#no one can tell me this looks like it comes from a sports manga

[https-immotmari]

❝ Crush na crush na crush kita! ❞ ─── pjsk boys!

WRITER'S START IN BEING DELULU!

Just from the title, y'all should have a thought of where I come from lmao ＜（＾－＾）＞! Anyways, third request came in and I hope you don't mind the reader's gender being neutral, thank you!~

fandom! .project sekai character(s) used! .akito shinonome, toya aoyagi, tsukasa tenma and rui kamishiro gender of reader! .gn!reader however, implied fem!reader implied in toya's and tsukasa's sections head start! .reader, in both akito's and toya's, is a senior, reader in toya's section is tsukasa's older (by one minute) twin sibling, light angst in toya's section, rui's reader is a foregnier and doesn't understand nor speak japanese very well however, they can understand english

. . .akito shinonome!

❝ Di mo ba nadarama? (Don't you feel?) ❞

what in the H E double hockey sticks is he feeling?!

he doesn't know why his heart goes crazy just the mere sight of you he doesn't know why he suddenly stutters his words when talking to you, he just doesn't understand why his mind wants to see you every day.

well, to everyone, it's no surprised you've captured the hearts of majority of the student population in kamiyama high. you're literally the IT girl/boy/person of kamiyama and you aren't even aware of it.

you're even a great senior! he met you through toya, who was trying to find tsukasa since he wanted to confirm something and they found him talking to you, and he was instantly whipped! though, he denies it.

toya lightly teases him that he acts like a mess when you're around him and akito just barks back with lies, just to save his pride.

"I'm telling the truth, toya. I don't act weird whenever (last name)-san is around." akito denied his best friend's, toya, accusation. him? having a crush on the school's heartthrob? that's stupid. he would never-

"excuse me?" akito suddenly froze on the spot as toya twirled his head only to see you carrying a bunch of test papers. "oh? toya? and uhm.." you squinted your eyes, trying to recall the name of the frozen ginger beside toya, "oh right! akito, right? you're ena's cute little brother, hm?" you tilt your head forward a bit, smiling in his way.

in the end, toya had the last laugh as he watches his best friend being completely different around their senior, "I told you so." as akito clutches his chest, where his heart is at.

just innocently dropping hints to toya that he 'needs' help with a difficult math problem, that's probably a year above them level, and that he needs a reliable and amazing senior to help him.

he ends up having tsukasa and sometimes rui, it's rare having you to 'help' him since you're quite busy as well.

but, that doesn't stop him! he often has toya delivers his little gifts, after a long time convincing toya that it was his older sister's, ena, request to deliver 'her' gifts, to your desk when you're not around, some students may have thought that toya has a crush on you.

his little gifts consist of key chains of (favorite things), sometimes flowers and pins with your favorite series/anime/manga/etc.

how he knew this? he actually got information from one of ena's conversation with you and your post from your social medias, in which he secretly hearts everything on an alternative account.

he turns into a lovesick puppy the moment you walk in, if he were a puppy, his tail would be going crazy all the while his face would be a hot mess.

during the sport event, you were one of the mc's and it made akito's motivation in winning increased TO THE MAX!

he was running faster than ever, even ena was suprised to see her little brother like that, poor tsukasa who was on his back, tsukasa was holding onto akito's shoulders for dear life.

"shinonome-san is running as fast as ever! it seems like he's eager to win, don'tcha think, partner?" the other mc look at you, waiting for your commentary.

you chuckled, smiling as you watch the intense match between your juniors, mizuki and akito. "I couldn't agree more, partner! even poor tenma-san is holding on for dear life~" both you and your partner snickered.

after he won that match, he was congratulated by you over the mic and no one can image the furious blush appearing on his cheeks, like, YOU, out of all people, were to congratulate him first before toya can?????

he was on cloud nine that even toya had a difficult time in getting him back to his senses till they were in their band practice, an hand to shake him back to life.

he denies this for a long time but, on valentine's day, instead of the classic chocolates and flower, he actually got you special and that he's proud of but, never admit it was him.

he got the valentine's day special chocolate pancake with (favorite fruit) on the side from the place where he usually buys his pancakes, he bought it using his hard-earned money. he also made oragami flowers, bouquet of flowers actually, the flowers being all of your favorite kinds. he actually spent a lot of time and dedication on the oragami flowers and learned them from a lot of youtube videos.

of course, he remained anonymously.

out all the gifts you've received that day, his gift stand out the most due to his effort in making it perfect. you gushed about it to your friends and one of them was ena. she had a gut feeling that it was her little brother, akito, but never got confirmation.

he doesn't know why his heart goes crazy just the mere sight of you, he doesn't know why he suddenly stutters his words when talking to you, he just doesn't understand why his mind wants to see you everyday. Don't you feel it?

. . .toya aoyagi!

❝ Crush mo rin kaya ako? (Do you have a crush on me too?) ❞

you're actually tsukasa's older, by one-minute, twin sibling so, he's known you very well.

though, he wasn't able to have a lot of conversation with you back then since you were more focused on your youngest sibling's, saki, health and was always in the hospital, in which he couldn't go, fearing that it upset his father.

despite not often having to chat with you, toya can see you as the loving and caring older tenma sibling, within the three tenma siblings, you're the matured and calm one, one of the reasons why toya and you got along pretty well.

him crushing on you came when you caught him tearing up a bit after an argument he had with his father, he was a little kid at the time, and instead of degrading him for crying, you sat beside him and comforted him, whispering nothing but sweet things to him as he cried in your shoulder. you comforted him like how you comforted tsukasa whenever he has his episode due to him thinking he wasn't a great enough brother for saki.

after comforting him, you gave him a small smile and encouraged him to go after what he loves the most, and at that moment, the thing, or person, he loves the most at the moment, till now, is you. he just doesn't realize it till his unitmates told him he was, in fact, has a crush on you.

he felt the warm and loving aura coming out of you that you always give to your family, especially to your younger siblings. something he had craved from his father ever since he was born and yet he never received.

after that day, this little kid was always following you around like a little duckling, except in the hospital, in which you find it to be amusing and adorable since you've ever known toya to be the quiet yet blunt stoic kid and seeing him following you around whenever him and you are inside your house.

toya, at the time, didn't know why his cheeks felt warm and his heart going slightly faster than before whenever he encounters you. it makes him space out sometimes.

one time, he made a claw machine empty because he wanted to give you plushies like he gives to saki, through tsukasa, as well! you were surprised to see a lot of stuff toys in your room when you got back home from the hospital.

it made your face brighten up and as a thank you, you gave toya one of your beloved books in which you cherished the most so, image the shock expression he had once tsukasa told him that it was one of your cherished books you held dearly, and you gave it to HIM??

upon knowing that fact, the book you gave to him now has its very own section in his bedroom shelf, it even has its own clear protection case to keep the dust away if he's not reading it at the moment.

nobody is allowed to touch the book besides him and you.

now that you two, alongside tsukasa and saki, have grown into teenagers, you two have more screen time with each other now that saki is finally out of the hospital!

since you and tsukasa are the same age, meaning when toya was a freshman in kamiyama, you were a senior at miyamasuzaka, the same all-girls school saki is in.

despite being in different schools, you two interacted a lot! especially when all four of you hangout after school!

his feelings for you were rather obvious, at least to tsukasa and saki, he was so different from his quiet and stoic self.

whenever you're around, he smiles more often all the while talking to you, toya can't help it! you're just a beautiful scenery, it's a crime to not admire you. saki even called him out-

"(n/n) sure does look beautiful, right, toya-kun?" saki innocently teased the blue haired individual, who was admiring her older sibling as they baked a bunch of cookies for the four of them.

toya immediately snapped out of his daydreaming upon being called out, "o-oh.. yes, of course they are." he shyly nodded, feeling his cheeks warming up. saki simply chuckles, knowing damn well that she'll be the matchmaker alongside her older brother.

when vivid bad squad was formed, he immediately rushed to you and told you about it, you smiled at him, he was finally doing what he wanted and not what his father wanted, and you were proud of him.

whenever he's at band practice, he often unconsciously rambles about you to his bandmates, an and akito teases him about it, telling him that they didn't know toya has a crush.

that's when he furrows his brows, crush?

due to his oblivious self, an and akito, mostly an, explained to him that he has a crush on you, and he was like "oh...oh!"

now with this newfound information, he felt even more nervous around you, sometimes stuttering his words as if he's malfunctioning robot.

his heart just goes crazy and with the way you acted around him these couple of years, thanks to an explaining how most women acted when they have a crush on you, he wonders if you also have a crush on him too?

. . .tsukasa tenma!

❝ Cross my heart, P.S. I love you ❞

he met you first in phoenix wonderland, you were a guest invited by one of your friends.

he, alongside his troupe members, was greeting the guests ever-so loudly and cheerfully and when his orange-yellow eyes set on you, his world just stopped right there and then.

your (h/c) was shining, complimenting your sparkling eyes and dazzling sweet smile, he felt his heart was racing, racing fast.

he was so stunned that when you and your friends came up to him and his troupe members, he was fumbling with his words all the while his troupe members cheerfully, mostly emu, greeted you and your friends. tsukasa's eyes were mostly on you, though he did try to act normal and tried to look at your friends as well but, his eyes kept glancing over you.

rui, who noticed this, teased him after you and your friends went away. tsukasa denied it, saying you look 'familiar' to him though, rui didn't seem convinced.

over the time your there, his eyes were trying to find you again, wanting to see if he was daydreaming that time but yet every time he sees you, he malfunctions again.

on the other hand, you caught him spying you from afar and whenever he quickly hides, you find it amusing.

he didn't know why he wanted to find out more about you, though you were a random guest, you can be EVERYWHERE!

but, I guess lady luck blessed him after a couple of weeks, he was in front of saki's school, miyamasuzaka, and while waiting, he saw you again! alongside your friends.

his eyes went wide, and my dude just stood there like 🧍‍♂️

once he and saki were back at home, he immediately bombarded her with a lot of questions about you.

"hey, saki, do you perhaps know somebody in your school with (h/c) hair and (uniform style/details about your uniform)?"

"oh, well there a lot of people with (h/c) hair in my school but, with the way you describe certain details uniform, I think you're referring to (last name)-san!"

that's where he learned about you as he watched saki talking about you gleefully, you were an assistant and close friend to the MORE MORE JUMP! members, no wonder why saki seems happier to talk about you to her older brother.

and no wonder he recognized you, he once saw you in shizuku's social media, in which he follows since they are good acquaintance with each other.

he thought about messaging you since shizuku tagged you in that one post. he wanted to formally apologize for weirding you out on that day.

and that's how you basically meet the blonde weirdo yet cutie from the theme park you visited a few weeks ago again. he firstly messaged you by introducing himself before apologizing for his behavior a couple of weeks ago, you honestly find it amusing and adorable. you two chatted with each other all day, and then the next day, and the next day-

after that, he invited you to hangout after school whenever your free, sometimes he brings along saki and toya, since you two bonded within the private messages you two have been sending each other.

honestly, he hasn't moved on from your first encounter, he still acts like a silly idiot around you. tsukasa doesn't even know why like, you're like everyone else, average yet has a certain charm around you making tsukasa even more invested into you.

whenever he's around you, he feels like very different that has him questioning himself about it. like, why does he feel funny around you but not to others? why does he feel the urge to impress you more with his charms and talents? why does he stutter his words out like a fool whenever it's you? WHY DOES HIS HEART YEARNS FOR YOU?!

I feel like he's seen a various of romance theaters, movies, dramas, etc (thanks to saki) so, he caught up with what's happening to him, it went like this;

"I'm in love..." the blonde muttered, finally knowing the reasons why he's acting differently to a certain someone. he had finally solved the mystery of his strange behavior whenever you're around!

"I'M IN LOVE- HAHHHHHHHHHH?!" tsukasa immediately stops himself upon seeing in the corner of his eyes, his troupe members all can be seen in the doorway, spying on their leader while rui was recording it with his signature smug cat-like smile plastered on his face.

in the end, let's just say rui, maybe emu and nene, got their blackmail for tsukasa.

he was quite shy at first but, he warms up since in his thoughts, he NEEDS to impress his crush, aka you, because the only way your crush is gonna notice you and wants to talk to you is to impress them! (tsukasa's words, not mine)

expects him to be a very, very, VERY gentleman towards you such as carrying your things, bringing you little snacks, escorting you to your house to your school along with saki, and many more that I can't possibly list down.

when he heard you were a fan of phenny-kun, he just has to impress you with his voice imitation of phenny-kun, he just had to. I mean, it IS his job, alongside his troupe members, to make people smile. his day brightens up whenever you enjoy his imitation of phenny-kun! doesn't he love you too much?

he probably made a play dedicated to you and have scenarios where you, the main character, and he as the love interest, he's too busy daydreaming he didn't notice that one of rui's inventions is coming straight to him-

he became a simp, your simp to be exact.

doesn't he love you so much? Cross his heart, he'll love you wholeheartedly that's for sure!

. . .rui kamishiro!

❝ 'Di ko alam ang nangyayari (I don't know what's happening) ❞

he honestly didn't expect himself to be having a crush on somebody, especially when his crush is oblivious foreigner such as yourself.

you were the infamous transfer student he had heard about from the juniors; it was quite obvious due to your appearance alone, so you stick out like a sore thumb. if that wasn't bad enough, you also had a hard time understanding and speaking their language. you usually kept quiet as you feared that you might sound like an idiot when speaking japanese.

so now, picture this, a transfer student from (country) that has a hard time understanding and speaking japanese in a japanese high school, seated next to the well-known troublemaker of kamiyama high, now surely it won't be chaotic? spoilers, it did.

rui honestly finds you amusing, he would chuckle whenever he would ask for something to you, and you would completely give him another thing instead what he asks for.

it was another day in class in this new high school of yours, if the lectures make your head dizzy because it's difficult in understanding the teachers a bit, the purple head boy next to you makes it more difficult.

