I expected.” Imayoshi teased looking at her walk into the stadium.’’

 “What the hell does that mean!?” Yamazaki spit out.

 “I just mean that perhaps you’ll find how quickly you’ll rub off on her.”

 “Well then I guess that means you’d all better watch your backs.” Hanamiya said pushing through the team as well and following after their manager. “After all the female spider is more venomous than her counterpart.”

 With that the team walked inside leaving behind a slightly shaken Tōō and a particularly impressed former Miracle.

~~~~~

 “They were amazing!” (Y/N) exclaimed walking out into the cold with her team. “Their teamwork and skills were beyond belief! That’s true basketball!”

 “It was really great game. You guys wanna go grab ramen or something?” Seto asked with a yawn.

 “Ehh I’m not hungry.” Hanamiya responded quickly.

 “I don’t want to spend too much. How about we go to Maji Burger instead? It’s really close by.” (Y/N) suggested scrolling through her phone.

 “Yeah, that’s fine.” Seto said looking to the other guys who nodded except for Hanamiya who sighed heavily.

 “Ya’ll go, but I’m heading home.”

 “What no come on! We can’t go as a team if we don’t have our captain!” (Y/N) exclaimed reaching for his hand only for him to jerk it away quickly.

 “What the hell does it matter? I’m not even that hungry!”

 “Please please please please please! Go with us! I’ll pay!”

 “….Ugh fine!”

 (Y/N) let out a small whoop before snatching Hanamiya’s hand and giving it a small squeeze. Once again, he jerked out of her touch but the girl was content.

 “Alright so Maji Burger it is.” Seto said as the team began walking in the right direction. There was a question on everyone’s minds and surprisingly it was Seto who had the gall to ask (Y/N). “Hey so out of curiosity are you tight on money right now?”

 The team looked to her. If there was one thing KiriDai girls weren’t worried about it was spending money. Hanamiya was the first to turn away, figuring it was probably a personal matter for her. The others didn’t have as much tact and pressed on.

 “Oh don’t worry about me. My financial situation is…comfortable. But I don’t like asking for things and want to pay for stuff on my own. Right now I have saved a good amount of my money for a trip back home during winter break.”

 “Back home?” Yamazaki asked, slowing down to walk beside her.

 “To America! That’s where I’m from. I’ve been living in Japan since I was about 8 but I go and visit often”

 The guys took in that information pretty easily. They’d figured as much based on her appearance as well as the accent she spoke in.

 “Well I hope your trip goes well and…what is that!?” Yamazaki asked pointing an accusing finger at the girl’s phone charm.

 “Hmm a phone charm? It’s Zun from Paranormal Payphone.”

 “I thought you liked Jaeyoung?!”

 “Well I did but then I played Zun’s route and he was soooo cute!”

 “But he’s not a megane!”

 “Hmm? Megane are cute but that isn’t all I look for in my type!”

 “Ahhh!” Yamazaki let out a sound of frustration before taking the fake glasses off his face.

 Furuhashi had long since removed his, as they only got in the way during the game. Both of them turned to Hanamiya, waiting for him to remove them as well.

 The raven-haired male looked away from his team before pushing his glasses higher up on his nose.

 “Fuck off! Unlike you two I need these! My contacts tore!”

 (Y/N) tried to suppress a laugh but a giggle escaped her lips.

 “Cute!” She mumbled much to her captain’s displeasure.

 “Fuck off fuck off fuck off!”

[recentanimenews]

FEATURE SERIES: My Favorite One Piece Arc with Steve Yurko

  I love One Piece and I love talking to people who love One Piece. And with the series going on 23 years now, there is a whole lot to talk about. As the series is about to publish its 1000th chapter, a true feat in and of itself, we thought we should reflect upon the high-seas adventure and sit down with some notable names in the One Piece fan community and chat about the arcs they found to be especially important, or just ones they really, really liked.

  Welcome to the next article in the series "My Favorite One Piece Arc!"

  My next guest in this series is Steve Yurko, co-host of The One Piece Podcast, a podcast with a subject you can probably guess. He's also a former storyboard artist for Rick & Morty and is currently working for Netflix Animation. As a ride-or-die Sanji fan, Steve chose the Baratie Arc, where Luffy and the gang run into an East Blue restaurant with a cool chef that loves to cook and kick.

  A note on spoilers: If you haven't seen the Baratie arc yet, this interview does contain major plot points. Watch the Arlong Park arc starting RIGHT HERE if you'd like to catch up or rewatch!

    Dan Dockery: So a friend tells you, "I'm done with the Syrup Village arc and I'm not sure if I want to watch this next one. I think I might be tapped out on this whole One Piece thing. In one sentence, how do you get them to stay and watch the Baratie arc?

  Steve Yurko: The Baratie arc laid down the foundation and created the formula of the One Piece arc as we know it.

  That's pretty good!

  Yeah, I’d say that, when I first started it, One Piece was my third favorite. I was more of a fan of series like Shaman King and Naruto, but after Baratie, things shifted. It was a turning point for me. I would hope that it would do the same for anyone who’s, say, previously apathetic towards the series.

    How old were you when you first read it? Or watched it?

  It feels weird to say this, but my introduction to One Piece was Chapter 1. Like Dragon Ball Z, the first episode I can remember watching was, like, Yamcha training on King Kai’s planet, and I’d get Goku and Yamcha confused and stuff, because I had just dived in. So for me to start a story like One Piece from the beginning is kind of rare. I was 15, I think.

  So, we're jumping into Baratie, and we first see the guy with the brass knuckles, Fullbody. He's trying to act cool on a date and he's being mean to everyone else. And then we have Sanji being typical Cool Sanji and Fullbody acts up and Sanji just tears through him. How did you react? Did you know immediately that you'd like this waiter?

  Well, I don't want to alarm you here, but my first thought was “Sanji’s cool!” I’d seen images of him before, and I saw his black suit and blond hair and I figured, “Oh, another crew member, probably. Looks distinct enough.” So I often have to look back and wonder “Did I like him because of his edgy coolness?” but I think now it’s because there were more layers to him. Like, he definitely stands out from the other Straw Hats, but he also has this distinct fighting style with cool reasoning. He’s a cook and he doesn’t want to bust up his hands trying to punch people in the face, so he uses his feet. So, he does like these cool capoeira kicks, which only gets better as they go along because I feel like so many anime characters, the stronger they get, the more they start to fight the same with fast volleys of punches and laser blasts. So Sanji’s kicks are a great way to differentiate himself from the main cast and other anime heroes. 

  So, then we have Luffy, he shows up by damaging the Baratie. Enter: Zeff. Full disclosure: In my infinite naivete when I first watched One Piece, I thought Zeff was going to be the new crew member. And then I thought Gin was going to join the Straw Hat crew. And then when Sanji finally joined, I was like, "This guy? Really? Dark horse candidate over here."

  You didn’t know yet?

    I guess I hadn't watched the first ED yet — when the crew slowly shows up and stands beside one another.

  You saw Usopp’s silhouette appear and thought, “Eh, I’ve seen enough.”

  "That must be all of them."

  It happens.

  So, you meet Zeff, and you learn about Sanji and Zeff's relationship, and we get a big One Piece flashback. What do you think of that? Because it would become a staple of the series to kinda pause, see what happened to an important guy, and then come back.

  Such an incredible story and so gruesome and terrifying. Sanji’s original flashback is so underrated because it could happen to anyone! Like, you’d have to go out of your way to get stranded on an island, but going days and weeks without food or any real comfort? I think people underestimate how traumatizing that would be. And then Zeff losing his leg because he hacked it off for food, it’s brutal. Just thinkin’ about that, I feel it in my shins. Because that almost happened to me with a minor injury. I let a minor injury get infected, and I could’ve been close to losing a leg.

    Wait, what? Gahd.

  I was doing box jumps at a gym, and my shin hit the corner of this wooden crate.

  Yeah, those things have no give in them.

  Absolutely. And at the time, I thought it was just this dark spot on my shin. And I figured it was, ya know a bruise. So I let it be. And then I picked at the scab and I realized “Wow, that’s a little deeper than I thought. I guess I’ll go to the doctor if it gets worse.” And I kept going to the gym, wearing pants over like this open wound. And my left leg is so swollen. So I went to two different doctors, as the first one did tests and then sent me to another one. And when this doctor saw me, the look on her face said “Oh, this is bad.” So I laughed out loud about how dumb I was and the doctor turned to me and said “This isn’t funny. This IS SERIOUS.” It had gotten infected with bacteria and it was spreading, and she just took a sharpie and drew around the infected area, and gave me antibiotics and was like “You have to keep this elevated, and if the redness goes outside of this line, go to the hospital.” But luckily, I recovered, even though the doctors were like “Honestly, we thought you’d go to the hospital.” So when Zeff severs his foot with a rock, how does anyone not feel that? 

