#well!! important chapter i think :)

[batfamhastwitter]

Part 38! If my family found my ao3 account I think that I would actually pass away I'm not even joking

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[akkivee]

still kinda not over ichiro taking a bite out of his hamburger in the leaders bonus hypster track and going 'it's so good!! it tastes really meaty!!' lmao

[yuseirra]

Anaylsis on Ai Hoshino's character and speculations of how her relationship with her ex-boyfriend actually went

With the upcoming second season of the Oshi no Ko anime, I think this is a good time for me to write how I feel about this character. The manga seems to be reaching the final arc too, so if I make any guesses, it's probably now or a never thing! I'd like to post this before I get utterly proven wrong and it gets totally useless XD and who knows? Maybe I just may get some things right.

I had a chance to talk about how I felt Ai with @aihoshiino through an ask (their analyses are so good and I'm sure they'll write tons better than what I can offer) and it led me to realize how interesting the character is. So I ended up jotting my thoughts on my own and it became quite long.

This post will touch on how I think Ai's mind worked, and how it may have affected her relationship with her ex. I've been following the recent chapters, and I read up to ch. 152. This means I'm aware of most spoilers, and that this post would be swarming with it! If you're okay with it, please read ahead!

*I originally wrote this in a different language. I'm too tired to write the whole thing over again, so I used DeepL translate! I fixed some nouns that got lost within the translations, so should make sense for the most part. Sorry for the clumsy writing in advance!

While thinking about the recent developments in the onk manga, I noticed some things while listening to the opening of the anime version, so I'll write it down. The other day, I had the opportunity to discuss the characterization and personality development of Ai with someone else, even though it may be brief. There were some things that were notable in the behavior of this character in the novel version as well. I don't know how the story will develop, but from the information I got thus far, I feel I can outline what kind of person she is to some extent.

Ai has a very strong desire for "love" because she's never been loved properly. Rejection from parents in early childhood takes a tremendous toll on a person's development of self-assurance and self-esteem. I'm not an expert so I can't make a professional statement, but I think Ai often resorts fo have an avoidant (withdrawn) attitude. She want to have deep relationships with people, but she doesn't want to reveal their intimate "real" selves to others because she's unsure if she'll be accepted. Self-hatred is a big part of why she keeps it hidden. There's a very selfless reason why Ai decides lie: she does it because everyone likes the pretty, bright, lovable version of her. Ai protects herself by pretending, but they also protect the "outside" from the "ugly" version of her. Everyone prefers Ai to be this invincible idol, and so Ai acts that way because it's the way to contribute to the group and the world around her. In the end, Ai becomes so good at performing this idolized persona to the extent where she shows signs of being broken or disheveled, the others will react "That's not Ai" and deny it. But even though she's initially happy to be loved and accepted and have a place, ultimately that's not the kind of "love" she wants. This character has a very idealized idea of what love is, and she wants that kind of love where you put yourself out there and it's accepted, but when you think about it, it's her parents who should have given her that kind of love. What she wants is the unconditional, the agape type of love, the type she never got that early in her life. In reality, she was actually always getting the love from her fans, and she was giving love in return, whatever form of love it was. It was just that she wasn't sure if it was love at all. That's the sad part about this character, she has a very strong image of what love is, and she's not sure if it's love when it comes to these whole other variety of emotions. That's why she says in her idol songs that she really wants to love her fans, even though she's already doing it… When Ai became a parent and was in the position to give unconditional love, she began to think, "Will I know what love is? (Regardless of whether or not this was to be a wise choice to do this at such a young age, there are definitely people who actually have this sort of mental state. It may not make sense if you look at this character's emotional state and judgment from what's considered as the norm, but this is the flow of her thinking. It's not a healthy state, but it's not fair to just dismiss it as thoughtless, and foolish because this character has never experienced normal love.) However, the "love" she thinks of didn't just happen when she gave birth to and raised her children… Even for her own children, she kept putting on a bright face and couldn't live unadorned… This is how acting (lying) is a form of love for her. She tried so hard all the time. She lived as much as possible to fit in with others. She thinks this is showing consideration for the other person. This is another sad point, because she doesn't realize that when she reveals herself, others will still love her for who she is.

When interpreting the character of Ai, you shouldn't interpret her as someone who is emotionally stable and loved. The MV for the song "Idol" was my first introduction to the work "onk", and the initial feeling I had when I saw it was discomfort. This was because I felt like it was exposing a very vulnerable and precarious psychology of a young child. To compare it to other works, I think it's similar to the psychological state of One Piece's Tot Musica or Fleeting Lullaby, but even more extreme in a way because there's not even a metaphor to cover it up. It's a very honest song, and so I was like, "Is it okay to lay it all out there?" and at the same time, I was like, "This is going to be popular, but do people like stuff like this these days?" because it's about something that pretends to be okay, but it's really not. It's a song about struggles, about trying and trying. This discomfort dies out a bit when you "get used to it", so now I just enjoy the song like the crowd in the song going "Whoa! Whoa!" but the song is too "easy", it's… It's really, really easy to understand, because the lyrics are what it is. You don't even have to scrutinize it to recognize what it says. It's painfully honest.