"psst.. mind letting me borrow your eraser for a moment?" he whispered to you, not wanting to get caught by the teacher. rui watched as you confusedly scanning your desk, trying to understand what he wanted from you.

'okay, he clearly wanted to borrow something... but, what??' you were thinking a bit too hard that the lecture from the teacher is mentally blocked from your head, now focusing on the given task by your seat mate.

"um.. t..t..this?" you tried pronouncing the said word in japanese but, it only sounded broken a bit, all the while showing rui a sharpener.

and that moment, rui kamishiro knew, he'll be going to enjoy this year.

you being shy reminds him a lot about nene but, in your reason, you were afraid of sounding stupid while speaking his country's language. though, he'll give you the benefit of the doubt since you were learning how to speak the language.

he teases you even though you mostly don't understand all he just said, which amused him more while you were determined to learn about the language more to know what rui is saying to you most of the time.

eventually, it was one of your daily routines to have rui tease you every day, even though you don't understand half of it but, hey! you're at least getting better with your japanese.

and with that, rui and your friendship began to develop as time went by, the purplenette introduced his unitmates to you and you were thankful that they introduced themselves in english. p.s rui rambles about you to them.

sometimes rui say english words to help you understand what he or other people are saying. though, if someone was mocking or insulting you, rui wouldn't even try to tell you what they are saying instead, he just guides you away from them by wrapping one of his arms around your shoulder and distracts you, though you had a gut feeling that the person was saying bad stuffs to you, you pick up some of their words and understand soe.

I think rui having a crush will take a long time since he's more on focusing on his inventions and his performances with his unitmates so, catching his attention in you, romantically, it's going to be a long ride. though, if you did, in which is going to happen, congratulations then.

though, he did start to feel whenever your around as the days goes by, and honestly, dude was confused. I feel like he has no grasp of like love and crushes since he's probably more focus on his works and his unit's performances that he doesn't have the time to think about anything else like love.

so yeah, it took him a long time to solve this difficult equation on why he feels weird whenever you are around/mentioned. he doesn't know what's happening to him.

with that, he went to nene and intentionally drop a topic like "what if somebody feels weird whenever somebody's around them, like something's making your heart beats faster?" and nene just look at him with a blank expression of hers, already knowing what's up with her childhood (best) friend however, she won't say it just for fun.

even with his newfound feelings, he acted the same but, once you come closer to his chest area where his heart is at, you'll hear his heartbeat. his teasing is still the same though he increased it to the max, anything for you<3

within school/lunch breaks, he'll teach you japanese words and how you pronounce them while you teach him english/(native language) words and how you pronounce it. though, that doesn't mean he'll stop teasing you just because him and you are teaching each other different languages, from time to time, he says to you compliments in japanese and when you try to pronounce it, his smug cat-like smile widens even more.

but, he'll only get scolded by you after you search about the phrases back at home, he'll do it again and again even if he's going to get scolded by you and he'll probably get the silent treatment by you<3

although jokes asides, he'll calm you down whenever you're feeling really anxious about speaking japanese, especially in front of the class whenever a teacher calls you out for recitation. he's one good listener and advice giver, so any problems you have, please go to him and he'll make it better, especially for you.

fast forward to summer holidays and school was ending, with all the moments and days you've spent with rui, you finally made a decision, something you'll feel embarrassed about but, hey! rui someone that is dear to you. as rui finished packing

up his things and mostly every one of your classmates were outside now, you approach rui very differently unlike the way you've approached him before this.

"rui.." you muttered out, loud enough for the said person to hear and make his head turn towards you.

"hmm, yes?" his eyes went immediately towards you, seeing a letter in your hands, your gaze shyer than ever, and some sort of red tint in your cheeks.

"I.. uhm.. I.." you stuttered out, trying to find the words you wanted to say to him. rui, noticing it, gives you a pat on the head as a sign of encouragement as what he always did to you whenever you feel nervous/anxious.

eventually, you finally did as what you have planned the day before, "I.. just want-ted.. togiveyouthis..!" you quickly finished yourself, saying it all in japanese, while handing the letter to him before quickly rushing out, leaving rui with a dumbfounded with a letter in his hand.

the mad sciencetist, I mean, the purplenette boy stared at the letter the rest of the time as he walks home, wondering what you wrote in this. though once he had opened and read it, he lets out a smile, not his usual smug cat-like smile but, a genuine and gleeful smile.

with his heart beating crazily as he only thought about what you wrote in that letter, his thoughts filled to the brim with you, he honestly doesn't know what's happening right now.

WRITER'S END IN BEING DELULU!

Apologies for the long wait! school just recently started and this january I'm filled to the brim with projects and performance task ＞︿＜!

and also, I had writer's block with rui's section though special thanks to one of my lomls @liqis-postoffice for the ideas &lt;3

rules! + masterlist!

[boinin]

Batten down the hatches: Rin's ego is about to land

The latest chapters show Rin playing with an unfamiliar aura: what looks like swirling rivulets of water.

This represents the refinement of his ego and playstyle since the under-20 match. But what exactly are they going for with the swirling water? Here's my two cents.

Rin is strongly associated with water, specifically the sea. He grew up by the coast; he and Sae shared a love of watching the sunset over the water after training together. Those childhood memories are turbulent now, like dark clouds on the ocean's horizon.

It's here he realises that he can no longer play the puppetmaster football that helped him thrive in Blue Lock. As good as he is, it wasn't authentic... and it's nowhere near where he needs to be to compete with his brother, or even Isagi.

Rin's flow state is the most unique out of any others we've seen. Let's dig into it. All panels are from the official translation, which is important as the translation choices are 1) consistent and 2) likely chosen carefully.

In the dying moments of the match, Rin complains about feeling restrained. Being Itoshi Rin is eating him alive.

Cool, calm and aloof.

A genius. Prodigy. Puppetmaster.

Team player. Team captain.

Isagi Yoichi's partner. Shidou Ryuusei's rival.

Itoshi Sae's little brother.

The prospect of defeat rudely wakes him up. His pretence comes crashing down hard, triggered by his ineffectiveness in spite of the teammates around him. It's one of the best rugpulls in sports manga.

When the power of friendship comes knocking, Itoshi Rin tells it to fuck off and die.

What a glorious moment... and not just because it posits Rin as a Uchiha Sasuke kinnie. I prompt you to examine his eyes in this panel.

They're a swirling vortex of hate and destruction, befitting Blue Lock's angstiest character. The shape reminds me of this:

Satellite images of Hurricane Franklin and Hurricane Idalia, August 2023. Image credit: NOAA Satellites.

Rin's true ego, which he unleashes against Sae, is a storm.

Optional soundtrack for the rest of this post (because Rin 100% listens to this once it comes out in Blue Lock's universe).

Although it isn't portrayed visually as such in the under-20 arc, the metaphor fits Rin's evolving playstyle. What is more destructive, more uncontrollable, more senseless than a hurricane? A violent force of nature that we can predict but never avert?

When a storm approaches, all we can do is rank it, track it, then attempt to mitigate the inevitable damage.

In football terms? Sounds a lot like playing Rin.

It's even alluded to in chapter 250: the graphics for Rin's formation are similar to the satellite images of large storms.

Within the U20 match, there are exchanges that support this theory. Darai calls Rin's evolving playstyle arrogant and avaricious. The latter (meaning extreme greed) is evocative of a force that pursues what it wants without regard for anything in its surroundings. What it can't have, it destroys.

Niou is confident enough in his physicality to try withstand his opponent's attrack. Rin literally flips him into the air. Niou's hubris brings to mind all man-made constructs which are supposedly storm-proof... until a cyclone comes along and proves otherwise.

The contrast between Rin and Sae's egos are interesting. If we accept Rin's is a storm, i.e. a destructive force of nature that cannot be controlled, Sae's is the opposite despite being as impossible to defy. Sae's motif is defined in the manga as "beautiful destruction", plays and passes depicted in graceful data strings. Rather than natural, his playstyle is sleek and controlled, and dominant to the point of appearing pre-ordained by his opponents.

Their attitudes are equally different. While Rin drools and loses composure in the final minutes, Sae does little more than raise his eyebrows throughout the entire game. He's completely emotionless.

It's the extremes of human nature: animalistic rage versus robotic detachment. This time, the latter wins. Will Rin have an opportunity to face his brother again, with a better grasp on his ego? Here's hoping.

My final thoughts on Rin are speculative. How does one beat a storm? Not just endure—but subdue and calm one?

It's beyond human capability. The ability to control the weather exists only in myth and fantasy, and even then it's usually in the hands of powerful entities, not mere heroes or wizards.

Subduing something as powerful as a hurricane would require a god.

Is this Isagi and Rin's endgame?

Time will tell.

[leonawriter]

Shinichi's friendship with Hattori Heiji is SO important to me.

Like, up until now in the manga we see him around Ran, who's his best friend, but... she's also the one he has a major crush on, and she's a girl, and the series is still early on so teenaged boys, no matter how nice, are kinda sexist. Other than Ran there's Sonoko, who's more Ran's friend than his, and his teammates in the soccer club. There's also Agasa.

Except... as said, Ran's his crush, Sonoko isn't his friend (they don't exactly get along much at first), his teammates in soccer only really play sports with him, and Agasa is much older.

Then he shrinks, and he has... well, he so far only has Agasa he's telling the truth to. And he has the Detective Boys in school, but they're little kids he's babysitting almost. His relationship with Ran is strained by lies and how she's treating him as a kid (and she has to), and he's unable to talk to anyone he knew from high school.

Enter Hattori Heiji, who is not only his own age, but someone who can keep up with his reasoning as he's coming up with things - not just after he's started to explain it all. And when he becomes someone In On The Secret... as much as we make fun of him for messing up with "Ku- Conan" all the time, I see it as kinda important, in a good way, too - because it proves that at no point does Hattori looks at him and sees "Conan" first before he sees Kudo Shinichi.

To Hattori, he is always Kudo Shinichi.

He respects him fully when he's shaped like a child, and Shinichi knows that Hattori will continue to treat him the same once he's returned to his normal body, too.

[sarahjtv]

My Hero Academia Chapter 430 Spoiler Talk: The True End of An Era (Part 1)

This is it, the final chapter of My Hero Academia. A series 10 years in the making has finally ended. It's really insane to think about. This series has done so much good for a lot of people despite the fandom's flaws. MHA was both people's introduction and even reintroduction to manga and anime. It's bittersweet to write about the final chapter, but I will do the best I can to honor the series I love. This is going to be a very long one. Also a lot of screaming.

Now, please, if you want to wait until the official translation releases on Sunday, PLEASE TURN AWAY NOW! Save this post and come back to it on Sunday when everyone has read the chapter. I will be using spoiler hashtags for this, so if you end up spoiling yourself because of my post, that's on you. THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING:

Here we go. We first start off with our Final Color page for the series! It's a gorgeous double-page spread featuring all Class 1-A (Now 2-A) kids that we've grown to know and love throughout the past 10 years including Shinso, Aizawa, and All Might of course. Izuku Midoriya AKA Deku, our beautiful MC who I will miss with all my heart and soul 💚, is leading the page and his friends towards the bright future they all fought so hard for. It's a wonderful way to conclude the series and I will make sure to get a high-quality version of it to use as my computer wallpaper.

The final chapter is titled "My Hero Academia" because of course it is 🥹. This was truly My Hero Academia.

OH FUCK WE GET A TIME SKIP TO THE FUTURE SOMEONE HOLD ME 😭

KOTA IS THE THE UA HERO COURSE AND IZUKU IS HIS TEACHER IT'S SO PERFECT FOR HIM!!!💚😭 I BET MR. AIZAWA AND ALL MIGHT WERE BIG INSPIRATIONS FOR HIM TO TAKE THIS PATH 🥹

IT'S ONLY BEEN 1 PAGE AND THIS CHAPTER HAS ALREADY ENDED ME IT'S SO JOEVER FUCK

BTW, Deku is saying a more optimistic version of the "Not all men are born equal" narration he told us at the beginning of the very first chapter of the series. Very nice way of bringing the story full circle.

Ok, the next 2 pages have a lot of things in them, so I'm going to try to sum it up as best as I can:

Izuku finally came home to see his mother, Inko, at their apartment and she looks happy 💚

All Might is out of his wheelchair and helping old Gran Tarino walk with a cane (how he still survived I have no idea).

All the kids running in their gym clothes in what looks like their second Sports Festival (god, what I'd give to see that in its entirety).

Miriko is very happy with her new prosthetics including one that looks like the Bullet Bill from the Super Mario series.

The kids struggling taking either mid-terms or finals written tests. Bakugo is still using his left arm to write, so I assume his right arm is still barely usable.

Shoji and Kota shaking some prominent mutant's hand I assume from their contributions towards the war.

Mt. Lady and Kamui Woods working together as usual!

Tokoyama meeting up with Hawks.

KOTA AND ERI HOLDING HANDS AND GETTING READY FOR SCHOOL WITH MADALAY'S APPROVAL THAT'S SO FUCKING CUTE 😭❤️🤍

Endeavor being followed around by his sidekicks and Hawks.

Aizawa and Present Mic visiting what I bet is Shirakumo's grave 😢

The fan translator says that the kids finally meet Melissa from the first MHA movie! We don't see her face, but I'll take what they say is truth.

Spinner's book selling and Compress reading it in jail.

Bakugo going through rehab to get his right arm back!

Deku and Ochako spending time in the snow.

