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fallloverfic · 5 months ago

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Han Yoojin's Black Choker

This post isn't going to be everything, but it's going to hopefully be easier to find/navigate than the handful of posts I'm seeing floating around and that I've responded to: a summary of official art with Han Yoojin wearing the black choker in S-Classes that I Raised, its maybe appearances in the text of the novel, and its maybe relationship with fanart. For the short answer, yes it appears in multiple pieces of official novel art, and maybe at least once in the novel text. But it might also be a fan design that's sort of accepted as official at least in some cases? Explanation beneath the read more.

Yoojin's black choker is most likely Grace, the protection item Myeongwoo made from Shalos. Other folks have said it's the translation item he gets from Yoohyun, and I disagree, but I'll get to that.

The novel covers and text

Yoojin is not wearing a choker on either novel cover. The first cover, on the left, has a black line for his collar, not a necklace or choker. It appears often in the manhwa. The black collar is gone in onlyraii's cover on the right (even though onlyraii had drawn Yoojin with the collar in fanart years prior to this, detailed later). The first cover seems to be from when the novel started publishing, and the second cover came out in April 2022. More on the second cover later.

The ebook release also got a cover, but it doesn't have Yoojin on it.

Text-wise the "choker" is possibly from novel chapter 109, where Grace turns into a sparkling choker at one point (which Yoojin notes is more over the top than a bracelet during his struggle to get her to turn into something less ostentatious). Some folks looked at different text in the novel here for how it and particularly Grace look, but just as a warning, there is no official English translation for the novel outside what we get in the manhwa, which is somewhat modified because it's a manhwa adaptation. There are fan translations for parts of the novel, but a lot of folks use machine translation, which can be very dubious.

In other places in the novel she's just described as turning into a necklace, not specifically a choker, though in novel chapter 176, it's described as sitting close around Yoojin's neck (which sounds like a choker). Whatever jewelry she turns into is specifically described as having a blue/silver jewel from which her bird form emerges (as she has in novel chapter 156, which is the chapter one fanwiki lists it appearing in, and in which she is described as turning into a necklace, not specifically a choker). So there's very little textual support for him to be wearing a choker, though he does at least on occasion wear necklaces.

Revised ebook novel volumes

SCTIR the novel was (and still is) originally released chapter by chapter on Naver, Munpia, and Ridibooks (currently Side Story is only available on Naver, but the chapters of the main story are on all three). The main story was eventually collected into 35 volumes and partially revised or at least given additional scenes in places. Each volume contained at least two pieces of art. For volumes 1-14 this was seemingly a character portrait with their bio (e.g., age, height, likes, dislikes), and 1 piece of interior art, with the latter at least being by 비완 (the manhwa artist). Volumes 15+ switched up interior artists, for a total of I think at least 3-4 artists, and those volumes had at least 2 pieces of interior art, with volume 35 having 4. The individual chapters didn't have this, it was added for the ebook release.

The volumes themselves are available on Ridibooks and Naver (they might be somewhere on Munpia but I couldn't find them).

The first volume of the ebook released in May 2020 (the Ridibooks release lists an earlier date for some reason than the one on Naver, which is November 2020). By this point, fans had already been drawing Yoojin wearing a black choker with a gem (usually blue or silver) on it since at least 2019: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. <This fanart is by onlyraii, the artist who went on to make the new cover for the novel published in April 2022. So at least some of the official artists were involved in the community and knew of popular fan designs (though notably, Yoojin is not wearing the choker on onlyraii's official book cover).

Just want to emphasize: there's a difference between an author drawing/commissioning art and ensuring that it complies with their specifications in the text/their vision and their publisher commissioning art that might not even get approval/comment from the author. I don't know how much geunseo had a say in any of the art for the novel. If there's some interview or something somewhere where they state clearly how many/which pieces of art they approve and the level of control they have over what the art looks like, I haven't seen it. It's not unusual for third party artists to have more freedom to do stuff and draw fan designs/things that aren't accurate in "official" art and for it to get approved (e.g., some of the interior art for the official English translation of "Mo Dao Zu Shi", which actually goes directly against what's on the page; it's kind of unclear how much control MXTX had over this stuff, and heavily implied she had little to none; it's possible that's the same case with geunseo). So whether or not you view this stuff as official is up to you. But it is in the official ebooks, though designs are not really consistent, which implies there was a lack of strong direction in what artists were/weren't allowed to do.

