#may/haruka

[thecmaly]

sakura protection squad, assemble!!! 😡

[officialmiintee]

wind breaker / your eye— it’s beautiful. It’s the color of twilight

[nerdinsandals]

A May from earlier this year that I drew to encourage people to support real artists instead of impersonators and thieves on Twitter.

Now seems to be a good time to post a textless version of her everywhere else. ✨💖

[Original post with text version]

[otakuman-san]

RS 22nd Anniversary and ORAS 10th Anniversary~

[raamitsu]

Boy is suffering from witnessing affectionate people in public lmfao

[lachatalovematcha]

🎀⭐🌈⋆.˚(*≧∀≦)ﾊ歌おう仲間よ🌈🍮🎀はメッセージ☆.:*・ みんなで歌おうよ どんな心も一つになれる きっと☆.:*・☀️🌈🍎(๑╹ω╹๑)/ ☆ ₊˚⊹☘️🌈⭐ＦＲＩＥＮＤ 笑顔で☘️🌈⭐暖かい気持ちになれるよ 🎈⭐️🌈愛のうた🌈🍦⭐️🎀(◡ ω ◡⁠)⭐🍅🥕

[101suouexpressions]

[Theory] Umemiya was going to train Sugushita to become the next leader

While making this post, I was hard stuck at a question: If Sakura didn't come to Fuurin, who would Umemiya foster to take his place? And finally, with the release of chapter 146, I've come up with an answer:

It could have been Sugishita.

Chapter 146

Most readers only see Sugishita as "very strong" and an "Umemiya fanatic", therefore he (on the outside) disliked Sakura because Sakura had announced that he wanted to become the leader of Boufuurin. 

What makes Ch.146 so special? Well, let's take a look at this page.

It turns out that Sugishita understands everything Umemiya had been trying to pass on to Sakura!

Unless he's sharp and a quite mature person, like Suou who could quickly deduce unspoken messages, the best explanation for this surprise information is because he had received the same education.

When you think about it that way, the dots start to connect.

Sugishita's position in Boufuurin

Sugishita had been recognized as a Fuurin student before even entering high school. His reputation had already been firmly established.

On a more personal level, Sugishita was widely known for being a very strong opponent. Umemiya, his direct connection to Fuurin, even knew Sugishita's capability like the back of his hand.

Why was Sugishita not suitable?

Umemiya didn't just drop him, but had been aware of Sugishita's problem for a long time: he was, like Sakura before coming to Fuurin, alone.

Umemiya can treat him like a successor, but his attitude towards Sugishita was more like towards a stray animal/a younger brother than an apprentice.

I think he had already known that Sugishita wasn't the most suitable for the leader position and would be much happier being in a group of friends instead.

What about Sugishita's opinion?

No matter what he said or how he acted, Sugishita had accepted Sakura both as a friend-

-and as a candidate for the leader position, a person whom he could trust.

"But not you!" - this is the most direct ackowledgement ever from Sugishita. Why can everyone give up but not Sakura? Because Sakura is the next Umemiya, the next leader, the person that everybody in Bourfuurin and Makochi will look up to and put their trust in.

His next words, "What did you learn from Umemiya?" really proves whatever I have been rambling about. Sugishita had witnessed Sakura's capbility so he knew, and acknowledged Sakura's role!

Then what comes next?

I can be wrong, of course, after all this is just a little theory I came up with from one scene alone. However, I can make a prediction that in future arcs, Sakura and Co. will encounter an actual candidate for the position of Boufuurin leader. They had met other leaders before (Tomiyama of Shishitouren, Nakamura of Roppo Ichiza, Suzuri of Gravel) but they're all from a different group/gang, so I think this would be an interesting thing to expect.

[oathkeeper-of-tarth]

Sword (master)post

I own and use swords! I also realised I never posted about all of them in one place, hence this very long post with many pictures. Enjoy.

