#but he doesn't deserve to DIE about it

[baejax-the-great]

Really have to assume that anyone saying hector didn't deserve to die the way he did didn't actually read the Iliad

[gayofthefae]

Girl, I'm so sorry, but if you he really was gonna tell her he loved her before Argyle interrupted them, I would not want somebody to say to me

"I guess, I just, I don't know, I guess I just wanted to say that I love you."

You guess you love me? What, you don't know? Be sure then come back to me.

[moonfurthetemmie]

ok so hear me out actually. i have an idea for how nightmare could actually stop Petruccio and Gonzalo

through a series of very unusual events, Petruccio (and only Petruccio) is captured and taken to JR.

Gonzalo spends several days frantically searching for him, and eventually he runs into the Meme Squad. They think he's a little off, but when he tells them he's looking for a dear friend of his who went missing they're like "oh. that'll do it" and just accept it.

Then he tells them that Petruccio is a corrupt and they all go "oooooh. uh...do you perhaps know if people wearing gold pins with the letters 'JR' had anything to do with your friend's disappearance"

"...what do you know."

they point him to JR and tell him about Dream.

Gonzalo wastes no time in tracking this mother fucker down and attacks him. With the element of surprise and Dream severely underestimating how violent and murderous a radiant could be, Gonzalo pins him down and manages to get Petruccio's location out of Dream.

Dream isn't fatally injured, but boy did he get a rough and painful wake-up call. Gonzalo leaves him, with the vague threat of a fate worse than death if he finds out Petruccio is dead.

Petruccio's alive and mostly well. He was freaking the fuck out these past few days but aside from that and being treated like a rabid animal in confinement, he's fine.

Gonzalo breaks him out. Big hugs and apologies and shit. They find the Meme Squad again to thank the three for their help.

They end up hanging out with the Meme Squad for a while, and the pair decides that they quite like these three.

Nightmare, thinking that it's mostly common knowledge and that they'll find out anyways if they hang out long enough, mentions his and Dream's destiny bond. Upon prompting he explains what that is and is like "you were probably going to hear about it anyways, sooo"

And Gonzalo and Petruccio go "...ah. that's...an issue."

Nightmare: ...Why?

Gonzalo, tapping his chin: Well...We like you. We like you a lot. You're fun.

Gonzalo: Dream, however, needs to go.

Nightmare: Nightmare: uh

Petruccio: ...You said he's trying to kill you, though. That must mean he's working on a way to break that bond.

Nightmare: Uh?

Gonzalo, grinning: Oh, I think I have a wonderful idea.

And they leave before the Meme Squad can properly process any of that.

Gonzalo and Petruccio drop Francisco off at JR and tell him to offer help in breaking Dream and Nightmare's destiny bond. They explain everything he needs to know, but tell him that if he tries to betray them they'll know and he better fucking not.

he decides he doesn't want to find out what they'll do to him if he does, so he quietly does as he's told.

Dream finds something strange about this, but when asked Francisco's face becomes Afraid and Regretful for a split second. And then he smiles and shrugs and says "I just thought I'd see if I could help."

Something about Francisco also reminds Dream very much of Petruccio and Gonzalo, but he can't place what. it's the magic tracker they put on him btw. dream can sense it. it's faint enough though that anyone who isn't them won't know what it is.

fast forward and Gonzalo and Petruccio get a message from Francisco saying that the soul bond has been severed, and Dream is now dedicating most of his resources to finding and catching Nightmare.

Gonzalo and Petruccio crack their knuckles and start setting something up.

they're basically planning on making a big show of trying to quickly and forcefully making him a vessel for Yighraru. They're not even sure how well it'll go, but either they'll get the perfect revenge, or he will have a gruesome, painful death, or he'll be left a mere shell of his former self from the trauma. All of which is a win for them!