But when I read the comic, I realized that was the entire point. Ai wanted to be honest, to reveal all of his intimate details, to be accepted, to understand others, to obtain what she thought was a "genuine relationship," and that's why he wrote this song. That's the core of the character. If the core of Aqua's character, which we talked about before (I wrote a different analysis on Aqua once too), is his inability to forgive himself, then the core of Ai's character's motivation is her desire to realize what she thinks is an "ideal form of love."

The problem is that this "lie" as a form of love comes in direct conflict with Ai's idealized notion of "love." After all, in Ai's mind, "true love" should be free of lies. Even when Ai has proposed the idea of lies being a form of love, she didn't even fully believe it herself. Because she kept wearing the mask of an "invincible idol" as an extension of her work, even in her daily life, she wasn't sure whether the love she was giving and receiving was really "love" or not. I think Ai is a character who thinks a lot about these things. This aligns with how celebrities are in real life, too. I realize that there must be many people who think differently from the image they are to be shown in the media.

I think this is what led to the breakup of her relationship with her ex-boyfriend, and I think she was trying to confess all of these feelings in the documentary, and I think it was meant to be a shock to the said character. It's probably going to be something that would hurt her ex-boyfriend in some way. I think this would only work if the boyfriend really loved her. I think she would have had good feelings towards her, love or not on her end as well. It just never came across. Ai's so used to pretending she's okay. She's the type of person who's very secretive and evasive when it comes to deepening a relationship. I think she avoided Kamiki because she thought it would be better for the both of them if she stayed away. On the other hand I think Kamiki would've been very dependent on her, and since this was a relationship he's had when he was very vulnerable and had been through some serious mess, Ai must've been kind of like a lifeline to him. He may have clung to her because she doesn't show her heart very often. Kamiki is an anxious attachment type, but Ai is an avoidant type, and I think that backfired in a very bad way. I don't think Kamiki was able to convince Ai to stay when the breakup happened… I don't know, maybe he was near the hospital when she gave birth because he really wanted to see his kids from a distance, this seems more likely given the how the storyline is going so far.

When Ai says, "I don't know," when Kamiki asks her, "Does Ai love me?" desperate for affection, she's trying to be honest in her own way. She can't simply say "no," to that but she really doesn't know if her feelings for him's really love. She can't lie to herself, so she wants to be honest. (Kamiki would've been so heartbroken, but when you look at the character of Ai, it's surprising to see a relationship without pretense. She wanted to be perfect in every moment, but she wasn't doing that with him.) I believe that Ai may have came to a conclusion that she's never loved anyone, whether towards her fans or to Kamiki, but she wants to "love properly" now. (Now that I think of it, Kana is the polar opposite of Ai. She's very honest and just plain states that she doesn't like her fans that much. It took Ai a really long time to say it, and if Ai was all wrapped up, Kana just went out and blurted it lol… I think that's what makes her so charming.) The song "Idol" was a song that summarizes the whole character of Ai, and I think she wanted to tell everyone that she loved(s) them, just like she could tell her children at the very end of the song.

She didn't want to get back together with her ex because she wanted to continue being an idol. She couldn't have a public relationship. But I think she wanted to show her kids to him because she gained a little bit of courage while raising them. That she could show her real self. When you look at a Ai, you can infer she has a lot welled up. They had always hidden themselves, and now they have "secrets" that are not just their own, living, that grow with time. She's always had vicious circle that led to self-hatred from all the lies she'd been creating, which led to anger and stress…and it was this close to being let out through the movie. Maybe that's why Aqua believes making movies is for her. It's to fulfill her desire to be freed from the lies.

When it comes to whether she loved Kamiki as much as the children or as much as Kamiki craved from her, it's hard to say for now. However, I've always noticed how Ai, who is very careful and cautious when it came to keeping her image, was willing gave her address and tried to show her children to him. That means she thought him as someone who she could trust. I thought that the ex must have liked Ai because they had a positive effect on her after their meeting. Considering their age, it is likely a case of two children who were unprotected and emotionally vulnerable and became close by relying on each other. I'm sure there were to be some type of bond at least.

