#man i relate to him so bad

[glitchdecay]

Natsuki Is So Much More Than His Ditzy Behavior: Part 2

In June of Natsuki's route in Repeat LOVE, Natsuki explains why he applied to the idol program at Saotome Gakuen despite being lauded as a genius violinist — and later violist — in his childhood.

The dialogue text is pretty long, so it'll go under the cut.

Note: I transcribed the Japanese manually from the Switch port, but I'm only human. All translations are my own.

―Japanese―

【来栖　翔】:「おかえり〜。じゃねぇよ、この天然スケコマシ！まったく、お前は昔から……」 【来栖　翔】:「あ…………。悪い……昔のことは、あんまり言わない方がよかったか……」 昔？ 【四ノ宮那月】:「ん？……昔って？」 【来栖　翔】:「だから……ほら、あれだよ、小学校ん時のさ……ヴァイオリンのコンクール、控え室……一緒だったろ、俺と……」 【来栖　翔】:「お前、ぼけっとしてて、自分の出番も忘れてて、でも、ステージに立ったら、女子にキャーキャー言われてさ……」 【来栖　翔】:「それから……その……。すごかった……。俺なんか絶対勝てないかっこいい演奏だった……」 【四ノ宮那月】:「んーーーーー？おかしいですねぇ。記憶にありません。確かにヴァイオリンもやっていましたが」 【四ノ宮那月】:「翔ちゃんと出会っていたら絶対覚えていると思うのに……。うーーん」 【来栖　翔】:「てんめぇ、俺なんか、眼中にねぇってことかよっ」 【四ノ宮那月】:「そ、そうじゃなくて……ごめん。あの頃の記憶ってすごく曖昧で……。だから……、自分でもよくわからなくて」 【来栖　翔】:「お前がヴァイオリンやめて、ヴィオラをやり始めたって聞いた時もショックだったけど……」 【来栖　翔】:「でも、お前のヴィオラを聴いて、悔しいけど、感動した。だから、それでもいいかって思った」 【来栖　翔】:「それなのに……。なんで……。なんでそれすらやめちゃったんだよ」 【四ノ宮那月】:「それは……。それは……僕が弱いから……」 【来栖　翔】:「え…………？」 【四ノ宮那月】:「ヴィオラはとても奥深くて……。どれだけ頑張っても自分で納得のいく音は出せなくて」 【四ノ宮那月】:「でも……みんなは僕の中途半端な音を褒めてくれて。それで十分だって……」 【四ノ宮那月】:「僕がどんなに違うって言っても、誰もわかってくれなくて……。誰も僕のしたい音を教えてはくれなかった」 【四ノ宮那月】:「答えのない道をただひたすらに進むのかとそう……思ったら、すごく怖くなったんだ。その道は果てしなく長くて、遠い……」 【来栖　翔】:「……那月……」 【四ノ宮那月】:「ホントいうとね。今も怖いんだ。アイドルが歌うのを見て、すごく楽しそうで、僕もあんな風に音を楽しめたらって」 【四ノ宮那月】:「そう思って、この学校を受験したんだ。でも……。歌にも正解なんかない。自分で作っていくしかないってって気がついた」 【四ノ宮那月】:「でも……。でもね……。今、僕はひとりじゃないから」 【四ノ宮那月】:「あなたが……。そして翔ちゃんがいてくれる。誰かがそばにいて、一緒に悩んでくれる」 【四ノ宮那月】:「それがすごく嬉しくて。頑張ろうって……。頑張れるって思ったんだ。今度は答えを見つけられそうな気がするから」

―English―

Kurusu Syo: Don't "I'm back~" me, you airheaded Casanova! Jeez, you've always been like this. Syo: Ah...... Sorry. Maybe I shouldn't talk about the past. The past? Shinomiya Natsuki: Hm? The past? Syo: Like... You know, back when... we were in elementary school... At a violin competition. We were... in the same waiting room, you and me. Syo: You were spacing out and forgot your turn. But when you got on the stage, all the girls were screaming for you. Syo: And then... You... You were amazing. I thought I'd never win against your performance. Natsuki: Hmmmmmmm? That's weird. I don't remember. It's true I used to play the violin, though. Natsuki: But I'd totally remember if I met you back then. Bummer. Syo: So you didn't even pay attention to me, huh? Natsuki: That's— not what I meant... Sorry. My memories from back then were a blur... So... I don't really know myself. Syo: It was a shock to me when I found out you quit playing the violin and started playing the viola... Syo: But when I heard your viola, even though it was frustrating, I felt so moved by it. So I wondered if you were okay with that. Syo: But even then... Why... Why did you quit that too? Natsuki: That's... Because I'm weak... Syo: Huh......? Natsuki: There's so much to the viola... No matter how hard I worked, I couldn't play the way I wanted to. Natsuki: But... everyone praised my half-hearted playing. They said it was enough... Natsuki: No matter how much I said that wasn't it, no one understood me. No one could teach me how to play the way I wanted. Natsuki: When I... thought about continuing to devote myself to a path without a destination, I felt so scared. The path seems so long and endless... So far away... Syo: ... Natsuki... Natsuki: To tell the truth, I'm scared even now. When I saw idols singing and looking like they were having so much fun, I thought I could be like that too. Natsuki: That's what I thought, so I applied to this school. But... there's no right answer in this kind of music either. I've realized that I have to make it on my own. Natsuki: But... You know... I'm not alone anymore. Natsuki: 'Cause you're here... And Syo-chan, too. There's someone with me to think things through. Natsuki: It makes me so happy. When you say, "Let's do it together," I feel I can do it. Because this time, I can find the solution.

