#but oh well I did the same thing with persona 5 and ryuji

[kingofanemptyworld]

I must resist the urge to look up fanart of akihiko I must resist the urge to look up fanart of akihiko I must resist the urge to look up fanart of akihiko I must—

[blackhakumen]

Mini Fanfic #1254: A Kiss Filled Christmas Morning~ (Persona 5 X Sonic)

9:13 a.m. at LeBlanc Café...........

Morgana/Lavenza: (Happily Presents Their Gifts to One Another) Merry Christmas/Happy Three Year Anniversary!- (Eyes Widened a Bit Before Giggling Softly Afterwards)

Lavenza: ('Sighs Happily') To think we've managed to stay together as a couple for this long~

Morrigan: (Snickers a Bit at the Memory Him and Lavenza Shared Three Years Ago) Yeah, and it all started when we both confessed on Christmas of all days.

Lavenza: (Giggles Some More) That was a silly moment we both shared indeed~ (Smiles Softly) But I'm glad it all happened all the same.

Morgana: (Smiles as Well) Me too. (Gives his Girlfriend the Gift He Got For Her) Here's hoping you like the gift I got for you this year.....

Lavenza: Come now, dear. (Opens her Gift Up) You know better than I do that I'll adore whatever gift you giv- (Suddenly Let's Out a Loud Gasps as her Eyes Starts to Sparkle at the Gift She Starts Picking Up in Front of Her) Mona-Chan!~ I-I-Is this what I think this is?~

Morgana: (Crosses his Arms Together With a Proud Smile on his Face) The exact Pochita plushie you wanted for a good while now? Why, yes, I do believe that's certainly what it is. You like?~

Lavenza: (Smiles Brightly) I love!~ (Happily Hugs her Plushie Tightly) It's the most second cutest thing I've ever seen!~ (Playfully Pulls her Boyfriend's Cheek, Making him Giggle Instantly) First being forever you, of course~ It's a shame we are not old enough to watch Chainsaw Man quite yet.

Morgana: (Opens his Present Next) Considering how graphic and mature Ryuji describes it to be, I say it's for the best to wait for no- ('GASPS') No way.... (Pulls his Gift Up in Front of Him) You got me a night robe!?

Lavenza: (Happily Nodded) In your definitive size~ I took the liberties of buying it for you at the mall the other day when you weren't looking. (Watches Mona Putting on the Robe) Is it nice and comfy on you?

Morgana: (Smiles Brightly While Showing his Dark Blue Colored Night Robe He's Now Wearing) Heck yeah! I feel like a million bucks already. (Hugs His Girlfriend Lovingly) Thanks, Lavenza~

Lavenza: (Hugs Morgana Back) You are always welcome, my dear Morgana~ Oh!~ And addition to that- (Smirks Seductively) Guess what's up in us at this very moment~

Morgana: What's above u- (Eyes Widened a Bit at What Lavenza is Pointing Him To) Ohhh God is a mistletoe. I didn't even know it was up there. (Turns Back to Lavenza) Did you?

Lavenza: (Twists Her Finger onto her Cheek While Moving her Upper Body Side to Side in an Innocent, Playful Action) I may have discovered it's placement when we first walked into the café together~ But that's neither here nor here at the mo-

Morgana cuts Lavenza off mid sentence by suddenly kissing her on the lips for a few seconds before pulling back, causing the young Velvet girl to blush.

Lavenza: (Places her Hand onto her Cheek With a Bashful Smile on her Face) O-Oh my~ Feeling eager today, aren't we, Mona-Chan?~ (Suddenly Hears the Sound of Mumbling) Mona?

Lavenza looks over to see a completely flustered out Morgana rambling on to himself, contemplation on what he did just now.

Lavenza: (Giggles Softly) (And there he goes, being as cute as always. It'll probably take a while for him to come back to his sense...) (Forms a Bright Grin on her Face as She Holds Up a Blue Colored Lipstick She's Now Holding in her Hand) (It's nothing a few kisses can't fix!~ (Forms a Mischievous Smirk on her Face Afterwards) (Especially now with this new lipstick I have yet to try~)

Tae: (Watches Lavenza Properly Putting Lipstick All Around her Lips While Sittong Next to her Girlfriend, Sae Niijima, On the Bar's Table) ('Sigh') Young love......It's way more tooth-rottenly sweet these days than I last remembered it was years ago. (Takes a Sip of her Cup of Hot Coco)

Sae: (Turns to Tae) You've started dating in a young age as well, Tae-san?

Tae: Yeah. Back when i was like...11 or 12 I think? It wasn't really anything special to it besides the kissing and the hand holding. (Rolls her Eyes a Bit) Even more considering the guy I was with at that time, was way more immature than yours truly. Appericated the learning though. (Leans Over to Sae With a Smirk on her Face) Got any dating stories you wanna share as well, my empress?~

Sae: I've only dated one person in the past. (Crosses her Arms Together With an Annoyed and Disgusted Look on her Face).And it was with Chad of all people.....

Tae: Ooooh~ He sounds like an asshat already~

Sae: (Sighs While Rolling her Eyes) You don't know the half of it. He was one of the popular kids in my sophomore year in high school and his narcissism and ego were as cheer as the bright sun. Unfortunately for younger me, I never realized how terrible he was up until the day he another girl right in front of me, during prom. (Takes a Sip of her Hot Coco)

Tae: (Eyes Widened in Disbelief) You're joking.

Sae: (Simply Shrugs) Wish I was, but.... it's the truth, no matter how much I want to deny it. He humiliated me and broke my heart so badly that I decided to pit complete focus on my work before and during my prosecuting career and vow to never get caught up in any romance related nonsense ever since. (Shyly Turns Away a Bit While Blushing) At....least until the day I've starting falling for you, of course.

Tae: (Heart Begins to Melt in Pure Happiness) Awwww~ I rekindle your need for romance?~

Sae: In a way. I still find the concept ridiculous at times, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy exploring with you this whole time. (Turns Back to Her Girlfriend Next to Her) So thanks....(Smiles a Bit) For loving me.

Tae: (Smiles Brightly) Likewise~ (Looks Up at Another Mistletoe Hanging Above Them Before Turning Back to Sae With a Seductive Smirk on her Face) You know, I think I may have found a way to celebrate this lovely of occasion right now~

Sae: Really? (Smirks Back at Tae) I was thinking the same thing before you even mentioned it~

Tae: Then guess what we're both thinking then, genius?~

Sae: Mistletoe time?~

Tae: Bingo~

The two girlfriends lean over and lovingly make out with one another under the mistletoe, exactly what they were both thinking of doing.

Futaba: (Giggles Softly While Twirling Herself Around and Holding Up her Christmas Present of the Year, Astro Bot) Welcome to one of the homes of our big, nutty family, little guy!~ Hope you enjoy your stay for years to come.

Astro Bot: (Happily Raises Both his Hands Up in Rejoice Before Hugging his New Friend)

Futaba: (Heart Begins to Melt in Pure Happiness Before Hugging Astro Bot Back) D'awwwww~ I love you too, Astro~ (Gives Astro a Big Kiss on his Metal Cheek Before Turning Over to the One Who Gave Her the Gift in the First Place) Thanks again for the awesome gift, Big Sis Tae!~

Tae gives The Oracle a thumbs up while still making out with Sae under the mistletoe.

Futaba: (Covers Astro's Eyes) Don't mind those lovebirds over there, bud. It's just them being cutesy and icky for the holidays. (Starts Blushing a Bit) Not like I'm any better with Inari, but still~

'Mechanical Sounding Sigh'

Futaba: (Turns to See Omega Sitting to her Left, Sulking Before Pouting at Him) And what gotten you in a grumpy mood, mister? The time for joys and cheers has begun, ya know?

Omega: I'm aware.

Futaba: (Pulls a Closer Stoll Up and Takes a Seat Right Next to Omega and Pulling Astro Down on the Table) Then talk to me, big guy. What's wrong? You don't like the presents you got this year around?

Omega: (Shakes his Head) Negative. I am intrigued with the gift I've received this year, especially that masterpiece over there. (Points the Duo to a Punching Eggman Bag on the Other Side of the Room) Even if it's nowhere near as highly advance as your new robot companion.

Futaba; (Snickers a Bit) That's a real funny lolking punchba- (Slowly Turns Back to Omega) Wait a minute, new robot companion? Omega, are you jealous of Astro Bot right now?

Omega: (Eyes Widened a Bit Before Quickly Turning Away) I cannot confirm nor deny that accusation..

Futaba: (Gives her Robot Friend a Stern, Sisterly Glare) Omega, tell me. (Pulls her Phone Out her Shorts Pocket) Or do you want me to tell your moms about your poor communication skills again.

Omega: (Sighs in Defeat While Turningaback to Futaba) I confess. I am jealous....and afraid that i will be replaced as your best robot companion by a smaller, more superiorly adorable robot model to your left.

Astro Bot: (Frowns at his Bigger, More Fearsome Fellow Machine)

Futaba: (Clenches onto her Chest, In Disbelief at What her Best Friend Just Said) What? ('Groans') Come here, you big dumb-dumb!~ (Gives Omega the Most Loving Hug Imaginable) Everything you said just now is completely bogus. There's no way in heck I'm replacing my best robot buddy!

Omega: Do you...truly mean that?

Futaba: (Looks Up at Omega With a Reassuring Smile on her Face) 100%!~ We've been friends for a good long while now and I always cherish every single moment I shared with you, including this one. Do you really think I would throw that I would go out of my way to replace you after all of that?

Omega: (Looks Down onto Futaba's Genuine Eyes For a Brief Second Before Shaking his Head) No. That would be illogical at best.

Futaba: (Happily Nodded in Agreement) Exactly. I love you, big guy, that won't ever change, so don't you dare forget for as long you live, got it? (Picks Asteo Bot Up) Also, please don't be too hard on this little guy. He looks up to you a lot.

Omega: (Raises an Eyebrow at the Duo) Is that right?

Astro Bot: (Happily Nodding at Omega Along with Futaba)

Futaba: Yep-Yep! Before we followed you downstairs, he's been wonderful who you were and I basically I had the honor to brag about how awesome you truly are in the battlefield. Now he wants you to teach him your ways.

Astro flexes his small, robotic arm to Omega while giving him a proud thumbs up.

Omega: (Leans Closer to Examines Astro Bot in Front of Him) Hmmmm........You seemed to be showing a lot of promise despite your tiny arms and cute design.

Futaba: (Smiles Brightly) Right!? Especially the cuteness side. He can definitely use that to his advantage! Just give him a chance, will ya? (Shows Omega Astro's Cute Puppy Dog Eyes) You don't wanna say "no" to this face- (Gives Omega the Puppy Dog Eyes as Well) Or mines too, do you?~

Omega: (Stares at the Two Puppy Dog Eyed Duo Fpr a Few Seconds Finally Coming Up Woth the Conclusion) Very well. I, E-123 Omega, will instruct you on how to fight, as your mentor and big brother figure.

Astro Bot: (Happily Claps his Hand in Rejoice)

Futaba: (Happily Pumps her Fist Back) Yes!~ Knew you come around, big guy!~ (Fprms a Cheeky Grin) And what better way to reward for your kindness than to recommend kisses from yours truly, under the mistletoe, hm?~ (Points Up at the Mistletoe Above Her and Omega)

Omega: (Shrugs) Tradition is tradition.

Futuba: That's the spirit. (Tries Reaching Up to Omega's Height Only to Give Up Shortly After) This is not working. Hey, you mind slouching your elbows down a bit?

Omega: (Hunches Himself Down to Futaba's Level) Like this?

Futaba: (Smiles Brightly) Perfect! Now come to Momma Oracle!~

Futaba hugs Omega once more before kissing one side of his head piece, all while Astro Bot runs over and hugs the other side.

While that's going on, the entirety of the café has been a kissfest of the making with Lavenza testing her new lipstick out by kissing a still flustered Mona on the cheek and the two girlfriends, Sae and Tae, are still making out without breaking a sweat.

Little did any if them know however, is that Sojiro and Yusuke has been watching them for a little while now, in the background.

Sojiro: ('Sigh') Look at this madness. Had I known it would turn out this way, I would've left only left one mistletoe up there a long time ago.

Yusuke: (Artistically Examines the Kiss Fest From Afar) You should give yourself more credit, Sojiro-San. You've just given me an idea for the holiday's artwork this year.

Sojiro: (Raises an Eyebrow in Curiosity, at Yusuke) Oh really? (Snickers a Bit) What're you gonna call it? "A Mistletoe Ball" or something?

Yusuke: (Happily Nodded to Sojiro) Yes, actually. (Presents Sojiro his Artistic Vision) Imagine, you will, a nice, exquisite dining hall where many sets of mistletoes are seen hanged above the area as the guests would be seen kissing and receiving kisses from their love ones close by, as they dance and socialize the Christmas night away until the very next morning. A fascinating premise for a potential masterpiece indeed, no?

Sojiro: Yeah, riveting. You're more than welcome to make that piece a reality after you help me prepare for dinner layer on. The sooner we get it all done and accounted for, the better. (Walks Back to the Kitchen) Hopefully the kiss fest will end along the way I'll tell you that much.....

Yusuke: (Simply Nodded to Sojiro) Of course. Bit let's not waste too much time. (Walks into the Kitchen as Well) My vision is still at large as we speak.

Sojiro: Uh-huh. Whatever you say, Inari.

Merry Christmas To Alland To All a Goodnight!!

@princekirijo

@bestpony666

@decibelcoatl

@caleb13frede

[lilrambo-shooter]

Over-analyzing the Phantom Thieves' escape from the Final Palace [SPOILERS]

Hopefully this hasn't been done already. If so, oh well, it was fun for me, who just finished their first playthrough last month.

This post has spoilers for the true ending of Persona 5 Royal.

Ok, I have thought about the animated cutscene of the PTs escaping Maruki's crumbling palace more than I thought I would. There's the memes of Goro's (possible?) last words being a complaint about being crushed by 5 women, the worry of the PTs when Joker lets go of the rope, etc etc.

One thing I kept going back to, though, was how we end up with the comic relief of Goro ending up at the floor of the Mona Copter.

So let's start from the beginning of their escape. The palace is crumbling, and the PTs are seemingly stranded on an island of rubble, with no way out. Morgana then urges everyone to hop into the Mona Car:

(Forgive the crappy screen pics, my PlayStation doesn't like 3rd sem stuff)

So the first thing we see is Haru leaning up to the window, with just a hint of Goro's outfit in the bottom right corner.

The next thing is a shot of the whole bus:

Two things: 1. Out of the two pictures, there's no sign of Futaba! 2. Where does this put Haru and Goro? Well, both of these questions have the same answer: In the far back!

One thing about the Mona Bus's design I never quite realized with my playthrough of vanilla P5 years ago was that there are seats running perpendicular to the first two rows. Based on the angle of the first image with Haru, we can see the back of the seats from the second row. For Goro, there is a few frames in which he is seen in the back:

Therefore, we can surmise this setup:

But what about Futaba? Even though it's from a previous cutscene and different escape attempt, we can see that the layout of the characters is the same, with the addition of Futaba in the back:

So that's what it's like for seating arraignments in the Mona Bus. What about the Mona Copter? The first shot we get of everyone sans Joker gives us Goro's comic relief:

We can see that all five of our pretty thief gals are up front, Goro squished on the floor, Ryuji and Yusuke in the back, and Joker hangin' on down below. It seems pretty packed. Goro's got a point, Mona! Or does he? Time to hit the Thieves' Den!

It's slightly different on the inside compared to the cutscene, but the layout seems to be the same. We don't get a good look at the back, so let's look at that:

Hmm, a good amount of open space! But wait, there's more! As it turns out, there's even more space in the back.

Based on this, here's the sketch of the Mona Copter's layout:

What's the deal!? There seems to be plenty of space! How did the Mona Copter become so front-heavy? We can see that the characters' arraignments are generally the same, save for the fact that Haru, Futaba, and Goro moved to the front, and Joker straight up just doesn't get put inside. Now, I'm no expert of the Metaverse, but I'd like to imagine that if Mona suddenly poofed from a bus to a helicopter, our PTs wouldn't so wildly get thrown about. Plus, we can see in a later part of the cutscene, when Maruki decides to make his final stand, that there is implied to be more room in the back with Ryuji and Yusuke:

Here we see Makoto grabbing the edge of the seats in the front, and Ryuji and Yusuke bracing on their respective sides. It's quite odd how they ended up like this.

My takeaway? Other than the fact that this whole post is ridiculous? Something happened mid-transformation. Maybe things didn't happen as instantly as we think, or the Mona Copter teetered around as Mona regained balance. Or both! Let's say they all began to fall forward as the Mona Bus began to fall right before the transformation. Those in the second row would have the seat in front of them to brace on, while the three in the front could brace on the dashboard. Meanwhile, Futaba, Haru, and Goro have a lot more space in the back to fumble around in. With the loss of seats in the Mona Copter, it's perfectly possible that while transforming, the three in the back lost balance, tumbled to the front, and Goro just happened to be the unlucky one. I'm going to be honest, I have no clue on what that means for Joker.

This whole bit with the Mona Copter was most definitely just for the gag; moreover, we can just say it's Mona giving Joker a good view of Goro, who Mona knows is most likely going to vanish when all is said and done. Doing his bestie a favor and acting as a wingman, eh? The front's glass only goes so far along the bottom the the Mona Copter, and Goro is busy taking up all of it, rendering the sight of Joker only visible to him, Ryuji, and Yusuke.

So yea, do what you wish with this information, I don't care. I just wanted to express my thoughts about this whack ass cutscene lmao

[2030kamenriders]

Ended up finishing Persona 5! Although I might do one replay, for reasons. (The game has a lot of stuff in it, and there's some stuff I wasn't able to get to which I do want to complete, like a few of the Mementos missions.)

Here are some of my overall thoughts:

That boss battle (as well as the big battles leading up to it) were really tough, but luckily not as bad as I worried it would be? (To be fair, I kept the game on Easy Mode the whole time.)

Lots of big themes that will take a while for me to process fully as it all settles into my head

I appreciate the ACAB undertones of the ending. It feels like that belief is a very core part of the main character, regardless of how you play him, so it would be a slap in the face if the game said "and then he became a cop". I also was very happy when Sae decided to switch to being a defence lawyer, and the twin wardens stopped being cops.

Still kinda sad that the main character still ended up in juvie for a while, but at least he's free by the end of the game.

Morgana survives! And he decides to live permanently with the main character too.

Akechi... I don't know if he survives? He's never seen after the incident in the cruise-ship-themed level. There's a part at the very end where the main character can go around town saying goodbye to his friends, but as much as I tried, I couldn't find Akechi. (The Jazz club owner seemed worried about him too.)

Looking back, I do think there's something kinda funny about how a lot of the story in the actual boss-battle arc takes place on December 24th. Definitely an interesting holiday special.

Looking at the game overall, I think my main complaint is: there were a few really weird things?

For starters: did the swimsuit scene really have to be involved in that one part of the cruise-ship themed level? Earlier, after the first boss of the game, I thought "Oh, they're depicting some questionable stuff to really drive home how much of a creep the gym teacher is." But then the game would slip in a few "fanservice-y" moments here and there, and it just felt really uncomfy (and hypocritical, considering the first boss battle of the game).