It's all a matter of speculation, but Ai's method of "caring" usually boils down in ways that the other person has no idea about how Ai herself feels and her circumstances. I think that's what happened in her relationship with her boyfriend. She's like the rabbit doll in the beginning of Mephisto, with her colleagues in IDOL going "You're great! You're never sad or angry!". Everyone around her ends up adoring and blaming her like an object to project upon, without having to think about how Ai feels inside. I think the 15 year-lie would have acted as a confession of that situation, with the message being:

Isn't it possible that she cut him off unilaterally to "protect him from herself," and then when there were signs that things were stabilizing over time, through the children, the president, and the fans, she took the time to call him back when she could, for it to have ended up like this? It's possible that Ai seemed to be so unmoved that her potential feelings didn't resonate with the other party, who felt betrayed at the time because she seemed so cold and distant. Ai doesn't like herself, and may have decided it's better for her to leave. She may have thought that Kamiki's obsession with her was bad for himself, or with him being so driven to the point where he thought that she was all he had. At that point Ai didn't believe she knew love, so she thought he'd be disappointed later. This is only a speculation but Kamiki could've wanted to take responsibility for the children if he knew, but it was Ai who thought it'd better for her to carry all everything and go her separate ways, because if she kept her mouth shut and kept it a secret, it wouldn't hurt him… and it's a child she wanted to have (and if this were to be the case, Kamiki's own wishes probably were never taken into consideration at all). Surprisingly, Kamiki may have feelings of affection for the children he had with Ai. He's never come to met them, but that could be because Ai told him not to. He complimented how Ruby grew up to be so beautiful resembling both him and Ai, that'd mean he must still like her, right? He has a love-hate relationship with Ai, but he's never harmed or came into close contact with either of his children until they were grown up. Could it be that Ai told him to stay away from her when they had the breakup?(And then she calls him up years later and asks if he wants to see the kids, unintentionally driving him insane)

"I've been lying about loving you all this time, and I don't want to do that anymore. Now I'm really going to tell you what's on my mind, and we're going to start over. We're going to build a relationship from the ground."Something like this? Something like this would be best.

If it's something like this, it'll be a blow to Kamiki. It'll be the same as Ryosuke, because he'll realize that he's the one who stabbed the hand that held out to love him and killed it, and he'll never be able to have that love again. It'll be revenge to realize that.

I can be wrong, but… But I still think there was something Ai would've wanted to convey to kamiki through that movie.

Ryosuke is a scumbag, and if Ai's meant what she said to them, I think it would be more of a statement towards all the fans who loved him than it was about him. Kamiki, if he really did instigate Ai's death, also needs to be punished for his respective crimes. Ai contributed to a part of his misery maybe, but… she's never actively harmed anyone. She may have hurt people's feelings, but she never did anything to deserve to die like this, and I don't think it should have happened, no matter what. It's a stalking and killing crime. I think Ai's life was very lonely, but I think she kept reaching out and trying within her limits. I hope all children grow up to be loved. The idea of love took over "Ai's" life, and I think she lived up to her name.

Beyond this are some more speculation, though it's likely to be more off than the stuff above.

For now, that's how I feel about this character.

I don't think Kamiki would have taken it that way, though. it was twisted, in more ways than one.

+ I think the Ai's feelings for Kamiki were… I think she's liked Kamiki quite a bit. Whether it was love is ambiguous. I don't think she would have been able to say for sure that she loved anyone at that point. This character hasn't been taught what love is, so her ideas of theoretical love, and the barriers to it are pretty high. Ai would've been confused going "Oh, is this what love is?" even if it's a level of emotion that most would consider to be love. What they had between them seems like something that could have been love, but never really came to a conclusion. In fact, the contradiction of Ai's character is that she wants to love, but blocks deep feelings for fear of being hurt. I think it would have been difficult for her to love him like she did for her own children, with whom she has an unconditional connection through blood…it would have been impossible for her at that time.

This is completely speculative, but I wonder if when she found out she was pregnant, she hid it, called it quits, and disappeared, because she felt like it would be a burden for him to know, and she thought she could handle it all on her own. She didn't ask for any help, and she didn't ask for anything when she agreed to keep the baby. Kamiki somehow found out and came to the birth and sees it from afar. Ryosuke runs away because he killed someone, but this character didn't do anything harmful to Ai that day. On the contrary, Kamiki may have been subconsciously been influenced by the person who exploited him. He may not have hated the children Ai had with him as much because he saw them as his connection to her. Perhaps after having seen her loving her children he had with her, raising them well, he had hopes that maybe she could get back together with him someday, and maybe she even cared about him a little bit. After he got that call from her, however, he realized that she needed the children but not him, and he despaired that there was no place for him in his life to begin with. Kamiki may not have any hard feelings toward his children. Rather, there might be some kind of inner affection he holds towards them proving as evidence that there was still a relationship between him and Ai; and that's why he sponsored the movie?