Either way. They set up a little stage somewhere. Dream vanishes for a few days around when they start setting that up. And then they day arrives, and the whole team comes. Bella hides off-stage. Antonio, Bea, and Lodo hide in the audience and wait for their cue. They're all in costume. They won't be recognized.

Gonzalo and Petruccio made absolutely sure that the Meme Squad would be nearby when they started.

Dream is tied up and dragged onstage. He's pretty beat-up. A crowd quickly forms, but the stage isn't easily accessible unless you frequently hop/vault/climb over 3-4 foot objects, so they mostly just murmur nervously. it helps that Gonzalo and Petruccio's faces have been on the news and no one is too eager to fuck with a corrupt and a clearly deranged and exceptionally pissed radiant.

They have their speech about how Dream was teeechnically right about Petruccio, but Gonzalo's just as bad if not worse. Also Petruccio was like this while he was still the positive spirit. They basically just poke huge holes into Dream's deep-seated beliefs about positivity and negativity while laughing at him. Publicly. There's probably at least one camera that they planted so that it'd get on the news at some point, in case no one filmed the thing themselves. It'd be no fun if there was no video recordings of their show!

Petruccio and Gonzalo realized pretty quickly after meetings him that, despite being reasonably upset about Dream's bullshit, Nightmare still really cares about him.

So, as expected, when the Squad rolls up to the show Nightmare goes "HEY WHAT THE FUCK??" and runs over to try and help Dream, Cross and Error in tow.

Antonio, the strongest, catches Cross and physically restrains her.

Lodo grabs Error and holds her arms behind her back, trying to ignore how badly Error's freaking out about being touched at all.

Bea just holds her arm out. Nightmare skids to a stop to avoid getting sliced by her fucking CLAWS and she grabs him from behind, pinning one of his arms to his body, and putting the blades on her gloves right under his chin.

Antonio and Bea mumble apologies. Lodo, not that Error can see it, slowly nods. she is also very sorry for this.

Petruccio and Gonzalo act surprised, and then go "aww, did you want to help him? After all these years of him hunting you down for the crime of being born a certain way, you don't want to watch him die? How heroic! You could learn something from him, Angel boy. A shame you won't have the chance to."

they pick on Dream some more about how fucking Nightmare just tried to come save him.

After a few moments of this Petruccio yanks Dream's head up by his hair and Gonzalo presses the blade of his dagger against his neck-

Nightmare "manages" to break free of Bea's hold, summons his spear, and jumps onto the stage, only to be grabbed by oddly familiar blue strings and yoinked mid-air. When he stops rolling he finds himself wrapped up in strings like the worst kind of mummy, almost entirely unable to move, and Bella steps onto the stage.

She kicks him (rather gently, but he still yelps) and goes "Don't you know it's rude to disrupt a theater production? Now look at you. So much for a hero."

She joins Petruccio and Gonzalo, and they start the 'real' show.

the crowd does not like the real show but they can't find it in them to turn away. Even Bea's straining to hear as much as she can.

but unbeknowst to everyone except Cross and Error, Nightmare has ooonnee little trick up his sleeve.

or more specifically. a pocketknife in his boot.

the eldritch magic being displayed and the way Dream's starting to freak out as his magic slowly turns blue isn't distracting the crowd so much that they don't notice as Nightmare trying to inchworm away and try to grab the knife. He can bend his spine and his knees and shit, he just can't move anything else. so he's just. awkwardly trying to contort his body so he can get that LITTLE FUCKING KNIFE and trying not to swear and draw attention to himself.

he manages to get it. freezes and looks back at the three trying to summon something. starts trying to cut the strings without cutting himself too badly. He gets one arm free, than the other, then his legs. As he's doing this he's trying to think of some way he can get Dream out of this. There's no way in hell he can take all three of them in a fight, and he's sure their lackeys that grabbed him and his friends are going to help bring him down. He's going to need something better than his spear, but what?

as he scrambles to his feet and looks around frantically, he is quite surprised to see the perfect weapon.

