#sorry yuuki i love you but :'(

[idiotwhotalkstoomuch]

I mentioned in my post about Shadow Haru that she's taken control of all the shops and made a pricing system that makes it impossible for the Infiltrators to buy anything. This begs the question of how they get any medicine or weapons and the answer to that question is Mishima.

In the Perfect Semester, all of the confidants get put in Mementos by Joker both as a way of thanking them for their help and as a way to protect them from the reality that is currently under construction. Three personas of their arcana are there to protect them.

Mishima is the first confidant that is freed by the Infiltrators as his guards are the weakest because of the fact Mishima is subconsciously resisting what the Phantom Thieves are doing. This may seem strange since Mishima is the Phantom Thieves' #1 supporter but his entire confidant is about him learning what the Phantom Thieves truly are so when he sees what's become of the Thieves in the Perfect Semester, he can tell that something isn't right, the Phantom Thieves are becoming the tyrants they swore to destroy.

With the Phansite not being very helpful to the Infiltrators, Mishima supports the Infiltrators by becoming their fixer for supplies. Since he isn't part of the Infiltrators and shops recognize him as the Phantom Thieves' most loyal supporter, he can collect the medicine and weapons they need. However, he still has to be a somewhat sneaky as he can't just waltz around freely as that risks getting thrown back into Mementos and he still has to go find clinics and model weapon stores with Takemi and Iwai unavailable.

[brokenhardies]

Madoka ‘Luna’ Mishina (made in this dollmaker)

A student of Kosei High’s music department and the eldest daughter of Eikichi Mishina. While appearing aloof and stoic on the outside, Madoka is a very caring, charming and confident young lady, with a strong sense of justice. She’s only recently moved to Shibuya from Sumaru City, and feels like an outsider because of that.

During the Phantom Thieves investigation into Madarame, Madoka is dragged along for the ride, awakening when she witnesses her friend Yusuke Kitagawa’s cognitive portrait and realizing that his teacher saw her friend as an object rather than a person.

Her Persona is Della Rose, an Old West outlaw and member of the infamous Wild Bunch gang. Della Rose uses a combination of curse & bless skills, with an emphasis on critical based skills - learning physical moves with a high chance of critical - as well as learning both dekaja and dekunda.

Her codename, Luna, comes from the crescent shaped hair clip that she wears in her hair, as well as the fact that the moon is associated with the night, when Phantom Thieves typically strike. She wields a buckler shield as her melee weapon and a portable light machine gun as her ranged weapon.

[pikahlua]

MHA Chapter 428 spoilers translations

This week’s initial tentative super rough/literal translations under the cut.

1 中継で、AFOと���戦いを見て… ちゅうけいで、オール・フォー・ワンとのたたかいをみて… chuukei de, OORU FOO WAN to no tatakai wo mite... "On the live broadcast, watching the battle with All For One..."

2 私は体育祭から轟先輩が… わたしはたいいくさいからとどろきせんぱいが… watashi wa taiikusai kara Todoroki-senpai ga... "For me, ever since the sports festival Todoroki-senpai was..."

3 俺も…！指針になったんです！ おれも…！ししんになったんです！ ore mo...! shishin ni nattandesu! "Me too...! It became my compass!"

4 私も わたしも watashi mo "Me too."

5 僕も…！ ぼくも…！ boku mo...! "Me too...!"

tagline 1 新１年に囲まれて… しん１ねんにかこまれて… shin-1nen ni kakomarete... Surrounded by the new first years...

6 憧れるのはいいが彼らも人間だ集団で追い回されたら驚いてしまうよ！ あこがれるのはいいがかれらもにんげんだしゅうだんでおいまわされたらおどろいてしまうよ！ akogareru no wa ii ga karera mo ningen da shuudan de oimawasaretara odoroite shimau yo! "It's okay to admire them, but they are also humans, and if they're chased by a big group it will take them by surprise!"

7 一人一人となら話せるんだが ひとりひとりとならはなせるんだが hitori hitori nara hanaserunda ga "But I can talk to you if it's one by one."

8 轟くんが対話をほっぽり出すなんて余程だ とどろきくんがたいわをほっぽりだすなんてよほどだ Todoroki-kun ga taiwa wo hopporidasu nante yohodo da "Todoroki-kun throwing out conversation would be reasonable."

9 廊下を走ってたぜ廊下をよォ‼︎委員長‼︎ ろうかをはしってたぜろうかをよォ‼︎いいんちょう‼︎ rouka wo hasshiteta ze rouka wo yoO!! iinchou!! "They were running in the hallway! In the hallway!! Class rep!!"

10 うむ規律は守らねばならない！ うむきりつはまもらねばならない！ umu kiritsu wa mamoraneba naranai! "Hmm, you must abide by the rules!"

tagline 2 No.428　笑顔が好きな女の子　堀越耕平 ナンバー428　えがおがすきなお��なのこ　ほりこしこうへい NANBAA 428 egao no suki na onna no ko  Horikoshi Kouhei No. 428 The Girl Who Loves Smiles Kouhei Horikoshi

11 後遺症もある！安静にさせてやってくれ！ こういしょうもある！あんせいにさせてやってくれ！ kouishou mo aru! ansei ni sasete yatte kure! "There's also the aftereffects! Please do them the favor of letting them rest!" (Note: I assume by aftereffects Iida means the trauma but who knows, maybe he means Katsuki's medical condition. Yes this line is updated.)

12 ご…ごめんなさいなんてことを！… go...gomen nasai nante koto wo! ... "I'm...so sorry, for such a thing! ..."

13 お見かけしてつい…‼︎ おみかけしてつい…‼︎ omikake shite tsui...!! "It's just we happened to see them...!!"

14 爆豪ってワーキャーされるの好きだと思ってたけど ばくごうってワーキャーされるのすきだとおもってたけど Bakugou tte WAAKYAA saseru no suki da to omotteta kedo "But I thought Bakugou liked being oohed and aahed over."

15 数が多過ぎてさすがに困惑してるな かずがおおすぎてさすがにこんわくしてるな kazu ga oo sugite sasuga ni konwaku shiteru na "There are too many of them, anyone would be flustered."

1 いいなァ‼︎ ii naA!! "Seems nice!!"

2 昔からかっちゃんわりと女性に距離置かれてたから慣れてないのかも むかしからかっちゃんわりとじょせいにきょうおかれてたからなれてないのかも mukashi kara Kacchan wari to josei ni kyou okareteta kara naretenai no kamo "For a long time, Kacchan was relatively kept at a distance by girls, so maybe he's not used to it."

small text 僕幼なじみなんだ ぼくおさななじみなんだ boku osananajimi nanda "I'm his childhood friend, [that's why I know.]"

3 へー意外 へーいがい HEE igai "Eh? That's unexpected."

4 意外じゃねェだろクソが いがいじゃねェだろクソが igai ja neE daro KUSO ga "It's not unexpected, damnit."

5 活躍は認めるが… かつやくはみとめるが… katsuyaku wa mitomeru ga... "I acknowledge his service contributions, but..."

6 ヤンキーがモテるのは認められん ヤンキーがモテるのはみとめられん YANKII ga MOTEru no wa mitomeraren "I can't acknowledge that a Yankee* is popular." (*Note: "Yankee" in this context refers to a type of delinquent subculture that Katsuki's character directly takes after.)

7 とっとと去ねや‼︎ とっとといねや‼︎ tottoto ine ya!! "Hurry up and leave!!"

8 ひ！本当に失礼しました！ ひ！ほんとうにしつれいしました！ hi! hontou ni shitsurei shimashita! "Eek! We're really sorry*!" (*Note: Literally, this phrase means "We were really rude.")

9 確かに意外じゃなかった たしかにいがいじゃなかった tashika ni igai ja nakatta "That was certainly not unexpected."

10 あ！あの！ a! ano! "Ah! Um!"

11 緑谷先輩‼︎ みどりやせんぱい‼︎ Midoriya-senpai!! "Midoriya-senpai!!"

12 あの！ ano! "Um!"

13-14 見てました みてました mitemashita "I was watching you."

15 マジで勇気もらいました！ マジでゆうきもらいました！ MAJI de yuuki moraimashita! "It really gave me courage!"

16 自分もなんかしなきゃ！って じぶんもなんかしなきゃ！って jibun mo nanka shinakya! tte "[I thought] I have to do something, too!"

17 ほんと…！思ったんです！ ほんと…！おもったんです！ honto...! omottandesu! "Really...! That's what I thought!"

18 あの… ano... "Um..."

19 ありがとうございました！ arigatou gozaimashita! "Thank you very much!"

20 失礼します！ しつれいします！ shitsurei shimasu! "I'll take my leave now*!" (*Note: This phrase means a lot of things. Again, it literally means "I will be rude," but in this case it's something someone says before taking their leave.)

1 えと…いやあ… eto...iyaa... "Uh...thanks..."

2 ……この痛みはーーー… ……このいたみはーーー… ......kono itami wa---... ......This pain---...

3 緑谷と轟はいい…‼︎ みどりやととどろきはいい…‼︎ Midoriya to Todoroki wa ii...!! "It's fine for Midoriya and Todoroki...!!"

4 オイラはヤンキーがモテる事を認められない オイラはヤンキーがモテることをみとめられない OIRA wa YANKII ga MOTEru koto wo mitomerarenai "I can't accept that a Yankee is popular."

5 魂がそうなっている たましいがそうなっている tamashii ga sou natte iru "That's what's happening in my soul."

6 まア maA "Well,"

7 戦いがでかすぎたよ たたかいがでかすぎたよ tatakai ga deka sugita yo "the battle was too big."

8 んでその中心にいたんだ んでそのちゅうしんにいたんだ nde sono chuushin ni itanda "They were at the heart of it all."

9 無理ねえよ むりねえよ muri nee yo "It was impossible."

10 (sound effect) ズキン… ZUKIN... Throb... (Note: This sound can indicate the throbbing or stinging of a physical or mental pain.)

1 職員室 しょくいんしつ shokuin-shitsu Staff Room

2 また２ーA取材交渉 また２ーエーしゅざいこうしょう mata 2-EE shuzai koushou "Again with the 2-A interview negotiations."

3 Noで ノーで NOO de "Give them a no."

4 受ケタイ奴モイルンジャナイカ？ うケタイやつモイルンジャナイカ？ uKETAI yatsu MO IRUNJA NAI KA? "Isn't there someone who wants to take it?"

5 峰田トカ みねたトカ Mineta TOKA "Such as Mineta."

6 そうじゃない奴もいるんで そうじゃないやつもいるんで sou ja nai yatsu mo irunde "There are also some who aren't like that."

7 そっち優先です そっちゆうせんです socchi yuusen desu "They are the priority."

8 じゃ　今日はここの復旧再建だ じゃ　きょうはここのふっきゅうさいけんだ ja kyou wa koko no fukkyuu saiken da "So, today the restoration and reconstruction will be here."

9 お！A組やないか！ お！エーぐみやないか！ o! EE-gumi ya nai ka! "Oh! If it isn't Class A!"

1 ファット‼︎お願いします‼︎ ファット‼︎おねがいします‼︎ FATTO!! onegai shimasu!! "Fat!! Please [have us]*!!" (*Note: This is a standard greeting that translates literally to "please do me this favor" that is used when someone is about to work together with someone else on something, sort of like "If you please" in English.)

2 おうよ ou yo "Sure!"

3 サンイーターももうサイドキックやっとるで！ SANIITAA mo mou SAIDOKIKKU yattoru de! "I also hired Suneater as a sidekick!"

4 君らはあっちを きみらはあっちを kimira wa acchi wo "You all [will handle] over there."

5 金属類はこちらへ きんぞくるいはこちらへ kinzoku-rui wa kochira e "Put various metals here."

6 っし！ sshi! "Okay!"

7 まず聖地だ まずせいちだ mazu seichi da "First, the holy site."

8 ん！ n! "Yeah!"

9 相当なダメージデニムだろ そうとうなダメージデニムだろ soutou na DAMEEJI DENIMU daro "Aren't you equivalent to distressed denim?"

10 おとなしく休んでいればいいものを…まったく おとなしくやすんでいればいいものを…まったく otonashiku yasunde ireba ii mono wo...mattaku "It's okay if you just rest quietly...jeez."

11 軽作業かっちゃん けいさぎょうかっちゃん keisagyou Kacchan Light-duty work Kacchan

12 やっぱそのままなんスか yappa sono mama nanSU ka "So you really are still in that state, huh."

13 気にするな徐々に回復している きにするなじょじょにかいふくしている ki ni suruna jojo ni kaifuku shite iru "Don't worry, I'm gradually recovering."

small text 手ができた てができた te ga dekita "I can make hands."

1 元には…戻るんスか？ もとには…もどるんスか？ moto ni wa...modorunSU ka? "Will you...go back to the way you were?"

2 俺は元より全部獲りに行ったつもりだ！ おれはもとよりぜんぶとりにいったつもりだ！ ore wa moto yori zenbu tori ni itta tsumori da! "I plan to attain something greater than what I was originally!"

3 おーい君たち おーいきみたち ooi kimi-tachi "Hey, all of you!"

4 これお昼 これおひる kore ohiru "Here's lunch."

5 うわぁーおにぎり‼︎ uwaaa onigiri!! "Wow, onigiri!!"

6 いいんですか!⁉︎ iindesu ka!!? "Is it [really] all right!!?" (Note: This is an expression of politeness, like "Is it really okay for us to eat this?")

1 ウチの土地は今回の戦いでふっとんじゃまったがーーーーー ウチのとちはこんかいのたたかいでふっとんじゃまったがーーーーー UCHI no tochi wa konkai no tatakai de futtonja matta ga----- "Our land was was all of a sudden done in by the battle this time-----"

2 全部取り戻します ぜんぶとりもどします zenbu torimodoshimasu We'll bring it all back.