As for Ai, It would have been hard for Ai to truly love the children of a man she didn't even like, but there are no signs of that with her, either.. I don't think she broke up with him because she didn't like him. If you look at the phone scene, you get the impression that Ai broke up with him in a pretty casual way, there was a level of willingness to talk to him again and keep in touch and build a relationship from the beginning. This is a big deal coming from Ai because she has little to no friends and only a limited number of people with whom she's had a deep relationship. She's still wanted to form some kind of relationship with her ex-boyfriend, and here we can infer that Kamiki is a pretty important relationship for her. From her point of view, there was room for the future in that relationship. I think she was thinking about starting over with a more authentic relationship with her fans and with her ex-boyfriend. As she grew to love her children, she was subconsciously preparing herself to do so.

By the way, is it really true that Kamiki has been committing murders all this time? I think it could be a huge detriment to the manga's completeness and immersion to reveal the real culprit was someone entirely different at the very end, but we've never seen this character directly do anything, so I think it would be a good idea for the author to bring a twist the plot. It could be just that he feels responsible or guilty because he couldn't stop what's happened… He might actually be someone like Aqua who feels intense guilt for something he wasn't responsible for (I say this is like a 5% chance). Ryosuke is a stalker, so it's possible that he stalked Ai for four years and found out her address on his own. In the case of the actor, it's also possible that Kamiki's warned her to be careful beforehand, but she died anyway, so he's self-loathing saying it's all because of him. If you look closely, he seems to be blaming himself, so he keeps repeating the phrase "because of me." Did he actually kill her? This could be a narrative trick. You see how he's had a terrible past. Himekawa and Uehara may not have been the only ones that died around him, maybe he's cursed? Maybe there's a god that makes people with great talent in the arts unhappy… Anyone would have been suspicious if people around Kamiki kept dying in the first place, but Akane, who did the background check on Kamiki, didn't suspect anything like that, did she? It's never revealed in the story if he killed people, and if so, how many. People just come to infer "oh, he's a psychopathic killer" but just how much of it's right? We'll get to see that soon, I guess.

++Lying is also a keyword that's constantly stressed.

Like I said, I don't think it's very likely… Now that I think about it, the bouquet is a possible connection to Ryosuke. However, he may be less guilty than we thought. If it's true that he's killed other celebrities, the most intuitive reason I can think of is that he didn't want anyone to shine more than Ai's ever did. But what good does that do? What exactly does it mean to this character to feel the weight of his life? :/ Is it actually a positive thing for him, does he want to have a heavy life, does he want to do anything with it? This is something I can't say until the author explains it, because I don't have any information. There is also the matter of God in this story, but I don't know that'd get tied it into the the plot even though the manga is nearing the end. Ai and Kamiki are supposed to be characters who are connected to the gods, probably but I can't make any guesses. I was more confident about the psychological analyses than my plot predictions.

Isn't "15-year old lie two things? Ai lied to her fans that she loved them, and she lied to her boyfriend that she couldn't love him even though she had feelings for him. She told two lies about love, and now she's spilling the beans and saying, as she said before, that she wants to try to love again with her true heart.

The song "Idol" is what summarizes the whole storyline. If there is a lie that can be maintained for 15 years, I think it would be this.

In that case, assuming that the boyfriend loved the child, it would definitely be revenge from Aqua's point of view and give Ai what she's wanted… After all, Ai's narrative is a journey of a child trying to be true.

[ddeongies]

quiet afternoon crush (ch 9) - anatomy of a hookup

ryeji college au, idiots in love, slow burn, fluff & smut, yeji falls first ryujin falls harder | word count: 41.6k/????

Ryujin draws all the while, barely aware of the charcoal on the page. All she can think about is pressing a kiss to the swell of Yeji's hip, tracing a finger across the corner of her jaw. She remembers how dark Yeji’s eyes were when she didn’t kiss her in her apartment almost three weeks ago. She remembers the sheer athleticism of that goal she scored at the semifinals and the way Yeji had found her in the crowd before being slammed into a group hug by her team. She remembers the quiet certainty with which Yeji had looked at her when they were sitting together in the common room, thighs pressed together, the private intimacy of the moment despite the fact that they were surrounded by her friends. Ryujin realizes that she’s not sure she’ll be able to shake the image of Yeji’s naked body from her mind. Realizes that it’s going to be near impossible to spend time with Yeji without itching to do something. She had been content to play a long game, to see if something could happen between them naturally. But after Snow Ball? After this? She’s not so sure that’ll work.  

