#and mari likes to use “boku” as her personal pronoun when speaking japanese

[muttakutagawa]

🍼+ fukumori

i had a feeling you'd ask for them.

I've only had [twins Natsuki and Mari] for a day and a half, but if anything happened to [them], I would kill everyone in this room and then myself.

Nozomu no wa: A shapeshifting ability that allows Natsuki to take on physical traits of various animals, whether as a partial or full transformation, depending on the type of ballet she performs.

Lover's Forest of Dead Leaves: A bonsai tree capable of growing an exact replica of a destroyed item at the price of being offered blood from the person who desires the replicated object. This only works if the object has been destroyed beyond repair or recovery rather than just lost, but the object can range from something as simple as a fully burnt out candle to something as complex as the recently deceased. The more complex the replication, the more sacrifice is required to complete it.

Send me 🍼 + a ship and I’ll draw/make a fan-child

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

Akudama 2 - 3 | HypMic 4 | Yashahime 3 | Taiso 2 - 3 | Moriarty 2 | Maou-jou 3

Akudama 2

I think one or two of the reviews I read of this anime picked up the names of each episode are based on movies and it seems they’re right. Namely, episode 1 is Se7en while episode 2 is Reservoir Dogs...so they’re crime movies specifically.

Kanto, Hikari etc. are the names of certain shinkansen.

Playing with your own blood in front of a no violence sign and smoking in front of a no smoking sign…LOL. So edgy and yet simultaneously so fun.

…*blinks* Welp, that OP was…an experience.

…hey, Funi are hypocrites…they gave HypMic a language warning, but not this???

Come to think of it, this anime is already exactly how I’d imagine the HypMic MTC episode to go…but with more cyberpunk, of course.

…why is “are you gay?” an insult…? I thought we were past this point years ago.

…what’s up with these puppets? The shark’s shirt says “fool” on it…

The rabbit and shark’s shirts keep changing every time they spin. When they talk about poverty/rich, the rabbit shirts says “poor” and the shark’s “rich” (or something of the sort). When the shark talks about Kansai burning to the ground, his shirt says “nervousness”.

Wow, Hiroshima vers. 2…Rabbit: peace/shark:war

Hoodlum’s just a sycophant…

…ooh, so if the girl and Hoodlum aren’t part of the plan…they could f*** s*** up?

LOL, plasma shield.

“Lil’ stick”? That’s a jitte! A non-bladed weapon which is still plenty nasty by itself!

Ken the 390??? I knew UraShimaSakataSen were on this ED and I knew this was a rap ED because I heard it in AMQ before I was able to finish this ep, IIRC, but I didn’t expect the guy from BATTLE BATTLE BATTLE....

Taiso 2

A-hah! I was right on the money! Tomoyo is an actress!

Oh, it’s senu. That’s an old-timey way of negating your verbs (it’s shinai now), hence “retires not”.

I think they’re hailing Minamino as the first winner in 45 years if I understood the newspaper article on the screen right…?

Does this mean Minamino will join Leo and Aragaki…? The OP shows him with them.

The AnimeLab translation of the title is “Duelling Samurai”, but the translation on the hardsubs is “Rock-Bottom Samurai”. The word donzoko indicates the latter is correct.

I think Leo said “Rei-chan”, not “Rachel”. It’s a bit hard to hear because he’s eating though…

I think there’s only one line where he doesn’t talk like a ninja in his intro to Ayu and that’s the line where he uses keigo instead.

I think the card says “acupuncturist Kawa????” (can’t read the last character due to Britney’s thumb), but…welp, Britney’s kinda disturbing in their (not sure what pronoun to use) own way. There also appears to be an address in Ikebukuro on the card.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Leo learnt how to speak Japanese fluently from ninja movies – that’s a pretty common anime trope, like in Tada-kun’s Rainbow Samurai case. “Always make your heart rainbow!” and all that jazz.

…so that’s what the card said - Kawamoto Orthopedic Clinic.

“My shoulder would…”

Seriously, this anime is just an excuse to look at Aragaki in different outfits (and also shirtless) and I love it, LOL. (I’m such a simpleton.)

Ah…sometimes, people ask me about the days when I used to learn piano and I bring up the fact there is such a thing as “overpractice”. I thought gymnasts would know when they hit their limits in that regard, but…I guess they don’t because they’re so consumed in their passion, or they can’t see what they’re doing to themselves (because it occurs under the skin and doesn’t ache)…?