OUR KID'S GRADUATION OH MY GOD MOST OF THEM ARE 18 THERE AND THEY'RE OFFICIALLY PRO HEROES I'M SO FUCKING PROUD OF THEM 😭❤️ Interesting though since none of them really look much older except for maybe Iida and Shoto, but it's hard to tell from the scans. And Bakugo and Monoma keep the crazy graduation tradition of blowing things up as their goodbye present to UA!

And finally, we see the embers of One For All slowly fade away in Izuku's hand until there's nothing left...

Oh, god. The time skip takes place 8 YEARS in the future geez. So, if this is 8 years since we left the kids in Class 2-A, they would be about 24-25 years old now damn. We're actually going to see them all grown up that's crazy.

The next page shows us a middle school class very similar to how we saw Deku and Bakugo at the very beginning of the series. The teacher asks them what they want to do in the future and we get to see small glimpses of other characters now such as Hatsume who has her own lab (go, girl!), and LaBrava who seems to own a company with Gentle!

The main kid we focus on in this class is Dai, the young boy with dark blue-ish dotted hair who was looking at the All Might statue in Kamino before the first war started (I don't blame you for forgetting; I had to look him up too). He says he wants to be a hero, but everyone else says that his Quirk is too weak for him to become one. Despite that, he still goes to the All Might statue (which sounds like has been rebuilt) for inspiration. Sound familiar? 🤔

Next we see Shoji accepting a prestigious award for his efforts in resolving mutant prejudice-based incidents! He looks SO BULKY HOLY SHIT DUDE 😳 And his hair got longer to the point of putting it in a ponytail! Also, Koda and the glue Class 1-B kid (I think his name is Bondo or something) are there to congratulate him too! I bet you that Shoji making it to the top 10 in the final popularity poll helped Horikoshi give him a little spotlight and it's a good way of following up on what happened after his bout in the Final War.

Next up, we see Ochako, Tsuyu, Momo, and Iida visiting schools across the country! Ochako has also set up a Quirk Counseling expansion project that's become one of the most essential things in the future society!

Ok:

1: It's hard to tell with Iida, but the girls all look slightly older especially with their hair being a little longer.

2: Their future costumes look great! It's not a 100% match to what we saw in Endeavor's vision, but it's still great! Iida's armor got more detail to them; Tsuyu's frog goggles got gogglier?; Momo is finally coving up her cleavage and showing less exposed skin took you 10 years, but you finally got there, Horikoshi; and Ochako's got updated headwear, the two dots on her outfit are side-by-side instead of on top of each other, and her collar thing looks similar to Deku's hero mask which I know was intentional.

3: Good for Ochako for doing something about Quirk Counseling. Definitely inspired by what happened with Himiko Toga. I hope this means that we won't have another incident like Toga had and that kids are now able to get help with their Quirks as opposed to being villainized. I hope Ochako's making good money out of this too for her family like she originally intended.

We also see a teenage Eri going to her music club with a guitar on her back! She has a normal girl's sailor uniform, so my best guess is that she's either still in middle school (I think she would be 14-15 at this point) or she's not in UA like a lot of us thought. Either way, she wants to pursue music instead of Hero work so I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't go to UA at all. It also looks like her horn did fully grow back, but whether her Rewind Quirk still works the same is up in the air.

And we see that Mr. Aizawa is still working at UA, BUT HE CUT HIS HAIR SHORT 😭 WHY DID YOU CUT HIS BEAUTIFUL, LONG LOCKS, HORIKOSHI??? OF ALL THE PHYSICAL CHANGES YOU GIVE OUR CHARACTERS THIS IS THE MOST DEVASTATING 😭

*BREATHS* But, he shows Deku and us a video of Bakugo SCREAMING AT A CIVILIAN FOR FILMING HIM TOO CLOSELY 😂😭 PLEASE NEVER CHANGE, KATSUKI BAKUGO 🧡 I'm also really glad he still got to be a Pro Hero despite his injuries.

AND NOW WE SEE MY SWEET FAVORITE BOY, SHOTO TODOROKI WHO CUT HIS HAIR A LITTLE SHORTER!!! I DON'T CARE WHAT ANYONE SAYS, I LIKE HIM BETTER WITH SHORT HAIR AND STILL LOOKS LIKE THE BEAUTIFUL PRETTY BOY HE ALWAYS WAS! STAY PRETTY, SHOTO!!! 🩵

Anyway, Shoto patrols day and night and is very nice to his fans! Kind king 👑! He's also become his own man to the public now as he's barley called "Endeavor's Son" anymore. That's a real relief because I know for a fact that that was haunting him for years. Also, there's a chance he'll pass Mt. Lady, Kamui Woods, and even Mirio in the rankings! I'm so proud of my fave! 🩵❄️🔥

GAH! I'm actually hitting a world limit here! I have to make a Part 2!

[tinyozlion]

Gundam Wing: Minutia and Trivia

On my long and winding way down research rabbit holes, I often stumble on bits and pieces of trivia that I find quite interesting, but don't really fit anywhere in my usual commentary on Gundam canon and are far too niche and inconsequential to merit a post of their own. HOWEVER. Since I know in my heart that you, dear reader, are also the sort of person for whom background details of the absolute least consequential variety are a source of delight and inspiration, I am compiling some of my discoveries here, and perhaps if I find more, there will be follow up posts. This one happens to be, in a very loose sense, mostly about Romefeller, OZ, and its Special Eyebrow People, because that is where my brain worms are currently converging. Here is my collection of useless trivia. I lay them at your feet like weird pebbles. Look at them. They're neat.

1. The Daily Kingdom Newspaper

It's quite likely that this has already been done, but in the grand spirit of this blog, I have decided to take the path of highest effort for the stupidest reason, and transcribed this paper. This page of After Colony news, ostensibly from July 14th, A.C. 195, appears to be reporting on events that happened towards the end of World War II. It's apparently been a slow news day for the Sanc Kingdom press for several centuries. I found myself getting kind of wrapped up in the stories and was disappointed I couldn't turn the page and find out what happened next. (I mean, I know what happened next, broadly speaking.) Of particular interest were Henri and Camille Dreyfus, Swiss chemists who made a lot of innovations during both world wars. ...They were also apparently noted OZ supporters? Well, what can you expect from a big industrial supplier of*checks notes* acetyl intermediates.

2. The OZ doggy

Pictured below: Treize's well-heeled hunting pet

and a dog is there too *BA-DUM tsch!*

This spotty and behaved hound is a real breed of hunting dog, the German Short-haired Pointer, or GSP! Did you know this, dear reader? I did not know this. This is new Dog Lore to me.

from the wiki: "It is a pointer and retriever, an upland bird dog, and water dog. The GSP can be used for hunting larger and more dangerous game. It is an excellent swimmer but also works well in rough terrain. It is tenacious, tireless, hardy, and reliable. German Shorthaired Pointers are proficient with many different types of game and sport, including trailing, retrieving, and pointing pheasant, quail, grouse, waterfowl, raccoons, opossum, and even deer."

Seems like a perfect bird-hunting companion for Mr. Treize. She'll probably go retrieve the beautiful red phoenix he murdered. I've decided she's named Oscar (after the Rose of Versailles) and she is a very good girl. Braver Oscar! Braver Hund!

3. Luxembourg Castle

This is Treize's abandoned Disney castle in Luxembourg. I owe the background artists of this scene an apology, for in my heart I assumed this was a random assemblage of spare castle-parts they found at Ludwig II's rummage sale. Reader, I was wrong:

THIS is Schloss Viandin, a restored castle in Luxembourg. Look at this place, it's gorgeous! You can hardly tell there's a secret mobile suit bunker in the basement. Frankly, I'm jealous I'm not being confined there, Treize! Stop sulking in the catacombs and go relax in the pretty princess bed until you feel better. Gaze upon the signed picture of Patrick Swayze; let him inspire you.

4. Romefeller's Secret

This one comes to us from the Battlefield of Pacifists manga, which, I've learned, is pretty good actually. (I mean it's not GOOD good, but it contains some interesting stuff). Now, come: I am taking you with me on this journey:

I feel extremely vindicated knowing that there's semi-canonical support for my theory that the Romefeller aristobrats are Austrian. I knew it. I KNEW IT. According to this manga, Romefeller was officially founded in Vienna-- the wording is a little ambiguous in this translation, but if Romefeller had members joining it in 1862, then it had to have existed in some form since then-- which means that the "Glorious Year" of 1956 is something other than its founding date. So what exactly happened in 1956? As I am a hack and fraud, and have been one all my life, I have looked to wikipedia for guidance. Mostly what was happening was the Cold War, colonialism, uprisings, Elvis, research and debate over artificial intelligence, both the hard drive disk and the snooze-button alarm clock being invented, Japan joining the UN, and wait what's this--

COMPUTER, ENHANCE:

...My god...

It's all coming together.

Eurovision is a plot by Romefeller.

The evidence is all here. There is simply no other conclusion we can come to.

--For this, and many other reasons that are well beyond the scope of a fandom blog, you should probably boycott them.

I rest my case.

5. The Romefeller Coat of Arms

I'm no vexillologist, and my heraldic experience is limited to adoptable pixel dragons, but what I am is an insane person with too much time on their hands. And so, to the best of my ability, I have blazoned the Romefeller coat of arms:

Supporters: Two Unicorns Rampant 

Crown: Purpur Crown of Peerage or Lord of Parliament  

Escutcheon: Heater with Two Engrailed Wedge Top - party per pale (halved vertically)

Blazon: Sinister (Right): Argent, Bend Sinister Sanguine; Dexter (Left): Bleu Celeste, Charged with a Ringed (or Celtic) Cross Argent 

Motto Scroll: UPRTUN or UPRTVN

--I don't know what UPRTVN is meant to stand for, but there are truly SO many ways you could play Latin Mad Libs and get a reasonable-sounding answer. At a stab, knowing Romefeller's priorities and values, I would guess it probably contains a, you know, "Unity/Peace/Rule/Tradition/Victory/Necessity", "Unity Through The Rule of Tradition Is Our Victory", or some such deeply worrying thing. Take your pick really.

6. "Herbst" / "Autumn"

The Rilke poem Treize quotes in "Frozen Teardrop" is not terribly difficult to find online, but if you're not sure what you're looking for it can be difficult because he has multiple poems about Autumn, and Autumn Day is perhaps better known; also the internet is absolutely filthy riddled with despicable bots and farmed content that has lost its attributions, so you do have to dig to find where different translations have come from (bless this very Web 1.0 page for carrying on the lord's work in basic html). Here is the original in German, and two complimenting translations:

Herbst -Rainer Maria Rilke Die Blätter fallen, fallen wie von weit als welkten in den Himmeln ferne Gärten; sie fallen mit verneinender Gebärde. Und in den Nächten fällt die schwere Erde aus allen Sternen in die Einsamkeit. Wir alle fallen. Diese Hand da fällt. Und sieh dir andre an: es ist in allen. Und doch ist Einer, welcher dieses Fallen unendlich sanft in seinen Händen hält.

This translation by Horst A. Scholz (linked here so I don't get into trouble) is the most spare and one-to-one translation into English I've found-- I always appreciate having a comparison between the very literal meanings and a more creative reconstruction when I'm reading translated poetry.

Meanwhile on the other end of the spectrum, this translation by Robert Bly is very freeform and agnostic; for my own purposes, I think the use of "Space" instead of "Heaven" happens to fit nicely with the themes of Gundam:

Autumn -translation by Robert Bly The leaves are falling, falling as if from far up, as if orchards were dying high in space. Each leaf falls as if it were motioning "no." And tonight the heavy earth is falling away from all other stars in the loneliness. We're all falling. This hand here is falling. And look at the other one. It's in them all. And yet there is Someone, whose hands infinitely calm, holding up all this falling.

[neonscandal]

explain to me how bakugo is traumatized. the kid he grew up with was nice to him once and he immediately came to the conclusion that he should die. that's not trauma, that's being insane.

I'm going to start with the fact that, justifiably, there's never a reason to tell someone to kill themselves. Additionally, note that me saying Bakugo is traumatized does not mean that Midoriya is also not traumatized.

Regarding your question, the trauma that I mentioned on a recent ask, (I assume this one prompted your question) referenced the following:

Captured by the Slime Villain, effectively bound and suffocated in front of an audience (doesn't include the fall out after being someone who is publicly assaulted)

Muzzled, bound and robbed of autonomy in front of a national audience at the Sports Festival

Kidnapped and bound by the LOV (the forcible binding is recurrent through all the above)

Don't really have to go into the swath of issues he and Class 1A likely can and do develop from being child pawns in a war of adults but that can be applied as well re: survivor's guilt, PTSD, paranoia from the mole, etc. from the PLF arc and up until current manga events (I didn't feel like a spoiler warning).

Things that people don't tend to capture in the box of Bakugo's characterization:

He comes from a verbally and physically abusive household, demonstrably (you can jump down to the second paragraph of Bakugo's Strengths listed here for my thoughts on that impact)

Forced to defend himself against older kids from a young age and possibly on a recurring basis, as referenced in the above image. We could probably chalk the confrontation up to a consequence of his false overconfidence, sure. But does that justify 4th graders ganging up on what looks like a kindergartener/first grader?

As for Bakugo and Midoriya's relationship, we don't have much to go on. We know they were close and amicable as kids, things likely went to shit when Midoriya didn't develop a quirk, there's some beetle excursion in the woods that Bakugo refers back to a lot which is pending further context for readers/viewers, and then there's a fall in the river which really soured relations as Bakugo misinterpreted genuine kindness for condescension (see home life and such above). Again, none of this justifies the bullying we see at the start of the series or the way their interactions have shocking physical components. But what I do find interesting is that I've previously likened Bakugo's disposition to Endeavors but, in retrospect, I think he's a strong parallel for Dabi too.