As mentioned earlier, if the main character has a strong-enough friendship with Hifumi, they can confess to her. This is usually marked by the game saying something like "hey, think about your next few words carefully". This didn't happen when talking to Yusuke at the same friendship level, so I guess the game assumed Joker would just be straight. But... it does happen with the doctor lady? Who is a grown-up (after all, she is a doctor). I didn't end up picking that option, but I really hope that the doctor declines that type of relationship, because again (gestures to the first boss battle of the game). It just seems very hypocritical to have the highschooler protag of a game end up with an adult like that. (And on top of that, he has to deal with the reporter lady too.)

I just think the story would be much better and more consistent if they didn't put in the creepy stuff from the above two points.

Oh, I almost forgot: there's also these 2 guys that occasionally show up in the game, who seem like some nasty caricatures, while contributing nothing to the story or gameplay. Luckily they only show up about twice or so, so I can erase them from my brain kinda easily. But every time they do show up, it's just really uncomfortable. Why did the game developers put them there?

Anyway, moving back to things I like about the game: if you max out your friendship with another phantom thief, their Persona monster transforms into an even stronger one. I also really like some of the "showtime" special attacks (my favourite is the one where Yusuke and Ryuji are eating lunch).

Sojiro seems nice (even if a bit boomer-y at times), and I respect him! I managed to max out his friendship level, and it seems like he now kinda views the main character as a sort of son. It also kinda fits with the whole sibling dynamic that the main character has with Futaba.

Kasumi just. Stops showing up at some point in November/December? Which is a bit strange. I was kind of expecting her to show up at the final boss battle, despite not being an official phantom thief. The game even has all the side characters with a maxed-out friend level (and Mishima) make some sort of cameo appearance in the cheering crowd during the final battle. But she wasn't even there, even though I know for a fact that I maximized the main character's friendship with her. I'm kinda concerned?

[petorahs]

☀️ anon

"I like girls that are mean to me" - not me but dude I get it

And i live persona 3 Portable. i think they really give you a completely new perspective with Minako and the social link with Ryoji is fantastic, best one, they are so cute. I know a lot of people dislike Minako bc they say she completely negates the theme of Memento Mori, but I think she is just the flipside of the coin. Like that meme about "nothing in life matters" where one is a depressed emo (Minato) and thr other is a sunglasses-wearing party man (Minako). She does fit the theme but /differently/ and that's rhe whole point of it. That's why I long for Atlus to do that again, give us femc with a different perspective on the same theme!!!! And yes, I know it was easier in p3p bc the cutscenes were basically a narated slideshow, so it just needed a modelswap and some new social links but honestly it was so damn good QwQ

I guess thats also why I took kind of an issue with Kasumi. When she was shown there was the hope she might be a Femc, but no Atlus proceeds to be a male protag waifu game-

Tangent: the fact you can date Kawakami but not your bros Ryuji-protects-women-daily-Sakamoto or Yusuke who is just a sweet nice guy living his best artist life, is a crime and I am personally pissed about it. I really hope that future games do shake things up and dont go down this path further. You can't just give Ryuji a line that's basically "my place is by your side/right next to you" and NOT expect me to see a budding romance.

i like how that's your takeaway LMAO what can i say...... me when im just a bisexual mess. girls can be mean to me. guys too im never picky but... girls. <3 obv my appreciation for yukari and her character goes deeper than that like i think shes the realest ever but thats another analysis for another day. for now hehe heart choker go brrr

?!!!!!!! PEOPLE SAY THAT ABOUT MY GIRL FEMC?!?! who what when where Why!! let me at em!! throwing hands!! i havent experienced minako/kotone in her entirety because well. p3fes the answer depression slump. but a large part of why i chose to p3 as my backwards dive into persona series and not p4g is because its arguably the only game to have a FeMC (maya p2 counts but also doesnt? cause she has the benefit of speaking in innocent sin that future silent protags don't). the sheer novelty of an unabashedly cute, girly girl in a social sim rife with the theme of death... her presentation alone could've told you how she's on the 'toxic positivity' side of the spectrum when dealing with grief? your description fits so well LMAO p3 MCs are so nihilistic love them both fr....

the glorified slideshow thing, their choice to port p3p instead of giving us a revamped, definitive persona 3 with fes' benefits (The Answer, control over team members, animated cutscenes) is just proof that they need to remake persona 3 with p5-level graphics now. god what are they doing over ther...

oh man now that you've got me started on it. kasumi, kasumi... she had So Much to Her that they just kinda. fumbled. do you want me to get into it? i kinda want to get into it. but it'll turn into a whole rant and these asks get long enough as is (not that I'm complaining! bro i love these back-and-forths theyre a highlight of my day fr) so i'll save it for another time I think LMAO. just know that im sharing grievances right there with you in the "kasumi-should-have-been-a-FeMC-of-sorts" camp.

lastly. OH for sure for real i get you like i feel the guy party members in 5 (aside from akch since. hes a special case) are kinda so agreeable to the point of simpery but like in a good way. in a dateable way. i feel like yusuke is so obvious about it too... shakes him affectionately. for a series not afraid of social commentary they really are afraid of blatant yaoi arent they. it couldve been baby steps like how fire emblem series did it... the time was right anyhow. scratches head... little known fact about me is that pegoryu and shukita kinda have my whole heart, almost as much as shuake does!! something about boys... just let them love, ATLUS!!

[justasmallbloginabigklainefandom]

Honestly kinda miffed about it, because I deliberated long on who I should date (or whether I should date in the first place), but ah well, the game did give me cop-outs, but I didn't really notice them, because they felt like dick-ish options to say, so I didn't pick them. I'd played 2 hours since the last save, so yeah, I was miffed, but not devastated so I didn't see the need to reset 2 hours of progress so I guess I am dating Ann now.

I don't want Ren to date multiple women, since that'll cause problems and I don't want that. I play him as a gentleman who drinks Respecting Women juice, after all. If Persona 5 Royal allowed poly relations with everyone being on board, it'd be different.

But yeah, Ann was my 3rd choice. So here's my Persona 5 Bachelorette (Waifu?) Ranking:

Hifumi. She just compells me. She's quiet and nice and very ambitious. She has a clear goal in mind, but she's also distant. Maybe it doesn't make sense, but because of that I started to see her as getting to know a potential partner instead of bestie from the beginning. I like her storyline about standing up to her mother a lot and she really teaches Ren a lot.

Makoto. I guess I just have a type for the more proper and ambitious types. I also feel like Makoto has had a lot of character development.

Ann. Ann is my BESTIE. That's honestly the main reason I didn't want to date her. Look, I am a sucker for a good Friends to Lovers as well, but I just really appreciated the platonic bond between her and Ren and Ryuji.

Haru. Honestly, she is the great mid-point. I have nothing to say. I have no reasons to date her, but also no reasons not to date her.

Kasumi. I don't really know the notion of "senpai", since I am not Japanese, but it's clear that Kasumi sees Ren as an older mentor of sorts and that creates a power imbalance in my head. She really treates Ren as a respected elder first and a friend/peer second. I am very fond of her, but also as a pupil or something.

Chihaya. Also nothing to say, but unlike Haru, I do not know this woman at all. Well. I do, a bit. I am on rank 5 and I am interested in her storyline, but she doesn't stand out to me as a Confidant or possible partner at all.

Futaba. She's too young. Ren is also young, so the age difference isn't even that weird, but also, she's Ren's sister. Or at least, that is how I see her. I even had Ren call her his sister when they ran into Iwai. I suppose she's not really his sister, otherwise she'd be at the total bottom, because the game doesn't build a family bond between them, but I do get that vibe, albeit just a little bit. So yeah they don't really have a sibling bond so I get why they could date but I could see them developing a sibling bond which I would prefer. Does that make sense?

Takemi. She's my doctor and also an adult. Power imbalance much? I also see Takemi better as thriving on her own. She definitely appreciates Ren as a person but honestly from all the bachelorettes, she gives the most "don't date me" vibes in my opinion.

Kawakami. Same here with the power balance. She's my teacher and also an adult. If I was already uncomfy with the thought of dating Kasumi, who's only a year younger and not even formally my pupil, then this takes the cake. And the maid thing is just creepy too, to be honest. I only rank her up because her Confidant perks are really nice and I did get invested in her story, but also, yeah, she kept lying to me!

Ohya. Go girl, give us nothing. You might be surprised she's last, especially after giving the reasonings for not wanting to date Futaba, Takemi or Kawakami, but I have only spoken to Ohya twice and I kind of just ignore her. Maybe if I had gotten to know her, she'd rank higher, but she's also still an adult.

Oh, uh, happy Valentine's day to Ann and Ren?

Well

I planned on dating Hifumi.

But I accidentally ended up dating Ann.

[computerram]

More dumping about Akira’s palace au, this time about Goro - where he’s been for like 5 years and what his role in all it is.

Building off the dummied out p5r scene, Goros probably spent most of his time in and out of the rehab center outside Tokyo and being fairly under the radar. Poor bastard probably didn’t even get a chance to do his college entrance exams or anything, he’s only made a very recent move back to Tokyo and its far less comfortable now he doesn’t have Celebrity/Hitman money and of course as soon as he does some Fuckshit starts happening

The same time as the PTs, Goro’s metaverse app comes back and Of Course he checks it out because That’s Obviously Suspicious

UNLIKE the PTs however he just... can’t help but find himself... being drawn to a certain.... blue door...... wow whoever could it be...........(it’s lavenza)

Lavenza’s having trouble reaching her trickster and fears he’s losing his way against this new adversity - why he already has a palace after all! - so of course she’s going to turn to the only other trickster she can get ahold of to guide his way, and offers him a temporary contract - he aids Joker, and she gives him access to her old ward’s Velvet Room

‘This is my fusion equipment’ ‘That’s an iron maiden’ ‘I don’t have my master’s guillotine I have to improvise’ ‘That’s not-’

She also explains that it’s very admirable of him he got as far as he did the first time round with no external guidance and even then managed to turn around and say ‘fuck you’ to Yaldabaths plan. He would have been a remarkable guest. Wait what do you mean you didn’t know about Yaldabaoth’s plan for you did he not tell you? Do you even know what a Velvet Room is-

That being said his social links were Awful. Except for one of course. You already know who I’m talking about. But any other bonds he may have had have definitely been broken by now.

Anyway armed with some new personas (as much as he can make with his Terrible Terrible Bond management) he heads into Akira’s palace and oh look who it is fancy meeting you guys here no I’m not a cognition put the gun down-

Now here’s where some fun stuff kicks in

Remember when I said Goro’s social links were Terrible? Well as part of his contract with Lavenza he’s gotta FUSE and to fuse good stuff you gotta KNOW people and when you know people you get BONDS oh we are gonna get Goro some FRIENDS, baby!!!

Also since it’s more fun this way: I think Goro’s SLink arcanas with the thieves should be different to Akira’s, since the arcana probably simply a reflection of how the holder sees that person/their relationship w/ the holder sooo with that in mind heres my Thoughts:

Lavenza - Judgement, Wheel of Fortune could also work, but boils down to how she’s the one who’s giving him a call to action

Sumire - Lovers and I KNOW what you’re thinking come back I’m going to explain the meaning of the Lovers arcana in more depth. Lovers' arcana is more symbolic of important choices + between two people is more about solidifying an union with someone you feel you can be honest with. Sumire’s probably the first person in the group Goro forms a bond with and I feel like the two can discuss how they both would have reservations about simply going in and changing Akira’s heart considering how much they both value free will and choice. There’s other things as well but that’d make this section way too long.

Futaba and Haru are very interesting to imagine links with considering their Very Valid reasoning for not wanting to be around Akechi. Haru I can definitely peg as Hanged Man, being stuck between her own personal feelings and how useful he is as a whole to the group, whereas Futaba would probably be more to do with her own anxieties about him being around, so perhaps Moon or Death if we wanna be cliche

Less concrete Reasoning but they have the Vibe: Ann - Temperance Ryuji - Sun, Yusuke - Magician, Makoto - Strength

Morgana - I’ll be honest with you homies I have No Idea what the dynamic between Morgana and Akechi would be compounded by the fact one of them is Litchrally a cat bro

For those curious, his other bonds (broken now) were probably Sae (Chariot) and Shido (Emperor). Even if the bonds themselves were lies or for ulterior motives, they were still Bonds you know

Oh how could I forget. His maxed out rank with Joker, the Justice arcana. Teehee it’s a narrative foil :3c

[obstinaterixatrix]

2021 fic retrospective

yeah I'll reveal the paper mask. if you reference the relevant fics in any way other than a 500 word essay about how great they are I'll block you. 11 fics, technically... 53k? ish? but about half of that was through cowriting (lol)

2/6

“I can’t stay” and other lies to tell, ORV, 2.5k

Han Sooyoung adjusts to post-epilogue life.

this one gave me such a huge headache... but I really like it! fulfilled my goal of having ysa punch out hsy (romantically) which is the only thing that matters. I love writing hsy and ysa but they're both smart and well-read in exactly the way I'm not so It's A Struggle. I have to put so so much effort into having like... one of those hollywood western sets. flat storefronts propped up to mimic the impression of a whole-ass town. that's me trying to write these gals.

2/21

a home to keep (out of reach), Kamen Rider W, 1k

While on the run from the museum, Wakana runs into Akiko.

oh the femslash life of writing an obscure ship from obscure(-ish) source material that aired over ten years ago. this has less than 20 kudos and I'm surprised I even hit that high. if I remember right I was in a mood of 'I need to write more gals and don't have specific ideas, someone give me some' and thankfully my friends obliged. Love You Buds!

2/27

being known, being loved, and other disasters you’ll never recover from, ORV, 2.5k

“Use your words” was supposed to be a thoughtless taunt; Kim Dokja wasn’t expecting to get a monologue.

this one's great. 10/10. utter genius. well actually I wish someone else wrote it and could dig into all of the complex ideas I couldn't quite grasp and it's terrible and I hate it. so it goes with this kinda thing. regardless, it 100% would not have been as good as it was (or wasn't?) if racher didn't let me call her at my 2am and talk with me for like two hours as I wailed and wept through the 4th scene. thanks racher <3

3/18

two sides, same coin, SVS3, 2k

With this, Mobei Jun can finally rest reassured that their relationship is plagued by no lingering ambiguity.

At all.

None whatsoever.

technically I wrote this fic last year and thought it was finished, but was struck by a brief bout of inspiration (and/or madness)

5/12

going nowhere // gone nowhere, Infinity Train, 23k

Two versions of a reunion without the train.

Side A: Ryan gets a call from the Parks and rushes back to Min-Gi.

Side B: Min-Gi doesn't get a call from Ryan but rushes to him anyway.

lmaaaoooooo I love cowriting fic. I have nothing but fondness for this one. if this fic were a living creature I would dote endlessly upon it. what started as a direct and targeted attack against lex got turned around on me and suddenly We Were Both In It... Together. 10/10, fantastic cowriting experience, lex expanded on a lot that I would've glossed over and really nailed a lot of solid vibes. I had a lot of fun breaking ryan's leg. speaking of, also big thanks to kly for the med reference (lol)

6/6

actually, that was a load-bearing wall, Persona 5, 2.3k

Makoto: Ryuji, how did you get injured? Is there anything we can do? Yusuke: He did not. Makoto: …Wait, why is Yusuke with you at the hospital?

sundry wrote all this, I just edited & spruced it up by making the texting segment look ✨phenomenal✨ (and after it was a prompt for me to write too, lol).

7/28

dreams not to keep, Infinity Train, 2.5k

Min-Gi has a weird stress dream about working at Dumpty's, one that is definitely meaningless and has nothing to do with complicated feelings that don't exist.

If I'm being transparent I had this vaguely drafted without any real intention of finishing it, then saw a dead dove fic in the tag that I found personally rancid, so I finished it out of spite just to bump it down. anyway I love dream sequences and psychological torment. this is a concept that was inspired by air and that I also drew to specifically antagonize lex (lol)

9/20

a door closed to light, Deltarune, 1k

There’s no good reason for Susie, of all people, to be barging into Noelle’s room. And it makes no sense why she’s the one who ends up doing it; Kris is the childhood friend—which makes them the obvious choice for a stupidly sappy rescue—and Ralsei’s like… basically one of those baby blankets, the kind with a dumb fluffy stuffed animal attached. So shouldn’t he jump at the chance to make friends or be a goody-goody or whatever?

I was actually visiting a friend when deltarune chapter 2 dropped and carved out time to finish it. I always knew noelle and susie would have more Solid Vibes when the game progressed, and I was right! the vibes are solid! thank you toby fox for being the number one lesbian ally that exists. but also since I was rushing so much I ended up missing a great opportunity for a joke and had to rush to change the ending (rip).

10/8

the unnamed ember that burns in your chest, SVS3, 1.5k

Mobei Jun takes a nap on Shang Qinghua’s bed and pines to a truly intolerable degree.

do you understand how agonizing it was for me to have a paper mask account that I wouldn't let myself reference at all AND YET I kept coming up with titles that absolutely slapped. are you kidding me. this was so goddamn romantic. fuck.

10/22

the rays of the protagonist’s golden halo don’t shine on us lowly side characters, so how about easing up on the collateral damage (you bastard), SVS3, 2k

Shang Qinghua and Shen Qingqiu have a fight after Mobei Jun gets injured while helping the protagonist (who, let’s be honest, would’ve been fine no matter what).

DO YOU UNDERSTAND. HOW AGONIZING IT WAS. FOR ME TO HAVE A PAPER MASK ACCOUNT I WOULDN'T LET MYSELF REFERENCE AT ALL. AND YET. I KEPT COMING UP WITH TITLES THAT ABSOLUTELY SLAPPED. I'm absolutely entranced by my own unrecognized genius. anyway this was fun I love writing petty squabbles and asshole friendships lol

12/30

as it turns out, dying isn’t the romantic gesture you might think it is, SVS3, 15k

Shang Qinghua wasn’t a protagonist. He was barely even a side character. The sum total of his dialogue never surpassed ten lines, which puts him just above cannon fodder. His death, sudden but not unexpected, was less than a paragraph in the epic of Luo Binghe:

The conspicuous absence of the man who could be considered Mobei Jun’s shadow was then explained to Luo Binghe. Just days ago, Shang Qinghua—whether by accident or a final act of loyalty—took a fatal blow meant for Mobei Jun. Scarcely did he have the time to draw a single breath before succumbing to poison potent enough to fell a great demon on the verge of becoming king.

In his previous life as a reader, Mobei Jun didn’t have any reason to pay him much attention.

Things are different now.