3 ごめんなさい gomen nasai "I'm sorry."

4 いや！責めるつもりで言ったんじゃねぇワリィ いや！せめるつもりでいったんじゃねぇワリィ iya! semeru tsumori de ittanja nee WARII "Oh no! I didn't say that with the intention of blaming you. My bad."

5 君たちの頑張ってる姿を見たら俺たちもクヨクヨしてらんねーって思ったんだ きみたちのがんばってるすがたをみたらおれたちもクヨクヨしてらんねーっておもったんだ kimi-tachi no ganbatteru sugata wo mitara ore-tachi mo KUYOKUYO shiterun nee tte omottanda "When we saw how you all were doing your best, we also thought 'We can't mope.'"

6 任せっきりじゃなく自分たちでまたいくらでもつくりなおすさ まかせっきりじゃなくじぶんたちでまたいくらでもつくりなおすさ makasekkiri ja naku jibun-tachi de mata ikura demo tsukurinaosu sa "We can't leave everything to you forever. We'll rebuild however many times it takes."

7 いやあこんな飯まで戴いたんだ いやあこんなめしまでいただいたんだ iyaa konna meshi made itadaitanda "Wow, and we got all this food!"

8 今日中に片そうぜ‼︎ きょうじゅうにかたそうぜ‼︎ kyou-juu ni katasou ze!! "Let's clean up everything today!!"

9 それはさすがに人手が足りんわ それはさすがにひとでがたりんわ sore wa sasuga ni hitode ga tarin wa "That's because we don't have enough helping hands."

10 ん？ n? "Hm?"

11 何だァ予定にないハズだ なんだァよていにないハズだ nandaA yotei ni nai HAZU da "What's this? This definitely wasn't the plan."

12 すみませんイレイザーヘッド sumimasen IREIZAA HEDDO "Sorry, Eraser Head."

1 ウチのがどうしてもお詫びをと ウチのがどうしてもおわびをと UCHI no ga doushitemo owabi wo to "My [class] really wants to apologize..."

2 先程は失礼致しました さきほどはしつれいいたしました saki hodo wa shitsurei itashimashita "We apologize for our rudeness earlier."

3 皆さんの事情も配慮せず みなさんのじじょうもはいりょせず mina-san no jijou mo hairyo sezu "We didn't even consider everyone's circumstances."

4 マジですげえな一年…‼︎ マジですげえないちねん…‼︎ MAJI de sugee na ichinen...!! "The first years are really amazing...!!"

5 なんでつれてきた nande tsurete kita "Why did you bring them?"

6 詫び圧が凄くて わびあつがすごくて wabiatsu ga sugokute "The pressure to apologize was immense."

7 皆の為に戦った先輩たちのように みんなのためにたたかったせんぱいたちのように minna no tame ni tatakatta senpai-tachi no you ni "Like our upperclassmen* who fought for everyone's sakes," (*Note: It's "senpai.")

8 俺たちも先輩たちの力になりたい‼︎ おれたちもせんぱいたちのちからになりたい‼︎ ore-tachi mo senpai-tachi no chikara ni naritai!! "we also want to be helpful to our upperclassmen*!!" (*Note: Still "senpai.")

9 仮免どころか入学間もないですが かりめんどころかにゅうがくまもないですが karimen dokoro ka nyuugaku-ma mo nai desu ga "We haven't been inducted into school* let alone received our provisional licenses yet." (*Note: In Japan there is a concept of "entering school" called nyuugaku which is basically the opposite of graduation. It's an induction or welcoming ceremony.)

10 やれる事やらせて下さい‼︎ やれることやらせてください‼︎ yareru koto yarasete kudasai!! "Please let us do what we can!!"

11 ２年生の邪魔になるから隅で軽作業ね ２ねんせいのじゃまになるからすみでけいさぎょうね 2nensei no jama ni naru kara sumi de keisagyou ne "So that you don't become disturbances for the second-years, please do light-duty work in the corner."

12 ハイ‼︎ HAI!! "Yessir!!"

13 後輩ってこんな未知の生物だっけ こうはいってこんなみちのせいぶつだっけ kouhai tte konna michi no seibutsu dakke "The underclassmen are such unknown creatures." (*Note: This word is "kouhai.")

14 飯こんなに用意してないんだけど めしこんなによういしてないんだけど meshi konna ni youi shite nainda kedo "We didn't prepare food for this many though."

15 食べてきました！ たべてきました！ tabete kimashita! "We ate and then came [here]!"

1 なんかよくわからんが……… nan ka yoku wakaran ga......... "I don't really understand, but........."

2 こんな感じで頑張りが数珠つなぎになっていくんだな こんなかんじでがんばりがじゅずつなぎになっていくんだな konna kanji de ganbari ga juzu tsunagi ni natte ikunda na "it's like this that hard work links people together*, huh." (*Note: This idiom literally reads as, "string together like rosary beads.")

3 ……お茶子ちゃん… ……おちゃこちゃん… ......Ochako-chan... "......Ochako-chan..."

4 うんーー un-- "Yeah--"

5 …少しずつだけど …すこしずつだけど ...sukoshi zutsu dakedo "...It's little by little, but"

6 前向きになってるようで まえむきになってるようで maemuki ni natteru you de "looks like things are looking forward."

7 良かったなって よかったなって yokatta natte "That makes me glad."

1 そんだけ！ son dake! "That's all!"

2 ごめんね！梅雨ちゃんデクくん何食べてる？ ごめんね！つゆちゃんデクくんなにたべてる？ gomen ne! Tsuyu-chan DEKU-kun nani tabeteru? "Sorry! Tsuyu-chan, Deku-kun, what are you eating?"

3 高菜⁉︎ 私も高菜がいい たかな⁉︎ わたしもたかながいい takana!? watashi mo takana ga ii "Takana*? I also like takana." (*Note: Takana is a type of Japanese mustard greens vegetable.)

4 高菜と梅干しこそ至高‼︎ たかなとうめぼしこそしこう‼︎ takana to umeboshi koso shikou!! "Takana and umeboshi* especially are supreme!!" (*Note: A pickled plum condiment.)

small text おめぐみや omegumi ya "Such a blessing."

5 (sound effect) ズキン… ZUKIN... Throb...

1 PM 7:00 ピーエム7:00 PIIEMU 7:00 7:00PM

2 寮制は緩和され りょうせいはかんわされ ryousei wa kanwa sare The dormitory system was relaxed.

3 ��宅へ帰る事も選べるようになった じたくへかえることもえらべるようになった jitaku e kaeru koto mo eraberu you ni natta Now we can choose to return home, too.

4 麗日一旦家帰るって うららかいったんいえかえるって Uraraka ittan ie kaeru tte Uraraka said she'd go home for the moment.

5 お茶子ちゃん… おちゃこちゃん… Ochako-chan... "Ochako-chan..."

6 既読がつかないの きどくがつかないの kidoku ga tsukanai no "It won't show that she read [my text.]"

1 ああ!!!くそお!!! aa!!! kusoo!!! "Ahh!!! Shit!!!"

2 何⁉︎ なに⁉︎ nani!? "What!?"

3 しくった！ shikutta! "It screwed up!"

4 急にヘリ出せなんて言うから…‼︎ きゅうにヘリだせなんていうから…‼︎ kyuu ni HERI dase nante iu kara...!! "It's because they suddenly told me to go out on a helicopter...!!"

5 カメラのバッテリーが KAMERA no BATTERII ga "The camera battery"

6 切れた‼︎ きれた‼︎ kireta!! "died!!"

7 あの日 あのひ ano hi That day

8 私たちの結末は わたしたちのけつまつは watashi-tachi no ketsumatsu wa our conclusion

9 カメラには映らなかった カメラにはうつらなかった KAMERA ni wa utsuranakatta wasn't shown on camera.

1 もう街並みが元通りだ もうまちなみがもとどおりだ mou machinami ga motodoori da The cityscape is already back to normal.

2 少しずつだけど前向きになってるようで すこしずつだけどまえむきになってるようで sukoshi zutsu dakedo maemuki ni natteru you de It seems like things are moving forward little by little.

3 良かったなって よかったなって yokatta natte That makes me glad.

4 事態が良くならないあの日からまるで日が沈むにつれて影が伸びていくような じたいがよくならないあのひからまるでひがしずむにつれてかげがのびていくような jitai ga yoku naranai ano hi kara maru de hi ga shizumu ni tsurete kage ga nobite iku you na Ever since that day when the situation didn't get better, it seems like, as the sun sets, the shadows go and grow longer.

5 これまでと違って本当に終わったんだ これまでとちがってほんとうにおわったんだ kore made to chigatte hontou ni owattanda Unlike before, now it's really over.

6 決着がついた けっちゃくがついた kecchaku ga tsuita The conclusion has arrived.

7 良かったんだ よかったんだ yokattanda It was good.

8 明るく前向きに取り戻していく時だもん あかるくまえむきにとりもどしていくときだもん akaruku maemuki ni torimodoshite iku toki da mon It's time to get back to being bright and positive*. (*Note: The grammar pattern here notes a sense of disatisfaction with what was said, like "but I don't like this.")

9 私は皆が笑ってるのが好き わたしはみんながわらってるのがすき watashi wa minna ga waratteru no ga suki I love when everyone smiles.

10 水を差したくない みずをさしたくない mizu wo sashitakunai I don't want to put a damper on things.

1 だから dakara That's why

2-3 ずうっと痛むこの傷もしまっておくんだ ずうっといたむこのきずもしまっておくんだ zuutto itamu kono kizu mo I'll put away even this wound that hurts all the time.

4 うぐっ ugu "Ngh."

1 うぅ uu "Uu" (Note: These are sound effects for grunting and sobbing.)

2 うぐ… ugu... "ngh..."

3 麗日さん うららかさん Uraraka-san "Uraraka-san."

tagline 少女が秘めた想いデクはーー… しょうじょがひめたおもいデクはーー… shoujo ga himeta omoi DEKU wa--... The girl's hidden feelings, and as for Deku--...

[carminecherry]

ENCLOSURE | mikey sano

this is part four of the series kill the lights

⇝ PAIRING: timeskip!biker!mikey sano x fem!reader

⇝ SERIES SYNOPSIS: after moving by yourself to tokyo, you black out at a party and wake up with a new friend. as she sweeps you up in her fast-paced city life, you feel yourself falling deeper and deeper for her mysterious brother. but something dark is brewing in the city. as his past threatens to resurface, mikey must fight not only physical enemies but the mental battle of his feelings for you. he can't resist you , but could he ever forgive himself if something happened to you? he'll love you selfishly and protect you savagely.

⇝ PART FOUR LENGTH: 2k words

⇝ PART FOUR WARNINGS: mentions of violence (18+ minors do not interact):

all characters are 20+; Alternate Universe! Canon Divergent. a friend from university invites you to his house party. as the drinks flow, you slip into a pleasant buzz. that is until a particular masked man makes his appearance, unveiling himself.

⇝ AUTHOR'S NOTE: a short chapter with a little spice at the end ;) more chapters coming soon! keep an eye on the tags and stay safe! <3

DO NOT INTERACT WITH THIS WORK IF YOU ARE A MINOR. BY CLICKING THE READMORE, YOU CONSENT TO VIEWING ADULT CONTENT.

Your eyes flutter open as morning light trickles into your room. You bury your face in your pillow, trying to buy a few more moments of sleep. You had been having the most wonderful dream. It felt so real. Those delicious lips on your neck. Your hands running over his toned chest. The heat of your bodies pressed to one another. Please, just five more minutes. Five more hours. But your body betrayed you.

With a frustrated whine you turned over, resigning yourself to being awake. Rubbing your eyes, you feel your mascara clump under the pressure. Shit, had you fallen asleep in your makeup? You sat up, blinking sleep from your eyes. Your throat was dry to the point of being a bit sore but other than that, you had escaped one of Yuuki’s house parties without a hangover! You could count on one hand the times you’ve woken up after one of Yuuki’s parties without hating your life. 

You rise, feeling gross from sleeping in your party attire. Quickly shedding your clothes and tossing them in the wash, you move to your bathroom. You washed your face gently and thoroughly, each splash of water a prayer that you didn’t get a breakout. You brush your hair and hop into a nice warm shower, rinsing off the unpleasant feeling that comes from not completing an evening ritual. Also taking the time to finish what your dream didn’t. After toweling off, you slip into the pajamas the sober you from last night had so kindly left out in preparation for the drunk you. Things don’t always go to plan, clearly.

Whipping up a quick breakfast, you rummage through the door of your fridge for the carton of iced coffee, grabbing a yogurt cup before closing the door and moving to your spot in front of the TV. There is decent counter seating at the small island in your kitchen, but you usually opted for sitting on the floor in front of your coffee table, resting your back on the sofa. You click the button on the remote and the screen illuminates, the news coming back from a commercial break. 

You dig into the meal as you finally check your messages. The sound of the TV is mostly white noise as you open several messages from Emma. There is a thread of spam from the party.  Her spelling getting progressively worse.

11:00 I lost you Im heading back frm the bathroom.

11:03 OMG Senju is here! You’d lioev her! Come meet her! *Blurry selfie

11:07 Where arrrreee yyyooooooouuuuu??,,

11:08 Og shit I forgot you an  Mi

1:20 Y/N I lovw yoi thx ro tnotight

10:00 Fuck me. I’m so hungover. What happened last night?

You reacted to the message from this morning and quickly typed up. 

“I’m so sorry! I Didn’t see these last night!!! … Are you sure you wanna know?” 

You send the message before clicking out to open a message thread from Yuuki,

1:30 “It was great to see you Y/N. Hope you got home safely!”