  Do you think that's one of the reasons Luffy is fascinated by Sanji at first? His mentor, Shanks, lost his arm and was cool about it. Zeff lost his leg and was cool about it. Basically twins.

  That’d be an interesting conversation that we never got to see. Just two dudes talking about how weird it is that both their father figures did that, with only Luffy thinking it’s cool. 

    Don Krieg's ship gets blown in half by an incomprehensibly cool character, Mihawk, the first Warlord to appear in the show. You see Mihawk arrive — what is your reaction to him? Because it's not a case of "The villain of the villain is my friend," but rather "Oh, he did that to the villain? I hope he does not do that to us, as that would suck."

  It’s almost like the good guys meeting the bad guys, and then a tornado comes in. But here’s the thing: I missed the issue of Jump where Zoro fought Mihawk. So I assumed that Zoro had just won. The greatest swordsman in the world shows up and Zoro beats him. Boom. The climax of his character arc has been achieved. Nothing left for Zoro. 

  He just did it.

  I didn’t find out until so much later that Zoro lost. I wasn’t quite aware of what made for a captivating story yet. At that time, an obstacle appears, an obstacle gets taken out, ya move on. I almost want to apologize to Mihawk. 

  I love how One Piece does this though. They do it with Smoker and Aokiji and the like. It reminds me of The Witcher III when you go off the path a little bit, and you're at a Level 4 and then a Level 39 Gryphon swoops down and decapitates you. It keeps the "power levels" interesting.

  Luffy starts up Breath of the Wild and goes right for Calamity Ganon. But Mihawk is like the analogy for the Grand Line. He represents it, without revealing too much. Mihawk is like a Pizza Hut demo disc of danger.

  I really like that. And no one knows, to this day, exactly how powerful he is. Over 20 years later, and we're still wondering how he matches up against Shanks or Blackbeard or whatever. One Piece has so many characters where Oda hasn't shown his full hand in regards to them, yet we're totally emotionally invested in them. That's good storytelling.

  He’s doing something right. And I love that Mihawk has a little character arc here, too, where he shows up nonchalantly slicing up Krieg’s ships, probably doesn’t expect much, and then he’s taken aback by Zoro’s gusto, because he hasn’t seen anyone like that in a while. And he slices Zoro down. But he respects him, when in the beginning, he clearly didn’t respect anyone around. Mihawk wants to see him be better and try to take him down one day. For him to willingly build someone up like that is rare. Like Frieza wouldn’t do that.

    So, Don Krieg — what were your opinions of him at the time? Because he's a really bad guy surrounded by more morally grey guys like Mihawk and Gin.

  What I like about the East Blue saga is that every main villain is an antithesis of Luffy and what makes Luffy a truly great captain. Buggy is all about treasure. Kuro is about ambition and the fortitude to be a pirate. Krieg is about might and strength, and Krieg thinks he has both of those because of his weapons and armor. But Luffy has willpower and ambition and doesn’t let the world change his views. Luffy is incorruptible whereas Krieg is willing to poison his own crew when stuff starts going south. Krieg isn’t fondly remembered, but he really serves his purpose in the story.

  So, after Krieg is defeated, Sanji turns down Luffy's offer to join the Straw Hat crew. Now, he knows this is a bad idea. He's not gonna find the All Blue floating around on the Baratie. Why doesn't he go immediately?

  Well, he knows it’s a bad idea but he’s completely misinterpreting Zeff’s sacrifice. He feels that since Zeff sacrificed his leg, he has to repay him by working for him indefinitely. But the reason that Zeff did that was because he wants Sanji to live on and chase his dream. That’s why Zeff took pity on him in the first place. He’s an older, worn-down man now, and he stopped chasing his dream. And now he wants to see Sanji or someone get a win. It lifts his spirit to see Sanji and live kinda vicariously through him. 

  So, the second time I ever cried over One Piece was during Sanji's goodbye and Zeff's "Don't catch a cold." The first time was when that little dog was trying to protect his dead owner's shop in Orange Town, but that's a different story. But this shot of Sanji on his knees thanking Zeff with all the cooks surrounding them is so iconic, and Sanji's acting like it's a gift that Zeff gave him that Sanji could never repay, while as you said, Zeff just wants Sanji to be happy. What did you get out of that? I assume that you're a human with human emotions.

  I cry every time I watch that. When I first saw it, I was like “How? How is a series this good?” And there’s so much to that ending sequence. Because the Baratie is built on this rough, angry masculinity. Just these dudes being mean and fighting each other and customers all the time. There’s never a time or a place for lending a shoulder to someone else. No emotional embraces of any kind. Just everyone berating everyone. No one can open up — just stupid man babies. And then you get to this moment where Sanji is leaving and they’re all trying to be cool while playing it off. Especially Zeff, who can’t give a legitimate goodbye, but rather a “Don’t catch a cold.” But there’s so much to that statement and the facade crumbles. All these grown men start bawling. 

    I've never thought about it that way. There's all these little hints of kindness, like feeding the bad guys, and it's a masculinity powder keg. And then Sanji, in an ultimate display of putting his heart out there, bows to the man who saved him and the keg explodes. That's really cool.

  ONE PIECE LIGHTNING ROUND!

  Favorite One Piece character?

  Sanji

  Favorite One Piece villain?

  Enel

  Favorite One Piece moment?

  March to Arlong Park

  Favorite Straw Hat Crew pairing?

  Luffy and Zoro

  Favorite moment of the new Wano anime arc?

  Soba Mask’s debut

  If you could eat one Devil Fruit, what would it be?

  Whatever Kanjuro’s fruit is

  Moment that made you cry the hardest?

  Sanji leaving the Baratie

  Moment that made you cheer the loudest?

  Straw Hats at the Tower of Justice standing across from Robin

  One Piece location that you'd like to live in?

  Whole Cake Island. Ya eat well, ya know, you can survive Big Mom

  Favorite fight scene?

  Sanji vs Mr. 2, of course

      Stay tuned for the next installment of "My Favorite One Piece Arc" as we speak with Botchamania creator Maffew about his favorite One Piece arc: Alabasta!!

        Daniel Dockery is a Senior Staff Writer for Crunchyroll. Follow him on Twitter!

  Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features.

By: Daniel Dockery

[thebiasrekkers]

Fragmentation 0.8

Plot: How does one measure freedom? Are our choices truly our own, or are they part of a preset design outside of our control? We all have a question burning inside of us, though few speak it out. It is the question that drives us forward, seeking purpose in our lives. What is The Matrix?

Rating: NC-17 // NSFW

Genre: Series | The Matrix!AU | angst | sci-fi | action | drama

Pairing: N/A

Warnings: Strong language, allusions to suicide, extreme angst, graphic violence

Links: FAQ || BTS Masterlist || Admin E’s AO3 || [ REQUESTS ARE OPEN ]

Word Count: 2,138

AN: Like all of my works, there will be OCs working opposite of the boys. In this story, we have three. The first in the Fragmentation series is Mackenzie. Like Yoongi and Hoseok, she is self-substantiated. How she does will be revealed! On to Crow’s origin story for Defragmentation! All information in the universe can be found on the official Matrix Wiki so please use that as a reference guide if you ever get confused!

Tag List: @aroseforyoongi​, @prisczero​, @pinkpjmin​, @btsaudge​, @flowerwrites06​, @unoriginal-username15432​

© thebiasrekkers (Admin E). All rights reserved. Reposting/modifying our work is prohibited. Translations are not allowed. Plagiarism/stealing is not tolerated by any means. Legal action will be taken in instances of theft.

“Goddammit Mackenzie! I thought I told you to be home by eleven!”

A pair of green eyes glared up at the rotund looking man. His reddish complexion was barely seen from the scraggly beard covering the majority of his face. Sweat soaked through the dingy wife beater he wore, half stuffed into a pair of faded cargo pants. There were a pair of dog tags hanging from his neck - something that always piqued the green-eyed owner’s interest, but never enough to ask about them. 

Mackenzie doubted he served anyone but himself, let alone the country.

Instead of answering him, she folded her arms across her chest. Normally this was the time when she escaped into her room, but he was blocking the way. He was always getting in her way. 

It was his fault. Life used to be normal. This was as far from normal as a person could get. He was as far from being a real father as a person could get.

“You don’t have anything to say for yourself?”

She rolled her eyes, doing her best to ignore the stink of alcohol on his breath. Mackenzie didn’t understand why he persisted on being like this. It was the same shit on a different day. Part of her wished that he would walk outside and get hit by a bus. But she knew that that was a miracle she would never be granted. 

“Answer me!”

“What do you expect when I’m closing?” Mackenzie asked, her tone flat and devoid of all emotion. 

