#life's thought but kh is stronger

[sweeteastart]

💫KHOCWEEK 2023💫

Day 1 - Instructions (2/2)

Sika

(She/Them)

Oh what would be my Khocweek without my sweet gurl Sika ?

Sika is new Keyblade master. She achieved this titled not without a fight as her fellow students either failed or unfortunately passed. Her grief is interrupted by the sudden crash of a boy on her isolated world. Sora will become unknowingly from this day forward the best and worst thing that ever happened to the teenager.

Whoah I'm so happy my girl is here again this year ahah love her so much !

Myrti

(She/her)

And here's my biggest surprise of them all : A New oc as appeared ! Well, Myrti isn't a new oc per say (she is about as old as Peche) however, this is my first KHOCWEEK with her ! Sooo I'm super excited ahah

Myrti was just another wielder in Daybreak Town. Just another kid doing their best to get through the lux collection in one piece. That was until she met them : Elrena and Lauriam. Three teenager, much like her, but that would change her fate forever. Not only did she join the dandelions, but by some ill fated destiny also the organisation. Even in their amnesic state, Myrti felt it. The connection. The echoes of an old feeling. The memory of long forgotten promises.

And that's it for today ! Again, I overdid it ahah but I can't help it ! The @khoc-week is my precious moment of the year and I'm ecstatic to celebrate it with everyone again in 2023 !! Thanks to the admins for their work and good luck to everyone ahah

[read-watch-sleep]

what are some of your favorite wammy boy headcanons?

Oh, Hello! This is a very exciting ask, so thank you! I have many of these so I’ll try to work off of ones I haven’t seen as much of before rather than just ones I like (this is also because I like them all.) 

Near: This is the most important and self-indulgent ‘headcanon’ I have but I’m a firm believer in citing the films/drama, and so: Near is Thai. He was born in Thailand and speaks/reads Thai as his first language. He was an orphan that was adopted after assisting in an international case in Bangnum, probably at a younger age than most of the Wammy’s kids, per L: Change the WorLd. 

The incidence rate for albinism rises to 1 in 500 in some areas in South Pacific (as opposed to closer to 1 in 10,000 elsewhere),  so it’s not even that much of a stretch to keep his original Manga appearance. This adds significantly to how much he stands out to everyone, because he’s too pale to looks like most other Southeast Asians, but has distinct facial features, and a generally smaller stature, which make him stand out amongst most of the European Wammy’s students.

Mello: Despite taking the most drastic measures out of most of the successors, I think Mello actually has the strongest moral compass out of the Wammy’s kids (including L). His attachment to catholic imagery, emphasis on how hard he works, and the circumstances leading up to his death suggest to me that he has a strong ethical viewpoint, probably established by organised religion, that Wammy’s was never able to teach out of him. Note how he allows Takada modesty, and does not mistreat the people he kidnaps, whereas L… did not grant Misa the same mercy in his custody. 

This doesn't make him a good person, however. Mello is more than willing to kill to get what he wants. It just means he has a stronger sense of righteous ‘good’ than most of his peers. 

Matt: I mention this in one of my fics, but Matt’s first crush was 100% Riku from Kingdom Hearts. I have never played a KH game in my life, but I’m absolutely certain of this. The highly competitive rival who pushes himself too far in order to stay relevant, only to recover to the ‘good’ side with the power of his heart? Cool and collected but with a jealous streak? Plus, have you seen what he looks like? That’s just Near and Mello wrapped into one pixelated Gameboy package. Matt’s first wet dream.

Beyond: I think Beyond, despite not really being able to attach to anyone, harbours a protective fondness over the other successors, especially those close to the top. I imagine he was able to figure out they were next early on, if they ever met, as Near was barely 10 years old when Beyond was arrested. He probably has their lifespans memorized. Wammy’s staff probably saw a lot of Beyond’s behaviour in Mello, as well– I think he was brash, impulsive, manipulative, and violently insecure. 

Unlike Mello, however, he wouldn’t care much about the opinions of other children, not even his rival for first place. 

A: I don’t have a lot of concrete thoughts about them, although I’ve seen many headcannons that I like. Generally, since A is largely a ‘fridged’ character, I change them to suit what would best work for a fic they might be mentioned in. 

I do think, however, that they were the most like Light, rather than L, than any of the other successors. Popular, handsome, talented, and with a complete disdain for the human race. 

Linda (honorary Wammy’s boy): Linda was given ‘artistry’ as a talent which has always felt a little sexist to me. While I think she is an accomplished artist, she’s actually much better with applied mathematics than any of the boys– Near things largely in terms of statistics, but Linda follows more complex modelling systems as well. Given that she was able to recreate Near and Mello’s faces almost perfectly, I attribute much of her success at Wammy’s, and also talents with maths, to an eidetic memory. Because her recall is so strong, she has an incredible knack for patterns, rivalled only by Near’s autistic tendency to process things by patterned details. Their shared talents with numbers and probably made them rather close, although I don’t think Near was all that interested in her. 

L: I don’t want to say that L is textbook Manic/Depressive, but I always figured that L had intermittent episodes of manic physical energy/activity that would contrast his usual “sitting in a weird position for 17 hours straight.” Basically, I think L, especially when he was younger, got the zoomies. Wammy’s probably tried to redirect the energy with sparring and sports, which is why he’s so good with tennis (although tennis is largely an intellectual sport) and martial arts. They probably found L on rooftops and such quite a lot– I can imagine him running up 11 flights of stairs at 2 in the morning. 

I also have thoughts about K and F from the films/drama, but I figure you weren't asking about those.

[islander-star]

KHOC Week Day 7 : Future

Tamie will go wherever her friends go ! Travelling, fighting evil and saving worlds, her life life will be adventurous ! She doesn't feels the need to settle down for now. She's tied closely to the KH canon so she will follows as the story progress and will evolve with it !

She's pretty happy where she's at in her life (we don't talk about kh3 ending...). She feels like she truly belong somewhere for once. Riku once proposed, half joking, to give her the power of the keyblade but she refused. Tamie got where she is without it and will continue to get stronger without it. Even without a keyblade she can keep up with the group !

Whatever the future hold, she's strong and not alone anymore. She's ready to face whatever comes her way !

The story continue.

Thanks @khoc-week and everyone for this amazing week (❁´◡`❁) it was fun ! I didn't have much time to do things but it was nice to put my thoughts into words instead of keeping them in my head lol. It gave me some ideas and helped my creativity. All the ocs I came accross were so cool !! And anyone that passed by, thank you !!

Keep creating !

[nadziejastar]

Absolutely love your akusai analysis stuff its so good omg.

Do you have any more thoughts on them?

Thank you for the kind words, I really appreciate it! As for my thoughts on Akusai, well, after beating Fire Emblem Three Houses recently, I do have a few thoughts. I know, I'm late to the party on 3H. (I actually loved 3H and would love to write metas about those ships lol). But anyways, regarding Akusai. It's a bit of a rant and there's minor spoilers for FE3H, so I'll put it under the cut.

Okay, so Sylvix felt like it was everything Akusai was supposed to be. It touched on all the same themes, too. In 3H, you've got a childhood friend trio. The standard two males and a female. On the surface it seems like the girl and the outgoing redhead goofball are a thing. But they treat each other more like bros. He and the quiet blue-haired sword guy had a much more intimate bond with each other, complete with a special promise™ to always be together and redhead being protective of blue. The redhead never wants to grow up and change because he doesn't wanna fulfill the heteronormative life script of getting married and having kids.

He is longing to go back to his childhood days but is sad at how much blue has changed since they were kids and has apparently outgrown their closeness. He hides his angst behind a smile and womanizing. Blue was once a meek clingy crybaby but now he is surly and obsessed with growing stronger. Deep down he is still an uke who secretly longs to be redhead's waifu. But he has a lot of shame related to his sensitivity and gender nonconformity. He distances himself from others, but boy does he get irritated if redhead flirts with anyone else.

I do wish the game would have just come right out and tell you that they're gay for each other (and so does this gaming site). I get why it didn't. Still, it didn't really hide it too much. They have a paired ending where they spend their whole lives playfully teasing each other like just when they were kids, never get married, and die together in each other's arms. It's the most romantic ending in the whole game, if you ask me. And Sylvix is SUPER popular and well received by the fandom. Both in Japan and the West. They have soooo much fan content. There are still some dudes who say they're just friends because ew icky gay. But most people in the fandom are able to tell they're queer-coded and are fine with it. In fact, the fandom was so fine with it that they released an overtly queer dude in the DLC, strictly due to popular demand.

3H is not a slam dunk with gay romance since much of it (particularly MLM) relies on subtext. But it still had more balls than most JRPG series and it definitely was a step in the right direction. We all know that Soriku is the most popular ship. The end of KH2 was total fujoshi fuel. But Soriku never had any chance in hell of being canon. KH is a video game shonen anime. Sora/Riku bromance is "safe". They can capitalize on shipteasing them to their female fans, but they won't alienate their male fans because Kairi is still very obviously the love interest for Sora. I found Akusai to be a lot more compelling because it was legitimately queer-coded.

Axel was queer-coded from the very beginning. His close friendship with Roxas in KH2 made people question his sexuality all the way back in 2006 and Akuroku rivaled Soriku for a time. And I do think that Axel always meant to be queer. Although personally, I did not get the impression that he was in love with Roxas. I got the sense that he probably had a best friend back when he was a human. And it was this dead best friend that he truly yearned for. The sweet and innocent Roxas reminded Axel of his human best friend and he latched onto him to help him forget the memories of days long past. That was my headcanon back in 2006 when KH2 first came out.

So, I was really happy when Days/BBS came out and it basically confirmed my theory that Axel was truly hung up on his human best friend and saw Roxas as a kind of replacement for him. And Isa was also very queer-coded. BBS!Isa has a more distinctly feminine design than any other boy in the series. He had very girlsh eyes and lips, small hands, long hair. And Saix's Mystery Gear is very cutesy-looking. Traditionally, the moon is viewed as a feminine symbol. And Saix's weapons in 358/2 Days were named after moon goddesses. They could have easily picked male moon gods, but they chose female goddesses like Selene and Artemis. It signifies to the player that, "Hey, this character does not follow the conventional gender stereotypes."

When you play 358/2 Days, and you get to the part where Axel is talking about love, you realize he's talking about his most precious memories from his human life, just like with all the other stuff like summer vacation and the red sunset. Akusai was not just superficial fujobait. Even if it was all subtext, it was a genuine depiction of two queer male characters who loved each other romantically. Axel is not straight. That’s a big reason why I was so mad that KH3 pushed their relationship off to the side and treated saving Isa as so much less important compared to saving Roxas. And it was so annoying how Saix had to mention Subject X whenever he might have seemed a little too obsessed with Axel otherwise.

Last year, Nomura said that he intended to show more of Lea and Isa's backstory in the future, so I've just been waiting for more content. I hope that we can get their story without Subject X overshadowing them like she did in KH3. I'm...cautiously optimistic. I expect this subplot to be included in Missing Link, since it is quite literally a missing link of the story. Axel is super popular and a queer-coded backstory with his childhood best friend would be very well received by the modern KH fandom, IMO. People are a LOT more accepting of gay content than they were in 2006. We've come a long way. And personally, I just love the idea that the tough cold asshole Saix's human self was actually a super sweet cutie who was in love with Lea. I really think the KH fandom would love that idea, too, if the writers were ever allowed to actually explore it. And a niche mobile game is probably a safer medium for that type of content than a mainline console game overseen by Disney, I guess. At the very least, if they ever put an Isa figurine into ML, I will whale for it if I have to. 

