#saeru x ene

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne Snow Day YCH Commission by Hika 🖤💙🐍🐇

Kuroha (Saeru) and Ene Snow Day YCH Commission by Hika (@/onigiwi2namayo)

Hika's Twitter: (X)

Hika's VGen: (X)

In accordance with Hika's Terms of Service (TOS), editing, using, or reposting these arts, in any way, is prohibited without explicit permission from Hika, and me, the commissioner.

Intro

Ene: I haven't touched snow for a long time, I forgot how cold it could be! (>v<) (*)

(*) = Quote from Feila.

I asked for KuroEne on a Winter Date building a snow bunny together 🐰☃️❄️

I also requested to have an Ene themed bunny snowman with a blue scarf around it 🥰💙

Hika was really nice with minor revision changes. I asked for minor revisions regarding the arrows on his boots, his dot facial markings, and to shift the colour palette more saturated and to use more cool blues for Ene, and more saturated red/purple tones for Kuroha.

I like the visual contrast it creates, with them taking cool and warm tones ^^

I feel so much joy... My skrunklies are so cute! I love seeing them in alt outfits! It's really refreshing~ 💘

I had trouble deciding whether to commission KuroEne or MaryEne for this. Hard decision since they're both cute. So I'll commission MaryEne next time.

Misc Rambles

I'M GONNA SCREAM THEY'RE SO CUTE IN HIKA'S STYLE 🥹🖤💙

WAHHH THEY LOOK SO CUTE 🥺 MY PRECIOUS OTP 🖤 💙

THE COLOURS LOOK PERFECT 💗💞💖

They look like they're having fun 🥰

The colours Hika chose are so good omg… Hika has really good colour coordination. I love her soft colours

Hika's dot lining style is so cute. Works really well for chibis ☺️ Her lining style is so clean. She has such nice colours.

Seeing my beloveds in Hika's style brings me such joy 🫶 💞

I did NOT expect a sketch WIP so soon. I was shocked by the turn around time

My Message

Thank you very much for the lovely commission! My Snow Day commission came out perfect! It's so cute!!! 💙🖤🐍🐰❄️☃️

I love how Hika drew the couple's poses, expressions, and design details. The finished artwork looks so cozy. It makes me so happy! 💗🥰

Hika has an adorable chibi style and great colours.

Hika is very nice and attentive. Very accommodating with the minor revision changes I asked for (detail and colour revisions)

Great communication and makes sure to check in and provide feedback at every stage. Super quick responses and really easy to work with! The delivery was super fast too! 👍

VGen Review

They're so cute in your style! 🥹🖤💙 I love how you did their design details and expressions. Their poses and expressions are adorable! It makes me so happy to see them in your style! I love how the commission turned out! The Snow Day art just looks so cozy ☺️

I love the soft colours you chose! You're really good at harmonizing colours. Thank you for being very accommodating with minor revision changes and incorporating my requests (scarf on the bunny snowman, minor detail and colour revisions) 🙏

Your lining style is so clean and you have such nice colours! You have a great chibi style!

Thank you very much for the lovely commission as always! It came out perfect~ 😭💗🫶✨ Have a nice day!

Commission Rambles

These were the refs I sent.

We were trying to decide between KuroEne and MaryEne at first, so we gathered the MekaDan's winter outfit refs.

Feila suggested to go with the Winter outfits used for the MekaDan chibi keychains by Fujimori (if MaryEne), but to give Kuroha a funny trenchcoat (if KuroEne), cuz he'd look so edgy mysterious that it'd be funny.

I went with KuroEne this time too cuz I really wanted to see them in alt outfits. I can go for winter MaryEne in the future

Since Saeru doesn't have a winter merch outfit, I asked for him to wear a black trench coat (photo ref) with a gray or black scarf, and his regular outfit's headphones, pants, and boots.

Feila imagined winter Kuroha wearing this big trenchcoat. I think it fits him very well 🥰

I always love seeing charas in alt designs (hairstyles and clothing) 🥰 It's nice to see more of their casual clothes. I would love to comm arts of MaryEne's casual outfits (last images). These fits are SOOO cute

Konoha and Saeru's boots have 2 straps with gray squares on them, so I let Hika simplify it based on the Kuroha rubber strap charm that simplifies them to 1 strap instead, due to the tiny feet in the style.

...

F: I lowkey want him to be in theme. I wanna imagine Kuroha in one of these. Do we want Ene to just be bunny themed or winter themed?

Me: Saeru and his snakes, go!!! Kuroha with a funny trench coat it is

F: Ene's definitely the playful type while the snakes are both the calm type so Ene would be the one standing. And I imagine her expression would be >v<

Me: Yeah they would definitely be the ones on their knees helping Ene build the snowman all calm and content~

F: Winter Anthology has both KuroEne and MaryEne. We are so back 💥💥💥

Me: KonoEne too cuz Ene's holding a Konoha-themed snowball

F: Snow day HebiEne (because it's either Mary or Kuroha)

Me: Both KuroEne and MaryEne are Snake x Bunny themed (technically cuz Mary is part Medusa), but MaryEne is a much softer version of it

Me: Mary should wear warmer clothes since she's more affected by the cold

I imagine Ene with her android body in my KuroEne AU isn't as affected cuz her body's heating/cooling system was made by Saeru

Saeru could just use Awakening Eyes to rebuild his body so it isn't as affected by the cold (he could make it so that his body retains heat better than the regular human, if he wanted)

Commission Rambles

Me: I sent this form.

Hika sends frequent updates and checks in at every stage (sketch, finished art with lineart + colours) so she wanted to check in with minor colour revisions with me once the lineart + colours were done.

Saeru originally had a monochrome colour palette (without any coloured tint), and I preferred for his palette to be more saturated and to differentiate the colours from each other more so there's more visual contrast.

So I showed Hika what I'd like the colours to be, and let her adjust the colours to her preferences. I sent this as a colour guide (and marked where they should be, cuz otherwise it'd be unclear)

Hika used my colour suggestions, and then adjusted some colours ^^

F: This is so oddly detailed, but I think it's a good enough guideline :D

F: The purple palette you suggested looks amazing. Even if it's a slight change, it looks and feels more like a calming winter breeze, while the original is an ecstatic wintry vibe

F: Could be so perfect for the retro style… Maybe it could be a little piece of photo that was printed out and Ene holds it dearly like her life depends on it

F: You know, it'd be funny if Ene has a cool tone in contrast while Kuroha has a warm tone in contrast. Could be a little symbolism

Me: Reminds me of my KuroEne kiss doodle from before 🤭🖤💙🫶 I made Ene have more cooler tones while I made Kuroha have more warmer tones for visual contrast reasons.

Red is the colour of blood ❤️ It's a good ref to these shots from Outer Science where he smears blood all over his face

[stepswowdsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne AU: Takane/Ene multiships celebrate her birthday 🖤💙🎂🎉

Summary:

Takane/Ene multiships centric 💙🧡🐇🎧

Mekakushi Dan members and Kuroha/Saeru celebrate Takane/Ene's birthday (KuroEne, MaryEne, KonoEne, AyaTaka, HaruTaka) 🎂🎉

KuroEne go on a trip together for Ene's birthday 💐

KuroEne go to a zoo together 🐍

Saeru's "love" 🖤

(Idea came to mind cuz Jin motherfucking gatekeeps my wife Takane/Ene's birthday)

I just had the idea come to mind but one day I would love to draw birthday related arts of Takane/Ene with everyone I ship her with giving her a kiss on the cheek (and something related to the ship)

KuroEne 🖤💙🐍🐇

Kuroha: Happy birthday, my dear little bunny~ Today is your birthday, correct? What would you like for your birthday? This is a very special occasion, so I'll spoil and pamper you so... Don't worry, I'll make all your wishes come true. 🐍

(He kisses her on the cheek while running his hand through her hair)

MaryEne 🩷💙🎀🐇

Mary: Happy birthday, Ene-chan! 🎀💝

(She wears her hair in twintails and ribbons so the two of them can take a picture together that she can put into her own journal used for scrapbooking)

KonoEne 💛💙⬇️🐇

Konoha: Happy birthday, Ene... 🧸

(Hugs her with a huge bear hug)

AyaTaka ❤️💙🧣🎧

Ayano: Happy birthday, Takane~ Let's do all the things you love today~ Why don't we share a scarf to keep warm? 🧣

(Wraps a scarf around her with a warm smile)

HaruTaka 💚🧡🎨🎧

Haruka: Happy birthday, Takane~ Come on, everyone is waiting~ Why don't we go to the arcade later today? Just as long as I get to see you smile! Oh, I know! I'd love to draw a portrait of you, if you'd like! 🎨✏️

F: OOOOH CUTEEE

Me: YEAH I just thought these would be super cute 🥺

Unfortunately we don't know the date, but that doesn't stop us from HC-ing what their birthday dates will be like 💥

F: Imagine the gifts they gave her 🤔

F: Yeah, Jin doesn't want the peak character to get cool birthday arts 😔

Some people are weirdly suspecting October to be her birth month

Me: OOOH good point!

Kuroha/Saeru's rich ass will be able to get her anything LMAO

He did manipulate people so he could get funds/resources to get the lab built and such

He's putting that money to good use

F: Oh, maybe one of those "buying everything my gf touch" /j

Me: 😂

Me:

MaryEne celebrating Ene's birthday:

I feel like Mary would make her a bouquet of flowers (since she makes flower bouquets and sells them for 5 yen each), and also get her a tea set 💐🫖🍵

And maybe she'd try to get Ene into journaling/scrapbooking with her as a way to spend time with her

I feel like it'd be fun for them to go clothes shopping together (which I could also see with AyaTaka/AyaEne). Like buying cute dresses and such...

F: Konoha... cake baking and him eating all of it in the end 🍰🎂😭

Me: HELP LMAO

Me:

KuroEne celebrating Ene's birthday:

He would get her new clothes and plushies, new video games. And perhaps he would take her to a Hot Springs vacation/onsen. Or a get-away vacation. Or go on an Amusement park date, or an arcade game date. Lots of possibilities!!!

F: Or flying into another country, most expensive choice

F: Tho I like to imagine a quick trip to the mall

Me: KuroEne trip to Vietnam, go go go!!!!!

My KHR AU Yume (Canon/OC) ship, XanLena, fits the most with this scenario, because Selena is my Viet NB KHR OC. Vietnam is her home country 🪷

But I would also love to think of KuroEne exploring my home country... 🥺🙏

Me: Oh yeah lol... Apparently this guy got the department store made in the first place

Me: Makes me wonder if his accumulation of knowledge applies to languages too.

Like if he knows everything from the start of civilization up to modern science, then it probably does, right?

F: Maybe?? I like to imagine it that way. Multilingual Kuroha

Me: At first Azami wrote in an ancient Medusa (?) language that Ayaka (Ayano’s mom) could somehow read. So I bet he could probably write and read it too

Cuz he knows more than Azami does (even about her own Abilities)

Me: Wait I was just looking at the old merch and... MaryEne ice skating date. I know Mary doesn't do well with the cold but she can bring a jacket at least

This is why I commissioned a chibi art of Snow Day MaryEne together 💗

KuroEne trip to the water slide!!! Lots of possibilities

Me:

Yukata KonoEne (Hanabi set)

Weh weh weh Ene in twintails.............................. Oh Japanese festivals (matsuri) are a great idea (not just for birthday related stuff, but can be in general, too)

F: Shintaro working out in that Sports merch set is so cursed. But really off topic PONYTAIL MARY IS PRETTY

Me: At least Japanese ping pong is on the lighter side of sports Ig

Me: I love seeing Mary in alternate hairstyles 💗

F: With Mary's original hair length, the skates might get stuck to it

Me Oh yeah true good point. Makes sense she'd have to tie her hair up

Me: KuroEne should visit Japanese gardens and koi ponds

KuroEne trip to Vietnam is fun to imagine... Ehehehehe

F: A fish feeding date :v Fish feeding is actually fun so a good date idea :D

Me: Lots of date ideas... Idk why I never thought of this before but zoo or aquarium date. Though Ene probably must be so used to the presence of snakes now cuz of this mf

F: There's a saying in Indo that goes like "Orang kaya mah bebas" which means "Rich people are free to do whatever" and it fits this context of KuroEne 😭

Me: LMAO YEAH

XanLena (KHR AU) and KuroEne (KagePro) can go wild

F: I FORGOT ABOUT XANXUS 💀

Me:

I imagine Xanxus' gifts to Selena (in general) are like:

A huge indoor garden with a koi pond and waterfalls, a trip to Vietnam, flower bouquets, rare/endangered plant species, an entire rundown village (cheap real estate with Italy's smalltown aesthetic) which includes a villa, cute clothes she likes (cute frilly clothes with ruffles, girly fashion, lolita fashion, custom made traditional Viet clothes), etc.

He'd also get the Servants to prepare flowers, chocolates, and food she likes for her birthday. And everything must be perfect. Otherwise he's firing them and very literally throwing them out of the building

Rich mafia boss bf and extremely selfish and spoiled… Expects nothing less but the best

Me: Though Ene probably must be so used to the presence of snakes now cuz of this mf

F: I don't think so, since Kuroha is also human-like, seeing snakes in the zoo would be like

Ene: Eeek! Snakes! I'm glad they're caged properly!

Kuroha: (…)

(→ Visibly offended)

Me: LMAO

Ene: Oh, sorry… I forgot about the guy next to me~ Should I put a leash on you or something?

Kuroha: Careful what you say, little bunny...

Kuroha: A caged/leashed animal can still bite, you know? (^-^)

Me: Oh I was moreso thinking about how he'd let his snakes from Awakening Eyes manifest in the house sometimes.

F: SNAKE LEASH IS A THING??? HELLLL 😭

Me: WHDSHHDSHDS

Me: Something like this:

Kuroha: Do you like them? They seem curious about you...

Small snake from Awakening Eyes: Sss 🐍

Me: And sometimes he uses Awakening Eyes to change his tongue to a forked snake tongue to tease Ene with

F: It'd be cute to imagine his snakes wandering around tho

Me: Yeah I think it'd be super cute to imagine them wandering around the house sometimes. Like if he lets them out sometimes.

I think Ene would eventually get used to his little snakes :3

After all...... they'd get curious about Ene since Saeru's scent is all over her

Me:

Ene: Eeek! Snakes! I'm glad they're caged properly, haha!

Kuroha: (...)

Ene: (Oops, maybe this was the wrong thing to say around my snake-like boyfriend...) 💦

Ene: Oh, come on... Don't get the wrong idea! The ones you let around the house are more on the friendly side~

Kuroha/Saeru Rambles

Me: It was somewhere in my notes but I forgot where it was so I'll just write this out again (until I find it again)

But basically I was thinking about how the thing with Saeru is that Azami's wish changing from her desire to know herself (the wish that created him and gave his existence/purpose meaning in the first place) changed to wanting to be with her family forever (so he felt like that purpose was taken away), as Mary states in MR2.

So, basically, he wants to be seen and acknowledged (because he fears fully disappearing and losing his sentience if he's fully forgotten)

And I was just thinking about how this does come full circle in the context of a Kuroha ship AU

While he works to further his goals to reset the timeline for his immortality, he entertains himself with exploring new possibilities in the Routes by messing around (including carnal pleasures, etc.), and the way he asserts himself into his S/O's life and sets up meetings/encounters to seduce them into falling for his temptations, like, now his existence becomes "necessary" to someone.

F: 💗

...

I think this is just a slightly different version of this post I made before

I'll quote the parts from it that's relevant

I think it’s incredibly interesting to think about, because in my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru gained a bit of a semblance of humanity, and a very human-like irony/contradiction of still being willing to “love” a human, despite him both loving and hating humanity.

In my KuroEne AU, Saeru Hebi lashes out against humans/the world because his existence was eventually forgotten/unneeded by Azami anymore and lost his sense of purpose when Azami's wish changed, and decides to rectify this by working towards his own plans (to avoid losing his sentience and thus gain a form of pseudo immortality through the time loops), and have his existence become "necessary/needed" to someone by making his S/O crave him and become addicted to him

Ofc he's unaware/not cognizant of the fact/can't grasp why his existence was deemed unecessary in the first place. So he gained a will and an identity, but lost his sense of purpose. And he resents this fact - losing a purpose.

Ironically, with him (Saeru) gaining an objective, he gained the human-like struggle to survive and preserve itself.

In my AU, he knows he wants to make his S/O addicted to him. So he is aware of that at least. He’s just not cognizant of his own flaws

[favoringeyes]

ok so hopefully quick saeru thread on why trying to empathize with him actually undermines his role as a character (im making this because im very passionate abt kagepro's overall narrative and it's themes, and saeru is a core part of that as the villain) this was originally on twitter and is very long so im putting it under the read more lol

to start off, all of azami's snakes were created from some sort of trauma or surivial instinct. despite his sentience saeru is STILL one of those snakes. his feelings are technically fabricated from azami's desire to find herself and later on her fear of change. the reason i believe he is sentient is the fact he was born from such a complicated wish, so he was created with the necessary complicity in order to carry out said wish for azami. and factors like other people, weren't taken into account for his creation. so the sentience wasn't an issue for the hundreds of years azami would be alone. it only became an issue when she met tsukihiko and started a family. this was an unexpected turnout on saeru's part, because the world azami created was one created from isolation and despair. saeru doesn't have the capacity to understand love or kindness because he wasn't born from it. (this is why the idea of him caring for kenjirou doesnt make sense either but thts a whole other can of worms). what he has for azami isnt love, it's devotion. such severe devotion that he is willing to do things that only hurt her just because it's what he believes is right for her. he has to keep living bc she needs him to survive. so now that we've kind of established saeru's character we can move on to his role in the narrative... kagepro obviously revolves around the idea of repeating time, or timeloops. from a simple story perspective it's because of saeru, he pushes marry to the brink of despair, causing her to rewind time in order to be with her friends again. going a bit deeper in manga route 2, we find out his real motivation is to keep living in order to grant azami's wish to find her true self. so lets go back to the idea saeru is only created from azami's loneliness, or her crushing isolation of simply existing, and combine it with the idea that SAERU is the one causing the world to repeat. that saeru hates the idea that azami could find happiness in others. that saeru believes azami cannot be happy in a world created in her image. that saeru causes so much suffering he recreates a medusa in marry, and he feasts off of that despair. what does this mean? thematically saeru is supposed to represent the idea of resisting change, resisting it through constantly forcing oneself to relive traumatizing and hurtful moments in life out of a belief that this is what it always should be. from the comfort in despair. so lets take that and apply it to a different character, the protagonist, shintaro. specially route x shintaro. in route x shintaro refuses to forget ayano, replaying moments in his head over and over and over where he shouldve reached out, shouldve done better. he ignores ene, someone who cares for him and wants to help him, because he believes that by completely indulging himself in his despair and regret over ayano, she will continue to live on in his mind. so, what is that similar to? it almost directly parallels to saeru's idea of causing despair in order to feed off of it to survive. but, there is something that separates saeru from route x shintaro. the fact that shintaro can understand love. when he deletes ene, he almost immediately regrets it. and is horrified by what he's done. he's so horrified that he literally ends his own life, essentially ending ayano's memory. this is the exact opposite of what saeru wants. saeru is desperate to keep living. to keep the despair, bc it's all he is. without it he's nothing. without it, azami is nothing. if saeru was meant to be empathized with, then it would encourage literally every bad thing to happen in kagepro's story. bc he is a representation of that, and can almost parallel to every character with it. kano's painful emotional stagnation, the unhealthy devotion seto has to marry resulting in neglect of his loved ones, kido's belief that she was born

essentially broken, etc. all of these r themes that show in saeru's character. the character that brutally kills the mekakushi dan over and over, seeing their lives as little more then warped reflections of his master. he views it as a game, he finds joy in tragedy. he mocks marry for finding love just like azami had, he mocks her for trying to change the repeating story he had written. he's a hypocrite, because just as marry tries to gain autonomy so is he. so basically, he is portrayed as pure evil because he is the resistance to finding happiness through others despite pain and trauma, and the entire point of kagepro is learning to love the world despite all of the horrible things in it because at least one person can still love another. that the time spent with others can be some of the most precious things in a lifetime, that even when those times pass, those feelings never leave. saeru is a subversion of this, basically screaming in the readers face that "good feelings are temporary and bad ones last forever". he is a direct antithesis to the narrative marry attempts to create as the new medusa, not a a story created from the despair of loneliness, but one from love and care. if saeru was ever meant to be empathized with, then it undermines the themes of summer time record completely. saeru is supposed to be a complete monster, and interpreting otherwise warps the themes jin is trying to portray in the first place.