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⚽️ Master Post

[avirael]

Peace of Mind

There was something incredibly soothing about the daily business of the Silver Bazaar.

The same familiar friendly faces, simple mundane tasks he could help with, no unforseeable occurrences disturbing the peace. A’viloh loved this place and it’s people from the bottom of his heart. They had taken him in the way he was, like he had always been one of them, and he knew they would always welcome him back with open arms. And this was exactly what the townsfolk and Kikipu had done when he had appeared not only without announcement but also visibly shaken at that.

A’viloh had pretty much fled Ishgard. Hadn’t even bothered to return to his room at the inn. There was nothing there that belonged to him. The few things he possessed and wasn’t carrying with him still were at the room in Fortemps Manor and he certainly wouldn’t return there ever again. As late as it was he had gone straight to the place where the Haillenartes had accommodated Cid and his team for the time he spent working at the Skysteel Manufactury.

“A’viloh?”, the man had asked with a yawn, visibly torn from his sleep, as he opened the door.

“You have to take me to Ul’dah.”, the Miqo’te had demanded without any word of greeting, much to Cid’s confusion. Of course he had tried to question him but A’viloh hadn’t let him and in the end he had agreed to have Biggs and Wedge fly him to his destination early the next morning.

The few hours it took for the sun to rise he had spent at the chocobo stables. Yugiri had taught him enough so he was able to sneak in there unseen and so he spent the night cuddled close to the soft warm plumage of the black chocobo Haurchefant had gifted him, silently crying about how lost and alone he suddenly felt. The bird had made a low, almost purring, sound and nuzzled his head with her beak until A’viloh wrapped his arms around her long neck and buried his face in her dark feathers.

The airship departed as the sun rose and after wondering for a bit wether or not he should, he decided to take Chloé with him. The chocobo was rightfully his, so the caretaker at the stable did not protest, and yet it somehow felt like theft to A’viloh. But the bird seemed quite attached to him and for the Miqo’te she was a welcome companion now that he traveled alone again. He had left his other chocobo at the stables in Ul’dah on the day of the banquet and there he still was right now, as Pipin had assured him. A’viloh hoped that the two of them would get along well and also that they might be useful to help with tasks at the Bazaar.

The flight had been uneventful and quite fast for the distance. It wasn’t even noon, when he thanked Biggs and Wedge, who planned to stock up on a few materials before flying back, and said his farewell to them. Then A’viloh got his second chocobo from the stables of the Immortal Flames and soon was out of the buzzling city and only a short distance away from the next best thing he still had to a home.

As he slowly rode towards the small settlement he felt such a strong feeling of familiarity that it made tears appear in the corners of his eyes again. He had not noticed how tensed up he had been until now all the pressure fell off of his shoulders at once.

At first all the people curiously eyed the two tall chocobos before they quickly realised who traveled with them. As a few of them stopped in their tracks to greet him, the news of his arrival spread like a wildfire among the townsfolk. No one had expected him and his sudden appearance was like a special happening for this quiet small village. It only took a few minutes until an excited voice hurried closer and made A’viloh instinctively turn his head.

“A’viloh? Oh, it’s so nice to see you!”, the lavender haired Lalafell exclaimed as she ran towards him. Blinking away tears A’viloh knelt down to greet the woman with a smile on his face and a tight embrace. “Kikipu, I’ve missed you so much.”

Happily she smiled at him before observing the two chocobo’s and looking around for a bit. “Are you on your own this time? Where is Rael?”

A’viloh’s expression visibly soured. Like a sulky small child he claimed, “I don’t know and I don’t care.”

For a few seconds the Lalafell quizzically stared at him. While it would have been just like her to scold him for such behaviour right away or at least pry the truth out of him, she must have decided to take a more careful approach to figure out what was wrong with him. Such a sudden visit, all things considered, and at that alone and despite his best efforts to hide it in a quite desolate shape, he should have expected for Kikipu to see through it all.

“You look horrible, my boy!”, she stated instead of insisting on the subject of Rael any longer and worriedly grabbed one of his hands with her tiny ones.

“I am fine.”, A’viloh tried to assure her but she simply made an incredulous face. “You look tired, A’vi!”

He shrugged. “I am…”

“Outright exhausted!”, she added. “Have you been eating properly. Come! I’m going to make you some food.”

“I am not hungry, but thank you.”, he claimed although he had barely eaten anything since days.

“No, no!”, Kikipu protested and pulled at his arm. “Come on! Tea and food for you! And then some rest! There’s still plenty of time for talking once you recovered!”

There was no arguing against her. There really never was. And so in a way everything was just like it always had been here at the Silver Bazaar. If there was any place where he would be able to find peace, A’viloh thought, it would be here.