비완 potentially drew Yoojin wearing the choker in volume 13, for the Chuseok art (September 2020, I'm going by the Ridibooks release dates). It's very hard to tell whether that's his shirt collar or a choker. But judging by the color of what's beneath it before robe starts and the skin above the choker, it looks like it's again the collar of a white t-shirt, not a choker.

The next time it was potentially drawn was by a different artist in volume 18 (July 2021). It's hard to tell because he's holding a bouquet that mostly covers his neck, but on the right side of his neck seems to be part of a black choker.

You can kind of see something that looks like a black choker near Peace's front left paw.

The clearest earliest example of him wearing it in official art is in volume 19 (April 2022), where he's clearly visible wearing a black choker with a blue gem on it. I don't see it mentioned as something he's wearing in the text of that chapter, at least from a brief browse.

He's also definitely wearing it in two pieces (one each) of art for volumes 20-21 (April 2022). Here's the one from volume 21:

In volumes 22 (April 2022) and 25 (August 2022), Yoojin seems to be wearing a cat collar with a similar design in two other pieces of art (one each volume). Not exactly a choker, but he's at least wearing something on his neck. Here's the one from volume 22:

The other art of him with the cat collar in volume 25 is a lot more similar to the other interior art choker designs, with a black ribbon or whatever it is and a blue gem in the center, rather than a blue ribbon.

After that, they switch artists at least once if not twice and none of them drew Yoojin with the choker - or any necklace at all - that I can see. He didn't lose Grace for good in the novel, though he doesn't wear her all the time, but no other artist for the interiors drew him wearing the choker for the last 10 volumes of the revised ebook novel release, if not the last 14. Whether that's a narrative choice or the inclusion of the choker at all is random/whatever the current artist wants/what was geunseo/the publisher's mood, who knows?

The manhwa adaptation

This is how manhwa episode 103 depicts Yoojin trying to get Grace to turn into something wearable after first receiving her (art by 비완), when the alleged "choker" description appears in the novel text:

I'm not seeing a black choker anywhere. The black line near his neck is the collar of his shirt.

As of posting on June 21st, 2024, at least on the free to read Webtoons page and Tappytoon English chapters of the manhwa, there is no art of Yoojin wearing the choker, either as Grace or the translation item he got from Yoohyun. The manhwa depicts the translation item differently, and Grace has only appeared as fancy necklaces or a bracelet. If 비완 drew the choker on Yoojin in the Chuseok ebook novel art for 2020, although the manhwa hasn't gotten there yet, they have drawn him wearing the choker before in official artwork, and yet have not drawn him wearing it since in the manhwa, for whatever reason. We'll have to see how the scene is drawn when the manhwa gets to Chuseok.

In the manhwa, Grace is shown turning into a simple bracelet after negotiation in episode 103:

You'll note he often wears shirts with black collars on them.

This is the translation item that Yoohyun gives Yoojin as it appears in manhwa episode 55:

Which is roughly how it's described in novel chapter 68, absent any specific color description for the metal ornament. Someone else said this is actually what people are drawing when they draw the choker because the design is vague enough to match a choker, which is strange to me, because from what I recall of the novel, Yoojin has this in his pocket/inventory most of the time. He's not wearing it constantly (he also already had it when he got Grace). It's kind of implied if not stated he doesn't like wearing it much and only puts it on out of necessity and takes it off at the first opportunity. He does, however, typically wear Grace (though he does, for various reasons, take her off a decent amount).

The April Fool's 2022 art by ? and the 2022 official novel cover by onlyraii

Someone else pointed out the "sketch" for the official novel art by onlyraii (final art below):

And here it is when it was released seemingly originally on 31 March 2022/1 April 2022 (KST).

In the other post I'm seeing about the "sketch" for this, the unfinished "sketch" listed was actually the April Fool's Day joke for 2022 that seems to parody onlyraii's cover, but with all the guys being bald:

(A lot of manhwa and I think Korean webnovels do April Fool's Day joke posts with fake "new" art done by official artists; 2022's SCTIR manhwa April's Fool's Day joke was magical girl themed, and this was 2024's, which had most of the cast become dinosaurs).