BLAH BLAH BLAH TITLES THAT ABSOLUTELY FUCKING SLAPPED YOU KNOW THE DRILL anyway this is literally the longest solo project I've written in years, usually you can't get me over 5k without my corpse being dragged by someone else. I'm a 2k oneshot kinda gal! I hate writing longform! it's so much work! so much effort! and yet! this fic drove me absolutely fucking bonkers and would not let me rest until it was exorcised. it has the most vibes per vibe out of all my fics. it's my magnum opus. and it's quarantined to paper mask account because if I ever acknowledge it, it becomes agonizingly obvious that nfsftlots was me going like 'haha so this is what I think a mo/shang roleswap would be. wait a second I could make them lesbians. wait a second I could make them lesbian ocs. wait a second I've written a novella.' anyway the last chapter of this fic was what I consider 8k of absolute madness. I'm spilling my guts here. I am relentlessly shaking your shoulder. can you even begin to understand what this story has done to me. I am narcissus at the pond absolutely enthralled by myself. this is the exact type of confession I love to read. you can make some pretty obvious parallels to how I'm acting now and a certain character in the fic and you'd be right to but you cannot mention this to my face.

[stargazer-balladeer]

Them with a Shy S/o [Persona 5]

anon: Hello! Congratulations on your Followers! I wanted to ask if you can write the "Them with a shy s/o" for the Persona 5 cast as well? Thanks!!

Characters Included: Akira Kurusu, Ryuji Sakamoto, Ann Takamaki, Yusuke Kitagawa, Makoto Niijima, Haru Okumura, Futaba Sakura & Goro Akechi

Note: A lot of you guys like Persona 5 huh? Oh well, I can see why :) Hope ya’ll enjoy this!

Reader’s Gender: Neutral

Warning: none

Akira Kurusu

This guy? He'll find it cute— no, scratch that. ADORABLE that his s/o's shy. He'll be all over them when he laid eyes on them, they better be prepared >:)

We all know this guy's a tease, right? And you are NO exception to this. Actually, you had it worse.

Because you are shy, he'll find every reaction of yours cute and always seem to tease you about it, until you were pretty much the twin of an apple -_-

But he knows his limit, of course. If he sees that it's either making you uncomfortable or hurt by what he's doing, he'll stop.

When you two first meet, it's you avoiding him and him pouting as you ran away. Pretty much a cat-and-rat chase, which the Phantom Thieves find funny, watching their leader chasing his s/o.

The reason why you're running? You heard the rumors and thought it was true. Not wanting to be his next victim, you ran whenever he's near you.

He only managed to talk to you (without you running away) when Ann drag you over to Akira, the group have had enough of this shenanigans.

You two hang-out in either LeBlanc or outside, but mostly in LeBlanc though. You two just chilling while drinking coffee (or tea, or whatever beverages you prefer) and just talk.

He'll find it hilarious if he finds out you're talkative, he might tease you about it but other than that, made no comment about it. He loves your voice so it's a bonus for him :D

How he ask you out? He asks you in a straightforward manner while you were drinking, which made you successfully chock. You two panic for a bit before you answered him yes, with a bit of embarrassment ofc.

Ryuji Sakamoto

He might not at all notice you, srry. Unless you're either friends with his friends (or his friends pointing at you) or you're a victim of Kamoshida. Yeah. That's the only way for him to only notice you.

He might not really care about you much but when he notices you everywhere he goes, he suddenly cared about you.

Like Akira, he finds your shy trait cute and find it hilarious when he finds out you're talkative. But he also LOVES hearing your voice so its a plus for him.

I don’t see Ryuji as a tease though, he might be as shy as you are! Which frustrates the group when Ryuji is being his Tsundere self. Like you would go up to him and he will either freeze or go away from you, that is, IF he realizes his feelings for you.

But he finds every reaction of yours cute but he wouldn’t admit it.

How you two meet? The first bulletin pls. If you’re friends with one of his friends, namely Ann, she would basically drag you over to meet him and the rest. If you’re a victim, chances are you appeared as a Shadow in Kamoshida’s Palace. 

He would find your shy self indifferent really, he already has seen that reaction of yours everywhere he goes (his delinquent self and all). But he might get to know you if you two were (force) to be together or left alone, he finds silence uncomfortable afterall.

You two will be often seen hanging out during and after school, probably in front of a store or the arcade. Akira (with Morgana) and Ann will also join in but not all the time, so its basically you and Ryuji.

How he ask you out? Very hesitant, shy and in-denial. It might take some time, and his friends pushing, for him to ask you out. But when he does confess, you could hardly understand what he was trying to tell you. Him stuttering while blushing while still acting cool, yeah, you were hella confuse.

But when you DO understand, you’ll blush and nod, too shy to say anything (much to Ryuji’s relief and dismay).

Ann Takamaki

This girl’s basically gushes about how adorable you were and spoils you rotten, much to your embarrassment. You two definitely met by her approaching you and just start talking.

If she sees you were uncomfortable with her, she would keep her distance. Other than that, she’ll be stuck with you. Good luck with that.

She’s so energetic that she would drag you to places where you’ve never been before. 

She’ll be the one who orders for the both of you if you are uncomfortable doing so, she really doesn’t mind.

She might tease you a bit, just to get a reaction out of you. But if she sees you were getting hurt or uncomfortable by her teasing, she’ll stop. This woman respects your privacy to a whole new level -_-

Like I said, Ann drags you places to places. You two are hardly ever seen in one place really, except for school, LeBlanc and that store that sells sweets. 

She doesn’t really mind your shy self really, but when she finds out you’re chatty, you two will be talking non-stop. Your topics will keep bouncing from one to another, till there is nothing left to say (which would probably never happen since you two always seem to find something to talk about).

How does she confess her undying love to you? She does it in a cliche way, this girl lives for cliches :) She does it by giving you 3 red roses, which means “I love you”. Whether you know or not about flower language, she wouldn’t tell you at once. She’ll wait until you figure it out. 

If you don’t know, either search in Google or ask someone (Siri?). You should probably go to Haru or Makoto for this.

If you already knew or just figured it out, you would immediately go to Ann and say your answer to her. Pls say yes ;-;

Yusuke Kitagawa

This boi doesn’t really care about your shy personality, no, he finds it endearing. You somehow managed to caught his artistic eyes. Don’t get me started with this poor boi. He doesn’t know how to approach you! So he did it the only way he knows how, following you around.

Ofc, this has an opposite effect than what Yusuke wanted. This made him creepy and stalker for you, so you keep running away while him chasing you. You even thought he was a kidnapper or a thief (not literally tho COUGH COUGH).

The group finds it amusing (Mommy Makoto sighing in the background) as they watch the scene unfold. But as the days go by, they were kinda worried and concerned about the two of you. So they decided to take matters in their own hands.

They managed to get you and Yusuke in the same room together. They even instructed Yusuke to not be weird. Yusuke, being confused, decided to follow their orders. 

The two of you managed to have a civil conversation about sunsets of all things. Ofc, you were still wary around him but you soon found yourself being comfortable around him. 

Yusuke isn’t a tease at all, actually, he’s more oblivious than you even! Yusuke doesn’t really understand the concept about love but is willing to learn about it.

(PS: Pls also feed this bby boi ;-; he needs it DESPERATELY)

You and Yusuke can be found either in a art gallery or his house. It’s also either watching him paint, listening to him rant or being his muse. It might be boring to others but you always found yourself enjoying his peculiar self.

He doesn’t mind if you’re talkative really. He likes to listen to you whenever you talk about something, he also finds this trait of yours endearing.

How he ask you out? Pls don’t ask ;-;. This boi doesn’t even know his feelings towards you, which was VERY obvious to everyone, heck, even you! You, being your shy self, is very hesitant to confess to him. WHAT IF HE DOESN’T LIKE ME? -_- <-- my reaction

It take everyone to explain to him his feelings. You might need to wait a bit long for him to finally realize his feelings. But when he does, he’ll immediately confess to you. This boi doesn’t know how to be embarrassed unfortunately ;-;

Makoto Niijima

This girl would notice you if you were in the Student Council or classmates with her or a victim of someone’s Palace. Other than that, you’re pretty much a background character for her. 

You always thought she was intimidating so you avoid her as much as you could. When Makoto notices you avoiding her, she would be hurt ofc. Did she do something to you that she doesn’t know of? You can be sure that Makoto would rack her mind for DAYS, trying to recall what made you avoid her so much.

If she couldn’t find out about it, be sure that she’ll approach you the following day. Managing to corner you, which is unintentional for her part. She would ask you the question and when you answered honestly (you can’t lie to her), she would be confuse. 

But ever since then, she would make an effort in becoming friends with you. She’s not bothered by your shy self, she finds it cute though :)

If she finds out you’re talkative, she’ll be surprised about it but it was warmly welcomed, especially during her time in being President. During her signing papers, you would talk to her about your day and some unrelated topics. She doesn’t mind at all, she finds your voice soothing.

Pls give this girl a rest ;-; she works wayyyy too hard. 

You two can be found hanging out in LeBlanc or either houses. You two can be drinking coffee (or whatever beverages you prefer) and just chat with one another.

How does she confess? It might also take some time since she wants to make sure that what she’s feeling is true. Bc I can see her as the person who likes someone, it’s already that person that they want to marry and spend their whole life together. 

But when she is sure about it, she would take it slow and confess to you. She’s patient so she watches as you fumble your words up. She’ll be overjoyed that you accept her feelings though. 

Yay! Happy mommy Makoto :D

Haru Okumura

She already notices you wayyy before you notice her. She notices your shy self and talkative self, she finds it adorable though. I’m gonna bet that she will be the one who approaches you first and strike a conversation with you.

You couldn’t afford to run away from her, she’s too precious! TwT So you decided to converse with her also and find yourself enjoying her presence much. 

Her aura around her gives out a soothing one, it easily attracts someone to her. It could be a weapon or defense, not sure. But one thing is for sure, you’re hook at once.

She might tease you here and there, but she’s rather passive. She enjoys cuddling and holding hands with you, even before you two started to date. She’s touch-starved ;-;

She is the kind of person who listens to other people talking. She wouldn’t dare to interrupt you while you are talking about something you are passionate about.

You two are never in the same place, like Ann. You two can be found everywhere, since I like to think that Haru likes to explore new areas. But she’s not gonna drag you around if you don’t like it. She would DEFINTELY stay with you at home, cuddling with you in the couch.

Haru might seem shy at first, but don’t be fooled! When she finds out she has feelings for you, she would straight-in confess her feelings to you. It might involve a bouquet or two :)

Pls say yes ;-; this bby deserve da world :)

Futaba Sakura

She doesn’t know you at all, unless you are either a part of the Phantom Thieves or a friend of her friends. Though she wouldn’t meet you either in that, so you best believe that you are a member of this outcast group or else you wouldn’t meet this hacker girl.

She can relate to you so much, although hers is much more of anxiety than shyness. She can still relate to you. You two might not talk at all, unless someone forces them to talk each other (i.e: mommy Makoto or daddy Akira :3 I don’t ship them tho).

You two instantly click though, much to everyone’s relief and dismay. You can bet that Futaba would drag you in her shenanigans, better be prepared :)

SHE LOVES THAT YOU TWO CAN TALK ENDLESSLY :D

Where you two can be seen? In her room. She never leaves her room unless necessary. So you two hang-out there, hope you don’t mind. You two play video games together or her teaching you how to hack.

She isn’t much into touchy-feely things but she would welcome a hug or cuddles. She’s more touch-starved than Haru unfortunately ;-;

How she asks you out? Simple. She doesn’t. And the worst thing, you don’t either. So you two can be friends for so long until either one of you confess.

So you better toughen up if you want her to be your girlfriend >:) This girl would surely say yes if you (stutter your) confess(ion). 

Goro Akechi

This boi is almost like Akira in so many ways, except for the fact that he handle his situation in a much different way. This two bois can be best bros if they want to -_-

Anyway, back to hc.

You two would meet during his school days or outside. He recognizes you as the shy girl in his class. He might scare you away though, since you can’t handle his fangirls or his charming looks, much to his confusion.

He tries talking to you but you always manage to find a loop-hole, much to his dismay. He managed to talk to you when you two were (coincidentally) riding the train.

That’s the start of the bittersweet friendship you two have.

Much like Akira, he WILL tease you to get reaction from you, he finds this adorable. He would leave teasing kisses around your faces and leave a lingering kiss on your lips, leaving you wanting more. He’s such a tease -3-

But he’ll stop if he sees you embarrassed or hurt, he’ll kiss your entire face in apology. At the end, you are as red as a Cherry.

You two can be seen either in either your home or in LeBlanc or anywhere private, since he has a fanbase. He would rather for the two of you to be at home or at LeBlanc since it really provides privacy. 

His work schedule is all over the place, so be sure to always be prepared whenever Akechi wants to hang-out with you.

It’s also a plus if you can cook pancakes for him :) You get his approval

How he asks you out? In the most basic way, asking you if you are available tomorrow to eat dinner or watch movie. SAY YES PLS :)

(He’s internally panicking ofc)

BTW, be sure to be prepared when he breaks up with you at the end. You know what I mean :) 

[x] Main Page || [x] Persona 5 Page

[kareofbears]

persona 5 strikers thoughts and feelings

This is going to be a long post. Like, the type of post you’d only really have time to read when you’re trying to sleep but you’re not ready to be unconscious yet so you’re just looking for something to do to spend your time with minimal effort. 

So in 2018, a masterpiece was born into the world: Into the Spider-verse was released and it was amazing—it’s honestly the best spiderman movie we have without a doubt, and it’ll be very far into the future before Spider-verse is beaten as the best spiderman movie. Them’s the facts. Then in 2019, Spider-man: Far From Home was dropped. It’s a great movie! Great characters, great continuation of who these characters are and works fantastic as a continuation of a story. It’s really hard trying to take the torch of a previous movie (or in Marvel’s case, juggling twenty something movies) and come up with a new movie that both works on its own, as well as being the next step in this series of films. Thus, with that idea in mind, I think it’s kind of unfair to judge into the spiderverse and far from home, because these are two movies with two completely different objectives in mind. 

Okay, so this is still a persona 5 strikers post, I promise, but the idea is the same: Persona 5 could basically do whatever it wanted—new story, new characters, new everything, and it’s just plain old awesome. However, Persona 5 strikers did not have that sort of freedom. It was bound to the original game, and it had its own rules and stuff it had to keep intact, characters they had to work with, and on top of that, it had to justify its existence as a sequel (lets pretend money doesnt exist lmfao). 

SO, the big question is: did it do that? Did it justify its existence? 

And my answer: holy fuck did it ever do that

I came into this game knowing the extreme bare minimum. I knew there was someone named Sophia, and i knew there was roadtrip, and i knew there were Personas. That’s my knowledge of it before i played it on the Switch.  I should also clarify like, early on, that i was not expecting anything from this game. At all. I was the world’s biggest cynic of this game—if you scroll down my p5s tag far enough, youll just see me complaining about a game that hasn’t even come out yet. I was fully expecting to have this be a Waifu show, and any male character that isn’t Akira to just be shoved aside like some kind of nerd in a high school hallway, and i have never been more pleased to be wrong. In fact, i actually owe it an apology, because of how fucking rude i was for no reason!!! Because this game deserves everything to be honest. 

Persona 5 strikers is, frankly, insane. Insane in the sense that it got to pull shit off that just would never have existed in the original game, because the original game is scared. It had to be as impressive as possible and garner as much attention as possible. Strikers does not have that problem—every single person who bought that game does not need to be convinced that persona 5 is a good game. They already played it. That means Atlus can just fuck around and have a good time, and man did they have a good time. There’s still scenes that still shock me if i think about it too hard, because i’m used to atlus having to follow this sort of rule set when it comes to persona 5 (or any of the main games im assuming, but i havent played them.) And on top of that, there’s still shit that’s Atlus Trademarked Branded in a good way. The style of story of story telling, and revealing the mystery that is so integral to what p5 is, is still there. 

So, to make this even a little bit comprehensible, i will make a list! 

First of all, What is this game?

In short, this game is an OVA of an anime. It’s bonus side content that has one thing in mind: to showcase these lovable characters more by putting them in fun situations. That’s it, and it is just phenomenal. That was the main point of, i’d say, like forty hours of the game. It’s just fun times with fun characters. 

But to get deeper of what i think is happening, or what they were thinking during the development, is that this is a second opportunity. Persona 5 (as we all know) had a lot of problems, and we were not quiet about those problems. We yelled it all out, made posts, made complaints on every social media platform ever. And Atlus heard all of them, and Strikers is a way to mitigate those mistakes. Aside from being a fun OVA, Strikers also works to be a deeper exploration of these characters—more specifically, the characters that did not receive much in the original game. Creating this sequel is having the ability to redo what they felt (or to be more specific, we felt) in the original game while adding new ones. I will get to that in a second.  

The format of the game 

Absolutely brilliant to throw them on a road trip. P5V already forced us to experience Shibuya for 200+ hours, and im so glad that they didn’t do that again. Going from town to town, making us experience these new places alongside our favorite characters is so good, and it just makes sense. It’s fun, it’s lighthearted, and it’s actually shockingly good. But one thing i do want to talk about early on is the way the story unfolds and the villains that they use, and what they do with it because it’s very interesting. 

So as we explore japan and stuff, we encounter jails, and with those jails comes an antagonist. This antagonist works to be a parallel to one of our characters. That character will find it in their hearts to feel bad for the antagonist, because the antagonist could have been them had the original game not happen. At first I thought all of the thieves were gonna get an antagonist, and i was really hyped for the ryuji one. And then came to hour forty of the game where i realized “yeah that’s not gonna happen. There’s just not enough time.” And i was right, and the game ended. But i am not salty at all, honestly, because the people who got a direct antagonist were: Ann, Yusuke, and Haru. (we wont count zen and sophie). 

Is there a trend??? Yes. these are all characters in the original game that have received the worst treatment by atlus. The three of them are basically cast aside the minute they finished their original arc, and its horrible! BUT that’s why this is the path that atlus chose for them—to give them more depth, and screentime, and a way to show their inner self. That isn’t to say that the ones who aren’t those three (makoto, futaba, mona, akira, ryuji) didn’t get anything. Futaba still has her thing at the end with ichinose, and she was very prevalent and animated during the rest of the game. Mona and Akira have to be a focal points, that’s just the nature of the game. The other two though, I will talk about in depth in a second.  

Makoto

Y’all i poke fun at shumako fans sometimes cause its kind of easy and fun, but i honestly love makoto. In my very first playthrough of p5 (my first ever jrpg game, first persona game, i had no idea what i was doing), i had only maxed out two characters: ryuji and makoto. And i know she had a lot of screentime and love in the original game which is great, but i truly felt like she was dissed in this game. Her only roles were

A driver

Someone to tell them “we don’t have a choice. Let’s keep going and see where this takes us.” (seriously, if you replay this game, you will see how much she does this)

Idk, i just wish she had more to do, especially compared to how much love they gave the other characters. 

But let’s talk about some of the new characters! 

Zenkichi

Damn you atlus. Damn you and your insistence at bringing in cop characters. I was fully on board with hating zenkichi, i was fucking ready for it. I was convinced that there was nothing they could do convince to like zenkichi. I was immune to their copaganda. 

And then i ended up loving him, which makes me sad a little bit. I didn’t realize how desperate i was to have an adult who has a persona. Someone who wants the world to change just as much as they do, while still having that aspect of them that makes them adult. Like??? As someone who is technically an adult, its a breath of fresh air. An adult. Who fights. For justice. Using a persona. And god i love akane so much, and her obsession with the thieves (that scene is probably in my top ten fave scenes of the game). Also what i loved about zenkichi is that he fucking hates the cops!! He hates the system of the cops!! And thats why i actually really started to love him!! Because i thought it was atlus saying that the systematic problem of the police cannot be solved by one person, and zenkichi threw away his badge. I actually cried at that part!! 