Dabi's rage stems from being robbed of what he thinks is his inalienable birthright as the oldest son and heir to Endeavor's legacy. He disproportionately targets Shouto as the usurper of what is rightfully his. Dabi's claim, of course, makes more sense from a traditional and, probably, cultural standpoint. But the reason I mention it is that I don't think Bakugo was constantly telling Midoriya to take a swan dive off a roof. It doesn't forgive the bullying but it contextualizes why, that day, the bullying reached a new height when Midoriya was outed for still trying to get into UA. Bakugo saw this as an immediate threat to his position because, even though he didn't admit it at the time, if anyone could get into UA, quirkless or not, Bakugo knew Midoriya could.

Just as Midoriya has always seen Bakugo as being heroic and capable of being number 1, Midoriya proves time and time again that, even without a quirk, he's got the spirit of a hero and is successful in spaces where Bakugo is not. As the story progresses, we see evidence and the ultimate manifestation of Bakugo's remorse through his apology and other ways he's softened up. I'm not saying he wasn't a little shit but that's also not all he was (IDK if you've met kids but... without healthy socialization they can be little emotional terrorists). As things have unfolded, we see that, internally, Bakugo uses thoughts of Midoriya to galvanize his path forward and we've recently confirmed that when Bakugo spoke to Kirishima about strength... he was referring to Midoriya, you can scroll down to paragraphs around the last picture. I'm just gleeful about calling it. But, suffice it to say they've both been looking to one another this whole time.

There are still periphery pieces of their background missing because the story is largely from Midoriya's perspective. I don't think we'll get a comprehensive backstory but I think there will be some sort of meaningful explanation behind the beetle trip that may inform why Bakugo ultimately misinterpreted things so poorly at the river. I mean, maybe it's as simple as the fact that he couldn't fathom kindness because it's something not typically afforded to those who are perceived as strong. I don't know but I look forward to finding out.

[welcometothejianghu]

Hey, you! You should watch Hikaru no Go!

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: Hikaru no Go/Qi Hun/棋魂.

Based on the manga of the same name, this drama is the Chinese live-action adaptation of a story about a boy who plays Go, the spirit only he can see who teaches him how to play Go, and all the friends and enemies he meets along his journey to become a good Go player.

...Wait, no, come back. I swear it's more interesting than that makes it sound.

What it is, is a character-driven tale of a charming young boy who, among a bunch of weird and wonderful people who love him, grows up to be a charming young man.

(You see how his shirt says SWEETIE CUTIE? That is because he is a sweetie cutie.)

It's a sports manga, so you've got Training Montages and The Big Game and all sorts of tense moments like that. But there's also lots of fun, gentle plotlines that are equal parts tearjerking and heartwarming. It is incredibly written, act, and produced, and I can't believe that it's not more popular, because it's so good.

Here are five reasons you should watch it:

1: GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY

Word of Honor is merely the second gayest thing I have ever seen a c-drama do. Hikaru no Go is gayer by an order of magnitude.

I think the way they got it past censorship was by saying, oh no, this isn't gay, it's just a sports rivalry! But come on, what do you mean sports rivalries aren't gay, have you seen how all those Canadian and US hockey players keep marrying one another? This is that. This is the tale of two boys who've been in love since they were seven figuring out that they've been in love since they were seven.

(And speaking of seven-year-olds, the kid casting is amazing.)

I mean:

This is an actual still from the show.

So is this.

So is this.

These are not taken out of context. The context would make them gayer. That's how gay they are for each other.

But you know what the best part is? They're not the only pairing. And I don't just mean this like, oh, here's two other cute boys, you can imagine the times they kiss -- I mean, the show itself has its own ships! Ships you wouldn't expect! Intergenerational gay Go solidarity!

Now here's the catch: You have to wait for it. But oh boy, the payoff had us clutching our heads and screaming as quietly as we could because it was after midnight and we were losing our minds.

That last episode!! You have to see it to believe it!!!

2: EMOTIONS!

Bring the tissues. There are parts where it was kinda hard for me to watch because I was sobbing.

Because it's a sports manga, there are lots of triumphs and tragedies. Not everybody can make it to The Big Game. Not everybody gets to live out their dreams. Sometimes you try your hardest and it's not good enough. Sometimes you play your best and you still lose. Some people have to give up on what they love. Some people who were there with us at the beginning don't get to make it with us to the end.

What really makes it is that the show sits with its emotions. Events will affect people's emotional states for multiple episodes to follow. People who have sadness don't just snap out of it. Loving someone doesn't automatically fix them. Shit's hard!

Of course, this contrast makes the triumphs even more wonderful. I will tell you that the show has a happy ending, but not always the ending you would expect would have been their happy ending. It is overall an incredibly uplifting show. You'll need tissues for that, too.

3: (Nearly) Everything Is Pretty Dang Normal

Part of what I mean by that is that while a lot of the actors are real pretty, they're also done up in ways where, like, if you met this person on the street, you would think, this person is pretty! and not, what the hell fancy-ass magazine cover did you just step off of?

Look at these normal goobers:

There are two exceptions to this. The first is Chu Ying, because he is a ghost energy being from the distant past, and ghosts energy beings from the distant past get astonishing eyeliner.

The second is Fang Xu, because his actor, Han Mubo, is an actual idol. Congratulations on your face, sir.

However, I also mean that the story is delightfully mundane. Sure, there's that one supernatural element to it, but everything else is just a regular story about regular people who have regular human problems. There are characters who disappoint their parents and mentors, struggle to pay their bills, try to balance school and extracurricular activities, have crushes, argue with teachers, flake on responsibilties, get lost in the woods, and do some pretty normal human things. Nobody's avenging anyone or trying to slay anything. It's just people being people.

It's even a bit of a period piece -- the show starts out in 1997, then jumps forward to the late '00s, so everything's just charmingly slightly outdated. Damn, I love everybody's flip phones.

4: Actually Good Television

Okay, if you like c-dramas, you know they can be ... janky. Episodes sometimes end practically in the middle of sentences. CG leaves much to be desired. Obvious cuts and last-minute overdubbing really stand out. You can tell where the censorship mandates got in there and started mucking around with things. That kind of jank.

This show feels different. It feels like someone thought out each episode, start to finish, and then created each piece to fit that vision. Every episode even has a title and beautiful title card. They start and end in dramatically logical places. The cinematography isn't anything particularly artful or experimental, but it's solid and clean and lovely. (And if you're sick of shows so dark you can't see them, you've got no worries here.)

The CG in the show is unobtrusive, and most of it is spent making Chu Ying subtly transparent.

There are a bunch of secondary characters, but to me that never felt overwhelming. Most of them are interesting, three-dimensional characters, no matter how short their screen time is. And while there definitely could have been more female characters, the show itself is pretty open about how sexism in the Go world means that it's mostly a boys' club -- and the ladies that are there are great.

In short, this is a show you can show to people who don't have c-drama brain and thus are less inclined to overlook some of the more cringeworthy aspects of their productions. I bet that your Average American Television Enjoyer Who Can Handle Subtitles would have no trouble getting into the groove of it, which I imagine could be very useful for those of you who have people you'd like to watch c-dramas with, except you don't feel like stopping every five minutes to apologize for one thing or another.

5: Better Than The Source Material?

This is the point where I have to admit that I myself have never read the manga or seen the anime. I came into this with only the vaguest familiarity with the source material. I can only tell you that the live-action drama is good; I can't swear that it's better.

However, @jianghootinandhollerin can speak to this comparison more authoritatively than I:

When I was 20, Hikaru no Go (manga) was my favorite thing, the primary obsession, the source of multiple livejournal themes, custom winamp skins, and a fanfic where Hikaru got a go stone stuck up his nose. Because of this deep love in my history, I was dubious about a live action version and the changes it made, but hey, turns out, those changes were exactly what the 20 years older version of me needed. This version of the story benefits so much from having the full, completed story to work from from the outset. The manga didn't know where it was ending when it started, but this show got to, and the story gets to be richer and the characters' stories get to be deeper thanks to that. And also, very importantly: everyone is older and much, much gayer.

Look, I understand if "but it's not the original manga/anime" is a dealbreaker for you. There are adaptations of things I can't watch because no matter how good the end product may be, I'm going to hold it against it that it's not the source I'd rather be seeing, and that's not a fair standard. That's fine. It happens.

But if you can, give this a go (pun unintended). It does not replace the original thing; it is a different take on the same idea. And yeah, it's one that really speaks to me here, on the other side of forty as I am. Maybe I would have missed it at twenty, but the person I am now really respects its attitude that while Being The Best is all well and good, it is not the only thing, and it is absolutely not more important than being yourself and doing what you love with the people you love. Sometimes you peak and can't advance anymore, so you become a teacher, and you know what, that's better than okay, that's actually pretty great. (Do I overidentify with Bai Chuan? Listen: maybe.)

Have I convinced you to watch it yet?

You can watch it on iQiyi, or you can watch it on iQiyi's YouTube channel. I hope you love it as much as I do.

[stellar-constellations]

hi !! just wanted to pop in here to request smth as well as tell you i love your writing sm !! i cant wait for part 11 of "the alliance" comes out !! there fr needs to be more yuri content in spy x family.

also, have you ever thought of crossposting your work on wattpad/ao3/quotev ? i only say since at workplaces and school tumblr is usually blocked, and when i have a bad day im always here rereading your writing.

ANYWAYS ONTO MY REQUEST ofc its gonna be yuri x reader !! it can be headcanons or an actual oneshot, whatever you want to do, but ive always wanted to see how yuri would react to birthdays, whether it be his one or y/n's.

anyways, thanks so much for reading this. even if you dont do my request, i hope you know how genuinely happy and giddy youre writing makes me and other.

        Yuri Briar x Fem! Reader

        This can be read with or without reading my Yuri Briar x Fem! Spy! Reader series: An Alliance (part 1).

        Beware! This fic DOES contain SPOILERS for the manga and for the Yuri Briar x Fem! Spy! Reader series: An Alliance (part 1)!

        Series information: Setting is AFTER the reader rejoined WISE (so Yuri and [Y/N] are married and [Y/N] becomes an official double-spy).

   Yuri doesn't exactly like celebrating his birthday, even when he was a kid he didn't care much. The only thing he really has to look forward to that day is Yor visiting him. Other than that, he sees the day as any other day. He wouldn't even celebrate if you and Yor didn't make him every year. 

        You and Yor would meet up the day before his birthday and bake a cake together. Afterwards, you'd both go shopping for birthday gifts. 

        Yuri swears he's in paradise on his birthday. You AND Yor both spending time with him, laughing and getting along with each other? That's enough of a birthday gift for him (until Loid and Anya walk through the front door).

        Other than that, Yuri would rather spend the day relaxing off work. He'd be up to going for a walk or a restaurant for dinner, but he's a little simple.

        "Yuri, it's your birthday, we're supposed to celebrate!" you explained. 

        "I know, I know. It's just... I've never really celebrated my birthday much growing up." Yuri admitted.

        When his parents died at a young age, he didn't really have the time to celebrate when he was busy studying for school. Yor would at least make him a cake (it wasn't very good... or edible) before heading out for work, leaving him to his own devices for his birthday. He didn't have birthday parties because of how poor they were and he didn't make friends either for anyone to attend them.

        "It is my responsibility as your wife to celebrate your birthday with you because according to this ring, I'll be with you for all your other birthdays." You spoke, showing him the silver ring with the ruby on top that he bought you.

        Your words made him tear up, his face turning red as tears and snot rolled down his face.

        "You're an angel!" he exclaimed, hugging you tight enough to suffocate you.

        "I know, now let go before you kill me and I won't be here next year!" you gasped, hugging him back despite your words of "let go"

        On your birthday, he's much more energetic and fun (he's a hypocrite).

        He'd buy you your favorite flowers and cook your favorite breakfast for in bed. After breakfast he'd bake a cake from scratch using a cooking book (no, you cannot help. Go watch TV or read a book). 

        He'd take you somewhere that you like to go or that's of interest to you: an aquarium, zoo, park, flower garden, beach, sports game, anywhere you'd like.

        He would blow his entire week's paycheck on gifts for you (he works for the state, he has the money). 

        "I have a reservation for that fancy restaurant that just opened up down the road." Yuri spoke, tying the tie on his suit.

        "How'd you get that done? There was a waiting list before that place even opened?" you questioned, brushing out your hair.

        "I have my ways." Yuri smiled. 

        "I hope none of those ways involved threats and bribery." You sighed, placing your hands on your hips as you looked at him.

        "No, no, I would never!" he said in a high voice, obviously lying. "...Maybe a little."

        "You'd go that far for me?" you questioned, holding your heart as a warm fondness stirred your chest, your heart beat raising. "You're such a sweetheart!" you cooed before kissing him on his cheek.

        "Psh! It was nothing! I just wanted to do something for you since you did something for me on my birthday." He spoke, acting as if it was nothing (the blush on his cheeks and the smile on his face said otherwise). 

        Thank you so much for requesting! I do apologize for the request being short, I personally don't have much experience on birthdays due to growing up in a family where we don't do much for birthdays.

        I'm also working on writing a request for a Christmas one shot for Yuri that will come out in the middle of December so stayed tuned for that!

At the moment, I'm also crossposting my work onto Ao3, Wattpad, and Quotev. I've finished uploading the Yuri Briar x Fem! reader: An Alliance series onto Wattpad and Ao3. My account name is "Stellar Constallation" for Wattpad and "StellarConstellations401" for Ao3.

        Want more Yuri content? Check out the Yuri Briar x reader masterlist!