He exits stage left. and then quickly enters again and swings a metal folding chair at Gonzalo, Petruccio, and Bella's heads.

with three rather sickening BANGs, the three of them crumple to the ground. Dream slumps to the floor as well, alive but exhausted and in great pain. Everyone stares at the three in silent shock. Nightmare slowly lowers the chair and says, shakily, a little awed himself, "why did they even have this back there?"

Cross and Error wheeze and yell, loud enough for everyone to hear, "What's this?? It's Nightmare with the metal chair!"

the crowd starts laughing too, relieved that Dream is alright, and actually starts. cheering?

nightmare blinks. why are they cheering. what the hell

and then Gonzalo and Petruccio stir. Whether or not Bella survived this I'm not wholly sure, but the two spirits are quite durable.

Nightmare immediately goes "oh FUCK", drops the chair, and drags Dream's half-concious ass off stage.

Antonio, Lodo, and Bea step back and Bea's like "did...did he actually hit them with a metal folding chair?? holy shit."

Lodo signs something about being surprised that Gonzalo and Petruccio didn't account for the 100+ year-old wanted criminal having a back-up weapon and being very resourceful. They really shouldn't have had that chair.

Some people from the crowd get to the stage before Cross and Error do, and help Nightmare get Dream down. Dream's bonds are cut, a portal is made, and they get out.

While Gonzalo and Petruccio still very much want Dream dead and are really pissed about what happened, they're not too keen on fucking with any of them again after the Metal Chair Incident.

Francisco spills the beans to Dream when he gets better, and Dream goes 'oh christ. okay. do you want to stay here we can put you in witness protection and probably get rid of that tracker thing'. there may be gay shit after. maybe. too soon to know

Nightmare's face is once again circulating around the internet, but for once everyone is praising him. and he is still so fucking confused

Unrelated to the last post (joke) do you think an eldritch creature could take advantage of a destiny bond to fuck with DS Nightmare and Dream? because if yes they definitely will need extra help because Nightmare is in no shape to try and stop H!Lear and H!Puck.

The thing’s influence might be too powerful once he gets near the main sources of its power in this dimension (the rings), and when he gets there he suddenly can’t remember what he was trying to stop them from doing and just joins them

[egophiliac]

Sorry, most likely my memory being poor, but I thought Malleus' mom (don't know how to spell her name and too lazy to check how to spell it) was already an adult when Lilia ""proposed""?? Like I was always under the assumption that it was like a one-sided child crush on somebody completely out of your league you tend to have as a kid 💀

I don't think they say how old she was? although it's entirely possible I just misunderstood; my Japanese is...shaky. :') the actual line is "幼い頃に私に求婚したのは偽りか?", which I read as "isn't it true that you proposed to me as a kid?", and took as her being older than him, but not necessarily an adult (like, I was thinking of Lilia as being not quite a preteen and Mel being preteen/young teen). although I don't know if there's a connotation or something I'm missing that implies a bigger age gap, if that makes sense!

(and of course, I might also just be forgetting some other line -- if someone else knows, then please correct me! I need to know which headcanons need adjusting 👀)

BUT YEAH in a canon-y sense, Malleus is 178 and around the third-years developmentally. which makes me think that even though dragons have a way longer lifespan, they go through childhood at about the same rate as most fae (or at least the kind that Lilia is) and just kinda...slow waaaaay down once they hit adulthood. so it makes sense in my brain that he and Meleanor could've basically grown up together!

...it makes it angstier that way, anyway. :)

[shannonsketches]

[aromanticannibal]

btw talking about character reactions to bkg dying (i wrote the deku post several hours ago but shh) Aizawa :

The absolute disbelief on his face. And then the widening eyes. Horikoshi really had fun with that close up like my mans was really like nuh uh you are not ignoring Aizawa. The eyebrows? The wrinkles? The absolute panic and despair in this man's eyes? When he sees his student (one of the most promising and one of the best and one of the most reckless) dead on the floor?