But then he became a cop again, and i was just :/ but as a character, i really love him to bits and would love to do a study on him, or at least use him as an outside pov. But! i absolutely love his persona, since im a les miserables fan hehe

Sophia 

she’s probably my favorite new aspect of the game. I was ready to not like her—again, i just suck like that, lmfao—and when i saw her, i was scared that she was just another waifu. I mean, she was very cute after all. But then as the game went on, i thought she was a little too cute. And even further into the game, i finally slapped myself in the face and realized oh my god shes not a waifu. Shes a sister. 

That blew my mind, im ngl to you. A female character that isn’t supposed to be romanced? By jove, what a miracle! 

And she…is an amazing character. Im sorry, i just love her so much. I love her so much that she  probably ranks as my fifth or sixth favorite character which is surprising even to me. Everything about her is delightful and invigorating. She’s funny??? Her comedic timing is amazing, and she has such chemistry with the rest of the team. She’s actually useful to the plot, and while her character design is a little too on the nose for me in terms of cuteness (i mean, good god she’s wearing oversized sweater to show how cute and tiny she is, and her hair has literal hearts in it), she is absolutely lovable. 

But what i actually really wanna gush about for a second is sophia at the last stage of the game. You get the idea, i dont really like to get excited over things, so at this point i figured that there was nothing this game could do to shock me. 

And then sophia had a persona awakening. 

Like. holy fuck did i yell. I didnt realize what was happening until the music had already kicked in. and its just so fucking smart!!! Sophia??? The ai?? With no heart?? gOT A PERSONA???? AWAKENING??? BECAUSE SHE LEARNED WHAT THE HEART IS AND THE PASSION THAT YOU NEED IN ORDER TO GET A PERSONA??? I started crying honestly, because it was just so smart. And looking back on it now, its obvious!! Of course it would lead to this, it only made sense that the culmination of her character arc leads to her getting a persona, nothing else would have been as good. Also, her voice actor is just amazing?? When she was talking to ichinose at the end, i actually got incredibly emotional because of the line reads. Its just so spot on and it really captures the essence of sophia.

Muah. five stars Atlus. You got me. 

Ryuji <3!!!!

Oh man. Oh boy. Okay. so where do i start. 

Yall know i love him. Hes probably my favorite fictional male character of all time, and he is the one i was the absolute most cynical about in this game. I was expecting literally nothing. Nothing. Like. nothing. I thought he was just gonna keep being used as a joke, or a gag, and he’s gonna be super horny all the time for the other girls and it was gonna make me mad and there was gonna be some insane homophobic/queerphobic jokes in every other scene and i know i was being unfair, but i cant help it. 

And then i played the first two hours of the game, and i cried the entire time. Because ryuji has never been better than he is in this game. Its crazy. 

The ryuji in persona 5 strikers is who ryuji should have been/how he should have been treated this entire time. From the actual funny jokes (for example, the gold bar joke + his reaction to it in the beginning of the game), defending his female friends instead of being the one people need to defend from (natsume arc), and the fact that he was the one to be there with morgana and akira in the very beginning of the game. Its such a small thing that they didnt even need to do, but it was such an integral part of the original game for me, that i just was convinced that nothing like this was going to happen. But then it happened. Its just small stuff like that that could have been overlooked but it wasn’t because this game? Persona 5 strikers? Fucking loves ryuji. 

The actual respect they gave this boy is insane and i wasn't ready for it. Like, they gave the shujin trio lunch, they gave the little charm of the katana when they were in natsume’s jail, and, in my opinion this is the second-best thing that they could have given ryuji is sophia. Ryuji and sophia are the pinnacle of a brother & sister bonding relationship in the game that isn’t akira & futaba. And its really prevalent too?? Small stuff from the beginning of the game (pulling her out of a jail, calling her shorty), but then you have the iconic “shut the fuck up” scene, and that scene was so well characterized and written and voice acted, that somehow him saying “fuck” was the least exciting part of that scene to me. Ryuji is an older brother to her, like its undoubtable, and its only further cemented at the end of the game where Ryuji helps out ichinose because he knows how much sophia cares about her. This game. Love ryuji. And i love. This game. 

You know what else i love? Akiryu. 

Guys. i was fully prepared to starve in terms of akiryu. But theres just. So much of it. I wont get too deep into it, because i think this aspect of the game for me still needs marinate a little bit. Like, what was that last shot when EMMA died and Ryuji walked to approach Akira so they could relish in their victory together?? And the smile from both of them??? What the fuck. That was amazing. Also Joker being saved by Ryuji when he was about to fall from the cliff to save sophia??? WHAT. The LEADER AND HIS RIGHT HAND MAN? WHAT. anyway. If theres anything i want to keep for myself in my own brain, its the akiryu aspect of this game, so i wont talk too much about that part of things (instead, itll probably manifest in fic lmfaooo). 

Sure, there’s tidbits of stuff i dont like that they gave ryuji: sexualizing ann in that one cut scene and making him touch the jails even though it hurts, and i recognize those and frown at them, but for the most part, i am blown away with how they treated him.

Basically, Ryuji has never been better. From the opening of the game with him being the first text message and the one to sling his arm around akira, to the very last cut scene where it was ryuji wordlessly leaving because he’s so confident that they would never be separated for long, this game adores Ryuji and i am so so happy to say that.

The Royal aspect of things

Yeah, i had to talk about this, but itll be a short thing i just wanted to point out. Because the last part of this game...is persona 5 royal. Which is curious. Like taking reality and giving that power to someone else so you dont have to experience suffering anymore? And even like, the final section just looked a lot like the top half of maruki’s palace?? And whats even crazier is that we had a boss fight with sophia, just like how we had a boss fight with sumire? Royal and Strikers have like, the same thesis statement. It’s kind of uncanny.It’s interesting, it’s like atlus came up with these two ideas, and then just decided they liked both of them so much that they just did it twice. I don’t mind though—actually, in terms of how the last Palace/Jails go, i probably like them both about equally. 

Though i did love the final battle in this one more than i did in royal. Splitting into teams?? Thats cool as fuck, and really innovative and i didnt see it coming. It also kicked my ass. A lot. 

Now for the last stretch: the small stuff!

The music — bomb as fuck. In my heart, Daredevil is ranked the same as Rivers. Axe to grind is also amazing, but Daredevil owns me

Akechi — i really debated whether or not to talk about him, but i figured a bullet point should be enough. Im really shocked that he wasnt in this at all. Like not even a name drop. If this is an OVA, and the point of the game is to please the fans, and akechi is arguably the fan favorite character, i was really ready for something. But there was nothing, except for the pancake hallway if that even counts as a reference. Thats it. Thats all i wanted to say about him.

The humour — FUCKING HILARIOUS im convinced that in my fifty hour playtime, five of that is dedicated to me laughing and unable to continue the game 

Akira — so much personality! His lines of dialogue are crazy sometimes (like. Whats up with him saying Ryuji has ‘nice abs’ when they were in bath? Im crazy and even i dont know what the fuck that could mean) 

Battle system — oh my god i almost forgot to talk about this. I love it! I kind of miss the turn based aspect just because i found it very comforting for some reason, but this hack and slash style of gameplay is so invigorating because i do feel like it justifies shit like the baton pass and huge attacks.  This battle system fully encompases how the Phantom Thieves are supposed to fight, you know what i mean?

Anyway, thats my thoughts on strikers. Loved it. Amazing. 9.3/10, wouldve been higher but Konoe’s Jail almost bored me to death. Also im a monster and i didnt do any requests that isn’t a fun one, teehee. As if i play persona 5 for the persona aspect of things.

[inkwell1013]

Quiet Hands - Persona 5

Pairing: Yusuke & the Phantom Thieves (platonic), Yusuke & Natsuhiko (familial)

Genre: Oneshot, Angst with a bit of fluff, Found family.

Word count: 2.9k

Warnings: In this fic, Yusuke deals with a lot of internalized ableism and ableist remarks from Madarame. There is also some physical abuse, emotional abuse and depiction of a panic attack. The r slur is also used. Please bear these warnings in mind before proceeding. 

Summary: Madarame never understood Yusuke. He was quick to punish Yusuke for fidgeting. Yusuke learns that loud hands get him hurt. It is much better to have quiet hands. It is better to hold down all the stuff that makes him different. It is better to be who Madarame wants him to be. The Phantom Thieves seemed to disagree with this.

- - - - -

Yusuke was a creature of unbreakable habit. He enjoyed order and structure, and liked to know when he was expected to do things and how he was expected to do them. The slightest disruption to his routine would send him spiralling, leaving him in a horrible mood for the rest of the day.

Today was one of those days. Madarame had invited a guest over without warning Yusuke beforehand, and that had sent him into a tantrum of epic proportions. He didn’t like strangers and he didn’t like surprises, so this was a particularly detestable event in his eyes.

Madarame dragged him downstairs despite his vehement protests. “I don’t want to,” whined Yusuke, trying to pull his arm out of Madarame’s grip. “Let me go!”

“Oh, grow up Yusuke!” snapped Madarame. “You’re not a little kid anymore, and this whining is completely unacceptable for someone your age. Sometimes you must do things you don’t want to do. That’s life, and complaining isn’t going to change anything. Now, you will behave and act normal in front of this curator, or I will ground you for the rest of the week. Do you understand me?”

Yusuke squirmed in his grip. “But it’s so difficult Daddy. I don’t like new people.”

Madarame scowled. “I am not your father. What do you call me?”

“Sensei,” sniffed Yusuke. “Do I really have to do it Sensei?”

“Yes, the curator is expecting to meet you. I’m not having you embarrass me again,” said Madarame, shoving Yusuke into the living room.

The curator stood to greet them as they came in. He was an aggressively friendly man, who immediately went to shake Madarame’s hand with a wide, toothy smile on his face. “Is this your son?” he asked brightly.

“No, he’s my student. I took him in after his mother’s death,” explained Madarame, pushing Yusuke forward. “Why don’t you say hello Yusuke?”

Yusuke mumbled a hello, doing anything to keep from making eye contact, which was made difficult by the fact that the stranger seemed to be attempted the exact opposite at every opportunity. “I apologise for his behaviour,” said Madarame. “He’s a little shy.”

He punctuated the last word with a sharp glare. Yusuke curled further in on himself.

“I understand,” laughed the curator. “My daughter’s shy too. Anyway, what layout are we thinking for this new exhibit?”

Madarame and the curator launched into a lengthy conversation about the upcoming exhibition, thankfully leaving Yusuke out of it. He didn’t want to talk anyway.

All this stress of meeting a new person was making him feel a bit shaky. Similar to how a kettle filled with boiling water needed a way to release the rising pressure, he had found his own way of release. It varied by situation and circumstance, and today it had manifested as fluttery fingers. The curator hadn’t noticed, still engrossed in the work that Madarame was showing him.

Madarame shoot Yusuke a murderous glare and reached over a hand. He pinned Yusuke’s wrist to the table, forcing his hands to a standstill. The curator happily continued with the conversation, having not noticed at all.

“Quiet hands,” hissed Madarame. “You know the rules.”

Yusuke knew he was in trouble.

Nothing happened until the curator left. Madarame was cruel, but he wasn’t stupid. He never struck Yusuke in public and never in front of others - he had his reputation to worry about after all - but things were different behind closed doors.

As soon as the front door slammed shut, Madarame struck, like a viper leaping from the brush. He yanked Yusuke forward, sharp nails digging into his wrist. Stumbling, Yusuke desperately tried to regain his footing, but was thrown of balance again when Madarame smacked him on the side of the head, sending him lurching to the left. He was lucky enough to grab a hold of the coffee table before he hit the ground.

His ear was ringing with discordant chords of a half-finished song, and his vision was blurred, but he could still make out Madarame’s scowling face.

“Sensei, I—”

“Ten fucking minutes! That was all I asked,” screamed Madarame. “And you couldn’t even do that. What is wrong with you?”

Yusuke stared down at the ground. “I don’t know…” he muttered.

“You don’t know?” Madarame said incredulously. “I’m not having a retard for a student. You need to learn to control yourself. No more of that stupid fidgeting. I’ve let it go on for far too long anyway.”

“But I can’t control it,” said Yusuke.

“You will learn. You are not a wild animal that is completely lacking in self control. I raised you better than that.”

“Sensei, you can’t—”

“I’m doing this for your own good Yusuke. No one is going to take you seriously if you act like that. Now go to your room and think about what you’ve done,” spat Madarame. “Don’t think I’m feeding you after this outburst.”

 Things only got worse after that. Madarame stayed true to his word and punished Yusuke for the fidgeting whenever he saw it. That didn’t mean that Yusuke stopped though; he just learned to hide it in front of his mentor. He learned to bottle it all down and release it when he was on his own so he could avoid the punishment.

Even so, the pressure was always building, hissing and screaming to be let out. Sometimes he couldn’t stop it from erupting out of him. Those where the worst days. He would be left shaking and crying, scratching at himself, trying to alleviate that crushing feeling deep down in his soul.

He was only hurting himself – he knew that – but it was the only way to make himself feel better.

Madarame didn’t understand it, just as he had never understood anything about Yusuke. As always, he resorted to violence. He would smack Yusuke on the back of the head every time, repeating the same words.

“Quiet hands.”

Like how a dog can be made to salivate at the sound of a ringing bell, Yusuke was conditioned to associate exhibiting these behaviours in front of others with fear. With pain. Whenever Madarame had guests over, he played the role of the perfect protégé and dutiful student, exactly how Madarame wanted him to, so that he could avoid his ire.

Not once did he question it.

Madarame just wanted what was best for him.

That was the only explanation.

 As sad as it was to admit, Yusuke had never had friends before he met the phantom thieves. He had always been too busy with his art and studies and never had enough time to socialise. No one at his school liked him enough to talk to him anyway.

The closest person he had to a friend when he was a child was Natsuhiko, who had been more like a brother to him, but Natsuhiko left when Yusuke was ten years old. Ysuuke didn’t even get to say goodbye. He just found his bed empty one morning and was informed of his departure over breakfast. Yusuke never quite forgave Natsuhiko for leaving him like that.

The Phantom Thieves were a motley crew, but they were the kindest people Yusuke had met in a long time, so he was happy to call them his friends. They were all kindred spirits, people who had been beaten down and abused by the world, and people who wanted change.

He found solace in their friendship. It was comforting to be around people who were so much like him, who had similar pasts and experiences, and who could understand him.

That day he was reminded of how kind the Phantom Thieves were.

Yusuke had started yet another one of his passionate rants – this time about an artist from the Edo period, who was well known for his unique handling of colours and composition – and instead of blowing him off and ignoring him, as he had expected them to, everyone was paying attention to what he had to say.

And he loved it. Art was a second parent to Yusuke (it had certainly done more to raise him than Madarame ever had) and he would happily ramble about it for hours on end. Once he got going, he could rarely force himself to stop.

There was a lull in his ramble, and he realised how rude he was being. “I apologise,” he said. “I let that go on a bit long, didn’t I? I have a bad habit of running my mouth. It won’t happen again.”

“We don’t mind man,” said Ryuji. “Art makes you happy and shit. We get that.”

“It’s like me and computers,” added Futaba, who was crouching on the couch and fiddling with the ends of her hair. “Sometimes you’ve just got to talk about these things.”

“Whatever makes you happy Yusuke,” said Ann.

“We’re your friends,” explained Ren, leaning dangerously far back in his chair. “We only want you to be happy, and if this is what makes you happy, go for it.” Haru and Makoto nodded in agreement.

Yusuke couldn’t stop himself. He felt bubbly and ecstatic. All that energy had to go somewhere and he found his hand flapping, quite without his input or permission. He rocked on his heels, riding that wave of joy.

It didn’t last long however, and a wave of horror came crashing down upon him as soon as he realised what he had done. Everyone was staring at him and he was frozen in place.

It was like he was the painting in Madarame’s palace. That damn thing haunted his dreams. He would never forget it – the reminder that he was nothing than a thing to the man who raised him. The man he thought of as his father. It sneered at him, as he tossed and turned, reminding him that he would never truly be free.

A tiny sliver of his brain knew that Madarame was gone, and couldn’t hurt him anymore. But it was overwhelmed by everything else that was screaming at him that he was in danger. That he needs to run and not look back. But he couldn’t even do that.

They’ll only hate you after this.

He tried to force himself to say something – anything – but couldn’t force out a single sound. He swore that he couldn’t breathe. Everyone’s eyes were on him. His heart was racing, pumping adrenaline through his veins that he wouldn’t even use because he was too terrified to run, let alone move.

“Yusuke is something wrong?” asked Ren, ever the gracious leader. Yusuke wasn’t sure if he would be able to handle it if Ren hit him. He was usually so composed, but Yusuke knew he packed a mean punch. He had seen him use it on shadows before.

Maybe, if he uses it on you, you’ll turn to dust and blow away as well. Then you won’t bother them anymore. They’ll be happy that you’re gone.

“I can’t— I don’t— I need—" he stammered, unable to form the words correctly. Everyone was staring at him. This was so humiliating.

Ren cast a desperate look to Futaba, who nodded and swayed to her feet. She inched toward Yusuke and reached out a hand to touch his shoulder. Yusuke flinched and she pulled away.

“You need to breathe Yusuke,” said Futaba. “I know it’s hard, but you need to breathe. In for four, hold for seven, and out for eight. Come on, do it with me.”

Yusuke took in a single shaky breath. And then another. Soon, his heart stopped palpitating at a million miles an hour, and he finally felt stable.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I don’t know what came over me. I- I don’t know. It simply happened.”

“It’s okay. You were just having a panic attack. Have you never had one before?” asked Futaba.

“No…” said Yusuke. “I can’t believe I lost control like that in front of everyone. This is mortifying.”

“No one’s going to judge you or anything. These things happen,” said Futaba, with a shrug. Everyone else nodded. “Do you know if anything triggered it?” she asked.

Yusuke chewed on his fingernails, a nervous habit that he never managed to kick, despite Madarame’s best efforts. “You’ll think it’s stupid.”

“We won’t. Trust me.”

“I am different to other people,” he admitted. “I always have been. When I was young, I had bad habits that were beginning to cause problems, so Madarame took it upon himself to… fix my issue.”

Futaba frowned. “You don’t mean..?”

“He used to hit me. It was never anything that bad, and never enough to bruise or scar, but it was adequate, and corrected the problem. I believe losing control and exhibiting that behaviour again in front of others was enough to remind me of it. I apologise for worrying you all.” He bowed his head, staring down at the ground.

There was a long, empty silence, which was broken by Ryuji. “Dude. He was abusing you.”

Yusuke blinked. “And that’s… bad?”

“Of course it’s bad!” exclaimed Ann. “He hurt you. It’s no wonder you’re afraid of him.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” asked Ren, staring Yusuke down.

“I didn’t think it was important…”

Futaba walked over to the couch and took her previous crouched position. “So, Inari, are you autistic?” she asked.

Yusuke scowled. “I don’t see how that’s relevant. I was diagnosed as a child, but I grew out of it.”