This is a side-sword made by Kvetun Armoury in 2018. It was my first sword and the only one I used for quite a while, including in tournaments, so it's really beat up - but still a beauty.

It's about 106cm long with a rather wide fullered blade and weighs 1300g, which is quite heavy - but most of it is centred around the wrist in the fabulous (and honestly wonderfully protective) complex hilt.

Here's how you hold it for maximum fine movement control and to avoid killing your wrist - one finger above the crossguard, aka fingering the guard. Trust, all the jokes have already been made.

Essentially, during a lot of the movements I typically do with the sword, most of its weight comes to rest on my index finger. You can also see my gloves are worn down from this in a few specific spots, and the grip itself has completely lost its red colouring in places.

You can see what this sword looked like when it was new in this post.

This is the side-sword I got to take the place of the retired one up there: the Malleus Martialis model called Errant - The Flowing Dancer (gotta have a good, fancy name) from 2023. 104cm long, 1200g in weight - heavy, still with that complex hilt, but more sleek and streamlined now.

And... the same fingering.

Finally, a different kind of sword, though related - a rapier (and a pain to photograph).

This one is a Pappenheimer rapier, made by Bellatore in 2022. The model is called Vieira because of the clam theming, and it comes with a matching dagger for the off-hand. Just to demonstrate, this is a shot I took right after I got it in which you can see the really neat "clam" look:

The sword is 112cm long and weighs about 1100g. But because of the length, point of balance, and the amount of time you spend with your arm extended while using it, it feels much, much heavier than the other two. This is part of the reason why you would finger the guard with two fingers.

All of these swords can be used for both cutting and thrusting - but the rapier is much more thrust-oriented than the other two, and its blade is much more bendy. Obviously, though, the balance of this and techniques in general vary wildly depending on which source you draw from.

All of these swords are right-handed models, which is relevant, because all but the rapier are asymmetrical. They also have rounded/spatulated/rolled tips, for extra safety.

To conclude, I climbed on a chair to take a totally aerial shot of all of them (I am very short).

The only other two swords I own (for now) are significantly smaller - as in, a couple cm each. Both are the strongest blades in the world, however so fragile as to shatter when handled by any force other than the delicate touch of a lesbian.

[ianime0]

[watermelonsandal]

Posting this before it’s too late.

[harukapologist]

posting it here bc im cringe uuh i sketched some of my comfort characters playing uno

[thecmaly]

but first, a quick souvenir--

-

more windbreaker comics

[cheesecake801]

Last ones are the yakuza crew at disneyland ! Did you know Akiyama and KH Donald duck share the same VA ? Well now I have a silly hc about Akiyama being a Donald Duck fan alsldkfk

[arget-star]

By Any Other Name

Sakura Haruka x F!Reader

A/N: Alright SO. I know I am primarily a Fire Emblem blog. however, Wind Breaker took over my life in the span of like a week and I could not get this thought out of my head and well. here we are. Not beta read, this is my first xreader fic i've ever posted. i hope you enjoy!

tags: fluff, a tiny bit of blood, feelings

wc: 2k

about: You met Sakura about six months ago, and have essentially wormed your way into his little walled off heart. He comes home to your now (mostly) shared little apartment, battered and bloody after saving a girl who looked like you

You’re not living together.

That’s what Sakura says, despite the fact you stay over four nights out of the week, and somewhere in the six months you’ve been dating, half your stuff has ended up in his ramshackle little apartment. “You deserve better than a leaky faucet”, he’d said, cheeks red and nose scrunched in a scowl. You’d merely laughed, kissing his forehead before replying, “It adds to the charm.” And that was that.

You’re not living together. So why does he hope you’ll be there, curled up on that cheap little couch you’d insisted on bringing over, that lovely smile on your face as you greet him?

Those assholes must’ve hit his head harder than he realized. Sakura grits his teeth, an arm banded around his throbbing torso as he wobbles along the sidewalk. Weaklings, all of them. Acting tough solely because they have nothing better to do with their time. Seriously, it’s just plain pathetic.