Her father’s eyes narrowed at her. She didn’t even flinch. “What did you just say to me?”

“I didn’t stutter,” came her clipped response as she let her arms fall to her side, “now move. I still have homework to do.”

Before she could take a single step, her father was advancing on her. Mackenzie mentally braced herself for what was coming. Her body was used to it, but it was always that dark corner in the back of her mind that suffered the most from all of this. So long as that part was shielded, she could handle everything else that usually followed. 

The pain that exploded from the side of her head paled in comparison to the pain of her hip crashing to the floor. Her arms immediately shot up to cover the top of her head as her body curled into a ball. The flurry of kicks that collided into her caused her nerves to scream out in agony. But Mack refused to scream, instead choosing to bite the inside of her mouth. The taste of blood flooded across her tongue and she heard her teeth clacking together when the heel of her father’s boot hit the top of her head.

After what felt like hours, but were actually minutes, her father abandoned her there on the floor. Every square inch of Mack’s body throbbed from the pain. There would be bruises tomorrow. Thankfully he’d missed her face so she could still go to work and school without receiving too many curious gazes. It was none of their goddamn business anyway.

Mack waited until she heard the front door slam before picking herself up off the floor. She roughly rubbed the back of her wrist across the corner of her mouth, eyeing the blood smear and rolling her eyes. She couldn’t help but wonder if the old man would notice if she spit on the floor just to spite him. Would he even care?

Grunting, she made her way into her bedroom, locking the door after shutting it behind her. Her father would most likely be out getting drunk for the rest of the night. It meant she had the whole house to herself until he came stumbling back in at four in the morning. Mack just hoped that she’d be able to get all of her school assignments finished and have enough time to surf the internet. Something told her that she was getting closer to finding what she was looking for.

Or, rather, who she was looking for. 

Speeding through her homework, Mack pulled up several browser windows once she was securely connected to the internet. Her eyes darted across the screen, her fingers flying over the keys - pausing only long enough to use her mouse to click on a few links that spiraled her into another location. Mack reached out to everyone that might have a lead and she got just a little bit closer than she did the day before. 

After another hour, she was starting to get frustrated. Everything was forcing her into a dead end. Just when she thought she had a lead, it only caused her to go on a wild goose chase on the wide web. Mack roughly scratched at her head, attempting to tamp down on her slowly mounting anger. 

“Dammit!” She slammed her fists on her desk, rattling everything on it. “Why can’t anyone just give me a straight fucking answer?!”

Burying her face in her hands, Mack did her best to suppress a sob that she didn’t even realize was building up in the back of her throat. She was tired, in pain, and a little hungry. But most of all, she was starting to lose hope. And that was starting to hurt her more than she would care to admit aloud. 

“Fuck it,” she muttered, standing up from her chair, “I’ll pick this up in the morning.”

Just as Mack turned away from her desk, the ping from her instant messenger sounded from the laptop. Pausing, she craned her neck to look at the screen. The username consisted of a series of random numbers. But what made her heart nearly drop to her stomach was what the person said.

You’ll never find Michael because you don’t know The Truth.

Mack ran back to her desk, her fingers gliding over the keyboard. She could barely hear herself typing from how loudly her heart was beating inside of her eardrums. It was the first time someone responded to her inquiries with something credible. It was the first time she could actually believe what she was seeing.

Because it was the first time someone actually mentioned her brother by name.

Who are you? How do you know that name?

The cursor on her screen blinked steadily. Mack wasn’t sure how much more she could take because she was almost positive that this was the clue she’d been searching for after all this time. It was a solid lead just because someone was able to give her a name. If they knew her brother’s name, that meant that they also had a good idea of where he was. She couldn’t afford to let this person slip from her grasp.

Who I am doesn’t matter.

How I know doesn’t matter.

What matters is...

What are you willing to do to know The Truth?

She stared at the computer dumbfounded. Was this another trick? Was this person just jerking her chain, trying to lead her into a false sense of security before sucker punching her in the face like everyone else? It would be the most logical explanation. It was the only thing that actually made sense.

Mack didn’t know why, but she felt like that wasn’t the case. Not with this person. Were they trying to lead her onto the right path after having been on the wrong one for so long?

Narrowing her eyes, she began typing again.

Anything.

The air was cold and frigid. Mack rubbed her hands together, her breath coming out in small white clouds. She peered through the metal fence as people continued to file through the city. She was isolated from the rest, sitting on a park bench and waiting. She looked at her watch, making a mental note of the time. She had five minutes left to wait. 

Five minutes until she would know whether this was real or a hoax.

The sound of gravel crunching underfoot quickly brought her out of her thoughts. Mack stood up immediately, facing the direction of the noise. All she could see were the trees cloaked in shadows cast from the street lights. She couldn’t see anyone, but the crunching noise wouldn’t stop. There was a large lump forming in Mack’s throat and she couldn’t help wondering if she’d fallen into a trap.

Seconds after thinking that, a young woman dressed in gray and black appeared. She wore a long black coat with a hood just barely covering her head of thick curls. Her eyes were hidden behind a pair of sunglasses. The rest of her outfit was some sort of gray jumpsuit that almost seemed to shimmer when it hit the light just right. The legs of the suit were stuffed into a pair of shin high combat boots - the heels continuously crunching into the gravel; releasing an eerie sound.

Mack puffed out another breath of cloudy air just as the woman stopped three feet from her.

“Y-You’re early,” she managed to stammer out.

The other woman smirked, her auburn curls accentuating her mocha skin even in shadow. “If you’re early, you’re on time. If you’re on time, you’re late. You’re late, Mack.” She reached up with a gloved hand to remove the sunglasses from her face, revealing a set of dark hazel eyes. “Or should I say, Crow?”

Mack took a step back, her lips parting slightly as the woman referred to her as both her name and her alias. Her heart hammered against her ribs, causing her lungs to tighten up inside. What in the world was happening? Just how much did this woman know?

Not wanting to look like some punk, she shook her head and straightened her stance. “You have information I want and yet I don’t know anything about you.”

The woman continued to smile. “I already told you that who I am doesn’t matter. It never will matter.” She shrugged. “Not until you know The Truth.”

“What the hell is this truth you keep talking about?” Mack could feel her anger starting to grow. “What does it even mean?”

She watched the other woman reaching into her pocket to pull out a cell phone. She punched a few numbers and then pressed it up to her ear. “Unfortunately, we don’t have a whole lot of time for me to explain. You’re going to have to see it for yourself.” 

Mack bit her lower lip, her eyes narrowing as she watched the woman reaching into her other pocket with her free hand. Half a second later, her heart froze as the woman trained the business end of a semi-automatic pistol at her. 

“Whoa,” Mack said, raising her hands up slowly, “what in the fuck are you doing, lady?”

“You have a choice to make, Crow, and you don’t have a whole lot of time to make it, so I’ll be quick.”

Panic began to settle around Mack’s chest. “What do you mean I don’t have a lot of time?!”

“Agents are coming. They’re coming for you because you’re sloppy and desperate, which, sadly, is making me sloppy and desperate.” 

When the hammer clicked back on the gun, tears sprung up in Mack’s eyes. “Please, don’t do this.”

“Shut-up,” snapped the woman, the smile now completely gone from her face, “I already told you we don’t have a lot of time. You have two choices. You let the Agents take you or I force you out of the bubble you’ve unknowingly been put in. I’m giving you five seconds starting now. Five.”

She took another step back, but the woman advanced on her. Mack didn’t know what any of it meant. What did she mean by “agents” and why did it seem like this woman was trying to help her, despite the situation looking crazy to everyone else?

“Four.”

Her heart shook in her chest, causing her to reach up and clutch at the front of her jacket. Mack didn’t want to die. She didn’t want to die without knowing the answers.

“Three.”

She still didn’t know where her brother was. She still didn’t know what The Truth was and what it had to do with her brother.

“Two.”

She wanted to live!

Mack ran up to the woman, wrestling the gun from her grasp. The woman took a step back, but the smile returned to her face. Mack pressed the barrel of the gun up to her temple as tears streamed down her cheeks. Multiple footsteps seemed to thunder through the gravel, but Mack could only see the single snowflake that began to fall from the night sky. The world disappeared into lines of green numbers before returning to normal.

She smiled.

“One.”

After the gunshot ripped through the night, Mack’s world darkened immediately. But she...she felt free, somehow.

“Welcome to the Real World.”

[hoshigomi]

Valley of Xuanyao // RAY! (not a review.)

Some thoughts on Xuanyao/Genyou/Dazzling Valley/Mysterious Valley/whatever you want to call it + Ray!

(This isn’t a fully-formed, plot critical review by any stretch of the imagination, but I wanted a chance to say everything I loved about these pieces of theatre, as well as a few criticisms I have.) (These are all my opinions and I’m sure people would agree or disagree with plenty of them!) (It’s literally just a couple lists, read at your own discretion.)

