#labru if it was awesome

[fulgurbugs]

Here y’all can also have this margin doodle from in between marcilles I guess too LOL

[laikabu]

labru illustrator-author couple... writing middle grade books...

it all started because kabru offered to be laios’s ghost writer after the reveal that laios’s awesome monster story didn’t have a plot

things snowballed and one day kabru receives the proofing pages and is horrified to see the big “written by kabru” text with a very tiny “illustrated by laios touden”, despite all the worldbuilding and characters and plot points are all laios’. he found out it was requested by laios himself

[emilibro]

Ughhh I'm so sorry to be an ass but I see so much popular art on tumblr and around the internet that really woobifies both Laios and Kabru and their relationship, especially when they're together.... You guys are aware that Laios eats monsters the way people would like. Eat animals, right? He's not crazy or stupid or sadistic or anything. He has a special interest and it's monsters.

Furthermore, his past having himself and his sister be shunned for their interests in the abnormal made him develop a distaste for humanity. Laios has just thought monsters were way cooler since he was a kid, and Falin really looked up for him for his dedication to his interests and personal code of moral ethics. He never loved his sister less for her abilities, he admired her for what made her different. Because he's fucking awesome and they're autistic as hell.... they both went through so damn much. Laios never fit into the military, into his hometown, he barely fit into most groups of adventurers since he met Marcille, chilchuck, and company, and two of the members of that original party didn't care enough to join him. His feeling of worthlessness to his friends in the beginning of the story are enough to make him imagine a whole scenario in between major chapters where he was the one who was eaten.. and he thought nobody except Falin would care enough to save him.

Point being Laios has a much richer character that goes ALONGSIDE his special interest in monsters. Which honestly is more comparable to, like. A fucking biologist. Not a monsterfucker, not a cannibal, none of that shit. Monsterfuckers are cool as a monsterfucker but he's not one.. he's more like a furry man.... And he's not stupid he's just. Autistic. Why are we making autistic characters with a silly side seem stupid? Everyone has dumb moments sure but like.. he's really smart guys... there's a reason he's such a good leader outside of his ability to listen to his party members. Don't fall for the mischaracterization of Laios that his party members originally set for him before major important arcs guys...

And Kabru. Oh my God. Kabru. Kabru is also autistic but for humans, social interactions and culture... he's a nerd for politics and the humanities, and I'll avoid saying much more to avoid spoilers for non-manga readers but you'll see more of that as time passes. But he's not the type to be easily flustered. Laios only gets to him, not even because he's that difficult to read, but because he catches him off guard. He's an interesting critter, bro. And Kabru definitely sees that. It takes time to respect that, but within a period of time he learns to see him as a relatively competent adventurer and places a lot of faith from him. On some level, this guy has learned to understand this very interesting autistic guy who is forward with his feelings that a very autistic Kabru hasn't learned to understand. That's what makes their relationship so cool, man. He's not cold in reality (though people may perceive him that way due to backstory motivations and attitude within the dungeon), but he's a lot more serious than this... c'mon guys.. let's be a little real here please.... at this point I barely like Labru anymore because they've been so like. Babied. Woobified. Whatever the word is man. I'm starting to appreciate their friendship more as a friendship now because I just think the beautiful qualities I saw in their romance have been sort of overlooked or misinterpreted. Nowadays I just think their platonic relationship is beautiful. Sighs.

Farcille is awesome though and these girls are awesome slay

-

Edit: hey guys, I wanna address a couple of things here! For one, this isn't intended to be ship hate. Labru is a perfectly valid ship - rather, I'm just not a fan of how deep the mischaracterization of both characters runs, and how it results in the subsequent babying of their relationship. While it's driven me personally away from the romance a bit, I have no problem with the ship itself. Additionally, Farcille has its own issues with woobification that could use some addressing, I just haven't had to see as much mischaracterization on my feeds. Maybe in a future post I'll address some of my personal peeves with many people's characterization of Farcille, ESPECIALLY Falin.

[faggoatquixote]

I think it’s awesome how labru shippers will tell you shipping kabumisu is ableist and racist bc kabru shows his soft caring side to mithrun and you’re “turning a brown character into a nanny” (yea don’t ask yourself how disabled ppl who have partners who are also caregivers think about this framing) and then in the next breath will call mithrun a dog, a thing, can’t we just kill it already? isn’t it great how the fandom has decided it’s totally normal to call a canon disabled rape victim that? I think that’s so cool

[myszkaa]

Thank you for the good boy meme bc now I’m seeing mainstream* meme channels and shit have to try and explain what labru is and it’s awesome

HELP YEAH I've seen it too, none of them have actually mentioned the king and advisor dynamic going on

I mean good thing they're avoiding spoilers but also yeah, most ppl don't get the joke

[papay0]

If any of you guys could recommend me either labru or laios centered fics it would be awesome

[room-surprise]

Spoilers for the end of the manga:

Kabru towards Mithrun: I want you to stop chasing nothing but revenge. I want you to heal, I want you to rediscover the joy of being alive. This is also what *I* need to do and that's why I'm able to tell YOU to do it. I've been where you are and you can get better. I can get better. I have come to realize that I value our friendship. You matter to me.