Without too much protest he let the Lalafell woman coddle him for a bit until the accumulated tiredness of the last week overwhelmed him. As his eyes fell shut, after drinking tea with Kikipu in a comfortable sunny spot, a deep dreamless sleep finally embraced him.

***

To A’viloh’s surprise the first few days at the Bazaar were incredibly busy. Everyone wanted to hear from the faraway city he had visited and the other curious places he had seen. A lot of the townsfolk also asked for his help with some work or transporting thing back and forth to and from the crossing or city. He had been grateful for the fact that he could help at all and also keep himself busy.

All this time he had tried not to think too much about everything unpleasant that had happened lately and especially not about the way he and Rael had parted ways. And for a while this had worked perfectly fine. But the more time he spent here and the more he settled back down into this peaceful daily life, just as a certain calmness slowly returned to him his thoughts began to wander. Back to the events of the last weeks and months. Back to the people he had simply left behind in Ishgard. Not only Rael, but also Tataru and Alphinaud to whom he hadn’t even given a single word of excuse or goodbye.

But especially his thought returned back to that night where he had stood only one step away from the abyss, his heart and mind overwhelmed by grief and pain and fear. He still felt all of that, still understood what had led him there to that ledge and yet thinking about how all of this could have ended, now that he was here among the people dear to him, deeply shocked him.

If Rael hadn’t been there… Maybe the Viera had been right with everything they had said. As painful as it was to admit this, but maybe he had lied to himself all along. Of course he had gotten a little bit stronger in the last year but apart from this he still was the same person. Although he had tried to become someone else, deep down he still was just terrified little A’viloh pretending to be alright. Pretending to be brave and pretending to want a new life for himself. Pretending to everybody and himself too.

While in reality he still hadn’t made his peace with everything that had happened before he had even washed ashore at the Silver Bazaar, he had gone to Ul’dah wanting to make up for all the pain he had caused. Wanting to finally return some of the goodness that had been given to him by Kikipu and the others. Wanting to help people, who needed help like he had needed it.

As he had tried so desperately to be something more than he had always been, to finally be useful, ignoring the protest inside him, he had not even noticed how he slowly accumulated even more weight on his shoulders. More pain and grieve. More guilt and self-hate. With every little failure and loss he had encountered along the way. Instead of healing he had pushed himself closer to the abyss step by step.

Maybe it was the best, for himself and for everyone, if he just admitted that he was not made for such a life. Maybe it was for the best if he just stayed here, taking some simple jobs here and there, not much more than was necessary to keep himself and the people here alive and happy. A quiet uneventful life.

And yet…

With each passing day, he found himself wondering more often. Not in the busy hours but instead in the silent moments. When he sat down at noon to have lunch in the shadow of a canvas awning, when he went to bed and could not sleep until late at night, when he opened the windows early in the morning and felt the salty wind rolling in from the sea pulling at his hair.

Then he wondered. About all the unfinished business. A whole city in turmoil. All the people he had left behind there.

Diligent, caring Tataru, who had always remained optimistic and cheerful despite everything.

Young Alphinaud, who himself was struggling and yet tried so hard to improve and make up for his mistakes.

Rael.

A’viloh was not sure anymore if he knew who Rael was or if he ever had known. But he knew Rael had always been at his side this whole time. Whenever he had felt bad Rael had been there for him and he also knew he owed the viera his life multiple times already. So did it really matter that Rael had kept this secret from him? He had known all along that something was bothering Rael. He had known that here were things they could not talk about. An he also knew that this hadn’t been easy for Rael either.

Again and again he wondered. What were all of them doing now? What were they thinking of him? And more often than every other question: Were they alright? Or maybe in danger?

Silently he kept asking himself this over and over again. One day, after he had picked up a delivery at the Quicksand, he even wondered if he should walk over to the Hall of Flames and see if anyone there knew about current happenings in Ishgard. As his chocobo kwehed impatiently, A’viloh had vehemently shaken his head and told himself that Kikipu was waiting for him and that everything in Ishgard would be perfectly fine now that he was no longer there to make everything worse.

And still the thoughts and worries returned day after day. Until one morning he stared out of the window with a vacant expression, entirely lost in thought. Kikipu stepped beside him, a mug in hand, and looked at him for a moment. “What‘s wrong?”, she finally asked.

Her voice startled him. Nervously he continued to put some things into a small backpack, readying himself for another trip to the city. ”Nothing. I was just distracted for a moment…”

“I see.”, with a stern expression the Lalafell put down the mug and placed her hands at her hips. “And will you finally tell me now what you are doing here?”

“What I am doing here?”, the Miqo’te repeated as if he didn’t understand the question. “I am supposed to take these things to Ul’dah of course and buy supplies instead.”