        Have any other requests? Check my official masterlist to see the characters I write for: Masterlist

[cyberbun]

An anon asked me what my top 10 favorite anime are and I agonized over this question for months but I think I have an answer. Then I accidentally published this without finishing it so I have to write it again

In no particular order:

Gatchaman Crowds (2013) and it's second season Insight (2015):

Hands down, my favorite anime of all time. As a fan of the superhero genre this has to be the best deconstruction/reconstruction of it I've seen in terms of how it reevaluates the concept of heroism in a digital society and how well it handles its themes of futurism along with personal identity and construction of the self in virtual environments. It is a series with a central thesis about the inherent goodness of humanity expressed through the language of superheroes and social media, and it's one of those stories that really gets the way people engage with the internet in a way that other similar sci-fi stories about fully online societies fail to do even to this day.

The first season's almost naive optimism is then thoroughly torn apart by the second's darker, more introspective tone, which makes the entire show play out like a series of political essays arguing back and forth with the backdrop of colorful superhero action. What makes it particularly good, though, is how it handles this darkening of the narrative, as it asks tough, incisive questions of its own story and still comes out parading genuine optimism about the future of its world and ours.

Because, at its core, it's a superhero story about how everyone has the capacity to be a hero and better themselves and each other. It's a truly transformative experience and, while a lot of its themes can seem... tragically over-optimistic, its datedness almost makes it feel like a time capsule of a time where we were at the cusp of using mass internet penetration to better ourselves as a society, and perhaps remains a reminder of how these technologies may still have the potential to make us all into heroes. Also Rui is a hot gender black hole and I want to be them so badly.

Samurai Flamenco (2014)

In a lot of ways, Samurai Flamenco is sort of the anti-Gatchaman Crowds; it's a straight deconstruction of the tokusatsu genre that's less interested in analyzing the role of superheroes in a society and more about using its own genre to examine the ways fiction allows us to project ourselves as something greater than what we are, while also commenting on said genre's iterations over its history; so ultimately it comes across as both a tribute to it and a deep examination of what exactly makes its fans tick.It is also bat fuck insane and I can't tell you a single thing that happens in it because it goes places. Watching this as it aired was an incredible experience.

Slam Dunk (1993-1994)

The best sports anime ever made. Dead serious. Not only is this a love letter to the game of basketball as a whole that manages to capture the intensity and adrenaline of every single thought that goes through the head of a player in the final minutes of a game, it is also a touching love story with one of the most compelling central casts of characters I've ever seen.

The anime was largely inferior to the manga for a long time on account of it being left unfinished, while the manga remains largely remembered for having one of the most bittersweet endings ever put to page; an equal parts tragic and triumphant culmination of the main character's journey from delinquent layabout to passionate athletic prodigy. Then, last year, we finally got one of the best looking anime films I've seen in my life adapting the final volume of the manga while also expanding the backstory of one of the secondary protagonists of the series.

Part of my love for this series is highly personal. I grew up watching this on TV back in the old country, and seeing it finally be finished after 20 odd years brought me to tears. A lot of it might be outdated by now, but there is yet to be a single anime I am so comfortable watching over and over and over again. I will go to the grave singing its praises.

Soul Eater (2008)

It's Soul Eater, you know Soul Eater. Probably the single most stylish show I've ever seen, visually; and to me still at the peak of the shonen genre as a whole. It's got both some of the best action ever put to animation and some of the most engaging core casts of characters I've seen despite how small its ensemble is. If it seems like I have less to say about it than others in the list it's mainly because it's already popular enough I don't feel like I can contribute much to the conversation; everyone likes Soul Eater. You like Soul Eater. Explaining why Soul Eater is good is like explaining why it is good to eat. Every time I watch Crona's episodes I cry a lot.

RahXephon (2002)

Talking about RahXephon is difficult because conversations surrounding it are usually centered around its relationship to Evangelion; and this is partially because it is, in many ways, a response to it and a reformulation of a lot of the questions that it asked about its story. This is not wholly unfounded, as director Yutaka Izubuchi is a longtime friend and collaborator of Anno's who did do some work in Evangelion prior to this, so the influence is definitely there. For a lot of people, this was rebuild before rebuild. I personally prefer the adage "Evangelion on antidepressants".

I do, however, overall feel this is unfortunate, because taken outside that context, RahXephon is one of the most complex and deeply layered reconstructions of the mecha genre I've ever experienced, with a beautiful score and haunting visual design propping up a story that's equal parts impenetrable as it is deeply layered; made up of so many small character arcs woven into each other completely seamlessly that you always feel like you're watching but a tiny fragment of a large tapestry of stories coming together into a single complete whole. It makes the world of the anime feel simultaneously small and huge, which fits the melancholic post-post-apocalypse visual aesthetic of the narrative It's one of my favorites not because of what happens in it, but because it is one of the most enriching experiences I've had with an anime or any other form of visual storytelling; I always feel like rewatching it makes me take something new away from it that I didn't notice before.

Ergo Proxy (2006)

Part of me has to admit I like Ergo Proxy less as a story and more as an aesthetic. If I had to put a name on how it feels to watch this show it'd definitely be "contemplative"; it's a slow going, compounded puzzle of a narrative which at times borders on self-indulgence with how many layers of things happening at once you're keeping up with. To give you an idea; the seemingly random text crawls during the opening of the show are key pieces of understanding what exactly the plot is by the end of the story. Peel away those layers, and you get a much simpler narrative than it might first appear, with one of my favorite one-sentence summaries: "what if three different Ends of the World crashed into each other at once".

While that seems reductive, one of the things that makes Ergo Proxy feel rewarding to watch, then rewatch to fully understand, is how it does ultimately completely nail the landing with the story it's trying to tell, despite having a complete non-ending that somehow manages to feel satisfying all the same. It's a story that explores themes of identity and human nature through the genre of ecological horror with one of the most stylish depictions of a bleak, dead world I've ever seen put in any narrative. So long as you're okay with a story that doesn't give you a full sense of narrative closure and one where a single watching won't give you all the pieces of the story, it is one of the most rewarding experiences to go back and pick apart, in my opinion. Like a puzzle, you will be left wanting to put all the pieces together by the end.

Ouran High School Host Club (2006)

Don't fucking look at me like that. I watched Ouran at an impressionable age and now I'm bigender. It has a place in my bunny heart. It is foundational to the person I grew up to become.

Cardcaptor Sakura

I watched this dubbed into Spanish back when I was young, and admittedly I don't remember 60% of it, but that doesn't mean I don't think fondly back on it moreso than any other show I ever saw back when I was a child, and one that I've had a lot of joy in going back to it as I've grown older.

I don't have as much to say about it as I do some other shows, and like with Soul Eater, it feels like everything there is to be said about it has already been said elsewhere and better; it is one of the foundational texts for the modern magical girl genre, it is one of the most beautifully animated and designed shows I've ever seen, and the best at keeping the distinct house styles CLAMP is recognizeable for intact in animation as far as I'm concerned. It's my personal choice for what other people would call a "comfort" show; but I do not wish to diminish the story or reduce it to an aesthetic the way a lot of people do for shows like this, considering just how strong the character dynamics and their progression throughout the story are, and the wealth of emotional depth that can be found in just about everyone's arcs.

While the overarching plot and the world of the story aren't as interesting as some other shows of its type, its strengths lies in how it uses that as a solid foundation through which to explore a distinct aspect of the human condition through each of its characters - love, grief, loneliness, devotion to another and many others.

Kekkai Sensen (2015)

This is one of those cases where I feel like I'm going to repeat myself. Take everything I said about Soul Eater, put it here. It is stylish, it's got a strong central cast of characters that are all equally fun and contribute the same amount to the narrative. It's got some of the most intense, lovingly rendered large-scale action scenes I've seen, along with some of my favorite small, touching narratives; thanks to one of the best urban fantasy settings ever put together.

The first season's storyline is a blend of manga chapters with an anime-original plot, while the second season mostly adapts the manga much more closely so it doesn't come together as tightly as the first does, but it is more of the best show of its type of the past decade as far as I'm concerned; and nothing takes away just how incredibly tight that first season feels, even if the final episode was months late and had to go double length while the animation melted a little. And yet, it all comes together beautifully in the end.

Angel Beats

What a surprise this show was. I'll always feel a little bittersweet about it, due to the circumstances that led me to see it, but I'm forever grateful I did. Angel Beats' greatest strength is the way that it disarms the viewer by presenting a fun, albeit somewhat dark supernatural comedy about kids in the afterlife, letting one get comfortable with the silliness of the world before really taking the "children in the afterlife" premise to its logical conclusion: This is a story about death, trauma, tragedy, and moving on- Quite literally, in this case- from the things that weigh us down.

I make no hyperbole when I say that this show has the single strongest emotional climax I've ever experienced, and every time I watch it again I am moved to tears, sometimes more than last. I can't say much, since a lot of what makes this show fun is experiencing it, and realizing the depth of the world along with our point of view character; but the biggest endorsement of it I can give is how gracefully and tactfully it deals with complicated subjects such as abuse, disability and addiction in stories where you know how they all end, and yet give you a satisfying emotional conclusion while also keeping the mood balanced between cheerful when it has to be and heartbreaking, with the latter becoming more and more common by the end of the story.

It's a story about growing up, as much as it is a story about dying. It knows the tragedy of its premise and it chooses to ask the viewer to find joy in the time they have with its cast - a beautiful metaphor for life itself woven deeply into the narrative and never once stated out loud. We know where this story is going, but we're here now, so we might as well have a little fun along the way. That is ultimately what youth is about.

[you-cant-fuck-megaman]

I liked the questioning about repli beauty you brought up. So, as we go into this rabbit hole, can we attribute the appearance and preferences for own image of a repli to previous programming and the way the X program developed itself?

Like, it started with humans building the first repli series and setting human society as a parameter of likeness for non-battle/labor replis, and from there, the replis just continued the trend when building the next ones?

Also, is the operating system on the next one based on a blank template or does it come from the repli that programmed/designed them, in a kinda genetical passing manner?

a fantastic question! there's a lot of big question marks about how things work in the X world that aren't really delved into. the question of operating systems is a surprisingly straightforward one, as we know that there are at least three eras of reploids: the original line made from X's template, the improved line made by Dr. Doppler from the X3+ era, and the "New Generation" Reploids in X8+ made by an unspecified designer/developer for spaaaaaace work.

but image preferences? hooooooooooooooooooo. i can't offer a solid answer. but here's some ramblings about my thoughts.

what we DO know is that Reploids were derived from X's template and that they started off as copies of his design/aesthetic, and if we're to take the Archie series as any level of canon (probably level 2 extra-canon) we have a very clear visual as to what the early reploids looked like. and that, despite this, the X series features mostly furry robots as characters.

now, on an out-of-universe level, i want to say that i remember this decision was made because it creates more imposing silhouettes--megaman is a franchise designed for baby children first and foremost, and it's easy for child brain to correlate humanoid shapes as friends and feral beasts as enemies. however, A: i cannot find a source for this, and B: Sonic the Hedgehog

in either case, whatever the reason is, in-universe we have a very clear disparity between the originator of reploids being humanoid (the original term repliroid is even a portmanteau of "replica" [in the likeness of] and "android" [a humanoid machine]) and the majority of on-screen reploids not being humanoid. which tells me that body image is a BIG THING among reploid culture, and either chassis remodeling is a relatively easy process or a lot of reploids are willing to invest a lot into being a different person than who they started out as.

this is something briefly touched in the Classic series, with Tundra Man (a late line Robot Master) intentionally remodeling himself into a body type that he prefers, but it's fleshed out further with the (chronologically farther) X world in the design changes to the non-animal characters--Zero, Alia, and Sigma all similarly sport different bodies as the series goes on. the only person who doesn't change much in the main series is X, ironically enough, outside of Command Mission. Alia X8 and Layer are silly designs that were designed for fanservice first and foremost, but we can reasonably surmise that (in-universe) they chose to look that way. i'm not about to tell a woman she can't wear a car hood as a bra if she wants to, but i will think that it'd look better if it was put back on the jeep because i need that to fucking drive.

meanwhile, there's a lot of obvious correlations to be made with early X Mavericks and their designs being optimized for the environment. icy area gets the penguin. aerial area gets the eagle. underwater area gets the octopus. but as the series goes on, the correlations become significantly less appropriate and it's clear that animals were chosen for their design aesthetic. the munitions factory gets.....the hornet.....? i guess, like...the hornet stinger missiles.......?

it makes more sense if you take iwamoto's X mangas as level 2 extra-canon like the archie comics, because Blast Hornet was a reploid biker-gangster punk who became a hornet for the shock factor. which ends up leaning back to the original theory that reploids ultimately end up choosing how they look--if not from the onset, then further down the line.

you could probably make a solid argument that the X series is a very trans-friendly future, and that nearly every major character is trans and nobody bats an eye about it. instead the robot police are mad about the crimes and murder. but the creed is "be gay do crimes" so this is actually oppression 🙄

[carriagelamp]

Early Spring (March - April) Books

My main takeaway from the books I read over the past couple months that by god if you're going to do something, at least commit to the bit. I would say the books I liked the most this month were the "cheesy" ones or the oddballs, and my least favourite were just... profoundly average. So basic and uninterested in its own premise as to be offensive. At least if you're over-the-top you're making me feel something! Which is more than I can say for some of the books on my list...

Dumplin’

I’ve seen this book frequently in bookstores, and I know it was fairly popular at the time so after my mom watched the film and recommended it to me I decided it was about time to read it properly. 

