#ashura-ou

[pluckingstarsoffmoontrees]

[ellayuki]

we're all made of glitter and nightmares (and baby, we thrive)

Tsubasa Chronicle Month 2023 

- Day 27: Villain's Day

~

"He's not a villain, mage. No matter what he turned into towards the end. I don't think he was ever a villain, in your or anyone else's story."

Fai looks up at the quietly falling snow, and tries to believe Kurogane's words. Usually, he has more luck, but today… Today, the grief is too strong. "You say that as though he didn't almost kill you and Sakura-chan and Syaoran-kun just to get under my skin and make me do as he wanted."

"You and I both know why he did that," Kurogane says, and it's strange, because Fai had expected him to sound exasperated, but. He doesn't. He just sounds tired. (And well, it is late.) "Maybe the way he went about things wasn't the best-"

Fai snorts. "Understatement."

"But he cared for you. He raised you when he didn't really have to and treated you like his own son. That has to count for something. Especially knowing that the madness wasn't something he could avoid."

He's right, and Fai knows it. Were it any other day, he wouldn't feel so contrary about it. Ashura was the only father Fai has known, and the ruin of Celes in the wake of his destructive madness will never change that. (And for all he knows, the madness was also part of Fei Wang Reed's convoluted plans.) "Yes. You're right. I just."

Kurogane steps close, wraps him gently in his arms. "You wish he'd have talked to you about it all."

"Yes." Yes.

[greyredroy]

so today  I offer you SMALL ASHURA  °˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°

tomorrow? who knows probably the same art but rendered oh yes, I believe Ashura-o also wore that clothes, when he was younger 

[hitsuzen-daijoubudayo]

[noa-ciharu]

If clamp put Taishakuten in Celes as well it would have been wild as hell. Fai would have turned out even worse. Imagine his little dysfunctional family with two(2) manipulate manslaughter manwhore dads

[song-of-amethyst]

Now read RG Veda :)

Ashura-ou still is the minor, yet important character.

Oh hello anon! You'll be happy to hear that I have, indeed, read RG Veda and also that I made myself go through all that suffering all in order to gather headcanons for Celes!Ashura. The things we'd do for blorbos am I right?

But it was definitely worth it. I loved how Clamp took RG Veda's Ashura's uncanny ability to know things (which was called 'Maya' or something? It's been so long, I think it's why he (and thus Taishakuten) knew the circumstances of Kujaku's birth) and made it have more of a presence in Celes!Ashura and in the consequences it had on the plot (specifically how he always "just knew" what Fai was up to, which made Fai very paranoid in trying to elude him--not using magic, for instance.) Though it turns out Ashura was playing 4D chess all along and already "just knew" Fai would return to Celes so. :D

Also I suppose this is an uncommon one but I ended up heavily headcanoning him as aroace. Though I see the point of people who ship him with Taishakuten! Clamp have a way of linking their works in a way that can create all sorts of implications you wouldn't get just from one or the other.

I wonder if there's a Taishakuten in Celes. I've always assumed there wasn't. That he'd gotten involved with Shashi and Taishakuten all so that his child would exist and survive, and that neither of them existed in Celes specifically because his child didn't exist (and Fai replaced him.) So in a sense, he became what his RG Veda self was trying to prevent his child from becoming (my hc/interpretation being that the curse would always manifest in the last of their line and given that Ashura's child in RG Veda was sexless it had to be him, but Celes was an alternative end), but he also remained stuck trying to change Fai's fate through extreme methods because it seems he wouldn't be himself if he wasn't destroying the world for the sake of his kid, adoptive or not, doesn't it.

[landofanimes]

CLAMP EXHIBITION (2024)

Merchadise: Foil stamped playing cards

The only commemorative product that covers all the works in the CLAMP exhibition!