You heart the message and reply, 

“It was seriously AMAZING! Thank you so much for the invite! I hope the damage is’t too bad. LMK about next time uvu”

Just then, the report on the news caught your ear and your attention was dragged away from your phone screen. “Developing story: There was an Arson Attack at a car dealership in Roppongi in the early hours of the morning, Saturday. Police are reporting extreme property damage and evidence of a robbery as well as several cars missing from the lot. Two employees are in serious condition at the local hospital. A security guard has been placed under arrest. He is suspected of conspiring with the attackers after reviewing security tapes from the crime scene. The situation is still developing and anyone with information about this event is being urged to report details to the number below.” 

The TV replayed clips from the security tape showing three masked figures and the security guard. They cut to a wide shot of the building now with a reporter in front, smoke still rising from the charred building as a phone number scrolled across the bottom of the screen. You shuddered. Japan was a safe country, but it meant that when something did happen it was big news. The faces of the two employees appeared on the screen, one younger and one who looked to be in his fifties. You mentally wished for a speedy recovery for the two of them. The news cut away to the newsroom and switched to the weather. It’s jarring how the world keeps turning, you think.

Your phone buzzes and your attention returns to the smaller screen in your hand. You take a big bite of toast. You read a new message from Emma.

“Noooooooooooo~ Is it bad, I’m gonna KMS”

“It’s not BAD bad, you were cute ;p But you should probably buy Yuuki a new houseplant”

“skull emojis”

“Regardless, I had a blast with you last night  <3 I’m still up for coffee tomorrow if you are~”

She hearted the message and replied, 

“Yeeeeesss~ I wanna check out that cute place you told me about in Shimbashi!”

Now it was your turn to heart the message, 

“Meet at the station and then head there together? What time is good?”

“How about 11?”

“Sounds good to me! See you then!”

You finish the last of your yogurt, taking a sip of your coffee. You pull yourself up, depositing your dishes in the kitchen sink with a small clatter. Today was shaping up to be a lazy day. Your phone buzzes again, a message from Emma appears on the screen, 

“Mikey is here and being annoying, do you care if I give him your number?”

You can’t help it when your heart beat increases, images of your dream flash in your mind. You type out, 

“Sure! No problem, thank him again for dropping me off last night <3”

“Thank him yourself, I’m going back to bed”

She concluded by sending his contact details. You input his contact as Mikey with a strawberry emoji next to his name. A smile plays on your lips. You followed Emma’s instructions and typed up,

“Thanks again for last night!”

As you send the message you get another from Emma, a picture attached. You click it before shutting your phone quickly, face heating. You compose yourself. Opening it again. Emma’s message read,

“What the hell?”

And attached is a shirtless picture of Mikey, seeming to toss a plastic bag of something at the camera. It’s a bit blurry but the bruises wrapping around his ribs are clear as day. Mortified doesn’t even come close.

“AAAHSHHSHHSHHGGG!!!!!!!” 

“Did you guys get into a fight or something? Please tell me you won ;p”

“Oh my god! *dead* I didn’t realize I was holding on so tight :’)”

“He drives like a maniac, I don’t blame you you should squeeze harder next time, just Heimlich him”

Emma’s joking helped to calm you down. You still felt an icky feeling that you had hurt him.

“If this job hunt keeps tanking, I’ll consider it the next time he’s hitting 100mph  on the highway” 

She likes your message before sending a short video. You press play. You see Emma chucking a pillow at him and yelling “Put on a damn shirt!” before the video cuts. You laugh, sending a pillow emoji. You open your chat with Mikey and follow up with another message,

“Hey,  I saw the damage, sorry about that” 

A bubble with 3 dots appears.

“I’ve had worse.” 

He replies. The period at the end makes his message weirdly formal. You pause, unsure how to continue the conversation when another message pops up.

“You’re welcome.” 

Period again. You like the message and respond, 

“Next time I’ll squeeze lower, maybe we can get a cool pattern going.” 

You cringe and move to unsend the message. A+ flirting. He likes your message before you do.

“Maybe we can come up with a better story too. Something other than you being a little wuss. Something that’ll impress the guys.” 

“I’m not a wuss >:( look what I can do to a tough guy like you, and not even a scratch on me.”

He is typing a response for a while, you migrate to lie on the sofa under the AC.

“Touche.” 

Is all he responds with. Feeling the conversation go dry, you lock your phone. You lay there, soaking in the cold air. You start a mental list of chores for the day; vacuum and mop, do a load of laundry, run to the grocery store. The joys of adulthood. You didn’t hate it as much as you used to. You learned to find peace in those little moments. Mindless tasks that allowed you to clear your head. An added bonus is having a tidy environment does wonders for your mood. 

When you were younger you lived in organized chaos, your parents constantly chiding you to clean up. When did you become so sensitive to your surroundings you wonder. You peeled yourself from the couch, pulling up a podcast to keep you company while you set to your tasks.

It's always nice to have an enclosure day once in a while. Today had been much needed after all of the socialization yesterday. You hang your laundry to dry out on your balcony. Before retreating back indoors. Your house sparkled and you reveled in your hard work. You throw on a simple outfit for a grocery run. Your list was short, it would be a quick trip. You kill the AC in your room and check that your balcony door is locked before hunting for the remote to turn off the TV. 

As you flip your couch cushions over, another news report flashes across the screen. “Breaking News. A young woman has just been attacked and stabbed in Roppongi. The attack occurred in broad daylight. The attacker is still at large. Witnesses say the attacker is a male, mid to late 20’s, around 180 cm and medium build. Residents are being urged to stay out of the area for their own safety. Be warned, footage of the attack taken by security cameras and bystanders are now circulating on social media. The suspect’s identity is still unknown. Viewers, please be advised that the following clips are graphic in nature. Those with any information about the attacker are being asked to report to the number at the bottom of the screen.” 

The news cut from the caster to a grainy video shot on a cellphone. The woman’s body is blurred out. It showed the man standing over her before fleeing into an alley. The man was masked and the video was grainy and slowed in an attempt to reveal any identifying features. The same scene from a different angle is played. Finally a collage of screenshots of the man’s covered face are displayed on the screen. 

The woman’s picture came up on the screen with her name and age. She was 22 years old. There had been no gore in the video, but you felt sick to your stomach. You flipped the TV off, sliding down the couch to sit on the floor. You weren’t close to that area of the city but you couldn’t help feeling scared. This type of crime, so violent in nature, is not normal here.

What really gnawed at you is that she was young, just making her way out in the world. You wondered if she had just graduated university. Your mind was spiraling. What dreams did she have? Why had that man done this? That pit in your stomach grew deeper and you felt sweat begin to prickle on your body. How long had you been sitting there? You hit the remote control to turn the AC back on. The TV remained off. You reassessed your fridge with new motivation and decided a grocery trip wouldn’t be necessary tonight.

[makeste]

So... How was watching that episode?

I meant to do a post on this sooner, as opposed to late on a Friday night hours before the next episode drops (eta: well apparently there's no new ep airing this week after all so that makes my timing slightly less atrocious), but yeah. basically I loved it. it hurt in all the right ways.

music was incredible. no shot it was ever not going to be incredible. Hayashi Yuuki thank you for always making my emotions your bitch.

there are admittedly a couple of moments in the anime which I felt weren't quite as impactful as they were in the manga. one of these is the moment when Jeanist, after seeing that Kacchan is (he thinks) traumatized and crying, immediately shifts gears from trying to hype him back up to return to the battle, and instead starts reassuring him that he's done enough and he doesn't have to fight anymore and they'll figure out a way without him. when I first read that part in the manga it absolutely slaughtered me. it's so rare to see media that stars young adults as the protagonists, and portrays them as capable young warriors, and yet also acknowledges that even so, they're still just kids. and to then surround said kids with adults who aren't dumbed down, and who are actually smart and capable and who are actively looking out for them and trying to protect them even though the kids are more OP than they are.

so to have a character that looks at someone like Bakugou and sees past how powerful and determined and ferocious he is, and instead just sees a kid who has been so incredibly brave and who they've asked so much of already. and to have that character make the on-the-spot decision to pull this kid out of the fight, regardless of the consequences, even if it means they might LOSE, just because he thinks the kid is hurt and scared and past his limits, and he needs someone to look out for him. that moment says everything about what kind of person Jeanist is. just, that one part got to me so much.

BUT, in the anime it all happens much faster and the moment gets kind of lost because Kacchan almost immediately starts doing his Deku-style muttering, and Jeanist quickly realizes that his initial read was wrong and this kid is actually FULLY AND COMPLETELY LOCKED IN MORE THAN EVER. which is exactly what happens in the manga as well, to be fair. but in the manga I got to read and absorb it at my own pace, whereas the anime just keeps on going with no concern over whether you've had enough time to process everything that's going on. and so that moment just kind of slips by, and almost isn't even noticeable unless you're looking out for it. it's not really a complaint, because there isn't really any other way the scene could be adapted, probably. but it does give me a good excuse to write a mini-essay about how much I love it, so yeah.

moving on though, in spite of my wishing we could have somehow lingered on that part a second or two longer, I did absolutely love the reveal of Kacchan mumbling and analyzing Deku-style. the first of many outstanding Okamoto Nobuhiko performances in this episode. full nerd powers activated. we'd already seen him do this in Bakugou Katsuki: Rising as well, but this is where it really stands out and it was awesome.

and by the way, shout out to the Big Three who are fucking great. eventually when I get around to posting my manga recaps for this part of the story, those will get more into their antics. for now though, I'll just say that everything was very well adapted. and the part where poor Mirio is all "???? sorry????" when TomurAFO has his brief little Tenko outburst was everything I hoped it would be, and Mirio's actor absolutely nailed it. like I knew it was coming and was anticipating it, and it still slayed me. easily a top five funniest moment in the whole damn series.

Kacchan standing up and telling Jeanist to look after the others filled me with just as much dread as the first time I read it. and the first time I read it, I had already been spoiled. so what I'm trying to say is, knowing what's about to happen does not in any way lessen the intensity of this moment. if anything it just enhances it.

the reveal of Kacchan's powerup was so incredibly badass. I can't even describe how badass it was. just, BOOM. now you see me, now you don't. LA DEE DA, HERE I AM! and the narration in the background talking about his quirk. chef's kiss.

no matter how many anime characters I see pulling off the omae wa mou shindeiru, I will never, ever tire of it. it's the single most badass thing anyone can ever do. especially when they were being underestimated the entire fucking time, and now all of a sudden they're out here scaring the shit out of the big bad himself. no one is faster than Kacchan. KACCHAN CAN RUN FASTER THAN ALL OF YOU. HE CAN FUCKING FLY!! HE'S BEHIND YOU RIGHT NOW!! GOD I LOVE IT SO MUCH.

and then Nobu hits us with the coup de grace. "Izuku… can I still catch up to you?" fellas is it gay to spend your last thirty seconds of life having an imaginary conversation with your beloved rival even as you're zapping around like a bolt of lightning, kicking more ass than anyone on earth has ever kicked.

and I was already dead by this point, but then the All Might vestige scene kicked in and resuscitated me so I could die again even harder. worth it.

so what really killed me nineteen times during this part was the way that Kacchan sounded so completely and utterly different from how he has ever sounded before. this is a scene that's taking place entirely in his head (or… in OFA land… maybe???? goddammit Horikoshi still owes us an explanation. THAT VESTIGE SHOULD NOT BE THERE I DON'T CARE WHAT ANYBODY SAYS). there's nobody else around. nobody to perform for. nobody to show off or look tough for. it's just him, and this big mysterious yellow All Might ghost thing.

and he sounds like an entirely different person. nervous, shy, sheepish. no crudeness, no insults. just, aw shucks. hand to back of neck. avert eyes. so this is kind of awkward, but... the thing is, I always wanted to... but I was such a brat when we first met... and I just never found the right moment after... anyway yeah I'm sorry and it's really dumb. but I really just. wanted to get your autograph.

just. this is him at his most sincere. this is who he's always been, all along. the one and ONLY time we've ever gotten a glimpse of him with absolutely no walls. and he is NOTHING like what he presents himself as to the outside world. he is sweet, he is gentle, he is self-effacing. he is painfully vulnerable, which is doubtless why he never dares to show this side of himself to anybody, ever. and he is ultimately so calmly accepting of this one last regret during what he believes are his final moments.

anyway. so yeah. it destroyed me. what else is there to say.

and then it happens. and once again, not to shit on the anime at all because this episode was fantastic, but this was another part that seemed much clearer in the manga. particularly that one page where we see that everyone else -- Jeanist; Mirio; Hadou; Tamaki; even Mirko -- tried to save Katsuki from that final blow, but they were all just a split second too late. the anime did its best to show that, but I think it was just harder to convey in that format. whereas the manga did it beautifully in a way that couldn't really be replicated.

but on the other hand, one thing the anime did VERY well was showing Kacchan's ragdoll body just flop lifelessly away afterwards. holy shit. I watched like a half dozen reaction videos to this episode on Youtube, and in most of them the anime viewers didn't quite realize how bad of a hit it was at first… until they showed that. then they were like, D: D: D:

and then last but not least… the image that broke the internet so hard that it spoiled me even in my paranoid social media isolation. Kacchan lying lifelessly on the ground. it's such a well-drawn panel in the manga, and the anime absolutely did it justice. having him be so pale was a wonderful touch. you see him, and you just immediately know. there's no room for doubt at all. it's powerful af. the Youtuber reactors all lost their minds. one woman actually started sobbing. phenomenal cinema.

so yeah! needless to say I thought it was spectacular. pour one out for the anime-onlys though. and now their watch begins.

[theolivetree123]

Yuuki’s Corpse Bride Card!

Event by me! Specifically for the raffle I'm hosting!