Minamino is basically Yurio…LOL.

That’s a cute, laidback ED. It’s called Yume? (yes, with the “?”) and it’s by Hatena, hence Leo’s shirt saying “Hatena”.

Welp, I don’t think anything supernatural will happen anymore, but…it’s still a fun anime. They toned down BB too, which should please a huge number of reviewers who found him obnoxious.

Yashahime 3

Hitokon? Short for “hito control” (hito = person)? Update: It seems the name was also kanji for “flying head root”.

“…puts one to sleep.”

“…from a place like that?”

Can a Dream Butterfly steal memories?

Moriarty 2

“Colum” (sic).

These CGI horses are gonna bug me, aren’t they…?

There is this sentiment that people need to be “saved” from poverty, especially when it comes down to African and Asian people living in slums (these days). I get the same feeling from this.

Maou-jou 3

Free advertising for Maou-jou’s home magazine! LOL!

I was wondering why those things were called “Show the Mary”…remember Mezo Shouji from Boku no Hero Academia? Same pun (the walls have ears and the doors have eyes, or something of the sort).

LOL, instead of yokudekimashita (literally, “you did good”) it’s makura ni narimashita (“you made [the book] into a pillow”). The common sentence ending for verbs means it’s funnier in Japanese, I think.

…argh! I can’t read all of Alazif’s info because of the hardsubs! Umm…”Current worry: Princess” and “Worry of the past hundred years: Destroying the demon clan” is in the box next to the logo. “Powerful magic techniques are recorded inside this book, so the demons feared it and sealed it away as a ‘forbidden grimoire’.”/”Currently, under the control of the princess, they’ve been bestowing magic and magic techniques to her, so they haven’t been used for the purpose they were made for and they’re wishing the princess would use them for not-so-stupid things” (I don’t know what pronoun to give Alazif, so I gave them 3rd person “them)…ah, someone translated the stuff for me! (That saves me a lot of time.) So Alazif is a “he”, huh?

OHKO to Demon Cleric, LOL.

SAN…? Oh, “sanity”?

Oh, Demon Cleric’s ears are black goat ears. No wonder you can’t see ‘em.

This sword is like Ex from Princess, ‘Tis Time for Torture!

HypMic 4

From here until episode 6-ish, I’ll be paying extra attention to characters’ role language. I normally do that, but I picked this anime for an assignment because I knew it had a lot of examples…yes, you heard me right. An assignment! I should be happy, but I’m wondering if my taste is going to get roasted by the normies or if I’ve gone too far with my unabashed love…

I was discussing with some of my peeps in a Discord server and…is it possible MTR will get an ED from here on out if you divide the episodes up for an almost equal amount for each division? We’ll have to wait and see.

…Oof. I’m sort of scared for this episode. It’s gonna have swearing galore…and yup, there it is, right out the gate.

Wait, why not translate wakagashira? It just means “young head” or “2nd in command”.

…well, at least they got some variation in their swearing this time…?

Hmm, normally the translation is “rabbit cop” or something toned down like that. They dialled it up to “rabbity-ass cop”. (Yakuwarigo: Samatoki = na, on the whole = very, very slang – as a former naval officer, you would expect Riou to speak formally, but he speaks as casually as almost everyone else (yamero etc.))

I’ve never seen anyone refer to Samatoki as “Kashira”. *laser stares Rentei for guest VA roles*

(Yakuwarigo: Samatoki (?) = zo)

“…why don’t you ask the cops to deal with it?” – Uh, Samatoki? Jyuto is the cop. (Well, a cop.)

I still have no idea why they subtitle the laughing…

Wait, if there’s a casino…is Dice there?!

…yup, right on cue. I didn’t think Tom and co. would be there too.

Oh, LOL. HypMic is a tourist trap anime = see those buns Tom’s eating? They’re chuukaman (Chinese buns). Makes sense in Chinatown.

It took me several watches to realise who’d passed by, but it’s…MTC in formal clothes?! (You can see part of Jyuto’s face, just to confirm it.)

Why are they wearing glasses? Even Jyuto’s wearing different glasses to the usual, LOL.

I learnt how to do some of the casino stuff while trying to get a job as a gaming customer service assistant in a huge casino joint one time. In a sense, this brings me back to then. (Update: I mean, the sound of the roulette, the sight of the board, the chips and the like. That’s what takes me back.)