There are MANY SPOILERS HERE so watch out.

First off: Genyou no Tani / Valley of Xuanyao / Chinese Aterui (I guess it’s not as much like Aterui as I initially assumed) / AVATAR (the blue people one) (but set in China) / not NOT Pocahantas ~

Call it what you want, I’ll admit right out of the gate that I didn’t follow the entirety of this show. It got a lot better on the second and third try, but the first go was a little rough. 

Official plot summary here. 

Things I LOVED:

This show is beautiful. The set is very Alphonse Mucha aesthetic in style, and it makes me very sad that exactly 0 pictures do it justice. Not only is the set STUNNING, but it’s INNOVATIVE as well, the way they used huge hilly mountainous set pieces to create, well, valleys (haha) and set the scene actually grabbed my attention SEVERAL times. There are also no pictures that do the palace set justice, but the grandeur of it took my breath away, as did the EASE with which the set took us between settings. Unfortunately the visual aesthetic of the show is like not something I’m skilled enough to describe in words, but my point here is that if you get the chance to see this show, it would be worth it for the visual feast alone. 

This show is beautiful (music edition). BOY! The music is HAUNTING and POWERFUL and simple and complex all at once. I have told several people that if either the opening or finale songs are put on that custom CD maker thing in the theatres I would literally buy a custom CD just to get my hands on these songs like a couple weeks before their official release. I got chills every time Shirotae Natsu opened the show (we could NOT ask for a better new fukukumichou), and without fail, at the (spoilers) mass exodus of the Wen people (hello, Coto Moses?) song. 

The show is beautiful (general stage edition): It’s SO DANCEY. IT IS SO EXPRESSIVE. Even though the vast majority of the cast is costumed… nearly identical to one another, watching a n y one of them is a treat different from any other. There is no shortage of opportunity for these women to emote physically, and not a single one of them holds back. There are also like a billion acrobatic tricks in this show for some reason. They don’t take you out of anything, it’s just all VERY PHYSICAL. The Wen men and women specifically use physicality HARD to express their… history, I guess? There are several scenes with a few singers and a few dancers working together to tell a story. They give me CHILLS. The women (led by Honoka) in the palace also serve to set the aesthetic world and honestly I don’t have anything smart to say about them but they blew me away. Aomi Sario does several cartwheels. Yuunagi Ryou jumps like five feet in the air and does a somersault. I don’t know why any of these women are airborne as much as they are but they sure are good at it. 

Other standout things I loved- there were a LOT more, but I need SOMEONE to talk about these people and moments, and I guess it’s my burden to bear. 

FOR SOME REASON OOKI MAKOTO TALKS LIKE A LOT. She may talk more than Amahana Ema, freshly-transferred Ayaki Hikari, or Kiwami Shin. I can’t stress enough how much there is NO REASON FOR THIS. She ALSO, in a TURN OF FATE, IS NOT PLAYING AN OLD MAN. She’s playing a young soldier (NO FACIAL HAIR!!!!!) who at one point is goofing around under a tree on the edge of a stage and does some incredible pantomime work getting a spider off of her. I’m a little in love with her. I could not be happier that they truly just let her GO OFF this show. If you have ever liked Ooki Makoto, you need to see this show. 

Ooki Makoto is always accompanied by Tenju Mitsuki who, as usual, is doing The Most for the Least Payoff because she like angered a God in her past life but not enough for the God to not give her the most beautiful face known to man. She doesn’t get to do much at all, unfortunately as USUAL, though her character very much has the vibe of her Kamatari character, and she does get to do a really fucking sick trick where she gets hit by an arrow and despite watching her through opera glasses three times in a row I have no idea how she does it. 

SEO YURIA REALLY STEPPED UP HER GAME? This was a good meaty role with a nice little bit of her Red Oni from Another World mixed in for like chaotic measure. She sounds vocally FANTASTIC and looks at times actually TRULY PHYSICALLY IMPOSING. I’ve always been theatrically on the fence about Seo, but it looks like she’s really finding where she fits onstage and her strengths and is working HARD. I’m really into it. 

Arisa Hitomi does beautiful work as the narrator of the whole piece, more or less, I just wish we could have seen more of her. That’s kinda how it’s gonna go from now on huh. Sigh.

Amato Kanon Amato Kanon Amato Kanon Amato Kanon Amato Kanon Amato Kanon . I will live and die in Hoshigumi, but if one day they move her to somewhere else to be top star, (after I mourn for a year and go through the five stages of grief), I will be right there by her side. Her character is spunky and fun and young and then gets tortured and killed (sorry, I said there were spoilers) in a way that I almost couldn’t WATCH. She’s an expert on throwing her (rapidly becoming lifeless) body around onstage in a way that really, really, really broke my heart. I winced. I’m sure I’m not the only one in the audience who would have put myself in her place to save her. 

It’s very cool when they use projections to enhance moments in this- like a sword striking a rock and the sparks that fly, or the mysterious man disappearing. Additionally, the SOUND DESIGN of this show was pretty flawless.

Current Kumichou and Soon-To-Be-Senka member Mari Yuzumi played, obviously, Coto’s mom, and the two of them share some really beautiful moments and part of a song- it was a fitting and sweet part to give her, and I’m so glad she got some real stage time here because lord am I gonna miss her. 

There’s a little drumline throughout some scenes of Wen people featuring (I THINK) Toudou Jun, Asamizu Ryou, Sayaka Rin, Sakuraba Mai, and POSSIBLY Kuresaki Rino. They don’t do anything to serve the plot, they just sometimes act as a transition in and out and winding through group scenes. It kicks ass. 

Though this show was by NO MEANS an “ensemble show” (it was obviously very heavily (and wonderfully!) pulled by Coto, and all the ensemble was…. To be honest, visually mostly indistinguishable from one another), it like… WAS an ensemble show. There are MANY scenes with the HUGE chunks of the troupe, whether it’s the soldiers doing some INCREDIBLE sword and spear work or the dancers as the Wen people telling stories through the sheer power of their NUMBERS, or the women in the palace with their ribbons and dance, the real power of this show is in the ensemble and what they give to the story. Personally, ensemble driven stories tick ALL my boxes, so even if the plot was a little rough for me, the sheer POWER of Hoshigumi really made this a show that I realize now, sitting at my desk in Tokyo, I wish I was seeing again like today. This show did a complete 180 for me, and I can not recommend it enough. It isn’t FUN, but I can’t find the words to express how MOVING and BEAUTIFUL it is. If you can’t see it in person, I guess I recommend buying the blu ray, renting out a movie theatre, and watching it on as big of a screen as you can possibly get.

RAY:

Ray was just OKAY to me, though I admit I DID love it a little more with each consecutive viewing. I wonder how I’ll feel about it at the end of the Tokyo run- it very well might grow on me and stick in my heart as a revue I really love, but for now I’m personally a bit lukewarm on this one. I’m gonna express my three gripes first, and then move on to the things I love. 

1.) God this revue really fucking abuses projections. Not only does it OPEN AND END with an unnecessary mini movie, and not only do they use the projections to transition us literally through the starry galaxy to the PANTHEON which they make with like Windows Screensaver level skill and then for some reason also show us on a real backdrop- if they had the REAL backdrop, why did they need to also show us a CGI version?, but they also straight up show us MOVIES while people are singing. As captivating as I find every single woman in Hoshigumi, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the acid trip that was the projections. They weren’t STILL EITHER. They were THIS distracting, down to the literal giant eye. I hated them so much. They didn’t make any visual sense, they didn’t enhance a thing, they really weren’t even vaguely thematically appropriate. I hope beyond hope that the venues they use for the tour just don’t have the tech power for this and the projections get cut. I didn’t like a SINGLE one of them. 

2.) I can’t really explain this one but something was… missing. The numbers weren’t…. varied , I guess? They were all the same like. Power level and mostly had the same amount of people onstage (a lot), and while there’s NOTHING I love more than a big group number, this one had… I guess maybe too many? Or maybe it wasn’t the amount that is the issue, maybe it’s just how they weren’t like tonally varied. The numbers were all GOOD, but the flow was weird? I don’t know. Something felt off. If anyone sees this and gets what I mean, please talk to me about it. 

3.) And this one is personal preference, but I thought the whole Ray theme was…. Much too heavy handed for an ohirome GT. To clarify, I think this would have been VERY suitable for a taidan revue, thematically, but I think it’s too early to be playing top star name games and adorning the whole stage with her name… repeatedly. I GET that it’s clever because like, ray of light, starlight, etc, but I didn’t like it. I wouldn’t have liked like, Dramatic ‘S’ as a first revue either, for example. This isn’t personal or about Coto, if they had made Kai top and called her first revue like ‘Seven Seas’ I also would have been like ….#yikes. I just wish they’d save this stuff for later in Coto’s run. 