Cameo of @the-rini-rush 's character, Carla, in the voice lines

Non-Groovy:

"Do you really think I'll find my special one?"

Groovy: Here!

VOICE LINES

💙: Thanks for coming to see me. I think I'll need a bit of support today...

💙: Oh... I'm nervous! There's so many people expecting me to pick a bachelor already!

💙: My suit reminds me of a story I heard once. It was about a man who accidentally married a corpse! Hm... perhaps that's what inspired this event.

💙: So many people came here tonight... ugh, that's just making me even MORE nervous...

💙: Do you think I look alright? I was actually happily surprised when I saw myself in the suit. I feel so fancy.

💙: Grim! Ugh... where did that furball go? I need emotional support here...

💙: Constance keeps flirting with Carla... oh, I'm not jealous or anything, I just think Constance should stop leading Carla on like that.

💙: Is getting married always this overwhelming?

💙*mumbling*... S-Sorry! I was just.. talking to myself. Oh no, I must've plucked the petals off of my flowers... It looks like I'll have to get a new bouquet.

💙: When I find my partner, I want to give them my bouquet. It'll be like a sign of my love for them. Oh god, what am I saying...

💙: What? No! I'm not gonna wear a dress! I'd rather die than wear a dress!

💙: You know, even though I'm kinda nervous, I really want people to participate as a bachelor. I think it'll be interesting to see how they'd woo me, haha...

DUO MAGIC

Yuuki: Oh no... what if nobody shows up... what if I get stood up...

Constance: Yuuki! Quit picking at your bouquet!

[kunikame]

in your system, even pluto is a planet. - i. mao

warnings : mostly mao centric, gender neutral, astral ref (my trademark trust), my formal apology to all maoPs for redamancy

w/c : 889

isara mao has always been second best.

it is how he spent most of his life, it is what he’s ultimately used to. he knows he would never be first– he knows he's not good enough to be first.

those are the facts, the truths he’s had to abide by since he was a child. no matter how hard he tried, there was always someone who was, simply put, better.

yet to accept a truth is easier than to stop hoping he could one day break the cycle.

he’s reminded of this once more as he watches his unit-mates work on their next choreography. as a friend first and unit-mate second, he will always be proud of them, will always support them and help make them shine if he can.

that doesn’t mean it hurts any less. 

watching them so easily become what he’s always wished he could be. isara mao is well aware he could never sparkle like they do.

as it turns out, he’s the only ‘trick’, whereas the other 3 are the ‘star’.

to accept it is slightly different than it is to continue fighting it.

and that’s where you come in.

while anzu may be their primary manager, she’s been kept busy by other units recently, so to keep trickstar functioning properly in her absence, you’ve been assigned to help them out instead.

mao wouldn’t exactly call it love at first sight (though makoto yuuki would beg to differ)– he simply has good intuition when it comes to people. he just knew you’re a good person, so he stuck close to you. that’s all.

all was well at first.

you helped them out wherever you could, gave them useful advice and even basically collaborated on the choreography. what caught mao off guard however, was that you tried your best to focus on all of them equally. you gave all of them the time of day when they needed it, without any reservations or excuses. if makoto had a question, you would answer it, and if mao needed help the moment after, you would immediately be by his side.

it was weird, to be treated like a voluntary choice.

then suddenly you no longer had time for mao. 

makoto, subaru, hokuto. subaru, makoto, hokuto. hokuto, makoto, subaru.

never mao.

and he doesn’t understand why. 

he doesn’t remember doing anything to upset you, so why?

have you simply realized he’s not good enough to be a choice?

sitting on a random staircase in yumenosaki, the redhead swirled his can of coke as he let out yet another helpless sigh.

he couldn’t even ask ritsu for help, he’d just fall asleep halfway through the story. perhaps it’s for the best if he doesn’t say anything at all. just suck it up and stick it out till the end, as always. deal with it.

for so long he’s associated himself with venus– with it being the second planet from the sun and all– he forgot to think that, maybe, he was just pluto all along.

with the final sigh of his short pity party, he threw the can in the nearest bin and made his way back to the studio. just a bit more practice and perhaps he’ll finally get closer to the others. 

the door opens before him and you’re standing there, eyes wide and mouth gaping, as if you’re seeing him for the first time (he probably doesn’t look much different though, he thinks).

“mao! i was just about to go look for you! the others have left already so i finally have time for you, i’m so sorry i’ve been pushing it off for so long, there was always just.. something. the lights broke and the–” you paused to let out a quick breath, shoulders relaxing for the first time this week, “you know what, whatever, doesn’t matter. i can finally take care of your concerns, so out with them!”

you step away from the doorway to let him in, but he just stands there dumbfounded.

“..mao?”

“... so you– you weren’t ignoring me? like, without reason?”

“what? no! i would never do that!” you looked genuinely distraught and now he feels bad for ever thinking so because yeah, you would never do that (or would you?), he’s just too used to people doing it (way too used, a voice in his head chuckles).

“oh,” he breathes, then steps into the studio.

“if it were up to me i would’ve dropped everything to cater to your needs, but the spotlight that was supposed to be on your position broke, so i made that my priority,” oh, “i’m sorry if i made you feel unimportant, i should’ve discussed it with you first..”

“n-no! no, no it’s fine. you’re fine. .. thank you. for-for doing that for me. and i’m sorry, too, i shouldn’t have assumed..”

you smile at him and he thinks not even the sun is worthy of you. 

it may be the center of the solar system, where pluto is not even a planet and where venus is second– but in the system isara mao sees you as the center of, perhaps he was mercury all along. if he is to crash and burn and suffer incineration in the long run, it may just be a worthy sacrifice.

at least he will no longer be second best.

ੈ✩₊˚TAGLIST : @ibaraluvr @venusflwers @thesapphirecake @yakshalea @mahouwoageru @kazemiya @menhwa-pdf @chalksdreams @gabirii @myunghology @solxima //ask/comment or fill form to be added/removed! (if you're in bold i can't tag you)

[small-world-au]

Sora Aguilar

———INCOMING BIG ASS POST———

Actual name: ???? Aguilar Yuki

Age: Same as the main trio

Personality type: ISFP

Ethnicity: Asian (Japanese) & Hispanic (Mexican) <- updated

Hair color/type: Dark purple (tho it looks like dark brown.) straight-curly

Eye color: light blue (beta) brown (officially)

Skin color: super light tan/dark pink

Gender: Male

Family: Natalia Aguilar (maternal grandmother)

Gabriela Aguilar (Mother 🪦)

Shino Yuuki (Father 🪦)

Dante (Stepfather)

Noelia Aguilar (Maternal aunt🪦)

Unknown (Maternal uncle)

Rowena Pagonis (Older half sister🪦)

Kip (therapy dog)

Stone (childhood sweetheart/husband)

Friends: Bailey, Jasper, Finn, Skipp, Zaria, Vinnie, pebble, maggot, Bailey’s kittens, Finn’s rat babies, old man Howard, Maroon, Olive, Ray, Rui, Maple, Chris, Zaria, Charlie, and Allay

Neutral: Tre, Rigel & cen, karma, Doña Mari, and Ivan Franzwick

Enemies: Fritz (the butler), ditch, Nadia (personal reasons), Jay, arrogant lootbags, street gangs, and AVRILLE!!!!

LIKES

Books

Sewing

Baking

Poetry

Cute animals

Stone

Spending time with friends/family

Exploring

Springtime

Food!!!

Caring for the young

DISLIKES

SHOESSSSS!!!!

Rude/whiny scraps & loot-bag

Leaving kip behind

Being treated as a 🏆

Discrimination

Art/writing block

Not being good enough

Disappointing his family

Leaving Stone and friends

Obsessive creeps

His dad and avrille

His beloved ones getting hurt

Being unable to help/being useless

Thunderstorms

Arguments

Street fights

Being cooped inside for too long

Sora Aguilar is one of the main character of my au. A sweet, gentle, and kindhearted young man filled with curiosity, who would do anything for the sake of his friends and family, even if it means sacrificing his own needs and wants.

He is Rowena’s younger half-brother, Gabriela’s and Shino’s only son, Natalia’s grandson, and Noelia’s nephew.

He’s a close friend to the scraps and a mom-friend who cherishes his own group dearly. He is also Stone’s childhood best friend/sweetheart.

He and his puppy (Kip) lived happily (???) in their mansion, until they wake up one night inside a big bag that was left on the streets of ramshackle.

Edit: ABOUT DAMN TIME I DID THIS SHIT!!!!!!!

Update 2: Sora’s now half Mexican!

Why? Cuz am Mexican.

Update 3: references and other ocs from “small world” au!

More facts below!!!!

[chatterbox-73]

Simptember 2024.

Day 5 - love bites.

Zero Kiryu x fem!reader

This story is a smut story for simptember, I’ll be writing more characters x reader one shots for simptember and if you want to see a character please let me know...

You must be 18 years or older to read this...

🔞⚠️NO MINORS ALLOWED⚠️🔞

Summary: you offer yourself to zero in hopes it keeps him away from your sister, so that both yuuki and he can be safe. Though you didn’t expect what you received from this arrangement.

Word count: 1.5k

CW: NSFW and adult content, nipple play, unprotected sex, pull out, missionary, bitting, drinking blood, slight manipulation.

You laid on the couch adjacent from the fire place in the headmaster’s living room, you had finished patrols much later than you were expected to and so now you found yourself locked out of the girls dormitory, “you can’t sleep on the couch tonight… go up to your room” you heard a voice from the door and found it to be your adopted father, “yeah I will…” you sighed and stood walking over to him, “…let me do one more sweep of the school, then I’ll go to bed” you watch the man sigh and slightly roll his eyes, “where did you learn to be so stubborn and ignorant? Yuki’s such a good girl, so what happened to you?” The man huffed, you chuckled and rested a hand on his shoulder, “yuki is too much of a good girl, she basically become a walking blood bag for Zero and it’s only a matter of time until Kuran takes her” you look at the headmaster from the corner of your eye, the man nod and focused on the fire burning away in the room, “stop Yuki from offering herself to zero…” he turned to you and swallowed thickly, before grabbing you and offering a sad expression, “even if you need to offer yourself in her place… please” he looked away from you in shame, “I hate myself for doing this, you know that?” He sigh and further leaned into the doorframe, “yeah, I know… but you don’t want to let down that woman…” you began to walk away before stopping for a moment, you looked over your shoulder at the man and met his gaze, “…are you sure she’s worth it? Or maybe you’ve allowed yourself to fall prey to a truly evil demon” you knew it was cruel but sometimes the headmaster would forget himself, actually you were sure he had begun to forget himself and no longer wished to remember.

You walked through the darkened courtyard until you reached the boy’s dormitory and to your surprise the doors were unlocked, you let yourself in and made your way to zero’s room, you didn’t bother knocking as you walked right in, the silver haired man jumped slightly and pointed his gun at you, “what do you want?” He hissed and slammed his gun on his side table, you shut the door behind you and locked it before walking over to him and sitting just in front of him on his bed, “I got locked out of my dormitory and the headmaster house is all locked up too…” you pout and move so that you were facing away from him, “but if you don’t want me here, I’m sure Kaname Kuran would be more than willing to open his bed for me…” you sigh and look back at zero with fake concern, “the only problem is, it’d break poor sweet Yuki’s heart… but you’d have your chance to comfort her and have her completely” you hummed and Zero glared at you, “what exactly are you asking me here…? Do you want a place to crash or are you trying to find a man to spend the night with?” He grumbled and raised a brow, “I’m looked for whatever I can get away with” you chuckled and began to straddle Zero, while you began to unbutton your shirt, you eyed the man for any reaction, “getting naked in front of me? This is harassment” he hummed watching your cute lacy bralette, “you’re right, I’m sorry… will you take me completely?” You asked and Zero’s hands moved to your waist as he nodded, “your skin and hair is damp, how?” He asked and grazed a thumb over the waistband of your skirt, “I’d like to think you’ve figured out why I’m here and perhaps realised I might have been lying, so that I might get what I need” you whispered and pressed your body to him, Zero clicked his tongue and rubbed his hands over your thighs, allowing them to disappear under your skirt, “so you lied so you could get off… you have a hand and fingers for that” he tilted his head and began to unzip your skirt.

“Of course I could use my hand however I’m not here for me zero” you spoke in a serious tone while you helped Zero remove your skirt, you laid back and looked up at him as he gave you a confused look, “what are you doing here, then?” He asked with a frown, “the headmaster wants me to keep you from feeding on yuki, I’m here to seduce you and so that you desire me and all I can offer” you answered honestly and Zero leans over you, he grabbed your shoulders and held you down, “what the fuck?!” He growled and got in your face, “I’m sorry but by allowing her to feed you, you’re endangering her and yourself… how could you be so foolish?” You shout and zero blinks, he leans back and lets go of your shoulders, “you’re right, it’d be better if I left…” he sighs and you sat up, wrapping your arms around his neck, “no we still need you… we still need you to protect her, to protect the school… stay and I’ll allow you to gorge yourself on me…” you whisper, Zero’s hands brushed through your hair, “if you’ll except me” you looked off to one of the four blank walls in Zero’s room.

Zero’s thumb ran across your lips before he guided you to lean your head back, his lips light pressed to your pulse, “who implied I wouldn’t want you? Because I didn’t” he said before he trailed his tongue down to your collarbone, only to give the skin a little nip and licking up the fresh droplet of blood forming on your skin, before sucking on the spot until the blood stopped flowing.

Zero’s fingers fiddled with your bra clasp for a moment before the martial fell from your frame his hands began to roughly fondle your breasts, occasionally pinching your nipples, “fuck… they’re so damn soft” he groaned and gripped one of your breasts before leaning in and bringing his tongue to rest on your nipple, zero’s teeth gently grazed your breast as he licked over the sensitive nub, a shiver ran down your spine as you felt him press himself against you as he began to suckle on your nipple, you moaned loudly not caring where you were just how good you felt.