[tapioca-puddingg]

The Future of KH Characters

Hey y'all, I know it's been a while. But lately I've been having some feelings about the future of KH and I wanted to share them. These are just my own baseless speculations and wants, i don't know nothin about nothin.

So the future of these characters have me concerned. I'm glad that characters like Roxas and Xion got revived, but I'm concerned about how they're gonna fit into this new story. Like, what are their new roles going to be? The problem I see here is that most of the heroes have had resolutions. Unless they introduce a new threat in the KH Universe.

So Sora, RIku, MoM, Luxu and Strelitzia have already been confirmed to be in the Lost Masters Arc. Riku isn't in Quadratum yet, but he will be soon. This'll be the first time that Sora will be isolated without his friends by his side (until he knows Riku is there), so I would like to see how he navigates that loneliness

Kairi

Kairi will be trained by Aqua, which is one of the best decisions they could've made for her character imo and I'm really excited to see their dynamic. I would love to see her and Aqua travel to new Disney worlds as part of her training. I think it would make the most sense for Kairi to be the one to travel to these new worlds since she hasn't had that journey yet

Maybe she can temporarily live at the Land of Departure too!

Ooh maybe she can eventually get keyblade armor too

She can become friends with the disney princesses and learn from their stories

Maybe the princesses inspire her to be stronger

Speaking of stronger, there still isn't much clarification on what her powers are exactly. Her powers have been only shown for the convenience of the plot, such as when her belief in Sora is what allowed him to keep his physical form in the Final World

So I would like full clarification on her abilities as a Princess of Heart and to possibly see those abilities applied to her moveset. I really just wanna play as her again okay

Aqua

Aqua will be Kairi's new master, like I said above

She finally gets to have a little sister!

I feel like having a pupil makes the most sense to be the next step in her life

I would still like to see more issues she developed from her time in the Realm of Darkness. It was a great touch that she got triggered by the swarm of heartless in Re:Mind

Also I'd like to see and her, Terra and Ven are processing Eraqus' loss

And just more friend moments between the three of them

Ventus

So it's implied that his memories have been restored, as he welcomes Chirithy with open arms at the end of KH3. Literally

That opens up the floodgates of hell

If he hasn't already, he's gonna have to tell Aqua and Terra the truth about what happened back then. I wonder if that will cause some tension in their friendship

Speaking of tension, maybe he'd want to find Lauriam and Elrena and reunite with them to talk things out

Terra

I can see Terra being a mentor to Kairi alongside Aqua

We know that he was disappointed that he couldn't act as a mentor to Riku, so this could be a second chance for him

But I can also see him going on his own path to getting stronger and mastering his darkness

Maybe Aqua and Ven disagree bc they want him to stay with them to get stronger. But he insists on going it alone

Maybe he finds a teacher (new character?), or he just does some solo self-reflection

Random thought but it'd be cute if he revisited some of the worlds in BBS to meet up with his old friends and see how things have changed

Speaking of which, wtf happened to Zack. Please don't tell me he died in this universe too... the last shot we see of him is hella eerie

Anyways, I want for that journey to end with him becoming a keyblade master

Lea and Isa

There's still the matter of Subject X, which many speculate is Skuld

That was their whole motivation for joining Organization 13 to begin with, so they gotta spin back on that

Now that Ansem is back in action, they're gonna have to press him about what happened to her

It's funny bc Ansem SoD was also searching for her in KH3, but we don't know why

Mickey

He was tasked with going to Scala Ad Caelum to investigate the Lost Masters

i hope we're able to learn even more about the past. Maybe we'll learn how MoM and the Foretellers were able to hop between dimensions

Unknown

As for Roxas, XIon, and Namine, I have no idea what their roles could be in the future. If anybody has any ideas, do let me know. I'm open to hearing more speculation

[firedragon1321]

So because this rant gained a bit more traction than I thought it would, I felt the need to make a sibling about S0wwiku specifically. Because I have complicated feelings about that ship.

The Ship That Couldn’t Sail

In my other rant- which was more about general toxic behavior in mid-late 2000s KH fandom- I mentioned S0wwiku would probably be my ship of choice, if not for the poor behavior of other shippers. As a ship, it’s more plausible to me than S0k@i.

Most S0k@i moments feel forced to me, and they get more hokey the further on the series goes (looking specifically at KH3). It feels like some Disney executive is trying really hard to push the pairing and sink S0wwiku. This feeling could be because Kairi needs better writing. Note that adjacent Final Fantasy canon pairings- like Tidus and Yuna- never felt forced in large part because the female half was given thoughtful development.

Sora and Riku are closer as characters. They do more individually and together. They’re built from better stuff, and feel like more realized human beings. It’s natural to assume that the possibility for a romance is there. I don’t think Disney will ever allow it. But in a fandom with ships like Riku and Michael Fucking Mouse, S0wwiku is tame, reasonable, soft, and could be fun.

So why don’t I turn this blog into a S0wwiku spam blog? Why do I hesitate to reblog something if it’s tagged S0wwiku, regardless of how harmless it actually is? Why do I claim I swap between this ship and S0k@i based on mood when that’s not true? Why have I spent years avoiding this ship, despite my interest in its possibilities?

Because of other shippers.

The short version of my other post regarding S0wwiku shippers is that- in the mid-late 2000s, when I was seriously entering fandom- they engaged in bullshit behaviors that made the ship unattractive to be associated with. In this rant, I’m going into more detail.

Seme/Uke Dynamics

For people who don’t know what that means- it’s a top/bottom dynamic that originated from Japanese doujinshi and yaoi manga. The “seme” is the top- taller, stronger, bearer of few emotions other than lust and jealousy. The “uke” is the bottom- shorter, weaker, overly emotional to the point of crying over a paper cut. It’s the bullshit “strong man, weak woman” het dynamic, but with one man chosen to be the “weak woman”. 

Sora was assigned the uke role, while Riku was relegated to his seme. This led to fics and art where Sora was sexually, emotionally, and socially inferior to Riku. Sora existed to moan Riku’s name and cry over Riku. He had no will or agency of his own. Riku, meanwhile, had to take care of this infantilized Sora. He was in charge in nearly every scenario. Some fics tried to soften the blow by making him dote over Sora, as one would a cute dog. 

Either way, both characters had no agency or identity outside the relationship. This is my core problem with shipping in general. I saw a tribute to a particular Star Trek ship (the most popular of all) that thanked the ship as if it was a person. The characters were merely parts of the relationship, with no identity outside of it. Which in real life is- a dangerous mindset to have. Even when I didn’t fully understand why when I first entered KH fandom, it still made me a little queasy.

(It’s basically co-dependency. Namely- “an unhealthy dependence on relationships”. I’d have to do more research on the seme/uke dynamic and co-dependency. It’s an interesting angle to view it through.)

The seme/uke roles were decided by an unknown selection of fans and became rigid from there. Swapping them was unthinkable. Those interpretations became the characters (never mind the games existing). “Orgy XIII” went through a similar transformation, where their ruthless actions were ignored in favor of their softer fan characterizations.

Today, the seme/uke dynamic is more vestigial, due to a fandom-culture-wide abandoning of them. While seme/uke dynamics have fallen out of fashion, their impact remains in KH fandom today. There’s a lot more talk of consent than in past years. But the damage is done. The seme/uke setup took their complex and nuanced bond and flattened it.

Of course, if anyone were to point out the flaws in this setup back in the day, they were called homophobic and knocked out of the fandom space. I can only talk about them now because it’s safe to do so, and age and experience gave me the words to be more respectful about it.

Steadfast Belief

Recently, I noticed people viewing the characters- mostly Riku- through a gay lens because they are gay themselves. Which I could see how they might reach that conclusion. One piece of “evidence” I noted that seemed pretty plausible through that perspective is how Riku offers Sora a Paopu, but quickly takes it back and says it was a joke. People with perspectives outside of mine might interpret the characters differently.

That’s not what this is about. This is about the religious belief that S0wwiku is canon. 

A bad behavior that’s been making a comeback in recent years is the insistence that S0wwiku is intended to be canon. This feeling comes from- as mentioned above- a more natural connection between Sora and Riku than Sora and Kairi.

There are shippers- of any pairing, in any fandom, then and now- who aren’t satisfied unless their ship is validated by the source material. They will jump through thousands of hoops to “validate” it with evidence of their own making. This process makes the ship almost an extension of the shipper. When the logical fallacies are called out, it’s treated as a personal attack. Then, things get ugly.

KH has a history with this behavior. S0wwiku was around long before Kl@nce shippers ever rose up. It didn’t invent the rules to the game, but it knew how to play and dominate.

This behavior is the big one that’s still around today. It’s so bad that the pairing frequently pops up in meta for unrelated topics regarding either Sora or Riku- a sort of stealth “insistence” that it’s “canon”. The Sleeping Realms Theory is written by a bunch of S0wwiku shippers who use it to play old games with new rules. Video essays exist to explain that S0wwiku was always Nomura’s intent- all the way from 2002.

Which...isn’t true.

A ship doesn’t have to be canon or valid to be shippable or enjoyed. Why do people need “proof” to ship something? A ship should be shipped just because you like it. You don’t need Daddy Canon giving you permission and telling you not to stay out past nine. Slash shipping in Western fandom was codified by Kirk and Spock, which came out of this exact sense of exploration. Fiction is a whimsical land to travel, and non-canon ships are hidden in its dark caves. Discovering them is supposed to be fun. That’s the magic of fandom. 

If you focus on making everything anchored to the author’s original story or intent, you’re not having fun. You’re the fun police. And you’re some of the people that give me so much anxiety that I’m afraid to publish original fiction.

Miscellaneous Bullshit

Below are behaviors I didn’t find it notable to dedicate a whole section to, but should be mentioned anyway.

Bashing characters- mostly Kairi- for being threats to the ship. People even wrote fanfics of Kairi dying brutally, or being rejected by Sora and Riku. Or both- see The Horrible Bloody Death of Kairi. I forgot to mention this in my other rant, but that fic is deleted, so the author likely had regret for her actions.

“Cringe” behaviors that- while not bad individually- were carried out in a sort of groupthink mentality back in the day. Everyone was saying “OMG S0WWIKU KAWAII YAOI >:)”, which gave the ship a kind of vibe that not everyone was into. If you weren’t feeling the vibe, you didn’t ship the ship. This wasn’t a conscious attempt to gatekeep- it was just kids having fun. Nor is it the dominant thought pattern anymore. But elements of it have lingered in my mind.

Attacking other fans for reasons listed here, and that I neglected to mention. I will not stop saying this- once the topic leaves the ship/fandom and enters a personal attack, it’s gone too far, and the conversation needs to end.

Monster in the Mirror

To me, S0wwiku is associated with people who carry out these behaviors. The ship itself became inseparable from the behavior of the people who ship it. And that’s a shame! Exploring Sora and Riku in a romantic way could have been interesting for me. It could have given me ways to create better romantic bonds in my original fiction. Accepting it as an adult could bring me some psychological peace. 

But that wedge is always going to be there. And other shippers don’t want to destroy it. It’s comfortable to them. Like Jack Skellington, they see the Heartless as part of the party, and not a world-eating threat. S0wwiku isn’t a ship. It’s a label. It’s a way of living. It’s a belief system. It’s extended beyond the two characters that compose it into a dangerous, multi-armed monster of terrible fandom behaviors.