From the conversation, you can see kid!Natsuki felt lonely as a genius violinist, so he decided to move to the viola, but it didn't work either. It pained him to keep playing string instruments because things weren't working out for him.

[j-rye]

bun ny bunny bu nny bunny ? @wolfertinger666

[al-luviec]

something simple to try to get out of art block (it didn't work)

[hdra77]

!!EYESTRAIN TW!!

'OH I CAN'T SAY NO, I'M LOSING CONTROL..'

ok this is old but ive been wanting to share this bc why nott :grin: <-completely forgets the emoji wont automatically appear like discord does Fool's reverence AU made with my bestie @strandedaylily !! doomed iterators !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! also not me wanting to make a pmv out of this like you've no idea even though i have another one that i havent EVEN TOUCHED FOR MONTHS also the song is new invention by IDKHBTFM

[hualianschild]

oh my xianle trio <//3

[dollypopup]

Forgive the rant, but it's been weighing heavy on my heart. So much of the speculation of the Lady Whistledown reveal is the nail biting of 'Oh, I hope it's not too bad for Pen!' or justifying how her actions as LW actually weren't that bad in hopes to minimize the fallout

But there seems to be so little care to the fact that Penelope hiding it from him is going to break Colin's heart.

He is so elated to be with Penelope because he feels like this is the one person he can truly unmask with, that he can reveal all his cards to, and be accepted, and he is going to realize that is a one sided feeling in his relationship. Not only did Penelope feel she couldn't unmask in the past, but she feels she cannot do so even after their engagement. Even after he has reassured her of how much he cares for her and how much he trusts her.

I know everyone wants to skip over the angst of it and get to the 'oh look, they're so happy in love!' but y'all

Penelope is going to hurt him. He put his heart in her hands and she's going to crush it. He's going to have to look in the eye the fact that she didn't trust him enough to inform him of this very large part of her life, and he's going to understand that she kept it from him purposefully. Yes, she has her reasons, but like. . .that's painful. It's a slap in the face. Is it fully understandable her not telling him right after he asks? Or before? Of course! A lot happened! She had the most intimate experience of her life in the back of that carriage, and she'd gone through a lot of ups and downs that night, but after that excitement simmered and she had a chance to breathe, she should have told him.

But she doesn't.

Worse, she decides he simply doesn't have to know.

The fact that Eloise has to put an ultimatum on it at all is proof of that. Colin is falling in love with half of Penelope, and she's making it so that he does so on purpose. She is actively hiding half of herself from his eyes, and regardless of reason, when one party of the relationship is open and vulnerable, and the other is secretive, the secretive party is doing their partner a disservice.

Right now the person who has poured the work into the relationship is Colin. He has confessed his feelings first, he made all the big moves, he openly declared his interest in her, he proposed, he proved to her that he finds her desirable, he has hit every single love language in the BOOK. He's said repeatedly how wonderful she is, he's given her an engagement ring, bought them a house, he's chased down her carriage, he asked for those lessons to spend more time with her, he's had physical touch aplenty.

But I feel like so much of us as an audience are riding on the fact that we know Penelope has pined for Colin for a long time, and not understanding that Colin does not know that. And even if he does, she has not shown him that she loves him.

And I need to see Penelope pour into him an equitable amount as he's poured into her. They're both two people who embody 'I want to be so full of love, I forget what it's like to be hungry', and we forget that both of them have been denied affection. This fandom sympathizes the most with Penelope to the point where we don't want to see that Colin has also been pushed to the wayside. This man is starving for love and romance. Not just to love, but also to be loved.