You can also see that while there are similarities, this is very much not what they ended up with, and again, it's dubious this was an actual sketch for the cover: it's not on onlyraii's twitter, though that doesn't mean it wasn't posted elsewhere, and seems more in the style of 비완's art, so it's likely this is the manhwa team doing a jokey post (the manhwa started in November 2021, and 비완 was still doing art for the novel ebook revision at least around 2020, so they'd have been around, and serikachan, the lead storyboard artist, does post about recent novel chapters on twitter, so at least some of them pay attention to the novel). I think it's intentional that all the men are bald as well, to note it's a joke; a lot of the Korean commenters are commenting on their baldness.

A core issue is the similarity and that they were released 11 hours apart (the gag went up around 11 hours before the official cover was released; onlyraii commented on their work for the cover around 40 minutes after the official cover was released). The "sketch" seems to show maybe a planned choker, but if it was an actual sketch in whole or part, it was clearly nixed for the final design. Who made that decision is anyone's guess.

"Sketch" or not, again, onlyraii has drawn Yoojin with a choker many times in their fanart dating back to 2019: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Before the 2022 piece. If onlyraii and/or 비완 wanted to incorporate a fan design into the official art in some way, again, they wouldn't be the first fanartist/community member to do so on official artwork.

In conclusion:

At this point I don't fully know if the design/his regularly wearing a choker comes from the novel or fanon that was later incorporated by fans into canon when they worked on the official art, or if geunseo suggested it or at least okay'd its inclusion on official art, but these things at least are true:

Grace is apparently mentioned as being a choker at least once in the novel text, but it's described as being rather fancy

the fan design/idea of the black choker with a small gem in the middle predates at least the official release of the ebook art with him wearing a choker (if they were released earlier than that on an artist social media post or portfolio or publisher post somewhere, in some form, encouraging fans to use it in fanart prior to the book releases, I have no idea), so at least the stuff pre-2020 was not inspired by the ebook interior art, and potentially nothing before 2022 was inspired by interior art because the clearest art with him wearing it wasn't out until then; it was likely inspired by the potential single/two times Grace is described as a choker in the text, or just generally popular fanon about him wearing a choker (wouldn't be surprising, there's a lot of emphasis on Hyunje grabbing Yoojin's neck all the time and how Yoojin's neck feels when he's not grabbing it)

Yoojin wears a black choker/collar with a gem in the middle of it in at least 3 if not 6 pieces of official ebook interior art, and a blue ribbon collar in at least one piece of official ebook art

after the choker/collar shows up on those 3-7 pieces of interior art, it stopped appearing at all (his neck is visibly bare of any necklace of any kind in multiple art pieces), and he doesn't wear anything on his neck in the artwork for at least 10 volumes; furthermore, despite the manhwa artist potentially drawing him wearing the choker in one of those pieces, they have not drawn him wearing it in the manhwa in the years since that ebook art was released, even after he had both Grace and the translation necklace item, both of which have been suggestions for what the choker is

So does he wear a choker? In the novel text and novel art, maybe, at least sometimes, but not currently in the manhwa. Does it look like it does in fanart? Maybe: it's not really described in the text and the few novel art pieces we have don't quite match each other. The publisher and/or possibly geunseo okay'd at least some official art with it on (though I don't know how much control geunseo has in that decision, and the author of the original work okaying art is different than the publisher okaying art, particularly depending on what degree of control geunseo had over any changes/what could be drawn, or if they were just allowed to say yes or no and that's it).

I'll try to keep this updated if new information/art comes out, so if you're seeing this as a reblog, check the source post to see if there's an update.

#han yoojin #sctir #my s class hunters #s classes that i raised #han yoojin's choker #han yoojin choker #내가 키운 s급들 #this is probably annoying to people but I was curious too and wanted to know if it was official #it's a long novel it's easy to forget details #it's not a criticism I just like having information clear #also I feel bad responding with all this to all those posts #sorry the opening is text heavy I tried to go semi chronologically #and while a past version of this started with the manhwa I felt it made more sense to start with the novel #fallfthoughts #now with more official art cause the publisher shared at least some of it on twitter

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