(Yakuwarigo: Dice slurs his words a lot, especially when yelling things along the lines of “Please lend me moneyyyyyyyyyyyyy!” This is also true in the game.)

Dice seems to have jumped straight to “Riou”, rather than “Riou-san”.  

I wonder if anyone will ever elaborate on that incident where Dice and Riou met?

(Yakuwarigo: Samatoki speaks coarsely, but not outright swearing in the source language…for an example, he says kussotare when roped into being Jakurai’s “female counterpart” for the ARB Halloween event, but he doesn’t do anything of the sort here.)

Even Ramuda uses “san” with Samatoki, most likely to emulate how Samatoki calls himself “oresama” (but with lower formality).

Ramuda-chin? That’s new.

Yakuwarigo: Gentaro spoke normally, just with desu/masu. Maybe the “perchance” was to make it blend in with his -de aru?

Uh-oh…Ramuda’s favours always are things like “dress up for me” and “hang out with me”, if the game is any indication. (One of them happens to be how Ichiro was roped into being a sorta-Kirito for the ARB Halloween event.)

This CGI…it’s not the jankiest, but it is gonna bug me ever so slightly.

I’ve noticed a lot of people in the English-speaking fandom, when they watched the anime, took a shine to MTC (because they seem to embody the entire “refuge in audacity” thing they’ve picked up on…plus that one hamster lyric people got attached to). You can see them being all “cop/gangster husbands” here if that’s your gig – it’s kind of my gig, but to be real HypMic is not a scene where I ship dudes. I’m sorry, but I just like watching pretty boys kick butt.

What warranted the dramatic glasses drop…? (LOL anyway)

That whistle…LOL. It’s like “Look at my boy fight” and “Riou’s got some sweet fightin’ moves” rolled up in one.

For some reason, when I saw the sign for the Organised Crime department, I heard the Student Council theme from Boueibu play in my head…? (Remember that harpsichord theme?) *shrugs* I dunno why that happened.

Hmm…they crossed out the subtitles using Swedish letters instead of strikethrough, huh? Didn’t know that was a limitation.

(Yakuwarigo: Jyuto = dazo)

“Wouldya look at that forlorn mug of his?” – Seeing a man taller than you (Riou is a good 190 or so cm, mind you, making him the tallest member of his division above Samatoki’s 180-something and Jyuto’s 170-something) making a sort of demented puppy-dog face…LOL.

(Yakuwarigo: Jyuto elevated himself to kimasuyo…maybe to win back Riou’s favour?)

(Yakuwarigo: The translation elevated Samatoki’s “nanda” to “the f***”. “Nanda” is not that bad – it’s casual, but doesn’t imply swearing like “ittai” is supposed to mean “the hell”.)

(Yakuwarigo: Jyuto doesn’t finish when he says “ore wa hanashi ga”. That’s called an omission, plain as that may be.)

(Yakuwarigo: Taihendaze!...Maybe that’s a bit far to call it “we’re f**ked”…? It could just be “we’re doomed!” or “we’ve got trouble!”)

(Yakuwarigo: Jyuto uses desune. He’s the most feminine of the trio by virtue of being the smallest height-wise and most polite due to his job, but he seems to bounce between casual and polite a lot.)

…wow, even the rap lyrics have the F bomb…and this time, you can see the evidence.

Natsu no mushi = bugs in the summer. Not a perfect match, but it works. (Notably, things like Gentaro’s speech and rap lyrics don’t play by the same yakuwarigo rules because you can play characters within it – e.g. the evil doctor Jakurai sometimes plays. I’ve noticed most of the songs use casual or whatever rhymes, even for someone like Doppo who’s considered more polite than most.)

…Despite the swearing…that song slaps, man! That’s great.

MTC seems to have more tragedy on average than other divisions. This is because FP and BB are quite light-hearted and mostly family-friendly with hidden depths, but MTR mostly has stalker stories. Update: That’s when they’re focussing on MTR solo. FP’s currently could get pretty dark soon and a lot of the dark/tragic stuff is not actually going to make the anime because it’s in the drama tracks/manga.

My gosh, we got to see Nemu animated!

Okay, I’m not well-versed in yakuza slang but kumicho = boss, so Samatoki would have to answer to a kumicho.

(Yakuwarigo: Notably, when Riou bows, he doesn’t elevate his speech.)

(Yakuwarigo: Jyuto = desukane)

…and randomly, rock solo postcard memory away from the sunset. (LOL) (Also, I believe I befriended Zainou during my time on WordPress. This episode title really does mean things, in a certain sense.)