Kabru towards Laios: No matter how much you hate it, I NEED you to become king so I can achieve my dream of a tallman-run kingdom that can stand up against the long-lived races and be equal. I DO NOT CARE what you want and I AM pushing you to do this, and guiding you to make sure you succeed. I will use you to accomplish my goals.

There's just.... a really big difference between these two endings. I think Laios and Kabru can and WILL become friends with time, but I don't think anything Kabru is doing in the manga with Laios is romantic or sexual. That doesn't mean it couldn't GO that way, but Kabru's motivations in-manga are not "he's gay and has a crush on Laios." It's more complicated and also simpler than that.

kabru/ laios people you are out of your minds you are inventing fucking ciphers, he pulls mithrun out of a suicidal death spiral and teaches him how to want again after knowing each other for like a week. they could not be more in love

[andreabandrea]

regarding that post about it not making sense to same gender trans headcanon a character who is tortured by their gender in canon, i think probably two of the biggest reasons you see this anyway is that, first, sometimes people want to see a character be a trans man for fetishizing reasons in their yaoi fics and dont really care if it thematically 'fits' or not (and im not saying the only reason that people would make a character trans in a fic is to fetishize them, but if you look at the way the majority of trans characters are written by cis authors on ao3, then i think you can excuse me for being a little suspicious and exasperated).

then, secondly, you have the ones like jesse pinkman where i think sometimes its just a case of he's a popular character who can be kind of relatable and a lot of transmascs want to see themselves in media, thus projecting onto him-- and i think anyone can have a battle with toxic masculinity, whether they're a normal man or a cis man. it doesn't have to be inherently transphobic for a trans man to struggle with what it means to be a man.

and sometimes it's just vibes based, i get it. bernadetta von varley is hard to sell as a transfem reading because of her abusive father training her to be a wife and spread the crest and so on, but she's an anxious loner in a hoodie so like she's sooo boymoder etc. and sometimes you dont care about canon/authorial intent and think to yourself actually i could do a really interesting piece about the intersection of misogyny and transfemininity with bernadetta, and that's awesome too.

however. i think though- and this is why i started typing this long-ass post- that the most insidious reason people might do these headcanons is pushback against transfem headcanons. i've seen a lot of sudden interest in nonbinary/genderqueer and/or transmasc laios touden ever since some transfems pointed out that he's tortured by masculinity and seems oddly interested in the alternate universe where he's a girl, among other points.

and i think- again- a lot of this just comes down to fandom/yaoi culture having a certain focus on men (notice that when dungeon meshi became popular with its anime adaption, the roving yaoi fans found labru and it overtook farcille which was the largest ship on the ao3 beforehand), and i dont think its always transmisogynistic on purpose.

'on purpose' are the keywords there-- sometimes i think people might not know how they come across. i see a lot of interactions on this site from sapphics and/or trans women like "i love women" or "this is a post i made about women" and well-meaning gay and/or trans men will add on "what if this was about MEN!"... and i want you to celebrate your identity and we can enjoy this interesctional lgbt community together, yes i know The Cishets are coming for all of us fuck infighting etc, but sometimes you have to realize when you're being rude and speaking over a woman. ask yourself why a trans woman might be offended that you took her personal post about her femininity and misogyny she's facing from men and said "this is so me except about men".

anyway laios and falin are both trans women.

[fruit00]

I changed my mind btw labru is awesome

[koitosoup]

HELLO YOUR ART IS AWESOME FABULOUS MAGNIFICENT I WAS WONDERING IF ITS OKAY TO USE ONE OF YOUR LABRU ARTS AS MATCHING PFPS WITH CREDIT?

hello!! yes you can use my art as icons/headers as long as you credit!!🥰

[rixxxen]

OMG Yandere Kabru x Bad End Laios! I AM OBSESSED! Your art is so awesome.

thank u (:

labru rlly cute but i like the ship more w some bad end au spice

[wisteriawater]

HELLO did you make that Thistle AO3 fic where he bonds with Falin and makes miniature models of the golden kingdom. If so I am a huge fan of ur work 😊 if not ig i’ll get eaten by a monster

No ^^° sorry. Though that fic sounds awesome. I'm writing a post canon thistle rehab fic where Kabru digs into his past before he was taken to melini, while Laios is trying to protect him from the consequences of being a dungeon lord. There's a lot more going on of course, but this post will be too long if I dump all my plot notes. Ironically it started out as just a labru fic, but the boy decided it was his fic and stole it. Don't get eaten by a monster, you're supposed to cook the monsters- not the other way around.

[atti-rambles]

Chilshi being 38/100 on the Tumblr wrap up of 2024 feels so fucking OFF but we all know it's bc of saber lol but it is still so surprising

Farcille is 2/100 which is SO AWESOME?? They are the only wlw pairing until 52 which... Yeah tracks

Labru is 17/100 which yeah I expected you guys here...

Anyway that's all the dungeon meshi ships and it feels too structured to me lol but I like seeing stats but there isn't enough to work with either.

I just thought it was interesting.... How is chilshi here at all omg we went insane...

[metallteeff]

i don’t know if i ship labru bc they’ve talked to each other once in the point im at but i think art of them is usually awesome