The plot follows Willowdean, a fat girl who is generally fairly comfortable in her skin — or who has always seen herself as such. But with her former pageant queen mom getting into the latest pageant season, her best friend getting more and more involved in romance, and Will finding herself enamoured with a coworker she is struggling more and more with complicated feelings about how she views herself and how others view her. In an effort to fight back against it, she decides to sign up for the most recent pageant.

It was decent! I can’t really complain. I got the audiobook and it was fairly chill, low-stakes listening. High school drama is never my first choice, but there were enough good things about this book. My biggest complaint is that the ending was very anticlimactic. This is the sort of book where I want the big, cliche, over-the-top satisfying finale! It's about misfits taking over a small town beauty pageant!! I want it in the style of Hairspray or Legally Blonde or something!!! But the book was so painfully self-aware that it really tripped itself up in “therapy talk” and "realistic" endings that just took the wind out of its sails, rather than asking what the satisfying ending is. Still, worth the read if you enjoy a YA coming of age story.

Fence v1

Christ all mighty folks. I feel like I’m being gaslit here. This comic had some rave reviews on goodreads so I grabbed the first couple books from the library and it’s? actually just awful? I figured, hey, this will probably be done in the style of a sports manga, right? I enjoy a sports manga from time to time, especially a queer one. And you can tell that that’s what it’s inspired by. But holy SHIT is it boring. Like the art is AGONIZING. It’s stiff and uninspired and emotionless. I’ve read manga that’s managed to make the fucking board game go look like a high-stakes action adventure, and this book managed to make TEENAGERS WITH SWORDS boring as hell. I don't know enough about the author to tell if this is indicative of her usual work, or if the fault lays in just the blandest art imaginable but seriously, what the fuck. Don’t read this. I’m gonna go reread Haikyuu instead and remind myself that some people know how to draw sports scenes that are capable of making me feel things. Jesus.

Fullmetal Alchemist

A reread ♥ I stumbled across an FMA fanfiction by pure chance at the beginning of March and it made me dig out my books and reread the first few volumes. Always a cozy story to return to. If you've never taken the time to read Fullmetal Alchemist... honestly I'm not sure what rock you've been living under but you should do it. An unshakeable classic for a REASON

Home of the Brave

I picked this one up because I really enjoyed Applegate’s free verse novel Odder and I heard this one was written in a similar style. I knocked it out in a single day, it was a very quick read but a very heartfelt story. I can't say that I think everything about it was done perfectly, but for the style and intended audience, it was pretty solid. Made you look at things from a different perspective, had some really heart-wrenching realities to consider, and a lot of feel-good heart.

It followed Kek, a young immigrant from Sudan who has come to live with his aunt since his father and brother were killed and his mother is missing. It explores Kek’s adjustment to living in the United States, how the trauma continues to affect him, and how he begins to make friends — with a neighbour living with a foster family, an old woman, and her cow.

Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid v1

I’ve seen gifs of this around, and found a copy of it in the used bookstore so I figured… why not. Is it a good book? No. Not sure I'd bother reading the second, but it was weird enough to have made it worth reading. If nothing else, the premise was strange, art took me by surprised at time, and managed to make me chuckle along from time to time.

Kobayashi helps out a dragon who is now determined to live with her and help her out in an effort to seduce her repay her kindness. The story starts with the dragon being completely heartbroken that Kobayashi would honest rather just take the train on her commute rather than ride a dragon to work because scales are frankly uncomfortable.

Murder Most Puzzling

A fun little book of brainteasers! Each mystery includes a short story description (based around a private detective and her harried assistant) along with hand-drawn art. Between these two things, you’re supposed to deduce who the culprit of each crime is, with all the answers in the back of the book. It was pretty to look at and fun to work through, especially with a friend.

My Happy Marriage v1

Quite enjoyed this one! Is it a really well-written book? No. It’s very simple. But the plot is exactly the sort of sweet, cheesy story that I enjoy.

A very Cinderella-esque story, Miyo is from a noble-born family but suffers under her abusive family: an indifferent father, a cruel step-mother, and a selfish, haughty step-sister. She is treated even worse than a servant, and has resigned herself to existing like a meek, cringing shadow in her own home — her lack of magic that people in her class are expected to have makes her feel like this is entirely earned and inescapable. The story kicks off when she is callously married off to a young nobleman who is notorious for scaring away brides within days; he is said to be cold and cruel. Miyo is perfectly prepared for this new home to be no different than her last home...

Old-Fashioned Cupcake with Cappuccino 

A sequel to Old-Fashioned Cupcake, in which Nozue and Togawa begin to navigate the more complicated aspects of a relationship that has progressed beyond outings as friends and casual dates, to spending nights and a growing interest in living together. A homophobic society and their own hang-ups make this a complicated topic to navigate and there’s a lot of ups and downs, but it’s ultimately just as sweet as the first part.

Railsea

My favourite read from spring so far — absolutely deranged, I’m going to have to read more by this author. I saw a tumblr post that described this as a dystopian Moby Dick novel crossed with Treasure Island… with giant mutant moles rather than whales and trains instead of ships. Frankly, if that doesn’t also grab you by the throat and make you want to read it, I don’t know what to tell you. The author’s writing style is very distinct, and mimics what you expect from something like Moby Dick or Treasure Island, and he doesn’t bother holding your hand as he introduces this strange world to you. The world-building is really top tier, it’s completely bizarre and yet it feels very natural once you see how it works. The underlying themes are also just breath-taking. It was a masterfully written book and just a pure delight, especially once the second half kicks off.

The Serpent and the Wings of Night

Speaking of books that got rave reviews and that I feel are gaslighting me…

This came to me highly recommended and the goodread reviews seemed to agree… and guys, just wholly shit. Pure opposite of Railsea. Boring trite language, world-building that made absolutely no fucking sense, and characterization that felt like negative space. A pure void of characterization that sucked my entire will to live into it like a black hole. Like, this book so clearly did not actually give a shit about its own premise and didn't make a single effort to create a cohesive world or narrative... it leaned on tired tropes so heavily that it creaked. I had a couple mutuals that got to listen to me liveblog this and I couldn’t get through more than a couple paragraphs without losing my shit. Complete garbage, clearly riding on the coattails of A Court of Thorns and Roses without understanding what actually made that series compelling. I absolutely did not finish this book. The little bit I did read nearly killed me.

Heaven Official's Blessing (TGCF) v6

I continue to be completely enamoured with Heaven Official’s Blessing. The only reason I’m not tearing through these books faster is because a) I don’t want it to end and b) it keeps making me want to stop and write fanfiction about it instead. Getting to learn more about Xie Lian's past, the fall of Xianle, and the complete collapse of his life was just... ouch. My heart. Had to stop and cry about Xie Lian and Hua Cheng a LOT during this one folks.

The Wild Robot Protects

The third installment of Roz’s life on her island with her son, Brightwing, and her various animal friends. This time a deadly tide is sweeping through the ocean, killing any living thing that comes in contact with it, putting enormous strain on the resources of the island as animals try to move inland to escape it. Roz takes it upon herself to venture north and find the cause of this tide.

It was… meh. A middling book. Not bad, good for kids who are enjoying this series, a good lesson about how pollution, the inter-connectivity of nature, and marine conservation. But given how good the first two books in the series were, I was a bit disappointed with this one. It felt long winded and boring, with nothing of note actually happening until literally the last couple chapters.

[dropintomanga]

Medalist - The Best Manga (Almost) No One Is Reading

“I want to strongly believe I can do it. I hate how much I know about the no-good side of me. I want to be more like the girl Coach Tsukasa believes in. I want to be someone I can believe in!”

Sometime last year, I was overhearing talk from manga bloggers/reviewers about a certain under-the-radar Kodansha title that deserves more attention. I later found out that it was licensed in the U.S. and also won several awards in Japan. This manga is about a sport that I’m not knowledgeable about (but has gained a lot of attention due to a anime series I’m sure people know called Yuri!!! on Ice!!), figure skating. This past week, I got to read the 1st 4 volumes of Tsurumaikada’s critically-acclaimed Medalist and finally saw what I was missing.

I don’t know a damn thing about figure skating, but I sure as hell know a great manga when I see it. And Medalist is just that.

Medalist focuses on the journey to become a competitive figure skater in Japan through the eyes of a child and her coach. The main character in question, Inori Yuitsuka, is a 5th grader who’s noted to be bad at everything in life so far except ice skating. However, she skates in secret as she has little access to skating rinks and she’s also considered to be “too old” to start competitive training. It isn’t until she meets her future coach, Tsukasa Akeuraji, that her life changes. Tsukasa had aspiring dreams to become a pro figure skater, but wasn’t able to due to starting at a later age. He becomes depressed over life due to not achieving anything significant in his figure skating career. When Tsukasa meets Inori, he realizes that she’s the same as him and decides to help her realize her dreams of becoming a pro figure skating medalist no matter what.

The art in this series is incredible. The figure skating scenes are well-done, but what really shines are the character interactions. Inori won the Magademy 2023 award for best female character and I can see why she won. She’s a kid who’s trying her damn best to challenge her insecurities via her passion for ice skating. I can’t help but be moved when Inori says something important to get her point across.

Tsukasa is a relatable character to those who feel lost at their hobby. As someone who feels like they started “late” for a competitive interest where it’s best to start young, I get where Tsukasa is coming from. This applies to my now-daily interest in Japanese mahjong. I’m well-past the general demographic (18-34) for the game in the U.S. as I started playing at the age of 38. There’s obviously certain barriers (mostly life responsibility-related), but I recently experienced the joy of helping a beginner get through a game in-person. I think, like Tsukasa, I want to at least help the next generation of mahjong players get started and find their paths to become better players.

Inori and Tsukasa’s relationship is amazing and well-written. Every great athlete needs a coach to bring out the best in them. However, if the coach/athlete relationship is based on how much an athlete wins, it will not go well. This becomes complicated when it comes to coaching children. With the exception of Inori being a 5th grader, Medalist focuses on aspiring 3rd grade figure skaters who are, for the most part, level-headed. But they all have personality quirks that can get in the way of achieving greatness. This manga does a great job in illustrating the coach/athlete dynamic when it comes to very young children. It’s something I don’t see in most media.

One of my favorite moments is in Volume 2 where Inori boldly tells her mother that she will get 1st place in a preliminary showing at a major cup and attempt techniques that appear to be hard for her. Inori’s mother didn’t really approve of Tsukasa getting her daughter into the world of pro figure skating at the start. But once she saw Inori look like an absolute gem in the making on the rink, she laments that she never thought of Inori’s feelings out of a fear of being hurt inside. I don’t know about any of you, but in my experience, my mother told me not to push myself so hard because of my mental limitations. She has told me not to try super-challenging jobs due to my depression. I think maybe she was trying to make sure she didn’t get hurt by my struggles and look like a bad parent to others. Part of it was also my own fault since I looked at the labeling I was prescribed a bit too seriously. 

So yeah, seeing Inori’s mother know that Inori can actually do something meaningful with her life got me emotional. I do feel that some parents are really overprotective over their children and what they should be doing in life. I don’t blame them because failure over things that aren’t the norm will always be scary. Plus, not every dream will come true. Yet I know what every child wants from their parent is to believe in their ability to become whatever it is they want to be/do and that they’ll have their support no matter what. I wish more parents opened their eyes enough to see that.

I could go on and on about Medalist, but I’ll stop here. This is a fantastic series to read for anyone interested in relating to ambitious children and being there for them in realistic ways. Medalist is a bold story that details what it takes to create a winning environment for children, parents, and the communities around them. 

[makima-s-most-smile]

Trigun Maximum 8 Part 1

Emotional destruction Vol.2. There is more to come!

Trigun Ultimate: 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4 Trigun Maximum: 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, 2.2, 3.1, 3.2, 4.1, 4.2, 5.1, 5.2, 6.1, 6.2, 7.1, 7.2, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 9.1, 9.2, 10.1, 10.2, 10.3, 10.4, 10.5

How… how has Nightow the style of 80s shoujo manga down to a T? I love it.

I didn’t see this at first, BUT KNIVES IS HOLDING A KNIFE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

01: Invasion

Of course, the Golden Gate-like-Bridge needs to be destroyed to show that the attack has begun. While the ark looks cool and all, it doesn’t really looks like something that can stay in the air. (really, Knives? Tell me how you plan to let the people on the ark live after you do the genocide. Self Absorbed bastard. This is your ark, for you alone.)

Yes, take even more agency from him.

Having his whole body weight on one point, the connector must hurt so much right now. I am sure it feels like it gets slowly torn out.

Legato could make a fortune by being a sport instructor. Just make me move! I pay you!

I wanna slap him so badly. Seriously. THANKS TO VASH?! He is running around trying to help them as much as he can!

KNIVES! YOU ARE THE REASON THAT YOUR SISTERS ARE ON THIS PLANET AT ALL! TELL ME AGAIN ABOUT YOUR SIN OF ACCIDENTALLY KILLING THE SISTERS THAT WERE ON THE 802 SHIPS. YOU DID NOT KNOW THAT YOUR FUCKING HAIR TURNS DARK WHEN YOU START TO DECAY! THE FIRST LAST RUN YOU SAW WAS LIKE 2 WEEKS AGO! TELL ME HOW MANY SISTERS YOU HAVE SEEN DIE, AGAIN?! You had 150 years to learn about this! 150 years and you failed to do so. Your sisters and their wellbeing aren’t that important to you, buddy. Don’t use them to give yourself validity. And don’t you dare to use Tesla again!

FUCKING FINALLY! I NEED SOMETHING MORE THAN CAPSLOCK TO MAKE MY RAGE ABOUT KNIVES’ DENIAL KNOWN!

Oh, tsundere Legato time. And Knives does not stop him. Does Knives truly not understand that Legato is starting to act not only on his own but against Knives’ stated interests?