A lot of characters here but I wanted to check who got the fancy cards, so after straining my eyes, here they are:

Diamonds ♦

K: Ashura (RG Veda)

Q: Kendappa-ou, Souma (RG Veda)

J: Misaki Suzuhara, Hikaru (Angelic Layer)

A: Hikaru Shidou, Umi Ryuuzaki, Fuu Hououji (Magic Knight Rayearth)

Clubs ♣

K: Syaoran, Princess Sakura (Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle)

Q: Yuuko Ichihara (xxxHolic)

J: Kimihiro Watanuki (xxxHolic)

A: Suu (Clover)

Hearts ♥

K: Sakura Kinomoto, Shaoran Li (Cardcaptor Sakura)

Q: Kobato Hanato, Ioryogi (Kobato)

J: Yukito Tsukishiro, Touya Kinomoto (Cardcaptor Sakura)

A: Sakura Kinomoto (CCS: Clear Card)

Spades ♠

K: Seishiro Sakurazuka (Tokyo Babylon)

Q: Hokuto Sumeragi (Tokyo Babylon)

J: Kamui Shiro, Fuuma Monou (X/1999)

A: Kamui Shiro, Fuuma Monou (X/1999)

Joker 🃏

Mokona (Magic Knight Rayerth)

Kero, Spinel, Momo (CCS: Clear Card)

[ka-go-me]

Ｖａｌｕｅｓ

【★】~ DeviantArt.com | Ashura-ou

[red-dyed-sarumane]

hello i am also a hiiragi magnetite enjoyer but a casual one (the songs just bang. they're really good. i loop them) and i had no idea until we became mutuals and i looked at your posts that their songs are part of a series. i had never looked into it. i am genuinely interested and if you ever wanted to rattle off to me what it's about i will eat that shit up fr. it's been so long since i was last majorly into a vocaloid song series

hi hi! i hope you dont mind a public answer bc you're far from the only one who didn't know. once u know what to look for tho it starts making a bit more sense.

in short: its a sci-fi, time loop-type story about a group of people trying to stop the world from ending

but i'll get into the songs a bit for u. (this is long)

in long:

yes its absolutely a series with the exception of fabric flower, perfection, nadenna, uni, and rasshaina. everything else so far is part of the same series. (in their personally uploaded songs obviously their commission songs arent part of it)

idk where to throw this in so im sticking it at the beginning all of the characters have names. i asked & they answered me directly. but they're keeping them a secret until they feel like the time is right so i would LOVE to tell u their names but uh. no one knows but hiiragi magnetite.

aru sekai series is actually a fan given name. hiiragi magnetite has never addressed the series out side of the songs themselves unless asked about it. if you called it aru sekai series to them, they dont correct you, so until they want to give it a name themself, i'll be calling it aru sekai series. the name coming from the first song aru sekai shoushitsu of course.

im going to put my proof its a series here first bc i see a lot of eng fans say they didnt know, and even jpn fans that realize theres a series will get it wrong & say theres 2 different series going on. its the same story its one series.

the easiest way & the way that made me realize it is aru sekai shoushitsu opens with "nami no ne no yume wo miyou ame hodo no uruoi wo/ umareyou mou ichido nakuse domo nai keredo" etc which is important in a lot of ways but for right now we're just going to focus on the melody of it.

this same melody occurs in all aru sekai series songs except for kugutsu ashura & laboratory. kyuuyaku hankagai has it in the last chorus at 4:48 as well as the more obvious 5:16. shuuen touhikou has it in the choruses as well at 1:20, 2:34, and 2:46. oumen mokushiroku is the only song so far that has it in lyrics as well instead if mixed into the instrumental, its the last lyrics starting at 2:30 "ah mata aete yokatta ne to itte hoshikatta no ni/ tasogare ga tokete yuku kiete yuku nanimo mienakunaru". unplanned apoptosis its a bit harder to hear & much shorter but its at 0:57, 1:06, 2:16, and 2:26. i dont know why i see people insisting marshall maximizer is a separate series bc its one of the obvious ones with the motif at 2:23 (or at least more obvious than some others). canon has it at 2:20.

theres also the theme most people realize that (kyuu)yaku, (shuu)en, and (ou)men have the same kanji as what starts lines in aru sekai shoushitsu.

a lot of songs also have text in the bg thats basically lore & helps connect & clear up somethings. a lot of these repeat lines from previous songs.