And then the anger? The handhold, the grip on that other student that very much should not be here, that should be safe and not in the middle of a warzone with him, the panic and the sweat and the clenched jaw? I'm still and forever going insane

[thefirstknife]

The thing about the final lore tab is that, besides the fact that I'm devastated in ways I can't put into words, the way Saint was affected by this whole thing is unique.

This is obviously primarily Osiris' trauma that we can't really properly comprehend, but Osiris wasn't fully conscious for most of it. It fell to Saint to wait, and hope, that Osiris would be brought back and that he would wake up. There was no certainty for him there. And even before that, he watched "Osiris" being strange and distant and acting weird but obviously nobody could even begin to speculate that the person he interacted with wasn't Osiris at all, so the trauma went from there, from learning that he lost Sagira, then to the shock of Osiris being kidnapped and then the quest to bring him back and then him being brought back in a coma and then the 9 long months of waiting until he woke up.

The state of constant anxiety he experienced for almost 2 years total is nervewracking and gutwrenching. I don't think we can fully understand the impact of that on someone. And the best, or worst, thing is that Saint is infinitely patient. He is infinitely emotional and merciful and opts to be the better person and to wait and wait and wait. And hope that it can be fixed.

Except it can't. It can't be fixed. And not only can it not be fixed, but there will never be justice for it. It's impossible. There isn't a way to truly punish Savathun for what she's done. There is no relief or catharsis for Saint. While Osiris can mostly move on, Osiris did not really have to go through what Saint had to go through. Their traumas are different and Saint's is the type that no one can really understand and there is nothing he can do about it.

A younger Saint would've killed Immaru and then Savathun, 100%. But now he can't, because he isn't that person anymore. And yet, the grief and trauma remain and he has no outlet for them and nothing that can be done to enact any sort of justice. So he settles for pure rage, letting himself essentially vent that anger out, but still leave everyone alive. And there's really no true release here. He got a brief satisfaction of killing Savathun over and over, but at the end of the day, she will walk away and nothing will change and there will be no fix.

Which is why he comes back and just cries. As he said, this wasn't for Osiris, it was for him. It was his outlet for anger and nothing else. After that, there's nothing else left to do but cry. No one can really help him carry the burden of what he's gone through and besides: he's a Titan. He's the one carrying other people's burdens. Which just added to the trauma because for so long he's only cared for others, mostly for Osiris, and never really let himself fully grieve or talk about it. Saint never really processed the horrifying ordeal of constant concern for his loved one, then the realisation that his loved one isn't even with him, then the desperate search and then waiting for months and months for the hope that his loved one might wake up. Then Osiris is awake and we're forced to play allies with the person who traumatised both of them in an incomprehensibly terrifying way. Saint had no other way of attempting to make his peace with the situation.

Year of processing grief. I'm in shambles.

[ruvviks]

PLEASE DO NOT TAG AS YOUR OWN OC.

Vincent spends all his life searching for himself, searching for his spot in the world. He lives in the past and what will never be, longing for everything he has missed out on and everything he will never have. It is not until he learns he is dying that he comes to realize he has to live in the present, to enjoy life as it comes.; and despite his confusion, fear, and his regrets, he tries to live the rest of his life to the fullest, knowing very well he is living on borrowed time. OC WEB WEAVE SERIES: VINCENT "V" MAYER.

charles bukowski, pulp // by wiissa0 // loneliness for love; lovelytheband // louise glück, from 'unpainted door' // by biryuza // summer farah, i could die today and live again // tobia photographed by su yang // wake up; run river north // ruhlare // by julykings // lemonade; twin xl // ryan walker photographed by ryan pfluger // mary oliver, from 'marengo' // still not dead; dreamers // by lovelyopalite // by geloy concepcion // lemon drop; raynes // chris abani, ritual is journey // 'die milchstrasse', cover detail // louise glück, averno // i like cars; caroline kole // by cruellesummer // frances molina, o’death

[noirandchocolate]

The Yiga Clan isn’t a cult in my honest opinion.