That said, the good outweighed the bad! Some numbers of note (this is NOT all of them, just the ones that stuck with me) include: 

The opening, which was very fun! The set was cool, multi layered and opening with just Coto inside like a cut out diamond shape on a platform and made good use of a pretty bare stage to really give EVERYONE a moment. There were more featured faces in this number alone that I didn’t even RECOGNIZE than I can count- and that made me really happy to see! Special shoutout to Taiki Hayate and Ruri Hanaka for getting to stand on the edge of the stage and sing. I just think they’re neat. The opening was rock-y and sexy and mature and it was very fun to get to see so many people shine in it. 

This was followed by Seocchi in a number with again, a BEAUTIFUL set. Seriously, when they aren’t abusing the hell out of a projector, this revue IS VISUALLY STUNNING. It’s like set on Jupiter kind of, there’s a swirling galaxy all lit up behind the dancers (Seo, Amato Kanon, Minato Rihi- who has big Renta energy and always makes me happy to look at) Aomi Sario, Ruri Hanaka, notably.) This number has big Look At The Youth Of Tomorrow energy. Seo sounds INCREDIBLE, and everyone who is featured here makes my heart leap. This was definitely one of my favorite numbers. 

There was a tango that would have been 90x sexier if only it didn’t feature those stupid turbans on literally everyone. Mikkii gets to sing her bridge solo (thank God), and the energy is rowdy. Everyone is in white pants.

The chuuzume is nice. It starts what feels like oddly early, but probably isn’t. They abuse the projections during the start of this one, (Hanagata Hikaru) and then thankfully pull the screen up and get rid of them for a while. The chuuzume is neat in that it also features a lot of little groups of siennes, from the young ones (who even get to SING small solos and things) (and I mean SMALL ones)- Amato Kanon has a solo at a point (and is CENTER ON THE BRIDGE for the kyakuseki part of the chuuzume), Aomi Sario and (iirc) Yuuhi Maki get a small duet, little groups are coming on and off constantly. It’s fun. They put the otokoyaku on the bridge and they do some sharp dancing and some kinda… seductive, to me, stuff. Most everyone is in red. The aesthetic of this chuuzume is GOOD.

THIS ROCKETTE MIGHT BE MY FAVORITE ROCKETTE EVER.

Aesthetically it is flawless, and it’s led by three girls including RURI HANAKA who gets a CENTER OF THE BRIDGE SOLO. These costumes are BEYOND adorable as well! Look at them! This rockette really shows off how skilled some of these girls are. They also do a lineup that goes as usual from shortest to tallest to shortest again, except they break this up by putting the three leads in the MIDDLE, which really means its like, short to tallest to SHORTEST to tallest to short again and believe me when I say it is COMICAL. There’s a solid foot difference between some of these women. 

The Olympics number which immediately follows the rockette is lovely, it features a biiiiiig group of the cast and then Mizuno Yuri, Otosaki Itsuki, Sazanami Reira, Aomi Sario, and Amato Kanon as the colors of the Olympic rings. Musically this one didn’t stick that hard with me, but it’s a visual treat, and everyone’s dance proficiency is on full display. Plus if you look at the back of the stage you’ll see Yuunagi Ryou and Hiroka Yuu doing like a dance battle and pulling and pushing each other around which is extremely relevant to my interests. 

From here it got really lovely for me personally. Amahana Ema and Kiwami Shin led Swingin’ On A Star on the bridge (and both of them sound lovely and sweet), and then theres a couple dance featuring about 10 or so people including  Toudou Jun and again Yuunagi Ryou (this is the only place in the revue I didn’t have trouble spotting her unfortunately, and I’m GOOD at finding her), going on while Maisora finishes up the number. It’s sweet and it’s sugary and it’s a piece of like small lightness after all the very Heavy and Full group numbers before. 

The kuroenbi is pretty good, it felt somehow… unfinished? But immediately after that is Coto jumping into You Are My Sunshine which I personally find to be the most charming thing in the world. It includes solos for Seo, Hanagata Hikaru, Aichan, and a LOT of attention on Hoshigumi’s musumeyaku who get to ALL line up on the bridge together and sing. It’s a treat. It made my heart happy and made me grin really big. 

Other shoutouts go to 

Sazanami Reira and her wild hair flips

Akachan who for some reason sounds vocally like she’s underwater, which was hard for me to place until recently 

Maisora and Coto who really DO work together well as a combi though these two shows didn’t give them much chance to see that (please watch Mozart once it’s out on DVD to see what these two can DO together)

Mari Yuzumi for still killing it with everyone else in every number despite the fact that she’s so up there that they’re moving her to senka after this- boy I am gonna MISS her

Amato Kanon for holding my future in her, soft, capable hands.

Minato Rihi for smiling like Renta

The upperclassmen for not letting being completely sidelined ruin their attitude and for still giving their all to everything and pulling my attention with their YEARS of expertise

Kisa Kaoru, Soua Takeru, Houma Toa, Hiroki Yuzuha, and Kuresaki Rino just because they make me smile.

Sakuraba Mai and Haruto Yuuho who should actually be a top combi together. 

Seo Yuria for really just like stepping it up all around and drawing my attention and taking up SPACE.

Ruri Hanaka because holy shit, girl….

All in all, this was a good pair. Not every revue works for everyone, and maybe this one just didn’t grab my heart the way I wished it did. It was still fun, and it definitely had enough numbers that I loved for me to want to go back multiple times, and whatever Ray lacked, Valley picked up for me. It’s a good set of shows, and everyone does really lovely work. I can’t wait to see where Coto and Maisora’s Hoshigumi goes!

[nichester]

Weekly Watchlist!

Yall I’m watching so many dramas lately... someone come kick my ass I don’t have time for this...

Hospital Playlist, Healer, and The Romance of Tiger and Rose all under the cut because I don’t know how to shut up!

Hospital Playlist (episode 9-11):  Ok I've talked a lot in a serious way about different aspects of hospital playlist's writing and construction, so THIS time I'm gonna talk about my ship and no one can stop me!

This team is very good at writing pining as deep as your bones, the kind that’s lasted years, and this show is no different it's killing me I love it. Ik Jun and Song Hwa have been friends for probably close to 20 years. He's been married and divorced in that time. He's had a kid! I do not think that he's had active, at least not conscious feelings for Song Hwa all this time. For one thing, that would be spectacularly shitty if he got married while pining for another woman. But mostly because that's just not realistic. It was a missed connection back when they were young that probably makes him a little wistful to think about, but that's nothing compared to decades of genuine close friendship. So what's changed to make him bring these feelings up now? Because he is making moves…very very slow moves. I think that now they're working together at the same hospital for the first time in years and he's seeing her every day. He's going through his divorce and his friends are there for him, and he starts to think that maybe he could live like this, with her, for the rest of his life. I think it's not so much having other characters express interest in Song Hwa that shakes him up, but that it's having her be a much bigger presence in his life, coinciding with his divorce, all making him think that maybe the timing is right to say something.

But! I do anticipate her saying that she's moving will throw him off track in a BIG way. Now he has a decision to make, and I'm terrified the writers are going to leave us on a cliffhanger. Does he say something right before she leaves and risk starting a new relationship long distance? Does he ask her to stay, therefore asking her to give up something she wants just to be with him? Does he not say anything and just wait, risking missing his chance again? I just hope we get this question answered in the last episode!

Healer (episodes 11-13): Straight up I do NOT remember the plot of this show, possibly because this is the point where the plot starts to go a little off the rails? What this means, however, is that when my sister is on the edge of her seat yelling at the tv, I don't get to sit smugly back and laugh at her anymore--I'm right there next to her!

Main thoughts about these episodes: it hurts to see Healer* be so hostile toward Moon Ho. I know that from his perspective he's protecting Young Shin, which is admirable! But it must hurt Moon Ho so deeply to see this kid he thought of as a little brother treat him like the enemy. Interestingly, it could be argued that Ajumma wronged Healer in exactly the same way as Moon Ho--keeping secrets, manipulating him--but his reaction to her is very different. His anger is defused by his trust that she cares for him, and did it to try to keep him from getting hurt (similar to his relationship with his mom). He's so angry at Moon Ho because he can finally vent all of his frustrations on someone he doesn't love, and who he doesn't think loves him. My sister and I both agree though that Healer's suffered enough and it's time for him to receive some affection! Poor kid gets lots of tough love, but that's not all he needs. I happen to remember things get worse before they get better, so the next episode will have to wait until we can find the time to binge at least two more and get ourselves through the angst!

To conclude, here's something to make all the Ji Chang Wook stans gasp. Last episode she thoughtfully goes, "you know, I guess he is attractive… I really didn't see it before." ….tough crowd.. but Healer got her in the end!