& then we get to kugutsu ashura & laboratory which dont have any of those but they are part of the series your key is in the lyrics using similar themes & concept & wording to other songs.

so what are the songs about

aru sekai shoushitsu

this is a headache of a song that, im so grateful they give us so many songs to expand on bc trying to make sense of it with no context was actually the worst. the absolute most important thing u want to know here is the lines they made into the motif for the series which establishes this tragedy is repeating. the theme of rain/blue is the symbol the current world is coming to an end and they'll later be "reborn" and try again.

no one has any idea what the repeating greek(?) means. i can figure out the words toroid & function & thats it & ive never seen anyone else get any farther with it. if anyone knows please i am begging u to tell me. anyway, from the word toroid alone though i know it has something to do with the world repeating itself.

thats the next main theme i'll get into. the story is a loop of sorts but i hesitate to say its a true time loop bc there is very clear emphasis on the concept of fractals, so repeating but not exactly the same, and toroid shapes, so not a perfect loop like say a sphere or circle would be. instead of a time loop sending them back to the beginning of the day its more like waking up in an alternate timeline altogether. its not a 1:1 learn what the day brings and get out that way. each time's different in its own way. the fractal theme drifts off a bit after a few songs but its still there overall.

the other big one is the concept of things seeming the same when theyre different, and this is easier to miss bc it's actually in the bg text rather than the lyrics. there's a whole paragraph about if a man dies in a swamp from lightning and then miraculously another bolt of lightning in the same area creates a man that's exactly the same in structure, memory, everything, is it still the same man as the one who died. this not only applies to the concept of the world itself, that not only is the world itself not quite the same when everything restarts, but is also a big thing with the characters themselves. there is something that people have that make them "people", something that can be lost, and without that, even though they seem to be the same, they're more of a "thing" than a "person." very big detail that was only a theory until laboratory was posted and confirmed it. aru sekai shoushitsu also says, in lyrics, "however, as long as you exist as people, the old world's legacy will continue on in the toroidal direction." so as long as they still have what makes them a "person" they can still be reborn in the next iteration of the world.

i think those are the most important things. the lyrics are a bit objective overviews of the next songs based on the starting kanji and also a bit more technical detail of whats going on, and the rest of the text is a more subjective view of the events than the lyrics.

kyuuyaku hankagai

this one's the start of our subjective character songs. all the text in it is at the beginning. i won't get too into it bc i dont think there's anything specifically u need to know from it, put it definitely helps put the level of desperation into perspective. theres a bit of play in it with the concept of "people" again, but its more about the lengths everyone will go to to do something about the situation iirc.

quite obviously this is the "past" song and establishes this has been going on for a while. i dont have an exact timeline for you, and im not telling you that because its the "past" that this is the beginning of everything. however. we do get told once again the concept of a "self" is important to the continuation of this. we also get a bit of world description, saying about how the world gets torn up and destroyed at the end.

short overview of it is they've been at this a very long time, everyone is well aware of the stakes, they're desperate & tired, but in the end they know even if they die at the end of the world because they cant save it, they're going to wake up and need to face it all over again. thats why theres so many long notes in this. this song is this characters cry for help. they cant let go bc if they do, if they lose their "self" its all over for them, they know that (although its not blatantly said at this point), so they have to keep going through all the "fractals" hoping that something they do sometime is going to work.

song has a lot of specific terms but its not as impersonal as shoushitsu u can feel the character in this song, especially with all the specific "byebye" written with various forms of regret and pain of separation etc. in an effort to keep this short im going to stop there for now.

shuuen touhikou

song that fits with the "end" (shuu) lines of aru sekai shoushitsu. quite literally an answer to the question of what would happen if they tried to escape instead of facing it.

the first part of text sets up the characters frame of mind, that they've been through this so many times trying to save everything, what if they didn't have to?

also in the text are the "shuu" lines from aru sekai shoushitsu, as well as part of the text from the beginning of kyuuyaku hankagai. and the last text deals with the concept of "ego" a bit instead of a "self".