[childrenrecord]

ok so hopefully quick saeru thread on why trying to empathize with him actually undermines his role as a character (im making this because im very passionate abt kagepro's overall narrative and it's themes, and saeru is a core part of that as the villain) this was originally on twitter and is very long so im putting it under the read more lol

to start off, all of azami's snakes were created from some sort of trauma or surivial instinct. despite his sentience saeru is STILL one of those snakes. his feelings are technically fabricated from azami's desire to find herself and later on her fear of change. the reason i believe he is sentient is the fact he was born from such a complicated wish, so he was created with the necessary complicity in order to carry out said wish for azami. and factors like other people, weren't taken into account for his creation. so the sentience wasn't an issue for the hundreds of years azami would be alone. it only became an issue when she met tsukihiko and started a family. this was an unexpected turnout on saeru's part, because the world azami created was one created from isolation and despair. saeru doesn't have the capacity to understand love or kindness because he wasn't born from it. (this is why the idea of him caring for kenjirou doesnt make sense either but thts a whole other can of worms). what he has for azami isnt love, it's devotion. such severe devotion that he is willing to do things that only hurt her just because it's what he believes is right for her. he has to keep living bc she needs him to survive. so now that we've kind of established saeru's character we can move on to his role in the narrative… kagepro obviously revolves around the idea of repeating time, or timeloops. from a simple story perspective it's because of saeru, he pushes marry to the brink of despair, causing her to rewind time in order to be with her friends again. going a bit deeper in manga route 2, we find out his real motivation is to keep living in order to grant azami's wish to find her true self. so lets go back to the idea saeru is only created from azami's loneliness, or her crushing isolation of simply existing, and combine it with the idea that SAERU is the one causing the world to repeat. that saeru hates the idea that azami could find happiness in others. that saeru believes azami cannot be happy in a world created in her image. that saeru causes so much suffering he recreates a medusa in marry, and he feasts off of that despair. what does this mean? thematically saeru is supposed to represent the idea of resisting change, resisting it through constantly forcing oneself to relive traumatizing and hurtful moments in life out of a belief that this is what it always should be. from the comfort in despair. so lets take that and apply it to a different character, the protagonist, shintaro. specially route x shintaro. in route x shintaro refuses to forget ayano, replaying moments in his head over and over and over where he shouldve reached out, shouldve done better. he ignores ene, someone who cares for him and wants to help him, because he believes that by completely indulging himself in his despair and regret over ayano, she will continue to live on in his mind. so, what is that similar to? it almost directly parallels to saeru's idea of causing despair in order to feed off of it to survive. but, there is something that separates saeru from route x shintaro. the fact that shintaro can understand love. when he deletes ene, he almost immediately regrets it. and is horrified by what he's done. he's so horrified that he literally ends his own life, essentially ending ayano's memory. this is the exact opposite of what saeru wants. saeru is desperate to keep living. to keep the despair, bc it's all he is. without it he's nothing. without it, azami is nothing. if saeru was meant to be empathized with, then it would encourage literally every bad thing to happen in kagepro's story. bc he is a representation of that, and can almost parallel to every character with it. kano's painful emotional stagnation, the unhealthy devotion seto has to marry resulting in neglect of his loved ones, kido's belief that she was born

essentially broken, etc. all of these r themes that show in saeru's character. the character that brutally kills the mekakushi dan over and over, seeing their lives as little more then warped reflections of his master. he views it as a game, he finds joy in tragedy. he mocks marry for finding love just like azami had, he mocks her for trying to change the repeating story he had written. he's a hypocrite, because just as marry tries to gain autonomy so is he. so basically, he is portrayed as pure evil because he is the resistance to finding happiness through others despite pain and trauma, and the entire point of kagepro is learning to love the world despite all of the horrible things in it because at least one person can still love another. that the time spent with others can be some of the most precious things in a lifetime, that even when those times pass, those feelings never leave. saeru is a subversion of this, basically screaming in the readers face that "good feelings are temporary and bad ones last forever". he is a direct antithesis to the narrative marry attempts to create as the new medusa, not a a story created from the despair of loneliness, but one from love and care. if saeru was ever meant to be empathized with, then it undermines the themes of summer time record completely. saeru is supposed to be a complete monster, and interpreting otherwise warps the themes jin is trying to portray in the first place.

[guess-ill-die-again]

Kagepro characters as BDG Unraveled GIFs:

Part 1: Kido, Seto, Kano, Marry

Part 2: Ayano, Shintaro, Takane, Haruka

Part 3: Kuroha, Saeru, Azami, Kenjirou, Yaki

Part 4: Hibiya, Momo, Ene, Konoha

Bonus Part 5:  s o o n

videos used:  x | x | x | x | x

[fuckyeahkagepro]

Kagerou Project Analysis

Kagerou Project Comparisons -> “Common” places, featuring Hibiya (& Hiyori) (& certain others) [ Routes: Music (+etc.) -> Manga -> Novels ->? MCA -> ? / any etc., MX4D?] “play” (Kano) [2013] vs “park” (Momo) [2018] (featuring: Hibiya & Hiyori; notably Hibiya’s POVs / involvement)

Momo: About the phone strap you bought... you're gonna give it to Hiyori-chan, right? Hibiya: !!!!?? Hibiya: W-why would you think that ?? Momo: Ohoho so I was right... Hiyori: (blank staring from nearby, seemingly not hearing) (“?”) Momo: Well, for your information, there's a nice park around the corner there... Momo: Wouldn't the atmosphere be quite romantic if you went there during this time? Hibiya: /choking noise + furious blushing [the scene continues on....] [ to KageDaze ..... ] ^ Manga Route 2 ( source: x ) - Hibiya & Hiyori meet Shintaro & Momo very early on. [Manga Route: officially / timelines-wise, takes place before Novels Route & maybe [unknown/likely] MCA] [*note: Hibiya & Hiyori: encounters the store. it’s not closed because the Mall Occupation incident was previously solved*. (*by a certain: K o n o h a [hmm] [hmmmm]) Hibiya: despite this, does not get a phone (yet). instead, he buys a phone strap ... initially meant for “Hiyori”. ] [ Hiyori: also gets Momo’s autograph. ] (previously; before Manga Route 2) Manga Route 1: - Reset. Mall is closed. - Hibiya & Hiyori do not encounter ? a specific mention of the park. [unknown] - Hibiya: does not get a phone. ... ? - Hibiya & Hiyori: do not encounter / get to know the Mekakushi Dan*. [*because ... Saeru. i.e. there’s literally timelines they may not even meet] [or they may not meet the same. this includes how they meet the entire Dan.] (no specific mentions of phone, but they were trying to go to the store.) * “Today is such a nice day, so it’d be nice to play outside for a while~. What a waste!”

The guy crossed his arms behind his head and pouted.

“Ahaha… that’s right too. It’d be kinda nice to play outside for a while”

Hiyori smiled softly.

“Well, take care then! I’m going now. Bye-bye~”

The guy smiled at us again, turned around and quickly walked away.

^ “The Children Reason”, Kagerou Days ch III / Novel 3 ( source: x ) - Hibiya & Hiyori meet Kano in the graveyard. [the novel continues on...] [ to KageDaze ..... ] [*note: Mall Occupation incident leads to Mall closure.] [ Hibiya: does not get the phone / go to store. .... Yet. ] [ also see: Novel 5, “The Deceiving” + a certain someone’s involvement. ] [ Hibiya: attempts to confess to Hiyori. Stumbles over words / etc. ] [ Hiyori: sees Konoha. Konoha: overheard. (hmmmm) ] [ Hiyori: misunderstands / gets angry, runs off, encounters the “accident”. ] [ Hibiya: eventually, appears to still wake up in the Daze] * MCA Route: Hibiya: encounters Momo early on, as early as Episode 02, Kisaragi Attention. Hibiya: with Momo, after getting to know her a bit, runs away from Momo’s fans. Hibiya & Momo: then separated. Momo recruited to Dan by Kido. Hibiya: later sees Momo on the tv, recognizes her. Hiyori: chides Hibiya about Hibiya not getting her autograph. “I’ll [tell Hiyori] [my feelings] tomorrow.” - Hibiya

no one: tells him about “the park”. instead:

- MCA Route [ aka: the Route “closest to the latter” ] [ Hibiya: does not get the phone. ] [ MCA ending: still happens. ] [ MCA: Reset ? ?? ] [likely] * - MX4D mini-Timeline: - Hibiya: winds up in temporary possession of Shintaro’s phone [ Shintaro’s phone: has Ene. ] - Hibiya: is involved with Hiyori during the Mall Occupation incident. - Dan: the original 9 w/Hibiya, Hiyori, Konoha, Ene. seemingly no Ayano. - Tateyamas: unknown if they even exist here (no Kenjirou seen, no Ayaka...) - Shintaro: has Eyes power (at start). - Mall: is saved from said incident (by everyone available). [still no Ayano.] - Mall: has bomb. - bomb: [ BOOM ] * [ Mekakucity Reload album (Music Route ? ??) part 2: yet to happen. ] [ Mekakucity Reload anime: yet to happen. ] Conclusions?: - if Hibiya gets a phone: ????? - if Hibiya gets a phone (that has Ene): ?????? - if Ene 1) tells him about “playing” at “the park” 2) invites one of the original Hibiyas to join the Mekakushi Dan: ??????? 3) or, both Hibiya & Hiyori: ???????????????????????? * if Saeru gets a hold of [Shintaro or Momo’s phones]: [ /insert Ene screaming in the distance ] (see: Outer Science*, Manga Route 1) [*note: in the original Outer Science pv / Music Route, Ene is deleted by Shintaro during Route XX. in Manga Route 1, Saeru instead destroys Shintaro’s phone.] (Summertime Reload spoilers under the ‘read more’!):

- Novel 8 (Summertime Reload): - Hibiya: gets a phone. - it’s a particular person’s phone. (*not Shintaro’s) - end of Summertime Reload: happens. [ another very notable part: also happens. ] [ that: maybe occurs before MCA Route (?) if MCA happens later ] [ that: depends on if MCA even happens that much later ] * also previously in From the Darkness, Novel 7: [ Hibiya: was about to get Momo’s autograph. ] Hibiya asked Momo to sign for Hiyori after all these commotions ended. Momo had mixed feelings because she didn’t think Hiyori’d be satisfied with her sign *since she’d not be able to return to being an idol then* and she felt a trickle of jealousy [in her heart]. Not hearing Momo’s answer, Hibiya then said: “So you*…… We will definitely have to meet again! Promise me!” with a face like he was about to cry. “…… OK I see. I promise you.” - replied Momo. (* emphasis mine.) (* linked: image from said scene.) (ALSO previously [same scene]): hibiya: ‘if you’re worried about something, then just say it out loud. am I really that unreliable to you?’ momo: ‘……eh?’ * and, also in Summertime Reload: “However, no matter what kind of karma she had to bear later, she would simply think “It’s OK as well.” In order to cut open a path to our future, at this moment, she just decided without hesitation like that. Now come to think of it, she had always been like that since our first meeting. She was worried about a complete stranger like me as if it was her own problem, and without showing any sight of doubt, told me such thing as “I’ll definitely help you!” She is so soft-hearted, stupid, reckless, unreliable… but more than anyone else, she’s such a kind person. Since Momo’s like that, I was able to fight for myself like this too. The one who taught me about “friends**” - it was (no other than*) her.” * - added in by the translator for possible emphasis, still relevant. (*emphasis [italics] mine]) [**linked: Lost Day Hour mini-manga] ^ Hibiya’s POV additional theory: here

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne Ticket Commission by Mire 🖤💙🐍🐇

Kuroha (Saeru) and Ene Ticket Commission by Mire (@/miremiremire)

Mire's Instagram: (X)

Mire's VGen: (X)

Intro

Dance of Love in the Midst of Chaos (*)

"The world can never tear us apart, we will always meet again." (*)

"I'll let you taste the biting fangs of love, and the intoxicating poison of pleasure…"

"I'll take you even further… I'll push you to the brink, and let you fall with me into the abyss. Ene..."

"Now... Shall we dance again?"

I commissioned KuroEne wearing formal wear in a Gothic ballroom with a Snake and Bunny theme, while they're surrounded by their flowers: Black Higanbana (Cluster Amaryllis) and Blue Star Milkweeds (Tweedia) 🖤💙🐍🐇💐

I asked for Kuroha to be drawn in his Design Poll outfit, and for Ene to be drawn in her Seek at Mekakucity outfit 🥰

I asked for a Snake wrapping around a bunny with hearts, sparkles, and roses, and provided the ticket info, including the seat numbers and quotes.

Thank you to Feila for helping me discuss and come up with ideas 💗 Feila came up with the title (live concert name) and quote used in the commission, which I marked with an asterisk (*)

"Dance of Love in the Midst of Chaos" = Live Concert Name

"The world will never end, we will always meet again" = Quote

I'm glad you were able to share your thoughts with me!

I also thought of using quotes from my KuroEne AU for the commission, but they wouldn't fit, given the space, so I just decided to include them here.

Ene's Mekakushi Dan number code is 6, and Kuroha is known as XX/XXX since he's not apart of the Mekakushi Dan.

So I thought it'd be a neat reference to include in the Ticket info~ The seat/row/gate numbers are a genius combination.

I chose Black Higanbana and Blue Star Milkweeds as KuroEne's flowers based on their Hanakotoba meanings. The colours and flower symbolisms suit them very well. So I asked for them to be included in the comm.

Kuroha: Higanbana - The Flower of Death, Death and the Cycle of Rebirth

Ene: Blue Star Milkweeds - Happy love, hearts that believe in each other

Mire drew both a long and short hair version of Ene's hair! I love both versions, but I love how flowy her hair looks in the 1st one. I feel like it fits very well with the composition.

Mire included Kuroha's yellow circles on the Oshi mark of the snake wrapping around the bunny. Oh my god... I love the inclusion of the thorned roses as well... 🌹

The snakes wrapped around Saeru and the bunnies around Ene... Cute... 🥺

There's SO much detail and effort put into this...

Thoughts

I'm SUPER happy with how my commission turned out! 💗✨ Everything is so breathtakingly beautiful! Mire's art style, colours, rendering, and attention to detail are so amazing! I was awed by how detailed the background is~

My commission is SO stunning! I'm still in awe by the commission! KuroEne look SO pretty in Mire's style! 🥺😭💗💘💞

Mire perfectly captured the couple's themes and expressions 🥺💖 I love how the small chibis on the ticket came out too~

Mire first sent me a message a few days ago to check in with me asking if any revisions need to be made.

Mire was very accomodating with minor colour and detail fixes, such as with Kuroha and Ene's headphones, Kuroha's yellow circles, Ene's digital facial structures, and the snake on Kuroha (which I asked to change from a white snake to a black snake with red eyes)

The changes fit them a lot more so I'm very grateful!

Great communication and very quick with updates. I'll definitely be back to commission Mire again in the future! ✨

Mire seriously outdid my expectations tenfold...

How detailed the gothic ballroom is, the flowers (black higanbana and blue star milkweeds), the snake and rabbit around them, the ticket design with the little chibis, and icon of a snake curling around a bunny…

The ticket design is CRAZY good, along with the colours and rendering OMFG

I wasn't expecting the little chibis… They're such a nice touch

I was so surprised too because the turn around time was way faster than I expected... I sent the comm form around Oct 19

Feila pointed out that event tickets are usually printed on thermal paper, so I'd love to print out my commissions for personal use.

Misc Rambles

OH MY GOD MY HEART JUMPED WHEN I FIRST SAW THE ART

THE DETAIL IS CRAZYYYYY... THE CHIBIS ARE SO CUTE~ THE COLOURS AND RENDERING ARE SO GOOD AND THE FLOWERS AND BGS ARE SO WELL DRAWN!!! I'M OVER THE MOON!!!

I'M GETTING EMOTIONAL 🥹😭💗💘💞🫶✨

THEY LOOK SO GORGEOUS I'M ON THE FLOOR

HELLO I NEED TICKETS PLEASE

KUROENE INVITE ME TO YOUR WEDDING!!! 💥💥💥

ENE MY WIFE!!! MY PRINCESS!!! MY ANGEL!!! 💙💗💘💞✨

I LOVE HOW FLOWY HER HAIR LOOKS

MIRE MADE THEM LOOK SO GOOD THEY'RE SO PRETTY

THEIR EXPRESSIONS AND THE COLOURS AND RENDERING TOO!!!

THE ART IS SUCH VISUAL EYE CANDY...

ENE LOOKS LIKE SUCH A PRINCESS HERE... MY BEAUTIFUL PRINCESS

MY WIFE AND HER CRAZY ASS SNAKE BF

I'M OVER THE MOON ABOUT THIS 😭💗💞💘🫶

I LOVE YOU KUROENE 🖤💙

My Message

This was the message I left for Mire!

KuroEne look SO pretty in your style! 🖤💙🐍🐇 You perfectly captured their themes! I'm so happy with how my commission turned out! 💗💞💘 Everything is so breathtakingly beautiful 💓

The chibis and Snake/Bunny Oshi marks on the ticket are SO cute! The hearts, sparkles, and thorned roses fit them so well! 🌹💖✨

Your art style, colours, rendering, and attention to detail are amazing! I'm in awe by how gorgeous the commission is 🥹💘💞

The colour scheme (black, gold, blue and white colours) harmonize so well in the artwork! I love how you drew their expressions~ The way you draw eyes in your art style is so pretty! 🥰

The background elements, such as the flowers (black higanbana and blue star milkweeds), and golden frames and black gothic ballroom, are so well drawn! 💐

The ticket design is amazing and has such good graphic design. The arts and chosen fonts go so well together! It's honestly one of the most creative commission formats I've seen.

I love both versions of Ene's hair you drew 💙 Thank you for the wonderful commission, and for being understanding with minor detail and colour changes as well! 🙏

I will definitely be back to commission you again in the future! 💗✨

Commission Rambles

Kuroha and Ene's Design Poll outfits by Sayuki

Ene's Seek at Mekakucity outfit by Satou Mahiro

I love Kuroha/Saeru's changshan inspired outfit by Sayuki 🖤💛

Ene's Seek at Mekakucity outfit is so pretty, I just knew I had to commission her in it 💙

You can read more under the cut if you're curious on the ideas that Feila and I came up with! We were coming up with ideas of what should be included in the commission.

We spent 3 days coming up with ideas and discussing the specifics (Themes, Background Elements, Ticket Info, etc.) before I sent the commission form.