He was a little surprised when Futaba cringed and Ren shook his head. “You don’t grow out of autism Yusuke,” said Ren, as gently as he could. “It’s a part of who you are.”

“But I’m not autistic anymore! I’m not. Madarame fixed me,” exclaimed Yusuke.

“Man, not to rude or anything,” interjected Ryuji. “But he lowkey traumatised you. He didn’t fix shit.”

“Hitting someone for stimming is like punishing your puppy for wagging it’s tail,” said Makoto. “You’re just doing what your body wants you to do. It’s normal. We all do it.” She gestured between herself, Futaba, and Ren.

Yusuke’s eyes widened. “You mean, you’re all like me?” he whispered.

“Yes,” said Ren “You’re not alone.”

“Thank you,” he mumbled, rubbing at his face with the sleeve of his shirt. Why was he crying? “You’re all too kind.

Ryuji rolled his eyes. “Nah. We’re just not shitty people like that bastard. Sorry if that’s rude or whatever, but it’s true.”

Yusuke couldn’t stop himself from snickering. “That’s absolutely true. He was a grade A asshole”

“Group hug!” announced Haru, launching herself at Yusuke. Soon, Yusuke found himself in the middle of a crushing group hug with every single Phantom Thief except Morgana, who was still peacefully sleeping on the windowsill.

“You’re a bit weird,” said Ryuji. “But you’re our weirdo.”

 It was Yusuke’s turn to decide where the group went on their weekly outing, and he chose the planetarium. Natsuhiko had taken him there once, when Yusuke was about ten years old. Looking back, he knew it was because Madarame had come home drunk again and Natsuhiko didn’t want him to see that.

It was funny how many of his good memories were tainted by hindsight.

Even so, the day stood out in his mind. It was a single happy moment in the sea of abject misery that was his childhood. Natsuhiko had spent the entire evening pointing out different constellations and telling Yusuke stories about them.

Even after Natsuhiko left, Yusuke remembered the stories. He would trace the constellations onto his palm and whisper the stories to himself, desperately clinging onto the few things he had left of Natsuhiko. He remembered every single word, exactly how Natsuhiko had told him.

He and his friends found their seats and settled down. The lights flickered on above them, stars appearing in the dark expanse. He remembered Natsuhiko daring him to try and count them. It was impossible; there were just too many. An incomprehensible number.

It was beautiful. He would paint it, but he could never capture its majesty quite right. All the swirls of purple and blue and black, with pinpricks of light shining through, filled the entire domed ceiling. It would never fit on a canvas.

Futaba leaned over and whispered to him, “Do you know any stories about the stars?”

“Are you sure you want to hear?” replied Yusuke. “You know how much I can go on about these things.”

“Of course. We all want to hear!” said Ann. Yusuke looked around to the smiling faces of his friends and couldn’t help but grin himself.

“Okay,” he said, flapping his hands, as he collected all the right words. Flapping was his favourite stim. There was nothing quite like it for that fluttery, excited feeling in his chest. “Can you see those three stars over there that form a line?” he said. “They are a part of a constellation called ‘Take No Fushi’. They represent a bamboo cane, being held by a young girl. The story stays that she and her sister were carrying buckets of water balanced on canes of bamboo, when they were attacked by a fearsome Oni. There was no escape, so they climbed a rope towards the sky. The elder sister became the moon, and the younger sister became the stars that trail after her…”

Everyone was listening to him. No one minded his stimming. He knew, for the first time in years, that it was okay to be himself around those he loved.

[shoichee]

Phantom Thieves of Hearts in KNB

This is part 3 for Murasakibara only! Part 2 and part 1 for other KNB characters are right here and here, respectively!

Persona 5 x Kuroko no Basket crossover

[Murasakibara x s/o reader]

Headcanons on how KNB characters find out you were a member of the Phantom Thieves + what they do afterwards

@akichan-th i remember how you wanted a murasakibara h/c and i spent a while thinking LOL

Warning: spoilers regarding the palace’s deadline after 10/11 and the subsequent events shortly after

Murasakibara Atsushi

in this headcanon, the PT is located in either Yosen high or any nearby schools in Akita, since it’s a 7 hour drive minimum from Akita to Tokyo (the main location of the PT, Shujin Academy)

you and Murasakibara have been dating for a few months

very casual, easygoing relationship between the two of you where you two give each other space if needed and cuddle (while snacking, of course) other times

so your Phantom Thief life remained secretive and very manageable to keep under wraps, especially since he just never saw the need to poke and prod through your business if you never bring it up yourself first

as long as you gave him cuddles and snacks, he didn’t have a problem; he knew you were a good person too, so he had no reason to doubt you

“(y/n)-chin,” he childishly demanded. “I wanna cuddle.”

“Ah..! I’m so sorry, Atsu!” you gave him an enveloping hug as an apology. “But not today, I have lots of work to do for school…”

you gave him a regretful look, and while he was pouting and whining for snacks, he eventually let you go out of his ginormous arms

he might be a childish person and have lots of clingy tendencies/demands, but he’s still reasonable in letting you carry out your own life

. . . 

“Ready to explore the palace?” Futaba waves you over, with the other hand grasping her phone that already had the metaverse app opened and ready to be activated 

“Yup,” you heaved, after jogging briskly for several minutes to the hideout

Ryuji: “Alright! All set!”

Haru: “I’m still a little nervous…”

Ann: “Don’t worry, Haru! We’ll make sure to change his heart!”

. . .

“Humpf,” Murasakibara huffed, blowing his hair strand off his face for the umpteenth time as his chin was propped on the table, his biscuits left mostly forgotten a few feet away 

“You’ve been sighing a lot, Atsushi.” Himuro peered over from his book to see him moping. “What’s wrong?”

“(y/n)-chin isn’t here,” he grumbled

“That can’t be helped sometimes, you know.”

“I knooow,” he drawled before sighing again

“What are all these snacks lying around for? Aren’t you going to eat them?”

“They’re for (y/n)-chin, obviously.”

“Staring holes into the Hi-Chew packages isn’t going to summon them over. Come here, we can use the kitchen and maybe fix you up a quick appetizer to take your mind off of this.”

“O-kay.”

the next subsequent day, Murasakibara was clingier than normal, even went as so far as to initiate PDA by holding your hand when walking in the hallways and draping himself all over you during breaks

and yes, he fed you those snacks he saved for you from yesterday

Murasakibara honestly thought this was going to be a one time thing where you were busy, but since you were working on Okumura’s palace before the deadline, you had to always leave every day, or at least every other day, to finish the palace exploration

you initially went to the palace with the PT every day, but after seeing Murasakibara’s sour moods during school and being really grumpy over you not spending time with him, you opted to tell Joker that you would settle on coming every other day instead

Murasakibara still had some reservations about the changes in your “after school” activities that didn’t involve him by your side, but at least he knew you made the effort to try to be with him as much as you could, even though he could see how important these “activities” were to you

so for now, he was content enough with the way things are

until several days later, when he was about to approach you after school, after finding you in a secluded corner of the campus outside (it wasn’t hard to spot you with his height), he tried to approach you when he overheard your hushed conversation on the phone:

“Yeah… got it… mhm… I’ll be there at Leblanc… yeah, it wouldn’t be a problem, I hope. I should be free this evening, Akira. Wait for me, okay?”

Akira? Who was that?

Murasakibara stood there, frowning as he was processing your words and the possible implications from them, and for the first time, he felt doubt 

while he was lost in his thoughts, you hung off the call, and went to look for Murasakibara, and in immediately spotting the tower of your boyfriend, you ran to him

“Atsu!” you cheerily called, and it immediately snapped Murasakibara out of his thoughts to face you (more like looking down)

“Atsu,” you said, squeezing his torso in a hug and nuzzling him. “I gotta go again… But I’ll make it up to you, I promise!”

and as you backed up from Murasakibara to start jogging to your destination, you yelled out, “I’ll bring lots of food tomorrow for lunch!”

a small hiss in the back of his mind concluded that you were possibly seeing someone else; the fact that you constantly canceled a lot of plans with him just for these “activities” already gnawed at him

in his laziness dread, he opted not to follow you at all and immediately went to look for Himuro

“Muro-chin, what does it mean when someone is always busy?”

“Is this about (y/n)-chan again?” Himuro chuckled, not missing the way how Mursakibara was even more sullen than usual

“Che.”

“Maybe you need to talk to them yourself, Atsushi,” he hummed, walking slightly ahead of the giant. “You can’t constantly rely on me for all your decisions.”

“Maybe they’re just sick of eating snacks with you 24/7,” Fukui popped up between them. “Have you ever even been on a proper date with (l/n) before??”

“(y/n)-chin isn’t like that…” he grumbled vehemently, but it was totally obvious that he was hesitant

the next day, you came to school like nothing ever happened, your face bright as you held a cloth loaded with bento boxes, and Murasakibara decided to try Himuro’s advice to “talk to you”

“(y/n)-chin, you like me, right?” he propped his chin on your head

“Huh? Of course I do, silly,” you beamed up at him, and Murasakibara, right there and then, lost the will to question you any further, and he felt the doubt washed away

he figured this whole ordeal must’ve been just his imagination and he chided himself for doubting you like that when you always gave him amazing food and told him when you were free and whatnot

scratch that, when school finished for the day, you were ready to bounce out again with another excuse

his doubt came back and just multiplied tenfold

you felt really guilty, leaving your boyfriend in the dust constantly

you hadn’t anticipate this would happen, no; Okumura’s palace unexpectedly became a lot harder to deal with in the deepest areas, especially with the constant puzzles in the maze to sort through

and you knew he wasn’t a stupid person to overlook your behavior despite his oblivious surface, but even though you knew you couldn’t tell him your secret life, you tried to make him feel better in the only way you knew how: give him food

but there’s only so much food could do to appease Murasakibara before enough was enough for him

so while you ran out from campus again for the umpteenth time, Murasakibara decided to put his laziness to the side and follow you for once

okay but to outsiders, it totally looked like this grown ass man child giant was stalking a little, unsuspecting you

you made a sharp turn before slipping into a quaint coffee shop, and Murasakibara made the connection to the phone call after seeing the shop sign “Leblanc”

he was already jittering inside from nerves, but now he’s agitated

If he walked in, was he going to see you with another person? 

he gave a slow sigh before stopping before the door and opening it as he ducked in the doorway

a soft jingle from the door’s bell announced his entrance and everyone in the shop (including you) stopped their conversations midway and turned their attention to the newcomer (whose shadow from standing at the door blanketed the entire shop interior)

Ryuji: “Huh? Can’t you read? Shop’s closed.”

Makoto: “Ryuji! Can’t you just be nice?—I’m sorry, please don’t mind his manners, but he is right that we’re not open as of now…”

“(y/n)-chin came in here.”

Ann: “A-ah! Well, yes they did! But uh, they’re a sweeper and is training to be a waitress—”

you jabbed Ann’s side with your elbow with a “shhh” before you got up from your seat to walk to Murasakibara

“Atsu, what are you doing here?”

“I came here to ask you the same thing, chibi-chin.”

“(y/n) is working here as an apprentice to be a coffee barista under the owner’s tutelage along with the rest of us,” Joker said, getting up from his seat to walk towards Mura as well

“Akira…” you turned to Joker

not only was this man on a first name basis with you, but he was the Akira from the phone call

Joker could suddenly sense a huge spike in a hostile aura emitted by the purple-haired titan

Murasakibara suddenly pulled your arm into his chest and wrapped your waist from behind, all while glaring at the ravenette

“(y/n)-chin is mine.”

there was a collective silence before everyone started shouting in disbelief

“I didn’t know you dated anyone, (y/n)!!” “That’s sooo cute!!” “How long were you with him?” “What a wonderful thing to experience, (y/n)-chan!” “Mwehe, got any dirt on (y/n)?”

Joker just gives a smirk to the two of you, which you knew he meant that he was gonna make some comments and jokes on your relationship from this point on

No wonder you couldn’t come everyday to do a palace run.

“Ugh, seriously?? How the hell did (y/n) find someone before all of us? I mean, I thought being a Phantom Thief would’ve made me more noticeable to girls—”

“Ryuji!!”

“Oh… uh—”

everyone in the PT gang turned to Murasakibara to gauge his reaction:

he just had figurative question marks and clouds floating over his head as he continued to embrace you from behind

“Fan… tom… Thief?” (you inwardly sighed in relief and amusement at his reaction)

“It’s a group activity we have to do often,” you hurriedly explained. “Like… D&D role-playing gaming, and plus we all do it together after we finish doing barista work… together, but it’s kind of… embarrassing, so that’s why we’re all doing this rather secretively. So… could you keep this to yourself too?”

“O-kay.”

“Yeah, so sorry again, Atsu, but could you leave me to my own devices for the evening again?...”

“No, I don’t want to,” he replied, squeezing you even harder with his arms as if daring you to try to escape from him, and you shot glances at your team members to help you out (they looked at you as if this was all yours to deal with)

“Atsuuu,” you turned to face him while still being in his arms. “Other than this group activity, you’re still my number one priority, you know?” and you tippy-toed up to his face to give him a sweet peck on his lips 

choruses of fangirling and groaning ring out again

“I guess I’ll leave you be, (y/n)-chin,” Murasakibara said indifferently, but you spied a small smile on his lips

being relieved that you weren’t going behind his back to see someone was an understatement; in fact, he was giddy that you were so forward with him in front of a large group of your friends

true to his word, Murasakibara never mentions a peep of the “Phantom Thieves” again to anyone (other than with you sometimes when you two are alone)

although he merely thought it was just a type of extracurricular/club activity of some sorts, he did ask Himuro (and a nearby nosy Fukui) if they knew what the “Phantom Thieves” were

“I’m surprised you only heard about them now,” Himuro replied. “There’s tons of popular merch of them and everyone is so hyped up that they’re pretending to be the Phantom Thieves themselves and trying to hand out ‘calling cards’ to other students.”

Fukui popped up in hearing the “Phantom Thieves” with a collection of calling cards of his own and bragging about how he had to go through extensive means to obtain the “limited edition” card

so you were just fans of these famed superheroes and role playing it with your other friends? he guess it could be embarrassing for you enough to try to hide this from him

Mura always walks you to Leblanc and then leaves home for the day, but sometimes, Sojiro invites him in (when nobody is doing PT business) for good plate of curry and soba 

Murasakibara loves the old man and his cooking

he’s grown somewhat close to your PT friends, particularly Ann, Makoto, and Haru; Ann has a massive sweet tooth like Mura, so she would often give him extra sweets she bought from a dessert shop, meanwhile Makoto and Haru are like mother-figures (strict and doting, respectively) to him (sort of like Akashi and Himuro)

if you didn’t give into his whining for a particular something, he’d turn to Makoto or Haru to try to persuade you in giving in (may or may not work)

he’d probably will not think much of the “PT” business for the longest time, even when the Okumura news break out, because he doesn’t think they’re real to begin with (oh, he would believe the murder is real, but the perpetrator being the “PT” he thinks would be the media over-exagerrating and just giving any anonymous killer at large the term, “PT”)

as long as he wasn’t directly affected, he’s not someone to worry about the needless things

when things were getting dire for the PT, you actually isolated yourself from Murasakibara as well as the Yosen basketball team, not because you hate them, but because you didn’t want to drag them into legal matters with the police by association with you

you cursed yourself for being careless and letting your boyfriend hang out with the PT because someone’s bound to see a giant kid lurking in and around Leblanc at least once

Murasakibara thought he did something wrong and would tried to get your attention, but every time he did, you would expertly avoid him

he even left so many snacks at your desk hoping for you to accept them :((

one day, you finally went up to Murasakibara when you were absolutely sure you were alone with him, and before he could say your name and be elated that you were in front of him again, you coldly said:

“I want to break up.”

the usually apathetic guy would widen his eyes in complete shock and fear; the first thing you said after not talking to him in weeks were… that?

“(y/n)-chin… why? (y/n)-chin! Talk to me...” 

It was for the best… you never wanted to ruin his future and his basketball career just by being near you

you feigned indifference and tried turning around to walk away from him, struggling to keep your face from being tear-stricken

“(y/n)-chin!” Murasakibara released a bellow you never heard unless he was playing aggressively on the courts, before he forcefully tug your arm to spin you around

there you were, failing to keep your true feelings hidden as you started sniffling and then full blown sobbing the longer your boyfriend stared at your face in full worry 

“Here…” he pressed your face into his shirt as he hoisted you up from your knees, and he walked home with your legs around his waist, crying your eyes out from the stress and fears you’ve felt haunted by lately (“Stop crying, (y/n)-chin, it’s annoying” he would say as he rubbed your back)

as soon as he puts you down on a couch in his living room, you knew he meant business when he had a serious look on his face that meant “Talk now.”

you bit your lip in apprehension and in seeing that, Mura grabbed a few snacks from the cabinets for you before settling next to you again

and you confessed the entire truth to him, sniffling and hiccuping as you struggled to enunciate your words while stuffing your face with cream biscuits

“Is that all?...” Mura tilted his head. “You obviously didn’t kill him, so why are you worried?” he munched on his next package

“Atsu, it’s not that simple, you—”

“I know, I know.” he ruffled your hair before pulling you close

“Just stop crying,” he mumbled into your head

and you felt safe for the first time in a couple of weeks

the Phantom Thieves will overcome this, definitely.

“Don’t break up with me, (y/n)-chin,” he said out of nowhere, pouting and sulking at your figure

you busted a huge laugh, the very sound he missed hearing from you for so long

“I wouldn’t dare, Atsu.”

bonus: sometime in the future, you brought over an overly-curious Murasakibara to mementos with everyone, and there, he finally hears Morgana speaking for the first time. Afterwards, he’s best friends with the cat, taking him everywhere he went whenever he did errands or snack-shopping and ignoring the questioning gazes from strangers as he talked to the said cat like it was a normal thing. Both love to eat sashimi together.

[blackhakumen]

Mini Fanfic #776: Text Before Graduation (Persona 5)

Futuba: Ladies!!

Futuba: Gents!

Futuba: You will NOT believe what just happened today!!

Ren: I'm not gonna do the big speech after all?

Makoto: Ren.

Ryuji: Dude.

Ann: Don't even start

Haru: That's not the news Futuba is talking about at all.....

Ren: I know.

Ren: Just trying be hopeful is all.

Futuba: 'Kay. We'll DEFINITELY talk about all that later. But first, some exciting news are ahead!

Morgana: GUESS WHO'S FINALLY HUMAN FOR A DAY!?

Morgana: Real Human Boy!.jpg

Ann: ＼(◎o◎)／＼(◎o◎)／＼(◎o◎)／

Ren: Oh my god.....

Ryuji: HOLY FUCKING SHIT, DUDE!!!

Haru: RYUJI!!

Haru: What did I say about texting out cuss words in group chat with children present!?

Ryuji: Sorry. Sorry. I was just surprised is all.

Ryuji: But seriously tho, is ALL OF THIS FOR REAL, DUDE!?

Morgana: Yes, Ryuji. It's for real.

Morgana: I'm a human now! :D

Morgana: For the day at least lol.

Ann: OMFG MONA YOU'RE SO CUTE I JUST..... CAN'T!!!!! (≧▽≦)(≧▽≦) (≧▽≦)

Makoto: I agree. You look wonderful, Mona.