*I'm gonna keep calling him Healer until he actually tells Young Shin the truth lol I figure it's just easiest especially since idt my sister remembers his real name

The Romance of Tiger and Rose (episode 1-6): This is such a charming drama, and really really funny too! Genuinely had me laughing hard enough to make my parents ask me what I was watching. The premise has great comedic potential--a screenwriter struggling to rework her script gets sucked into it as a minor (villainous!) character she intended to kill off in episode 3! Now she has to figure out a way to manipulate the story to save her own skin, and hopefully keep things on track for the happy ending she'd initially planned. (If any writer has ever felt that their characters are getting away from them, check this show out)

The female lead won me over very quickly--she's smart, kind, and most importantly a very good comic actress--but the rest of the cast is also really fun to watch. (I particularly love her loyal, beleaguered servant) For a drama that’s mainly a comedy, I was surprised by how good the central romance has been! The set up is about as classic as a romcom can get--he thinks she loves him, so he decides to encourage it, not realizing that he's falling head-over-heels for her until it's too late. Yes, we are going Beatrice and Benedick best couple in shakespeare fight me, which is very hard to do well. You don't want it to seem as though the only thing he likes about her is that she flatters his ego. Instead, it comes across as a pretty natural direction for his thoughts to go, seeing as this is the first time poor murder kitty (™ dangermousie) has someone who seems to care about his safety and happiness. Of course he's going to fall for her! Meanwhile our heroine, Qianqian, is just doing her best to stay alive and try to get the story back on track (including trying to set him up with her sister) all the while totally unaware of the fact that he's madly in love with her. It's delicious--I'm only 6 episodes in but at this point I highly recommend to anyone who's interested in a lighthearted romcom with a lot of fun parody elements!

[zukadiary]

Hoshigumi Small Theaters ~ Spring 2019

I am five entire shows behind on reviews and I hate it!!

But I finally make it to Kansai!! I conveniently managed to see these guys on back to back days upstairs and downstairs in the same building. If nothing else I think I am 500% more educated on Hoshigumi after this trip.

Man from Algiers / Estrellas 2.0

Man from Algiers ticks all the National Tour buttons—old, done many times, ambiguous time period (useful for traveling costume recycling, i.e. why not just use the rainbow sports jackets we need for Estrellas anyway!)—and while I’m not surprised that Coto can make just about anything good, I was a bit surprised at how much I enjoyed the show itself (this was the first time I’d seen it at all, which was a blessing as the surprise ending was my favorite part). 

I can definitely envision it in all its original 70s glory, and it made me wonder if they really just wanted to exploit a West Side Story aesthetic’s swoon-inducing abilities and came up with the plot later; the opening looks and choreography were awfully familiar. Am I saying it didn’t work?

No I am not saying that.

(And the resulting prologue number was really cool).

The story, while dated, was simple and easy to follow, and does a great job of making sure you understand each character’s motivation with minimal info (difficult AND clutch for one-acts). There’s a good summary on the wiki, I’m including spoilers not mentioned there.

Team National Tour is definitely the lighter side of the troupe split, especially with regard to upperclassmen, but I thought Algiers was a good fit for this particular arrangement of members, and everyone really nailed their characters. Most notable: 

Julien is a despicable person, and it’s a testament to Coto’s pure heart and brimming talent that she made him a totally valid protagonist, complete with moments that made my heart lurch a little (when his old friends are bullying him in his cute little chauffeur outfit; how quickly he abandons everything to stand by Sabine when everything goes to hell at the end). 

It was very weird first not to see Aichan in Ocean’s and then to see her hanging out with a percentage of Hoshigumi, but this cast needed her. Her Jacques (albeit very reminiscent of her Bernardo) was a good balance for Coto; they both played unsavory people, but Aichan playing bad has kind of a darker streak that suits the more evil friend well, whereas Coto playing bad still has an undercurrent of goodness that gets you fully on board with his journey to reform.

Otoha Minori as Sabine was a good choice not only for her abs in the gold night club bikini dress, but for her maturity, which lended sincerity to Sabine’s fantasy-level selflessness in her concern for Julien and her desire to watch over him. When she shoots Jacques in her dressing room to get him out of the way so he can’t interfere with Julien’s new life, I was so impressed that it read as an act of sacrifice (however excessive and stupid) purely out of love and desire to see Julien continue to grow and succeed, instead of “look at what I did for you, come back to me!”

Asamizu Ryou played Bollinger, the dude who takes Julien in and grooms him for upper-crust success, opposite not just Coto (her senpai) but Shirotae Natsu (her mega-senpai), and she did it with a surprising amount of gravitas. She’s got that face which definitely helps, but she was a little scary and exuded a lot of authority. Shirotae Natsu was hilarious as the extraordinarily airheaded wife, and her interjections may have even been singlehandedly responsible for keeping the pacing of the show brisk and entertaining. 

Sakuraba Mai played the Bollingers’ daughter Elizabeth. She was detestable, but in the way that indicates a great acting job. She’s at that awkward spot where it looks like she’s getting almost heroine weight roles in small theaters and disappearing in grand theaters. I hope they keep pushing her because she’s very strong.

Number one heartbreaker Kozakura Honoka (voice of an angel!) played blind Annabel, daughter of Kumichou/a very influential duchess. She mostly stays inside alone, and then Julien woos her with the intention of climbing the social/political ladder (while developing feelings for Elizabeth and also really never getting over Sabine). Annabel overhears Julien confessing his feelings to Elizabeth and asks her attendant Andre (Kiwami Shin, in love with Annabel) to let her kill herself. Honoka apparently put an immense amount of time and research into acting blind and it showed. 

Fellow American Sayaka Rin had probably the most lines she’s had yet, in a role formerly held by both Takashio Tomoe and Hyuuga Kaoru <3 

My personal MVPs of this show were Shidou Ryuu and Kiwami Shin, Shidou not even for doing anything particularly spectacular, but just just for having grown so much since I first became aware of her existence via the Koumori shinko 3+ years ago. She’s always going to be on the cute side rather than the devastating side IMO, but she’s developed enough confidence and control in her acting that she’s become a really lovable best friend/brother type; her character’s relationship with Julien and secret-but-obvious admiration of his far superior coolness was really adorable. Andre (Shin) isn’t a super juicy role until the very end, but the way Shin did Andre’s quiet breakdown when Annabel was explaining she didn’t want to live anymore, and then her poise when Andre came out of nowhere and shot Julien just as he and Sabine were trying to run away from shooting Jacques (?!??!) was like, my jaw actually dropped. Granted she’s still super young, but Shin isn’t someone who has thus far impressed me proportionately to the amount they’re pushing her, so this mini breakout was nice to see. 

Estrellas (a revue that I loved!), like all tour revues with less than half the cast and no staircase, felt quite small, at least from the B-seki side box. But in the smallness, normally unseen people get to shine, and there were moments that had me bouncing in my chair. Amato Kanon is going to grow up dangerous (if Tennis Daughter doesn’t just consume all the otokoyaku below 98th); in the opening with everyone else beaming she was smoldering. Aichan and Anru took Kai’s medley (with different songs) and made it a very cute douki thing. Sazanami Reira needs to dance closer to the front more often. Ruri Hanaka (who, bless her heart, cannot sing, at least not like a musumeyaku) somehow snagged Airi’s part in Tonight is What it Means to be Young, and despite the singing, absolutely killed it; that girl can DANCE and she’s got sass and arm muscles for days and a look in her eye like she’ll superglue you to your makeup table if you cross her. 

And boy, Coto looks good in that top position. The talent is really stupid, but on top of that she has such warmth. I’m really excited for her Hoshigumi.

Kamatari

Kamatari accomplished a feat, because admittedly I went in having already biased myself against it; I thought Beni and Airi getting a weird nihonmono for their last small theater was dumb and just about as NOT THEM as you can get.

But I take it back! It was lovely!

For starters it was visually stunning, which feels like the thing you say when you’re trying to convince yourself that you liked a nihonmono you didn’t actually understand a word of... but in this case, it really was just a bonus. The story (summary here) is not actually all that complicated, and the dialogue was even on the friendly side for nihonmono—no weird dialects (beyond what it always takes to decipher Beni), no 12th level keigo. 

Act 1 introduces Kamatari (Beni) and Soga no Iruka (Hanagata Hikaru) meeting as youths in school and developing a friendship, and then takes us, as far as I can tell, fairly historically accurately through the events leading up to and including the Isshi Incident. Act 2 was a little harder for me to follow; but it seems to be just a progression of Kamatari’s struggles living under the new post-incident emperor Naka no Oe (Seocchi), with whom he’d conspired to eliminate Soga no Iruka, and the former empress/Naka no Oe’s mother (Kuracchi), who wants to see Kamatari suffer, because she both loved Iruka and couldn’t side against her son. 