Commission Rambles

This was the commission form I sent

Definitely the most detailed form I've ever written

I usually just describe the design details and poses and expressions, and then hand a Google Drive link of visual references. I included a folder of KuroEne's refs, and some photos of the flowers and gothic ballroom as inspiration

I just like to be detailed with my commission forms cuz I find it helps the artist

For the last SS, we drafted ideas for potential flowers, then narrowed it down to the two we chose. So we didn't include it in the final form

Feila mentioned that higanbana are also poisonous flowers... Fitting for a snake 🐍

Higanbana is PERFECT in symbolism for Kuroha/Saeru, especially since Awakening Eyes manifests as black snakes and aura spirals.

The Kagerou Daze VII -from the darkness- illust by Sidu draws him with black aura spirals that coincidentally look just like the spindles of higanbana.

Blue Star Milkweeds and Red Higanbana

Black higanbana doesn't exist IRL, so it's just wilted red higanbana.

I haven't posted it yet, but I'm in the middle of writing a post on KuroEne and Flower Symbolisms (based on my own picks). I mentioned this more in depth there

I considered putting Snake of Clearing Eyes or Saeru, but I feel like KuroEne looks the best as a ship name so I went with that.

The comm form basically describes our ideas. I could talk about our ideas a lot more in detail eventually (but in a different post)

[stepswowdsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne AU: MaryEne infiltrate Saeru's lab and confront him

Summary:

KuroEne AU: MaryEne team up against Kuroha/Saeru

Kuroha manipulates the MekaDan into splitting up and kills them one by one

Before leaving the hideout, Kuroha reassures Ene that he will be sure to come back for her... After all, he always keeps his promises (^-^) 🖤

Mary feels the snakes slowly return back to her, and Ene wonders why Saeru insisted on going by himself

Mary uses Captivating and Concealing to distract Saeru once he reveals his identity

Ene runs away carrying Mary and finds temporary refuge in an abandoned building so they can plan their infiltration of Saeru's lab

Mary uses Focusing Eyes to obtain entire floor plans of Saeru's lab

Ene uses Opening Eyes to disable security systems

Ene confronts Kuroha alone to stall for time so that Mary can learn how to control the Kagerou Daze with Combining

Lengthy discussion between me and Feila.

These are the main points ^^

I was imagining a scenario where, after Kuroha kills everyone on August 15th and leaves MaryEne alive on purpose, he reveals his true motives as the “traitor” of the Mekakushi Dan and the one behind everything.

Mary and Ene confront him at first, and then realize that they can't outrun Saeru due to his super strength and speed due to Awakening Eyes.

So, Mary, who absorbed the MekaDan members’ snakes after their deaths, uses Captivating Eyes to draw his attention to her, and then uses Concealing Eyes to completely blank out his surroundings in white.

And then Ene uses the distraction to carry Mary and run away with her since her android body won't get as easily tired, giving them some time to run and find a place to temporarily take refuge.

I HC’ed that Ene carries Mary cuz she hardly spends time outdoors, so she’d get tired easily due to her lack of exposure to sunlight.

So Ene carries her since she doesn’t get as tired with the body that Saeru built.

Ene then tells Mary that they need to come up with a plan to make the first move, otherwise they'll eventually get cornered.

My dialogue script WIPs and rambles are under the cut since this post is super long.

Dialogue Script WIPs

Rambles

Decided to show some dialogue snippet WIPs from the KuroEne AU Route where MaryEne team up against Kuroha/Saeru because I never posted them before.

I haven't cleaned up the rest though so I'll only post these snippets. I used line breaks to distinguish between different scenes since I write down ideas as they come to mind.

Saeru tells them, "You [two] have nothing left," telling them that all of their struggles are pointless and that their efforts will be in vain since they're the only ones left.

Therefore, the Queen (Mary) will use her powers to rewind the world to see her friends once more.

...

Ene realizes that she can stall for time against Saeru by engaging in conversation with him first, and then baiting him into intimacy, since she knows he won't turn down the offer to indulge in more pleasures with her.

I imagine that Saeru will eventually realize that Ene is stalling him... and that she must be desperate to resort to this, but realizes that her wanting to stall for time for Mary's sake for as long as possible is not the only reason for this, but that she's acting based on her inner yearning too.

While they're still talking, though, Saeru tells Ene that he basically decides who lives or dies, and that he could end her life right now if he so pleases. But then Ene counters this by telling him that Saeru is more interested in seeing how things will play out.

I especially love Saeru's line, “How could you ever expect to defeat someone who surpasses you in both knowledge and strength?” because it’s true.

Ene uses Saeru's interest/willingness to see more outcomes/gain more knowledge of her antics against him, and then counters him by saying that he’s not immune to “human sentimentality/emotions,” despite claiming to be above it all…

"You've always been much more interested in seeing what choices I make."

Also I feel like Saeru seems especially excited seeing his S/O (Ene, in this case) stand up to and defy him.

He looks down on humans and thinks he's above all human sentimentality while also claiming to love humans and their foolishness... That's such a human-like contradiction.

...

I think Focusing can be used more than once to check his whereabouts (assuming he doesn't change his appearance)

I don't think he even bothers changing his appearance since it's just MaryEne left.

Though MaryEne think it's best to use Mary's Eye Abilities sparingly so she can preserve energy and not get too exhausted. Saeru is aware of all of the Eye Ability Snakes and what they do.

Mary’s gonna try and use them sparingly to avoid revealing too much of their hand. Otherwise, he'll find ways around them and counter Mary's Eye Abilities. Like don't use them more than once in front of him in a single Route. Cuz he can still be caught off guard with the element of surprise.

Novel Route states that “he is a living encyclopedia with a full grasp of everything from the start of civilization up to modern science” and due to his nature of existence as the embodiment of Azami's knowledge/wisdom, also knows things beyond what Azami knew about herself.

Saeru told Azami (Mary’s grandmother) to create the Kagerou Daze in the first place, when she wasn't even aware she could do that.

Saeru can counter Combining Eyes (Queen Snake) in the Novel Route and MR2 by just using Awakening Eyes to rebuild his body

The most useful Eye Abilities to use against him are:

Combining, Locking, Captivating, Concealing, Focusing, Deceiving (maybe)

Discussion Rambles

KuroEne AU ideas I came up with just now

Also I just thought about something.

Mary would be able to know Kuroha/Saeru's whereabouts with Focusing Eyes as long as he doesn't change his own appearance (like he did in MR2 to avoid detection by Hiyori's Focusing Eyes)

Not sure if he's gonna do that here.

Depends on if he wants to make the game easier for them (not considering it a threat due to his ego since Mary is bound to reset anyways with only the two of them alive), or if he wants to make things harder for them on purpose.

I assume he's not gonna bother to change his appearance with Awakening Eyes in the first KuroEne AU Route with a MaryEne team up cuz only 2 are left.

Though ofc I still want to write a KuroEne AU Route where Ene gets to see Kuroha/Saeru's MR2 form...

In that case, Mary would still be able to see where he is with Focusing Eyes.

F: Tbh even if he changes his form, if he looks odd enough it'll be detectable at somepoint

How tf does Focusing Eyes work again-

Me: Yeah I think Focusing Eyes works by being able to zoom up on any person you imagine if you've seen them before.

In MR2, Saeru changed to the MR2 form to avoid detection by Hiyori's Focusing Eyes. Though once the MekaDan confronts him in the forest, Hiyori is able to use it to detect his whereabouts and can estimate how long it’ll take to reach them. Like Hiyori goes, "He's on the move again...!"

After he gets hit by a land slide and the mf just regenerates with Awakening Eyes

F: Oh no wonder it didn't work 😭 So you have to imagine their appearance first, then you can find them. I thought it'd be like zooming in really really close towards a certain area

Me: I think Hiyori has to know their appearance to zoom in on a certain area. This is probably one of the most useful abilities to use against Saeru.

Locking (Mary), Combining (Mary), Concealing (Kido), Captivating (Momo), Focusing (Hibiya), and maybe Deceiving (Kano), are the most useful ones to use against Saeru imo.

Focusing (Hibiya) and Opening (Ene) are really useful for infiltrating his base though

Me: Ok I just checked Focusing Eyes' wiki page rn to remind myself.

Hibiya can use Focusing Eyes to obtain entire floor plans of Saeru's lab after seeing a picture of Kenjirou.

I imagine that's how MaryEne's going to keep an eye on his whereabouts and plan their infiltration.

So Mary can still find his whereabouts while they temporarily take refuge in an abandoned building. Ene can use Opening Eyes to check out which security systems she needs to disable before entering

Me: One other thing I realized.

In Outer Science, the Bad End of the Music Route, since Kuroha kills everyone at once, this triggers Mary's transformation into a "monster" or Medusa, as Saeru calls it, since she absorbs all of the dead members’ snakes after their deaths.

In MR2, the members get killed throughout the day with some time in between.

I remember Mary was lying in bed first for a while from exhaustion because she was slowly turning into a "Medusa."

Mary instantly feels when a member's snake returns to her when they die.

Kagerou Daze: Ch. 57 - 58

In my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru splits up everyone in the MekaDan to search in pairs of 2 for the "Clearing Snake"

Then he starts to kill everyone, so the remaining members later try to search for the missing members.

Even if they don't know what exactly is going on yet, Ene and Mary must feel that something is terribly wrong

To get a specific member's snake back basically means their death... But I don’t think they would realize what it means at first.

F: Mary would stop every once a while like "Hold on... I feel another one coming back to me," or something like that as if she was trying to process what's going on

Me: Yeahhh like at first I don't think they know what's going on

Me: Imagine if Kuroha told Mary and Ene they should stay inside the base at first so Ene can take care of Mary?

Ene probably watches over Mary while Mary’s in bed at first. Since in MR2, she looks exhausted and her hair shortens (and gets blackened at the ends) as she absorbs more of the members’ snakes. And then eventually, Mary gets out of bed after feeling slightly better.

So then Ene worries that if the “Clearing Eyes” guy is targeting everyone in the city, then their base might not even be guaranteed to be safe anymore, so she leaves the base and takes Mary with her

F: MekaDan has 9 members, so spliting up into teams of 2 would let one person not get a team, which would be Saeru, it's all apart of his plan—

Me: RIGHT

I imagine Ene eventually gets a sinking feeling about this (once Mary starts getting snakes back) but ofc... he is her lover, so she wants to believe in him at first (before the reveal)

At first, Ene thinks, "Kuroha would understand if we temporarily moved locations to some place safe... Because frankly, I don't even know if our base is safe anymore... We'll regroup with him later! And then we'll try to find everyone! It's better if we all stay together!"

(Note: In Routes where Saeru pretends to join the Mekakushi Dan, he goes by "Kuroha" for obvious reasons)

I imagine there's going to be some scene where Ene gets teary eyed at the thought of Saeru leaving the base alone (like right before he leaves the MekaDan's hideout) and clutches onto his sleeves, saying, "Don't go... What if something happens to you and that 'monster,' the 'Clearing Eyes' guy, gets you!!!"

And Saeru just goes (...) before he turns around to face Ene.

Saeru reassures her that he has Awakening Eyes' super strength so he can scout across the city. And he pats and ruffles her hair and smiles at her like (^-^) and then gently caresses her cheek.

Me: One more thing I imagined.

Before Saeru leaves the hideout, he tells Ene, "I promise I'll come back to you."

And then, when he finds Mary and Ene (after he killed everyone), he goes like, "See? I always keep my promises..."

He is so evil for this honestly.

F: Oh God... 😭😭

"Jokes on you, I WAS CLEARING EYES!"

Me: Yeah honestly it's already devastating enough on Mary since he killed all of her friends and she physically feels the effects of slowly becoming “the next Medusa/Master” (as Saeru puts it)

But then Ene??? It must be so devastating to find out that her lover of 2 years is actually the mastermind behind everything who orchestrated everyone's deaths and killed everyone.

This must feel like your entire world flipped upside down and came crashing down on you all at once. The situation is so DIRE now.

Ene feels like she can’t afford to let her feelings get in the way, now that it’s been revealed her lover is actually a monster that needs to be stopped at all costs.

And Ene would definitely try to hide how she feels to avoid worrying Mary by keeping up a (^v^) shtick, but Mary ends up telling Ene that she should tell her how she really feels.

Honestly heartbreaking cuz she was probably getting flashbacks to all the happy times she had with Saeru (before of all of this happened) while she was running away with Mary.

Me: Yeah and then I imagine Saeru comes back to the base (after killing everyone) to find it's completely deserted. Saeru notes it's a good call on Ene's part, cuz if they just stayed in the MekaDan's base, they would've been cornered by Saeru.

Then he assumes that MaryEne either figured out his identity, or that Ene decided to take Mary with her after seeing their base might not be safe anymore (which is more likely)

Though they're probably laying low while trying to find out what happened to everyone.

On Mary and Ene’s end, no one is answering their text messages or phone calls, which is extremely concerning.

I imagine they’re not running around the city to avoid detection, just so Mary can preserve her strength just in case they run into the so-called "monster," so they move around quietly. At this point, Saeru probably eventually finds them by scent since he’s a snake.

F: Not to mention not listening to Shintaro's warnings because he was the one who had a bit of suspicions for Saeru

Me: Yeah I imagine Shintaro and Kano would've been a bit suspicious of him... 😭 Ouch

Me:

Kagerou Daze: Ch. 21

I just imagine Ene does that thing where she quickly goes back into her cyber body and tries to find the other members' whereabouts through GPS but just gets an error message. Something is OFF.

And no one is answering their text messages or calls...

Me: Mary feels the other's snakes slowly return to her (throughout the day) while they're still in the base, and goes, "What is this......? I suddenly felt..."

And Ene gets concerned when Mary's hair starts to fall off and she grows snake scales on her, and just goes like, "…Mary?"

Me: And then Ene eventually just thinks back on Saeru’s decision to go scout for the other members alone, "Why did he insist on going alone... A group of 3 would've been better!"

F:

Mary: He probably wants to go alone—

Ene: But why? Does he not want to be included? It's odd...

Me:

Ene: But the killer is on the loose...! It would've been better if everyone all stayed together...!

Ene: But I guess he’s always been a solitary person...

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne Coffin YCH Commission by Mire 🖤💙🐍🐇

Kuroha (Saeru) and Ene Coffin YCH Commission by Mire (@/miremiremire)

Mire's Instagram: (X)

Mire's VGen: (X)

Intro

Inside the Coffin ⚰️✨

If you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes back at you.

I commissioned KuroEne wearing formal wear with a Snake and Bunny theme, surrounded by Red Higanbana (Cluster Amaryllis), the flower that Saeru is associated with 🖤💙🐍🐇💐

I asked for Kuroha to be drawn in his Design Poll outfit, and for Ene to be drawn in her Seek at Mekakucity outfit 🥰

I chose their formal outfits because I feel like they fit very well with the Royal theme and Coffin aesthetic.

I asked for Higanbana to be scattered around the coffin, and to have a snake wrapping around an Ene-themed bunny plushie (with her digital facial structures) and a blue ribbon 💝🎀

Once again, thank you to Feila for helping me discuss and come up with ideas 💗 I'm glad you were able to share your thoughts with me!

This comm has 1 main flower type, so at first I considered Forget me nots, the flower I associate with Ene, but I decided to go with Higanbana.

I chose Higanbana as Kuroha's flower based on its Hanakotoba meaning, since it fits him aesthetically (colours wise) and symbolism wise. It's also the flower that he's associated with in the Kagerou Daze -from the darkness- art by Sidu.

Kuroha: Higanbana (Cluster Amaryllis) - The Flower of Death, Death and the Cycle of Rebirth

Ene: Wasurenagusa (Forget me nots) - True Love, Memories, Don't Forget Me

Thoughts

After the gorgeous KuroEne Ticket Comm that Mire did for me, I was very excited to commission them again.

This time too, I first got the message when I woke up in the morning, so I was pleasantly surprised... My forever beloved childhood OTP~ BREATHTAKINGLY GORGEOUS 🥹💗💞💘

My commission came out absolutely stunning! 🥰💞 I'm so happy with how it turned out! KuroEne look so beautiful in Mire's style 🖤💙

Mire perfectly captured their theme-ing and motifs. The art style, colours, rendering, and graphic design are all so pretty… I'm amazed by the attention to detail. Everything is so gorgeous 😭💗

I love the geometric rendering style Mire has that makes their hair look so fluffy. The colours harmonize so well together, omg. Mire always delivers 😭💞

Mire puts SO much effort into the colouring, rendering, details, and graphic design. The design of the frame is so good 🤯💥I'm utterly blown away... Everything is so gorgeous 😭 💗

Their art style is really pretty... They're so attentive to details and included all the requests I asked for: Kuroha's smug expression, the red Higanbana (Cluster Amaryllis), and the snake wrapping around an Ene-themed bunny plushie.

They were super nice and accommodating with minor changes as well, such as with Kuroha's headphones.

The vertical and horizontal versions are both so good! I would love to print this out for personal use and hang it on my wall as prints 💗

I was wondering if VGen had any way to tip artists, and it does, with the Boost feature.

So I boosted the commissions on VGen for both the Ticket and Coffin YCH comms to show my appreciation for the gorgeous artworks Mire made me. So I sent roughly a 25% and 35% tip :)

Misc Rambles

OH MY GOD THEY'RE SO PRETTY PLEASE ASDFFGHJKL 😭💗💞💘 I'M GONNA SCREAM

I really wanna gush about this art, because Mire captured KuroEne's theme-ing and motifs perfectly 🥺🙏 They drew their design details and outfits so well, and the colours and rendering are so amazing…

They have such great attention to detail, like with the snake wrapping around an Ene themed bunny plushie... The bunny plush is SOOO cute. I love the design of the border frames used for this YCH comm too. The quality is seriously outstanding…

I requested KuroEne with Mire's Inside the Coffin YCH comm after my previous KuroEne Ticket Surprise Me (Omakase) comm, since I really wanted to see KuroEne in Mire's adorable chibi style.

Ene's feet scatter into pixels in canon, so I like how Mire made Ene wear boots with cross-laced XXX shaped straps since it makes things easier to draw with the YCH base.

Ene with her XXX straps on her dress and boots, and Mr. XXX peering over the coffin ❌😌 Not visible, but he has little X's on the back of his Design Poll outfit.

I asked for a bunny plushie with Ene's digital facial structures on it with a snake wrapping around it to represent KuroEne thematically, since I thought it'd fit them very well.

Kuroha/Saeru is associated with Higanbana (Red Cluster Amaryllis), the Flower of Death, by Sidu.

The dark evil cunning and malicious entity who is the cause and center of death, is the one lovingly (menacingly) peering at Ene lying in a coffin while putting his hands on the sides, as a kind of ominous foreshadowing for what comes at the end of a Route…

If you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes back at you.

I've always thought of this quote in terms of confronting your own death and mortality. He's not ready to come to terms with it, either, hence feeding the cycle (with all the time loop resets)

The higanbana is so pretty and detailed… They're so good at drawing flowers. The scale textures on the snake look hand drawn too.

My Message

This was the message I left for Mire!

Thank you so much again for the wonderful commission! KuroEne look so adorable in your chibi style! You drew their design details, expressions, and outfits very well.

You have such amazing attention to detail. The colours and rendering are amazing~ I love the colours you chose!

Your art style is gorgeous, and you have such pretty colours and rendering... The way you drew their expressions, outfits, and the flowers are so pretty and detailed!