The small lavender-haired woman didn’t move one bit and just kept seriously staring at him. “Don’t play dumb with me, A’vi. I meant why you returned here and are staying so long, while your friends are still in Ishgard.”

“I told you I am not needed in Ishgard any longer. You almost sound like you want me gone…”, he answered, keeping his gaze fixed on his bag instead of risking to look the Lalafell in the eyes.

“A’viloh…”, Kikipu said with a sigh. “My dear, you know that you are always welcome here. But we also both know, that you haven’t been telling me the whole truth. So you better spit it out now!”

With furrowed brows A’viloh looked at the small woman, who in return stared at him with a serious unwavering determination on her face. Yes, there really was no arguing against Kikipu. Yet alone lying to her.

“Something horrible happened.”, he admitted finally before adding, “And I fought with Rael.”

To be honest he was not even sure if this were the right words to describe what had happened. Probably not. And yet it felt like it.

“Oh no… Why didn’t you tell me ealier?”, Kikipu asked with worry in her voice.

“I didn’t want to bother you…”, A’viloh explained and while this wasn’t a lie, in reality he had just not wanted to tell her the whole truth. He still didn’t want to. How where you supposed to tell anyone you loved that you almost threw yourself off a cliff anyway? Neither did it feel right to him to just retell the secret Rael had kept so carefully, even though by doing so they had lied to him.

The Lalafell sounded and looked a bit reproachful, when she addressed him again. “You are never bothering me. Please, sit down and tell me what happened.”

A’viloh shrugged uncomfortably and suddely pretended to be in ahurry. “Maybe later, I should really go now…“

But Kikipu wasn’t going to let him evade her this easily. „Uh-uh, the delivery can wait! Now, stop running away and tell me what’s wrong.“

Stop running away.

Somehow the way she said that reminded him of Rael. Running away… Was this really what he was doing?

With a sigh A‘viloh put down his bag again.

Maybe he could tell her at least a bit. Maybe it would help somehow…

[wonder-worker]

are there any books you'd recommend for Isabelle of Angouleme?

Hi! I’m really not an expert on Isabella of Angouleme so I'm probably not the best person to ask for recommendations for her. Here are some I've heard of, though I haven't read all of them:

"Isabella of Angouleme: John's Jezebel" by Nicholas Vincent (King John: New Interpretations). I haven't read it myself but I've heard good things!

“Maternal Abandonment and Surrogate Caregivers: Isabella of Angoulême and Her Children by King John” by Louise J. Wilkinson (Virtuous or Villainess? The Image of the Royal Mother from the Early Medieval to the Early Modern Era). It focuses more-so on Isabella's tenure as queen, the period shortly after John's death, and her decision to leave England. Despite what the title may imply, it's sympathetic to Isabella and analyzes her situation in detail.

“Co-Operation, Co-Rulership and Competition: Queenship in the Angevin Domains 1135-1230” by Gabrielle Storey, her PHD thesis which collectively focuses on Isabella of Angouleme along with Empress Matilda, Eleanor of Aquitaine, and Berengaria of Navarre. You can read/download it here, it's an excellent piece for all four women.

Sally Spong has written/is writing:

Isabella of Angouleme: The Vanished Queen (Norman to Early Plantagenet Consorts). You can see her conclusion here. It's nuanced and sympathetic, though not without its issues and pre-conceived notions.

Isabella of Gloucester and Isabella of Angouleme: Female Lordship, Queenship, Power, and Authority 1189-1220 (PHD thesis University of East Anglia).

“Isabelle d’Angouleme, By the Grace of God, Queen” by William Chester Jordan. You can read it online here, though I will say that it's ... very very questionable, accepting the sensational claims of lot of unreliable sources (including the idea of John abducting Isabella in a fit of uncontrollable infatuation) entirely at face-value.

“The Marriage and Coronation of Isabelle of Angouleme” by H.G. Richardson, available here on JSTOR.

Isabella has also been the subject of two complete French biographies till date:

"Isabelle d’Angoulême, reine d’Angleterre" (Aquitaine: 1998) by Sophie Fougere.

"Isabelle d’Angoulême, comtesse-reine et son temps (1186-1246)" [Actes du colloque tenu à Lusignan, 8 au 10 novembre 1996] by Gabriel Biancotto, Robert Favreau and Piotr Skubiszewski.

There are also a few blog posts about her (here and here) which may help if you want a brief overview of her life, though they can get a little sensationalistic sometimes.

Hope this helps! If anyone knows any others, please feel free to add on!