People forget that Colin has been denied affection from his family, from his sexual experiences, even from Penelope. She didn't write back to him the same way his siblings didn't. Colin has been disparaged in his household, too. He's been made to feel like a burden, like he has no right to family funds, hell, he was all but called a pathetic virgin in Season 1 by his own brother, the head of his household, and his mum and Daphne and Anthony all assumed that he needed his messes cleaned up for him and he says aloud no one takes him seriously.

I want to see Colin be loved. I need to see it.

It's not a scorecard, I get that, but if you look at it objectively, Colin has done so much in his relationship with Pen, and she's lying to him. She's keeping from him a secret that reinforces what others have said of him: that he's gullible, naive, too trusting, someone that needs his muck ups solved for him, just a foolish boy caught up in his fantasies. And when the truth of Penelope's deception comes out, and he's going to question if all those people were right all along, and questioning his trust in himself (because, mind, this is the second woman who has said she loves him and has been keeping a huge secret from him, if that happened to me, I'd be closing my heart off for a very long time), he's going to need her to mend the wound that she'll pry open.

Colin said a hurtful thing about Penelope in Season 2, and then spent Part 1 of Season 3 soothing the pain that caused her. Now, Penelope is doing a hurtful thing to Colin, and she will have to heal that hurt, too. He is a tender, soft-hearted person who trusts her completely, and is falling arse over elbow for her, only to then get tripped up on her own web of wires and do a barrel roll in the dirt. And I know they'll choose each other, I know.

But after she helps him up, I need to see Penelope romance Mr. Bridgerton, assuredly, fervently, loudly.

Because he deserves to be.

[tacagen]

one of the things that fascinate me about thawne: yes, he CAN be normal with kids! surprisingly normal!

((not at all times, though. his mental illness still spills through and as usual he, in trying to manipulate or hurt others, spits out at them the exact stuff that would hurt him (or have in his childhood/barry's rejection interpretation) the most in the first place lmao))

but at the same time. his like second instinct when doing his bullshit is FUCK THEM (as) KIDS

(and, well. whatever this classifies as)

[what-is-it-to-be-pk-esque]

Ok I know I'm heavily biased here but like I kinda love that Astarion's romance is one of the few in this type of video game where you basically end up canonically unmarried and childfree in his "good" ending? Just travelling the world??

Like it's honestly the millennial dream lmfaoo cannot believe i chose what would undoubtedly be my favorite option, first try

[jazzically]

the library is an archivist's grocery store. imagine jon gets hungry but he cant go around eating people's experiences anymore so he starts devouring memoirs instead and becomes the world's leading expert on every autobiography ever written

[triglycercule]

idea. since askdusttale answered an ask about where dust got his determination from (because dust has SOME determination just so he can remember the timelines and keep going against the human) and said it was totally up to personal interpretation on how he got his determination. so so so like what if what if dusttale's player did something similar to something new's player and changed dust's code to give him determination??? so dust and killer COULD BOTH had their codes tampered with??? the parallels would be INSANE. they both started off as sans and got their codes tampered with by the player but dust and killer went on two opposite paths. dust out of his own voalition decided to go against the human but killer had to team up with the human no choice at all. the opposite parallels go CRAZY oh god im tweaking

killer doesn't know exactly (since i forgot whether or not he can see codes or something like that. i swear there was an image of him describing fell and swap's code and then his own) but he can SENSE that something's off. something's different about dust that he doesn't quite know about. maybe it gets him to ask a bunch of questions that dust is definitely not open to answering because jesus man mind your own damn business but the question that really sets killer off is the way dust answers when he asks "so if you have determination then how did you get it?" and dust just shrugs his shoulders and said that one day he suddenly remembered the resets and then that's when he got it (and then goes back to mumbling to phantom paps or wtvr) and killer's just like. zomg. a sudden change in behavior or mentality that seemingly has no apparent reason related to the human???? like like like when he suddenly had to agree with the player despite literally never wanting to????? killer is over thinking the implications behind this

meanwhile dust is just annoyed now because killer keeps on following him. he keeps asking him strange questions. wtf why is the guy asking to see his SOUL that's incredibly personal???? he just wants to be left alone man he has no idea what's going on

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

What’s up with the ties between Sally & Eddie?

There are quite a few - to the point where I’m starting to suspect that they may be foils, or at least inherently tied together in the story.

First let's bring things back to the clocks. The “day” side has an obvious resemblance to Sally, like how the “night” side resembles Eddie. There’s not really much I can say here since we don’t know much more yet, and who knows if this has changed behind the scenes. But just think about that, the rarity of the color purple, night vs day, and the “monster”. Keep it in your head, I think it may be important. 