Your commission formats have such amazing graphic design and compositions! The art quality is seriously outstanding... 💖💗

Thank you for including the details I asked for (ie. Kuroha's expression, and the snake curling around a bunny plushie). You drew them perfectly 🖤💙

Commission Rambles

I sent these as refs. Feila and I discussed ideas on what poses, expressions, flowers, and items would fit best based on their symbolisms and in terms of visual contrast.

He owns this :} expression with the insane smug smirk and eyebrows

If I wanted them as marketable animal plushies, I'd pick these. The snake and bunny plushie are SOOOOO cute.

The bunny plushie with the headband is just so cute, I'm obsessed with it 😭💗 It's just SO Ene-core 💙🐇

I love their Design poll outfits and Ene's Seek at Mekakucity outfit sm… They look so elegant. Takane/Ene, my princess 💙

閃光の舞姫 (Senkou no Maihime) has also been translated as "Dancing Princess of the Spotlight" in older fan-TLs 😌💗

...

I initially had the idea of a snake wrapping around a bunny plushie or a golden apple (that Saeru is associated with in the Joker art by Sidu because it symbolizes immortality)

Added with how Fujimori (most likely) depicts Saeru in the chibi MekaDan Playing Cards as a Shinigami (死神, lit. "Kami of Death") or a Grim Reaper, with the scythe (which are closely associated with shinigami and grim reapers), and a Jester/Clown aesthetic with the Jester hat, to play up to the Joker card motif 🃏♦️

Feila said the depiction of him as a Shinigami or Grim Reaper feels fitting for him since he brings death to other people.

And that the Jester/Clown look is to represent the eternal looping of the Tragedy (August 15th incident) is a grand show/play that's been rehearsed many times

Snake wrapping around a bunny -> Saeru trapping Ene

Snake wrapping around a golden apple -> Saeru is the embodiment of knowledge

Went with the 1st cuz it represents his S/O falling for his trap (seductions). Since snakes trap their prey by wrapping themselves around their prey.

I liked the idea of Saeru having a smug smile while holding onto the coffin's edges, and Ene having an annoyed pout :< like in a "Damn it, stop killing us" kinda way

Higanbana

Forget Me Nots and Cluster Amaryllis

Wanted to ramble about how Saeru is associated with Higanbana.

I thought that picking Forget Me Nots (Wasurenagusa) could have interesting and yummy angst fuel, like how Ene won't remember their past memories together in previous Routes since he's the only one that remembers (aside from Ayaki), and how she wouldn't want him to ever forget the crimes he did and his past karma.

Even if he's the only one that remembers and has zero remorse about his deeds (lol), his karma still follows him like a shadow :)

Even if he's the only one that remembers and has zero regrets about his deeds, his karma still follows him like a shadow :)

Using Higanbana, the Flower of Death, Saeru's flower, would represent him always being with her while also being her cause of death. Its symbolism is perfect for Saeru, which is why I chose it.

Black Higanbana doesn't exist IRL (similar to Blue Higanbana too), but they tend to be used in creative works. Red higanbana sometimes turns black when they wilt.

However, there is "Black-flower Higanbana" (Kurobana higanbana) that's a variant of Higanbana. It's a deeper red colour and has a darker black gradient on the reds.

When I first saw the LN 7 art of Kuroha, I HC'ed that it was Higanbana because of how similar the shape (how it looked like the spindles of Higanbana), so I associated it to him as one of his flowers due to its Hanakotoba meanings (flower symbolism) as the Flower of Death.

Also cuz the MekaDan are associated with various symbolisms (ie. Shintaro and Ayano with paper cranes, Ayano with Chrysanthemums (Kiku) in Sidu's Hanafuda Calendar Art (2016) and in Additional Memory)

So I expected that Sidu making Saeru's Awakening Eyes manifest as black snakes or a black aura that resembles Higanbana, to be very intentional on her part.

I'm very happy to see my HC was confirmed cuz Sidu writes Higanbana (彼岸花) next to him on the rough sketch version 😌❤️

Higanbana fits his character perfectly with how he's at the center of death. It's the Flower of Death/Hell and grows in hell (the side of the dead), Higan (彼岸, lit. "The other side"), the far side of the Sanzu River.

They're usually grown around cemeteries and grave sites. They're usually red, the colour of blood, somewhat toxic, and are often associated with an unlucky/bad omen symbolism, which fits him.

Though Higanbana also has good omens too, like symbolizing that happy things will come, since it is also called the "Heavenly Flower"

I'm in the process of writing a more detailed post on KuroEne and Flower Symbolisms, based on my own picks, but I haven't finished writing it yet since I want to talk about all the flowers I chose for them in depth.

I put the ideas that Feila and I came up with for the comm under the cut.

So the YCH form has a couple different poses and expressions and flower suggestions listed.

When Feila and I discussed ideas, we figured that Ene fits more as the one in the coffin. I was wondering whether to have him holding onto the coffin or resting his elbows on the coffin while his hands press against his face. One is reminiscing, the other is mocking.

But then I went with the 1st cuz his Design Poll outfit has larger sleeves and I wouldn't want it cover too much of his design, since his arms would be raised in that pose.

Total coincidence and the shoes definitely a stylistic choice, but it fits since she's occupying an android body in the context of my KuroEne AU, so she would have shoes.

Commission Rambles

I sent this commission form!

I also included a quick sketch as a visual ref guide when I sent the form :) Figured it'd make Saeru's expression easier to draw

The comm has mainly 1 core item inside the coffin, so the details of the bunny plushie are simplified (which is perfectly fine with me 👍)

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne Speedpaints 🖤💙🐍🐇

KuroEne Kiss (Post Version)

【KagePro】 KuroEne/SaeEne 🖤💛💙

【カゲプロ】 黒コノエネ/クロエネ/冴えエネ

My shadow wants to swallow up this dream of yours.

Original Post

I hadn't posted the version with the painted auras (the one I originally had) cuz it's not a huge enough change to warrant a post on its own to me.

Once I refine this more in the future, I'd post a new version. But I figured I could post the speedpaints here 👍

Kuroha Speedpaint 🖤💛🐍

Recorded me doing the rough base colours for this one 😌 I had a lot of fun choosing the colours for this one! 💗🫶

Original Time: 45 minutes (Sped up by 16x)

BGM: Outer Science Rearrange Cover (ft. Kagamine Len) 🎵

Kuroha and Ene Speedpaint 🖤💙🐍🐇

I did a bit of edits on Kuroha's colours, then filled in the base colours for Ene~

Working with cool colours is super fun 🙌

Original Time: 45 minutes (Sped up by 16x)

BGM: Outer Science (ft. IA & ONE) 🎵

Rambles

This KuroEne kiss art is honestly one of my fave arts I've ever done 🖤💙🐍🐇🥺

This was the version of the doodle I posted online. I corrected the colours after I stopped recording.

Their expressions are sooo good here and I love the colours so much! I'm so proud because it has some of the best colour work I've ever done irt colour coordination.

I've been busy so I haven't gotten the chance to clean it up and refine it, so for now I just posted the doodle WIP.

I recorded me doing the rough colour drafts on my KuroEne doodle! 🥰

I originally recorded these around late July and posted these on my side blog back when I was still on priv, but I figured these are better to post on my art blog instead.

These aren't refined, and just me roughly filling in the base colours on my sketches to get an idea of colours

Since Idk when I'll get to refine these drawings and clean up the sketch and lines

Tumblr's finnicky with posting videos ngl, so I posted YT links this time. I put them as Unlisted. Feel free to check them out if you're interested in my drawing process ^^

I described my art process in the video description, but I can also put them down below in the post too.

At first, I chose a much more muted colour palette for Kuroha than I usually would. I wanted to try out Sidu's muted colours, since I usually pick saturated colours. But then at the end, I ended up picking a more vibrant colour palette for Ene.

And once I turned both Kuroha and Ene's layers back on, I noticed Saeru had muted colours while Ene had vibrant ones, so I was like "Ok, I need to coordinate the colours after this."

So I just recorded until I filled in the base colours.

When I record my screen with OBS, I put it on Window Capture so it doesn't record "Layer > New Correction Layer > Hue/Saturation and Gradient Map" menu screens.

So after I was done recording, I coordinated the colours and shifted both to saturated colours. I adjusted the colours with gradient maps and shifted the colours manually. I think I work much better with saturated colours anyways.

I shifted Saeru's tones to purple~ish reds because I love the visual contrast it creates against Ene's blues.

I shifted Ene's tones to a different hue of blue to match Saeru's colours better.

I also made Saeru have paler skin compared to Ene, cuz it makes sense with him being a snake/non-human ^^

The more red + purple toned Kuroha has really nice visual contrast against Ene's cool colours (blues) in her design~

At first I wanted to do both a Muted + Saturated colours version, but I think I just work better with saturated colours tbh. It was a fun experiment though.

I adore Sidu's aesthetic sense and colours and rendering. She has amazing values. Iirc she starts by painting in grayscale first, which explains why her values are so good.

KuroEne Doodles

Different versions I played around with!

This shows how I got to the current colours. I play around a lot with Correction Layers (Hue and Saturation, Brightness and Contrast, and Gradient Maps) until I get the ones that look the best to me ^^

OG

(+) Hue shift on Ene

(+) Red hue shift on Kuroha

(+) Hue shift on Ene

(+) Red/pink hue shift and increased saturation on Kuroha's skin

(+) Increased brightness and saturation on OG

(+) Hue shift on Ene

(+) Increased Brightness and red hue shift on Kuroha

(+) More red hue shift on Kuroha

(+) More red hue shift on Kuroha

(+) Multiply Layer on both

(+) Hue shift on Ene

(+) More red hue shift on Kuroha

(+) Hue shift on Ene

First one's the OG.

I first started with choosing a more muted colour palette than I usually would. I wanted to do quick rough colour drafts to get an idea for colours...

I'm not sure when I'll finally get to refine this (clean up the sketch), but it's one of my fave drawings I've done, so I wanted to add quick colours on it.

Picked a muted colour palette for Kuroha and a more vibrant colour palette for Ene, and then coordinated the colours after.

Art Process Rambles

I put the video description rambles under the cut (describing my art process)

Inspiration

Kagerou Daze VII -from the darkness- Kuroha/Saeru Illustration by Sidu

Ene SPDG (Super Pretty Dennou Girl) Illustration by Sidu

Outer Science MV by Sidu

I honestly love the idea of Saeru taking more red tones. Gives him more visual contrast against Ene's blues.

Because it just reminds me of the red tinted shots in the Outer Science MV where he smears the MekaDan members' blood onto his face... It fits him so well. I love these shots sm

Kuroha Speedpaint

Decided to fill in the rough base colours for this! I love doing rough colour drafts~ Helps me get a good idea of colours.

I put Outer Science as the BGM. Fitting for the Outer Science Person~

I also love the tuning and adlibs and robotic voice effects on the Len fan-cover of Outer Science so much~ The tuning is superior to the Original to me. So it's my personal favourite version of Outer Science and my favourite fan-cover.

Watching this fan-cover is what got me into KagePro. It was my first time watching the Outer Science MV.

The tuning and mixing in this fan-made rearrange cover is insanely good. It's stronger than the original. The chorus has so much oomph and power to it in this, and I love the added adlibs and robotic effects on certain lines.

I prefer the instrumentals (guitar riffs, drums, and bass) of the OG though. The fan-cover version's instrumentals sounds more like an arcade, which is also fun.

0:00

I start with colour picking from the colour edit I did as a guide for colours.

The original refs, the Kagerou Daze VII -from the darkness- Kuroha/Saeru illust and Ene SPDG illust are by Sidu.

Sidu has a great sense of values and picks very muted colours, so I did a colour edit for fun to shift colours closer to the saturated cooler tones I would choose.

Doing colour edits for fun first helps me harmonize colours better compared to if I just made a colour swatch. It helps me see how the colours work together.

The faster way to fill in the base colours would be to create a new layer and temporarily close all the lines, then select the outside of the lines, invert the selection, and then use the bucket tool. I'd do this for more refined drawings that are in the lineart stage

I manually fill in the colours when doing rough base colours though. Manually filling in the base colours is relaxing ngl

Since they're rough colour drafts, I'm not shading/blocking in shadows, I just wanna get an idea of how the colours look together

1:05 - 1:10

When I do Gradient Maps and Layer Mode effects, I either clip them to the Colours, or put them in a folder and set them to Through so they can show on the layers underneath it.

I realized I couldn't eye drop the exact colours on the colour edit ref with the Folder set to Through Layer Mode (60% opacity), so I duplicated it, then merged the layers

I also adjusted the settings of my Eyedrop tool later so that it can grab the colour from the image itself, rather than just the colour on the Layer it's on. Cuz if you're not on the exact Layer, then it won't grab any colour.

1:12

I was considering whether I wanted to airbrush the tips of the fingers with a dark gradient cuz I love the darkened gradient limbs design trope. Douman has it canonically, and my friend Raisu added it on Idate's design (which is why I always draw him with it).

Decided to go without it here tho cuz I feel like it takes away from the colours

1:42

Doing colour edits and adjustments with Posterization and Hue/Saturation effects can throw the contrast out of wack, so I adjust the colours myself on my own drawings.

I usually shift the hues of shadows and highlights (in comparison to the base colours) to keep the colours interesting. I try to use different hues for them so the colours can pop more. I was trying to come up with a good colour for the darker black inner clothes

2:17 - 2:25

After roughly colouring the black spirals around him, I use Posterization on CSP.

Window Capture on OBS only records the main window for CSP, but I went to Layer > New Correction Layer > Posterization which creates a Posterization layer. I adjust the colours with this, which increases the contrast and darkens the colours slightly.

I'll probably fix the colours of the dark sleeves manually later.

2:26

I draw my lines on vector layers so I can easily adjust and edit (move and scale down/up) my lines without losing quality.

I duplicate the lineart, so I can use a CSP Auto Action that colours the lines. I used to manually colour my lines, but this one's quick and you can get really pretty line colours with it, cuz it colours the lineart according to the colours underneath.

It doesn't show the windows that performs the Auto Action through the recording, but I downloaded an Auto Action available on the CSP Assets Store that's called "Better Line Color" that follows a series of steps (it can be mimicked manually on other programs) and adjusts the colour of the lines according to the colours underneath it.

I think when I refine the drawing more, I wouldn't have the dark spirals apart of the lineart, and would just paint it instead.

I was playing around with whether I wanted the coloured lineart to be on "Multiply" or "Colour Burn" Layer mode. Depending on the drawing, either has really nice effects.

On my other drawings, like the coloured IdaTatsu and Selena doodles I had, I preferred the coloured lines on Colour Burn Layer mode cuz it adds a subtle saturated glow to the lines. Here, it adds a slightly blue edge to the lineart.

I went with Multiply for now (just cuz this keeps the colours of the black spirals intact better, but I'll consider which one looks better after)

After the recording was done, though, I just switched back to the painted black spirals I originally drew.

Ene Speedpaint

0:00 - 0:32

I clean up the colours on Kuroha a bit. I also add back the gray transition colour on the hair (between the highlights and base colour)

I brighten the eyes a bit and make it slightly more saturated

0:32

I start filling in the base colours for Ene, picking from a more vibrant colour palette (edit of Sidu's art)

0:45

I realized that her digital structures are shorter on the side closer to her mouth, so I adjusted the lines a bit

0:48

I start filling in the rest of the base colours. At the time, I wasn't whether I want to have Ene's eyes as ice blue or saturate them more…

1:44

I wanted to saturate the skin more so it'd have more contrast, but decided to keep that for later.

1:58

Added a muted gray transition colour on the hair

2:00

Started splotching colours on the sweater and skirt to get an idea of colours.

2:25

Upped the Brightness and Contrast on the skin. Played around with Posterization on the Colours.

Since Kuroha's lines were black, I decided to do the Better Line Color on Kuroha's lines again. This time I used the Bucket tool to colour the lines with a dark blue colour, clipped them, duplicated the lines and then did the Better Line Color Auto Action again.

I also did the same for Ene's lines. I set it on Multiply cuz I liked the soft look the coloured lines

2:42 - 2:51

Before I added the colours, I just had Kuroha's lines above Ene's lines folder, and then had a white layer in the middle.

I was still wondering how I'd show Ene's hand on his sleeve, but Kuroha's colours still being over hers… I was considering just putting the folder of his colours on top of hers, but HMM…

For now though, I just duplicated the lines and colours for a PNG version, then cut from that, for showing on my socials

End: Once I turned back on Kuroha's colours, I realized that I chose a really muted palette for him and a really vibrant one for Ene, so after I finished recording, I played around with the Gradient Maps and saturated the colours and eyes more.

I'll definitely coordinate their colour palettes more later. I'll do a muted version and saturated version.

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne Chibi Commission by Hika 🖤💙🐍🐇

Kuroha (Saeru) and Ene Chibi Icon Commission by Hika (@/onigiwi2namayo)

Hika's Twitter: (X)

Hika's VGen: (X)

In accordance with Hika's Terms of Service (TOS), editing, using, or reposting these arts, in any way, is prohibited without explicit permission from Hika, and me, the commissioner.

Intro

Thank you to Hika for the lovely commission of my beloved KuroEne 🖤💙🐍🐇

I also commissioned Hika before to draw my KHR Yume (Canon/OC) ship of Xanxus and Selena ❤️💜 That will be posted soon, too 🥰

I don't mind giving permission if my mutuals want to use them. I'll most likely grant it, but you also need to receive Hika's permission if you do.

I commissioned Hika to draw Kuroha and Ene for my chibi icon commission! Hika initially drew the unhinged expression for Kuroha >:D And then changed to the version with the smug smile :]

I asked Hika to keep both expressions for the finalized versions since I loooove both 💞💘

Hika sent me the high-res files for the KuroEne commission 🖤💛💙 THEY'RE SO CUTE AHHH I'M SO HAPPY!!! MY CHILDHOOD OTP OF 10+ YEARS!!!

I LOVE THE COLOURS AND THEIR EXPRESSIONS... MY KAGEPRO OTP FOREVER!!! THE BELOVEDS

KUROENE WORLD DOMINATION 💥💥💥

Hika's chibi style is SO cute. I love how Hika draws eyes and expressions sm… Kuroha's new expression is SO cute OMGGG. I also LOVE the insane one very much <3 I love both! And Ene my wife is just the CUTEST AAAAA 😭💙💘💞

The thick round lines and simple blush and highlights works so well. God they look SO precious!!! And Hika's colour choices are fantastic.

I love the blue~ish tones Hika used for Kuroha's hair and how Hika used yellow and blue for the backgrounds to make the colours pop.

The dark blue BG works well against Ene's more muted blue hair. And I love the ice blue colour Hika chose for Ene's eyes ahhh…

Also ty to Hika for including both expressions~ The cute Kuroha and the insane expression are so nice ahhh. AND MY WIFE ENE'S ADORABLE EXPRESSION AHDSHDSHDSHDS

I put the Saeru twice for the sake of formatting

My Message

This was the message I left for Hika!

I love how the commission turned out... You drew their eyes and expressions so well~ 😭🥺

Your chibi style is very adorable! You draw such expressive chibis! They look so precious~ I also love the colours you chose and how well they pair with the BG colours. The thick round lines, simple blush and highlights are so nice in your style!

The colour choices are amazing ✨ I love the blue~ish tones used for Kuroha's hair, and how the yellow and blue background colours makes their colours stand out!