You laid back and hummed as Zero climbed over you, your hands traced up his bare arms “your chest and arms look bigger” you hummed as you squeezed his biceps, before coming to trail you hands up until your fingers interlocked behind his neck, you pulled Zero down and pressed your lips to his, it felt hot and suffocating, but oh so satisfying. You began to feel Zero’s hands grip your panties before pulling them off and discarding them across the room, he then pulled away from the kiss, “I’m going to get started now” his lips still hovering over yours as he spoke, you nodded and felt Zero shifted as he undid his pants and pulled his member from his pants, you gasped as he rubbed his tip between your folds, making his tip catch on your entrance, “damnit… you sure about this?” He groaned and pressed his tip against your open but not quite letting it slide in yet, “yeah, I’m sure… I want this” you huff out between deep breaths and zero looks into your eyes for any hesitation but finds none, to this he pressed forward and sheaths himself.

You slowly and sensual, it’s nothing like you expect, but exactly what you needed, your legs wrapped tightly around Zero and your nails dug into his back, his hips moved in strong and slowly thrusts that were angled upward, his hand grabbing tightly onto the bedsheets as his arms rested either side of your head, zero had captured your lips and tongue in a erotic dance that was yet to end, all your moans and gasps were swallowed by him before they even had a chance to escape. You body start to feel light and your opening began to squeeze, zero pulled away from the kiss and groaned “you’re close… just wait a little longer” he pulled back and grabbed your hips before he picked up his pace slightly, you gasped struggling to hold on any longer, “release for me, finish all on me” zero hummed and you did just that, you pressed your head back against the bed and you whined as your body seized up, zero quickly snapped his hips into your a few times rather franticly before he pulled out and pumped hot squirts of release all over your chest, “god damnit… shit” he groaned loudly and watched and as his shaft rested comfortably between your breasts, he brushed a hand over your face and stood to get you a damp cloth so he could clean you off.

You laid naked curled up into zero’s side, you spent the night until the early hours of dawn talking with him, “let’s skip class” Zero hummed as he closed his eyes and kissed your cheek, “this is way they kept you down a year, but I’m too tired to care” you chuckle before you closed your eyes and began to drift off to sleep, listening to the sound of Zero’s heart beating steadily in his chest, “very funny… now go to sleep… beautiful” he grumbled and lightly kissed your lips.

Simptember Masterlist

Day 4 - Tamaki Amajiki: Comparison

Day 6 - Shigure Sohma: Taste

[metalandmagi]

The Real Anime Awards of 2023 part 2

Every year, I become increasingly disappointed in the Crunchyroll Anime Awards, so I started making my own Anime Award lists THAT ARE FOR THE ACTUAL YEAR IN ANIME! IF CRUNCHYROLL WON'T INCLUDE FALL SHOWS THEN I WILL! I've already done my silly version for 2023, so now it's time for my serious picks. But it's still just for fun, so don't take any of my nominees too seriously or get offended that I didn't include your favorites. Even I can't watch everything.

Full disclosure, I don't include all the same categories that Crunchyroll does (just most of them). These are also only for television shows, so I didn't include any movies (and I really don't watch enough anime movies on a yearly basis to include a movie category).

Anime of the Year

Vinland Saga season 2

Zom 100 Bucket List of the Dead

Oshi no Ko

Frieren Beyond Journey’s End

Pluto

Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (I don’t care what MyAnimeList says. It’s made by Science Saru, so I'm counting it.)

Best Continuing Series

Vinland Saga season 2

Dr. Stone New World

Horimiya: The Missing Pieces

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2

Spy x Family season 2

Attack on Titan the final season (just assume I mean the last special from here on out)

Best New Series

Buddy Daddies

Oshi no Ko

Tengoku Daimakyou

Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Migi to Dali

Best Animation

Tsurune season 2

Trigun Stampede

Demon Slayer: Swordsmith Village arc

My Happy Marriage

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2

Attack on Titan the final season

Best Character Design

Overtake!

Bleach Thousand Year Blood War part 2

Oshi no Ko

Blue Lock cour 2

Tokyo Revengers season 2

Mou Ippon! (Yes I'm 100% serious. I actually respect this show’s character design a lot, considering the artists were able to make realistic, distinct, varied female characters of all shapes and sizes without making them into moe blobs. So that's why this is on here instead of another shounen of the week.)

Best Romance

Tomo-chan Is A Girl

My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv999

Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts

Skip to Loafer

Insomniacs After School

Horimiya: The Missing Pieces

Best Comedy

Buddy Daddies

Cool Doji Danshi cour 2

Skip to Loafer

My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999

My New Boss is Goofy

The Hundred Girlfriends Who Really Really Really Really Really Love You

Best Action

Trigun Stampede

Demon Slayer Swordsmith Village arc

Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2

Attack on Titan the final season

Hell’s Paradise

Honorable mention: Bleach Thousand Year Blood War season 2 (sorry, I just wasn’t as impressed with the action in this season, but it still deserves a shout out)

Best Fantasy

To Your Eternity season 2 cour 2 (is it cheating if it's only counting the last cour of the season 😅)

Ousama Ranking: Yuuki no Takarabako

Hell’s Paradise

Mononogatari season 2

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Mushoku Tensei season 2

Honorable mention: Hikari no Ou (I never finished it but the vibe was there.)

Best Drama

Vinland Saga season 2

Oshi no Ko

Pluto

Ooku: The Inner Chambers

Tengoku Daimakyou

Migi and Dali

Honorable mention: Undead Girl Murder Farce- it's more of a mystery than a drama, but I still wanted to include it somewhere.

Best Slice of Life

Horimiya: The Missing Pieces

Kubo Won’t Let Me Be Invisible

Cool Doji Danshi cour 2

My New Boss is Goofy

Insomniacs After School

My Clueless First Friend

Best Protagonist

Thorfinn (Vinland Saga season 2)

Mitsumi Iwakura (Skip to Loafer)

Maomao (The Apothecary Diaries)

Arikoto Madenokoji (Ooku: The Inner Chambers)

Frieren (Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End)

Kouya Madoka (Overtake!)

Best Antagonist

Eisuke Nikaido (Tsurune season 2)

Canute (Vinland Saga season 2)

Millions Knives (Trigun Stampede)

Taiju (Tokyo Revengers season 2)

Ibara (Dr. Stone New World part 2)

Reiko Ichijou (Migi to Dali)

Honorable mention: *SPOILERS* The Bureau of Traditional Music (Mononogatari season 2). These guys were squad goals, not gonna lie.

Best Boy

Vash the Stampede (Trigun Stampede)

Every Single Boy from Cool Doji Danshi cour 2- THEY’RE ALL GOOD BOYS OKAY!?

Sousuke Shima (Skip to Loafer)

Taiyou Takada (My Clueless First Friend)

Einar (Vinland Saga)- Yes Einar instead of Snake. Snake is a lovable antihero, but Einar is best boy material

Yukichi (The Masterful Cat Is Depressed Again Today)

Best Girl

Tomo (Tomo-chan Is A Girl)

Runa Shirakawa (You Were Experienced, I Was Not: Our Dating Story)

Kana Arima (Oshi no Ko)

Amit (Niehime to Kemono no Ou)

Akane Kinoshita (My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999)

Mitsuri Kanroji (Demon Slayer: Swordsmith Village arc)

Best Score

Trigun Stampede

Vinland Saga season 2

Insomniacs After School

Bleach Thousand Year Blood War part 2

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Best OP (yes there are 8 nominations, I couldn't decide 😭)

Jujutsu Kaisen season 2 (“Specialz” King Gnu)- I really think this season’s OPs should be taken as a pair, but when it comes down to which OP will stand the test of time, I think this one will be more iconic.

Vinland Saga season 2 OP2 (“Paradox” Survive Said the Prophet)

Oshi no Ko (“Idol” YOASOBI)

High Card (“Trickster” Five New Old)

Hell’s Paradise (“Work” Millennium Parade)

Tengoku Daimakyou (“Innocent Arrogance” BiSH)

Bleach Thousand Year Blood War part 2 (“Stars” w.o.d.)

The Legendary Hero is Dead (“Shinda” Masayoshi Ōishi)

Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead (“Song of the Dead” Kana-Boon)

Honorable mention: Link Click season 2 (honestly this is probably the best OP of the year, but since the show isn’t Japanese, I have to exclude it 😣)

Best ED

Tengoku Daimakyou (“Dare mo Kare mo Doko mo Nani mo Shiranai” ASOBI Doumei)

Oshi no Ko (“Mephisto” Ziyoou-vachi)

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End (“Anytime Anywhere” milet)

Dr. Stone New World part 2 (“Suki ni Shinayo” Anly)

Spy x Family season 2 (“Todome no Ichigeki” Vaundy ft. Cory Wong)

Migi to Dali (“Skyline” Nulbarich)

Best VA Performance Japanese

Uemura, Yuuto As Thorfinn (Vinland Saga season 2)

Takahashi, Rei as Tomo (Tomo-chan is a Girl)

Satao, Gen as Ganta Nakami (Insomniacs After School) His laugh is so pure and genuine, I could listen to it forever!

Inoue, Marina as Armin Arlert (Attack on Titan the final season)

Tanezaki, Atsumi as Anya Forger (Spy Family season 2)

Nakamura, Yuuichi as Satoru Gojo (Jujutsu Kaisen season 2)

So there you have it! My picks for the real anime awards of 2023. Like I said, don't take this seriously at all, it's just something fun I like to put together every year. I always try not to nominate the same things, but it's easy to end up playing favorites. It's so hard to try to include a variety!

[obscurecharactershowdown]

The Contestants Are Here!

Thank you for your patience, I'm now ready to announce our contestants for the Obscure Character Showdown! There are 300 characters, split up into 6 groups of 50.

Here's how the schedule will work: Day 1 is Group A Round 1 Part 1, Day 2 is Group A Round 1 Part 2, Day 3 is Group B Round 1 Part 1, Day 4 is Group B Round 1 Part 2, Day 5 is Group C Round 1 Part 1, and so on and so forth until we reach Group F Round 1 Part 2, and then the next day we'll fold back over for Group A Round 2. I'm splitting up the rounds because tumblr can interpret posting many polls at once as spamming, and each group contains 25 polls, so. 13 one day, 12 the next.

I expect to start polls by Wednesday, May 31, but I may be a little later than that. I'll keep you updated.

The polls will be tagged with 'obscurecharactershowdown,' 'obscure poll,' and their group letter and round number.

Under the cut is the groups and matchups. Thank you all for your submissions, and I'm sorry if your submission didn't get in! If it was a submission for your OC, a mythological figure, a Real Life Thing, an album character, a commercial character, etc, then you may not be out of the running yet. Be patient, I have something else I'm working out!

Please don't come into my inbox, replies, dms, etc, and tell me that a character I chose isn't actually obscure at all. No one's media experience is universal, and from my own experiences, I picked to the best of my ability.

GROUP A

Juan Salvo (El Eternauta) vs The Faceless One (Masters of the Universe)

Leila Vernon (The Magic Misfits) vs Malaya Walters (How to Be a Werewolf)

Rosalia Rossellini (Trauma Team) vs Hotwire (Transformers Universe)

The Blue Electric Angels (Matthew Swift book series) vs The Protagonist’s Mother (Milk outside a bag of milk outside a bag of milk)

Syksy (Farragone) vs Chaerin Eun (Surviving Romance)

Miyabi Hanakouji (Persona 2) vs Valier / Reinhardt (The Demon Prince Goes To The Academy)

Merim Felspar (Three of Hearts Podcast) vs Gracefeel (The Faraway Paladin)

Ragna the Bloodedge (Blazblue) vs Shigeru Watanabe (Sakana)

Tragedian (Pathologic) vs Shin Kazama (Area 88)

Morga Eirsdottir (Arcana) vs Shadow Joker (Kaitou Joker/Mysterious Joker)

Rose Red (Ghost Quartet) vs Jacopo Bearzatti (The House in Fata Morgana)

Teardrop (BFB) vs Catherine Winters (Love, Money, Rock'n'Roll)

Nin (Paranatural) vs Naarah (CatGhost)

Rose Hsu Jordan (The Joy Luck Club) vs Seijyu (Mashin Eiyuuden Wataru/Mashin Hero Wataru)

Itakura Akira (Talentless Nana) vs Daryl Zero (Zero Effect (1998))

Tarisa Manandal (Muv-Luv Alternative: Total Eclipse) vs Whisper (Golden Treasure: The Great Green)

Isaac Yaga (Thistlefoot) vs Raikou Shimizu (Nabari no Ou)

Kasane Fuchi (Kasane) vs Taïs (Aïnako)

Kozlov Leifvich Grebnev (Biomega) vs Rosa Ushiromiya (Umineko no Naku Koro ni)

Bowie (Ginga Senpuu Braiger) vs Cyber 6 (Cybersix)

Kim Boksil (How to End an Unrequited Love) vs Zolophilia (Disciple of the Lich: Or How I Was Cursed by the Gods and Dropped Into the Abyss)

Kate (Shadow’s House) vs Michael Tutori (Wii Music)

The Guardian (Hyper Light Drifter) vs Salim Condo (La quete d'Ewilan books) 

The Queen of Hearts (Fool's Run by Patricia McKillip) vs Jyu Free (Dobutsu no Kuni/Animal Land)

Tom (Deltora Quest) vs The Player Square (Adventure (Atari))

GROUP B

Elliot Hemlock (Devil's Candy) vs Sulfus (Angel's Friends)

Togou Mimori/Washio Sumi (Yuuki Yuuna is a Hero & Washio Sumi is a Hero) vs Fengxi (Legend of Luo Xiaohei)