Lavenza: And very handsome too.

Morgana: Thanks, Lavenza ( ꈍᴗꈍ)

Lavenza: (✿^‿^)

Yusuke: Did your wish of being one has finally been answered?

Morgana: Not exactly. I asked Ludwig to make me a potion to make me human for day so I can be able to see you guys graduation tonight.

Ren: Neat. We're happy for you, kiddo.

Ryuji: Yeah. Being a human makes you feel alive now, doesn't it?

Morgana: You know it!

Morgana: This maybe a one time opportunity, but I'm still gonna enjoy every moment of it!

Futuba: We're gonna be with ya no matter what! (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

Morgana: Never doubted that for a second, Futuba. Thanks.

Makoto: Speaking of which, Haru, where are you guys right now?

Haru: We're just leaving out beauty salon and finding ourselves something to eat.

Lavenza: Ms. Haru wanted to receive a "Graduation Makeover" before the ceremony begins in the next couple of hours.

Ann: Cool. Shiho and I are getting ready ourselves. Looking our best and whatnot.

Makoto: Sis is helping me get ready too. Which reminds me.....

Makoto: Ren, have you been able to write down your speech yet?

Ren: I did.

Ren: Still not sure it's gonna be good tho....

Futuba: What kinda speech you gotta do, Ren-Ren?

Ren: A Graduation Speech. I was nominated to do at some point during the ceremony.....

Makoto: You'll do just fine out there, Ren-Ren. Trust us.

Ryuji: Makoto's right, man.

Ryuji: Remember that speech you did on your birthday?

Ryuji: You totally nailed that one mo problem!

Ren: Yeah. But only because you guys and everyone else in the mansion were there to see it.

Ren: Meanwhile, there's gonna be a crap ton of people in the ceremony. Sone of which I don't even know, some that might have high expectations of me, and with the exception of you guys, Shiho, Mishima, Eiko, and even Kawakami Sensei, I'm pretty sure everyone else in school still doesn't like me.

Ann: I'm sure most of the people in school has already warmed up to you as of late.

Ann: And even then, u shouldn't have to worry about them or anyone else in the audience think. Just have the same confidence u been having ever since you first came to Shiyuba and you'll be just fine.

Ren: That's almost easier said then done really....

Ren: What if I randomly mess up?

Yusuke: Then you simply keep going and never look back. It'll be less stressful that way.

Haru: You've endured so much since when we first met you. Your false accusations, the mementos, even the Smash Tournament.

Morgana: And against all odds, you were still able to pull through in the end.

Futuba: Which is all the more reason why you shouldn't back this one out.

Futuba: We believe you, bro. Always.

Lavenza: I wholeheartedly agree with everyone on this, Joker. You must gain more confidence in yourself.

Lavenza: You are the chosen one after all. (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

Ren: You guys really believed in me that much, do you?

Ryuji: We've always believe in you, man. And so does the boss and almost everyone in Smash Family.

Makoto: We love you so much, Ren. And we'll always be there for you no what anyone else says.

Ren: I knew I see you all as my real family for a reason......

Ren: I love all of you too.

Ren: And it might not be important to tell you all this, but... I'm already in tears lol.

Ren: The Crying Joker.jpg

Makoto: Oh honey~ I'll be sure to give you lots of love once my sister and I get to the café

Ryuji: Already on my way right now. Ain't no way I letting my bro cry us on now lol!

Ann: Neither am I!

Yusuke: Nor me as well.

Haru: We are also on our way to to café too, Ren-Ren!

Haru: You better prepare yourself for the bestest group hug of your life!~

Futuba: YEAH!

Ren: Sure thing, guys lol.

Ren: By the way, Morgana, you're having a good time being a human so far?

Morgana: Oh definitely. The salon was great and the burger we ate was pretty good.

Futuba: He even get to hold hands with a certain velvet girl every time we take scroll~

Morgana: NO I HAVEN'T!!!

Futuba: You so did! Haru and I were there to witness it.

Lavenza: I can conjure on saying that what Futuba is stating is true. Mona-Chan and I have been holding hands since we left the mansion.

Lavenza: It makes me happy to see that he cares about me ever so much. ( ꈍᴗꈍ)

Futuba: Holding Hands!.jpg

Ren: Now that's adorable.

Makoto: I agree. It's so cute!~

Haru: I knooooow!~ I couldn't stop gushing about earlier!~

Ann: I just told Shiho about and we're already gushing about it RIGHT. NOOOOOOW!!!~ (≧▽≦)(≧▽≦)(≧▽≦)

Ryuji: Oh I am SO gonna tease you about this, cat! >:)

Yusuke: Maybe I should create a reincarnation of this in my paintings....

Morgana: ALRIGHT, LISTEN!

Morgana: I only hold her just to make sure that neither of us get close to the road. THAT'S. ALL.

Morgana: Nothing more! Nothing less.

Haru: It's okay, sweetie. We believe you.

Haru: Isn't that right, you guys?

Ren: Yeah.

Ryuji: Whatevs.

Makoto: Of course.

Yusuke: If you say so.

Ann: Whatever you say~

Futuba: I still ship it.

Morgana: CAN WE NOT, FUTUBA!?

Lavenza: What does "Ship it" means, Mona-Chan?

........................................................

Morgana facepalms himself as he continues texting.

........................................................

Morgana: I tell you about it, later, Lavenza.......

Kazooie Joins the Chat......

Kazooie: Hey. I don't wanna alarm u guys or anything, but we saw some blue haired kid earlier ago in the mansion that sounds EXACTLY like Mona!

Morgana: That's because that blue haired kid was me, Kazooie.

Morgana: I'm a human now!

Futuba: Human Morgana!.jpg

Kazooie: Huh.

Kazooie: Well, I'll be damned......

Kazooie: Not bad. I'm happy for ya, squirt.

Morgana: Thanks!

Kazooie: Also I've just seen the messages you posted just now and I agree.

Kazooie: You and the white haired girl look cute together.

Futuba: RIGHT!?

Morgana: KNOCK IT OFFFFF!!!!

@keyenuta

@caleb13frede

@princekirijo

@26shann

@cyber-wildcat

@albion-93

@ma-lemons

[zevzevarainai]

Hey! You ever end up doing essay on the kazumaji gifs? (I'm highly interested because it's always majima o' clock where I live)

it’s always majima o’clock here too; maybe we live in the same area... but lmao i didnt write the essay on my kazumaji gifs because i didnt think anyone would want to hear it so i meant it more as a per request kind of deal. and you’re requesting. I want you to know you did this to yourself, my friend

below the read more for everyone’s well being. welcome to my first official majima analysis essay

ok so in those tags i said something like majima is softest with kiryu because it is absolutely the truth (unless you count makoto, which i love them too, but majima has moved on or at least is making an effort to. and that was pre-tacky snake skin jacket and pre-mad dog persona.) 

the prompt for the gifset was “maybe something about majima being stupid and unhinged but like, in a sweet way” and the whole point of this rambling is that kiryu is really the only one we see who causes the mad-dog persona to slip. kiryu says he can never get a read on majima but just because he is unpredictable doesn’t mean he doesn’t understand that he isn’t just batshit crazy. he trusts majima, and finds comfort in his lack of predictability, keeping kiryu’s life exciting and providing distraction from the insane amount of tragic shit that happens to kiryu. and majima has a similar experience of idolizing the yakuza lifestyle as teens/young adults only to have the yakuza drag them through hell. But this is supposed to be about Majima.

ANYWAY what GETS ME is again that mad-dog vibe slipping around kiryu. the only time we really only see it again is with Saejima when he comes back from jail. i’m gonna talk about that later too. LET’s GET TO THE GIFS i’m going in chronological order not the order i put them in

1)

Ok so as an audience, we don’t really know what happened between Kiryu and Majima between Yakuza Zero and Yakuza/Yakuza Kiwami. Yes, we get that tiny ending scene of Majima going KIRYU-CHAN for the first time and Kiryu smiling at him. But we are given nothing as to how they met or why Majima started calling him Kiryu-chan. It is left completely to the audience’s interpretation. Because then it goes straight to the first scene with Majima in Yakuza/Yakuza Kiwami after Kiryu gets out of jail. It implies that they already knew each other, and arguably that they were somewhat close -- close enough for Majima to “miss him.” (What was majima doing for those 10 years, i don’t know, but he clearly wasn’t in a great place, missing both kiryu, makoto, and saejima, we ignore y5 lore in this household or make up shit to fill in the giant gaps) You could argue that Majima missing Kiryu is just Majima being “crazy haha woah” but his character is so much deeper than that, and it’s proven in this gif’s scene. Yes he is fighting Kiryu with all his men. But if you are reading this you understand that them fighting physically all the time is a secret love language. They never intend to severely hurt each other. Fighting is how they know that they have an equal, someone else who was modeled into a weapon because of the Tojo Clan.

And yes, “He belongs to me!” is an extremely gay thing to say. He doesn’t even need to say that, though. One of his men didn’t understand that he doesn’t actually want to hurt Kiryu. The guy picked up Majima’s knife and tried to actually hurt Kiryu. Majima willingly gets stabbed so Kiryu doesn’t get hurt. That’s a handful of gay subtext right there. Majima’s first scene in y1 is about how the world is a horrible, shitty place that will chew you up and spit you out if you care. Then he goes and gets stabbed. Self-sacrificially. He cares about Kiryu, even if it hurts. 

2)

This one isn’t as deep. It stems of the same concept of them fighting each other as equals. Majima explicitly says more than once that strength is the most admirable trait, Goromi says that it only matters that a man is strong. Kiryu is the only person who presents a challenge to him. He admires him. 

3)

(As a disclaimer, I know a lot of people are uncomfortable with Goromi. I’ve also seen a lot of non-binary, gender-fluid, etc. people project on Goromi and Majima, and I feel like that can only be a good thing. Obviously they deserve more and more quality representation. I think the people who dislike Goromi are valid as well, but for the sake of this argument we are going to see Goromi as the people who project on her do and I’m going to use she/her pronouns when talking about Goromi.)

Regardless on your stance on this whole little side quest, the player has the choice to go along with Goromi which creates actually a lot of subtle connecting between the two of them. Even in just talking to her, we see the mad-dog mask slip. She talks about how much she cared about the girls at Club Shine and wonders how they’re doing. Literally says “all part of my tragic-ass backstory.” And Kiryu sympathizes with it. Says he sees through the “i hated it” bullshit and sees Majima/Goromi’s true self, which is that the cabaret job was hard for Majima because he cared about the women and didn’t like using them as a source of income and knew it would be his fault if they got hurt. 

Also, Goromi says that "When I’m with a guy, it’s all about if I’m having enough fun. That’s why he’s gotta be strong.” Sound like someone we know? Someone who we are talking about in the last gif with i-just-got-the-shit-beat-out-of-me-and-it-was-awesome bliss on his face?

Anyway, the scene in the gif is near the end of the session. Kiryu is talking about how he’s been in prison for 10 years, and Goromi says that now that he’s out he should try to relax and and a little fun. Arguably, “since you’re so lonely right now, I’m gonna give ya a hand!” is most of Majima’s role in YK1. Kiryu gets out of prison. Majima wants to fight him all the time and says it’s because he’s gone soft and needs to train. Majima Everywhere presents excitement in his life when everything else is hard and shitty and traumatizing. Yes, Majima kidnapped Haruka. But there isn’t a lot of info on that. Majima says he did it so they could fight but it very likely could have been an order from the Tojo Clan or even Nishiki. Until he develops a bond with Haruka, Majima is, in a way, all he has. Nishiki is mean now. Yumi is ???. Kazama is i don’t even remember but he certainly isn’t any emotional support. He’s lonely. Majima is the only person he has from before prison, and quite possibly the only person who understands what he is going through. 

4)

YK2, Kiryu has yeeted out of Majima’s life as Kiryu does, but he’s trying to protect haruka so I’ll let it slide. And what does Majima do now that Kiryu’s not there? Leaves the Tojo Clan. Yes it’s because he doesn’t like the 5th chairman’s style and to make up for Kawamura, but the point is he’s bored. The use of “MY Kiryu-chan” is obviously written there because “haha majima he’s crazyyy” but come on. Majima left the Tojo Clan after Kiryu stepped down as the 4th chairman. Because he was bored. Because he couldn’t trust his own men. The only person he considered an equal just wasn’t there anymore and he found it difficult to adjust. (That’s YEARNING, fellas)

So yes, HIS Kiryu-chan came home, but what is home in this context? It clearly isn’t the tojo clan, so I guess it could be Kamurocho in general. But if the clan doesn’t make it home, what does make it home? Perhaps a certain triangle shaped man??

5)

Oh boy silly Majima wants to fight Kiryu again hahaha weeeeeeeee NO listen, LISTEN, he does want to fight kiryu again, because 1) the man has been bored for a year 2) FIGHTING IS THEIR LOVE LANGUAGE 3) Majima is once again surprising Kiryu in a world where nothing surprises him anymore, where kiryu expects people to be vile and only want him for gain. Every single goddamn game it’s “Kiryu plz save the Tojo Clan plz” and Kiryu NEVER gets anything in return unless you count, i don’t know, Daigo and Haruka’s safety? But Majima doesn’t give a shit about any of that. Majima is one of the only people who consistently does things for Kiryu (even if they’re presented in an abnormal way). Majima is really the only one who makes sacrifices for Kiryu. But this fight, it kicks off YK2 of “hey, i missed you but i won’t admit it because we’re manly yakuza, please let me try to make you smile.”

6)

THE kazumaji scene. Going off of Majima being the only one to make sacrifices for Kiryu, here’s a perfect example. Majima first aids the Tojo Clan which he swore to leave literally only because Kiryu asked him to. Then, here, he get beaten within an inch of his life because he promised Kiryu he would protect Kamurocho from Ryuji. Majima does not give a shit about the Tojo Clan at this point. Yes, Majima LOVEEESSSS beating people up, but he’s fatally wounded. This is not a Majima who would die for the Tojo Clan. This is a Majima willing to die for Kiryu. After warning Kiryu about being to trusting, too.

And of course, we get the Majima collapsing on the pavement and Kiryu rushing in to CRADLE him in his arms like a damn fanfic. You’ve even got the “I did it for you” which everyone knows is basically an “I love you.” Look at Majima’s face in the gif. Bless the Kiwami 2 graphics, first of all. He’s looking at Kiryu like he wants him to be the last thing he sees, like he wants him to know that he’s going out for Kiryu, that despite the fact that he’s about to cough up blood he needs Kiryu to have the information he needs to save the clan and Kamurocho. He’s telling Kiryu all this with labored breath because he promised. Kiryu “One-Expression” Kazuma is viably worried as hell, the little nod in the gif kills me because Kiryu needs him to know he’s touched and he’s so grateful. The only reason Kiryu left him was because there was danger elsewhere and he trusts Kaoru enough to take care of him. (Side note: I love Kaoru Sayama, but I still feel like she’s good enough a character on her own and doesn’t need to be a romantic interest for Kiryu. Like it was like oh... she’s Girl so she needs to fall for the Big Strong Male Protag.... If Majima was a cis girl they would have made out in this game, maybe even y1.) 

7) Speaking of sacrifices, Yakuza 3, the game where Majima literally joined the Tojo Clan again because Kiryu wanted him to protect Daigo. That’s a huge lifestyle change, Majima.

Yes, this scene is funny because Majima is riding in a Barbie-ass truck like a 15 year old driving on a learner’s permit in a downpour (yet proves he can drive stick seconds later) and thinks he hit Kiryu while he purposely hit everyone else. Look, Majima needs this ok y3 he looks like he’s been crying since kiryu left no one No One is going to hurt Kiryu now

That truck is likely stolen, he’s driving erratically as fast as he can because Kiryu is in danger, how did he even know that Kiryu was in danger is it like some kind of 6th sense... If you didn’t already know, I would take a bullet for Majima’s voice actor; his delivery of “Kiryu-chan! Where are you?!” could have just been like haha oops kiryu did i hit you ;3 but instead it’s this raw cry of genuine panic, like did his actions get kiryu hurt, Majima could not live with himself if he was the reason Kiryu got fatally hurt

8) Ok I’ve hinted at the fact that I have beef with the Hot Mess that is yakuza 5, wasn’t huge on Y4 and Y6 was fine but it was heavily based on the events of Y5. In my head I’ve got an entire fix-it fanfic in which Majima yeets out to Okinawa with Kiryu after Y3 I could write that upon request too ANYWAY here’s another sacrificial majima...

Despite not caring for Y5, THIS SCENE is RAW. Maybe he’s not super “unhinged” in this scene but it’s just so much. Majima, who Kiryu brokedown in his taxi bc he thought he got killed (because Kiryu made him stay in the tojo clan haha we’re out here crying), chooses Kiryu over Saejima. Saejima, Majima’s oath brother, Saejima. We love Saejima, Majima loves Saejima, but 25 years is a long ass time. Majima changed. Saejima changed. For awhile he had Makoto, but then Kiryu was all Majima had for a good chunk of Saejima’s time in prison. This is the man Majima got his eye stabbed out for defending. But the BaD GuYs that arent memorable enough for me to even look up the names of are like look, we want to watch the world burn because we are Bad Guys, so either you are going to fight your brother to the death or we are going to snipe Kiryu’s daughter in the fucking head. Obviously he doesn’t know that Baba is going to betray them, so he has to pick between Saejima and Haruka. He chooses to potentially kill Saejima for Kiryu’s happiness. I’m sure if things didn’t change, Majima would have held back and let Saejima kill him. Majima would rather die than see Kiryu in pain. Majima would rather kill Saejima/let Saejima kill him than let Haruka die. If that’s not a giant declaration of unconditional love and devotion, I don’t know what else to tell you.

Anyway, thanks so much for indulging me and listening to my yakuza opinions if you made it this far you the mvp :’’’’)

[akechicrimes]

Prompt 37? Futaba and Akechi platonic/Futago siblings?

37. “Follow me. It’s okay, just hold my hand.”

after akira leaves tokyo, futaba does just fine without her key item, except for when she doesnt.

(one of them AUs were goro survives the engine room and rejoins the phantom thieves. no i will not explain. persona 5 canon AND persona 5 royal do not interact. for reference in this universe futaba and akechi are half siblings but only akechi knows that)

*

“Next time you see me, I’ll be a whole new person,” Futaba tells Akira excitedly on his second-to-last day in Tokyo. “I’m going back to school, I’m out and about by myself—oh! Oh! Did I tell you I said yes to Kosei? I told Kosei I wanted to go to Shujin and they offered me scholarship! And I went to the subway station by myself yesterday!”

They’re crammed into Akira’s Leblanc attic, sitting around a cake that literally none of them were capable of baking themselves, so they’d bought the thing from a bakery and decorated it with little black and red hearts. Ryuji is passing around his gross soda, while Ann is recounting some story that doesn’t matter with incredible enthusiasm. Makoto looks like she’s determined to enjoy herself and will hear no argument.

The whole thing is incredibly morbid, if you ask Futaba. It feels less like they’re waiting for Akira to leave Tokyo and more like they’re attending Akira’s funeral. Akechi in particular looks like he’s regretting attending, which honestly tickles Futaba more than it should, that the most dishonest Phantom Thief seems to be the only one looking as honestly put-off by the entire affair as everyone else is determined not to be.