Most of the roles were pretty small so there are fewer standouts, but here they are:

This was the third in a progression of Hoshi shows I saw live (the other two being Another World and Elbe) that really helped cement my respect for Beni and Airi’s brand of chemistry. At the beginning of her top run, I was skeptical about Beni’s ability to generate romantic chemistry with anyone at all (Scarlet Pimpernel didn’t really help me with that, and I haven’t seen anything between that and Another World). They definitely don’t have sizzling hot chemistry, and they don’t have that cute newlywed chemistry either, but I noticed watching Kamatari that in the last few Hoshi things I’ve seen, I’ve found it very easy to believe how deeply Beni loves Airi in whatever world they’re portraying. They have like, comfortable old married couple chemistry (yes, even when they’re playing love at first sight). Their moments in Kamatari were very tender, but in a wholesome “aw, she cooked for him” kind of way. Yoshiko (Airi) also had a lovely part at the end, where the two of them are old, and Kamatari’s health is failing, and they go back to the spot where they met, and she says their life wasn’t always easy, and they suffered, and they struggled, but in the end she can honestly say she had fun, and she’s truly happy. I teared up! It was sweet and meta! That alone convinced me it wasn’t a bad last small theater for them.

Hanagata Hikaru was SO much the star of Act 1 that it had me wondering if this was gonna turn out to be HER taidan present (but then she died and didn’t appear in Act 2 at all). I can’t complain because she kicked ass. I feel like I said this exact thing re: Another World, but Mitsuru is normally about as vanilla as it gets for me, but she blew me away. The pompous genius school kid to the idealistic young man to the uncertainty that comes with the reality of seizing power to the change to tyranny mixed with love for the empress and complicated feelings for his childhood friend all flowed seamlessly.

Not that I’ve watched a ton of Hoshi recently, but this was the best role Tenju Mitsuki has gotten in GOD I can’t even remember how long. Esaka is in service of the (state? empire?) as a historical record keeper, and serves kind of as a narrator as well (along with Itsuki Chihiro). I don’t even know how to describe how she characterized him... he’s odd? Maybe a little off? Regardless, she was brilliant. Watch it.

Arisa Hitomi has that empress energy for sure. I read up on the history of the events afterwards, and the explanation of why she had to give up the throne after witnessing such violence (the idea back then that an empress couldn’t be sullied by such things), and that made the sensitivity with which Kuracchi portrayed her feel even more poignant the more I sat with it afterwards.

This was the first show where to me Seocchi felt like she belonged up there with Beni and Mitsuru. She definitely put some weight behind Naka no Oe and was very princely. NOW I wanna see her tackle a more interesting/challenging (and tbh more Hoshigumi) role from up in this spot. 

All in all now I’m a little sad I won’t be around for God of Stars.

[furederiko]

"Shin Sakura Taisen Rekidai Kayoushuu" Review (Part 2)

SEGA boldly (or is it a risky move?) introduces new Kagekidans that represent new cities with this game. Not one or two, but just THREE for now, with a fourth one debuting later in the Spring TV series. Track 4 to 6 of the album are specifically slotted for these new heroines...

Contrary to reports in various sites that had reported them as such, in my opinion, these are definitely NOT character image songs. Kouhei Tanaka-sensei has openly referenced them as "[City Name] GEKITEI". So these sit in line with Paris Kagekidan's "Mihata no Moto ni" and New York Kagekidan's "Chijou no Senshi". Whatever happens to those teams, by the way? Hmmm...

One might argue that unlike "Shin GEKITEI", only one member sings these songs. But they seem to forget one thing: Sakura Shinguuji sang solo on the first vanilla version of that song. I don't know what the future holds, but there's a possibility that in the sequel(s), we might get another take of these songs that incorporate other members of their teams. For two of them, at least. We'll just have to wait and see. For now, let's embark on a globetrotting journey!

Niji no Kanata (Other Side of the Rainbow) by. Huang Yui (Sumire Uesaka)

As soon as I heard the full version, I wasn't completely sure how I felt about it. Surprisingly, I think I enjoyed the short MV version better. When SEGA started releasing one MV after another, starting from Berlin to this one, "Shanghai GEKITEI" totally stole my attention. I proudly declared it as my favorite of the three. Perhaps because the verses felt more concise (with less instrumental parts) that made it sound more... kickass? Even though it had a somewhat odd lyric, which you will understand why. This full-length version somehow exuded a different vibe. The verses were longer, which was the bit that I'm not too fond of. On the other hand, the lyrics flowed better and made more sense. And then there's an issue with Yui's voice. She had a playful and childlike tone in "Aratanaru". Assuming that's her who got the shortest line in the interlude, of course. I prefer the more gallant take that she used here, but the inconsistency threw me off. Suffice to say, I had to hear it a few times to finally get the hang of it. But goodness gracious, the Chinese vibe, which was even stronger (that should be obvious, I know! Ahaha), never failed to win me over. Just like the verses, the instrumental portions were also longer, thus giving it a slower and elegant pace. That serenading sound of Erhu just hit my soft spot every single time, likely resonating with some part of my genes. Combined that with a blast of modern instruments, and it blew me away. I sure want to see a live orchestra perform this with a Chinese theatre dance to accompany it! Its lyrics, courtesy of Ouji Hiroi, carried a similar message of Teito, Paris, and New York themes. Protect the city, its people, and seize the dream. Why does the title use 'Rainbow', though? Especially considering 7, while being a good number for a relationship, is considered as unlucky in Mandarin (ghost month). The key is in the kanji for 'Rainbow', because it is also known as 'Hong' or 'Jiang', the name of a two-headed dragon in Chinese mythology. And what does the symbol of Shanghai Kagekidan look like? Yep, a DRAGON! So while in Japanese it literally translates as "Other Side of the Rainbow", the context also points to it being "Other Side of the Dragon". Even though it might take me a while to get used to this, and it's no longer my number one, it's an amazing piece nonetheless. I'm old, so I'm not familiar with Sumire Uesaka's pop songs. But so far, I haven't heard her sang a song like this. As Kouhei-sensei had stated, these new "GEKITEI" were composed to challenge the VAs vocal prowess. That seems to be the case here, to which Uesaka did a great job! PS: Wikipedia told me that Uesaka is a fan of Russia. I wonder how she would feel if she was cast as a leader of the Moscow Kagekidan instead?

Entaku no Kishi (Knights of the Round Table) by. Lancelot (Manami Numakura)

Just like the previous song, I had a completely opposite reaction to this as well. It honestly took a while for me to like or even understand the London Kagekidan theme when its official MV first came out. This full anthem also sounds different but in a far more positive light! How so? The second Westminster Bells kicked off, my mouth grinned so wide. Then the music slowly developed into that familiar tone, but continued to build up even more with meticulous touches and flares of fanfare, horns, trumpets, and an electrifying mix of the electric guitar. And suddenly I was transported into the medieval era, with images of brave knights flashing on my mind, en route for a battle to protect the land. Daaaang... Kouhei-sensei totally knows how to make something sound so graceful, yet gallant and rich, huh?! A sensation that young'uns nowadays would easily call 'EPIC'. My lingering issue with this song remains as-is: Manami Numakura's voice. Don't get me wrong, she is a wonderful VA with a unique vocal tone (Kohaku in "Dr. STONE", right?). I'm just not a fan of her singing voice, never was since her Idolmaster days. Even when it's my least favorite part of the song, that tomboy-ish charm blends perfectly with the song and gives it a distinct sound. The end result is something that continues to delight me and puts a smile on my face. Oh, what about the title, you ask? I think it's obvious enough. London Kagekidan is clearly based on the tales of King Arthur. Arthur is (likely, the code-name of) its blond-haired, high priest-dressed Captain, while our female lead here is the loyal Lancelot. It intrigued me when the lyrics, by Shouko Fujibayashi, mentioned 12 knights just like its lore. Does the team really have that many members? Assuming it will feature in the sequel, that would be fun to see. Then again, Idolmaster started out with 10(+1) idols, so I'm sure Lancelot would fit along just fine! Hahahaha... PS: Do you think that echoing bell at the intro and interlude sound convincing? Well, Kouhei-sensei said they actually recorded it at the actual location! Another good reason to appreciate this song.