Shinozaki Yusuke (Shinozaki-kun no Mente Jijou) vs Yellow Tempest/Yellow Storm (Ending Makers)

Hiroki Dan (Brutal: Satsujin Kansatsukan no Kokuhaku) vs Tirsiak (Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion)

Tau-indi Bosoka (Seth Dickinson's Masquerade series) vs Sugar Peace (High Card)

Anima (Why Shouldn't a Detestable Demon Lord Fall in Love?!) vs Rinzen (Avatar Legends)

Walter Walzac (The Brave of Gold Goldran) vs Hoshi or “Star” (Arakawa Under the Bridge)

Lex (Cryptid Crush) vs Marshall (U.B.Funkeys)

Pappy van Poodle (Rusty’s Real Deal Baseball) vs Cockroach Boy (Nekra Psaria)

Denzil and Cuthbert (Count Duckula) vs Mama Fireplant (Super Mario World TV series)

Isaac (Awful Hospital) vs Naki Kokuriko (Ayakashi Akashi)

Tughril Mahmut (Shoukoku no Altair) vs Mark (Galactik Football)

Mistake Bradley (Home Sweet Home (1981)) vs Oopsy Bear (Care Bears (2007 series))

Yin Yu (Heaven Official's Blessing) vs Jinwoo Shim (New Recruit)

Xuanli (Lanxi Zhen) vs Tenna (Johnny the Homicidal Maniac / I Feel Sick)

Ssrin (Exordia) vs Kondou Seiichirou (Isekai no Sata wa Shachiku Shidai)

Hikaru (Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu) vs Dr. Albert Krueger (Therapy with Dr. Albert Krueger)

Chris Wise (Anna and the Apocalypse) vs Chase Beckley (Elevator Hitch)

Cindy Caine (Halloween Horror Nights) vs Uncle Flipping Hades Terwilliger (The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death, by Daniel Manus Pinkwatee)

Juliana Valverde (The Hazards of Love) vs Red Savarin (Solatorobo)

Bennett (Hello Charlotte) vs Ruan Nanzhu (Kaleidoscope of Death (死亡万花筒))

Eve (Serina: A Natural History of the World of Birds) vs Senri (+Anima)

Nero (The Boy Who Fell) vs Yee (Outlander Fantastic Princess)

Atl (Certain Dark Things) vs Sheila (Witch’s Heart)

Josh Rumbles (Celia's Journey - a series by Melissa Gunther) vs Queenie (BACK)

GROUP C

Bolt (Crypt of the Necrodancer) vs Mila (The Quest)

Iris (Drawn: The Painted Tower) vs Pearl Forrester (MST3K)

Queen Seles (Sabrina the Teenage Witch: The Magic Within) vs Vella (Velouria Beastender Tartine) (Broken Age)

Mr Morris Lessmore (The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore) vs Garrett Miller (Extreme Ghostbusters)

Dr. Anna May (Scott the Woz) vs Ocoho (Radiant)

Bai Lang (My Tooth Your Love) vs Aleida Rosales (For All Mankind)

The Scorched Apostate (A Practical Guide to Evil) vs "Järnarmen" ("The Iron Arm") (Jönssonligan dyker upp igen (1986))

Aliya Elasra (Heaven’s Vault) vs Roc (Xenoblade 2)

Sawamura Tetsuo (Yuureitou) vs Kid Twilight (Story Thieves by James Riley)

Doris Frances Barbara (Blood & Syrup: A Vampire the Masquerade Podcast) vs Mikey McGil (The Skinjacker Trilogy) 

Psianop the Inexhaustible Stagnation (Ishura) vs Gu Nanyi (Rise of the Phoenixes)

Sawtooth Rivergrinder (Freefall) vs Katook (The Katurran Odyssey)

Kim Koizumi (Chroma Key) vs NIL (Hyperbolica video game)

Kathryn (Fixation) vs The Spider Core (The Lab - Core Slingshot) 

Satyarani (Raven: The Secret Temple) vs Alys Hunter (Prosiect Z/Itopia)

Bamba (Kishiryu Sentai Ryusoulger) vs Barago (From Far Away) 

Grunty (The World Well Lost by Theodore Sturgeon) vs Ink (Going Home)

Rook (Griftlands) vs Rambler (Happy Happy Clover)

Elisabet Grimurdottir (Nancy Drew: Sea of Darkness) vs Felix Iskandar Escellun (Last Legacy)

Nancy Neil (Snowboard Kids) vs THE-MEASURE-CUTS (The Blackout Club) 

Nephis (Shadow Slave) vs Rina Shioi (Magical Girl Site)

"good" Tom (El Goonish Shive) vs Tomoe Tachibana (Trauma Team) 

Enik (Land of the Lost (1978)) vs Ernő Nemecsek (A Pál Utcai Fiúk (The Paul Street Boys)) 

Dee Kennedy (Dayshift at Freddy’s) vs Eamon Bailey (The Circle by Dave Eggers)

Bob Sparker (Electricopolis) vs Kirinda (Juuni Senshi Bakuretsu Eto Ranger)

GROUP D

Todoroki Kakeru (Chō Soku Henkei Gyrozetter) vs Lelee (Cursed Ones DnD)

Engine (Gachiakuta) vs The Exsurgent Virus (Eclipse Phase)

Therese 'Tess' Dombegh (Tess of the Road) vs Heart (Moonlight Chicken)

Captain Grace (Magical Girl Raising Project: Limited) vs Gongyi Xiao (Scum Villain's Self Saving System) 

Es (Milgram) vs Fox (Mirrorworld series)

Kindersnatch (Prey and a Lamb) vs Copen Kamizono (Azure Striker Gunvolt)

Lady Bat (Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch) vs Pepper (Hello From Halo Head)

Marziale (NOISZ) vs Ulala (Space Channel 5)

Soloman (Soloman) vs Diggory Graves (Hello from the Hallowoods)

Matatagi Hayato (Inazuma Eleven GO Galaxy) vs Phon (3 Will Be Free)

Riley (Nexomon) vs Hizame (Amatsuki (Takayama Shinobu))

Brutha (Discworld) vs Colt / Coltia (Monster Rancher 2)

Raven (Gravity Rush) vs Holy Joo (Oh! Holy (Webtoon))

Kit Devlin (Kitty Corner) vs Kusuriuri (the medicine seller) (Mononoke)

Dandelion Tuft-Flores (Soil That Binds Us) vs Tin (Triage The Series)

Sparky & Whoosh / ポチ & タマ (Pochi & Tama) (Ribbit King (Kero Kero King DX)) vs The Biologist (The Southern Reach trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer)

Silver (Oneshot) vs Allumi Niumbirch (Shaman King Flowers)

Kronoculus (Costume Quest 2) vs Raven (Raven (CBBC))

Gary (Faith the Unholy Trinity) vs Appare Sorano (Appare-Ranman!)

Roxis Rosenkrantz (Mana Khemia) vs Abby and Zara (Doctor Who / Graceless)

Shijima Tsukishima/Shimeji (Shimeji simulation) vs Sym (I Was A Teenage Exocolonist)

Oona Wong (Kiki Strike Series) vs Cynthia (Incryptid)

Felix Leiter (James Bond franchise) vs Jefferson (Death's Door) 

Gerald McBoing Boing (Gerald McBoing Boing (1950 short)) vs Gruftine (Die Schule Der Kleinen Vampire / The School for Little Vampires)

Nuch (Not Me The Series) vs Sad Ghost (Shattered Pixel Dungeon)

GROUP E

Percy Blakeney (The Scarlet Pimpernel) vs Sarah Collins (Dark Shadows (1966-1971))

Grace Summers/Poppy (Blood for Poppies (An interactive novel)) vs Tangie (The Tangerine Bear)

Pleck Decksetter (Mission to Zyxx) vs Zaknafein Do'Urden (The Legend of Drizzt (Forgotten Realms))

Tusk (Shrine II) vs Richard Conway (Gunpoint)

Zinn (Monstress) vs Detective Victor Spooky (Deep Night Detective) 

Teddyco (Sanrio) vs Leonie Beaumort (Aviary Attorney)

Magda (Vapors) vs Yokoe Rei (School Zone Girls)

Mini Kapoor-Lopez (Pandava Quintet) vs Maki (Darker than Black)

Edward Manners (The Folding Star by Alan Hollinghurst) vs Reo Miyao (Bokutachi no Ikita Riyuu (Our Reason For Living))

Cian (Bear and Breakfast) vs Principal Shirley Oddwell (Oddport Academy)

Curse Bringer Angel (Baroque) vs Daniel da Silva (Think of England by KJ Charles)

S.T (Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton) vs The Cashier (Midnight Museum)

Inien (Thrilling Intent) vs Vola ('Pax' & 'Pax Journey Home' by Sara Pennypacker)

Seaweed (Gloomverse) vs Fangus Klot (Oddworld)

Osari Hikaru (B-Project) vs Stag Malinay (Krystar First Fragment)

Randy Rosebud (Maggie's Apartment) vs The Lacewing King (Honeycomb)

Akama (The Idiot (1951)) vs No Significant Harassment (Rain World) 

The Nigh Furies (Wen Yan, Mo Xiao, and Hai Die) (The Wolf) vs Libby Day (Dark Places)

Sally Swing (Betty Boop) vs A (Tomorrow Will Be Dying)

Puck Reverie (OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes) vs Conrad (The Castle of Otranto)

Monmouth (100 Cupboards series) vs Goo (Inanimate Insanity)

Shrimp (The Upturned) vs Suren Darga (DC Comics)

Kim Jinhyuk (Antique (2008)) vs Cecilia Sylvie (Cross-Dressing Villainess Cecilia Sylvie)

Sullen the Magic Mirror (Barbie as Rapunzel CD-ROM) vs Bea (Brawl Stars)

Zachary Ezra Rawlins (The Starless Sea) vs Dash X (Eerie, Indiana)

GROUP F

Kiyoshirou Ushimitsu (As the Gods Will 2) vs Su Moting (God Troubles Me/Hanhua Riji)

Gabrielle (Gabrielle's Ghostly Groove) vs John Dough (John Dough and The Cherub)

Michiko Hada (Helter Skelter: Fashion Unfriendly) vs Corrun Crosslight (Spell Check)

Moondance k'Treva (The Heralds of Valedmar books by Mercedes Lackey) vs Liv (Spooky Month)

Ibuki Momoi (Dai-Guard) vs Etcetera (Cats (musical)) 

Li Ching Lung (DNA Says Love You) vs Fumi-ba (Kamen Rider Ghost)

Uguisu Anko (Call of the Night) vs Corona Hoshino (Swans in Space (manga))

Frog (QuickSpot) vs Karl (All Hail King Julien)

Wolfman (Darkwood) vs Kenna De Poitiers (Reign)

Granger (NeverHome game series) vs Chopfyt (oz)

the Doctor/Doc (Boyfriend of the Dead) vs Gaap Goemon (Mairimashita! Iruma-kun)

Magnate Arabo (Stars in Shadow) vs The God of Hunting (A Herbivorous Dragon of 5000 Years Gets Unfairly Villainized)

Iroha Irohazaka (Cipher Academy) vs Mission-chan (Mission-chan no Daibouken)

Forest Friend (Gris) vs Chiitan (Astro Boy)

Simon (Ma vie de Courgette ("My Life as a Courgette")) vs Ellie (Monster Tale)

Melatonin Protagonist (Melatonin) vs Topsy (The Only Harmless Great Thing)

Harp (Star Guardians) vs Dadish (Dadish)

Turnip (Chicory: A Colorful Tale) vs Sha Sheng Shi ("Killing Stone") (Qing Ya Ji (Yin Yang Master))

Guillermo "Dixon" Alverez (Rebelde (2022)) vs Avery (Hellbound Guardian)

Agent (Penguinronpa) vs Sasana (Nekogami Yaoyorozu)

Uhh… these guys? (Rhythm Heaven Fever) vs Fernando Carvalho (Ordem Paranormal)

Mallory (Escam) vs Elle (Starcrash)

Miyauchi Rena (Blue Reflection: Second Light) vs Adelade (A A Prime by Moto Hagio)

Yamabiki (Starving Anonymous) vs Tiger of the Wind (Monster Rancher (1999))

The High Ki of Twi (the enchanted island of yew) vs Malkah (He, She, & It by Marge Piercy)

[kitstoleurjob]

Day 6. Cuddles (lee!Mishima ler!Joker)

Mishima X Joker Meant to be read as romantic

Side Note: LET ME BE SELF INDULGENT please. Also I personally prefer Akira over Ren so I'll be referring to Joker as that. Anyways I'm Yuuki Mishima's #1 fan and uhhhh I push these two together like Barbie dolls. So uh Happy Tickletober!!!

THIS IS A SFW TICKLE FIC!!!

"Mishima, you've been on the Phansite all day. Come and just chill for a bit." Akira patted the spot next to him on his bed, motioning for Mishima to sit down. The other had been hunched over the stair railing for about an hour and a half now, filtering through comments on his forum.

"I will..! Just, give me a second. There's been these annoying trollers all day and they just won't quit it. Like seriously, give it a rest! Although they underestimate my devotion to the Phansite." Mishima explained, continuing to fuss over his forum. After a couple minutes though, he decided to take a short break and wandered over to Akira, flopping down on top of him instead of next on the bed, earning a small 'oof'.

"Oh- uh, this works too." Akira shrugged, readjusting him and his partner into a comfortable position. He wrapped his arms around Mishima's torso, along with intertwining their legs. "You comfy?"

"Mhm..." Mishima nodded, holding Akira's arms with his own. A few minutes later, however, he was back on his phone continuing his moderating duties, much to Akira's dismay.