That’s everyone else’s problem. Futaba might not be happy Akira has to leave, but she’s proud. She’s sad that Akira has to leave, but also she promised Akira that by the time that he had to leave, she’d be able to get around on her own, without clinging to him for support. And she is able. She kept her promise.

Tomorrow might be the day that Akira has to go, but today is the day that Futaba is Officially Recovered.

Akira does that annoying thing he does where he puts his hand on her head and messes up all her hair, like he’s a human cat showing affection by pissing everyone off. Futaba yelps. “Look at you. You don’t need me at all.”

“I told you that I’d be ready to say goodbye by the time you had to go back to your hometown,” says Futaba. “I haven’t broken my promises yet, have I?”

There’s a burst of laughter from Haru over something Yusuke said, who looks rather surprised to discover that he said anything funny. Both Makoto and Akechi snicker at him, and then stop immediately to glare at each other the second they realize they’ve accidentally wound up sharing an opinion.

Akira ignores them. “Well, you can still text me if you need me. Or call.”

“I’m trying to tell you I’m getting better and I don’t need you,” Futaba grumbles. “Also, what kind of psychopath do you think I am to call someone on the phone?”

“That’s what phones are for.”

“Calling people is scary.”

“I thought you were getting better?” Akira teases.

“I am!” she says, pointing a finger at him. “I am! Just you watch, Akira. I’m getting better every day.”

*

Six months after joining Kosei, Futaba locks herself in her room and does not reemerge for seven days straight.

*

She tells Sojiro that she’s sick. Sojiro tells the school that Futaba told him that she’s sick. She definitely fakes a hell of a good cough, and the school lets Yusuke send her her all the homework that she was supposed to be doing in the first place, but Futaba already knows it’s only a matter of time before Sojiro rats on her, and she won’t even blame him because it’ll be for her own good.

In the meantime, she has stashes of crackers and peanut butter from back when she was a full-time hermit. She hates the taste of peanut butter within three days. Her bed is a relief, soft like a home she never left, up until it isn’t anymore. It’s too soft. No matter how she lies on it, no matter how soft it is, a mattress just isn’t comfortable when you’ve been lying on it for seventy-four hours. It’s hot. Smothering. She feels like she’s going to drown in the blankets and they’ll have to fish her moldy, sweaty corpse out of the bottomless quicksand pit of her too-soft mattress.

The thing about being a shut-in is that you don’t actually like your room very much. It’s not a relief, or an oasis, or even a place you enjoy. You’re just terrified of everywhere else more.

She plays a lot of video games that she doesn’t even like. She watches a lot of Twitch streamers she doesn’t even like. She doesn’t do her homework. She ignores Sojiro. She pretends she’s alright to everyone who texts. She wakes up and goes to sleep and thinks about going outside and goes to sleep and wakes up and wonders if the whole last year and her cautious baby steps back into the world outside was all just a hazy dream.

*

There aren’t a lot of Thieves left in Tokyo, weirdly. Haru and Makoto both graduated, off doing business and law junk that honestly makes Futaba’s brains want to crawl out her ears, but all the numbers check out and Haru’s not in the red yet, and Futaba’s looked at enough people’s dirty laundry to appreciate Haru’s clean ledger. Akira’s back in his dinky hicktown, where there’s barely anything electronic connected to Wifi worth breaking into for surveillance, which is really boring.

Ann’s been doing so many modeling gigs that she might as well not be attending Shujin anymore. She’s practically surrounded by electronics, and all of them are connected to the internet. On any given day, Futaba can snoop through the internet trail of electronic file cabinets full of images of her face, emails about her face, paychecks for her face. Futaba sends Ann more than one email about creepy old dudes making gross comments about her, along with a bunch of other illegal shit they’ve done, plus their offshore accounts full of cash if Ann wants Futaba to sic a lawyer on them.

Ann looks like she’s having fun. Ann looks different on the other side of the computer screen, like she’s less real. Like she’s not someone Futaba really knows. Like Ann’s not someone Futaba’s literally cried on at one point in her life.

Ryuji is definitely attending Shujin, but between physical therapy, catching up on a whole year of track, athletic scholarship hunting, and studying for college admissions tests, Ryuji seems to have been swallowed whole by Shujin, really. Out of boredom, one day, Futaba went down that rabbit hole of researching what it takes to get recruited for track in college, and holy shit–apparently Ryuji’s coach was supposed to be helping him with that whole process, but of course Ryuji barely has a proper coach ever since Kamoshida left Shujin’s track program in pieces. The amount of networking he’s doing is insane, especially for one teenaged boy who barely remembers his homework every night.

Sometimes, when Ryuji’s forgotten to check his email in a while and there’s a message from a coach sitting in his inbox, Futaba will send him a text to make him check it. And then it’s all, What were you doing looking at my emails, Futaba and Which of my other passwords do you know, Futaba, as if Ryuji doesn’t just use the same password over and over and has literally nobody but himself to blame.

So it’s really just Futaba, Yusuke, and–weirdly–Akechi, who’s off doing his gap year and said he was going to go abroad, but then he never did. Not to be a huge snoop, but Futaba went digging through his junk for about five seconds and then she never did it again, because she felt really weird about finding out that the guy that killed her mom is looking into social work, volunteerism, and reforming the justice system.

Like. The man who killed the Thieves’ leader is now literally out there saving orphans. It’s wild.

She might’ve been the one to tell Akechi that he can start over again and do better, but she reserves the right to at least feel weird about it.

She does not call Akira. She talks to Yusuke at school, but she refuses to ask him to accompany her on the subway. She should be recovered by now, shouldn’t she? She was supposed to have gotten over all that when Akira left Tokyo. She’s doing fine. She’s just looking out for her friends. Her, living vicariously through her friends, who’re growing up and growing away, flourishing into young adults? Never.

*

Everything is the same.

*

Didn’t she help kill a god last year?

Didn’t she work so hard to get out of her room, to make friends, to reconnect with Kana-chan?

Didn’t she work so hard to change herself?

Didn’t she help change the world?

*

Everything is the same.

*

Tuesday, 1:43 PM

YUSUKE: Futaba?

FUTABA: yo inari

FUTABA: u got more homework for me or what

YUSUKE: Ah, no.

YUSUKE: I think your teacher finds it suspicious that I’m sending you homework when I’m not in your grade, as it is.

FUTABA: oh no

FUTABA: what a shame that we didn’t have an entire year of experience with getting away with wildly illegal magic brain crimes without raising any suspicion

FUTABA: truly emailing me like four pieces of paper a day is far too difficult

YUSUKE: Well, I can’t get your homework from your teacher, but I can give you more homework if you’d like.

FUTABA: ok bucko that wasn’t a challenge

YUSUKE: There’s a math problem set that’s been incredibly dull to get through when I have more important pieces I could be working on…

FUTABA: inari im sorry to say but

FUTABA: me literally doing your homework for you is about a thousand times more illegal than you giving me my homework when ur not in my grade

YUSUKE: Oh, is it?

FUTABA: wh

FUTABA: are y

FUTABA: what do you mean OH IS IT

FUTABA: did you not KNOW ur not allowed to have other ppl do ur hw????

FUTABA: inari have u been making other people do ur hw for u so u can have more time to do art?????????

FUTABA: no shut up i dont want to know

FUTABA: i will not be ur accomplice

FUTABA: i see ur little speech bubble thingamajig yusuke i said stop typing forever and ever

YUSUKE: I can’t invite you to the art gallery tomorrow if I can’t type.

YUSUKE: It also seems impractical for you to outlaw me from texting forever.

FUTABA: i literally did not say that

YUSUKE: You said, and I quote,

YUSUKE: “Yusuke, I said stop typing forever and ever.”

FUTABA: ok i know it looks like i said that but please im begging u it’s literally just an exaggeration

YUSUKE: As Makoto would say, it’s hardly an enforceable law.

FUTABA: u literally texted my sick and crusty ass just to give me a hard time

YUSUKE: Are you about recovered from your cold?

FUTABA: and now u have the nerve to ask me to go to ur art show thing

YUSUKE: I didn’t say that.

FUTABA: oh really

FUTABA: what were u gonna ask me about then

YUSUKE: The art show, naturally.

YUSUKE: But you could have done me the courtesy of letting me ask.

FUTABA: all that on the day of my daughter’s wedding and now u want me to do u a solid

FUTABA: well i have news for u

FUTABA: the answer

FUTABA: is yeah

FUTABA: sure why not

YUSUKE: Oh, excellent.

YUSUKE: I thought that you might decline on account of your illness.

FUTABA: i’m not a punk bitch

FUTABA: i’m going

FUTABA: u were only working all those paintings for like two months i wanna see their oily faces in person

YUSUKE: Just because they were made with oil paints does not mean that they are oily.

FUTABA: cant wait to see my oily boys

YUSUKE: Unfortunately, I have to set up the event beforehand, so I will not be able to accompany you on the way here.

YUSUKE: Will you be alright by yourself?

FUTABA: uh

FUTABA: hmm

FUTABA: how oily are these boys in case i need to call a rain check

YUSUKE: Hmm.

YUSUKE: Perhaps someone else can go with you.

YUSUKE: Let me see if I can find someone.

FUTABA: what like one of ur art friends

FUTABA: i’m not going with anyone i dont know sry

YUSUKE: I’ll keep it in mind.

Tuesday, 1:59 PM

YUSUKE: Unfortunately, Ann and Ryuji were not available. Both of them will be coming late to the art show.

YUSUKE: Fortunately, Goro is.

FUTABA: whomst

YUSUKE: Goro Akechi?

YUSUKE: Crow, in case you know multiple Goro Akechis.

FUTABA: no like why u callin him goro

YUSUKE: I asked him if I could and he said yes.

YUSUKE: There’s not many people left in Tokyo who were part of the Thieves.

YUSUKE: I’m not exactly popular at school myself, so I thought it prudent to hold onto the connections I already had.

FUTABA: hhhhhhhhhhhhh

FUTABA: but why him……………………………………….

YUSUKE: Has he done something wrong?

YUSUKE: Well.

YUSUKE: Besides the obvious.

YUSUKE: Last I heard, you were quite vocally supportive of Goro making a change for the better,but have you prehaps reconsidered?

FUTABA: i mean he’s always been nice to me

FUTABA: like even before he was on the team as crow

FUTABA: and then later after he like lost his shit and tried to kill us

FUTABA: he was also like weirdly nice

FUTABA: even if he was dressed as a tokusatsu villain

FUTABA: but

FUTABA: i

FUTABA: ok this is gonna sound really weird but like

FUTABA: you know how i said that the person to take me to the art show has to be someone that i know

YUSUKE: Yes.

FUTABA: even though akechi was one of the thieves at the end

FUTABA: i feel like i dont really know him

FUTABA: he like had that whole breakdown where he spilled all his kylo ren sadstuck junk and then he peeled his dumb ass up off the floor and then we beat up his dad in a dark alley

FUTABA: and then i guess akira likes him a bunch and hangs out with him and i guess probably talked to him about all that stuff that happened

FUTABA: and also i think ann talks to him

FUTABA: and also haru i think for some reason……………………..

FUTABA: but like i feel like. we as a group. never really uhhhhhhh

FUTABA: got to know him very well i guess

FUTABA: because he spent like the whole year being a fake ass bitch

FUTABA: and then by the time he wasnt, the thieves were busy literally fighting god, and it was all business business business

FUTABA: ughghfhg i guess this is just a really long way of saying that like yeah ok i guess i do know him but i dont think i really do

FUTABA: even when he was off the shits in the engine room it was like

FUTABA: somehow that was not……………………………….. really him

FUTABA: idk maybe this is just my Thoughts but like

FUTABA: idk some people are like “your true self is who you are at your worst” and

FUTABA: yeah maybe you are some PART of urself when youre at your worst but like

FUTABA: also not???

FUTABA: that can’t be it

FUTABA: that’s not ALL of you

FUTABA: so all i ever saw was him when he was being a fake ass barbie prince and then when he was like actively losing his shit

FUTABA: and both of those were like. two types of fake ass barbie prince

FUTABA: except obviously the one where he started screamin about murder and trying to kill joker was like, fake ass serial killer barbie prince

FUTABA: anyway i dont buy it for a second that seeing akechi at his worst means that i know the first thing about his “”“”“”“”“true self”“”“”“”“”“”“

FUTABA: like i know that i technically met him but also at the same time i dont think ive ever really actually met this dude

FUTABA: uh tldr what’s the truth crowboy

FUTABA: second tldr do you got anyone else i can go to the art show with because im not unpackin all that junk in the trunk while also trying to fend off a panic attack in the subway

YUSUKE: Well, to speak to "what’s the truth, crowboy,” I’d say he’s actually really funny.

FUTABA: WHAT

YUSUKE: Yes, actually.

FUTABA: YOU TRYNA TELL ME YOU SHARE A SENSE OF HUMOR W AKECHI

YUSUKE: As everyone knows, I don’t have a sense of humor.

YUSUKE: But if I did, that might not be inaccurate to say.

YUSUKE: Either way, we could ask Boss if he’ll take you to school.

FUTABA: no

FUTABA: im not makin him shut down leblanc for the day just cause i cant get my shit together

FUTABA: and i go to school by myself all the time now i dont need to be walked there by my dad like a four yr old

FUTABA: r u sure u dont have anyone else who can take me

YUSUKE: You said it had to be someone you know.

YUSUKE: I can take you.

YUSUKE: But I’ll be getting to Kosei early to prepare.

FUTABA: how early is early

YUSUKE: Four in the morning.

FUTABA: PLEASE INARI

YUSUKE: The people you know is a quite limited pool, Futaba.

FUTABA: shut the hell ur face i dont need u tellin me to make kosei friends too

FUTABA: i get my butt to school every day i’m already a hero

FUTABA: ok alright

FUTABA: crow-san it is

FUTABA: hhh

FUTABA: no shut up stop typing i’m fine

FUTABA: i already saw his dumb ass get inflicted with Horny from Yaldy God Himself i ain’t afraid of no crows

FUTABA: actually now that i remember that that was pretty funny mwehehehehehehe

FUTABA: OKAY send me the who what when where why

YUSUKE: There’s a PDF flier. I’ll send it to you.

YUSUKE: But I will have to type the email to send it to you.

FUTABA: oh my GOD inari

FUTABA: i swear to god ur not actually this dense and youre just pretending u dont know what an exaggeration is just to drive me up the wall

YUSUKE: Oh, that is a possibility, isn’t it?

FUTABA: WH

YUSUKE: Ah, last period is starting. I’ll have to talk to you later.

FUTABA: WHAT

FUTABA: NO WAIT

FUTABA: HELLO????

FUTABA: YUSUKE NO COME BACK

Tuesday, 2:53 PM

FUTABA: YUSUKE HAVE YOU BEEN MAKING AKECHI DO UR HW FOR U SO YOU CAN DO MORE ART??

FUTABA: IS THAT WHY UR ON A FIRST NAME BASIS W HIM

FUTABA: ANSWER ME STRINGBEAN

*

In Futaba’s opinion, there’s an infinite amount of more embarrassing reasons to pull yourself out of your depression pit than “I needed to yell at my friend for being a snotty bastard,“ and there’s worse escorts to have than the weird guy who went from being a professional murderer to their weird awkward friend. Firstly, if there’s anything that can motivate Futaba Sakura, it’s the primal urge to dunk on her friends for spite and memes. Secondly, there’s no chance in hell Futaba’s going to have a breakdown in front of Akechi.

She can do this. She got herself out of this grave once; she can do it again. Even if Akira isn’t here. She’s getting better. She promised him.

On the eighth day of her almost-return to hermithood, Akechi texts her:

AKECHI: I’m here.

AKECHI: Are you ready to go?

Futaba is wearing only an old shirt, no bra, sweats, and vaguely greasy hair from all the showers she’s skipped.

FUTABA: i’m SO ready

FUTABA: the readiest

FUTABA: ultra mega super ready

FUTABA: featherman ranger code name Ready

AKECHI: Oh.

AKECHI: Alright.

Hell yes alright. Time for Futaba to save her own life from her gravesite of a room.

With… Goro Akechi. Wow, life is weird, huh?

She drags on her Kosei uniform like a skin discarded long ago. It feels stiff. Maybe because it feels wrong to wear school clothes like a functioning human; maybe because she just hasn’t washed it in a week. The very idea of explaining herself to Sojiro stresses her out, so she doesn’t do it. The idea of not explaining herself to Sojiro, when he deserves an explanation and also would probably have a heart attack if he realized that she’d disappeared from her room without his knowing, also stresses her out, so she still doesn’t explain herself to Sojiro.

I told Akira I’m better now. I can do this. I did this for more than six months. I was out of my room in the real world, I went to the school festival, I changed my own heart…

She creeps down the stairs like a thief in her own house and pokes her head out the door. Goro Akechi is fiddling with his phone in the sun outside her house, looking like he, too, has only just managed to pull on his Human Suit and look like a guy who didn’t make shadows beg for mercy for fun, so it looks like this whole expedition is going to be a lot of fun.

"Futaba-chan?” says Akechi, only just noticing her lurking in her own doorway. “It’s been a while since we last saw each other. How are you?”

Futaba opens her mouth. No noise comes out.

Akechi’s eyebrows slowly begin to knit together.

“I’m good,” she says squeakily. Clears her throat. Holy shit, she’s not afraid of Akechi after all that junk they went through in the Metaverse. She saw him as a rat. She saw him visibly want to break his father’s face when Shido tried to apologize to him on live TV. Once, Makoto and Akechi got into an unironic, passionate, hour-long argument about whether or not it’s beneficial to color code your notes.

“I’m alright!” Futaba announces louder, maybe a little loudly, considering the way he looks only more concerned. “L-Let’s hurry up and get this sidequest over with!”

She pulls her hoodie over her head and jams her hands into the pockets and makes herself as small as possible and inches out of the doorway. “If you… say so,” says Akechi, and eventually matches her incredibly slow pace as she shuffles her way towards the main street.

When the noise of Yongen-Jaya’s street hits her, her heart rate (already high as hell) spikes even higher like the first day she’d come out of her room, but the old coping mechanisms come back like second nature: Breathe slower, avoid eye contact, remember her mission, stick to the sides of the streets. Breathe slower. She’s still got it. It’s still hard, but she’s got a whole arsenal of ways to deal. She can do this. She will kick Yusuke’s ass for being a dick, if only out of sheer spite.

If Akira were here, I could hide behind him and…

No, shut up, shut up. All she has is her hoodie and Goro Akechi. Akira’s not here. She can do this by herself.

Akechi makes precisely two attempts at small talk (“How has Kosei been?” “Have you seen the pieces Yusuke submitted to the art show before?”) before he realizes that Futaba isn’t going to respond by virtue of barely holding onto her shit by her fingernails. He shuts up and sticks close by. Futaba makes her way down the streets towards the subway like walking on a tightrope. The subway station isn’t busy, but she puts every step in front of her like she’s going to fall. Getting on the subway might as well be a highwire. Futaba and Akechi wait for the train in mutual silence to the sound of other commuters murmuring amongst themselves, like a toothless echo of Mementos’s depths.