Kurogane no Hoshi (Iron Star) by. Elise (Nana Mizuki)

*standing ovation* This. This IS a SCARY song! And by scary, I mean what a challenge it IS to pull off. Imagine trying to do at least an okay job at this in a karaoke booth? Godspeed. Nuh-uh, I don't think this song will work without Nana Mizuki's powerful vocals. Not just because I'm a fan of her, or have always wanted her to be part of this franchise. But I love Elise because she adds that much-needed heavier tone to the cast. Her brief but scene-stealing lines in "Aratanaru" proved that notion. You could easily recognize her voice amidst the chorus. If you think the short MV version (the actual first 1:20 minutes) that you see above already sounds amazing, just wait till you hear the middle part of this song. It slowed down, with various strings gently swayed you to enter another realm. Then it went FULL OPERA, with a piercing vocal work that would send nothing but genuine shivers to your soul! Goosebumps. All the time. The music had clear influences of Wagner's compositions, and those who are at least aware of classical music (or have seen "ClassicaLoid Season 2" Hahaha) would probably notice that almost immediately. Song of Valkyrie, anyone? Because of that, Kouhei-sensei personally did the arrangement for this number, seeing that it required a full-blown orchestra ensemble. Sensei showed the first part of the music sheets during one of the Teigeki Report, and I had a feeling it must've blown away everyone who saw it. I mean, Seijuurou Kamiyama's VA Youhei Azakami was literally jaw-dropped. He also revealed that Nana went above and beyond on that last high note, hitting it longer than she was supposed to, in time for the grand orchestra finish. Seriously, goosebumps. It is certainly one of the highlights of the album, and you DEFINITELY need to listen to this. Also, this is the only Kagekidan theme that I'm not sure can work as a group song. It IS still a Berlin Kagekidan song, proclaiming the might and power of the team that started it all. But can it be performed by a team of Hoshigumi? Dealing with that complicated lyrics by Shouko Fujibayashi ("...Schwarzer Stern, kurogane no hoshi..."), and fast-paced tempo will undoubtedly leave them breathless. Now I'm patiently counting the days to see Nana perform this in a live concert! Mindblown... PS: By the way, original Hanagumi's "Dream/Yume no 1 Pound" and Kanadegumi's "Enbukyoku, Kimi ni" came to mind when I tried to analyze this song. Presumably due to that middle part, which is true to Kouhei-sensei's style. You'll be hearing that magic touch of him again in some of the next tracks.

Next: the curtain rises for the Shin Hanagumi ladies!

Video is available on SEGA Official Youtube Channel. "Shin Sakura Taisen" is produced by SEGA, and RED Entertainment. Credits and copyrights belong to their respective owners.

[rollzerox]

Protective (maybe for Jae Ha and his daughter? )

Willdo! I love excuses to write more of Jae-ha with his adorable daughter! Let’ssay she’s about six here, and also your prompt so got me going for a littleparent scare for Jae-ha. After all her mother has a knack for getting kidnapped…

Jae-hacurrently was looking around town at the market that was set up in a nearbyvillage. They didn’t have the funds for an inn so they were camping justoutside town, and half the Happy Hungry Bunch had fallen ill due to thechanging seasons and they were away from Hiryuu Castle, on their way back fromvisiting Princess Tao in Xing. Yona, Kija, Shin-ah and Hak all were sick withcolds while Yoon was trying to take care of everyone but was worried about theyoung Ryokuryuu getting sick so he suggested Jae-ha take her into town whilegetting supplies as Zeno would stay with him due to the Yellow Dragon’s immunity,and Valerie was assisting in tending to the sick. Yona agreed as the last thingshe wanted would be to get her daughter sick, and it gave her husband a chancefor a bonding time with his little girl.

 “Daddy lookat those! They look like the one momma has!” Lina was pointing to the hairpins onevendor had.

 “Pukkkyyuuu!”Ao purred on her shoulder.

 Jae-hachuckled at that. “Why do you want one too Lina-chan? Daddy bought that formommy back before we were married. It holds some really happy memories for her.”He smiled just recalling when he gave her it.

 “Actually Iwas wondering if there was something I could get for mommy so she feels better.”Lina said as she looked around. “Is there something we can get to help GrandmaYoon? He’s not going to get sick too right?”

 Jae-ha bentdown to her level, petting her on the head. “… You’re too precious. Don’t worryYoon’s the very reason we’re all still alive, little one.” He winked at her. “Ifhe gets sick your Auntie Valerie will cure him immediately. I have a few thingsI need to get to help him though, so let’s find that shop right away, ok? Maybewe’ll even find a little present to cheer up mommy on the way?”

 “Ok!” Linasmiled wide, rushing ahead to help find the shop, Ao hopped off her shoulder asif trying to help search.

 “Don’twander too far.” He chuckled, getting up and walking with her.

 “Oh come ondaddy you’re too protective like Uncle Darkness Dragon!” Lina pouted a bit,crossing her arms. “I can defend myself with my leg just like you taught me!”

 “Still I’drather you not have to resort to that Lina dear.” Jae-ha pointed out. “And youknow when you complain about being protected you once again remind me of yourlovely mother?” he laughed just thinking about it.

 “Mommy is greatand doesn’t need anyone to protect her!” Lina smiled wide. “I want to be strongjust like her!”

 Soon enoughthey found the shop needed for the medical supplies, after all his adoptedsister told him exactly what to buy and after paying for the items need heturned to leave but then his eyes widened. “…Lina?” he whipped his head around as the small child was nowhere in sight. “Lina!” he shouted, turning to the shopkeeperthat shrugged that he didn’t see where she went.

 ‘Where could she have gone?!’ Jae-ha’s mindwent into panic, leaping into the air to get a better view as he landed on oneof the roofs. ‘Her red and green hairshould stand out… Still…’ he sighed and closed his eyes, trying to sensethe presence of his daughter. He was glad for that radar as it helped him pinpointwhere his daughter was right away as he leapt a few times to find a group of mensurrounding her. Clearly bandits that were trying to kidnap her.

 “ISAID LET GO OF AO!” Lina leapt right up and kicked the one man right inthe head with her dragon leg, grabbing the squirrel and hugging it tightly.

 “You littlerunt!” one of the men grabbed her by her pigtails, lifting her off the ground.

 “Just howstrong is that kid? She knocked the wind of out him…” another bandit noted, pointingto the injured one. He then blinked when he saw a shadow cast over him asJae-ha landed right on his back, smacking the bandit down to kiss the ground.

 “Oh crap!Where the heck did this guy come from?!” another one shouted.

 “Daddy!” Lina cried.

 “Pukkkyyuuu!”Ao cheered.

 “… Youcreeps better unhand my daughter right now…” Jae-ha hissed as he stood up, hishair shadowing over his eyes until he lifted his head, giving a look that couldrival the Thunder Beast’s death glare. “Usually I find taking a life very unbeautiful,but if you bastards harmed one hair on her head… I’ll kill you all.”

 One of the banditsdidn’t seem to take his threat as he drew a sword, but Jae-ha immediatelykicked him straight into the air, making the child kidnapper land right on a roofof the nearby building. Seeing as the bandits weren’t going to listen, heproceeded to pull out his throwing knives to toss at the one holding Lina, asthey hit the bandit’s shoulder he released the young Ryokuryuu.

 But Linachoose to jump up and kick the man square in the chest before rushing to thefather after he finished taking out the other two as that scared off the restof the men, running away quickly.

 Linashivered as she saw that scowling face on her father, one that seemed almost foreignto her as she rarely ever saw him lose his temper as he bent down and placedhis hands firmly on her shoulders.

 “Why did you run off like that?! I toldyou to stay by me and not wander off! Do you have any idea how scared I was andif those men had hurt you?!? If it wasn’t for the fact I can sense you I wouldn’thave found you so fast, if it had been Hak or your mother with you-“

 But Jae-hastopped shouting at his little girl when he saw the tears falling down her cheeksas she sobbed. “I’m sorry daddy! Waaahhh!I didn’t mean to! I lost track of Ao and went to find her and then those badmen tried to hurt her! I didn’t want to make Uncle Shin-ah sad by losing hisfriend!”

 Jae-ha’sface softened as Ao climbed onto his shoulder, making an apologetic face as shewhimpered. “Pukkkyuuu….” As if apologizing,and the squirrel had tried to wander off when hungry on Shin-ah before.

 Jae-hasighed as he hugged his daughter tightly against his chest. “… You should havejust told me, we would have gone to look for her together. You put yourself in dangerby keeping it to yourself and rushing off like that.” He brushed his hand overher hair, trying to get the young Ryokuryuu to calm down. “I know you thinkeveryone is over protective of you, but it’s really just because you’re thatimportant to us, Lina-chan.” He kissed her forehead as he cleared her tearswith the sleeve of his robe.

 Lina sniffedas she still looked upset. “… I’m sorry, really I am daddy. I won’t do itagain.”

 “That’s mygirl, now we won’t mention this to mommy or Grandma Yoon because then they’dscold you even more.” Jae-ha said, petting her on the head as he then liftingher onto his back. “Now let’s go for a ride in the sky to dry those tears.”

 “Ok… Thankyou for saving me daddy.” Lina whimpered, burying her face into his hair as shewas still crying a little.

 “Anytime,though that was a beautiful kick you did back there.” Jae-ha smiled as hejumped into the air. “We just need to work on it a bit more, we’ll practicewhen we get back.”

 Lina smiledfinally, hugging her father’s back tightly as she held on during their trip inthe sky. “I love you daddy.”

 “I love youtoo, my precious little treasure.”