At first I thought this was a moment of peace for Wolfwood that boils down to him finding his determination. But in hindsight, this is him knowing he is starting to get crushed between the rock and the hard place. He is waiting to act, he cannot act, even though most gruesome things are happening all around him and he is part of it. (Insert the: "Kitten, I'll be honest. Daddy is about to kill himself"-meme)

Who else thought about Carl? “That’s what forgiveness sounds like. Screaming and then silence.” Knives, that kills people!

*snorts* Yeah, because you have had such a presence in the story til now. Tell me again, how lawful the world is. I'll wait. Yeah, at the bar of that nice granny with the guy that was nearly lynched with his truly innocent bestie.

I forgot about that. I forgot that Wolfwood is used to kill in the cities. I made a pained squeaky noise when I saw them. Someone shut Chapel up and hug Wolfwood!

Wolfwood’s past pulls him down. His training and way of life goes so strongly against his morals. And Chapel knows exactly how to use it to hurt Wolfwood.

But Wolfwood has already changed so much during the story. From the start, while he put his own life first, he never killed with any animosity, the didn't torture people. By following Vash’ (pretty selfdestructive) ruling, he found a way of going forward that fits his morals so much more. He cares about life and especially the lives of others. His responsibilities still stand, that’s why he is still able to kill, but this Wolfwood here is very far from the pupil Chapel had true power over.

Can someone shut this bitch up, please?

Chapel is a manipulator. He knows his “pupils” and knows how to put them down. He doesn’t plan to take Wolfwood in again. He just wants to hurt him. He wants revenge for Wolfwood acting out, for Wolfwood deserting the Eye of Michael's teachings. But this is a struggle for power over Wolfwood, too. Livio is a much better pupil in his eyes, since Chapel seemingly erased his character and wants successfully.

The antithesis of the blank ticket. Your past binds you down. You cannot start anew. Just give in and accept your given place in the world. It is Wolfwood's way of thinking, too. No wonder he hurts so much. Chapel’s teachings dug deep into him.

Wolfwood realises how deeply Chapel has dug his claws into Livio. That’s why he tries to force Chapel to make Livio stop and not Livio himself. But he has no power in this situation here. Chapel has the power since he has power over Livio. And, damn, he uses it to hurt Wolfwood in revenge. Wolfwood is desperately looking for a way out, but he cannot find one.

His sisters want him to stop, too. Not that he listens.

Vash is still hateful of himself for attacking Rem. He never stopped. Even working through his anger at Rem... The anger was replaced with selfhatred and ever since then he has been spiraling.

But the thought about people not changing… They talk about humanity, but isn’t it about Knives, too? I highly doubt that Knives can change. Everyone is able to, but not everyone chooses to do so. Knives cannot reflect upon what he has done, because then he himself and humanity wouldn’t be that different. Both twins are so good in seeing things just as black and white. Damn all of humanity or all of humanity is good, instead of what it truly is, grey. 

OF COURSE HE SAID TESLA! This is so much not about Tesla. Poor girl is just a pawn for Knives, like everyone else. He was such a sensitive kid and now he cannot even realise his own true feelings, much less recognise feelings in other people. He is living a delusion.

It makes Knives an interesting villain, though. I like villains that you can somewhat empathise with. Every last one of us can end like him (without the outright genocide). He is a warning and he is not redeemable, however much I feel for him.

Edit: Upon rereading my last paragraph can be so misinterpreted. What I meant with 'without the outright genocide' was not that neither of us can be easily radicalised and be part of a genocide by either inaction, outright ignoring it or even be an active part of it. My country's history is a glowing negative example of it. I literally meant that we cannot be a fucking warship.

Ugh, yes, Vash is completely right. 

But look at you, Vash. You are a bottle under so much pressure, too. You drinking away your pain does not erase it. You know the source, but you never started to deal with it at all. Why does the stuff you preach never reach you yourself?

But Knives turns away from Vash, again and again. Knives cannot open himself up to Vash. Anger and hate are feelings that are so much better than the vulnerable hurt and fear. Seriously, Vash, how long til it is enough?

“Then we will be even.” No, not really. The people who have hurt Knives are gone. There is no balance to be redone. Knives’ “even” means that the scales are completely destroyed and only he remains. Knives pumps out new victims of violence daily, the only words that are spoken are “Hate creates more hate, violence creates more violence.” Knives has been gone up in his crusade since the Great Fall. Everything after that was him actively searching for and creating more and more reasons to justify him causing the Great Fall and more importantly, killing Rem.

02: Silent Ruin

I shall save our imprisoned sisters! By imprisoning them in MY BODY! A much better idea! Knives does not care about them. Everyone has to agree with him. There is no group, there is no peace, there is only Knives. And Knives can only stop if only Knives remains. If he successfully erases humanity, then he will turn on his sisters, he will turn (more) on Vash. 

I have to agree with one thing from Chapel. He taught Wolfwood really better than to let someone get away… Someone like Chapel… Just saying.

Wolfwood tries his best to protect his home. It is never enough, the odds are so against him. How must that feel? That you give your all, you put yourself between something that evil and children and it is not enough. Remembering Wolfwood’s second nightmare, he killed Chapel to protect the orphanage from Chapel. Maybe Wolfwood found out about the continued usage by Chapel just then.

“So many uses for the good-natured.” I don’t think Wolfwood gets that Chapel means him, too. Wolfwood has been used and abused by him. He is a victim. And he cannot see it. He only sees the things he has done, not that he literally had no choice there. And he lets all the sins fall back to him, making him completely monstrous in his own eyes.

Chapel is so sure that his grip on Livio is complete and I so hope that Wolfwood can prove him wrong. 

There is something to be said about the arm sticking up into the air like the ship from the Great Fall. Even the angle is the same. This is something like the Second Fall. 

Just a reminder that Wolfwood is on the ship, unable to do anything to stop this, waiting and hoping for something to happen so he can act. And it is eating him alive. He is isolated and completely alone. If he rebels now, his life would be not only forfeited, but he would also be unable to help when… if… the time comes. He has to kill in Knives’ name while he waits all his morals and pain aside. The deaths would happen anyway. But that doesn’t change Wolfwood from hating himself for doing so. Vash is at least actively fighting Legato, Wolfwood suffers a different kind of torture. And I am not gonna lie, I'd prefer to be in Vash' position instead of Wolfwood's.

So, like after the Great Fall. How many people died after the initial crash due to hunger, infighting and exposure? Has the population since then grown? Or is it still stagnating?

INSURANCE WOMEN! AHHHHHHHH!

03: Counterattack!!!

I just love Meryl and Milly as intelligence, checking out the situation in the different cities and bringing the info to the people who are able to do something.

I love the proactiveness, I love their care, I love their bravery.

Meryl looks so different. She has lost her spunk, her spark. She looks so much more downtrodden and depressed. Softer and hurt, really.

I love our brat Brad. Like Meryl and Milly, he is a good person who tries to help the way he can. He couldn’t go out, til now, because his expertise was needed, but he is ready to go at the frontlines.

It looks like none of them know what happened to Vash. The last people of the group who have seen him are Meryl and Milly and that was when he was driven out of the city.

FINALLY SHE TELLS SOMEONE! 

And I didn’t get that Meryl knows everything… She saw more than Hoppered, but it looked like everything since Vash was adulty, but maybe Nightow retconned that one.

I have complicated feelings about this. Meryl wanted to get to know Vash and know of his enigmatic past. But narratively, Vash and she didn’t really do anything to get there. It was an accident. Vash didn’t need to change and open up to share this. And… that is an ongoing flaw of him, a flaw that has already cost him so much and we don’t see it changing. Vash not only gets her total empathy without opening up, he now gets it from all of Home (or at least the command). That said, I like that we see it affecting Meryl. She is traumatised, rightfully so. She is working through it either completely alone or only with Milly. For all the empathy Vash deserves for his life, he doesn’t really earn it by connecting to others. Others connect in his stead for him. While Meryl suffers for it alone, Vash profits from it. This is an ongoing pattern, not only with Meryl. With Wolfwood, too. How often did Wolfwood persist and run after Vash to keep on talking, while Vash avoided? And it irks me more and more, the further the volumes go. Vash is a self made martyr, but it is the people that care about him that pay most of the price. Vash needs an Oh-Moment, but I don’t trust that even that would be enough. 

Oh. Vash fought Knives before! Until now it looked like July was his first “real” fight with Knives, but he had altercations before. I would love to know more about those, because from what we saw in July and Jeneora Rock, Vash had so much trouble confronting Knives. Vash’ conflict avoidance, especially with Knives, is such a big part of him. He actively goes against Wolfwood’s advice to check out the erased towns more than once. We know that Vash has a real inner conflict going on about Knives, that he says he wants to kill him but his actions say otherwise. Did no one zoom in on that in the past? Or wasn’t it there then?

Young Luida!

Is he fighting on his own? Maybe, maybe not. But I love that the humans are now empowered enough to go and help Vash and don’t leave it to him. It doesn’t look like they wanted to in the past, either, but Vash left them no choice. Now Vash needs them, even if they don’t know how much.

No, Luida! Don’t join the selfhate club! What counts is your actions and not your thoughts. And you are the least of a coward. You lead a fucking company. Same for you, Meryl! You stood by Vash’ side. Yes, you didn’t completely understand the danger you were in, but may I remind you of Keele? Please don’t let yourself get pulled down by those martyrs. You do enough and are strong enough.

And next to everyone is like that. People don’t want conflict, they don’t want to risk being hurt or worse killed. They don’t want their loved ones to die. So if someone else is able to bear all the responsibility and pain, they feel relief. But that often leads to people like Vash and even more like Wolfwood. People who have to bear the gross alone. But what counts is action. And Meryl is going out into a warzone, trying to help and get info, Luida is leading a resistance.

Being a leader is such a difficult position. On the one hand you are safe from the frontlines, but everyone's life is on your shoulders. Your mistakes add up and your victories are easily forgotten. It is so easy to see leaders as highpaid CEOs that cash in while the workers suffer. Luida is not one of those and I hope she does not stick to that fallacy.

The plants share their memory. Vash has been shown to connect to his sisters via his mind, why wouldn’t his sisters be unable to do it, too? And this is a sign, this is a cry for Knives to stop. His sisters do not want this. They could show him hurtful things, but instead they show him humans appreciating them. What is important for me in that scene is that it is not only a child asking questions, it is a mother teaching the child ageappropriately about the plants, showing her own gratitude to the plant in question and it then gets reflected in the husband, too. The plants care for humans, they want to help. (Little siderant about angels. Angels are so much like machines. They exist for their godgiven purpose and are satisfied with this. They do not wish for more. Dependent plants seem more and more like angels, especially with Nightow saying they see humanity as their god. Independent plants, like humans, have no ingrained purpose and maybe part of the twin’s struggle comes from this. They don’t know their purpose, but they feel like they need one. Nice reflection of the modern human.)

Knives is visibly upset by his sister’s memory. Of course, since it goes against what he preaches. It shakes his resolve. Vash seems shaken, too. I cannot really put his expression there. Well, he is most likely in pain and enduring Legato. But beyond that… who knows.

I am not sure how to interpret these panels. Especially with it ending on Wolfwood smoking, what we have seen before is him enduring and waiting, too. Could it be that the dream of the plants is on par with Vash and Wolfwood, with them enduring and waiting for their time to act to give balance back to humanity and plants? Or is it a foreshadowing that those two will help the plants achieve this balance?

COUNTERATTACK! THE TIME OF WAITING IS OVER! Yes, Knives… you are so completely rational, standing at the front of your battleship, laughing maniacally.

Plant memories. Good ones. Even the researcher with the cross that got halved by Knives is part of it. His sisters see the good in humans, how they try and they appreciate it. Moreso, they actively use these memories on Knives to stop him, to make him listen.

Even here. Brad doesn’t want to attack the innocent plants. But Knives uses them as shield. Brad has to do this to get through to Knives, to have any hope of success. And again, a struggle that is caused by Knives himself that in the end hurts mainly his sisters, while he is unaffected.

And this is what the regular panels of Wolfwood smoking boiled down to. He waited for a time to act. 

It looks creepy and quiet, like a predator inching in on his prey, looming over it in a real display of power difference. An omen of death and judgement. But Wolfwood also looks like a broken man, a dead man walking at the same time. Like I said, Wolfwood has been through his own torture for seven months and I truly believe that it has left massive scars in him.

[burningfairytales]

Just saw your answer. Can I ask, why do you love Haikyuu, All for the Game, and Throne of Glass? I think those 3 media are unique (because they're so different from each other) and I love to read your writings.

Hey! :)

Of course you can ask!

I know, they're all super different; it's weird.

Starting with Throne of Glass - I love the growth of the whole book series a a whole? In both the characters but also the writing itself.

You can really tell that SJM was young when she started writing it, and I think it's fun to see how her writing evolves with time.

(Fun fact - I couldn't finish the first one when I picked it up the first time. I thought it was horrible. I gave it another chance after reading ACOTAR though, and everyone is right: It does get so much better. Now I think it's cool to compare the writing in the first book to the writing in the last one.)

I like the storyline, and I LOVE the characters. I think every single character is well-rounded. They're flawed and they all learn and grow.

I also have to say that by now, I prefer ToG to ACOTAR because, well. The first three books were great! After that it felt like they solely existed for smut purposes. Not that there's anything wrong with that - it's just not my cup of tea.

In Throne of Glass you did have some scenes that bordered on spice, but it felt fitting. Like it was there for a reason - a natural continuation of the characters becoming intimate with each other both physically and mentally. It didn't feel like there was smut just for the sake of it being there, if that makes sense?