He spits out a glob of blood into the nearby bushes. He doesn’t remember biting his cheek; maybe he’d ground his teeth against it after taking a particularly nasty kick while dodging someone else’s punch. Wasn’t he past his body locking up, his muscles moving with all the speed of a turtle?

The girl had been clutching the long strap of her purse with all her meager might while surrounded by leering thugs. The type of guys who coast by on looks rather than action. Intimidation instead of respect. At least now he’s able to articulate—better yet, understand—what pisses him off so badly about guys like that. Sakura would’ve leapt in regardless, but then he caught sight of her underneath the lamplight, and her shade of hair matched yours. The purse even had a keychain dangling from it, the charms jingling in faint alarm.

She wasn’t you, obviously. You were already home, had probably cooked something simple yet delicious and were keeping it warm until he arrived.

So he froze, mismatched eyes wide as a new type of fear unfurled within his chest, and then all hell broke loose. He knew how to protect someone in a fight, finally, and while the poor girl flattened herself against the side of a nearby building as he sent the idiots flying, his attention still kept flicking to her. He kept thinking what he’d do if it was you, and on one such slip of his concentration, that bastard’s boot came out of nowhere.

He’ll have to report this to Umemiya in the morning, and tell you all about it tonight, and—

Sakura looks up. He’s nearly there; the derelict building doesn’t seem so foreboding, especially once he catches sight of the warm yellow light on in his apartment. Maybe, just maybe, things won’t be so bad after all.

The doorknob wiggles. You carefully place your bookmark inside your book,  sitting up properly in your seat. Sakura’s home a bit later than usual—he probably got stuck eating at Café Pothos with everyone else. Good. You’re grateful he has so many friends, even if he acts like a cat who fell into a puddle of water about it.

“Welco—Sakura!” Your book tumbles from your hands in your haste to stand up. He stands in the doorway while you catalogue his injuries as if in slow motion. Blood drips down the left side of his face from a cut above his eyebrow. His nose is bleeding, too, running down his chin and staining his white shirt red. His knuckles are raw. It’s subtle; yet he sways, quickly placing his right hand against the wall to brace himself. The motion is enough to jolt you from your surprise.

You’re at his side in a blink. His reaction is sluggish; lips parting in belated surprise when you loop his right arm around your shoulders. Normally, he reads your movements almost before you make them, bracing himself for whatever contact you’re about to subject him to so he’s never caught off guard. But slowly, like water eroding rock, he’d learned that he can let his guard down around you, even at his most vulnerable.

Especially then.

“‘M fine,” he mutters out of reflex. You only scoff, walking him over to the couch with a small huff of effort. “Just a small fight.”

Carefully, you help ease him down onto the cushions, releasing your hold only once he’s settled. “A small fight?” You echo, disbelief in your tone. There’s no reprimand or ridicule, just a healthy doubt. He doesn’t know exactly when he stopped looking for the irritation he’s so used to hearing. Leaning his head back, he sighs. “Some guys were causin’ trouble. A new gang, I think. Trying to rob a girl—” he cuts off abruptly, and you watch his cheeks turn a brilliant shade of red, nearly blending in with the dried blood caking his skin. Sakura immediately looks away; he misses the knowing glint entering your expression.

Spinning on your heel, you head for the kitchen. The faucet doesn’t leak as badly now, after you’d finagled a temporary fix with determination and a healthy amount of internet research. He deserves more than a crappy sink, even if he won’t admit it. “You were by yourself?” You ask, opening the drawer and removing a towel. (Yet another item that had miraculously wound up in his space one day. When Sakura confronted you, you’d shrugged, then asked what he wanted for dinner.)

Sakura watches you for a moment, ignoring how something deep within his chest settles as you run the towel under cool water. It’s a familiar scene, enough that he no longer feels the urge to yell and raise his fists in defense. “Yeah. Nothin’ I couldn’t handle on my own.”