Ah, it did switch! It’s just…uh, gone to an MTC version of itself (and it has the same name, “Kizuna”). So that means we wait another 6 episodes for MTR. On the other hand…what will the final version be? A whole cast version? A different song? No song at all? *shrugs* Only the future can tell us these things. (Also, why is Jyuto so loud…? That’s why I’m not a bigger fan of him. Much like Ramuda’s minna genki?, his iconic quotes like “In the building!” are so loud and silly-sounding, you just can’t get them out of your head.)

The cityscape in the middle of the disc at the ED’s start seems to have changed. I would assume that’s a Yokohama skyline.

Keiichi Nakagawa is the voice of Rentei…I should stop burning myself on guest VA appearances, this guy’s a rookie. This Nouzenkazura VA (Kenji Hamada) though is voiced by the guy who does Otegine in Touken Ranbu and isn’t as much of a rookie as Rentei’s.

Notably, where BB do the “BB sign” (as it seems to be known), MTC do a finger gun. MTR have the wolf fang, but…what is FP’s, then? Update: It’s a peace sign to the side to make an F.

Today’s new music was “Red Zone (Don’t Test da Master)”, by KLOOZ and DJ WATARAI.

*cringes at the airhorn* *briefly presses fingers to forehead, as if going to massage temples, but then removes them* The airhorn reminds me of crazy sport fans. Crazy anime fans are more civil than them, which is one reason why I don’t follow sports on the regular.

Update: Oh! The pond owl cafe in episode 2! It means Ikebukuro!...Sort of. Fukurou rhymes with ‘bukuro and ike = pond.

Akudama 3

Hmm? Is it just me or is that T in the code the kanji for “bird” (tori)?

“It’s where I belong.” – I know my reason for pursuing Japanese is a purely selfish reason – so I can stay above others in the topics I think matter to me and pursue the endless natural high that comes from the thrill of translation (which may be all one reason or two, depending on how you look at it).

Oh, the bunny and shark again.

The bunny’s shirt said “life” at one point, I didn’t understand the shark’s though.

At one point, shark: Ka (from “Kansai”), bunny: ken (authority).

At the end, shark: heaven, bunny: hell. These broadcasts look like NHK broadcasts at the end.

Most of these words are katakana, making them look foreign.

Kansai 300, 25-1.

“Move-you-s**t!” – It…seems a bit out of character for Swindler to say the swear word there.

Taiso 3

That CGI…is not the greatest.

According to Moon Land, gymnastics operates on a deduction/addition system. You add points for difficulty, but deduct points for errors like how Minamino’s feet are apart.

*sees montage* - Those CGI scenes really take out the budget, huh…?

Gymnastics moves are named after their creators…kinda like scientific names and finders.

There was a lot of commentary in Moon Land so I’m not sure what the moves are called from memory (the dialogue always did that for me), but having the reactions speak for themselves…I think the anime team has enough faith the reactions will convey everything. They did, by the way.

You can see the bone at the base of Minamino’s neck, under the skin…it’s sort of scary.

The fact you couldn’t see Jotaro’s eyes for a shot or two…that kind of unnerved me and built tension.

Oh! The men in black appear after the credits!

[bloody-scans]

Hello! I've been wondering for, like, forever. But what are the pronouns each characters use? (I'm mainly interested in Maria(all), Bloody, Hydra and Mary) Ore? Boku? Watashi? And also, do they have a different way of speaking? Like, if you say "I love cat" in Japanese, it could be "watashi wa neko ga suki desu" or "watashi wa neko ga suki" or other different kinds of ways. So if all the characters were to say a sentence meaning the same thing, how would each character say it?

Hey!

It’s Caramel over here, I wrote the reply to this ask in FOUR hours and half and I’m not counting on the time I’ve been looking for examples.

Sorry! I swear I never saw this ask before. Tumblr’s notification feature seems to not have worked correctly again. My biggest apologies if this ask has been sent in ages.

This is the kind of questions I love to answer because I know people get really curious about this. So, for once, let’s look a little at raws (with me explaining, of course) and forget this is a scanlation blog?

(Alright, this is huge and has several pictures and it includes three speech bubbles from chapters we didn’t scanlate, including the final chapter, so it’ll be under a “read more” link. I have no idea if tumblr mobile app still doesn’t show the link and shows the whole post instead. If it does and you don’t wanna see the rest, I’m deeply sorry, you’ll have to scroll through all of this.)