the lyrics are such that this character is still part of whatever everyone's doing to fix this, but doesn't really agree with how its being handled, constantly being frustrated by how nothing's changing and no one wants to try anything too different. they entertain the idea of just running for it, that theres some town out there that they'll be safe if they can reach, that maybe running is enough to do something that they arent just standing around hoping anymore.

so effectively, no, even if they were to drop everything and run for it, it won't do them any good. (by extension they might also not be able to come back from it, but i cant say that for sure)

oumen mokushiroku

the concave "ou" song. also the only one i can accept the ""official"" english title for since mokushiroku is read as apocalypse in aru sekai shoushitsu.

theres no text in this one! unless u want to count the ou kanji.

this one's interesting bc instead of a part of the human team we have an angel who can't do anything to help them. shes watching over them, she wants to help, but for various reasons she just cant. she cant tell them it's not her fault, she cant affect anything in a way that matters. part of the reason she has the broken umbrella i think is just to really get across shes supposed to be the safeguard but she cant. for reasons beyond her control she cant.

some of the lyrics kind of mirror other songs, "inoru you ni" "omotai kaze furiharau you ni" for example relating to similar phrases in shuuen touhikou, "ima sakenda" like the main lines of kyuuyaku hankagai, starting of with rain similar to aru sekai shoushitsu among other things.

and of course like i said this is the only song that uses the motif in the lyrics & this is a theory but im putting it out there i feel like that implies the others are a part of this but this character in particular can actually do something about it. i dont know if shes actually the one who makes the whole world be reborn or not but i will put that out there.

theres also the line like "we lost something without a shape or feeling" & i think thats another tie into the theme of needing to keep their "self" for any of this to be possible.

unplanned apoptosis

theres a lot going on here. this chara is hilarious to me bc all the others are pretty collected about the whole thing all things considered and shes just acting out the whole time.

she hates it. shes fed up & i think should be considered an unreliable narrator to an extent. she tries to act like fine whatever i dont care but she does. she does. she also doesnt want to take blame for anything.

now, theres the line in here like jibun wo koroshite and this isnt in the way u might immediately think. i also hesitate to say its the same "self" the other songs are talking about considering its jibun rather than jiga. its more like suppressing & denying her true feelings to deal with everything. not that that wouldnt tie in to that big theme if she took it too far but for now shes safe.

theres text in this song this time tying it directly to oumen mokushiroku in case the art wasnt enough for u to know that. its a bit about fate being predetermined for them, a bit about things continuing in the same direction they've been, but shes brought back again

the songs really a lamentation of losing her past and future to this as well as showing how badly shes handling it.

and theres a bit of foreshadowing here in the what with the window(s) behind her being dark and broken while also being the exact same in composition to the one in oumen mokushiroku. which u think initially is because the angel cant help her, but the lines in canon about something causing the glass to break i really think is in reference to this and is saying she's at least part of the reason the angel cant help anyone. whether shes aware of this i cant say bc shes a liar who doesnt take blame for anything & since this is her viewpoint thats a bit unclear.

marshall maximizer

i think its that it's asa's art instead of sena yuta's that people think this is unrelated but honestly arent u people so confused. u look at these lyrics and think its a stand alone song? are u not so confused?

anyway, this is actually another big one in terms of plot

welcome to sunk cost fallacy the song. like literally. thats what it is, admitting they've put everything into what they're doing that it's probably not worth it, but they've been at it this long they can't just stop either. its gotta pay out eventually right-

but if u take anything away from this, its that "people" or at least this character can tell when someone isnt one of them anymore. theres the lines like "observing you acting like a person gone mad" "to you who's pretending to be a person gone mad" where both "person" and "you" are written in katakana much like when the concept of being a "person" is discussed in aru sekai shoushitsu. "you" (kimi) being similar to "thing" (mono) in this case (shout out to hayato in the hiiragima tag on twitter for figuring this out btw)

theres also the iconic lines up to hito de nashi? as though to say, but if you act as a person does, then arent you a person as well?