Shipping is supposed to be about love. Perhaps I could join in, if we all make steps to remove the hate.

[houseofsannae]

So I finished playing Dark Road last weekend

Meaning I finally caught up to where everyone else had been a few weeks previously when the concluding update actually released. I have thoughts, but without spoilers (spoilers below the cut), I will say:

Dark Road might actually be one of my favourite Kingdom Hearts games

Bold claim! Why is that?

It’s almost 3AM and while I wanted to write an essay, this is probably going to be a lot more rambly and topic-jumping than any of my uni profs would have accepted. I’ll start by saying: this should have been a full Playstation title. With the traditional KH control scheme (By which I mean the command deck system, AKA the one we had for three games seriously why did they bring back KH2′s shitty magic system for KH3 BUT I DIGRESS). Dark Road should have been a “full” game, and it should have been made before KH3. I recall reading somewhere that Nomura had wanted to tell this story before KH3, but had decided not to since people had already waited so long for KH3. Not sure if that’s true, so don’t quote me on it. Frankly, Dark Road makes a lot of bizarre choices from KH3′s ending... make sense.

There’s a common, repeated theme for the “main” Kingdom Hearts villains (Ansem and Xemnas, meaning). Both of them had their plans fail because they made a mistaken assumption. Ansem assumed that the mass of dark power he could feel behind the Door to Darkness was Kingdom Hearts (because obviously darkness is stronger than light, and therefore Kingdom Hearts (which is strong) must be made of darkness). He was wrong; the Door to Darkness led to the Realm of Darkness. Xemnas believed that Nobodies could not regain their hearts save by accessing Kingdom Hearts, and built his own to accomplish that. While 3D is cited to claim that he lied about not knowing Nobodies could grow hearts of their own, there is no evidence to show that he knew that in KH2. Both Ansem and Xemnas based their plans on something they were fundamentally wrong about. So it would make sense for Xehanort to have done the same thing... but KH3 doesn’t indicate that’s the case, going so far as to have Sora say that what he’s doing (xenocide) must be done... just not by Xehanort. But that’s a different rant.

Dark Road gives us “what Xehanort believed and was wrong about”. Xehanort has apparently believed all his life that he was some special “Child of Destiny” destined to save the worlds from Darkness. And, as we all know, he’s not.

Riku is.

A bunch of you auto-filled “Sora is”, didn’t you? I’ll remind you that the premise of KH1 is that Riku was supposed to be the “chosen one”, but refused the call so hard Sora had to do it instead. Sora’s not the chosen one, he’s not a “Child of Destiny” or what have you; he’s the guy that stood up and said “I’ll do it” when the actual chosen one said “no”. If this “Child of Destiny” nonsense is going to continue going forwards, which given how no one in KH3 could affect the plot aside from Sora, it probably will, I will take heart in the fact that Square Enix adores the “Screw Destiny” trope so much that averting it was one of the major factors in making FFXV such a tragedy.

Speaking of things I don’t like but am living with, confirmation (sort of) that they’re definitely sticking with Vanitas not originally being part of Ventus. I still don’t like it but I’m not mad about it anymore. Let’s see where Nomura’s Wild Ride takes us.

I also want to talk about the presentation of the story (the segue will make sense in a minute I promise). If Dark Road had been released all in one go, we could have avoided all of the “What do you mean the KHUx Player reincarnated into Xehanort” backlash. Because surprise! The Player didn’t reincarnate into Xehanort, they reincarnated into the elderly person who raised Babynort. (That’s right, folks, we are now one of the parents who fucked up a perfectly good child and gave them anxiety!) My objection isn’t to either of these twists, it’s to the fact that all the hairpulling could have been avoided if the game hadn’t been released in segments.

Relatedly I have to say something on a more somber note. What we did get was a remarkably solid game (once the gacha elements were removed), but... I get the distinct impression there was supposed to be more. That the other worlds that are visited during the story missions were supposed to have their own grinding modes, not just Wonderland and Agrabah. That, plus the fact that so much of it was released in one go... It’s sad to me that there was obviously a longer plan here to do more, that was (I assume) curtailed by COVID. I feel bad for everyone who worked on the game not getting to fulfill the full extent of what they’d planned. At the same time, though, I’m glad they did manage to at least complete the story. Yes, there could have been more to the game, but what is there was done well.

I’m also happy that the cardboard cutouts ceased to be cardboard cutouts! (I’m referring to the other students, who seemed to have nothing to them other than character designs in the initial release, which was all I had played). I love every single one of them, and even though their deaths were foregone conclusions, what happened still hit for me. I will say I’m pissed that the people who were saying “Well obviously Bragi is Luxu, since (actual name of a Norse god) Bragi is an anagram of Braig!” were right. It feels like we were supposed to assume that was too obvious to be anything other than a red herring, and thereby be blindsided by the reveal... but people called it from the character reveal on that stupid basis alone. Contrarilywise, I am elated that Vor is not Kairi’s grandmother, which was the other thing that everyone was trumpeting from the character reveals. I have absolutely no idea why anyone thinks Kairi’s grandmother holds any narrative importance whatsoever. Further, I am immensely frustrated by the obsession with trying to figure out “Who of these new characters are actually someone we already know in disguise!” Just let a new character be a new character. Fuck’s sake, I did this with the Star Wars sequels and had my victory from TLJ yanked out from under me by RoS. Just let me live.

So yeah, I adore all the new dead kids, and someday I might even memorize their names. I wish we could see more of them, but given that they’re dead... well, if there is some bullshit and we see them again, I won’t be complaining.

I feel like I had more to say but it’s now almost 4AM and my brain is shutting down. If you have any questions or want me to comment on specific points that I didn’t cover here, the ask box is always open - though I reserve the right to disagree with your opinions, naturally.

All in all I enjoyed my time with Dark Road and I’m excited about Kingdom Hearts again (well, moreso than the baseline excited, that never goes away. You know what I mean)

[zafirosreverie]

Could I request an Eve x fem!reader? I know you already did a proposing but how about Eve proposing to reader?

a/n: this is short, but I hope you like it!

KH’s tag: @natalia-helena-alianova-romanov

Promise (Eve x reader)

You groaned when you felt the sun hitting your eyelids. You didn’t even need to look at the clock to know it was too early. Too early on a saturday. Someone better be dying or something burning to wake you up.

Eve smiled as she watched you opening your eyes and slowly sitting on the bed. She knew you didn't like to be woken up early on a saturday, but this was important and if she didn’t do it now, she would never gather the courage again.

You yawned and looked at the clock, frowning. 6 a.m.

“Mackie, I love you, but you better be dying or we’re going to have problems here” you said

The older woman couldn’t help but giggle at how cute you were, too grumpy and sleepy. It just made her be more sure about all of this. It proved to her she really wanted it, wanted you.

“Kind of” she admitted and you immediately went into full protective mode.

“What happened? Are you ok?” you asked, suddenly too awake.

You were joking, but now that she confirmed something was wrong, you couldn’t help but feel fear. In all the years you have been dating her, you saw how much the universe enjoyed putting her through the worst and every time she came back stronger but she didn’t have to do it alone. You didn’t want her to do it alone.

You quickly checked on her, trying to see if she was physically hurt, but it only made her giggle. She took your hands and gave you a small kiss before she talked again.

“I’m fine honey, I’m just nervous”

“Nervous?” you frowned “why?”

Eve took a deep breath and tried to remember all the speech she prepared for this. Weeks of planning, of listening to Jane, Amanda and Margo, of arguing with Brendan before he finally realised this was about his mother’s happiness and not his own ego. Days of preparation and in the end, she decided to pick the simplest option.

It made sense to her. You taught her that the small things were often the most important ones, that living happy in a day was better than to worry about a past life. You were happy with the simple things and she loved that about you. So, it would only be right that his was slimpy but meaningful too.

If only that helped her calm her nerves.

“Y/N...” she started “You know I love you, right?”

“Of course I do” you blinked “I love you too, Eve”

The older woman only smiled and gave you another quick kiss, but you could tell this was only the beginning of whatever she had to say, so you waited for her to continue.

“Listen...you have become an important part of my life, Y/N. I feel grateful for every day I spend with you and for all the things you share with me. I can’t explain the way you make me feel, when you kiss me or hug me or simply ask me about my day. I have never felt more loved and...and I don’t want to lose that. Never” she stopped for a moment to look at you.

It was a relief to see you didn’t look scared or uncomfortable. You looked at her with such adoration and love. It was almost unbearable and she only wanted to pin you down to the bed. But there would be enough time for it later. If everything went according to the plan.

“I know I already broke a big promise with Ted” she felt bad for bringing up her ex into this, but it was just to make a point “but now I know it was because he wasn’t worthy of keeping it, he was not the right person....And I think...I feel...that you are, Y/N”

“Eve…”you whispered. You thought you knew where this was going and you could feel the tears coming to your eyes.

“I really want you to be” she said “And if you give me the opportunity, I swear I won’t let this end like that. You’re the promise I want to keep” she said.

You were speechless, and as you watched her opening a small box, you felt the tears finally rolling down your cheeks. Her hands were shaking but she kept her voice firm.

“Y/N, would you marry me?” she asked softly.

“Yes” you whispered “yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes” you laughed, throwing yourself at her arms and pressing small kisses all over her face.

Eve was surprised, she didn’t expect such an enthusiastic reaction, but she couldn’t be more happy that you said yes. When you finally let her go, she put the ring on your finger. It was simple, but beautiful. And it meant the world to both of you.

[vanibear]

alright kh asks: i would LOVE to hear your thoughts on vanitas

ohhhhanon.... anon u are asking the right questions !

ok. vanitas. i rea d the translation of his backstory in the bbs novel and it changed me forevr (not really but really)

his character just. the way he poetically weaves with the other ppl hes related to makes me go bonkers. he looks like sora because as sora was the missing piece that fixed ventus, vanitas was the missing piece that broke him. all of his powers, his existence even, is fueled by emotion but all of the ones he experienced in life were negative.. he created monsters because thats how he was treated (and i think what would he create if he were given a better life ?) he trained endlessly; to replace his emotional pain with physical (which are honestly the same thing for him) and to then replace that pain with strength ..... like he deserved so much better. again. the fact that his emotions created monsters. which he then killed to become stronger. but he felt the pain of each of his creations as he killed them. and was trapped in that cycle in the name of impressing xehanort. in his despair and rage over his situation. likeee frr im going to explode i think about his character so much!! and he deserved better i am going to find him wherever he is and adopt him and give him a loving home !!!!!!!!!!!!!

[lilyginnyblackv2]

Riku’s KH Outfits - What the Colors Tell Us:

I've been wanting to make this post for a long time. Riku's outfits over the course of the KH series has been very interesting to me, specifically in their usage of yellow.

When we think of the color yellow, we often think of things like loyalty, friendship, happiness, openness, and innocence. Many things we tend to associate with childhood. And I do think that we can apply that to Riku to some extent. As he has gotten older and more mature, closer to adulthood, his outfit has gotten less yellow...to some extent. But his loyalty, openness, and friendship has gotten stronger. It seems like an odd contradiction, but is likely tied more to the negative meanings of yellow, which I'll get into some more below.

Over on this Japanese blog site called white - tara, they talk about color language in Japanese, noting both the positives and negatives of the color yellow.

1.