The dark blue BG works well against Ene's blue hair~ And I love the ice blue colour chosen for Ene's eyes! 💙

I'm so glad you were so accomodating with minor changes and revisions like colour changes and small details! I really appreciate it 🥰💘💞

Misc Rambles

WHEN HIKA SENT ME THE KUROENE CHIBI COMM OH MY GODDDD THEY'RE SO CUTEEEEEEEEEEEEEE 😭🖤💙

MY HEART RATE SPIKED WHEN I SAW THESE...

THEIR EXPRESSIONS PLEASEEEEEEEEE

ENE MY WIFE IS SO CUTE I COULD CRY

12 YEAR OLD ME WOULD BE SO PROUD OF ME RIGHT NOW… BE THE CHANGE YOU WANNA SEE IN THE WORLD 🤸

I KNEW HIKA WOULD DO THEM JUSTICE CRYING SCREAMING SHAKING ADKLSKLSDKLDSKLKLSDKLSDKL

Commission Rambles

KuroEne have some official art refs (official art, merch arts) that can be inconsistent in colours (ex. their headphones) so I also gave some notes and quick edits of official arts.

I sent these arts of Kuroha and Ene as my main refs 🖤💙

I sent more too, but I felt that since I'm commissioning chibis of them, that these arts simplify their designs nicely.

Kuroha and Ene Rubber Strap Charms by 1st PLACE

Kuroha and Ene from Cospa's Tsumamare Series (Pinched Series)

Concept Arts by Sidu from .dsd –Sidu illustration Works 2011-2015–

Scans by @/ayara-resara

Edit by me

Ene, Konoha, and Kuroha from Mekakucity V's

I did a little edit of their concept arts for fun. I mainly did it to get a clearer full body ref of Saeru to make it easier for the artists I'm commissioning

Takane/Ene and her bfs. All 3 of them /lh 🖤💛💙

My main focus is on 9/6 and XX/6, basically all related ships (KuroEne, HaruTaka, KonoEne)

Depending on the arts (including merch arts), Kuroha's clothes either get coloured with the same black colour, or with the inner clothes as a darker black.

I prefer when his inner clothes and boots, etc., are a darker black cuz it has more visual contrast against his design. It also differentiates the clothes more to have the outer shirt be a lighter gray black vs. the darker blacks in his hair and inner clothes.

His entire design is in dark colours (black, gray), and the gold in his eyes and facial markings cuts away from that. Yellow is a bright vivid colour.

Though it makes sense in MVs like Outer Science and some official arts/merch why his outer and inner shirts are the same colour to not distract from the mood/atmosphere, and also in pieces/merch that use a limited colour palette

For the FIRST time, I finally get to see that Kuroha art in full and not in crusty quality for once. It's a happy day for me

She is TINY compared to them... Haruka/Konoha/Kuroha is 182 cm (6'0") and Ene is 157 cm (5'2") or 640 px tall... Portable gf. They could put her in their pocket

Interesting that Ene's thigh highs were originally asymmetrical in the concept arts. The finalized design definitely fits her more.

Simplifying Ene's headphones is completely fine with me cuz of the rectangular part on it...

The rest of my rambles are under the cut as usual! ✨

Commissions

Whenever I commission artists, I send a detailed description of the characters' relevant design details, poses and expressions, etc., in the form itself.

Then I attach all necessary art refs in a Google Drive Folder and then send the link to the artist.

Because I know that sending a lot of art refs and a detailed description, just makes things easier for the artists you're commissioning.

My commission request forms tend to look like this

Commission Request

Characters

Series/OC (if applicable)

Design Details (for each character)

Poses and Expressions (Artists can ask for these to help guide their art process, but otherwise I just leave it up to the artist)

Other Notes (Simplifying details, especially for chibis, is perfectly fine with me)

VGen Rambles

VGen's site layout and format are honestly better than Ko-fi's imo

VGen has a REALLY nice UI for commissioning artists... I prefer it over Ko-fi when it comes to commissioning artists.

It shows all your commission requests in an organized format, and it has a really good commission request form, where the artist can send invoices.

VGen lets you upload more files and links as art refs. It's better than Ko-fi's in that it allows you to upload more files and add links. Iirc, I think Ko-fi's has a limit of 5

The artists can DM with their clients on VGen directly, and also leave files in high quality directly on the commission form after completion

There's also a review section, typically the artist leaves a review for the client and the client can give one. I always leave a message for the artist after the commission is done to show my gratitude 🥰

[stepswowdsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne AU: KuroEne's Amusement Park Date + Kuroha pretends to join the Mekakushi Dan 🖤💙

KuroEne AU: Scenarios

Dialogue Scripts (Suggestive dialogue)

Kuroha goes to the Amusement Park with Ene

Kuroha/Saeru pretends to join the Mekakushi Dan, while getting intimate with Ene. Shintaro accidentally stumbles in on KuroEne's intimacy and learns about their relationship.

I originally wrote these rambles on 8/29/2024 and 9/1/2024 but forgot to post them here

I put these rambles under the cut as usual!

KuroEne AU: Dialogue Scripts

(CW: Suggestive)

Based on an idea I had where Ene asks Kuroha about his motives. He then tells her he's been with the Enes of previous routes. Ene dares him to make her feel good, and Kuroha accepts the challenge.

Ene recognizes that she might not be able to ever truly beat him, but that doesn't mean she'll ever stop trying.

Ene reflects on her experiences with Kuroha/Saeru.

KuroEne AU: Unsorted dialogue scripts.

I'll post my Outer Science arts and Outer Science MV analysis rambles soon in the coming days (since I always try to find new things to say when it comes to analyzing my fave MVs).

Whenever I get the time.

For now I'll just post this since I forget which dialogue scripts I have and haven't posted

Both in terms of art and writing, KuroEne really gets my creative juices flowing, so I'm so grateful to this pair (and my other faves too) for getting me out of the rut of never posting anything. I'm slowly getting more comfortable with posting my art WIPs too.

KuroEne AU: A monologue snippet from Ene. I want to write more scenes like this ^^

I think it's super fun to delve into and explore her feelings and the kinds of insecurities and loneliness she tries to keep beneath the surface.

How in Manga Route 2, she admits to Shintaro that having so much fun spending time with a friend made her start to feel like she didn't deserve it... Weh weh weh ;__;

...

Kuroha/Saeru uses the pronouns 僕 (Boku, "I") and 君 (Kimi, "You") in Outer Science, and the rougher masc pronouns 俺 (Ore, "I") and お前 (Omae, "You") in the Kagerou Daze manga.

I made him default to using Ore (俺) and Omae (お前) in my own dialogue scripts since the rougher masc pronouns fit an arrogant chara like him, but I imagine that he probably does use 僕 (Boku) and 君 (Kimi) if he wants to appear softer to Ene.

It'd be familiar to her since Haruka and Konoha both use 僕 (Boku) and 君 (Kimi)

...

I don't have a favourite character to write dialogue scripts for, since I enjoy writing for all of my meow meow mf and wifey faves. But writing villain charas is seriously cathartic for me :)

The dialogue is sooo fun to write for villain/antagonist charas.

I excel at writing my faves most, so other charas' roles tend to be rather minimized/minimal (or mainly just cameos, if they're there), since I usually just focus on the ship itself in my ship AUs.

Kuroha takes Ene to the Amusement Park

Kagerou Daze Manga: Ch. 9 - Shintaro and Ene

I decided to put the pages for context just in case my non-KagePro mutuals wanna tune into these rambles ^^

I didn't get to write all of what I wanted today but I got most of it down so I'll just post what I got for now

One of the ideas I had that I forgot to talk about was Ene getting Kuroha to take her to the amusement park. Ene gets excited talking about how, while she was surfing the web earlier when the android body was recharging, that she found out about an Amusement park attraction and wants to go with him.

I imagine that Kuroha decides to play nice prior to the fateful day of August 15th (in which he plans to enact the "plan" or "Tragedy." Like he acts more tame/normal on purpose, and holds back, and decides to go along with his partner's whims.

Ene goes like, "Take me to the amusement park!!!" And she gets excited when he agrees. I assume they're in a Route where he's made enough improvements that the battery can last anywhere from several hours ~ a full day instead of just an hour or few.

At some point during the Amusement park trip, Ene innerly thinks to herself with flustered, panicky thoughts, like, "W-w-wait why is my face getting all red??? Maybe it's because I'm just embarrassed by this guy's teasing??? Yeah!!! That must be it!!!"

She thought of it as going with like, a friend, before, but she thinks about the fact that it's just the two of them here and that this IS the person she has an intimate relationship with and thinks to herself, "HOLD ON!!! IS THIS A DATE!?!?" And cuz Ene is so easy to read, Kuroha can guess her inner turmoil and just gets amused.

Ene pulls him by the arm and makes Kuroha to come along with her to all the amusement park attractions, and he lets her. They probably go on stuff like the mini boat rides and other attractions.

Kuroha just reacts like (...) the whole time while on the roller coaster ride, like the completely calm type that doesn't react at all, he just watches Ene's excited reactions of "Yippee!!!" (>v<)

Kuroha comments that it's good that Ene seems to be enjoying herself, and Ene tells him that she's never had the chance to go to an amusement park before and that she's having LOTS of fun!!! And that she's glad that he is here with her.

Ene goes like, "Come onnnnn, carry me!!!" And he carries his fussy needy gf, while making a teasing quip that she acts awfully spoiled. And she just pouts like "It's fine, it's fine!!!" (>3<)

When he thinks about it, Kuroha picks up on the fact that back when she was Takane, she'd spend most of her time cooped up in her room at home playing video games, and probably didn't get the chance to go to an amusement park (also due to her chronic illness too). So the bright and peppy exterior Ene displays is over compensation for her regrets and an opportunity to do the things she didn't get to before

At one point, Ene wants Kuroha to win prizes for her at a booth/stand selling plushies by throwing darts into a target marker, and Ene tells him she wants him to win prizes for her. When Kuroha throws the darts, it hits the center (red bull's eye) perfectly.

There's probably also a game with hitting moving targets as well, and he hits them all perfectly and wins the prizes that Ene wants. And Ene's like, "Wow~ You're good at this! Throwing darts, I mean!"

And Kuroha tells her, "Naturally. This much is child's play. I am quite skilled at hunting down moving targets..."

He has plenty of practice at it. Ene takes it as a video game thing cuz Ene makes him play video games together and her faves are shooter types, but ahahaha, there's a much darker secret to that. After that, Ene is carrying a fluffy bunny plushie.

It'd also be fun to think about the Amusement Park Scenario with KonoEne too? KonoEne where Konoha just noms on cotton candy while staying close to her, and she just gets all blushy and huffy at him.

Also with the darts scenario, Konoha wouldn't hold back (cuz of how dense and airheaded he is), so him throwing the dart just creates a mini crater in the wall.

Like it plays out much differently with KuroEne ofc.

...

I was just thinking about it but I really want to write dialogue scripts for an Amusement Park scenario in my KuroEne AU.

Basically Ene tells Kuroha she's always wanted to go to the amusement park (since she didn't get the chance to before) and that she wanted to go with a friend (Shintaro), but said friend was a total shut-in and not the type to want to go outside.

So this is the perfect opportunity for her to go with someone!

Ene has a faint blush on her cheeks and pushes her sleeves together as she goes like, "I've been meaning to ask! I was wondering if you would… take me to the Amusement Park?" And Kuroha agrees to take her.

While there, Ene tells him she's having lots of fun! Kuroha muses to himself about the irony. In Manga Route 1, he ended the MekaDan at this very same park. The irony isn't lost on him.

But it's cute to see Ene enjoying herself and having fun and he finds her behaviour naive and foolish for readily accepting him and trusting him so easily, but also innocent and endearing.

Kuroha/Saeru pretends to join the Mekakushi Dan

I just had an idea like y'know what would be a fun idea for a KuroEne AU Route.

I just thought about it since, my KuroEne AU routes usually have KuroEne hang out alone together in a secluded/abandoned building or real estate just to themselves.

But I also thought that it WOULD be interesting

If the Mekakushi Dan doesn't get the chance to meet Konoha, but Kuroha pretends to be an Eye Ability user and "joins" them just out of curiosity.

The MekaDan think they've invited a new member, in reality they have the enemy in their hideout. The irony isn't lost on him.

He's good at playing pretend.

Something that he can pull off because he's an Eye Ability snake, he can make his eyes glow red. And he just pretends his Eye Ability is Awakening Eyes

The other Mekakushi Dan members accept him like, "Welcome to the Mekakushi Dan!" (:D)

And upon getting this warm greeting from everyone, he goes from (…) and slowly smirks like, "Thank you for having me."

…

Like, Kuroha/Saeru pretends to be apart of the Mekakushi Dan and be "one of them" to find new ways to spice up the game and make things fun. It's something different cuz he's usually used to playing the game alone with Ene, now they have "spectators" around them

Though obviously they'll be alone for their intimacy.

Shintaro almost feels relieved to see someone like Kuroha/Saeru that can manage to tease Ene so easily and make her flustered, it's like getting payback or sweet revenge for Ene always teasing him.

…

I thought of one scenario that'd be fun where it's like… KuroEne are alone in the MekaDan's hideout together, the rest of the members are still out and have yet to come back.

Shintaro comes back earlier than the others (earlier than expected) cuz it's been a long time since he's been in the summer heat (as a shut-in NEET), so he's not used to it.

Shintaro wonders where the others (KuroEne) are while thinking to himself. While checking one of the rooms, he sees that the door is slightly open and catches a glimpse of the view of Kuroha leaning in to kiss Ene through the space in the door that's open.

He just immediately backs away from the door and freaks out innerly to himself. Then Shintaro thinks back on all the instances of Ene actually getting embarrassed/flustered by Kuroha/Saeru's teasing, which is so unlike her usual self, and things start to make sense.

Irt Kuroha/Saeru, he's a Snake so he can sniff things out way better than a human can, he probably smelled the scent of another person in the air when Shintaro came in through the door. But it doesn't matter to him if anyone finds out about their r/s.

Shintaro: (WHAT…. NO WAY!!! THERE'S JUST NO WAY!!! AHHHH! IT'S NOT MY BUSINESS! I DIDN'T SEE ANYTHING!)

Shintaro: (Come to think of it… I just thought it was fun to see Ene being the one getting teased.. I never thought there'd be something like THAT between them!!!)

Shintaro: (BUT I DIDN'T THINK THERE WAS ANYTHING GOING ON BETWEEN THEM… I MEAN!!! THAT ENE!?!? WHO USUALLY ACTS SO SPOILED AND SELFISH!!! SUDDENLY ACTING ALL SHY!?!? ARE YOU KIDDING ME???)

Inspiration

Made these rambles after being inspired by Feila's KuroEne chatroom style posts

Feila's KuroEne posts 😭 CRYINGGG /POS

Ene managing to pester and tease Saeru is a huge feat she should feel accomplished. I think it's so funny to imagine Shintaro being the (unfortunate) spectator of KuroEne's shenanigans together.

Ene being bratty on purpose to rile up Saeru is a fun concept :3

Especially when he's usually a more calm/level-headed character so it would take a lot but I think my wife has it in her 👍

C: Omg

M: THIS IS EXACTLY THE DYNAMIC I HAVE IN MY HEAD FOR KUROENE HELPP

Me: We should have Ene acting bratty enough to Saeru for him to want to tease her back in exchange :3

[stepswowdsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne AU: Kuroha tries to provoke Ene into attacking him

(CW: Sexually suggestive dialogue, Saeru being a freak)

Summary:

KuroEne AU: Kuroha tries to provoke Ene into attacking him and Ene refuses, an answer that he accepts.

Sen's Meow Meow Mf Faves (^-^)

Route XX: ShinEne

I really wanna draw a KuroEne art at some point so I can caption it with:

“I’ll come to you as both your lover and executioner.”

I love imagining KuroEne as that whole "I will come to you as your lover and your executioner" trope

It's such a sexy ship OH MY GODDD

Utterly perfect for my tastes of dark eroticism. Kid me had such good taste

It fits them sooooo perfectly irt Kuroha/Saeru being the main antagonist/villain who’s responsible for (almost everything bad that happens) and the time loop tragedy in KagePro.

Sen's Meow Meow Mf Faves

Ashiya Douman vs. Dioscuri Anthology Comic by AU (@/delete_au)

Magi: Ch. 251 & Ch. 253

Outer Science MV by Sidu

My smiley (^-^) meow meow faves have that very specific dark silhouette smile trope.

Douman. Judar. Kuroha.

KuroEne

Just had a thought about a KuroEne idea that goes something along the lines of:

Kuroha: Hehehe… Such passionate words, Ene.

Kuroha: I wonder… Did you prefer my lies or truths?

Kuroha: Did they (your past selves) prefer when our relationship was built on lies or truths?

Kuroha: ...Or perhaps both?

Kuroha: Love me, hate me… It’s all the same in the end…!

Kuroha: Your love and hatred… your yearning and desire... and your sorrows and grief… They are all nourishment to me. They all feed my desires in the end.

KuroEne AU: Kuroha tries goading Ene into hurting him

Not posting the whole thing cuz my KuroEne AU dialogue scripts are GIANT...

So I'll just post a snippet from it.

At some point their sex would go like this:

Kuroha: Hurt me and make me feel pain!

Ene: Wtf no 😭

Me: Oh I just looked through my KuroEne AU dialogue scripts. I found the first one that’s a huge masterpost of KuroEne ideas, the first one I ever wrote.

I just found some dialogue scripts of KuroEne getting intimate with each other as both Enemies and Lovers. I should revamp them sometime…

(This is not the first of the batch, but it's from the first KuroEne AU dialogue script doc)

Me: Just thought of it but a KuroEne idea where they're Enemies and Lovers and Kuroha tries to taunt Ene into hurting him during their intimacy but she just refuses. Ene is really too nice for that.

Kuroha: Hurt me! Make me feel pain! Direct your anger and your love and hatred towards me—

Kuroha: ...You won't do it? How come?

Kuroha: Or could it be, that even now, you are chasing after your beloved, even when he's a monster wearing his face? (*)

Note: Talking about Haruka.

F: You know... when I read the first sentences, I was really happy and I was passionate about life, but after reading that last part... I still feel the same except I was emotionally stabbed. Ene wouldn't dare to hurt anyone here, I just can't imagine that :<

Me: I feel like Ene would tell him, "Oh, dream on, if you think I'm gonna stoop to your level!"

Ene: ...You must've seen it from the other mes. When I do it, I want my partner to feel good. I'll do it tenderly.

Kuroha: (...)

And Kuroha/Saeru goes like "..." and decides to accept that answer. So he lets it go.

F: She's more of a uh... "hurt with words" type. Verbal violence, I think? Verbally aggressive. Even then, she doesn't really go too harsh with it, just teasing and minor insults every now and then

Me: Yeah like she's more so the type to counter him verbally

F: > “Dream on, if you think I’m gonna stoop to your level!”

This is hot. She's threatening him with a sentle gex 💔

Me: HAHA. It's cuz there's no way that Ene would be a harsh top. When she tops, she will be gentle loving and considerate.

F: ‼️

F:

Kuroha: A little bite won't hurt now... or maybe a choke? Or perhaps... bondage?

Me: Saeru who is trying to tempt her into other things... of course he would.

F: Classic Saeru, what were we expecting from him really?

Me: I always imagined that she reaches out for his hand to hold and intertwine fingers with him when she tops him.

F: 💖

F: AWWWWEEE this is cute, gotta admit <3

Me:

Kuroha: (!)

Kuroha: (Kuroha notices Ene reaching out for his hand, and intertwines his fingers with hers.)

Kuroha: I do find it endearing… how you're still being so gentle and considerate with this.

Kuroha: How you want to make me feel good.