and then the text. its. heavy. discussing what it means to be a person, if there's something special about it, if it matters to be alive for yourself or because of something else (in a series context. so. being forced to live without the "self" they need for example) it even starts to get into the "mono" versus "hito" concept until both characters talking get too overwhelmed by it. the character they were talking to then "disappears" after admitting they might nit be a "person" which seems to say those that lose their "self" dont get to continue.

for now though, the character narrating the song is still a "person" they still get to try again, and they continue to

canon

another one i see people say isnt part of aru sekai series. it says aru sekai de in the first lyric. whats not clicking.

this ones more on why things arent quite working out.

theres a sense of balance they need to keep in place, presumably, so they can make it out of this, but each time something happens that upsets the balance. again, theres the mention of cracking the glass that i think is a reference to that window in both oumen mokushiroku and unplanned apoptosis. this seems to be their sign if things are working out or not, the chorus of this song seems to being saying if the glass breaks theyve messed up, nothings going to change and they need to try again.

this chara's like the others in that shes also tired of everything, but she still has her "self" so she has to keep trying. only she'll do anything that might work so they dont have to do this again, so they "don't say goodbye" again. which includes lying a bit so people will try her ideas.

theres also the part admitting they didn't want any sacrifices for this, but, clearly, that didn't work out in their favor. this is probably a pretty broad definition of sacrifice, can be everything from time, energy, etc to sacrificing their "selves" for their cause.

theres also text in this song!! its coded in the video but shunnanna in the hiiragima tag decoded it so we know the text! it talks a bit about coming to and realizing the worlds okay, theres pretty flowers, and it smells like it just rained. it also then repeats the nami no ne no lines from aru sekai shoushitsu. the last part talks about a risky experiment that got out of control and ended up destroying everything. which that last part, to me, seems to imply this whole thing was their fault in the first place.

in the end tho, this songs the same they don't accomplish much and have to try again.

kugutsu ashura

tongue twister mantra the song.

this ones interesting bc the character isnt human to begin with (being ashura) so i think thats why the motif isnt here. they get to repeat in their own way tho.

shes just that. a puppet really. she cant do anything to help out, rather she can only do what she's supposed to so to speak.

if u can get through the wording though theres a lot to this!

its a bit more of an outsider's perspective at how needlessly desperate this how thing is. things are awful, everyone's having a bad time, hell, people are actually dying, but no one listens to reason and things keep continuing on in the same way. it places a lot of blame on the place that started the whole thing, the place mentioned in the canon text i believe, honestly for a good reason, and kind of criticizes whats going on.

and then u have the ending that really cements its part of the series for me, the whole thing changes into what feels like almost hope which is a nice change for this series. it talks of moving forward, of getting new starts, it works in the theme of rain especially with urufu as the same base as uruoi wo from aru sekai shoushitsu, and then of course the "mata ibukuyou ni" being thematically similar to the "umareyou mou ichido" also from aru sekai shoushitsu

theres a lot of specifics in the whole thing & a lot of very specific word choice but i think that gets the point across for now

theres no extra text either but honestly the lyrics are quite enough context if u can decipher them

laboratory

this song is so heavy. like. up until now things have been left rather vague and theres room to doubt how dire everything is especially with how subjective the songs are but this.

this girl is losing her "self". thats the whole song. her just terrified and being completely unable to stop it even though she would do anything to change things. all that talk from the other songs about whos a "person" and whos a "thing" this is a "person" whos becoming a "thing" and doesnt have a choice in it. i dont know what she did. but this is her punishment for it. she ignored things she shouldn't've and now she cant be her "self" anymore.

this is telling us directly its not just the world theyre fighting for, theyre fighting for everything that makes them who they are too. it's traumatizing in its own way that they live through the end of the world repeatedly. but now shes living through the end of herself and she wont get another chance. and thats why theres no motif in this one. she is no longer a "person" she can no longer continue. theres also no extra text in this song.

thank u if u read the whole thing thats where we're up to right now!! i hope thats enough to at least get started. theres a lot of deep diving u can do in this series & its a lot of fun to keep up with as it happens bc sometimes a new song just clicks so many things into place.