Positive: Yellow is the color of the sun. The sun creates its own light. So yellow is an independent color that calls to mind self-assertiveness. Negative: Too much independence and assertiveness means being "lonely" and yellow can be a color that creates disharmony when there is too much of it.

2.

Positive: Yellow is a color for learning, a joy for learning and knowledge, and for satisfying curiosity. Negative: Because of this though, yellow can signify egoism and self-righteousness, but can also indicate sensitivity and vulnerability.

3.

Positive: Yellow can also signify personal will. Not only in the sense of being an individual, but also when it comes to deciding your own way in life and not just being "another brick in the wall," so to speak. Negative: However, it can also indicate self-doubt, irritability, anxiousness, and other such feelings and emotions.

So, those are the three points (both positive and negative) that we are going to be using to examine Riku's outfits in some more detail. I have a group photo of them at the beginning of this post, so you can more easily see the changes over time, but I'm also going to be including each individual photo for each game below, under the read more, with my thoughts on the outfit, the usage of yellow, and what that might be. Also, while I'll show an image of it, the outfit Riku wears in KH1 in his "Dark Mode" and which Riku Replica wears wasn't included in the above image simply do to space. Adding anymore panels to the grid would have made displaying all the outfits basically impossible. Anyway, the use of the Read More is going to be mostly for the length of this post, which I expect will be quite long, lol.

Here we go!

BBS:

Riku is five years old here. He's a toddler. Both him and Sora are bit too well spoken for their age, but that tends to happen a lot with writers and little kids. But, even more so than that, Riku is incredibly perceptive and smart. This lines up with Riku's personality in KH1 as well (he could tell that something was up with Maleficent). He is soft spoken, when Sora rushes ahead - he trails behind, and he helps Sora sort out his feelings more. The interesting thing to note about BBS Riku's outfit is that yellow is a *huge* part of it, while Sora, in comparison, basically has none. Even the sandals that Sora wears are more of an orange color than a pure, deep yellow like Riku's tank top is.

Riku being a child, this obviously plays into the more childlike aspects of what this color represents - happiness and innocence. But we also see Riku's loyalty, independence, self-reliance, desire for knowledge, and so forth. We really see this when he interacts with Terra and when he talks to Sora about wanting to get off the island some day. He wants to know about other worlds and how to not only become stronger, but also leave the island. And he wants to gain that strength so that he can protect "the things that matter."

So yellow is very prominent in his color scheme. With the other prominent color being black, and with only some blue being scattered about. The black, I feel, not only works as an equalizing and enhancing color for both the yellow and the blue, but as a "blank" color. Like, he is still figuring himself out. And by KH1, when he has more of his personality and sense of self figured out (though not completely) we see less black...kinda.

KH1 and CoM:

Of course, by this point the black represents more of the corruption that Riku ends up going through in this game due to the Darkness and his improper handling and understanding of it (because of the grooming he experienced by both Ansem and Maleficent - with grooming here meaning more of a "being manipulated to become a certain type of way" meaning, rather than anything sexually related. Just more in a general predatory/abusive way). His tank top having yellow in the front, with black in the back definitely symbolizes the sorta "backstabbing" elements to Riku's character in KH1. How he appears the normal and the same at first, but then we slowly start to see more and more of his corruption.

At this point, Riku has a lot more blue in his outfit, because he has become the "blue oni" to Sora's red. And in this game we see the loyalty and friendship from his childhood heading in a more negative direction. I try to avoid bringing up anything HP related nowadays, but really, Riku is such a Hufflepuff at heart. His loyalty ends up becoming a double-edge sword that leads him to his extreme jealousy. And we really start to see the negative meanings of yellow in KH1 - specifically with his egoism, self-rightousness, and his jealousy leading to irritability and the like.

It is also in this game that we see Riku gain his dark mode, which is mainly just black, blue, and red, with the white skirt part likely just being there to help provide some balance to the outfit itself. It fits to him like a skin, almost like it is infecting him, in a way. There isn't any yellow here. All that's left is the blackness, symbolizing the corruption and darkness, and the mixing (though not blending) of red (Sora's color) and blue (his color). And this makes sense, since it is when Riku's jealousy and confusion in KH1 is at it's height that Maleficent provides him with the power to access this mode. It's also and outfit that we see Riku Replica and Dark Riku wear.

Riku Replica, in CoM really encompasses Riku's negative and confused feelings regarding Sora, while Dark Riku is all about the corrupted power and strength. In CoM, Riku largely wears the same outfit as he does in KH1. So I don't have too much to say on it here. The biggest change is when he chooses to wear the black coat and take the road to dawn. In game we are told that this coat is meant to protect a character from the darkness - allowing them to safely travel and pass through it.

Days:

However, it is during this time in the series and in Days that we see Riku truly hiding himself. He really jumps into the lone wolf role (one of the "negative" aspects of the color yellow) and really does start working from behind the scenes. We don't really know what outfit Riku is wearing underneath the black coat at this time. So how much or how little yellow there is at this point is unknown. But we do see Riku wearing a blindfold and trying to lie to himself. This period is a huge one of soul searching for Riku and trying to figure out how to make things right again - to atone and also protect and save Sora. So the general black of the coat he wears fits him at this point. Since he is essentially trying to find himself again, but doing so solely through the darkness that he was initially trapped in.

KH2:

Riku's KH 2 outfit is the first time that we see white playing a prominent role in his outfit. Before this, white was pretty scarce, mostly just like the stitching of his outfits or his shoes. But the white here is a jacket that he wears over his black undershirt. That's also wear we mostly see yellow in this outfit, outside of a bit on his sneakers, where there is also black and white. In KH2 Riku continues his lone wolf actions and the negative associations with yellow like self doubt and anxiousness really come into play for his character. He feels unworthy. But this is also when we see him and Sora re-forge their friendship, with a clean slate, after Riku takes the initiative to open up to Sora about his jealousy and how he viewed their dynamic. Also, Riku's loyalty to Sora in KH2 is shown really well, not only through the behind the scenes moments, but also through the way his character works in your group when fighting (taking the hit for Sora, etc.).

He wears the mostly white and yellow jacket over his black undershirt. This choice feels symbolic of how Riku ends up stepping back into the good graces of those around him as he returns to the Realm of Light. But through most of the game he uses the darkness to travel and to help and aid him. At this point, Riku still feels uncomfortable and undeserving of being within the Realm of Light again, and him wearing the white and yellow jacket can symbolize that uncomfortableness in regards to "light." At this point, Riku likely still felt like he didn't truly belong there - like a wolf in sheep's clothing, even though he really wasn't.

Also, a quick note, Riku still has blue in this outfit. His jeans provide this, and they are a lighter shade of blue than the ones he wore in KH1. The bagginess of his KH2 outfit also fits in with the idea of Riku feeling like he "doesn't fit in," and likely was a contrast to his his KH1 and "Dark Mode" outfits, which were more confining and form fitting. His previous outfits were confining just like his previous mindset was, now in KH2 he is reevaluating. Of course, it also just fits the moody, angsty mood of KH2 Riku too, lol.

DDD:

Riku in Dream Drop Distance is basically on the right track to be what his BBS version wanted to be when he got older. This Riku is still in recovery. KH3 Riku is still in recovery, imo, too. But we'll get to that in a moment. Basically, DDD Riku is KH1 Riku flipped. The bright yellow of his outfit is on his back, the front of his shirt is white, and the black is only on the "edges" and such. The white, like with KH2 Riku, could easily symbolize Riku trying to figure himself out again. This time it is more form fitting though and isn't just covering up a black shirt underneath. Through this game, we see Riku adjusting himself to being in the Realm of Light again and learning to be comfortable and realizing it is okay for him to be there. He still struggles with the darkness, which is always looming (like how there is black on the edges of his outfit), but he manages to finally master the darkness by the end of this game. Being comfortable both in the light and dark.

Riku's friendship, loyalty, and openness are at their most pure and sincere in this game. At the start, there are still the negative aspects of yellow weighing him down (self-doubt, etc.), but the positive aspects of desiring knowledge, independence, and personal will all push him forward. The desire to forge his own path is also what helps him overcome the darkness and take control of it, all while protecting Sora.

KH3:

Finally, we have KH3 Riku. Both Riku Replica and Dark Riku show up and play a part in Riku facing his past properly and really coming to love and accept himself for who he truly is. He doesn't fear the darkness anymore, feels comfortable in his own skin and who he is by the end of the game. Though, a part of Riku, in both DDD and KH3 seems to have elements of someone who is in recovery. He is taking the most noble paths, even if it might hurt him in some way, rather than any paths that may be a bit more morally grey or what have. Almost like for overcompensation.

Nevertheless, this Riku is assured in his friendship with Sora, which DDD had only strengthened, so he takes a backset on his lone wolf, and self forged paths. Instead, he allows Sora to grow more on his own and simply supports him. Of course, he is still loyal and protects him, like in the Demon Tide scene. He is a bit closer to reaching the place that his child self wanted him to be. At the very least, in KH3, Riku finally feels comfortable in himself and his own skin. His outfit has very little yellow this time around, just small stripes at his shoulders, but that's enough. Too much yellow causes disharmony after all. This is just a nice, balanced amount. It shows his friendship, loyalty, and openness, but not to extremes. The same goes for the negative traits like being a lone wolf (we see him working with others and turning into the leader of the group by the end of Remind), self-doubt (he comes to accept himself), and personal will (he places judgement in Sora's choices and learns to let Sora lead like we see him saying near the end of KH2).

Most of Riku's new outfit in KH3 is black and blue with some white thrown in and a dash of yellow. I think this shows how Riku has come to accept the darkness and use it in a way that benefits, rather than harms, him. And it matches well with the blue of his outfit, which consist of a light blue T-shirt and medium blue jeans. His jeans aren't the long baggy pants from 2, nor the constraining pants from 1, but closer to the loose shorts from his childhood. The color is also more in-between the blue of his KH1 pants and the blue of his KH 2 pants. Slightly duller and more matured looking. His shoes have also changed, for the first time we're seeing him wearing boots rather than sneakers. Boots are sturdier, just like Riku is himself now.

Riku has become reliable and dependable again, much like the young Riku that we saw in BBS, but this Riku has found the balance with blue, black, white, and yellow. Or, at least, more balance than he has before. But, Riku isn't quite done growing yet and he still hasn't fully fulfilled that desire he had as a child. Not yet.

Is some of this just me overanalyzing? Most likely. But it was still fun to think about. I also want to do a breakdown like this for Sora and Kairi in the future as well. Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this. Also, please feel free to add to this as too. It’s been a while since I’ve played or watched or interacted much with KH, so if I forgot something or overlooked something, etc., feel free to talk about it and such. :)

[karla-the-elemental-dreamer]

KH-OC Week - Catch Up: Day 5 - (5 AUG 2021)

@khoc-week

The prompt I am doing for this one is 'Memory'. I thought this was just going to be a little diary entry simulation, but I ended up getting carried away and made a little fictional piece out of it. This does not necessarily follow my IRL existence and my dream avenues, this piece is more a completely imaginative fiction (incorporates only some aspects of stories from dreams); and what it would be like if I had a more concrete position, like living there for significant periods of time.

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Diary Entry Written: 8 AUG 2021 (8:08 PM)

Words: 1,652

As I sit here in isolation, thinking about how lonely it is here in the house, I remember all the times I spent with Riku and his friends, who are in turn my friends, and this makes me happy. All of a sudden I don’t feel so alone anymore, and as the memories replay, it’s like the people in them are actually with me; we are experiencing these moments all over again.