"Really? Y'know I'm sure the Phansite can wait, Mishima... Take a break from it, just relax." Akira insisted, worried about his boyfriend. The teen had mentioned to him in passing about how he's been losing more and more sleep fretting over the community he made.

"I wish I could, really! And things are calming down again..! Just, give me a few more minutes, okay?" Mishima stressed, typing away hurriedly on his phone.

"No, Mishima. C'mon, you need a break, okay?" Akira pled, trying to nudge the phone out of Mishima's hand. In the process of doing this, however, he accidentally pressed into Mishima's stomach, causing the boy to giggle. "Oh~? I didn't know you were ticklish." He let out an amused huff.

"Ehe- well I didn't think that was something you needed to know..! Just- just uh- give me another minute, okay!" Mishima begged, trying to get out a couple more messages.

"Hmm..... nope! I say it's break time. The online world can wait." Akira winked, even though he knew Mishima couldn't see his face. Without any further notice, Akira pulled Mishima closer to him, who let out a small surprised squeak. He squeezed Mishima's sides, causing the other boy to let out what could probably classified as the cutest giggles on earth.

"Gah- nohohohohoho! Wahahahait!" Mishima shook his head wildly, trying to kick his legs out. His hands, however, were still gripped to his phone, shakily typing.

"Oh no no no~ Break time, love~" Akira gently pushed the phone out of Mishima's hand, it gently plopping to the floor. "There we go. Rest your eyes." He gave Mishima a small kiss on the forehead before resuming his attack.

"Ahahahahakira! Nahahaha! Ihihit tihihickles!" Mishima giggled, pushing himself against his boyfriend.

"Aww, I know it does~ Here, how about this? You stop worrying about the Phansite for the night, and I'll stop, m'kay?" Akira tried to persuade. Unfortunately he wasn't very successful, since Mishima was trying to reach down off the bed for his phone. "Well, you asked for it." He pulled a fake evil chuckle before drilling his thumbs into Mishima's hips.

"WhahahAHAHAHAT? NAHAHAHAH AHAHAKIRA! IHIHIHI'M SORRY! I'LL TAHAHAKE A BREHEAK JUHUST NOT THEHEHERE!" Mishima shrieked, bucking in Akira's hold. Thankfully for him, though, Akira's hands slowed down to a stop. He sucked in a couple breaths before flipping over, pressing his head against Akira's chest.

Akira rubbed Mishima's back as the other hummed contently. "It's already pretty late, y'know. You need me to walk you to the train station?" Akira asked, but he got no response. He looked down at Mishima to see the other teen fast asleep.

He chuckled, reaching over Mishima to grab his phone and plug it in before pulling a blanket over the two of them, drifting off to sleep.

[getoffthesoapbox]

[VK/M] What's In A Kaname?

Before I dive into my thoughts concerning some recent happenings in the horror show that is VK/M, I figured I'd set the stage with a preliminary dive into the skeletal structure of Kaname's narrative arc from the original VK. If this is triggering to anyone, well, take it up with Hino.

I don't know why I've never done a deep dive into the skeletal structure of Kaname's narrative arc before, but I think it's because we were always waiting for the "big reveal" of his "great plans" that never came. Instead of sitting in that mode of thinking, I've changed perspectives for this exercise--I'm now looking only at what is ACTUALLY there once you strip away the dumb things that don't matter (like the vampiric politicking that never goes anywhere with Hino because this is a love story at its heart). Going into this without preconceived notions or expectations for "narrative twists" made it easier to parse what is actually in Hino's story. And once I did that, I found a very straight-forward, simple arc for Kaname. It'll take a minute to detail first, but I'll lay it out simply at the end.

We'll start post-time skip because the first part of the story is mostly Kaname working in the background without much narrative thrust.

Night 49: Kaname obtains what he's wanted--Yuuki is now a vampire, is in a relationship with him, and is estranged from Zero. Kaname thinks that he and Yuuki will be in loving bliss from now on.

Night 49-50: Things don't go as Kaname planned. Yuuki struggles with using her fangs on him, even though he wants her to and encourages her. Initially he thinks this is due to her humanity interfering with her vampiric side (6 months into the time skip). Their relationship stagnates while she starves herself. No progress. He's stuck in the "bro zone." As far as any super plans, he has none at this time outside of Yuuki.

Night 51-52: Kaname discovers Yuuki has attempted to not only bite herself, but also take blood tablets from Aidou. This shouldn't even be a thing when Kaname is a willing blood source for her--not only does he love her, but he's a Pureblood. She shouldn't be able to resist either of those two things, not when she loves him. Whelp, unfortunately for him, she confesses her heart is still attached to that Zero guy. But that's ok because she loves Kaname too, right? Whelp, about that...Yuuki won't admit she loves Kaname either and instead acts sorry while beating around the bush about it. Their interaction ends with Kaname placing a restriction on her eating--she'll have to take blood from him and no one else.

Night 52-54: Now that Yuuki is drinking blood from him and has confessed to having feelings for Zero, Kaname needs to test the depth of those feelings. He's reassessing where their relationship stands in light of this new information. He takes Yuuki to a ball with Zero, making sure to give her ample time to interact with him. Zero fails to drive home the estrangement, and Yuuki emerges from the ball more determined than ever to help Zero.

A sub-point here is this is when Kaname's Plan A begins. This plan is never detailed explicitly in the story, but I believe his Plan A was to gather all the Pureblood bloodline strains into Zero and then transform Zero into the cure (likely by killing him).

Night 56-59: Yuuki leaves the house (with Kaname's knowledge) for the first time in order to go and do what she can to help Zero. She runs into Touma and is injured. Zero appears. Kaname watches from a distance via remote-viewing from his familiars, keeping tabs on things but letting them play out because he's still testing Yuuki's feelings for Zero.

Night 60: While injured, Yuuki nearly bites Zero. She only stops because she a.) wants to savor him and b.) snaps out of her stupor to realize that she's in the arms of the man who supposedly wants to kill her. None of her motivations are Kaname-related, but she does run back to Kaname.

Night 61: Kaname is furious with Yuuki because she basically betrayed him entirely and revealed that her feelings for Zero are stronger than her feelings for him. His recourse now is to try to force her feelings to shift toward him. The best way to do that is to break down her image of him as her brother so that she'll see him as a man.

Night 62-64: Kaname drains Yuuki to the point where she has no choice but to drink from him and then sends her down memory lane. His plan backfires, though. Rather than seeing him as a man, she sees her own feelings for Zero in his feelings for the Hooded Woman and she also sees the utter darkness in his heart.

Night 65-66: Yuuki awakens and Kaname tests her feelings to see if she has changed her mind about him. He tries to see if she was jealous about the Hooded Woman, but gets a neutral response from Yuuki. He then asks how Yuuki sees him now. The best that Yuuki can offer him is that she adored him as her brother and senpai, but that she doesn't know who he is as the ancestor, and that she'd like to start over fresh with him. This is NOT what Kaname wanted. He wanted her to see him as a man and realize she loved him romantically. The answer here becomes obvious--he needs to accelerate Plan A (Zero cure) and get rid of the "interference" in his relationship with Yuuki. But the only way he can do this is of course if Yuuki doesn't know what's going on. So he gives her one last test--stay home and wait for his return. Yuuki fails the test.

Night 67-82ish: Kaname dumps Yuuki back onto Zero after he kills Aidou's father (and yes, I do believe Aidou's father is dead--we've never seen him in VK/M, not even for Aidou's wedding, and Ruka did not seem like she was creating an illusion for Kaname at this time), and then begins to initiate Plan A. This mostly involves him letting Sara run around, drinking and attacking Purebloods, and Kaname wandering around after her cleaning up the mess. Sara is then driven into Zero's vicinity, and Kaname allows Zero to drink from her. At this time Kaname has no plans for Yuuki outside of perhaps planning to turn her human again if she doesn't take well to the Zero-dying thing.

Night 83-88: Kaname breaks into Hunter Headquarters, but he doesn't do so in order to "find" the forge--he just "discovers" the forge, which implies his Forge Plan is Plan B. When he enters headquarters, he's still operating under Plan A (which I assume is the Zero cure). Zero and Yuuki catch up to him here, and Yuuki cuts her hair to signal her determination. Kaname, upon seeing the forge again, decides to open up to the idea of Plan B (a.k.a. he becomes the forge in the Hooded Woman's stead). He releases the Hooded Woman and runs.

Night 89: Yuuki returns to Kaname after having taken Zero's memories and destroyed her relationship with him. At this point, Kaname is ready to abandon both Plan A and Plan B if Yuuki genuinely wants a real romantic relationship with him. He attempts to suss this out by sleeping with her. After all, she gave up Zero for him! Surely she loves him!

Night 90-92: Kaname realizes all's not well in paradise; Yuuki appears to still want to turn him human even after sleeping together and her reaction once they both wake up is to huddle in blankets and accusing both of them of not deserving to be in Zero's presence. Kaien "sends" Zero over to Kaname, but I suspect Kaname requested Zero as yet another test for Yuuki. Kaname tests the strength of Zero's memory loss and finds it solid; he then tests whether or not Zero has feelings for Yuuki even without his memories and whether Yuuki still loves Zero without his memories. Kaname finds both are still true, and he picks Plan B back up again. At this point he's intending to have Isaya turn Yuuki because Zero has no memories. This also still "removes" Yuuki from Zero. Unfortunately for him, Zero regains his memories.

Night 93: Kaname completes Plan B, placing his heart in the forge and unloading his last thoughts onto Yuuki. She can't even give him a final grand love confession--the best she can offer him is wishing she'd never been born. Kaname gives up at last at the idea that he held a major place in her heart and wishes her and Zero well.

VKM begins.

This long ramble was merely to demonstrate the justification for the following skeletal arc for Kaname:

Nights 49-68 (before Kaname leaves Yuuki):

Gets Yuuki, separates her from Zero, gets Zero positioned perfectly for devouring purebloods. -> Finds out Yuuki doesn't actually love him, but thinks he can overcome this because, well, he's her master and a Pureblood, and we know from his past history that this can overcome love. -> Tests the strength of Yuuki's love for Zero while setting up Sara to gather bloodlines for Zero for Plan A -> Realizes Yuuki's love for Zero is stronger than expected -> Gets butthurt and tries to salvage Yuuki's feelings for him via changing her perspective on him with his memories -> Fails. Decides to pursue Plan A to get Zero out of the way.

Nights 69-93 (after leaving Yuuki):

Follows Sara and stirs up events to get Sara to gather Pureblood lineages and take them to Zero. -> Discovers Forge location. -> Plan B now an option (become forge). -> Nearly discards both Plan A AND Plan B when Yuuki takes Zero's memories. -> Gives up on Yuuki entirely after he has sex with her and nothing changes and she still shows signs of preferring Zero. -> Goes full bore into Plan B because it's the easiest and he can still separate Yuuki from Zero via Isaya. -> Fails to separate Yuuki from Zero and accepts his fate while succeeding at Plan B.

In the shortest sense, we simply have: After the timeskip, Kaname thinks he's won Yuuki's heart and can sacrifice Zero for Plan A, the Zero Cure. He discovers he's wrong about both and, after first attempting to win Yuuki's heart one last time, ultimately changes his plan to Plan B, becoming the forge. The end.

There is nothing in Kaname's arc that suggests he ever once felt secure in Yuuki's romantic love for him, and this is the key reason he follows through with Plan B.

What this shows me is Kaname is a shit for beans planner. He just throws things against the wall to see if they stick. The reason he seems "mysterious" is that he's always changing his mind, not that he has a master plan. His main motivation is to get in Yuuki's pants, and when he can't get that it's either kill the guy she actually loves (Zero) or kill himself. It's obvious how toxic he is when you break down the structure of the story and remove all Hino's flowery language and artwork. There's just nothing positive here to work with--he's literally the villain of the story.

The reason I wanted to work through Kaname's narrative skeleton here is because the latest chapter has a hint that Plan A (kill Zero for Zero cure) really did exist. There's tons of evidence for "a" Plan A in the original story of course--Kaname letting Sara run free, Kaname silencing Aidou's dad for investigating, Kaname disliking letting Zero drink from Sara but saying it's "necessary" (necessary for what, certainly not the forge plan!), Kaname seeming to only realize where the forge even was AFTER he entered Hunter Headquarters, implying he was there for a different purpose before discovering the forge's location.

Yuuki in the story assumes Kaname was always trying to become the forge, and because she's the protagonist, we're meant to assume that too in the original story. But I think there's enough evidence to suggest Kaname had a Plan A that involved the Pureblood lineages and Zero. The most logical conclusion is that it's the Zero cure, which lines up both with his attempt to reverse the Hooded Woman's sacrifice in the past AND with his "surprise" at discovering Ichiru and Zero were Hunter twins. It also explains his early involvement with Shizuka, which hasn't been narratively resolved yet. It's still just hanging in the breeze, waiting for someone to fold it up and put it back in the closet.

This is a long-winded way of saying the Zero Cure is BACK ON THE MENU, BABIES! More contemporary thoughts later!