[izartn]

I would love a fic where the Tsubasa crew ended up in the RG Veda world after all the canon happened, and end up passing a few days with Yasha and Ashura.

If we go by post canon Tsubasa, this means it's only Syaoran, Kurogane and Fai, but that's fine by me too. I prefer them all settled on their skin.

Imagine those three finding again Yasha and Ashura, only this time the two are alive and together as their counterparts in the country of Shura/Shara wished, and still gods, but at the cost of loosing everything else. I imagine it's be a very bittersweet feeling.

Imagine the Tsubasa trio (and oh, syaoran only has the memories but he never really met Ashura in person after all. maybe he takes care of remembering everything to tell his parents when he gets them back. the end of the shara arc was so melancholic and sad),

Imagine the Tsubasa trio swapping stories with the RG Veda duo, and the surprise and sad happiness at the recognition of their past companions names, living other lives, happy lives, in other worlds without them. Just the duo reaction to Kendappa being the ruler of Nihon, with Souma as her loyal retainer and a little sister to take care of and spoil, and Ryu having been a close friend of past Syaoran in Outo and also Souma of that world, and misterious Kujaku who helped Syaoran and the rest in Nirai Kanai, still someone of great power and kind nature.

I would love to read it if written skillfully, it could lead to pain, like Ashura deciding it was due to not being born in those places that everything went well, and Yasha reasuring them that it has nothing to do with anything. Maybe TRC-trio revealing what happened in the Shura-Shara world, that they were kind if misguided and people were happy with their rulers and remembered them for centuries.

They both died at the end of course, but given this is the og RG Veda counterparts, Ashura letting go of life after realising there would be no bringing Yasha back makes perfect rational sense to them. It was what Yasha intended to do in this world if there was no bringing back Ashura alive to themself.

Fai getting chills when TRC gets the resumed story of what went wrong in this world and it starts with Ashura going, my father Ashura-ou heard a profecy that I would... I don't think Fai says anything to them? But getting a conversation with Kurogane about the like good of it being the same Ashura-ou who raised him and fucked him up at the same time, and brought the destruction of Ceres by the end... Some startling parallels there, CLAMP did well in choosing the figure of Ashura-ou for Fai father. Didn't our Ashura also had a twin who was killed at birth or something? Or just the living half brother?

Maybe Fai does end up talking a bit with Ashura about the madness of Ashura-ou. And the fucked up thing about destinies and curses that others impose on you. And being saved by meeting their guys and a new family.... And then it gets melancholic and a but sad ;_;

But I belive that Yasha and Ashura are living incognito between humans, although without mingling much, so this visit from the TRC crew maybe makes them realise that although their lives are short, both of them deserve to care and be cared for their new friends and neighbors. Leave them in a better please than the desolation of, at least we both have each other for ever and ever of RG Veda ending, please. More like, without you by my side I wouldn't be able to enjoy life, but together we can be happy and meet new people and new places and help others.

Syaoran telling Sakura about this world, Kurogane and Fai meeting the true Yasha after his feather fake on Shura and realising how much was missing and not, and the measure of the love that's it's there across dimensions and lives for these disasters, Fai and Ashura awkwardly bonding, Syaoran realising this Ashura has never been a ruler of anyone and how that affects then, Yasha being a bit distant from these weirdos who galled through the sky until they sit talking and then warming up bc he's fond of their devotion and follow through, etc, etc.

Just. All these people meeting and being themselves, and the funny realization that Yasha and Ashura had been very powerful and/or gods the two times they've met, deciding the future of their worlds. That nobody is ever all gone.

Lovely lovely.

Of course I also want more Yasha/Ashura fic in general, but also more tsubasa proper crossovers with other clamp verses, or other canons in general so this scenario is like catnip for me, specially considering the arc of shara/shura which adds the extra knowledge for the TRC trio here.

[pluckingstarsoffmoontrees]

@completeoveranalysis I eventually decided not to include Emeraude and Zagato because I've never really heard anyone speak poorly of them.