At the start, it was hard as I tried to introduce myself to a new world of people and vice-versa. I would tell Riku about myself, and it seemed like he was listening, but a few hours went by, and it’s like he forgot what I had told him… Sort of like he didn’t care, but then I knew Riku wasn’t naturally like this. At the time, I was new, and with Riku having redeemed himself from the darkness, I guess his insecurities were… Protecting him in a way; he did not want to be deceived again. It’s always hard at the start when I know exactly the person I want to show to others, but that they may not perceive me the way I perceive me. I knew exactly how Riku felt, which why I thought to myself, “Just be kind”, because in truth, it’s sometimes actions that speak louder than words.

So I took it upon myself to look out for Riku’s friends when he himself couldn’t be there, or if he was there but he was caught up in another matter. I recall the first thing I did for one of those ‘guardians of light’, so they are called. Xehanort had gotten the best of Sora, shattering him into a million pieces (emotionally), as he was made to watch Xemnas almost incapacitate Kairi. I yelled to Kairi, “Why aren’t you using your keyblade? You have one!”. Of course at the time, Kairi didn’t know who I was, and so she was hesitant to follow my advice. But just as Xemnas was about to make her take her last breath, it seems like Kairi knew what I was on about, and fear was turned into common sense. I continued to yell from the bottom of the plateau; “you get into these situations because people think you can’t fight for yourself!”.

As Riku was busy trying to keep himself from being dominated by Ansem, he looked over at Kairi’s direction with a sort of slant in his face. He himself didn’t know that I was standing below, he could only be confused by the voice he was hearing, but then I think that in Riku’s heart, he agreed that Kairi needed to become stronger and stand up for herself more… Because others won’t always be around. As Kairi swiped the keyblade, Xemnas was launched back, with a shocked look on his face like he didn’t even think the girl could do it. Both Sora and Riku looked at each other, and then to Kairi, with a look of amazement as they saw that she pried herself from Xemnas.

I skip to after that battle, where I heard Kairi say to them, “I probably wouldn’t have made it if it wasn’t for that girl”. Sora had answered, “No Kairi, it was all you. See, you do have in you, and for that, I’m proud of you”. Kairi stopped him, “But that voice, it helped me a lot”. Riku was curious and so he peered through a wall of the graveyard ruins, and he could see me walking away as I felt I had done my job. A few of these moments, and down the track, Riku began to trust me and see that I meant no harm. Rather than pushing me away and only what I thought was him pretending to care, he took more of an interested and asked me what I wanted when he noticed that I wanted or needed something.

Six months later, and Riku is the father figure I never would have dreamed of back then. And back then I thought I could never show that I was weak, or he would become uncomfortable with such thoughts and push me away. But then he later would accept me for who I am, and he said that is was okay for me to be weak. As my dream guide, he told me that it’s impossible for a person to be strong all the time, and when the cracks show, that it’s no problem to rely on others to build us up. Though Riku did admit that he himself wasn’t perfect, and that some of the messages he shared with me were inspired by Sora’s way of thinking. Riku would tell me stories of the time he and Sora spent together, and he said that he loved Sora very much… But then Riku also admitted that he had a place for me as well, as he did for all his friends.

Down the track, Riku encouraged me to meet his other friends. In Twilight Town, he introduced me to Roxas, Lea and Xion. At first, Roxas didn’t seem too convinced that I was trustworthy, but after a few rods from Riku, Roxas was able to see. I remember telling Roxas that I was aware of all his trauma from the events of KH-Days and KH2, and I said to Roxas that if there was a way for me to bring him back in time so that he never had to go through such a thing, I would. In-fact that’s when I said to any guardian of light who had been through some sort of deep darkness. That if I had the power to change things, I would.

And this is in-fact how I became closer to Terra. Because of all that Terra had been through with Xehanort, he initially thought I was trying to lead him on. However, I understood exactly why Terra wasn’t convinced, and from Riku encouraging me and standing in the same room as I spoke, I told Terra that I understood exactly why. I stated that I witnessed everything that Xehanort did thanks to the accounts of KH-BBS, and I said that I would never wish that on anybody. I said to Terra that I wanted to see him enjoy his life, and that I would be a good friend who would do anything to help him get back the joy that he missed out on for 11 years.

So when I could go on a mission with Riku, I would. But the mission would be so dangerous that Riku wouldn’t let me go no matter how strong I claimed to be, Terra was always the first person he took me to, and in turn Terra would always be the first one to offer to look after me on Riku’s behalf. And then even in a streak of no missions, I lived with Riku on the islands, but I would occasionally go for sleepovers at the Land of Departure.

Aqua and Ventus would sometimes spend time with us, but everybody understood that Terra was my special connection to that place. So as Aqua would have bonding time Ventus, Terra would have it with me. I remember once, I brought a couple of canvas over as I wanted to see if Terra could paint. He didn’t have that steady-a-hand, and unfortunately he ended up making a bit of a mess, but we could make out that the painting was of him, Aqua and Ventus.

I ended up painting a picture of me, with the Land of Departure in the background, holding my Spirit of Brigid keyblade. Why did I decide to draw this keyblade? Firstly, I thought it fit the royal aesthetic of the place. But secondly, I had this memory while painting. The first time I picked up that keyblade, I didn’t realised it was serving as a music box as I heard the school song playing from within the metal! I remember I had to actually slap the keyblade, and that’s when the music stopped and I could use it as a keyblade and not a darn radio. In-fact these days, when the Spirit of Brigid plays the school song, Riku laughs, and he sometimes even slaps the keyblade for me.

So after I spent the night and/or day with Terra, Riku would come to collect me, and Terra would tell him what a great time we had, and if Terra actually had fun. And then Riku would take me home, back to the islands. That same evening, we would walk along the beach, and Riku would ask me for my perspective on the stay. And sometimes, depending on what I told Riku, he would turn my experience into lessons and give me further advice or insights into life.

I would ask how Riku’s missions went, but sometimes he wouldn’t say much. I knew he still kept some things to himself, but at the same time, I understood. It’s not because he couldn’t trust me. Instead, it was more because he likely wouldn’t wish his experiences on me, or something really bad happened to him that he just had to keep it inside. However, for as long as I was under Riku’s roof, even on our bad days, we would always end the night and start the new day together. We slept in his bed, and he’d have his arm over me, ready to comfort me if I had any nightmares.

So yes I may be trapped in my own house, outside the KH world at the moment. But when I think about the day that Riku took me in; Lea and Roxas taking me out for ice-cream whenever I visited Twilight town; Terra babysitting me, and having the delicious dinners that Aqua made, it’s like there with me at this very moment, and I know I’ll be back to see them soon.

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Hope you enjoyed reading that piece! Now to race to get Day 6 and 7 out in a reasonable time-frame so it isn't too late outside the week. Day will contain a special drawing that I trying to finish. Day 7 may be another written piece.

[jadekitty777]

Fic Writer Questions

Tagged by @victorious1956 (I kind of forgot you tagged me for like, ever, lol). These stats are from 9-1-21.

How many works do you have on AO3?

Currently 79!

What’s your total AO3 wordcount?

411,393. Jesus, when did that happen?

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Mostly RWBY, though I have 2 Undertale fanfics up as well.

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1.    Sick Leave (485)

2.    A Bit of Luck (324)

3.    The Hero’s Road (253)

4.    Transmission Error (214)

5.    Temptation (187)

4 out of 5 of these are Qrow/Clover fanfics and of those, two of them are drabbles.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

Yes, always. My philosophy has always been that if someone took the time to comment, then I can take the time to show my appreciation for it. (It can also sometimes lead to friends!)

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Ooo… Hm. I tend to like happy endings since I write mostly romance. So, Luck of the Draw probably wins by a mile, especially considering it was a vent fic.

Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve ever written?

Yes, I have. Or, well, kind of? Not in so much that the characters of two shows tend to collide, but moreso AUs using that idea of the show.

Absolutely the Miraculous Ladybug/RWBY AU is the weirdest one I’ve got.

Though I DID at one point want to do a Voltron/RWBY story and actually use Voltron and RWBY characters together as a more traditional crossover. Never did get around to it.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Eeh, yes. Like twice on Ao3 and twice on fanfiction.net. While I can remember what all of them were about, the one that super stuck with me is the very first one I ever got – but that was because it was from my friends at the time and I was like 12 or 13?

Might be why I tend to be nervous posting stuff or showing friends my work.

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

I do on occasion. I used to a lot more consistently when I was younger but anymore I tend to find keeping the, ah, “groove” to be difficult. I have about 3 up and a LOT more in my folder that never got… *snorts* completed.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

No, or at least, not outright.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don’t believe so.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Oh yeah, many times. Most of my Kingdom Hearts fanfiction days were all cowritten as well as some really old Final Fantasy 7 stories.

What’s your all time favorite ship?

Hurm, “all time” huh? God I always was terrible at this “ultimate favorite” thing.

Honestly, I don’t know. One of the ones that probably stuck with me the longest was Sora/Riku because Sora is my favorite KH character and Riku is, well.

…He’s pretty lol.

In general, I tend to gravitate towards the optimistic characters and then pair them with someone they have good chemistry with, which often is someone they are friends with – though, not always. I tend to like that emotional connection though as it tends to jive well with my own personal lifestyle (as in, I’m demisexual lol).

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Probably the Dragon AU idea I had for Taiqrow – Bound to the Sky with You. I always intended to cycle back to it, but with my waning motivation for RWBY, I don’t see it happening.

What are your writing strengths?

I’d say for the type of stories I write – single character pieces and romance are where I do my best work. I tend to favor a small cast; it’s easier to maintain and keep focus when I’m only juggling a handful of people. Character pieces tend to be things where I want to explore something about the character that I have an extreme interest in (I.E. Tai’s depression or Qrow’s alcoholism).

As for what works best in my writing itself, probably dialogue and paragraph flow. With the former, I mean I’m pretty confidant my dialogue for characters sounds natural, both for what the characters would potentially say in canon as well as just authentic to a conversation actual people might have. For the latter, I tend to think a lot about how and where to put my sentences and how to construct the breaks in the story so it all provides the best impact.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Long writing, 1000000%. I struggle very much with doing a piece that is longer than a chapter or two – partially because I tend to lose interest or want to jump into another project but mostly becaaaaaaause- I am slow as fucking molasses. I have never been good at ‘freeforming’ my writing. This is mainly because I put too much pressure on myself to get things right the first time or, sometimes, will spend minutes searching a thesaurus to find the right word. I’ve tried many recommended techniques to try and speed up my writing process and leave the more time-consuming stuff for the editing process, but the habit is what it is.

Probably also goes without saying that, since I’m good with smaller casts, of course larger casts are also a bit of an issue for me. It’s hard to balance like, nine people for example. Which, when I wrote One Piece fanfiction was…. Yeah, kind of an issue LOL.

I’m also a bit weirdly OCD about not reusing a certain word too many times or even a character’s name too many times. I don’t like things to sound repetitive; though ironically, it’s probably not even something most readers would even notice.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I mean. I did an entire fanfic with ASL in it soooo…

More seriously though? I think it’s fine, but research is often necessary if it’s going to be a huge staple for the story. Not only do language and culture go hand-in-hand, it’s important to think why the character knows certain languages and what environment they grew up in to learn it and how that might influence them in general.