[kimbapisnotsushi]

here are some more miscellaneous post-ts headcanons but this time we're not going pro teams we're taking a walk on the side of your average working adult let's go!!

okay let's be real do we REALLY think lev is in charge of his own social media accounts bc i feel like that's a dumpster fire waiting to happen

i'm going to say yes because it's funny as hell

he tweets things like "lol i worked with [insert older veteran actor here] today i had no idea he was such an asshole" and gets frantic phone calls from the pr team like three seconds after posting

his instagram is also full of like. really blurry casual pics and just doesn't look professionally curated at all but the fans love him for it

i'm actually super curious as to whether he gets typecasted a lot and if so i'd love to know what it is

i want to say goofy comic relief side character?? so when he gets selected for a serious drama role nobody is expecting him to blow it out of the water but he does!!!!!!

also another thing lev does that gives his pr team a heart attack is when he posts anything vaguely related to his love life. which funnily enough are the only quality non-shitposts he does himself

like you've got the aesthetic silhouettes against a wall, the hands intertwined on a candlelit table, the vague tweets of "so lucky to wake up next to you. wish it would never end <3" and everyone's going WILD trying to figure out who it is

(and, well, nobody is going to notice shibayama yuuki liking the posts amidst all the other pro volleyball players who do, right?)

shirabu's got a rep in med school for having the worst fucking bedside manner of all time

well not really i think he's like. the kind where fellow/older colleagues and such judge him for it and they think that he could stand to be a LITTLE bit nicer but if he works with kids or whatever i bet the kids would actually really like him.

he's dry and straightforward and calm and takes them seriously and treats them like adults. the only thing he does to baby them is dumb down the medical jargon into an explanation they can actually understand

ugh shirabu actually makes me really soft for what an asshole he is

oh but if you're a bitch ass bastard for no reason he'll try to be as snarky as he can be without like. getting reported to hr or whatever

sorry i know this probably isn't how medical professionalism works irl once again i just think it'd be really funny

also can i just say that i think it's the funniest fucking thing that komi became an actor. like where the hell did THAT come from

i feel like he got thrust into doing a role for a class play during cultural festival season and got hooked on it probably? because literally when else would he have the time to get into/practice that kind of shit

that's probably a fun fact he drops during a magazine interview or something LMAAAAO

"yeah volleyball practice took up most of my time, and i never really thought about doing anything else. but then things changed in my third year of high school when i got cast for cinderella . . ."

speaking of fukurodani. yukie and kaori my beloveds

i skipped out on them during my managers post which i regret deeply and dearly so here they are!!

full disclaimer i don't know how sports promoters actually work i'm assuming they promote whatever sports games they are assigned instead of just sticking to one sport only? which means that whenever kaorie gets her hands on something that isn't volleyball she gets a dozen texts from bokuto moaning about betrayal and treason and all that

when kaori gets with someone she meets through work (so someone on a pro sports team) the rest of fukurodani are like "okay but he's a BASEBALL PLAYER" as if being a baseball player is the most atrocious thing a person could be

kaori's like "guys come ON i told him all of you were cool!" and everyone's like "now why in the world would you tell him that"

yukie has a decently popular cooking channel that is loved not for her yummy recipes or her aesthetic filming but because none of her kitchenware matches

she just collects whatever she likes + a bunch of shit that's been gifted to her and while it should make her kitchen look cluttered it's all just very cozy and lived-in

like. all her pots and pans are different colors and themes. no pair of chopsticks are the same. she has a ladle shaped like a dinosaur and a teapot glazed with magnolias on the side

her recipes DO slap tho she and osamu collab a lot

UGH i love them living nice fulfilling adult lives i wish that were me

[kafkaoftherubble]

185.2章：放下？还是压抑？可贺，抑或可悲？

// Chapter 185.2: Detachment v. Repression

This ramble concerns To Your Eternity manga Chapter 185.2. It is edited from a conversation between (yea you guessed it) @bestbonnist and me after the chapter dropped before I had to hastily run off because sorry gotta see shits with my Besto Furrendo! Lisan al-Ghaib! Lisan al-Ghaib!!!

Although this chapter is devoid of hype moments—unlike C184.1 where plenty of us were sent into a frenzy— and good old macabre, this is genuinely one of my favorite chapters to date.

Because it became a really nice philosophical discussion between friends. Sounds a tad cheesy when I say it like that...

(1) Two Different Perspectives on Fushi's Latest State of Mind

Ray expressed dismay that Fushi's coping mechanism seems to gave become even more terrible because they are essentially repressing their emotions. They are telling themself not to feel anything and to be detached. In the Wish Era, Fushi seemed to have become more resigned to their fate, which became starkly apparent when contrasted by the Doll and Andy's loud, outward desire to see Abel live.

That dismal observation actually stunned me—because I happened to see this development in a positive light. What better state of mind should Fushi aspire to attain apropos to their immortality... if not a state of non-attachment? After all, if they don't learn to be so, then the sheer impermanence of life will torment them forever. To me, non-attachment—or in a more English-natural manner of speaking, detachment—is a goal worthy of pursuing, even if it is often fraught with erratic instances such as mistaking "repressing one's emotions" as similar to "being genuinely unperturbed."

----

(2) The Benefits of Attachment

In this story's universe, attachment keeps a person's faie (their soul) around.

Hence, to Ray, Fushi's loss of attachment implies their death (which I agree is a reasonable projection for the end of this story). When they no longer have anything to do—no goal—then it is time for them to move on.

But more than that, there's this other thing Ray is worried about. The manga asked whether Fushi is human, especially in its earlier exploration. Whether they think they are human. Therefore, it's hard to see Fushi's detachment as anything other than dehumanizing themself ("I'm not human so I don't deserve to be attached/feel bad when people I care about die.") It's one step to Fushi's progression into becoming a deity at the expense of their humanity.

This prospect is upsetting because they wanna see Fushi leave as a human being, as someone who dies after living a satisfying life like Yuuki did.

Ray also argued that there's a difference between acceptance and detachment. "Acceptance is acknowledging that something is out of your control and acknowledging that the way you feel about that." To them, Fushi seemed to have acknowledged that something was out of their control, but they hadn't yet acknowledged their feelings toward it.

Then, they conceded that while Fushi was frank about being pained by people leaving, ultimately, the dude seemed deadset on trying to ignore that pain altogether. "Fushi isn't good at being 'above' feeling things!"

I agree with this. Of course, they aren't! One of Fushi's powers is supernatural empathy. They can't ignore the sensation of pain or (occasionally) love in their vicinity even if they try. Feeling shit is what they do, willingly or not. And from an emotional connection like that, one easily forms attachments.

---

(3) The Common Error: Mistaking Detachment with Apathy

Strangely, at that point in our conversation, it became clear that Ray thought Fushi should not be detached because it stops them from accepting death—while I think Fushi should learn to be detached because it helps them to accept death. Same destination, but different ways of assessing detachment as a path.

Now, of course, when I use the term "detachment" or "non-attachment" (preferred), I'm once again drawing it from a Buddhist philosophical perspective. Because dude, it's me, 睿得失。You fucking signed up for this the moment you talk to me, bwaahhahahahaha!

Even Buddhists, born and raised, often make the mistake of conflating "equanimity," which non-attachment encourages, with "apathy."

One of the four sublime qualities (brahmavihārā), equanimity (upekkhā) is the state of being unwavering and unperturbed even in the face of loss and gain [1], good-repute and ill-repute, praise and censure, and sorrow and happiness. Its far enemies—as in, its direct contrasting vices—are greed and resentment. But its near enemy—the quality mendaciously close to equanimity—is apathy.

[1] Just a little aside: this is why I joked that Fushi should take up my self-given Chinese name in our conversation. 睿得失 means "being wise (about one's) gain and loss." The hope of attaining some semblance of upekkha is built into the name already.

Plenty of people think being detached means being uncaring and indifferent, and that it has some elements of dehumanization to it—be it to other people or to yourself. But it's not. Being detached is to keep a balance between concern and coercion. It's expressing compassion while being mindful not to conflate your genuine care with your desire to will things and people to bend to the state or situation you wanted.

Fushi and us mortals could easily realize one fact about life: it is truly impermanent. The desire to impose our will on the universe—as if there is some supernatural feature to our will that can influence things to happen—is a source of agitation. Life doesn't bend to our will; it indifferently stays impermanent even when we demand it to be permanent in some sort of personal bliss.

In Buddhist thought, it's our actions and intentions that impart changes. Our will (and our demanding desires) don't. We'll revisit this in our 5th Chapter later.

In other words! Contrary to Ray's interpretation, I see being detached not as imposing a limit on your compassion but liberating it from constraints. Now that you're detached, your mode of compassion is centered around the situation and people as they are, not as you hope them to be. True compassion asks for nothing in return—not because you suppress your demands, but because you genuinely have none to begin with.

----

(4) Fushi's Laudable Baby Steps

What really made me think that Fushi had grown here was their insistence that whether Abel lives or dies is "his decision to make."

Not Fushi's, despite their god-like powers. Not Doll or Andy, despite their love and attachment to Abel. It's Abel's choice. All Fushi can do is to accept whatever the man says—and that acceptance is only possible if they begin practicing detachment. After all, attachment results in the reactions Doll and Andy expressed.

To me, Fushi is taking a step in the right direction already. This is the kind of wisdom I think an immortal, most of all, should gradually pick up (I also think mortals like us should, too, but that's beside the point).

Here is where I think Ray's criticisms warrant merits in my interpretation: Actually practicing detachment/non-attachment is hard as fuck. I wouldn't deny that though it doesn't make you an apathetic non-human, you're not gonna be very normal-humanlike if you manage to be equanimous either. While learning to be detached, one often takes up a lot of problematic tactics and mistakes it to be detachment.

One such misguided tactic? Suppression of emotions. You force yourself to pretend you're not feeling anything instead of facing them and realizing their falsity while believing you're being detached. So Ray's concerns are completely warranted, because I don't believe Fushi has consummated their learning either. They wouldn't have lied about the massacre if they were really that detached.

Repressing your emotion, as a tactic, is wrong, but it is the hallmark of someone who's trying to get there, especially when you compound it with the philosophy Fushi was articulating. They care. But they are also being clear-eyed about the limits of their demand.

I don't think they seem resigned here. I think they are being wise. Baby steps, and their method is imperfect, but good nonetheless.

----

(5) Yuuki the GOAT and His Biggest W Yet

Fushi grappled with wanting to impose their will to make others live as long as they in the Modern Arc, right? That's one of their biggest and most constant sources of dukkha (dissatisfaction/suffering). But Yuuki's satisfying death and life... actually steered him in the right direction!

Fushi didn't come to earn detachment because of some horrible, tragic death turning them jaded and cynical. They learned because Yuuki's life and death were that fucking good.

Learning philosophy from pain is all well and good. It is usually how people learn it (few would give a fuck about existentialism or Buddhist philosophy or stoicism or what-have-you if they weren't in a personal crisis). But learning philosophy from joy is a whole other thing. Whatever you learned from that instance has no hint of jadedness and cynicism to corrupt your thinking; it's like making a decision when you're at the most optimal state.

This is Yuuki's victory. He influenced and taught Fushi without giving him pain or trauma to live by. He was not some main character of a tragedy despite outwardly looking like a bumbling normie.

Think about it: none of the Immortals who were attached to Fushi, until now, had been capable of influencing and teaching them without accidentally leaving some grief, pain, and trauma!

Why does Fushi take on Yuuki's form so much lately—if not because Yuuki is the only one who managed to teach them without the use of pain or trauma or anything like that?

And as Ray pointed out, Yuuki was the form embodying "Peace." Even his death was offscreen and peaceful. On a bed, unpoisoned and unhurt. Fushi remembers him constantly because he makes them feel at ease.

"It's our actions and intentions that impart changes," that was what I mentioned in Chapter 3 of this long-ass ramble. Here it is exemplified. People inherit the fruits of other people's actions (and you yourself are one of those who will inherit your own actions, too). And well? These are the fruits of Yuuki's actions that Fushi continues to reap even now.

That's how complete Yuuki's W is. He managed to leave just the kind of food for thought for an Immortal that eventually set them up to grasp the kind of wisdom they lacked. Who says the Modern Arc has no lessons?

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(6) Conclusion, or The Abrupt Ending of a Conversation

As you can tell, I really don't think Fushi's latest development is bad. Bittersweet and a bit of a mixed bag, sure, but I ultimately think it's commendable rather than worrisome. Of course, my ass interpreting things through a Buddhist lens has a lot to do with it, but brutha, this is exactly my niche! You should have seen me talk about non-self vis-a-vis Fushi in a YouTube comment section!

Ray did leave this paragraph that had eluded me because, again, the Muaa'dib was calling me and I really gotta go:

"I have a potential counter-argument for you, which is about how Fushi's ideal person to follow is kind of a mix of Yuuki (as you explained) and Kahaku (bag of mess and you haven't read that part of the present era anyways), which is putting the concept of detachment together with a really selfish kind of selflessness (as we talked about). But I'm not clear on whether that's still there after their fight with the left hand. I feel like it's lingering a little but I haven't seen much evidence for it in the wish era."

Now, I don't really know what that whole bit was like because I didn't actually read all of the Modern Arc—just the latter half. But again, "detachment" and "self-lessness" are complementary and forward-feeding to one another in Buddhist Philosophy, so on this concept alone, I don't see a clash.

I should probably clarify what Ray's "selfish kind of selflessness" meant here, but... I'm kinda tired now. And I've briefly touched on this in my essay about... Gojo Satoru, goddamn it.

Or maybe Ray should explain it themself! I distinctly remember someone owing me like, 3 essays or something. I'm such a kindhearted person I'm willing to give them a discount and accept just one essay for this week, though. Don't squander it, you!

Thank you for reading my ramble.

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Did you enjoy this? If yes, wouldn't it be really fucking cool if you get to read essays and commentaries like these, alongside fanfic and fanart and other interesting bits, in one place?!

BECAUSE! We are thinking of starting a To Your Eternity zine! It's merely in its Interest Check phase, but you gotta fill this form up so we can see just how many people in our modest little fandom want this! Be a supporter or a contributor, it don't matter at this stage! Support is the currency here!

[kitchenaidmixer02]

IT IS COMPLETEEE

I’m sorry if I did masako dirty 😭

(I drew Masako chatting to my own OC Yuuki :3)

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YOU DIDNT DO HER DIRTY AT ALL I LOVE THIS

THANK YOU SO MUCH AAAA MY GIRL