Strange. Suo-chan and Nirei-chan always shadow Sakura. Unless Sakura is going home—they haven’t invaded his space since the day they’d discovered him sick on the floor. Now, especially, Sakura would rip their heads off if they came snooping around while you were home. The faucet shuts off. You wring out the towel once, twice, then pad back over to the couch.

“I never doubted that, Grade Captain,” you tease, arranging yourself so you’re sitting on your knees. Drops of water drip down your wrist and onto the cushions below. His blush deepens, and you don’t bother hiding your smile. “Now hold still.”

“Shaddup,” he mumbles without heat. Instinct makes him shift back an inch; he’s always taken care of himself, alone. Sick, bruised, bloodied—he proved time and again he didn’t need anyone else. Then you breezed into his life, upending his entire world with your musical laughter and patient touch.

This is far from the first time you’ve patched him up. He no longer hisses and rages and scowls, a teenage version of a toddler’s temper tantrum, yet neither can he completely disregard a lifetime of gut reactions to others extending a hand in his direction.

You never minded when his hackles rose. You understood him, remaining endlessly understanding while he let his fear run its course. The damp rag hovers in the space between you and him. Sakura zeros in on the blue material instead of your face.

“Ready?”

That’s another thing. You ask him about things. Wait for his brain to catch up with non-dangerous situations. It’s weird, and scary, and wonderful.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll be gentle.”

“You always are.”

The smile you give him is radiant. Your free hand cups his less bloody cheek, keeping him steady, while you tenderly press the rag to his chin. He hisses out a breath through clenched teeth.

It’s quiet, as you slowly clean him up, beyond the soft scrap of material against skin. There’s a rhythm to your movements. Sakura finds it soothing, despite the circumstances. You both study each other; Sakura, like you’re a puzzle he’s still trying to solve, and you, like he’s something precious.

His golden eye truly is beautiful. He told you others have compared it to twilight, but you think it’s more akin to burnished gold. Rare, and infinitely treasured. He closes it, keeping it safe from harm as you run the now pink-tinged cloth over his browbone. A shame, you think, he keeps himself so locked away.

The slight pressure leaves his face. You move back, giving him room to breathe, holding the rag loosely in your hand. His eye opens again, a coin glinting in a riverbank.

“There,” you say, unfolding yourself from the couch, brushing your thumb across his cheek before you release him completely. “I’ll be back with the first aid supplies.”

Sakura just nods. He never says the words thank you; but you hear it in the way he lets you take care of him, how he takes your hands so reverently in his once your all finished, cradling you like he’s afraid you’ll snap in half if he squeezes too hard.

You’re opening the cabinet underneath the sink when he speaks again. “She looked like you.”

He says it so quietly, you nearly miss it. You freeze, half-bent down to reach for the ridiculous amounts of bandages and antiseptic bottles stashed neatly in their respective baskets. (Another thing you’d changed one day, much to Sakura’s initial chagrin, until he’d stumbled home covered in half a dozen cuts on the rare day you weren’t waiting for him, and found everything he needed without cursing his lack of organization.)

Mechanically, you grab the necessary materials. You’d assumed as much, based on his reaction when you told you the cause of his current state. A shudder runs down your spine as you imagine what the other guys must look like, lying defeated in the street. Sakura doesn’t fight just on behalf of someone else—at least, that what helps him sleep at night, though you know his tune has changed after all his experiences with Bofurin. For him to fight on your behalf, however tangentially related, makes your heart flutter.

Kotoha will practically jump for joy when you tell her.

For now, you let this newfound knowledge settle into your skin, your fluttering heart, smiling to yourself as you exit the bathroom, arms loaded with supplies. “Did she, now?”

Sakura’s sitting upright, head down, once again avoiding your gaze. His fingernails dig into the fabric of his school pants. Beneath the curtain of two-toned hair, you can see the blush sitting high on his cheeks. It’s a miracle they’re not permanently stained pink.