Kuroha: Knowing that you’re still so concerned with my pleasure… makes me crave you more.

Kuroha: ……It’s exactly like you, isn’t it?

Me: 1st and 3rd she could be talked into and agree to. Biting and bondage, I mean.

I can't imagine Ene being comfortable with consensually choking someone so she'd refuse.

F:

"My body is invincible, do whatever you want with it…"

"What if I refuse?"

"Why? Are you scared of hurting me? ',:)"

F: She'd most likely bite tho :D

Me: Yeah I agree she'd bite him!

F: Neck, collarbone, shoulders, the typical spots :^)

Me: Yeah and even though he could heal them with Awakening Eyes if he wanted, he just lets the marks/hickies stay.

Me:

Ene: I refuse. That's... that's just not my style!

Kuroha: How come? Are you scared of hurting your beloved's body? His body? Or mine?

F:

Ene: …You sure know how to provoke a person like me, don't you?

Me: This line is 💗

Me:

Kuroha: This body is invincible... Do as you please.

Ene: Unlike you... I'm not the violent type! Ene is a delicate flower, I'll have you know!

Ene: I’m going to make you feel good, just like you’ve done for me, and that’s that.

Kuroha: (......)

Kuroha: ...I see. That's just like you, isn't it? Very well... If you insist. I accept your answer.

Ene: ...Is it true that you know everything about me?

...

F: Well... so Kuroha is a masochist, I mean... yeah he wouldn't get hurt so it's explainable but omg he sounds so desperate it's like he wants pain 😭

Me: Yeah I see Kuroha/Saeru as a sadomasochist. Mainly a sadist, but he tries to provoke Ene into hurting him because he wants to see if he can get a new outcome and see if he could possibly push her to that point

Also there's the fact that he's never truly threatened (by his partner) because of Awakening Eyes. Even if he did get hurt, he could just heal and regenerate.

Me: The way I see it is that Kuroha/Saeru likes seeing "strong emotions" being directed towards him, no matter what kind. It's cuz love and hatred and greed, etc., all feed his ego.

Saeru's "attachment" isn't really like Douman's attachment. It's like Saeru’s committance to keep the game going as long as all those strong emotions are being directed towards him.

F: Just for fun? Or does is that an actual goal he wants to achieve to get something out of it?

Me:

Ene: No. I’m not gonna do it. There's just no way. I won’t hurt you…

Ene: And doing the opposite of what you want is always a plus~ 🎵

Ene: Why don’t you let me take charge this time~? I’ll do it for you!

Me: Yeah I'd say just for fun. Cuz once Ene establishes that she's not gonna do it after trying to provoke her into doing it, he's satisfied with her answer and lets it go.

Her answer to him is "to lie with her S/O tenderly." So he will accept that.

F: "Trust me, because you wouldn't even have a single bruise on you. <3"

Me: Saeru first blinks in surprise in response to Ene saying this, but then smirks like, "Oh~? Really?"

...

Me: > "How about choking me?"

Also yeah, I feel like Ene wouldn't like anything resembling hands wrapping around the neck...

Ofc that only happens in Routes similar to Route XX, but still...

Just gonna put this for context just in case it's needed.

Losstime Memory’s Route XX has a metaphorical representation of Shintaro killing Ene by wrapping his hands around her neck.

Irt KagePro’s Music Route, Losstime Memory’s Route XX leads to the events of Outer Science.

Me: Good god the misunderstandings between ShinEne (platonic or as ship) are so :'^)

I care about them... I mainly see their dynamic as platonic but I like seeing it as ship too.

In Route XX, Shintaro sinks further into his depression, believing that Ene is only a "neighbour/stranger" who lives in his computer who is incapable of truly understanding him.

While Ene tries to cheer him up and telling him he should pay attention only to her and move onto the future and make connections with other people, and ultimately fails to reach him.

She fears that if left to his own devices, he'd give into his self-loathing and suicidal impulses.

The lyrics of Artificial Enemy before Shintaro deletes Ene has a line something like "I've gotten bored of you, a toy that is only good for talking to"

Shintaro imposes a sense of distance between them and chooses to drown in his solitude/loneliness, can't move on from his guilt and can't move onto the future

But the thing is, Ene saw herself (the way she lived previously as Takane) and knew him before as his classmate back when she was still alive/human, so she really does understand the kind of loneliness he experiences...

F: Did you just stab me.

Correction: Any hand-wrapping near the neck (*)

Let her hug Saeru by wrapping her arms around his neck 💔

Me: Yeah that's what I meant to say. Yeah she would still hug him and wrap her arms around his neck

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne 🖤💛💙

Happy 6/9! Happy HaruTaka/KonoEne/KuroEne day!!! 💛💙 I want to draw HaruTaka and KonoEne too eventually, but I haven't gotten the chance to draw them yet. So for now I'll post my recent Kuroha and KuroEne doodle log 🖤💙

My fave KagePro meow meow mf unhinged evil snek x my cheeky cute energetic wife!!!

KuroEne doodles

These WIPs are really messy so I'll refine them sometime in the future!

I'll post the rest of my KuroEne doodles, and rambles about my KuroEne AUs, and thoughts, under the cut!

Inspired by the Outer Science MV and Kagerou Daze LN 7 cover -from the darkness- illustrated by Sidu

Kuroha x Envy Baby (Song by Kanaria and illustrated by LAM)

KuroEne doodles

I was imagining Ene sitting on a desk or elevated ledge for the last one

My character trait is just scribbling whatever until I get to refine and clean up the sketches. So these are very scribbly for now

Kuroha is my fave KagePro chara. Murderous mad man! I'm a villain enjoyer~ And Ene is my wife~

I have folks following me for all sorts of fandoms so I'll try to explain a bit of context first so those curious can follow along with my rambles if they'd like!

Technically Kuroha is just referred to with ?? or XX in merch, but 6/9 and 9/6 (KonoEne Day) are convenient days to draw Ene and her Haruka lookalike harem~~

KuroEne AUs 🖤💙

I have 3 main types of KuroEne AUs, and my sub AUs tend to fall into one of these:

1) Canon-verse AU where Kuroha pretends to be Konoha, so Ene thinks he's Konoha with Haruka's memories. Takes place in an AU setting that's closest to canon and very angst heavy.

2) Canon-verse AU where Ene can manifest in the real world and even becomes intimate with Kuroha. Kuroha/Saeru remembers previous routes, so he's done this before and remembers their moments of intimacy in all the past timelines. Also very angst heavy.

After all the time loop resets, Kuroha/Saeru figured out a way to transfer to a humanoid android body for certain durations of time so she can interact with the real world (inspired by the CopyBots and Iris from BN6)

3) Fluffy lighthearted AU with fanon Kuroha with a much more fluffy, lighthearted, and tamer setting. Just me coming up with cute little scenario ideas. I love fluff!

Other KuroEne AU ideas:

Royals AU KuroEne (Prince and Princess/Cinderella)

KuroEne dancing in a ballroom together in formal clothes (though this could also work in KuroEne AU No. 2)

KuroEne making snow sculptures together. Kuroha makes a giant snake snow sculpture and Kuroha helps Ene make a giant chibi version of herself. Snakes tend to feel lethargic during the winter. Ene throws snowballs at him.

Snake and Bunny theme (Ene's twintails could look like bunny ears)

I think I need to name my KuroEne AUs eventually to differentiate them lmao

KuroEne AU: No. 1

I also like thinking of KuroEne in canon-verse angst AUs where Kuroha messes around in the routes (timelines). In AU no. 1, he pretends to be Konoha, decides to actually bond and get to know and befriend the Mekakushi Dan members before k*lling them this time, and Ene projects her feelings for Haruka and Konoha, onto Kuroha (who she thinks is Konoha…)

Kuroha decides to mess around in the Routes and befriend the Mekakushi Dan members. I feel like Kuroha should experiment that way cuz he doesn't want the "fun" to be over so soon yet. And also because he's curious how things will play out, and see what will be the same and different compared to previous routes.

In the present day, 2 years later, when she meets Kuroha, she recognizes his appearance, and thinks he's Konoha. After seeing Kuroha, who she thinks is Konoha, she's surprised to see "Konoha" in the flesh...

In my KuroEne AU, Ene thinks that Kuroha is Konoha with Haruka's memories, because Kuroha/Saeru remembers previous routes (timelines) and thus knows her true name (Takane) and context.

I'm insane LMAO. I love angst! KuroEne's angst potential is so high.

I love how KagePro ships are all super heavy and tinged with angst and tragedy.

I love that aspect of them, but ofc, I will delve into light-hearted AUs with them too that take place outside of canon~ I want to write/draw KuroEne in a much more fluffy and lighthearted setting too.

KuroEne AU: No. 2

Canon-verse AU where Ene can manifest in the real world (since I'm taking creative liberties here for the sake of my ship) and even becomes intimate with Kuroha. Very angst heavy.

Takes place in an AU setting close to canon, except the only difference is that Ene can manifest in the real world (unlike in canon where she can only interact with the digital world in devices)

Especially with all the time loop resets, you could see this as an AU where Kuroha/Saeru finally manages to figure out how to make Ene able to manifest in the real world as well.

It was inspired by the Copybots from MMBN/EXE (Battle Network: 6) where Iris, a NetNavi (Network Navigator, companion digital AI, a digital cyber girl), interacts with the protagonist, Netto, by transferring into a Copybot (Android body) to be able to move around in the real world.

The CopyBots take the form of the NetNavi currently in it. They are battery charged, so NetNavis (MMBN/EXE's digital AIs) can only stay in them for certain periods of time.

I imagine this is the case for my KuroEne AU too

Due to Kuroha's knowledge of previous routes, I imagined that since Kuroha keeps memories of previous routes, at some point, he starts to play around in the routes and experiment with different possibilities. He eventually gets to know and bond and spend time with Ene.

Though eventually, Kuroha proceeds with the "Plan" on August 15th to kill everyone in the Mekakushi Dan and force Marry to rewind the world. Thus, repeating the "never ending tragedy."

I imagine Kuroha eventually found a way for Ene to be able to transfer into an android body so she'd no longer have to be stuck in electronic devices like in canon…

Ene tops and hate fucks Kuroha/Saeru (when she finds out about his real identity). Kuroha obliges in letting her top him when she wants to "play" with him. I think the smug personality he has would really rile up Ene and make her competitive side come out. They're playing a "game" with each other.

Kuroha has been intimate with Ene before and keeps memories of previous routes. He knows about the context of the Mekakushi Dan, therefore, knows about Ene's past as Takane (and her relationships with Haruka and Konoha)

And, due to the time loops, he makes improvements to the Android bodies (CopyBot-like models that I need a name for eventually), for his encounters with Ene, throughout the routes, like improving the battery life and durability and such

It'd honestly be pretty funny if tsun tsun Ene tries to justify her trysts or intimate encounters with Kuroha like this

Ene: They're not trysts!!! I'm just doing this with you so that I can finally defeat you!!! Hmph!!! (//>3<//) Kuroha: And yet, you seem to enjoy our little... encounters.

Trying to convince yourself you're fucking a guy (your most hated enemy) only to defeat him, sounds hilarious ngl 😭

Cuz technically, they are playing a "game" of some kind, so the competitive side of her comes out here~~

I think KuroEne has a very unique context that makes their relationship dynamic sooo interesting to think about because of HaruTaka and KonoEne's context.

I love conflict and tension in ships, and KuroEne has sm of it cuz it's with the series' big bad villain/antagonist who's the main source of conflict and tension in KagePro.

How I got into KagePro

Kuroha/Saeru and Konoha, and Ene hanafuda arts by Sidu

I first got into KagePro when I was 12, so Kuroha was my 12 year old self's big fave~ KagePro was my kid self's first fandom interest.

12 ~ 16 y/o me was OBSESSED with this mf and the KuroEne ship 😭 Ene my wife… 🥺💙 I think the KuroEne ship has such great angst fuel. I love fluff and angst~

The Kuroha liker in me coming out with the unhinged anime man / meow meow mf core taste, HAHA.

Sen's unhinged anime man (insane meow meow mf) pipeline

Kuroha (2013) -> Saeran (2016) -> Judar (2022)

Kuroha (KagePro), Saeran (MysMes), Judar (Magi) pipeline

Black/white haired meow meow mfs with monochrome/black/white design aesthetics are my ultimate fixation

Obviously I have so many faves like this, like Douman (FGO) and Idate (WATGBS AU), but those 3 kinda have similarities in terms of their basics and design vibes/aesthetics tbh

I love smug evil bitches with black/white design aesthetics 🐈‍⬛ I love his expressions ✌️ And Kuroha has a great song and MV too~

Also I’m gonna admit that seeing this thumbnail got me into KagePro

I first got into KagePro after watching the Outer Science MV and kid me immediately went like "I NEED TO KNOW WHO THIS MF IS" and then became obsessed with Kuroha and KagePro

The first song I ever listened to was Headphone Actor, and Outer Science showed up in my recommended soon after, and when I saw the thumbnail (this exact thumbnail), kid me was just like “I NEED TO KNOW WHO THIS MF IS”

And then I fell into the KagePro/Kuroha/KuroEne obsession.

Kuroha BITCH

You are my favourite KagePro character <3

OUTER SCIENCE MY FAVE KAGEPRO SONG <333 It's so catchy~~

I'm laughing so hard at how obvious my character taste has been since FOREVER. Glad to know that my character/ship tastes are as ancient as time!

Kuroha is mad entertaining it's not surprising why kid me would be obsessed with him

KuroEne rambles

KuroEne relapse… KuroEne reload. After 10+ years I'm still not over them ADKSKLDKLSLK

I was so obsessed with them, I think it's because it was the first ship I was really obsessed with and made AUs for

Also I'm REALLY not surprised why kid me was so obsessed with them... It's literally a ship between my wife x meow meow mf (of the series)

My fave ships are usually between my fave (usually the meow meow mf chara) and my other fave charas, which is exactly the case here

I swear they made up at least 80% of the KagePro art I drew omfg

Takane was 157 cm (5'1") and Konoha is 182 cm (6'0"), and Ene is 640 px tall and weighs 2 MB. Portable wifey…

KuroEne Art Ideas

Things I wanna draw eventually...

KuroEne doodle with Maid outfit Kuroha wearing spiked high heels while he has a bloody mop (maybe it's just red paint instead???), and slips a finger into Ene's thigh highs while he kisses her cheek. Ene's entire face gets all red and she just goes like "WORST MAID EVER!!!"

KuroEne wearing hanfu

KuroEne wearing Việt Phục

Pokemon AU KuroEne where Kuroha is a Dark/Poison type trainer with snake/serpent-like/serpentine body Pokemon (ie. Arbok, Seviper, Rayquaza), and Ene is an Electric type trainer (ie. Rotom), and Konoha is a Normal/Grass/Fighting type trainer (ie. Serperior, Bewear)

Imagining Ene's blushy pouty face (//>~<//) is cute~

KonoEne/KuroEne Shitpost

Kinda wanna make a joke/shitpost meme like

Ene: (<- Would fuck a snake)

(<- Having an existential Crisis)

(Applies to both Kuroha and Konoha)

Humanoid snek…

Inspiration

Outer Science (MV) (Illustrated by Sidu) (Fan-translation by vgperson) Kagerou Daze LN 7 -from the darkness- (Illustrated by Sidu)

Inspired by the Outer Science MV, and my fave Kagerou Daze (LN) cover: Vol. 7 -from the darkness-

It's based on the classic "Welcome to my womb" line in the Outer Science MV and my fave Kagerou Daze LN cover 🤭✨

Sidu's gorgeous Kagerou Daze VII (7) cover with Kuroha on the cover 🖤💛 This will always be my favourite cover. Sidu's art style is IMPECCABLE I love their aesthetics sm… The pose and blood splatters and expressions... AHHH IT SLAPS SO HARD

I thought of a sketch concept where all the "Keep out" tapes bind around him just like in the LN cover.

I'm still amazed by Sidu's MVs. Outer Science is still my fave KagePro song and MV. Sidu's art style is so nice and their MVs are gorgeous. Sidu really appealed to my aesthetic tastes when I first saw this MV in 2013 as a 12 year old, I was immediately enamoured with it. They have such great aesthetic sense.

The colours and chosen visuals… The insane attention to detail...

Outer Science my beloved~~

Sidu you will always be famous!!!

Sidu's MVs just hold up SO WELL

The art, visuals, text and animation effects are so good...

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne/SaeEne 🖤💛💙

【KagePro】 KuroEne/SaeEne 🖤💛💙

【カゲプロ】 黒コノエネ/クロエネ/冴えエネ

My shadow wants to swallow up this dream of yours.

Intro Rambles

Happy 9/6! Happy HaruTaka/KonoEne/KuroEne Day!!! 🖤 💛 💙 🥳 🎉

I've loved 9/6 and all related ships for over 10 years now 🥰💞

KuroEne was baby Sen's 1st ship that I was OBSESSED with as a 12 year old, and after 10 years, the KuroEne obsession is here to stay.

Snake x Bunny 🐍🐇

Ene's twintails look like bunny ears 💙

I came back to KagePro in April and got obsessed with Kuroha and KuroEne again, exactly as I predicted. Turns out I'm not immune when my meow meow mf gets handsy with my wife.

B*tches when Snake of Clearing Eyes. I'm b*tches! /lh

I first got into KagePro when I was 12 when I watched the Outer Science MV. Sidu's MV aesthetics and Kuroha's design drew me in immediately. Great design and song~

I'm obsessed with Meow meow mf charas. Black and white colour scheme and design aesthetics. Causes problems on purpose. Sen-core bastard cat. Smug chaotic edgy evil asshole character. Violent, unhinged, bloodthirsty and murderous. Arrogant with a huge ego that distances them from humanity (or social interactions).

All of my top fave masc charas are like this. There's literally no one with more obvious and predictable tastes than me LMAO 😭

Kuroha/Saeru, the embodiment of "Knowledge/Wisdom" as a dark evil cunning and malicious entity in KagePro, and the main source of conflict and tension in the plot, is so interesting to me.

The truly evil monster who wears the face of a past love.

With Ene, I'm very enamoured with her chara and design. The way the way she acts so cheery and self-centered in the hopes of Shintaro to open up more, how she wants to be someone else's friend to subside their loneliness, the same kind of loneliness she'd always felt back then… It also feels like over-compensation for her past regrets, wahh, Ene… ;_;

Rough sketch WIPs. I love their expressions here sm~ I started playing around with Gradient Maps cuz I love picking colours. My works tend to lean more saturated with high contrast, so I ended up going with a more saturated palette.

This shows my process for picking colours. The final one I ended up picking is the 1st one. It has a blue hue shift on Ene, red hue shift on Kuroha, and generally more saturated colours and higher contrast. The last one shows the colours I started with.

The more red + purple toned Kuroha has really nice visual contrast against Ene's cool colours (blues) in her design tbh~

I started off with a more muted palette (different from what I'm used to), but ended up going with more saturated colours cuz I think it fit the mood of the piece more. Though I think it'd still be fun to do both a Muted Colours and Saturated Colours version!

These doodles aren't refined, and just me roughly filling in the base colours on my sketches to get an idea of colours. Since Idk when I'll get to refine these drawings and clean up the sketch and lines

Shadow gate to love by Guilty Kiss is sooo Sen ship-core. It basically works for every Light/Darkness, Angel/Devil, and Narrative Opposites ship of mine. Oh baby shadow gay~ 🌈

KuroEne has such a unique context as a ship cuz it uses HaruTaka and KonoEne (my no. 2 KagePro ships), as a basis. Ene has a "special" relationship with the person that Saeru uses as his vessel.