They’re more like a crime syndicate.

If a crime syndicate was also an oppressed minority group subjected to a genocide in the distant past and continued marginalization in the present as they’re forced to lurk at the edges of and mostly outside society to eke out a living through theft and violence while the “good” members of the same minority who accepted the harsh terms of cultural genocide at the hands of the very people they served get to stand next to every other race that reviles them and call them “evil” and “traitors” because they seek justice against the divine-right monarchy that betrayed them first and have forsworn the goddess who never once deigned to help them.

They're not monsters to be mowed down, they're people. People who engage in genuine and understandable strife against authority figures who uphold systems of inequality.

...

Anyway, that's what I think.

(Edit: For even more of me rambling, see the notes.)

[em-exceeds-change-zearu]

dw about it. he's just like that.

og images under cut:

[sapphic-agent]

Me at Horikoshi right now. What a horrible time to be a fan of Izuku, Tomura, Nana, and basically everyone that isn't Bakugou

[deltarunebt]

Well, we've gotten plenty of Spamton (which is wonderful amazing showstopping incredible-), but for the sake of fairness... What, er, changes Jevil?

When Frisk meets him, he seems genuinely concerned about the King, but judging by the fact that 1) you said he (like Spam when we first meet him) hasn't had a Fourth Wall Moment™️ yet, and 2) he used his spot in the meme to encourage overthrowing the government...

Does Jevil just find a shadow crystal? Or meet that certain Mystery Man? Or does something else happen that sends him down a weird path?

Aha my bias shows a fair bit... admittedly, its also just because I have a better grasp on Chapter 2 than I do chapter 1, though. There's more to work with and that makes it easier to work with!

As for Jevil, no, nothing like that, its actually pretty simply just.. his view of King changes over the course of his adventure with Frisk. Or, I suppose, his opinion of King changes when he gets the reality check that no, King isn't going to make an 'exception' for Frisk and is Super going to Kill Them, and also that King considers Jevil a traitor for siding with Frisk and orders for him to be locked up while he deals with the Lightner and their 'Pet Flower' .<.

Jevil is aware that King is behaving irrationally and is concerned, yes, and he believe at first his job as Jester means he needs to fix it through 'cheering up' King, more or less. Eventually he realizes that that just... isn't going to work. Of course, Spade King isn't just straight up evil, he does believe he's in the right, but just like in base Deltarune, its not something Frisk or Jevil can just change his mind on. And Jevil is especially driven to make things right in that his naïve belief that Frisk will be able to change King's mind leads Lancer to ALSO believe that, which gets Lancer in trouble (same as it does in base Deltarune.)

I've kind of been referencing the song 'The Court Jester' in my head for the mentality turn Jevil has, albeit less... intense than that song sort of implies. Jevil goes from 'kids cartoon idea of what a court jester is supposed to be' to an Actual Court Jester- that is, someone who's job is to bully the King and call him a dunce to keep his ego in check.

Jevil actually doesn't get a fourth-wall moment at all (at least, not within my current outline of things), which arguably means he's more stable than Spamton is here... albeit Spamton's fourth-wall moment doesn't actually fully sink in for him, it's just sort of a Glimpse into something more that triggers a full-scale mental break down because he's kind of been teetering on the edge for awhile. Guy already has a puppet complex, having literal strings attached to him as NEO didn't uh- help, with that.

[shadystranger]

soulless sam being done with the back and forth dean was having with the guy but once the guy is about to get physical he steps in between him and dean intimidating him do Not try to do that with dean It's so hot i fear

dean was rock hard here

[columboscreens]

[thaliagrayce]

y'know what we don't talk about enough? Hazel died. We talk about how she grew up in the 30's and 40's and we talk about how out of place she feels in the modern world, but! She died! She was dead! She has spent more time dead than alive, and not by a close margin!