“Y-yeah. I knew she wasn’t you, but for a moment…I need to teach you how to defend yourself. I can’t patrol everywhere, and I’m not the strongest yet. Anyone from Furin will keep you safe, but if we’re not around—”

This is new. You swallow, setting the first aid supplies down on the tatami, sitting down with your legs crisscrossed. (One day, you’ll convince him to buy a table, but there’s only so much furniture you can squeeze in such a tiny place.)

“Sakura,” you say, but he doesn’t hear you.

“—I need to know you can take care of yourself until I get there—”

“Sakura.”

“—and send them all flyin’—”

“Haruka.”

That shocks him into silence. He inhales, then looks up sharply, lips curling into the angry snarl you know so well. It’s his only defense mechanism, beyond his fists, and he’d never raise those at you. (That thing lodged within his chest stirs again. No one’s called him by his given name in years. It feels right, that here, in this space you two have created together, you should use it.)

He’s quite the sight, half patched-up and spluttering mad. One eye darkens like a storm at sea; the other kindles into molten gold, ready to burn any who get in his way.

You’re surprised, too. But you didn’t know what else to do. He’s never spiraled like this before, and it hits you that for perhaps the first time, he was genuinely scared for someone else. You shake your head, breaking eye contact, and reach for the gauze. “I’m sorry, Sakura. I should have asked before using your first name.”

Your fingers shake only a little when you grab the nearest antiseptic, flipping open the cap with your thumb. He watches it all, struck dumb. He doesn’t want an apology. He wants you to say it again, but he doesn’t know how to ask.

All of the fight leaks out of him. His shoulders slump forward. Haruka. Haruka. You hadn’t said it in disgust, or fear, or hatred. If he had to guess, you sounded concerned. Haruka. “I liked hearin’ you say it,” he replies.

A laugh bubbles out of you, born from nervous relief. You nearly spill antiseptic all over you instead of the gauze. “Really? May I call you Haruka, then? Not all the time…just here.” Rising to your knees, you crawl over to him, taking one battered hand in your soft one.

His throat tightens. An odd pressure builds behind his eyes. “Fine.”

“This’ll sting,” you murmur in warning, almost like an afterthought. “You can use mine, too. If you want.”

Sakura’s about to respond, tell you he’ll do it if it’ll make you happy (and make his own heart beat a little faster), but then the gauze descends onto his split knuckles. It’s not like eating a kick to the face; it barely registers in comparison.

Maybe it’s the emotions he’s kept bottled up since the fight. Maybe it’s the fact you called him Haruka and the world didn’t explode. Both things, he assumes, and that’s why your healing touch hurts worse than a dozen roundhouse kicks.

It fades, after that first bright burst.

Neither of you say anything again while you continue your ministrations. Once his knuckles are taken care of, you move on to his face, tenderly smoothing his bi-colored bangs off his forehead to ensure no strands get caught underneath the small bandage you apply to the cut above his eyebrow.

The entire time, he replays this strange evening over and over again in his head. It all leads back to you, caring for him, using his first name like it’s nothing when it in fact means everything. He hates himself, a little bit, for not being better at this.

For your part, your focus on him turns clinical. You can deal with the emotional part of it later. When you’ve finished with the last bandage, you stare at him a moment. Take in this boy who pushed away the entire world when it wrote him off, the very same boy who harbors no malice in his heart, just kindness hidden by anger.

You press a soft kiss to his lips, then slide away before he can reciprocate. He splutters again, blush back in place, and it’s such a Sak—Haruka thing to do, you bite back a laugh.

“Are you ready to eat, Haruka? You get hungry after a good fight.”

He offers you a rare smile in return.

[solthecontestshipper]

red

he likes the color red, and he likes her

[sporkybolt]

yes these two fueled my rivals-to-lovers obsession since I was 8 yes it’s 2024 and i still think of them