In general I just felt like the characters and their interactions and relationships felt very natural to me.

As for All for the Game - I mean.

I was part of the fandom when we were still 20 people and a cardboard cutout, you know? There were very few of us, but we loved those books fiercely. And as there was barely any fan-content out there at the time, we had to go out and make it ourselves.

I met some people in that time that I will never forget - people I wish all the happiness in the world for, even if we don't talk anymore.

I also met one of my best friends through those books. Now imagine - this was almost ten years ago, and this year, she officiated my wedding.

So those books will always, always be special to me.

As for the story itself - I had no idea what I was about to read at the time. Someone on tumblr recommended them to me and she generally had great taste, so I tried them. I mean, if she had told me I was about to read "Sports Manga Goes to America And Also The Mafia Shows Up" it might have stayed on my to-read list forever.

It does sound pretty ridiculous.

But this whole theme of all these damaged kids coming together and having to figure things out together, and helping each other heal?

That kinda gets me everytime, and Nora did it especially well.

It was like, never once was an issue talked about like it meant nothing. People tend to handle trauma like it comes with an expiration date, you know? Like there is just a certain point after which you're expected to be over it.

Well, some things you don't get over. Ever. And they get easier to deal with, with the right tools. And the right people. But that doesn't make them lesser-than. I think that's a theme that just spoke to me.

Also, I mean, the whole relationship between Neil and Andrew. I mean. Yeah. Perfection.

As for Haikyuu - which is perhaps my oddest choice, and also my latest obsession...

I went into expecting nothing. I knew it was a sports anime that people talked about a few years ago, and I always meant to check it out, but never got around to it.

And then it was on Netflix, and I thought, hey, y'know what, I haven't watched any good animes lately.

Look, I didn't go into it expecting to cry because Hinata managed to receive a stupid ball. I didn't expect to cry because of "thanks for getting me into volleyball."

I may have expected crying about "It's time I became an ace. Period." if I'd known it was coming, but I DIDN'T SO THERE'S THAT.

Thing is, I cannot, for the live of me, think of a single character I don't like. There are characters I really wanted to not like (I'm so sorry Tendo, you deserved better) and characters I am still midly annoyed by (look as hilarious as that snake guy was he was just in too many scenes, okay. I had the same problem with him that I had with the one guy from Laketown in The Hobbit 3. You know which one I'm talking about. Like three main characters DIED and you didn't get to mourn them because apparently an executive decision was made to underminde that tragedy by forcing a guy to wear a dress and expect the audience to laugh at that.

It's been years. I am still bitter.)

(Ahem.)

But yes, I just love every single character so, so much. They're all so intricate with their own desires and flaws and dreams and ways of thinking. I rarely even liked a main character as much as I love Hinata.

I love the relationship each team displays among its members. I love their dynamics. I love the dynamics the teams have amongst each other.

Ah - another scene that had me choking back tears. Daichi's and Kuroo's hug. I mean. After all those "I'm going to break your hand"-handshakes?? Yeah, there were tears.

Haikyuu might not have the depth that for example Throne of Glass has when it comes to its plot, but that's not necessary - it wins in other aspects.

I'm telling you that when I'm having a Bad Day (capital letters necessary), Haikyuu is a show that will cheer me up. Sometimes it doesn't need much. Sometimes a few dorks with a volleyball will do. It's just a very feel-good show - or a feel-good manga series of course.

So I guess, maybe these three things aren't completely different - they all overlap in the part that matters most to me: people finding each other. Strangers becoming a team, a family, and choosing to help each other through life.

Found family, man. That will never not get me.

[throwaway-yandere]

List of Yan!Idol Event Producers/Assistants:

This will be frequently updated! I'm not posting all anons at once, but I'll spoil the first five who guaranteed a spot: 🕯️ anon, bao bei anon, 🐠 anon, 🕊️ anon, and 🦊 anon!

Producer Lumine: if you sent your request on my inbox and NOT the google forms link as instructed in the guidelines, I'll ignore it. I'm sorry, but Madam Alice will literally blow me up if we hired you without going through her "interview" process.

-----

Dandelion anon: "I'd like to think that my strengths come from my ability to read the room and consider the feelings of everyone whilst still using logic (and not letting it cloud me, so you can call me balanced?). I've been told that I naturally exude a comforting aura and it makes others feel safe around me! I am also quite affectionate and loves to dote on those I love. As for weaknesses, I tend to find more stability in planning, so I may lack a bit in the spontaneity department (but I'd be willing to be more spontaneous with someone who brings out that side of me). I also tend to give advices to others, but struggle to practice them myself at times T-T"

Lumine's notes: "smarter than average, plays a sport/knows martial arts, fond of cleaning". Alright then, you're Heizou's producer. Can't say you can get used to his "spontaneity" quickly... I'm sorry for that.

"Esther" anon: I like jazz music. I dont like rap, but i can appreciate a good melody. I especially like rock, rnb and some pop, specifically the ones with angsty breakup songs as the main point. I like to draw, especially the eyes and the hands. You’d be surprised how much personality is in those. Dont give me that look. I dont have a fetish. I really, really like the sun. I dont like cold weather. But i have this…thing where i drink the coffee in the afternoon, and eat popsicles when it rains. It gives off that…synergy, y’know. Also hot soups best meal ever. Mushroom soup beloved like HHHHH

Lumine's notes: "nosy, likes angst, does theater/spoken word" Hmm... I think you'd do fine with Mister Alberich... I think he'd be quite fond of you.

🕊️ anon: My main personality traits are that I am loud, bubbly, enthusiastic, energetic, easygoing and very kind! My friends always praise my intuition and are always amazed at how I am able to tell what they're feeling - they can never fool me! For my worst personality traits I'd definitely say that I'm really lazy and leave everything in the last minute and that I can get really sensitive sometimes. I'm also very self conscious of how I look which isn't good because I always end up downplaying myself in one way or the other. I can also be VERY scatterbrained, no seriously, it's amazing and kind of pathetic at how easily I forget things... I love history, mythologies and fairy tales, reading manga and watching anime, being with friends!!

Lumine's notes: "well put-together, into soft yanderes, laughs a lot, 'nosy'," amongst other things– *sigh* why am I even evaluating this? This is Diluc's producer.

Snailnom: I may have issues with vulnerability, empathy, and may be extremely touchy, but I'm the best person to be around when you're feeling down. I'll give great distractions and I'm always willing to talk! I'm just fantastic! And that's not the ego talking since I am also the most humble person ever! I am literally perfect! In everyway. I put my all into everything I care about! Which is.. unfortunately, not much outside of friendships. I have bits of trust issues, but that’s not a problem, since you can trust me! Totally! I am your friend and DEFINITELY not an enabler first, friend second. I would do petty crimes with you! I would go wild! I will eat a grape off the floor! Go apeshit! Do no harm!! I'm also a cheapskate, I'd prefer gifts you'd find down the street: like a piece of shiny glass, a smooth rock, a blade of grass, literally anything but something that could cause money! But uhoh! That might have been a lie! Not a complete one though, never those, after all.. The best lies have bits of truth in it! I do like gifts you'd find on the street, but I do like things you spend money on. Ehehehehehehe~ I am both cautious and reckless. I will jump headfirst off a (reasonable) height with no hesitation while be too scared to go down a crowded road by myself. Speaking of doing things by myself, I don't like doing that, and would love to do things with a friend if possible. I love the simple things... Like world domination and trying to eat an entire bag of fries in a few seconds. Ah, the good life is my life.

Lumine's notes: Pfft– haha! I don't even wanna read the rest. I just wanna see you produce Itto. (ps: you definitely got this job because of your energy. Even your other answers solidified it. This is fate–)

Fox: Strengths - Patient, persistent, responsible, witty, loyal and kind Weaknesses - Cautious, sensitive, very serious, low confidence/self worth and indecisive. Interests - gaming, drawing, thought proving exchanges with friends, watching youtube videos, travelling, and eating good food. First appearances: I’m probably one of the most god awkward and reserved people you will ever meet. I will give close answers and forgot how to function out of shock. Despite a million thoughts going on in my brain. But aside from that I’m a pretty chill person from what my friends tell me and can be mysterious, unpredictable at times. Have a huge sweet tooth for sweets and snacks an awful lot. My mind is logical but chaotic at the same time wanting to multitask through 5 other things trying to be efficient as possible. But even then mid way I probably get distracted by something else not even related to the tasks I was doing in the first place.

Lumine's note: I hesitated on whether or not Mister Kamisato gets with Fox because they're compatible or with Producer Hundred for the chaos... But there's just no way I'm robbing Mister Kamisato a chance of a great work partner given how overworked he is. Fox's a smart person, I think Ayato would grow fond of them in due time. He does have a thing for dogs, after all...

=============

mei ✾: i'm creative but also logical. normally very easygoing but serious about my job. i have a lot of love to give! i tend to express my love with physical touch and quality time. i dislike confrontations and will try to avoid it at all costs. i'm shy and find it difficult to talk with strangers (although i do a 180 once i'm comfortable with someone) i'm bad at keeping up communications because 1) i always feel that i'm bothering people or 2) some days i just don't have the energy for it. i struggle a lot with body image especially for myself. - taste in music: i love everything tbh! from pop to kpop to country to cpop to game osts, as long as i like how it sounds, i add it to my playlist haha

Alhaitham's voicemail: "I hired them because they have a neat handwriting. That's all. What? "I don't believe you"...? F-Fine. I hired them because I knew them from before. They're incredibly smart, logical, great at math, and a realist. That's all you need to know."

Solitary anon: My strengths? Probably communications and creativity. I've met loads of people in the past so I'm able to adjust myself to everyone around me. I like to create a balance and it often results with me being the 'trustworthy' or 'reliable' friend. But as I get more comfortable around people, I get a bit more talkative and my humour starts to shine through, My weaknesses is probably the fact that I adjust myself to everyone around me (its a strength and a weakness). I have the constant need to be perfect, to be liked, and I know it's damn impossible to be like that - but I still try. So I end up being pushed over easily and social gatherings exhaust me (as much as I like them,) I really like to write and do art! It's one of my outlets and I've been enjoying it ever since I was younger. I write my own novels aside from fanfiction and I even drew comics! I'm pretty smart but too lazy to study much (unless I like it). My absolute favorite color is blue (im like a moth and blue is my light). I love to game and I also like to listen to music. My style is dark academia and Idk what more to say?

Cyno's voicemail: "Tighnari, I met someone who can understand me. They like dogs. Hmm? Oh. They also like dark academia, tabletop games, a realist-- You're not interested?... Understood."

Bakery anon: "I’m a bit of a bookworm (I own atleast 14 poetry books and..more other books) however I also am quite fond of baking! Though aside from that I’m described as motherly and loyal by my friends."

Dottore's coffee-table book record: "Smart and creative. A perfectly fine mindset, can certainly handle others, a creative– an asset that can be used as a clean-up slave... Hmm, this specimen will prove to be most useful."

[applescabs]

tagged by @phoenixfangs yayyaa get ready for paragraph assault. it's vacation so I'm watching lots of shit.

reading: oof. lots and lots of things. plenty of ongoing mangas (i mostly follow by the volume) most notably I'm almost done w Homunculus (2 vol left) and King in Limbo's last omnibus is dropping on tuesday (i preordered it) so im excited for that! ig I'm also playing through slow damage rn, which is mostly a visual novel, but it has more gameplay than the usual nc visnov. its a mystery, which im always a fan of.

currently watching: 4 things w my brother; -boku no hero season 7. yes, season 7. yes, I still like this series, in fact I think it's really good and it's kinda funny to me how there's so many joke posts going around (made by people who havent even seen it) about it being shit. it airs on saturdays but we usually watch it on sundays (because that was more convenient last season and it sorta stuck) -isekai suicide squad. its entertaining/interesting enough and has some good animation sometimes. it airs on thursdays so we literally just watched the newest one. i like clayface n deadshot in this one. -blue lock. i went to the Nagi movie w another friend and then managed to convince Finn to watch the show with me. he's not a sports anime guy (this is his first) so we'll see how it goes, lmao. we're trying to watch s1 before s2 drops in october, but we're keeping it a weekly thing, watching it alongside new releases. -jojo part 3 ova. we watch this one sporadically since the episodes are longer than the standard nowadays, so he's not always in the mood. the music in this one was made by one guy with his midi soundboard, but I love the vibe of the whole thing, very different from david prod p3. I'm also watching 4 things myself; -Cowboy Bebop. constantly in awe of how good it looks. the fine details on the ships and weapons... augh. its making me want to check out more 90s animes. i'm also a big fan of how it does its storytelling, its got good visual language and utilises "show dont tell" well. i exclusively watch this one on the tv instead of my laptop, its too good for the laptop. -Shuumatsu Train. one that i didnt finish last season that i decided to pick back up, since its strange and interesting enough that it seems like a waste to leave unfinished. -Boueibu s1. im rewatching s1 so that i can immediately watch s2 afterwards (havent seen it yet) -Tasogare Outfocus. what can i say. i always watch anything gay that comes out (not that i always finish them...) i do also like movies and moviemaking so the backdrop interests me as well.

currently craving: im actually like. full af i just had icecream for desert plus an iced coffee afterwards. ig im craving brushing my teeth.

coffee or tea: see thats the thing. cant choose. im choosing both. i like to have both coffee and tea at night, coffee as a nice after dinner treat (mostly iced coffee, if it's hot i usually drink it in the afternoon) and tea late at night when I'm chilling. might make some tea after i stop being so full. also zach i might just have to take you to court over the sweet tea thing. better find a good lawyer.

tagginggg @kuwupikaa @sunflowermews @isleofair @drakefisher @xrd n anyone who feels compelled to do thisss