How does that effect a person??? We got some of it in the flashbacks, but once those caught up with her present timeline and she shared them, they just kind of... disappeared. And she was a regular girl with some weird past experiences. That's one way of doing it, sure!

I think it would have been a lot cooler if she was just a touch creepier. If she felt a little bit Wrong. Yeah, in general she's more approachable than her brother, she's more sociable and less closed off, but. If you actually spend any time with her, it can be difficult to tell which child of the underworld is actually more unsettling.

Hazel is bright of personality and has a dazzling smile, but sometimes she'll just... shut down. She'll go completely blank for like half an hour and nobody knows what to do with it. Sometimes she forgets she's alive. Sometimes she'll spout the grimmest shit you've ever heard like it's nothing, she won't even notice it's weird until the room goes quiet. She spent decades in Asphodel, which is designed to make people forget about themselves and wander around for eternity, only she didn't have the luxury of forgetting! Wild! After she comes back to life, sometimes she forgets that she's allowed to Do Stuff now. She can spend so long sitting and staring at nothing. Sometimes she'll start crying on cloudless days because it hits her again that she can actually feel the warmth of the sun on her skin and she can hear birdsong. Every little mundane experience is a blessing and she will make you remember that in the most foreboding way possible.

[jichanxo]

playing LJ and idk what’s in the japanese water but Yagami is INSUFFERABLE!!!

He’s so fucking annoying his only argument is “muhhh sawa sensei” when Kuwana, Reiko or Ehara say the horrible things their kids endured like SHUT UP!!!! Reiko and Ehara’s children killed themselves bc they were bullied, I understand and support them fully for getting revenge, especially since the justice system is shitty when it comes to such cases

Did you feel the same or am I tripping?

putting this under the cut

sorry i know you sent this days ago and maybe your opinion has changed since then but i'll answer the best i can? (also i hope i don't accidentally spoil anything ahahah)

this take is not uncommon (and i felt the same at some point, though i've since changed my mind) so no, you're not tripping lmao. despite changing my mind, the fact that people say this pretty regularly probably means the writers didn't execute the idea as well as they could have. i would say that it feels clumsy and almost like a joke (cue sawa-sensei counter) to the point that it detracts from the point they're trying to make. i think some people will disagree with me on this -- rather than the writers, it's the players who aren't fully understanding what's being said to them in the text -- but regardless of whose "fault" that is, yes it's a Known Thing

(funnily enough, during my first playthrough, my sister mentioned seeing a meme about "sawa sensei" getting repeated a lot, and by the time the 2nd/3rd time hit we were like OH MY GOD THE MEME WAS REAL. which is a funny memory to me. lmao)

i think the thing that's getting lost here is that the "sawa sensei" argument is not meant to discredit how kuwana, reiko and ehara feel about the injustice. this part is not in question. yagami's stance on doing illegal shit is also not relevant to this conversation (and i'm not sure i could provide a compelling argument on this front anyway, aside from that he's very anti-murder, lol. clearly he does illegal shit himself so he's not against doing illegal shit based on principle alone. depends on circumstances probably)

sawa gets brought up because she clearly did not deserve to die. almost everyone agrees that sawa was a good person. kuwana puts her on a pedestal for confronting him about kusumoto being bullied, idealises her and muses that she would've understood him for what he's doing (killing people. and this is clearly a stretch). reiko says that sawa was the only person who visited kusumoto in hospital without an ulterior motive, which is one of the best testaments of character that she could give, really, imo. ehara probably holds a negative opinion of sawa for her false testimony about there being no evidence of bullying -- but this was clearly done under pressure of the people around her, and ehara's opinion is the exception to the rule.

so, sawa is a good person. so what? who cares? what's the point of bringing her up?

the point of what kuwana is doing is that he sees it as a way of righting the wrongs that the justice system leaves unaddressed. he needs to believe that what he is doing is right, because it gives him purpose and distracts him from his guilt.