Ashura was a good idea though.

[funnygeekpics]

So this opens up a can of worms that, as far as I know, CLAMP has never fully explored.

We know from other parts of TRC that people with the same essence can have different "true" names.

We also know that interdimensional counterparts can have slightly different physical appearances; RGVeda!Ashura-ou and Celes!Ashura-ou are counterparts, but one has pointed ears, while the other has normal ears.

But this seems like a whole other level. Like, according to the Outo arc, there is a boy whose real name isn't Ryuu-ou and who looks nothing like Ryuu-ou, but who is still a counterpart to the other Ryuu-ous. The same goes for the other people we meet in Outo.

Just in case there's the slightest doubt in your mind, Outo!Ryuu-ou says this after everyone gets teleported to Edonis:

I don't know what to do with this information, but I am sharing it with all of you.

[greyredroy]

ok but what if those two gatekeepers weren't just random background characters. what if they were close to ashura-o in their youth.

what if there was the same trope with a trio of friends where one of them is a prince and the others are formally his servants. (oh and you may recall here the xianle trio from tgcf as a bonus) what if ashura during his nobody-loves-ashura-everybody-dies-because-of-ashura era... (which was left behind the frames but I believe it happened!) ... begins to gradually withdraw from his childhood friends in attempt to keep them at a distance for their safety. ...until the day they were announced that they've been demoted to regular gatekeepers. and it didn’t raise any questions: the young king is getting too busy running the kingdom. also they aren’t nobles. one of them grumbles at the other: well, what else did you expect here? look who he is and look who you are. sooner or later everything had to come to this! thanks for the reading. have a nice day! ~

[hitsuzen-daijoubudayo]

[noa-ciharu]

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[theblueescapist]

I almost posted this as a poll response, then remembered that you are always only one step removed from ship wars in fandom, and decided to make a post on my own blog instead. I find it so bewitching to witness Touya/Yukito battling against Seishirou/Subaru because it's like CLAMP's two souls pitted against each other. I love both ships a lot, for very different reasons. Touya/Yukito is just so healthy. They love each other profoundly, they treat each other right, they have good communication once plot shenanigans stop happening, they are equals from the start. Their love is soft, and deep, but that doesn't mean it's not passionate; we never get to see that passion because of the target demographic of the manga, but Touya pinning Yukito against a tree is just one example of what's happening off-stage. Their relationship is what every mentally healthy person should aspire to. Seishirou/Subaru is just the opposite. They are both mentally unhealthy people at the time the manga starts, Subaru because of having such a heavy burden on his shoulders ever since he was a child, Seishirou because he's a sociopath. Their relationship starts off with a profound power and knowledge imbalance, in that Subaru being younger means that his potential is not fully developed the way Seishirou's is, and that the game Seishirou is playing with Subaru is rigged, since Subaru doesn't remember the rules. Subaru never stood a chance, and that defines their entire relationship even when they meet again later in life, because Subaru is still too emotionally damaged even as he's grown into his powers, while Seishirou still acts unaffected. A valid interpretation is that Seishirou would have killed Subaru if not for Hokuto's spell...except there is the little eye matter. Seishirou being a sociopath means what is generally considered normal doesn't apply to him, but if we try to translate Seishirou's wish into a more regular pattern, what Seishirou wanted was to be the only important person for Subaru. He couldn't let Subaru go any more that Subaru could, and that is profoundly unhealthy, and...profoundly relatable for anyone who's not mentally healthy and isn't in a healthy relationship. CLAMP never finished X, so we will never know Seishirou's last words to Subaru. Considering the precedent CLAMP set in this matter is in RG Veda's last volume, where the revelation of Ashura Ou's actual last words to Taishakuten completely change the reader's perception of the entire story, I cannot help wondering if CLAMP meant to include a similar scene for Seishirou's last words. We will never know, but the mere fact that CLAMP left us hanging means Seishirou/Subaru will always be in my head more than Touya/Yukito, since we can only speculate on what their whole relationship was meant to be.