Also, providing translations for what’s being said has to be carefully considered, because the best way to do it is in text, but it can be hard to do so and not break the flow of your writing.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Ha, don’t laugh. Dragonball Z. You will never find them though – I purged them back in high school.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Terribly, I love a lot of my fanfics and am proud of many. Also, I’m still terrible at picking favorites. But, okay – I Found My Heart in San Francisco is almost always the first Taiqrow fanfic I will recommend. I poured so much love and research into that piece and I really enjoyed how it came out, even if it could have been stronger. If the person isn’t looking for a romance piece though, I would probably recommend The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus One. That one is a Qrow-centric character piece, exploring his journey from young child to adult and the things he learns along the way thanks to the influence of certain people in his life.

Given the chance though, I would name half my folder just out of pride lol. It’s important to love what you do, and I do cherish the stuff I write.

Tagging: @spectralscathath, @aerislei and @raybyanothername (if you guys want to/haven’t already done it, of course)

[databoyreekoo]

thoughts on khmom

this thread contains spoilers for khmom, you have been warned

long story short; i loved it

i’ve always been indifferent about kairi. i don’t like her, but i don’t hate her either. honestly, it’s hard to have any sort of opinion on her when her presence in the story is severely lacking...especially compared to other female characters like aqua, xion and namine, who are all developed and well-rounded. but that’s the thing...it’s just kairi. fans like to jump to “nomura doesn’t know how to write female characters and will never give his female characters anything” when in reality, kairi is just poorly written. (i’d like to add that i’m not saying there aren’t any flaws in the way nomura writes his female characters, but this issue is exclusive to kairi as far as kh is concerned). i mean...even larxene and ava have more depth than kairi, and they haven’t even been featured in as many games as her. this is frustrating for those who already like her, and for those who want to like her. yet...it’s been kinda obvious that nomura a) didn’t really know what to do with her post kh1, and/or b) doesn’t particularly enjoy writing for her.

between kh1, kh2 and ddd, kairi showed only a smidgeon of her desire to fight for and help her friends. however, these moments were immediately countered by her waiting on the islands for sora and riku to return, her getting kidnapped, her getting manipulated by xehanort (and other orgxiii members)...or her getting killed. in kh3, her training was left in the hands of a wizard...not a keyblade master. and yes, even though time doesn’t exist in the secret forest, there’s only so much knowledge axel can pass onto kairi...and without a variety of enemies to fight, there’s only so much experience kairi can gain. she still had a lot to learn but was thrown into a war and expected to hold her own (she did good for what little time she had to prepare, though).

then..remind happened. apart from the lore bits that were added and the plot holes that were addressed, the rest of it felt like fanservice, to be quite honest. it gave the fans everything they had been screaming about since kh3′s initial release, including “kairi development/spotlight.” i’m using quotations because kairi was very inconsistent in remind. one moment she’s blocking xion’s attack and protecting axel (repaying him for protecting her earlier in the KG, regardless if she remembers it or not AND for plot reasons; getting to see xion’s face, all in all this feels good, this feels like natural progression for kairi, love that for her), then...she’s suddenly overpowering XEMNAS of all people after he literally slapped sora, roxas AND xion away like a couple of mosquitos...(thematically, it would’ve made more sense for it to have been xion or roxas getting the upper hand, and it would’ve been in character too since they’re both powerhouses...it just feels like this was compensation or an apology for kairi not doing anything in the base game when xemnas kidnapped her...WHICH STILL HAPPENS BTW making this interaction between xemnas and kairi feel insincere and unrewarding...i want natural progression for kairi, i don’t want her to come off like a mary sue), then later once sora and the guardians bring kairi back, she’s totally clueless as to what sora means by “kairi, are you ready for this?” when she can obviously see darkness swirling above their heads...yet, earlier, she immediately gave axel affirmation when he asks “you with me?” just as they’re about to fight saix and xion...her fight against xehanort was wonderful though, her gameplay suited her very well. i just want consistency and natural progression like the rest of the main cast experienced.

i feel like remind was kinda misleading when it comes to kairi...and a lot of fans just rolled with the hype straight into khmom, believing it to be this huge turning point for kairi...only to be let down by the ending.

however, khmom is a turning point for kairi...but it feels sincere, it feels deserved. it feels natural. she got to address her repressed childhood memories and confront an illusion of xehanort, the embodiment of her suffering. she acknowledged her weakness (in jp, sena translated it different) and how it put sora and everyone else in danger. she showed frustration and anger with the way xehanort used her and altered her fate. she charged in to fight and stand up for herself without a second thought. she’s more assertive and involved now than she ever has been, and her personality is finally showing through and she’s bursting with life. even when she tells riku she wants to go, and he denies her in order to keep her safe (i swear to god, if i see one more person call riku a misogynist for gently putting kairi down because she isn’t experienced enough and doesn’t have the power of waking needed to journey to a dangerous, unknown world i’m gonna lose my mind, sora was literally denied access to the realm of darkness all throughout kh3 because it was too dangerous and he hadn’t regained the power of waking and nobody said a damn thing about that), she acknowledges her lack of experience and tells riku with confidence that she’s going to train hard and get stronger so she can fight alongside sora AND riku...not just sora this time. this is the first time in a long time we’ve seen kairi so vocal and adamant about her training so she can grow stronger and not put herself or anyone else in harms way anymore...instead of her writing it down in an unsent letter or having the game telling us but hardly show it. she even tells yen sid she wants to train under aqua WHICH IS HUGE because not only is it a decision she makes herself (and actually voices this time instead of remaining passive), but she also utilizes magic and speed in combat...training under aqua will help her develop SO MUCH, in both character and skill. this also opens potential friendships between kairi and terra, as well as kairi and ventus.

kairi is finally...FINALLY starting her own journey, and even though her path is different from sora and riku’s right now (which, honestly, will be more beneficial for her in the long run), i have more faith now than ever that kairi’s path will cross with sora and riku’s again and she’ll have the strength she wants in order to stand by their side and support them.

[wait-still-rendering]

Spoilers for: KINGDOM HEARTS, KINGDOM HEARTS II, DREAM DROP DISTANCE, KINGDOM HEARTS III, and MELODY OF MEMORY.

This is a character analysis of Kairi from the Kingdom Hearts franchise. I thought this would only be a headcanon, but apparently not.

Buckle up, Kairi fans!

The way I project onto Kairi. I have a headcanon for her.

Y'know how in Kingdom Hearts I, she says she doesn't remember her hometown when Sora asks her? Do you remember how it was framed? It's framed in a way that says she isn't telling the entire truth with the shot focusing on her mouth and not showing her eyes. It's a very famous technique used in anime, given that Kingdom Hearts is a Japanese game.

(Nomura might be retconning Kairi remembering, but I'm not adhering to that right now.)

My headcanon is the reason remembering is so traumatic and painful for Kairi, or that she has repressed memories, is because yes, Xehanort, but also her grandmother.

They seemed fairly close from what we've seen of Kairi and her grandmother. No one knows what happened to Kairi's Grandma either. Having a maternal figure being stripped away from you at that age, being sent far away by a strange man, being adopted by strange people and living on a strange world --- that's all very traumatic.

For context, I'm adopted so I kind of understand Kairi being adopted in a sense although my adoption and her adoption are different in many ways.

Adoption is traumatic. I keep using that word a lot, but it's relevant. With the context that Kairi is forcibly sent away by Xehanort (Terranort) and just being put in this strange place with no one she knows, for a 4 year old that is terrifying. Especially for someone so young. She has no way back to her family, and maybe she doesn't even know about the invasion until years later like in KH1. (I'm iffy on that part because of the flashback in Melody of Memories, but actually, I think the heartless invasion was already happening. I don't know. Tell me if it was or wasn't please.)

Her trauma isn't from the perspective that no one wanted her; it's from the perspective that she is powerless. She powerless against men in particular. Whenever she's in danger, it's always or almost always the men that hurt her. Terranort, Axel, Xemnas, Xehanort.

What I've noticed is that they always yank Kairi's arm.

They're always bigger and stronger than her in stature and they always use her as a way to get to Sora.

This is all a theory and not canon, but y'know character analysis is fun especially for a character I grew up with.

I mean, she has no agency because of bad writing, but this is for fun, as I said above.

What if she feels like she doesn't have agency? Everyone portrays Kairi as wanting to do more, but you can want to do more and be more active and in your own life and still hinder yourself --- self-sabotage. Personally, I do it all the time.

Her going toe-to-toe with more experienced keyblade wielders is impressive because of how little experience she has compared to them. That's not the point. I'm getting off track.

Back to the adoption bit.

I don't know if she had parents or if they died early or what, but Kairi might harbor survivor's guilt. Sure, the Final Fantasy gang is all there, but there is no trace of her grandma.

Maybe her subconscious reasoning is, "Even if I try, I'm still left behind."

(Lmao, abandonment issues Kairi.)

Sora and Riku are constantly leaving her in the dust to the point where her and Riku's relationship is kinda awkward. You could say the same for her and Sora.

She is not the same kid she was in Kingdom Hearts 1. She doesn't have her spunk or maybe it's just buried somewhere deep in her.

It's almost like she's isolating herself. With the loss of Sora in Kingdom Hearts 3 doubled with not really knowing anyone too well. I.e., Terra, Ventus, Aqua.

Honestly though, I can't explain why Riku's and Kairi's relationship changed because they had this sort of playfulness in the secret ending of Dream Drop Distance. I'll chalk it up to bad writing or even the fans complaining about Alyson Stoner stepping in as her VA. Because I remember everyone's reaction to Alyson Stoner voicing her in the secret ending and the fans being like, "But Hayden!!!" And maybe people on the KH team took that as, "They don't like spunky Kairi." I don't know. It's a thought that's been floating in my head for a while.

To be honest, KH3's voice acting is wonky.

Aaaand I'm off topic again.

Maybe it's just painful for Kairi because her Grandma was a safety blanket for her and being taken away from her grandmother led to the culmination of Kairi's repressed memories or Kairi flatout refusing to remember the beginning of all her pain. And I think her grandma plays a huge part in that. Kairi's Grandma is always telling Kairi stories from what little we see of her. There could be this ache within Kairi's heart for her grandma because she doesn't know what happened to her. She doesn't know if her grandmother is alive or if she's dead. As the saying goes, ignorance is bliss. A part of Kairi does not want to know the fate of her grandmother because it will hurt all the same. The guilt she'll harbor if her grandma is alive and the fact that Kairi never searched for her grandma like in KH3. The anguish if her grandma is dead and all she has left are her Grandma's stories and memories Kairi doesn't have access to or does not want to access.

What I'm saying is, Kairi does not want to delve into her memories because that will lead to her present and she'll have to face something more than heartless; she'll have to face her past.

If you finished reading this, thank you. I was all over the place, so really, thank you. I just wanted to give a new perspective on Kairi. It might not even be new, tell me in the replies if it is or isn't. I just want people to interact with this analysis/theory and tell me their thoughts.

This just came to mind, but if anyone wants to make a YouTube video on this, please credit me as wait-still-rendering.

Thanks,

wait-still-rendering

Edit: I'll add pictures later

[razorblade180]

The NaruSaku post

@perfectkidalienpatrol asked me a two questions a couple weeks ago one about restructuring Kingdom Hearts DDD and 3 to be more emotional which you find right here < [it took time, please read. Also leave a reply on this one because it also took way too much time. Thank you 😅]

The second question is about how I would write NaruSaku, which is this post. [I rewatched 60 percent of Naruto Shippuden for this. I’m not playing games here.]