So first of all, I’ll just say that, in terms of their own speech, Bloody, Hydra and Mary are three of the four most interesting characters in Bloody Mary. The fourth character isn’t one you mentioned but I’ll talk about them at the end.

My biggest enemy in this demand to find examples of their pronouns is: Japanese doesn’t work like English and, therefore, the pronouns for “I” or “you” aren’t in the sentences like 90% of times in manga to cut speech short.

I’ll start with the Marias because there’s nothing special in them:

Both Yzack/Isaac and Yuusei use “私” (”Watashi”), which is a very neutral way of referring to oneself.

Yzack

(from chapter 8)

The second bubble says “Kimi wa watashi no kawaii musuko  wo dou yatte koroshita…?”.

(from chapter 40 [final chapter])

“Aa… Watashi wa…”.

“I love cats” in his speech: “私は猫が好き” (”Watashi wa neko ga suki”)

Yuusei

Same as Yzack, he also uses “watashi”. However, I could only find a part in which he uses a pronoun for himself on chapter 40.

(from chapter 40 [final chapter])

“Watashi no koe ga Kikoemasu ka…?”

“I love cats” in his speech: “私は猫が好き” (”Watashi wa neko ga suki”) [exactly the same as Yzack]

Maria

Even though he uses a different pronoun from the other Marias, he uses the most generic pronoun used by male characters in Bloody Mary (for example, Shinobu and Takumi use the same pronoun): “俺” (ore):

(from chapter 1)

The second bubble says “Ore no daijina chi”.

(from chapter 16)

“Ore mo sou omotte ikiteta kedo…”

“I love cats” in his speech: “僕は猫が好き” (”Ore wa neko ga suki”)

And now the most interesting cases. Before carrying on, I need to explain one thing about Japanese writting in general because you’ll need to know this to understand what comes next: Japanese has THREE alphabets (well, one isn’t exactly an alphabet but, to make it easier, let’s say it is) - “Hiragana”, “Katakana” and “Kanji”.

Hiragana - If you can’t read this alphabet, you can’t read Japanese at all. Every single word in Japanese has its own Hiragana writing. - “わたし” is “watashi” in hiragana: わ - wa / た  - ta / し  - shi.

Katakana - This alphabet is exactly like Hiragana but, while Hiragana is used for the Japanese language, Katakana is what is used for what’s not Japanese. Ever wondered why Japanese voice actors pronounce English terribly? Because they usually are reading words writen in Katakana. - “ワタシ” is “watashi” in katakana: ワ - wa / タ - ta / シ - shi

Kanji - This isn’t actually an alphabet but let’s pretend it is. This is the actual name of those really tough symbols that seem chinese (and some are the same as in Chinese) - “私” is “watashi in kanji. This is completely unrelated to pronunciation, unlike the other two alphabets. Not all words in Japanese can be writen in Kanji.

As you may notice if you scroll up across the speeches I’ve shown you so far, you’ll see EVERYTHING is writen in Hiragana and that the speech of any of the Marias is all in Hiragana or Kanji. However now there’ll be Katakana in the mix and it will make things clearer to readers who understand Japanese, but I’m certain this confuses those who don’t and that’s what I am going to explain in here.

Hydra

Hydra is your local princess in everything, including in her own speech. Her pronoun is “私” (“Watashi”), just like Yzack and Yuusei because, despite being a neutral pronoun, it is also associated to female speech. Most women use that pronoun to refer to themselves in Japanese.

(from chapter 3)

Last bubble says “Watashi wa obakana kyuuketsuki-tachi to wa chigau no yo”.

She talks so politely, it gets really complicated to understand sometimes. Do you know what the “obakana” in this sentence is? It’s what we usually hear in anime as “baka” (yes, it’s “idiot”, “stupid” and so on), but because she’s using “o” (note of polite speech) and “na” (used in some adjectives), it doesn’t even seem the same word anymore if you write it like in English. However, in Japanese, you can note what she means because the word “baka” is written in Katakana while “o” and “na” are in Hiragana. Why is it in Katakana? Just to make the readers understand she really means that those vampires are idiots, the use of just hiragana in a row may confuse readers and it’s in that alphabet just to avoid confusion.

Another really interesting thing is that Hydra ends her sentences with わ (”wa”) a lot. This means nothing, it’s just a marker that the person talking (in this case, Hydra), is really feminine when speaking:

The second speech of the same picture says: “Daijoubu yo, mata kuru wa”.