KuroEne is like the equivalent of the evil sleep paralysis demon (in this case, evil sadistic parasitic snake) possessing your past love (Haruka), or the person that you're conflicted about, but still have a certain kind of tenderness for (Konoha)

Sadistic parasitic evil snake bf and computer virus gf~

Ene already gets flustered around Konoha who is airheaded. So with Saeru, the teasing would just be merciless, cuz Ene is easy to rile up. ENE BELOVED…

KuroEne is SUCH an interesting ship to think about and analyze due to their characters' context and the potential of the complicated, complex, and messy relationship that they would have.

They give me immense brainrot.

I'll talk about the setting of my KuroEne AU. I'll put the rest of my rambles and art WIPs under the cut! I copy pasted these rambles from my side blog and previous post, since it's pretty long.

It feels fitting to include it again, cuz it's basically the big summary of my KuroEne AU.

Art Rambles

Version 8: Lineart (Multiply + Colour Burn) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (50% Opacity)

Version 7: Lineart (Multiply + Colour Burn) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (20% Opacity)

Version 6: Lineart (Multiply) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (50% Opacity)

Version 5: Lineart (Multiply) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (20% Opacity)

Version 4: Lineart (Multiply + Colour Burn) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (20% Opacity)

Version 3: Lineart (Multiply) + Increased saturation on Ene's Eyes (20% Opacity)

Version 2: Coloured Lineart

(Sketch is coloured a dark blue)

Version 1: Lineart (Multiply + Colour Burn)

(Sketch is coloured black)

KuroEne Kiss 😚 🖤 💙

Progress WIP shots of the Lineart set on Multiply vs. Multiply + Colour Burn (Combined)

These are still super sketchy lines for me since it's the 1st sketch pass (that looked good right away ^^)

I drew Kuroha with black nails (since I have a tendency to add painted nails and/or eyeliner on my fave) but Kuroha having black nails just felt so natural I forgot it was even a HC

I'm planning to do more sketch passes to clean up the sketch later on

Also I'm gonna say. Their headphones are lowkey annoying to draw 😭

Kuroha's are at least easier to draw due to the shape, but Ene's has this rectangular part on it that I honestly dislike drawing. I'll fix the sketch up eventually.

Also I adjusted the white colour on Ene's sweater compared to last time, so it's a bright tinted blue~ish white instead of pure white

Usually I don't repost stuff unless I redraw stuff (or make new edits and significant changes), but I figured I could talk about my art process this time.

I initially had Ene's eyes as ice blue for visual contrast against her hair.

With the lines being set on Multiply, the lines are slightly translucent

With the lines being set on Multiply + Colour Burn (combined), the lines gain a subtle glow on the edges.

In response to the lines being lighter, I upped the saturation of Ene's eyes.

I think having it at 20% Opacity looks best cuz it still harmonizes with the colours well

And I think I lightened the value of Kuroha's inner clothes a bit compared to last time. I'll play around with the values later.

I have a tendency to shift hues in my arts for the colours used for lighting and shadows, to keep things looking visually interesting.

That's why I roughly splotched red on Kuroha's hair, and pinks on Ene's hair and sweater to get an idea of colours

I've been playing around with a Auto Action called Better Line Color that you can find on the CSP Assets Store that colours the lines according to the colours underneath, and makes a subtle glow on the lineart.

It does some steps like Gaussian Blur, other adjustments, then sets the Layer Mode to Colour Burn, Linear Burn, or Multiply.

The duplicated lineart, when set to Colour Burn, creates a nice subtle glowy effect that I've been using on my coloured doodles.

Having coloured lines makes such a huge difference with my art. I think it has a really nice effect on my art 🥰

When I first tried it with the KuroEne doodle though, I was so confused cuz all white colours would show OVER the lineart. I found it strange cuz it didn't happen on my other drawings.

So then, for the KuroEne doodle, I just set the lines to Multiply Layer Mode instead. I think both versions look nice ^^

Colour Burn darkens shadows, deepens colours but preserves whites, so the whites show over the coloured lineart. The solution is to change the pure white to a tinted colour white instead. I'll fix that and make edits and combine both versions later.

So far, the dark spirals around Kuroha are on the same layers as the sketch, so it has the glowy lineart effect on it. Though I'll eventually make the dark spirals apart of the colours instead, like in Version 2

The version with the saturated purple glow still looks nice. This time I combined both Multiply and Colour Burn lineart versions.

...

I've been having fun playing around with colours, seeing which layers to turn off and such.

I've been playing around with Gradient Maps and Hue shifts and slightly different colours.

The purple/red toned Kuroha one is also really nice cuz it has nice visual contrast against all the cool colours (blues) in Ene's design

Red vs. blue contrast <3

Plus, it fits Kuroha to be tinted with red...

Considering the red tinted shots in the Outer Science MV where he smears the Mekakushi Dan members' blood over his face.

Love the chosen shots in this MV. Outer Science is my top fave KagePro MV due to its stunning visuals and visual storytelling. Additional Memory and Losstime Memory are also in my top faves.

The white, black and red shots here look so good. And the expressions as well~ I love Sidu's brilliant visual aesthetic sense.

KuroEne Rambles

Ok I also have something to add (once again I'm snatching these rambles from my side blog's rambles cuz I've yapped way too much about these two)

It's pretty unfortunate that my yapping and ramble posts outspeeds me creating art so I'm just waiting for the chance to draw so many of my KuroEne writing and art ideas so I can post them on main combined with drawings

Canon verse KuroEne is not “romance,” at least definitely not in the traditional sense. But there IS desire and passion, and a sense of yearning/longing, a need for warmth and fulfillment. It’s filled with desperation and tension and conflict, which makes it really interesting…

When I think about their relationship in this kind of canon-verse AU setting, it's infused with feelings of love, obsession, desire, passion, yearning, and attachment.

It's so fun to think about Kuroha's selfish twisted nature and dark urges, combined with Ene's bold tenacity and confidence. Since he's someone that's generally observant and good at reading people and their desires, it makes him pair well with Ene who has trouble facing more honest feelings and being open about the things she wants.

I think a lot of things are playing into their relationship dynamic. Like the circumstances of HaruTaka and KonoEne's context, Kuroha's omniscience and knowledge, desire, and a craving/yearning for warmth, touch, and affection and companionship on Ene's end, and the pull she feels for him because of the vessel he uses, and his intimate knowledge of her.

For 9/6 day, it's time to blast the anthem of my fave ship, Yuukei Yesterday~ The song dedicated to Takane's feelings and HaruTaka~ Tatatara!! 💗

Considering the theme of my art, though, I put a lyric from Shadow gate to love.

I also wanna say that I'm seriously obsessed with my genderfluid Kuroha HC 💞

Kuroha can change his body into whatever he wants by using Konoha's Eye Ability, Awakening Eyes. In Novel Route, he knows how to use Awakening Eyes to rebuild the body molecule by molecule and make him immune to other Eye Abilities.

...

I think it's interesting that canon verse KuroEne is a ship that's so tinged with angst and tragedy. But I also love that aspect about them.

I think that in the context of a Kuroha ship AU, Kuroha believes that he and his S/O have a connection of karmic fate with each other, in the way that they'll continue to meet across all the different time loops, for all of eternity.

Kuroha’s love would inevitably be very dark and twisted, because he is that way at his core. At the end of a Route, he kills his S/O, and/or their friends, in order to meet with them forever. Ensuring the next coming of a new cycle is a priority to him.

The intimate knowledge that Kuroha/Saeru would have of his partner’s desires, wants, past, insecurities, relationships, etc., due to all the time loop resets, is so interesting to think about.

And, he gets to be with the other party forever by doing this. It’s a win win for him! He doesn’t want to give that up. Cuz in some fucked up way, in his fucked up form of love and obsession, he creates the concept of “eternity” with his S/O, by killing them, and/or, their friends, constantly, endlessly.

...

Kuroha is someone that wants to draw out "truth" to add to his "knowledge" (massive knowledge bank) and explore endless possibilities.

And Ene is someone who has trouble being honest, especially with her wants/desires, and Saeru was created for the purpose of granting wishes. So he finds it fun to tease her and rile her up, and fulfill her desires for warmth and pleasure, etc.

Ene asks Kuroha if he's learning how to pretend to be human throughout all the time loop resets. Kuroha says there’s no “pretending” about it. And it's true. He's been here since even before the beginning of the world. He asks her if you can really call it pretending at that point.

The end of Outer Science's MV shows Saeru in Azami's hair even before the creation of the world. He's existed before humans were born. He knows the nature of humans better than anyone else after observing them for a long time. He has so much knowledge, that the sheer extent of it is just unfathomable to the average person.

Each time the Route resets, he gets to “perfect” his knowledge, and in the context of intimacy, he gets to know his partner and their intimate desires even better and better, each time.

He constantly refines and adds to his “knowledge” every new Route. He likes learning new things about the other party. Kuroha likes how Ene, with her confrontational, brazen personality, and predictable unpredictability, always manages to find a way to catch him off guard and surprise him.

Kuroha/Saeru possessing Konoha's body means he has his face. His body. His voice. Ene can't shake off the feeling of how uncanny his resemblance is to them, physically, and gets reminded of Haruka and Konoha around him.

...

Now I'll copy paste my rambles from my old posts that summarizes my KuroEne AU. Here. I added some new stuff at the end

KuroEne AU: Set-up

Source: KagePro LN: 7 - from the darkness - Colour Illustration Source: Sidu's Mekakushi Dan Members Colour Illustrations

Ok, I'm just gonna ramble about the setting of my KuroEne AU.

I also included a summary for context just in case my non-KagePro mutuals want to tune in to read these rambles.

I just wrote this quickly before I go to sleep. I have more to say but I think this is a good starter.

In official KagePro media, the present day plot starts after 2 years, on the fateful day of August 15th (Kagerou/Heat Haze) Day.

The Kagerou Daze, the never ending world, swallows up people who die on August 15th, and gives those with especially strong desires, who are compatible with an Eye Ability, a substitute life so that they can return to the real world.

In most Routes, Saeru ends up orchestrating Haruka and Takane's deaths. One thing you'll learn about KagePro is that this guy (Kuroha) is responsible for almost everything bad that happens

Because killing them so that they'd come out with an Eye Ability, is a part of his plan to get the rest of Azami's snakes out of the Kagerou Daze and into the real world.

Haruka's death leads to the creation of Konoha, and Takane's death causes her to lose her human body and become a cyber girl named Ene

There are multiple different ways that a KuroEne AU could go, depending on the Route. KuroEne AU Routes are so fun to write, because any time I get a new idea, I can just put into a different Route (timeline) to explore all the "What if" scenarios that don't fit into a single Route.

Kuroha's Plan and KonoEne

Source: @/x0401x

Mekakushi Dan Clear Files: (X)

Normally, the rest of the Mekakushi Dan members meet each other in the present day plot after 2 years, the fateful day of August 15th, the day Kuroha/Saeru plans to kill everyone.

Kuroha/Saeru's plan is to gather all the snakes with a new Medusa in the real world (bringing the rest of Azami's snakes out of the Kagerou Daze to the real world), and killing all Eye Ability users.

Then, he forces Marry, "the next Master," to rewind the world using the power of the Queen Snake, Combining Eyes.

In official media, Kuroha/Saeru usually possesses Konoha's body at the end of a Route on August 15th, the day he plans to proceed with the "Tragedy" and kill everyone.

I imagine that in my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body MUCH earlier. Like, anywhere within the timespan after Takane and Haruka's deaths (1 - 2 years)

Because of this, Konoha and Ene usually end up meeting and befriending each other earlier. Ene recognizes Konoha as Haruka's game avatar from back then, and mistakes him for Haruka. Konoha asks if she has the wrong person, and Ene gets heartbroken at Konoha's seeming amnesia and inability to remember her.

Ene imposes a sense of distance around Konoha due to her conflicting feelings (he resembles the person she loved but isn't him).

In my AU, KonoEne establish a relationship dynamic of some kind (which varies depending on the Route), which either progresses to an acquaintance-ship, friendship, or intimate relationship.

Kuroha introduces himself to Ene for their first meeting in a Route

Source: Sidu's 2016 Calendar Hanafuda Set

And then, at some point, Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body. At this point, when he introduces himself and makes himself known to Ene for the first time, he can choose what information he wants to reveal, and how much.

For example, Kuroha can choose if he wants to introduce himself as Black Konoha, and/or "Saeru," or whether to reveal it for later. (And he also chooses whether he wants to reveal his true identity as the Snake of Clearing Eyes.)

Ene later nicknames him "Kuroha" and "Saeru" to shorten the name.

He knows that the 1st one would be more familiar to Ene. To introduce himself with the 2nd one would make Ene more distrusting/suspicious of him.

He most likely doesn't reveal his true intentions (to kill the Mekakushi Dan) so soon, because he knows that if he does, Ene is (obviously) not gonna want to "play the game" (of being intimate with him) anymore, cuz it means that he is literally putting her and her friends' lives in danger.

Though, across multiple Routes, he probably does play around and experiment with the timing of when he reveals certain information, and how much.

I think in most Routes, Ene is suspicious of him at first, and asks about his intentions and what he's really after, and Kuroha/Saeru just tells her that it's too early to say yet, and that she will find out soon.

(Though, Kuroha could probably quell her suspicions with enough convincing, due to the massive amount of knowledge he carries)

KuroEne AU: Context

Source: Mega Man Battle Network 6 (Rockman.exe 6)

In my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru, who has messed around with human technology and innovation, has been able to develop a humanoid android/robot body with human flesh that Ene can transfer into.

This concept is inspired by Mega Man Battle Network (Rockman.exe), specifically, the NetNavis (humans' companion AIs in this universe) from MMBN/EXE.

NetNavis can transfer into CopyBots (android bodies) for limited amounts of time, to move around in the real world. These CopyBots take the appearance of the NetNavi that transfer into it.

In my KuroEne AU, I imagine it's battery powered, but with every Route, he gets better and faster at making it. Like he improves the battery life over time, so it goes from lasting an hour to lasting a whole day, etc.

According to the KagePro LNs, Kuroha/Saeru has knowledge from everything from the start of civilization...

Shintaro in the KagePro LNs compares Saeru to "a living encyclopedia with a full grasp of everything from the start of civilization up to modern science."

That LN bit confirms that Kuroha/Saeru carries knowledge of the history of mankind and its technologies over (probably) millions or thousands of years.

Especially when scientists have made developments regarding wrapping living human-like skin onto a robot that can heal when cut.

If he carries knowledge from the start of civilization, so much knowledge that it's unfathomable to the average person, then yeah I definitely think he could get it done (especially for the sake of my AU).

KuroEne's Intimacy

Source: (X)

Scan: @/ayara-resara

Kuroha proposes that he has a solution for Ene not being able to move around in the real world, and introduces the little invention that he made, for her to test out, which Ene eventually agrees to, out of curiosity.

Ene feels a sense of gratefulness to him for allowing her to move around in the real world since it gets lonely in the cyber world, not being able to feel or touch anyone on the outside…

Kuroha gets to know and bonds with Ene, anywhere within this 1 - 2 year timespan, and at some point, Kuroha and Ene get intimate with each other.

Ene gives into the sense of longing/yearning that she feels for Kuroha/Saeru, a yearning for warmth and touch after being stuck alone in the cyber world for so long (in spite of everything - if she knows about his true identity at this point), which is in part caused by his vessel (being Konoha, who's in Haruka's body).

Kuroha knows how to react to her and what to say to her and how to act around her due to his knowledge, and so, seduces his S/O and tempts her with carnal pleasures, and they indulge in "the game/dance" of being intimate with each other.

Because Kuroha/Saeru keeps memories of previous Routes, he remembers memories of being with the Enes of previous Routes, and thus, knows how to react to her when talking/chatting with her normally, knows how to appease Ene's behaviours and whims, goes along with what she wants, knows how to get the responses he wants when he wants something from his partner (so he knows how to seduce them), and knows how to satisfy his partner in the context of intimacy.

Because of the knowledge he carries, he knows the context, past, Eye Abilities, vulnerabilities, etc., of every Mekakushi Dan member, and that includes Ene. So he'd definitely know about Haruka and Takane, and Konoha and Ene's context and relationship together.

The person who's her greatest enemy (whether she knows it at this point or not), very literally knows everything about her.

And not only that, the greatest enemy of the Mekakushi Dan, knows her better than she knows herself.

Kuroha's Nature

Source: COSPA - Tsumamare Series (Keychains and Rubber Strap Charms)

Not only does he weaponize Konoha's body by using Konoha's body as a murder weapon to kill everyone at the end of a Route, he weaponizes words, too. Kuroha/Saeru uses "knowledge" as an advantage over his partner, and weaponizes knowledge. Actually staggering advantage. Because he knows almost everything.

Kuroha ships are like the only time I have ships where one party in the ship has THIS much of an advantage over their partner.

Therefore, as I said before, Kuroha/Saeru ultimately has a power imbalance with his partner (any Mekakushi Dan member that he could be paired with).

He has an overwhelming advantage over his partner due to his role (set-up as an antagonist constantly killing the cast) and capabilities. It is ultimately in his favour.

That fact in itself, that the power imbalance exists, isn't inherently a bad thing, it just means that you NEED to tread carefully with portraying Kuroha's ships. I always make sure to depict my ships with as much care as possible, and as healthy as possible.

Ene is one of the characters who is a really good match with him. Because making Ene more assertive and dominant in the KuroEne ship, and making them take turns in leading intimacy, with having Kuroha letting Ene take control through their bedroom intimacy at times, helps alleviate this power imbalance slightly.

Kuroha is literally so fucked up dude cuz even his twisted form of affection that he holds for his S/O (the Mekakushi Dan member who he's paired with), is still in a twisted, selfish, self-serving way.

Due to his twisted nature, he embodies Koi (恋), "Selfish love," "loving someone for their own sake."

Even when he caters to his partner's pleasures, it still ultimately caters to his pleasures the most. That makes him interesting, though. Someone so inherently dark and twisted and sinister, with selfish desires like that… 🥰💖✨

Misc Rambles

So I imagine, in most KuroEne AU routes, he reveals his true intentions either approaching the fated day of August 15th, or right on the day of August 15th.

There's absolutely a sense of betrayal that Ene would feel following the reveal of his true intentions - he built up a relationship with her, on purpose, just to drop the worst possible scenario imaginable.

Like let's be real. The reveal of "I've been killing you and your friends throughout multiple Routes (timelines)" just sounds like a nightmarish scenario, especially if you've been fucking this guy, like come on. 😭

And something that would make Ene get especially pissed at him, is if he decides to reveal that he was responsible for orchestrating Haruka and Takane's deaths in the first place.

(In official media, Ene sees Konoha for the first time, on August 15th, 2 years after Haruka and Takane's deaths)

Though, there are probably KuroEne AU routes where Konoha and Ene don't get the chance to meet each other - Routes where Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body before the two can actually meet, so when Ene sees who she thinks is "Konoha" for the first time, it's actually Kuroha/Saeru. With this kind of setting, he could even pretend to be Konoha, if he wanted.

And then on August 15th, he proceeds with killing the Mekakushi Dan with sadistic glee (and even his S/O - though if he's feeling nice, then he can spare them, since he doesn't need to kill everyone), and forces Marry to rewind the world.

Thankfully, due to the nature of Ene's body and predicament, she won't feel physical pain when he kills her. And then, a new Route (timeline) begins.