I’m gonna follow the same rules I did for KH more or less. I’m not changing 90% of any major events just certain people surrounding it and I’ll add stuff that’s not unreasonable. Most of the things I’m about to say is gonna be from Sakura’s perspective since Naruto is already in love with her and have a good of his feelings towards her. I’d also like to take a moment and say I’m a person who doesn’t believe Sakura is weak or useless, but she’s sorely underused. What makes this bad is her screen time is almost always to make others around her have more of an effect or her doing something stupid because plot. Okay, let’s get the big stuff out of the way first that lays the ground work.

Part 1 of Naruto is unchanged. (Rip Sakura, she’s still of no use here.)

The start of Shippuden, all the way up to Pain is basically the same. The thing about NaruSaku is there’s plenty of ground work in the show. The series definitely shows Sakura warming up and caring about Naruto in a variety of ways. The entire blueprint is there, Kishimoto just decided to go with Hinata.

During the Rasenshuriken training, Kakashi grabs the food pill basket from Sakura and tells her stay. Since Naruto’s training is more trial by fire and repetition, Kakashi uses his free time to train Sakura. Combat, a little ninjitsu, even tricks about genjutsu and things he’s learned about sharingan. (You know, sensei stuff)

Neji will live for obvious reasons.

Okay, so my whole thought process really starts at the point in the show where Sakura falsely tells Naruto that she loves him. At this point, the show has given tons of scenes of Sakura healing Naruto, defending the way he is, acknowledged his growth, and has him as a strong motivator do whatever she can whenever she can. All while being emotionally torn because of her love for Saskue and being faced with the reality that Naruto has been in love with her forever. The scene plays out the same with Naruto not believing her and the Saskue murder team leaving. Sakura doesn’t let it show she is deeply conflicted about telling that lie. Was it a lie? It certainly wasn’t completely truthfully. Her thoughts and feelings on Naruto had been rapidly changing and confusing her little by little since he returned to the village. All she was certain of was that Naruto was a person that had become very important to her and she didn’t want to cause him any more suffering.

Fast forwarding to Sakura encountering Saskue, the encounter is only different by Sakura confessing her honest feelings to him right on the iron bridge, telling him how she’ll join his side if he can’t find it in himself to stop being a criminal. She’s unknowingly under a genjutsu that’s letting Sakura see him in front of her, pretending to care about this conversation while he’s actually about to chidori her from behind. Sakura catches on to the trick a bit too late but was fortunately saved by Kakashi. Naruto eventually shows up, the fight happens, and we get the scene where Naruto tells Saskue that they well both die the next time they fight. Two very important things come out of this entire event. The first is Sakura’s feelings for Saskue are now shattered after he tried to kill her twice, while the other thing is Sakura’s fear of Naruto’s prediction coming true.

We get back to the village and everyone starts going their separate ways except for Naruto and Sakura, because she tells him to stay back for a moment. She takes this moment to apologize to him for what she said. The guilt about the entire thing builds more and more as she continues her apology until Sakura gets so frustrated with her own actions, or lack of action. Naruto interrupts her apology before she got too far gone into self loathing and sorrow and tells her that it’s okay. Yes, his promise is a big reason for motivating him but Naruto is also in it for himself and tries to lift some of the guilt Sakura has for all of this. In the process he ends up mentioning just how much she actually does for everyone, especially him; which only makes her feel more conflicted about everything since all of his feelings are on the table clearly for her. Sakura mentally decides she having such a kind person like him always supporting her was something she wasn’t close to being worthy of, so she would strive to be that person. Sakura decides to do one more selfish act though, she asks Naruto to stay alive through all of this. Naruto simply looks at the girl that is clearly concerned about all of this and says yes, despite not knowing just how sure he can keep this promise.

At this point in the anime there’s a lot of war preparations. In one scene there’s Sakura looking at photos of the gruesome tragedies that she should expect to see as a medical ninja. A head nurse also explains how sometimes you have to prioritize who to save. Sakura then thinks to herself in a crazy circumstance where both Naruto and Saskue are fatally wounded, who would she rush to? I’m keeping this scene but giving it new context. This thought plagues her mind not because of love, but because desire. Sakura hates to admit it but she still very much hates the idea of Saskue dying. Like Naruto, she very much wants him to come back, regardless of the heartache she feels whenever she thinks about the boy who barely gave a damn. But Sakura also has made the goal to do all she can to support Naruto the right way and the thought of leaving him to die is ludicrous. Sakura shakes off the crazy thought and focuses on the task at hand. None of those ideas matter if she can’t get stronger. I like the idea of her hitting a rut someone like Ino or Shizune coming to her aid since Tsunade is busy. One of the women reinvigorates her drive by telling Sakura how Naruto is probably pushing himself to the limit as they speak. [Nine tails is beating him up] Not just for his friends, but for the world. Sakura takes that to heart, protecting everyone is the bar, not just Naruto and her friends. Sakura decides now would be a good time and take a step back, going off to train by herself until it was actually time to head into war. Kakashi would personally be the one to get her when that time came, surprised to see a very specific part of their previous training had gotten much better along with her chakra control.

On the Naruto side of things, all the same events happen. The only thing I would add for my own personal amusement would be Naruto mentioning Sakura to his mom and how they’re similar, but Sakura has no interest in him. Kushina laughs and tells him if Sakura really is anything like herself then Naruto can’t be too sure of anything until it happens. He doesn’t understand that all but nods anyways.

War starts! All the cool fights happen and the filler. All of this is same obviously because so much is going on, including injuries. Naruto eventually joins the war and sends his clones to help everywhere. The location where Sakura is stationed is under severe condition, to the point it’s about to fall apart. Injured ninja and attacks have relentlessly assaulted the place in one form or another and the medics are running on fumes. Sakura herself is barely hanging on as another wave of injured people are in desperate need of healing. Supplies are diminished to almost nothing, staff has gotten hurt, and more white zetsu were said to be headed their way. Sakura took a moment to look at the chaos of war. The overwhelming feeling of it, the pain, how everything just kept going until something gave out. She was about to give out. Her body exhausted from being up for days treating people was finally catching up with her mind in thinking about shutting down, until she thought about Naruto. She wasn’t sure why she did, but he popped into her head, as well as the numerous times he’s pushed passed the breaking point to the finish line. Then she remembered his praise about her and her vow to catch up with him. Not yet, she couldn’t be done yet. Not while there was still everyone to protect. Sakura rallied the people she could to both attack and defend what they had left. Somehow, through all the madness, the injured had been treated and another wave was taken out. More had to be done and all who were able to move were more than willing to help the ninja that had saved their life. Unfortunately, a zetsu had snuck into the ranks and was heading right for Sakura who was far to tired to defend herself from the attack she saw coming. If she got hurt then it was game over for this unit and her, now that they had basically nothing. Sakura should’ve died on the spot but a Naruto clone had finally arrived in the nick of time, beating the zetsu in an instant. Sakura couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Her body gives out and Naruto catches her in a similar way Minato catches Kushina. Naruto tells everyone how awesome it was that they held out so long and they rightfully give Sakura a majority of the credit. Naruto starts to tell her how amazing that is but she passes out. He simply chuckles and tells all of them to follow her lead. He’ll step in now and let them rest. It’s his turn to protect everyone.

The next time the show cuts back to this location is when reports of Naruto clones suddenly vanishing after many tremors and explosions have happened, giving Sakura an uneasy feeling. Minutes later word reaches them that the real Naruto is fighting the masked man and Madara. Many ninja from everywhere go ready to race off to this final battle. Sakura’s had the chance to rest and is ready to give her all in any way she can, along with so many others.

[Cool shit happens! The allied shinobi force appears!]

Neji gets injured protecting Hinata and Naruto, bringing him right to deaths door and nobody is around to help him. Naruto looks around to see all the death and destruction that leads to Obito into giving his speech. So basically I just changed this scene from Neji being dead, to Neji dying and having to be left there; causing everyone to simply accept that they have to press on and that Neji isn’t going to make it. We still get the moment of Hinata snapping Naruto out of despair and Kakashi’s elaboratetion on his meaning behind the statement “I will not allow my comrades to die.” That way we still get Kurama motivating Naruto, causing Naruto to snap Lee out of his despair and then outcome plays out like it usually does; the people rallying to attack the ten tails again with the Nine Tails Power given to them. Naruto spends up all his chakra protecting everyone and gets badly injured. I had forgotten Sakura literally gave a speech to motivate ninja to do their best protecting him while she healed him, so that was nice to see.

The Hokage show up. People are hyped. Minato asks Naruto if that’s his girlfriend, to which Naruto says yes like the goofy fool he is. Sakura still hits him for it, but blushes. Minato clearly sees a lot of Kushina in Sakura, but says vocally, instead of in his head. Naruto thinks about his conversation with his mom. Sakura just tries to stay focus.

Tiny Rant-I can’t wrap my head around why this scene actually exists. This happens after Neji’s death, a cornerstone event that pushes NaruHina greatly. Why would Kishimoto almost immediately swing back in the exact opposite direction! It paints the picture that while Naruto is extremely grateful for Hinata’s actions, Sakura is still the only girl he is interested in! Neji died for NaruHina like five minutes ago!

Saskue shows up like a cool guy. We get the moment of Naruto telling Sakura to stay back after he’s fully healed; to which Sakura tells both of them how that’s not gonna happen. Team 7 is back! Another moment I don’t have to change because the show flat out shows how happy Sakura is to be standing next to the two most important men her life. She’s by their side and fighting, they don’t feel out of reach. Sakura has her team back for once and is protecting everyone thanks to Tsunade’s training. Finally, things feet right. Until they don’t.

The battle progresses naturally. Eventually the Kagoshima show up, Obito becomes a Jinjuriki, Madara is being terrible, etc. Things are spiraling out of hand pretty quickly but everyone keeps pushing as hard as they can. Then the worst happens, the crazy scenario Sakura didn’t think was possible has suddenly became reality. She feels both Naruto and Saskue’s chakra fade away, they’re down. Madara has taken both of them down. However, now isn’t time to despair on that fact. Every second matters. Two people, fatally injured, only enough time save one. The one she promised to protect to protect, or the one she desired to come back home. Time feels like it’s come to a stand still. Sakura didn’t want to imagine a world without either of them, then it hits her instantly. Sakura has been living in a world without Saskue for years now, but Naruto, the agony of a world without him gives her an immense sorrow in her heart she refused to ever feel again. It was the same sorrow she felt when Saskue left that night years ago. The sorrow of the one you love leaving you. Sakura realizes that she does in fact love Naruto, and she isn’t about to let it fade. She will keep her promise. Sakura rushes to go save him, fearing she’s wasted enough time as it is. In actually, Sakura had made that decision in less than second. She had been running his way the moment his chakra stopped.

With the help of Gaara and Minato, Sakura is managed to save Naruto. Minato has been watching the worry the girl tried to hide and stared again how much she was like Kushina. He then thanks her for looking after his son. Sakura corrects him, giving Minato thanks for bringing someone who cares so much about her and support her into this world, despite the many slip ups and pain she has inflicted on Naruto. Minato tells her that he didn’t have to be around long to know his son must feel same sentiment towards her, if not greater. They get informed that Saskue has been recovered and receiving medical aid. Sakura feels a weight lift from her shoulders. Both of them, she still in a world with both of them.

[More craziness happens! Night Guy!!!!!! All the hype stuff!]