sawa's death contradicts this. even if he and reiko didn't kill her themselves, it's proof that their extreme actions have negative consequences. they can say that the system is wrong, look what this monster did to my son, etc etc. but what they are doing also harms innocent people. the justice/revenge/whatever they pursue is at the cost of other innocent people. sawa herself represents the unforeseen cost of kuwana's self-imposed mission to kill bullies. they can justify themselves all they want, but sawa's death is a reality they can't talk around. they acknowledge she was a good person, but she died because of their actions. is this a worthwhile cost? yagami doesn't think so.

and the thing is, kuwana and reiko can be persuaded.

at least, that's kuwana's opinion about reiko

and later he says this about himself.

these screenshots are pulled from a youtube video w/ english dub so take it with a grain of salt, but you get what i'm trying to say here.

i think the repetition is the point. they agree sawa was a good person. they can be persuaded away from their current stance (that murder is an acceptable response). by repeating himself, yagami is using the argument that's most personal to them, mostly likely to convince them. repetition is not a bug, it's a feature. whether or not this was conveyed well by the writers is another argument altogether, but yagami's point itself is sound.

truthfully, i think LJ could have benefitted by leaning into what makes this case personally compelling to yagami. if you're not paying attention, the "but sawa sensei" argument can feel pretty flat, but putting emphasis on yagami's experiences would help it feel more rich and justified aside from "innocent people dying is bad" (even though that is a sound argument on its own). he does mention emi, i believe it's only once, so it's not like they don't do it at all, but i would like more. the impact of emi and of JE specifically is that yagami doesn't like to leave things unaddressed when he can do more, and that's clearly a motivating factor here. he won't leave kuwana alone for as long as there is 1. something yagami can do about it and 2. kuwana still intends to keep killing

think about the fact that yagami's parents were killed by someone seeing vigilante revenge, both a deeply personal tragedy, and a life defining event that set him on the path he walks now. leaning more into that would have helped, or at least been interesting, in my opinion. obviously it's not 100% the same since yagami's father was the lawyer and not the accused, but the key parts (vigilante justice + collateral damage) is there. of course yagami is trying to change kuwana's mind. not only does yagami understand kuwana's pain wrt the pain of inaction (yagami's regrets about emi) but he's experienced the aftermath of collateral damage, himself.

of course, yagami's personal experiences are only relevant to us, as viewers. sawa is still the best argument to convince kuwana and reiko (and i can easily imagine reiko brushing yagami off if he talked about his backstory LMAO), so that's what we get. sawa is what matters to them, so sawa is what he will keep reminding them of. that's why the sawa argument is what it is.

we can get into discussions about the inevitable failure of the legal system and what that means for "real justice", but we would never come to a consensus. instead, i think it's better to look at how kuwana and reiko are impacted on a personal level by their actions: neither of them have moved on, even after seeking their justice. they remain stuck in the past. their actions grant them no closure, and robs them of a future (reiko as a politician and mother, kuwana as a humble handyman: but as far as we know, a pretty damn good one considering how well he was able to leverage his connections to avoid being caught this whole time... at least in my opinion)

when kuwana argues, he asks how they should seek justice if legal avenues don't grant it to them. he asks, "what about the reiko kusumotos and akihiko eharas of the world?" he is right to point this out.

when yagami argues, he asks how revenge can be justified if innocents will suffer (and die) for it, even unintentionally. he asks, "what about the yoko sawas of the world?" he is also right to point this out.

there is no easy solution. they both have a point. that's what the story is ultimately about. kaito says it straight up at the end of the game:

well, that's my take. admittedly i'm not as well versed on LJ as some people are, so i could be remembering and paraphrasing some things wrong. i've seen people who really like LJ's writing, and others who straight up hate it LMAO, so yknow, your mileage may vary. hopefully this will at least help you understand the other perspective

if you want to hear another take on the sawa sensei argument, i'll put this here. i drew on it quite a bit while writing this, so yknow, credit where credit is due.