Also the fact that Eddie is the only one with a watch, but Sally’s face has an incredibly similar face on her door.

Obviously Sally has some sort of beef with Eddie, despite him being nothing but friendly and (to our knowledge) being undeserving of it. One thought I entertained was “maybe Sally is dismissive of him because he’s a worker,” but that holds zero water when you consider how perfectly friendly Sally was with Howdy (karen Sally debunked <3). The second thought I had was “maybe Sally senses the queer in Eddie and it intimidates her” - which would make sense if Sally is a lesbian like I suspect. Internalized homophobia, anyone? This holds up if Eddie is going to turn out to be - not open about himself, but comfortable in his skin in a way that, say, Frank isn’t. Which I have a feeling that will be the case, which would likely make Sally put on airs even more so than usual. 

Anyone else seeing a continuous trend of (social) masks and performances unfolding in the Neighborhood? I sure am.

But let’s talk about why I think they might be foils. They balance each other out in an interesting way, despite their only solid similarity being that Both will work/perform no matter the weather. They have a lot of closely related differences:

Eddie has been mentioned (and implied within the story so far) to have a deeper well of knowledge than he lets on, but acts humble about it. Sally has been mentioned (and implied) to know less than she portrays, but acts like a bit of a know-it-all - she pretends to know things that she doesn’t. 

Eddie’s role is about helping others at his own expense, while Sally’s is using others to reach fame. 

Eddie strives to connect with his Neighbors and is all about accuracy/precision. Sally is in her own little world and has proved to be more than willing to improvise / not think things through before acting.

Eddie is slow to anger, and Sally is easily irritated. 

Selfless vs Selfish.

Night vs Day. 

And to put them in the Johari Window - i believe that Sally resides in the Blind Spot (known to others, not known to self), and Eddie resides in either the Facade (not known to others, known to self) OR the Unknown (not known to others, not known to self). Personally I’m starting to believe that Eddie may reside in both. 

It’s far too early to draw any real conclusions, and theorizing on all of this is difficult. I feel as though - as usual - we have puzzle pieces but no frame of reference for the way they fit together, what picture they build. And who knows, tomorrow’s update may shred this to ribbons, but I doubt it. 

One thought I had was that they’re in cahoots about something - it doesn’t have to be something malicious or some sort of secret plot, it could simply be something they both know and are trying to keep quiet about. Eddie is trying to connect with Sally since they have this in common, but Sally is actively putting distance between them to preserve their secret / plausible deniability. Do I actually believe this? Meh. I’m just throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks.

So current base thoughts: Sally is dismissive of Eddie either because he intimidates/scares her on an internalized level, or she’s actively trying to put distance between them for a currently unknown reason. There’s probably a secret third option I haven’t even considered!

[allegoryofthebeast]

Never not thinking about how Louis understood Lestat well enough as a human to know how to break his hypnotism on Paul and his unthinking bravery bearing the intensity of a monster as a human in a room full of humans but then also he’s like sorry… he’s some sort of French magician pay it no mind I don’t

[artem1sc0re]

If I had a nickel for everytime I redrew this scene, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice, right?

BUT WHATEVERRR, ITS JOSH!!!!

(I got given a compliment whilst drawing the first one so that’s cool :D)

[parlerenfleurs]

Starting to think, going by the MXTX fandoms, that a lot of people are comfortable with being a bit terrible and not thriving for an ideal whatsoever, because they really really reeaaally want to believe Xue Yang and Jiang Cheng are poor cuties who weren't lucky and the heroes are a bunch of holier-than-thou arrogant bitches who need to be taken down a peg when the text says the opposite, because then it justifies their own faults and hatred of genuinely awesome people who seem to have it better in life and isn't that sooo unfair and isn't it fair that they should suffer to learn what it's like to suffer like them, poor tortured, petty, flawed humans who see themselves in the villains rather than the heroes.

[itspileofgoodthings]

one time my mom was talking about something, I don’t remember what, and she said “have you ever known the poverty of having nothing to say?” and when I say nothing has ever punctured my heart quite like that statement

[alxastrx]

When you're one of the most selfish mc who only saves people because it's part of a job you never wanted and did not get to chose or you would've died, who took your co-workers' morals and ideals because you didn't have any and desperately wanted to fit in somewhere, be it with the heroes or the villains, who's activelly haunted by one the most tragic past to have been created and suffer from a psychosis so bad (dare I say schizophrenia) that even your enemies acknowledged that you are mentally ill and objectively flawed in your judgement, never hesitated to try to kill anyone and has the most egoistic reason to be a good person but the fandom still thinks you're just a kind crybaby "I don't know what a gun is" homosexual twink.