Previous KuroEne Posts

In my new post (this one), I wrote more about the set-up of my KuroEne AU, and then copy pasted my old rambles. I copy pasted the summary of my KuroEne AU cuz it felt relevant since I'm posting the same art.

My old post has some more rambles regarding some general ideas of my KuroEne AU (since I didn't feel the need to copy paste the same stuff here too)

Shadow gate to love

Lyrics:

Song: (X)

These lyrics work so well for ships like LimGuda, XanLena, IdaTatsu, and KuroEne.

The song sung by the sub-unit, Guilty Kiss, in Love Live! Sunshine!! My favourite version of Shadow gate to love is this fan-edit that pitches down the song to match the original voice actors’ voices, compared to their characters’ voices (which are higher in pitch)

Shadow gate to love is sooo Sen ship-core. It basically works for every Light/Darkness, Angel/Devil, and Narrative Opposites ship of mine.

It’s my song to fall back on if I can’t think of any other songs for my ships. I think it fits these 4 the best, though.

Oh baby shadow gay~ 🌈

The lyrics are in the link above.

The lyrics of the song works for all of my meow meow mfs in general.

In KagePro, though, the mention of "Strong scented eyes" takes on another meaning cuz of the emphasis on EYES, particularly the Eye Abilities.

I also love the emphasis on the Light/Darkness aspect and seduction in the lyrics.

KuroEne: Kuroha seduces Ene by tempting her with carnal pleasures, and keeps the secrets of his plan to commit the Tragedy (killing the Mekakushi Dan on August 15th, Kagerou Day) hidden from her. He tells her "beautiful lies" in order to keep up his facade.

He decides to act tamer prior to the fated date of August 15th, catering to her desires and befriending and bonding her and spending time with her and actually getting to know her. They'd do soft and fluffy stuff like go to the amusement park together, play video games together, and eventually, get intimate with each other.

Due to his inherently dark and twisted nature, Kuroha/Saeru prioritizes his own desires and desire for immortality, and constantly keeps causing the Tragedy by killing the Mekakushi Dan, Marry's friends, forcing the time loop resets. He also believes that doing this allows him to be with his partner forever, because he can continue to come and meet them forever and ever.

Ai (愛) vs. Koi (恋)

Azami's genuine pure form of love for her family, willingly sacrificing herself for her family and mankind.

Vs.

(In the context of a Kuroha ship AU)

Kuroha/Saeru holding a twisted form of affection and obsession for his S/O and wanting to continue the time loop Tragedy in order to be with his S/O forever in a twisted, selfish, self-serving way.

He looks up to his Masters and serves them, but won't put anyone else above himself and his wants and needs.

In the end, he's doing this all for Azami, because he believes that this is what she truly wanted and needed, but ends up being the one causing her the most suffering.

"Selfless" vs. "Selfish" love.

Ai (愛) vs. Koi (恋)

Azami -> "Loving someone for the sake of someone else"

Kuroha -> "Loving someone for one's own sake"

Kuroha's twisted selfish love and how he ultimately loves someone for his own sake, to experience the "high" of being in love...

Reminded of that one chapter title from FGO: Tunguska Sanctuary event (Koyanskaya's main story chapter)

"Love is Karma, and Karma is..."

This fits so well with Kuroha/Saeru's character and KuroEne. Good god.

I can't put any more images due to Tumblr's image limit so you can read about the two loves (Ai vs. Koi) here

Source: (X)

...

If you wanna put it crudely or in funny terms, then Kuroha ships are like the most elaborate ships with the time loop tragedy causing serial killer, in the history of anything ever. But actually really interesting and fascinating.

"I'm gonna kill you" boogaloo (and nothing else) is not very compelling for ships (and even in general) lol

In canon-verse, Kuroha/Saeru lacks humanity and forms of care for others (when compared to my other faves).

That's why I wanted to explore the ideas of Kuroha messing around in the Routes and actually getting to know the Mekakushi Dan members before he kills them all.

[stepswordsen]

【KagePro】 KuroEne/SaeEne 🖤💛💙

【KagePro】 KuroEne/SaeEne 🖤💛💙

【カゲプロ】 黒コノエネ/クロエネ/冴えエネ

My shadow wants to swallow up this dream of yours.

KuroEne was baby Sen's 1st ship that I was OBSESSED with as a 12 year old, and after 10 years, the KuroEne obsession is here to stay.

Snake x Bunny 🐍🐇

Ene's twintails look like bunny ears 💙

I came back to KagePro in April and got obsessed with Kuroha and KuroEne again, exactly as I predicted. Turns out I'm not immune when my meow meow mf gets handsy with my wife.

B*tches when Snake of Clearing Eyes. I'm b*tches! /lh

I first got into KagePro when I was 12 when I watched the Outer Science MV. Sidu's MV aesthetics and Kuroha's design drew me in immediately. Great design and song~

I'm obsessed with Meow meow mf charas. Black and white colour scheme and design aesthetics. Causes problems on purpose. Sen-core bastard cat. Smug chaotic edgy evil asshole character. Violent, unhinged, bloodthirsty and murderous. Arrogant with a huge ego that distances them from humanity (or social interactions).

All of my top fave masc charas are like this. There's literally no one with more obvious and predictable tastes than me LMAO 😭

Kuroha/Saeru, the embodiment of "Knowledge/Wisdom" as a dark evil cunning and malicious entity in KagePro, and the main source of conflict and tension in the plot, is so interesting to me.

With Ene, I'm very enamoured with her chara and design. The way the way she acts so cheery and self-centered in the hopes of Shintaro to open up more, how she wants to be someone else's friend to subside their loneliness, the same kind of loneliness she'd always felt back then… It also feels like over-compensation for her past regrets, wahh, Ene… ;_;

Rough sketch WIPs. I love their expressions here sm~ I started playing around with Gradient Maps cuz I love picking colours. My works tend to lean more saturated with high contrast, so I ended up going with a more saturated palette.

This shows my process for picking colours. The final one I ended up picking is the 1st one. It has a blue hue shift on Ene, red hue shift on Kuroha, and generally more saturated colours and higher contrast. The last one shows the colours I started with.

The more red + purple toned Kuroha has really nice visual contrast against Ene's cool colours (blues) in her design tbh~

I started off with a more muted palette (different from what I'm used to), but ended up going with more saturated colours cuz I think it fit the mood of the piece more. Though I think it'd still be fun to do both a Muted Colours and Saturated Colours version!

These doodles aren't refined, and just me roughly filling in the base colours on my sketches to get an idea of colours. Since Idk when I'll get to refine these drawings and clean up the sketch and lines

Shadow gate to love by Guilty Kiss is sooo Sen ship-core. It basically works for every Light/Darkness, Angel/Devil, and Narrative Opposites ship of mine. Oh baby shadow gay~ 🌈

KuroEne has such a unique context as a ship cuz it uses HaruTaka and KonoEne (my no. 2 KagePro ships), as a basis. Ene has a "special" relationship with the person that Saeru uses as his vessel.

KuroEne is like the equivalent of the evil sleep paralysis demon (in this case, evil sadistic parasitic snake) possessing past love (Haruka), or the person that you're conflicted about, but still have a certain kind of tenderness for (Konoha). Sadistic parasitic evil snake bf and computer virus gf

Ene already gets flustered around Konoha who is airheaded. So with Saeru, the teasing would just be merciless, cuz Ene is easy to rile up. ENE BELOVED…

I'll talk about the setting of my KuroEne AU. I'll put the rest of my rambles under the cut! I copy pasted these rambles from my side blog since it's pretty long.

KuroEne AU: Set-up

Source: KagePro LN: 7 - from the darkness - Colour Illustration Source: Sidu's Mekakushi Dan Members Colour Illustrations

Ok, I'm just gonna ramble about the setting of my KuroEne AU.

I also included a summary for context just in case my non-KagePro mutuals want to tune in to read these rambles.

I just wrote this quickly before I go to sleep. I have more to say but I think this is a good starter.

In official KagePro media, the present day plot starts after 2 years, on the fateful day of August 15th (Kagerou/Heat Haze) Day.

The Kagerou Daze, the never ending world, swallows up people who die on August 15th, and gives those with especially strong desires, who are compatible with an Eye Ability, a substitute life so that they can return to the real world.

In most Routes, Saeru ends up orchestrating Haruka and Takane's deaths. One thing you'll learn about KagePro is that this guy (Kuroha) is responsible for almost everything bad that happens

Because killing them so that they'd come out with an Eye Ability, is a part of his plan to get the rest of Azami's snakes out of the Kagerou Daze and into the real world.

Haruka's death leads to the creation of Konoha, and Takane's death causes her to lose her human body and become a cyber girl named Ene

There are multiple different ways that a KuroEne AU could go, depending on the Route. KuroEne AU Routes are so fun to write, because any time I get a new idea, I can just put into a different Route (timeline) to explore all the "What if" scenarios that don't fit into a single Route.

Kuroha's Plan and KonoEne

Source: @/x0401x

Mekakushi Dan Clear Files: (X)

Normally, the rest of the Mekakushi Dan members meet each other in the present day plot after 2 years, the fateful day of August 15th, the day Kuroha/Saeru plans to kill everyone.

Kuroha/Saeru's plan is to gather all the snakes with a new Medusa in the real world (bringing the rest of Azami's snakes out of the Kagerou Daze to the real world), and killing all Eye Ability users.

Then, he forces Marry, "the next Master," to rewind the world using the power of the Queen Snake, Combining Eyes.

In official media, Kuroha/Saeru usually possesses Konoha's body at the end of a Route on August 15th, the day he plans to proceed with the "Tragedy" and kill everyone.

I imagine that in my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body MUCH earlier. Like, anywhere within the timespan after Takane and Haruka's deaths (1 - 2 years)

Because of this, Konoha and Ene usually end up meeting and befriending each other earlier. Ene recognizes Konoha as Haruka's game avatar from back then, and mistakes him for Haruka. Konoha asks if she has the wrong person, and Ene gets heartbroken at Konoha's seeming amnesia and inability to remember her.

Ene imposes a sense of distance around Konoha due to her conflicting feelings (he resembles the person she loved but isn't him).

In my AU, KonoEne establish a relationship dynamic of some kind (which varies depending on the Route), which either progresses to an acquaintance-ship, friendship, or intimate relationship.

Kuroha introduces himself to Ene for their first meeting in a Route

Source: Sidu's 2016 Calendar Hanafuda Set

And then, at some point, Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body. At this point, when he introduces himself and makes himself known to Ene for the first time, he can choose what information he wants to reveal, and how much.

For example, Kuroha can choose if he wants to introduce himself as Black Konoha, and/or "Saeru," or whether to reveal it for later. (And he also chooses whether he wants to reveal his true identity as the Snake of Clearing Eyes.)

Ene later nicknames him "Kuroha" and "Saeru" to shorten the name.

He knows that the 1st one would be more familiar to Ene. To introduce himself with the 2nd one would make Ene more distrusting/suspicious of him.

He most likely doesn't reveal his true intentions (to kill the Mekakushi Dan) so soon, because he knows that if he does, Ene is (obviously) not gonna want to "play the game" (of being intimate with him) anymore, cuz it means that he is literally putting her and her friends' lives in danger.

Though, across multiple Routes, he probably does play around and experiment with the timing of when he reveals certain information, and how much.

I think in most Routes, Ene is suspicious of him at first, and asks about his intentions and what he's really after, and Kuroha/Saeru just tells her that it's too early to say yet, and that she will find out soon.

(Though, Kuroha could probably quell her suspicions with enough convincing, due to the massive amount of knowledge he carries)

KuroEne AU: Context

Source: Mega Man Battle Network 6 (Rockman.exe 6)

In my KuroEne AU, Kuroha/Saeru, who has messed around with human technology and innovation, has been able to develop a humanoid android/robot body with human flesh that Ene can transfer into.

This concept is inspired by Mega Man Battle Network (Rockman.exe), specifically, the NetNavis (humans' companion AIs in this universe) from MMBN/EXE.

NetNavis can transfer into CopyBots (android bodies) for limited amounts of time, to move around in the real world. These CopyBots take the appearance of the NetNavi that transfer into it.

In my KuroEne AU, I imagine it's battery powered, but with every Route, he gets better and faster at making it. Like he improves the battery life over time, so it goes from lasting an hour to lasting a whole day, etc.

According to the KagePro LNs, Kuroha/Saeru has knowledge from everything from the start of civilization...

Shintaro in the KagePro LNs compares Saeru to "a living encyclopedia with a full grasp of everything from the start of civilization up to modern science."

That LN bit confirms that Kuroha/Saeru carries knowledge of the history of mankind and its technologies over (probably) millions or thousands of years.

Especially when scientists have made developments regarding wrapping living human-like skin onto a robot that can heal when cut.

If he carries knowledge from the start of civilization, so much knowledge that it's unfathomable to the average person, then yeah I definitely think he could get it done (especially for the sake of my AU).

KuroEne's Intimacy

Source: (X)

Scan: @/ayara-resara

Kuroha proposes that he has a solution for Ene not being able to move around in the real world, and introduces the little invention that he made, for her to test out, which Ene eventually agrees to, out of curiosity.

Ene feels a sense of gratefulness to him for allowing her to move around in the real world since it gets lonely in the cyber world, not being able to feel or touch anyone on the outside…

Kuroha gets to know and bonds with Ene, anywhere within this 1 - 2 year timespan, and at some point, Kuroha and Ene get intimate with each other.

Ene gives into the sense of longing/yearning that she feels for Kuroha/Saeru, a yearning for warmth and touch after being stuck alone in the cyber world for so long (in spite of everything - if she knows about his true identity at this point), which is in part caused by his vessel (being Konoha, who's in Haruka's body).

Kuroha knows how to react to her and what to say to her and how to act around her due to his knowledge, and so, seduces his S/O and tempts her with carnal pleasures, and they indulge in "the game/dance" of being intimate with each other.

Because Kuroha/Saeru keeps memories of previous Routes, he remembers memories of being with the Enes of previous Routes, and thus, knows how to react to her when talking/chatting with her normally, knows how to appease Ene's behaviours and whims, goes along with what she wants, knows how to get the responses he wants when he wants something from his partner (so he knows how to seduce them), and knows how to satisfy his partner in the context of intimacy.

Because of the knowledge he carries, he knows the context, past, Eye Abilities, vulnerabilities, etc., of every Mekakushi Dan member, and that includes Ene. So he'd definitely know about Haruka and Takane, and Konoha and Ene's context and relationship together.

The person who's her greatest enemy (whether she knows it at this point or not), very literally knows everything about her.

Kuroha's Nature

Source: COSPA - Tsumamare Series (Keychains and Rubber Strap Charms)

Not only does he weaponize Konoha's body by using Konoha's body as a murder weapon to kill everyone at the end of a Route, he weaponizes words, too. Kuroha/Saeru uses "knowledge" as an advantage over his partner, and weaponizes knowledge. Actually staggering advantage. Because he knows almost everything.

Kuroha ships are like the only time I have ships where one party in the ship has THIS much of an advantage over their partner.

Therefore, as I said before, Kuroha/Saeru ultimately has a power imbalance with his partner (any Mekakushi Dan member that he could be paired with).

He has an overwhelming advantage over his partner due to his role (set-up as an antagonist constantly killing the cast) and capabilities. It is ultimately in his favour.

That fact in itself, that the power imbalance exists, isn't inherently a bad thing, it just means that you NEED to tread carefully with portraying Kuroha's ships. I always make sure to depict my ships with as much care as possible, and as healthy as possible.

Ene is one of the characters who is a really good match with him. Because making Ene more assertive and dominant in the KuroEne ship, and making them take turns in leading intimacy, with having Kuroha letting Ene take control through their bedroom intimacy at times, helps alleviate this power imbalance slightly.

Kuroha is literally so fucked up dude cuz even his twisted form of affection that he holds for his S/O (the Mekakushi Dan member who he's paired with), is still in a twisted, selfish, self-serving way.

Due to his twisted nature, he embodies Koi (恋), "Selfish love," "loving someone for their own sake."

Even when he caters to his partner's pleasures, it still ultimately caters to his pleasures the most. That makes him interesting, though. Someone so inherently dark and twisted and sinister, with selfish desires like that… 🥰💖✨

Misc Rambles

So I imagine, in most KuroEne AU routes, he reveals his true intentions either approaching the fated day of August 15th, or right on the day of August 15th.

There's absolutely a sense of betrayal that Ene would feel following the reveal of his true intentions - he built up a relationship with her, on purpose, just to drop the worst possible scenario imaginable.

Like let's be real. The reveal of "I've been killing you and your friends throughout multiple Routes (timelines)" just sounds like a nightmarish scenario, especially if you've been fucking this guy, like come on. 😭

And something that would make Ene get especially pissed at him, is if he decides to reveal that he was responsible for orchestrating Haruka and Takane's deaths in the first place.

(In official media, Ene sees Konoha for the first time, on August 15th, 2 years after Haruka and Takane's deaths)

Though, there are probably KuroEne AU routes where Konoha and Ene don't get the chance to meet each other - Routes where Kuroha/Saeru possesses Konoha's body before the two can actually meet, so when Ene sees who she thinks is "Konoha" for the first time, it's actually Kuroha/Saeru. With this kind of setting, he could even pretend to be Konoha, if he wanted.

And then on August 15th, he proceeds with killing the Mekakushi Dan with sadistic glee (and even his S/O - though if he's feeling nice, then he can spare them, since he doesn't need to kill everyone), and forces Marry to rewind the world.

Thankfully, due to the nature of Ene's body and predicament, she won't feel physical pain when he kills her. And then, a new Route (timeline) begins.

Previous KuroEne Posts

In my new post (this one), I wrote more about the set-up of my KuroEne AU.

My old post has some more rambles regarding some general ideas of my KuroEne AU (since I didn't feel the need to copy paste the same stuff here too)

Shadow gate to love by Guilty Kiss

Source: (X)

These lyrics work so well for ships like LimGuda, XanLena, IdaTatsu, and KuroEne.

The song sung by the sub-unit, Guilty Kiss, in Love Live! Sunshine!! My favourite version of Shadow gate to love is this fan-edit that pitches down the song to match the original voice actors’ voices, compared to their characters’ voices (which are higher in pitch)

Shadow gate to love is sooo Sen ship-core. It basically works for every Light/Darkness, Angel/Devil, and Narrative Opposites ship of mine.

It’s my song to fall back on if I can’t think of any other songs for my ships. I think it fits these 4 the best, though.

Oh baby shadow gay~ 🌈

The lyrics of the song works for all of my meow meow mfs in general.

In KagePro, though, the mention of "Strong scented eyes" takes on another meaning cuz of the emphasis on EYES, particularly the Eye Abilities.

I also love the emphasis on the Light/Darkness aspect and seduction in the lyrics.

KuroEne: Kuroha seduces Ene by tempting her with carnal pleasures, and keeps the secrets of his plan to commit the Tragedy (killing the Mekakushi Dan on August 15th, Kagerou Day) hidden from her. He tells her "beautiful lies" in order to keep up his facade.

He decides to act tamer prior to the fated date of August 15th, catering to her desires and befriending and bonding her and spending time with her and actually getting to know her. They'd do soft and fluffy stuff like go to the amusement park together, play video games together, and eventually, get intimate with each other.

Due to his inherently dark and twisted nature, Kuroha/Saeru prioritizes his own desires and desire for immortality, and constantly keeps causing the Tragedy by killing the Mekakushi Dan, Marry's friends, forcing the time loop resets. He also believes that doing this allows him to be with his partner forever, because he can continue to come and meet them forever and ever.