Naruto and Saskue are back in action! Naruto save Guy, then he gives Kakashi an eye. Everyone is impressed, but not as impressed as the moment he senses that Neji isn’t dead yet and heals him to the point he’ll live; Neji is still completely out of commission though, but it’ll be quite the surprise for Hinata, her father, and Team Guy.

More of the same stuff happens all the way up and through Kaguya. Sakura gets a little bit of emotional whiplash by Saskues actions. One minute he’s looking out for himself, the next he’s actually saves her from a threat. It’s a very confusing couple of minutes. It’s welcomed though, it’s like old times. Things just might get back to some since of it in Sakura’s eyes.

[He is so rude! Still love him though.]

Now we’re gonna skip to after Kaguya is beaten. Team 7 has saved the world. Now they just have to release the people, except Saskue is still on his nonsense. Naruto confronts Saskue about his plan to kill the Kage. Sakura could feel her heart sink. They were going to fight again. If that happened then Naruto’s prediction might come true, they would die. Naruto would die. Sakura couldn’t stand still and ran in between the two unexpectedly. Sakura pleaded to Saskue to just stop for once in his life. That if he ever cared about her and Naruto in any form, then the fighting would stop here; reminding him of what Naruto said about dying. Saskue takes a step closer and Sakura’s tearfully eyes hardened. This wasn’t going to be like last time. Sakura wasn’t going to hesitate to use force and Saskue could tell. “You really are annoying.” He says before activating a genjutsu, but it doesn’t work on her. This was it, the exact thing her training with Kakashi and by herself had been about. Constant days of intense chakra control and being trapped in various visual genjutsu that Sakura had to learn resist/breakout of. Saskue had made his answer clear, but Sakura refused to let him dismiss her like that and charged at him. She knew she was outmatched. She knew that there was only so much she could actually do against him, but that wasn’t going to stop her from trying. Sakura was going to stand up properly to Saskue and give everything she had to prevent an unavoidable fight. The fire in her was immense, but the fight was over in no time, ending with Saskue knocking her out from behind like when he first left her behind. Naruto was pissed and Kakashi rushed to her. All that effort and pleading from someone who wanted nothing more than to be by her comrades, tossed to the side like a leaf in the wind. The final confrontation had begun. Naruto vs Saskue.

[One exceptional fight 10/10 fight later]

Sakura has woken up and is racing to the Final Valley in absolute terror, along with Kakashi behind her. He didn’t show it but he was fearing the worst as well. He could see tears fly off of Sakura as she took off. Her mind was flooding and rejecting thoughts all at once the whole way there. All she wanted was the reality of the outcome. Whatever it was, she’d have to face it. What she faced was a miracle. The ability to save both of her friends who were definitely battered and broken, but alive. The fighting was finally over. Saskue apologized to her, noticing just how angry she stil was through her tearfully relieved expression. Sakura told him to shut up. The emotional rollercoaster she was dealing with was crazy enough as it is.

Fast forward to Team 7 at the Hidden Leaf Gate to see Saskue leave. Instead of Sakura asking to join, she walks up to him with confidence, giving both a playful and serious attitude. She holds her fist out and taps his chest. “Get into trouble and I’ll stand in your way again to knock the sense back into you.” Naruto’s jaw drops hearing that. Saskue smile then flicks her forehead. “Still annoying, thank you.” Sakura can’t help but smile back. Naruto gives Saskue his old headband and then the man sets off.

Naruto lets out a huge sigh as he walks back into the village with Sakura. He feels exhausted from the whole legal experience but there was more things to be done, but first, he was starving. He started waving goodbye to Sakura until she asks to go too, offering to pay. Naruto was shocked. His ears had to be playing tricks. He turned back around to see Sakura not directly looking at his face but she clearly talking to him. He could tell her face was a little pink too. “You know, like a date...” Sakura said, walking past him. Naruto stood motionless for a couple of seconds before catching up with her. “How about we go halfies?” Naruto asked. He had asked this same question when he asked her on a ramen date so long ago. Sakura remembers this and can’t help but giggle. The fact that she had rejected such a gesture before was embarrassing to say the least, now it was too her benefit and it was still dumb. The more things change, the more they stay the same. “It’s a date.”

The the tail end of the show where time skips gives us how they continued to grow closer and do these little dates until the moment Sakura tells Naruto that she loves him one moonlit night by the training field or academy swing. This time those words are real, and Naruto gets emotional because he finally gets to say those words back, their promises fulfilled. The final episode is their marriage. The start of their new and strongest promise to each other.

There, I’m done. In summary, what if Sakura stopped liking a person because they tried killing her and everyone she cared about. You know, sane people stuff. She’s a smart girl with critical thinking skills and able to blossom in many areas in her life, and yet the series didn’t let her fully exlpore or evolve it in the one area that arguably mattered the most. How her relationships with Naruto and Saskue. They left it one note even though many scenes and articles point into the direction of her affection towards Naruto was growing. They even paralleled her with Kushina. It’s so weird to lay all that ground if that isn’t the route. Those moments of romantic growth could’ve gone to Hinata, the one with nearly zero interaction throughout the series. I can only think of four scenes, two of them being in part 1 of Naruto. It’s weird.

Side note:If anyone is having a hard time believing Sakura could learn a way to resist genjutsu, Deidara did it with one of his eyes to deal with Itachi, and also didn’t fall of Saskue’s. You can not convince me Sakura wouldn’t learn a way, someone with far more control and an affinity for that kind of thing. Especially with the help of Kakashi. Also it’s just very thematic that the two people Saskue wanted to push away the most, could see right through him and render one of his major things useless.

[blackhakumen]

Mini Fanfic #852: Date Night at Home (Kingdom Hearts)

7:34 p.m. at Seasalt Family's Apartment.......

Lea: (Sitting On The Dining Room With Isa Table While Wearing a Black Turtle Neck Sleeve Shirt, Dress Pants, and a Ponytail and Giving him a Seductive Smirk) Gotta say, Isa: You look rather presentable in this time of evening~

Isa: I wouldn't exactly say a button shirt and dress jeans is anything to write home about really. (Smiles a Little) If anything, I'd say you look more presentable than I do right now.

Lea: (Smiles Brightly at his Boyfriend) Appreciate the compliment, man. I was gonna you to that Bistrot restaurant for the rest of the night, till I found out that all of the seats were taken in the last minute. So I hope you don't mind having our date here.

Isa: I don't mind it at all. Though, we could've went to the Bar for our date night instead.

Lea: (Starts Rubbing the Back of his Head Back and Forth) Yeah....But I didn't want the place to remind you too much of work. 'Specially some the customers that kept irritating you and Barrett.

Isa: (Thought About What Lea Said Before Nodding in Understanding) Fair point. I wonder what we're going to be eating this evening......(Turns to Lea) Do you have any suggestions?

Lea: Well.....

'Door Open'

Roxas: (Walks Inside the Apartment While Carrying Two Boxes of Pizzas and a Bag on Top of Them) Your meals have arrived, gentlemen!

Xion: (Follows Behind Roxas While Holding a Bottle of Soda) Along with Grape Sodaaa!~ (Closes the Door Behind Her)

Isa: (Gives Lea a Deadpinned Look on his Face) We're having pizza for dinner?

Lea: Yep. From Tony's. Heard they have the best pizzas in town......Annnnnnd the most expensive one of the bunch.

Roxas: (Places One Pizza Box on the Dining Table) Yeah. No kidding. Did you know they sell peppermint candies for six dollars a piece?

Lea: (Eyes Widened in Complete Shock) Six dollars!?

Isa: That....seems like an awfully high price for a piece of mint candy.

Xion: ('Sigh') That's what we were thinking.... (Starts Taking the Lid Off of the Soda While Pouring Some into Lea and Isa's Wine Glasses) But I guessing that's mostly because the place is also a restaurant as well.

Isa: I see.....Well, if that's the case, I think it will be best that we don't order their pizza for a while.

Lea: Agreed. I rather not pay a crap ton of money for a pizza like that again honestly.....

Roxas/Xion: (Nodded in Agreement) 'Kay.

Xion: (Smiles Brightly at the Couple) In the meantime, we hope you boys enjoy your little date night together~ (Makes Her Way to the Living Room While Carrying the Other Pizza Box in her Hand) We'll be in the living room if you need us!~

Roxas: (Follows Xion to the Living Room While Pointing at the Couple) Don't do anything I wouldn't do in there!

Lea: We'll try!

Isa: I'll make sure Lea behaves himself!

Lea: (Glares at Isa) Seriously?

Isa: Seriously. Now let's starting eating before our pizza gets more cold.

Lea: ('Sigh') Fine. (Opens their Box of Pizza and Takes a Slice Out of There) So how's work been treating you as of late? (Takes a Bite of the Slice Pizza)

Isa: (Takes Another Slice Out of the Box as Well) It's been decent for the most part. Not a lot of customers giving us trouble as of late. So I'm thankful for that. (Takes a Sip of his Grape Soda) Also, Tifa has a recent haircut as of late?

Lea: ('Gulps') Really? What's it look like?

Isa: (Takes Out his Phone, Search For the Picture of Tifa's New Cut and Shows it to Lea)

Lea: Huh. Not gonna lie: The short hair actually looks good on her.

Isa: I agree. It represents her growth as a person fairly well. (Puts his Phone Back in his Pocket) It kind of reminds me of Aqua's usual hairstyle in a way. Speaking of which.....(Takes a Bite of his Slice Pizza Before Using a Napkin to Wipe a Few Crumbs Off his Lips) How's your daily keyblade training has been going for you as of late?

Lea: (Shrugs) It's going alright. We did a crap ton of push-ups today...(Takes Another Bite of his Pizza) Which kind of sucks by the way.

Isa: Is that so? How much did you do?

Lea: Twenty and a half. I did all of mines while Aqua sat on my back the whole time. (Takes a Sip of his Grape Soda) She's says it was supposed to improve my endurance and strength or whatever. Meanwhile, Terra was able to do fifty of them in a freaking handstand! It was crazy!

Isa: Can't say I'm too surprised by the outcome. Terra is a lot stronger than people have him credit for. He's also a worthy sparring partner.

Lea: I can tell. You guys are completely jacked. I always wondered how you managed to get like that.

Isa: Trial and Error. Mostly Trials....The stressful ones.

Lea: ('Sigh') Yeah.....The Whole Organization XIII experience was a wide ride for us, wasn't it?

Isa: It has. But at the very least, we left that past behind us and live a better life for ourselves and the kids.

Lea: (Nodded in Agreement) I know that's right.

'A Bit of Silence'

Lea: Hey, Isa?

Isa: Yeah?

Lea: Have I ever told you I love you as of late?

Isa: Sometimes. But I do acknowledge those words from time to time.

Lea: Cool. Cause....(Smiles Softly) I really do love you, man.

Isa: I love you too, Lea. (Smiles Back at Lea) A lot more than you realize.

The couple stare at each other for a brief before reaching out to one another for a kiss, until.....

Roxas: (From the Living Room) DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!

Xion: CHILDREN ARE STILL PRESENT!!~

Lea: ('Groans in a Bit Annoyance') Kids.... Always have to find a way to ruin the moment.

Isa: To be fair, Roxas did kind of warned us not to try anything in here.

Lea: ('Sigh') True..... Doesn't make it any less annoying though.

Isa: Fair point.....You wanna watch TV with them in the living room?

Lea: Yeah, man.

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