When they get on the train, people around her are quiet, thank god, but all of a sudden she’s convinced that she smells because she hasn’t taken a shower in literal days, and she tries to pack herself into her seat as tightly as possible. The guy in front of her is scrolling through something at a ferocious pace and his thumbnail keeps hitting the screen with this incessant clack, clack, clack noise. The subway voice announces their next station as the doors begin to close, and a girl suddenly sits bolt upright, having realized that this is her station after all, and bangs Futaba’s knees hard as she passes. Futaba wants to curl her legs to her chest, but she’s wearing Kosei’s uniform skirt and it’d just make everyone stare at her if she did that on the subway. She curls her fingers into the skirt hem. She stares down at her knees and lets her hair drape around her like a curtain. She can do this. She can do this. Breathe slower. Even slower. I did this for more than six months, I told Akira I’m better now, I changed my own heart…

Akechi pulls out his phone. Futaba’s phone buzzes.

AKECHI: Are you alright?

FUTABA: i said i was ready dude

Akechi types and retypes an answer, which technically Futaba could just look over his arm and read, but instead Futaba flips through apps on her phone and pulls up a shitty mobile dungeon crawler. She dies four times before Akechi puts his phone away without sending anything.

They pass multiple stations like that. Futaba sure as hell hopes that Akechi’s watching which station they’re on, because she isn’t. After the millionth time she dies, Futaba just closes the app altogether. Concentration’s shot. Can’t focus on anything. Heartbeat’s too loud. Breathing’s too loud. The guy next to her is breathing too loud. Everything is too loud.

New text:

AKECHI: Yusuke said you’d recovered from your cold, but you still look a little unwell.

Futaba doesn’t respond to that. She doesn’t need Negative Nancy over here telling her she’s gonna crack. Because she isn’t gonna. The subway starts to slow, and the voice announces the station for Yusuke’s school. She’s literally almost there, she’s right there, she might die in three seconds because her heart is going to pound of her chest but at least she’s going to make it, she promised Akira that she was alright—

The subway doors open. Passengers stand to get off. Akechi stands up. Futaba drops like a rock.

“I can’t,” Futaba’s voice says. She sounds like she’s crying. “I can’t, I can’t do it, I—”

“Futaba—”

“I’m can’t do it, I—”

She buries her face in her knees on the dirty subway floor. Oh, she really is crying. “I’m sorry,” she says, “I’m so sorry, I couldn’t…”

Around her, people’s feet stop moving. They’re staring at her. She’s crying on the subway and everyone is staring at her. “Shh,” says Akechi, like Futaba doesn’t know she’s being a loud and irritating pest, but then he takes off his winter coat and covers her with it. Suddenly everything goes dark. It’s a huge coat, too; it wraps around her whole torso with enough room to spare to cover her entire head. Inside, it’s like she’s back in her room, only listening to the sounds of real life somewhere on the other side of a computer monitor, where it can’t hurt her. It’s so surprising she hiccups to a stop. Two hands pull her up by the shoulders and guide her to stand. “Up. Let’s go.”

“Is she okay?” says a voice.

Futaba’s entire body seizes with fear. She ducks into her own knees, trying to disappear.

“Hey, little girl, are you alright?”

“She’ll be fine,” says Akechi’s friendly, super fake ass barbie prince voice. “My sister just had a hard day. I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”

“A hard day?” Now the stranger’s voice is accusatory.

“For your information, our dog was recently brutally run over in front of her eyes.”

“Young man, are you serious right now?”

“Oh, yes. There was blood everywhere. Its intestines squelched horribly under the tires less than six feet away from her,” Akechi goes on. Futaba chokes, and then hiccups in what she realizes is almost a laugh. “Please excuse her. Thank you.” And before the literal complete stranger can follow up on that awful statement, Akechi takes her hand and pulls her up.

Futaba stumbles to her feet. If she has to take the coat off right now, she will actually die.

“It’s okay. Just hold my hand and follow me.”

Blindly, she lets him lead her out of the subway, weaving through people with only minimal contact with other people’s shoulders. There’s a whole awkward period where Akechi has to walk her up the stairs out of the subway station while she can’t see anything, but eventually the noise and bustle of other people around her seems to die away, and the air grows cooler in the way it does in the shadows between city buildings. Then they stop walking altogether. When Akechi lets go of her hand, she almost tries to grab it back before she catches herself.

“Okay. There’s nobody else around, now. It’s safe.”

Futaba doesn’t come out of the jacket. In the dark, her eyes dart back and forth, trying to see even as she blinds herself.

“Sorry for grabbing you so suddenly like that,” Akechi’s voice goes on after it becomes obvious she’s not going to come out.

Futaba wipes snottily at her own face. Oh, this is so gross, she’s got snot and tears on top of five days worth of grime and body juice because she hadn’t taken a shower. She’s disgusting. She really actually wants to die right now. She can’t show her face like this.

“Er,” says Akechi. “Do you want…. water, or…?”

Futaba folds up right there on the city pavement, probably dragging Akechi’s nice coat all over a dirty alleyway. She tucks her face into her knees, where she feels safest, and pulls the coat flaps even tighter. “I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to be.”

“I’m sorry for not being okay,” she mumbles.

There’s a short silence. “You really don’t have to be.”

“I do,” Futaba says. She feels like she’s nine years old again, a petulant kid who needs to hold people’s hands and be escorted around Tokyo. “This is—it’s stupid, and I can’t believe I-I’m still doing this, a-and even a-after everything that h-happened last year, I’m still just a… I’m still…”

“It’s fine,” says Akechi. Even he sounds overwhelmed, and at the first sound of weakness, she pulls the coat off her head and glares at him furiously, red-faced and covered in tears and snot and gross depression juice crust and all.

“I’m not supposed to be this way anymore!” she says miserably. “I’m supposed to be better! Moved on! Doing literally a-anything else but crying over t-taking a subway! It’s stupid and nobody else is like this and I just want to be over this already and I just want to be better already and—!“

She covers her face with her hands again. God, even when she says that, it sounds pathetic.

After a moment or two, she hears Akechi moving again. She peeks at him. He’s crouching in almost the exact same pose as her, looking like he’s resigning himself to neither getting his coat back, nor moving from this spot any time soon, nor getting to Yusuke’s art show on time, but also looking archly and entirely unperturbed about it. Actually, it looks like he’s writing a work email on his phone.

Futaba was right about being in an alleyway, but it’s so cold because they’re shielded by a trio of vending machines selling canned coffee and wrapped sandwiches. "Our dog was recently run over?” she says.

“People can mind their own damn business,” says Akechi in his Pleasant Boy Voice, without looking up from his email.

“He was just trying to help.”

“Oh, yes, let’s help the crying girl by crowding her and suffocating her in a crush of public transit.”

Futaba snorts. “That was really mean of you.”

“Oh, absolutely,” says Akechi.

Futaba sucks a truly disgusting gob of snot into her nose. “Ugh. I wish I could’ve seen the guy’s face when you told him that.”

“It was like I’d spat on his shoes. I should’ve kept going. Or had a camera.”

“Futaba giggles wetly into her forearms. "Like one of those—those prank videos online… Get Yusuke to film it.”

“Yusuke, as the cameraman? I’m not trying to make a documentary.” Akechi flips to a different screen on his phone. “I already texted Yusuke about our poor dead dog, by the way, so don’t worry about it.”

Suddenly Futaba feels like literal garbage again. “Why are you always so nice to me?” she mumbles.

Akechi makes a weird face, like he’s trying to do his old Pleasant Boy shtick while having swallowed a lemon whole. “You say that like me being nice is somehow unusual.”

“Uh, yeah. Because it is. You literally were just being a huge asshole to a guy you’d never met over a fictional dog.”

Akechi has this increasingly disgruntled look on his face like he kind of wants to punt Futaba down some stairs, which, frankly, is the best sort of reward, in Futaba’s opinion. “I’m working on it,” he says grumpily.

“How’s that been?” says Futaba.

“Which part?”

Futaba has one whole moment of self reflection on this idea as maybe not a good course of action before she barrels on anyway: “The part where you’re turning your life around. Starting over. Trying again.”

“It sucks dick,” says Akechi.

“Oh, right on,” says Futaba, and then before she can stop herself: “Wait, I thought you liked dick?”

Akechi makes a noise like a strangled cat.

Futaba cackles. “Dude, incognito mode when you’re browsing for porn does not save you from people like me.”

“Have you been spying on me?”

“Uh, yes? Obviously?”

“You know you could get arrested for that sort of breach in privacy.”

“Oh, boo hoo, so sorry I know all about your weird orphan-saving night job and your smutty Featherman doujinshi collection. You’re not gonna narc on me.” Futaba stops. “Are you?”

“Stop looking at my internet history.”

“No. You better not narc on me.”

“Then stop looking at my internet history.”

“You had to google how to change a SIM card last week, crow-boy; you couldn’t stop me if you tried.”

“I will narc on you.”

“No you won’t. You’re the one trying to not be an asshole.”

Akechi makes a face like a cat being slowly submerged in cold water. Futaba laughs in his face.

“If you’re quite done,” says Akechi grouchily.

“No, never. You’re made for being made fun of,” says Futaba. “I’m gonna be making fun of you for years and years, crow-boy; you’re never going to get rid of me.”

“Great.”

“Gonna be creeping on your weird orphan-saving night job until the day you die.”

“Wonderful,” says Akechi without inflection whatsoever.

“Mwehehehehehehehehehe.”

“If you’re quite done.”

“I will take a well-deserved break from my endless duty to troll you both on and offline,” says Futaba. “Because I really really really wanna go to the art show.”

Akechi has the nerve to look relieved that he no longer has to squat in a dirty alleyway listening to a high school freshman bully him. “Then let’s go.”

Futaba hugs her knees tight. “But I wanna keep your coat.”

“Aren’t you wearing your own coat?” says Akechi, trying to look like he isn’t shivering. “Aren’t you getting hot?”

“I’m keeping it.”

“It’s my coat.”

“I’m keeping it.”

“Fine, then. Keep it. It’s dry clean only.”

“Oh, ew. No, take it back, gross, gross,” and Futaba peels the snotty, tear-stained, dirty winter coat off and dumps it back in Akechi’s arms, who looks at it with the expression of someone long-suffering and without hope of escape.

“And,” says Futaba, “I wanna see it if you tell anyone else that our dog got run over.”

Akechi smirks. “You’ll have to film it, then.”

“Oh my god, like I wouldn’t.”

Futaba scrubs her face one last time. She still feels like she’s covered in a grimy layer of slime, but maybe she can wash her face at Kosei. When she gets there. Because she’s gonna get there.

“Uh, one more thing,” says Futaba.

“Not like you’ve bullied me into doing literally everything else you’ve wanted,” says Akechi.

“You can’t laugh at me.”

“Good thing I don’t have a sense of humor,” says Akechi, which horrifyingly confirms to Futaba that Akechi and Yusuke, of all people, really do share a sense of humor.

Futaba hesitates. “Please, um… please don’t tell Akira about this.”

“Why would I tell Akira?“

"Nice. Good answer.” She smooths her hair down, trying to make herself presentable, or just have something to do with her hands. “I… told him I was gonna be okay without him and all that, so… I don’t wanna let him down, you know?”

Slowly, almost shyly, Akechi smiles. “Oh, yes. I know.”

“Our secret. Secret-keepers.”

“Secret-keepers. Are you ready?”

Futaba takes another deep breath. Pushes herself up, brushes herself off, and sighs. “Absolutely not. This is gonna suck so much dick,” says Futaba. “Let’s go anyway.”

[twilightknight17]

So I fell asleep last night before I could make the post, but I got P5 Scramble yesterday and I’m having a blast so far. ^_^

I’m probably going to go through it the same way I did my Royal playthrough, so if you don’t want to be spoiled, don’t click through on these posts!

Before we start, I just want to mention that I don’t really know anything about the story. Somehow I’ve managed to avoid spoilers for an entire year except for a few small things.

I do know the identity of (who I assume is) Kyoto’s Jail Monarch. (Monarch is kind of a weird, formal word. I think I liked Jail King better. Or... Warden? Warden might have been the best choice.) ANYWAY, I think I know their identity, and by extension, I have a vague idea of why Shadow Joker exists. Other than that... You’re getting speculation and bullshit untainted by later plot revelations. XDDD

I did find it funny that when I booted the game up, I got a “No save data found, unable to start game” message. Like... no shit, PS4, it’s a brand new game. But the little starting tutorial fight was cool, and I liked the opening movie!

The police briefing was...interesting. It’s good to see them actually being somewhat logical? Like... considering everything that happened the year before, it makes sense that they’d assume this is the Thieves again. They have no way of knowing that there’s no way to access Palaces anymore. This isn’t really the Thieves MO, though. Except for the guy who confessed to document tampering. The author shredding his work for no reason and the guy streaking through the criminal justice headquarters don’t seem like they did anything wrong. Those seem more like psychotic breakdowns.

But... I guess we don’t know if the police ever knew anything about Black Mask, or if Shido was convicted on only real-world crimes and not the metaverse hits he ordered. I wonder if that’ll get elaborated on.

Zenkichi’s introduction was him laughing at the streaking guy in the middle of this Serious Police Meeting, so I think I’m gonna like him a lot. ^_^

Anyway, the “higher-ups” really want this case closed, according to “Commissioner Kaburagi”, who I already don’t like. If you’re the police commissioner, Makoto really would be a better choice, holy shit. She’s already prepared to go after Akira, who is the only Thief they know the identity of, so I guess that’s fair. But still. Has he not been falsely accused of enough for a lifetime?

Although... if you’re gonna look up all his life details, can you maybe... share some? Just a few things? Hometown? How are his parents? Anything?

*

Coming back to Leblanc was cute. Got some Trickster’s Maze vibes from the initial text conversation where they were talking about how people kept not responding to texts, but I think it’s all good. Love that the Sayuri is still on the wall, and that Morgana’s been home with Akira.

Naming the app “Emma” is never going to stop being hilarious to me, because reasons.

Y’know, Atlus, this would work a lot better if he could like...respond to their curiosity. At least these dialogue options seem to suggest that talking things out with his parents went well. Even “I missed you” isn’t inherently negative. He’d miss them either way.

.......so when my boyfriend gets back from his soul-searching vacation, he’ll be welcomed back with open arms, right, Ryuji? Right?

Meanwhile, for summer break plans, Yusuke wants to go to Kyoto for a month-long art tour. Unless...

Never change, dear. Never change.

Nice of Sojiro to water my plant and keep my room from drowning in dust, but he really couldn’t have replaced the bedframe with literally anything other than the plastic storage crates? XD The attic looks so empty and lonely without the shelves of trinkets and plushies, and the TV.

So my reaction to this next part was literally, “LAVENZA, IT’S BEEN LESS THAN 24 HOURS”. X’‘‘D Akira really can’t catch a break. But Lavenza’s dialogue sounded actually sad that he was being dragged into this again. And she’s promised repeatedly that she’s going to be there for him. It’s sweet, even though my room is still a prison and she’s still using torture equipment. Iron maidens, Lavenza, really??

I’m a little concerned that Igor’s not around, though. Lavenza did the dream/reality/mind/matter speech instead. Where is he? I know he’s never around for spinoffs but considering my headcanons I’m very curious now. And why didn’t he like... tell Morgana that Lavenza said ruin is coming again? Even if we don’t count thirdsem events, Morgana still knows that he’s Hope, and he still has a bond with the Velvet Room. Talk to your cat damn it.

Oh no, she’s cute and Alice-in-Wonderland themed. I’m doomed.

She called it her “EMMA keyword” and I immediately blurted “what? keyword??” and then everything went directly to Hell immediately. Keyword was the key word, I guess. X’‘‘‘DDD

And you can tell it’s been six months, considering that these nerds got caught almost immediately. And got their hands bound. And got dragged to the throne room and forced to kneel!

...I’m doomed.

Someone at Atlus looked directly at this fandom and all the fanart of the interrogation and said, “Yeah, they’d be into that.” XD Steppy steppy. At least she’s not a rapist like Kamoshida, but jeeze, we keep getting beaten up and thrown in the dungeon by royalty. All we need is a princess and we’ve got a whole royal family!

Although, I suppose the prince didn’t bother with a dungeon. XD

I think it’s interesting that apparently the guards tried to take our Desires and failed. I guess being a persona-user means your mental state is stable enough that something like that can’t manifest.

Oh no, she’s cute. I love her. Another for the collection of Joker’s baby siblings. This is number... 5? She kind of reminds me of Jose, a little. I’ll be interested to see what she is, since she’s got amnesia right now. She can’t be just a straight AI.

But if she’s Yald’s mom, I’m also going to be majorly weirded out.

I really like the gameplay? It’s so interesting to see how the characters move and fight when they’re not limited to turn-based attacks. And I like being able to jump to different points and use them to ambush enemies. I don’t fully understand all of it yet, and it’s hard for me to keep an eye on things like status ailments and my teammates because everything is so chaotic, but I’m sure I’ll get it.

I did die to a miniboss, and when I hit “return to checkpoint”, it gave me the prompt to select a language for the voice acting again. I dunno what was up with that. X’D And I’m baffled by the concept that you can just leave the metaverse and come back and it restores all your health and stuff. No penalty. Time doesn’t pass. You didn’t waste a day. Have the kids finally learned that we are capable of entering and exiting more than once on the same day? Hallelujah.

...this boy is angry that we have to deal with the Jails instead of having a BBQ feast. Never change, Yusuke.

If you go by the crepe shop in Shibuya, Morgana still doesn’t think you’re a crepe person. I’m so tired, Morgana. It’s also a bit weird and forced that Iwai and Takemi are both out of town. We couldn’t have seen at least one of them? I know we’re not gonna be able to use those shops when we’re on the road, but we could worry about that then.

(Disturbingly easy to return a gold bar that you apparently bought off the dark web. Omg. That was hilarious.)

AND THEN YOU GET UP THE NEXT DAY AND ZENKICHI IS JUST IN YOUR HOUSE? SITTING IN THAT CHAIR? That is not the “detective chair”, sir, that is my boyfriend’s chair, and you need to move. At least he likes the curry, but jesus fuck. Sir, I have unresolved trauma of adults coming into my house to snoop into my business. Get out of my house. X’D

You give me a detective sitting in my boyfriend’s chair and then immediately send me to a taping of the same show in the same studio where I first met him. God, P5S, you’re trying to kill me.

Alice clearly knows that giving out the keyword is doing something. She’s being very deliberate about this. But I don’t think she’s actually aware of the Jail. Love that she’s so arrogant that she can’t imagine that Akira just... didn’t use the keyword, and that’s why she can’t control him.

So I guess the Jail Monarchs are called such because they’re imprisoning other people’s shadows in their distortions. So these are people that want control over something to the point that it distorted their worldview. Part of me wants to go off on a ramble about how this relates to Mementos or Apathy Syndrome, but I’ll wait and do that when I have more information. I’ve got some more of the dungeon to do, and I cannot wait to see Alice’s boss fight.

I’m having so much fun. I really missed these kids; they’re grea--

.......I hate these children. X’‘‘‘‘DDDD