(from chapter 16)

Second bubble says “Chigau wa…”

(from chapter 16)

Second bubble says “Mukae ni kita wa”.

“I love cats” in her speech: “私は猫が好きわ” (”Watashi wa neko ga suki wa”)

Mary (yes, I’m keeping Bloody for last out of the ones you requested because he has a really unique way of speak)

Mary is the only character in Bloody Mary we know of who changes slightly the way he speaks as he grows up.

He always uses the same pronoun for himself “オレ” (”ore” in katakana), whether he is a younger human or a more grown-up vampire. The reason why it is in Katakana is up to interpretation but I believe it’s just to keep the mystery around him.

(from chapter 29, young and human Mary)

“Ore… daijina jouhou wo shuushuu shitenda.”

(from chapter 33, present-day, older and vampire Mary)

Second bubble says: “Ore no koe… Kikoeteru ka?”

Besides this pronoun, he sometimes uses “nee” (instead of “nai”) or says “sugee” instead of “sugoi”, which is an informal way of speaking. Bloody shows this exact same way of speaking. Besides the twins, Shinobu talks that way as well.

However, after meeting Hydra, Mary adds one thing to his speech - he starts using “な” (”na”) at the end of his sentences a lot. Funny enough, while Hydra’s marker (”wa”) at the end of her sentences is a feminine marker, this one is a masculine marker. Which means that, long story short, Mary adopted the male version of Hydra’s feminine marker.

(from chapter 10)

The second bubble says “Maria ga nande “harai no chikara” ga tsukaenai no ka? Oshiete kuretara na”

(from chapter 10)

The last bubble, which is the end of the sentence, says “nemuri na”.

“I love cats” in his speech: “オレは猫が好きな” (”Ore wa neko ga suki na”)

Bloody

Here’s an example of the use of “nee” instead of “nai” that Bloody, Mary and Shinobu use (in this case, it’s Bloody who says it):

(from chapter 16)

“Iranee yo, betsu ni kore kara tatakau wake demonee shi”

Bloody is definitely the character that stands the most out of all the characters when he speaks because… He mostly speaks in Hiragana only. Of course, to not lead to mistakes in interpretation, his speech usually has one kanji or two but the idea is him talking just in Hiragana. What does that mean? That Bloody has a cute and childish way of speak.

Due to this way of speaking, the pronoun he uses to refer to himself is “おれ” (”ore” in hiragana).

(from chapter 1)

“Jaa, ore wo koroshitekure”

(from chapter 16)

“Demo… Kore ore no chi no nioi ja-…”

Now, one example of one speech bubble of his written in hiragana only (and it has one word that could be writen in kanji in it):

(from chapter 16)

“Are… Hontou da nande darou?”

However, what makes Bloody sound even cuter is - japanese names in hiragana:

(from chapter 27)

“I… Ichirou…” (usually writen as “一郎”)

Second bubble, “Shinobu” (usually writen as “忍“).

“I love cats” in his speech: “おれはねこがすき” (”Ore wa neko ga suki”)

And now, the only character I think is interesting that you, anon, didn’t ask about but that I think I should talk about her together with all of these:

Lily

Lily is the only character in Bloody Mary that has the marking of a foreign accent when speaking Japanese. This marking is: while the whole speech is writen in regular Japanese (hiragana and kanji), the last letter of her speech is in katakana:

(from chapter 20)

“Ita!!” (”i” in hiragana and “ta” in katakana)

(from chapter 20)

“Demo mate yo? Nande konna ni boroborona no ka?” (that “yo” and the “ka” are in katakana)

And, in case you’re wondering: Yes, even though she’s English, she is speaking in Japanese in those speech bubbles above.

Below is an example of how the text appears when she is talking in English (and, as you can see, the last letters of her speech in the bubbles below are in hiragana, which shows she has no foreign accent when saying this because she is talking her mother tongue):

(from chapter 20)

In case you don’t know about it, manga in Japanese is read up-down and right-left, however when the speech is in English, like in the picture above, it is read left-right and up-down, just as if it were writen in English.

Also here she uses the word 私達 (watashi-tachi), which implies she uses the pronoun “watashi” to refer to herself in Japanese.

“I love cats” in her speech when she speaks Japanese: “私は猫が好キ” (”Watashi wa neko ga suki”, that “ki” is in katakana)

I hope this answers your question, anon!

-- Caramel