[longagoitwastuesday]

I am liking Jujutsu Kaisen, way more than I imagined I would, but I foresee it will let me down and it's keeping me from enjoying this as much as I could haha

I think the characters and dynamics are well set, and I think many of them have an incredibly good and deep potential, but I would be willing to bet they'll not get a proper development, enough for them to really hit. A well assembled set of gears is not enough to make the movement go, you have to wind the clockwork.

I think Gojo and Megumi have a fascinating and very complex dynamic, but I doubt it will be given the time and care that imo it needs to actually work. And it is going well enough for now! One could see the intimacy between them was deeper than the one Gojo had with, say, Yuji and Nobara ever since the very first few episodes despite the fact Fushiguro too was a first year. But the pieces forming what they have are extremely complex, and it just wouldn't be realistic if it doesn't show, even if in a not showing way, or if it doesn't have consequences or implications.

It's one of those dynamics that shape one's life, the way one regards the world, the way one establishes or not relationships with other people. It's one of those dynamics that could be full of fondness, gratitude, resentment, admiration, trust, and that imply intimacy, the good kind or the bad, even if in just the knowledge of someone who's been a constant through your life. It could, and would, imply a myriad of feelings, and probably in such a mix it could imply contradictory feelings too. Even the nothingness would weight, even the nothingness would be significant and meaningful.

Gojo took Megumi and his sister under his wing, the son of a man who murdered him, because of both selfish and selfless reasons. Megumi looks like Toji. What does Gojo feel about this? How does Gojo deal with this? How does Gojo go about taking care of Megumi? Would he walk him to school? Make him breakfast? Celebrate his birthdays making him blow candles? Did he take him to the zoo? Does the relationship between them feel professional or is it something more? Gojo appreciates his students, but is Megumi to him just another student? When Gojo faces Sukuna in Megumi's body, did he see the kid he raised, or does he just see Sukuna in one of his students' body? Did he have one faint wavering instant? And how does Megumi feel about this? Is he resentful of him? Resentful of the situation? Of the selfishness behind his actions? Does he feel like a pawn? Is he grateful? Does he resent feeling grateful? Would he rather not? Does he love Gojo? Does he feel nothing about him other than what he could feel about a teacher that sort of annoys him but knows he's reliable in his strength? Does he think it unfair, cruel or unfeeling that Gojo is close, closer perhaps, with Yuuji or Yuta, considering their story? When Sukuna slices Gojo in two, does the remnants of Megumi's soul tremble?

And not just Megumi and Gojo. Yuuji and Nanami, Gojo and Nanami, Yuuji and Fushiguro, Nobara and the boys, or Nobara and Maki, Todo and Yuuji or Yuta, Gojo and Yuta, Megumi and his sister. Gojo and Geto, even! If the pieces are well set, the dynamics are intriguing, interesting, and have potential to be deep, but then the characters have like two plot relevant scenes that punch you hard, but little more, it's not nearly enough. Especially not nearly enough for the enormity that is shonen dynamics and situations. And the potential existing at all, and then not delivering, makes it all the more frustrating when you're left with something mediocre that could have been so good.

The development of dynamics through not only a few plot relevant gut wrenching moving scenes, but also the smallness of life, is important. The friend who recommended this to me said that those things were just unnecessary filler, but I disagree. I think there's a big difference between a large amount of anime-only filler episodes whose existence is based on the fact they had run out of manga chapters to animate, and moments of quietness. The low stakes character-driven moments of quietness can be so telling and so insightful, and they are so satisfactory when brought back later in higher stakes situations. My friend teased me there was no scene of Gojo making breakfast to Megumi, that it would be an idiotic idea, but it would be so telling. How he makes breakfast, what they eat, if he tries hard or if it's all mechanised, if they have personal bowls or if they use whatever, if he just buys them some pastry on the way to school, if the way they have breakfast changes through the years, or if he doesn't make them breakfast at all! All that would be very insightful on their dynamic and its evolution. All that would give a glimpse on how they regard each other and why, even in the present. All that could become meaningful in tense situations and high stakes scenes.

These moments also let the plot breath; if a lot is happening all the time, if every character is always experiencing trauma after trauma, the entire story is so emotionally draining that at some point you don't even care all that much. Besides, these nothing moments or low stakes plot arcs, besides deepening and developing dynamics, also let some in-world time pass, which would make the intimacy and bond between characters more believable imo; between Yuuji eating Sukuna's finger and their last confrontation in December how much time has passed? A few months? Am I truly to believe these characters are so everything to each other in only a few months?

Without some smallness, some repetition, some daily life, some low stakes not plot-centric development, the dynamics don't hit, they don't truly feel fleshed out, and dynamics as complex as the ones Megumi and Gojo have, or as supposedly meaningful as the one Megumi has with Yuuji or his sister, should be fleshed out if they're going to exist at all. Otherwise they'd risk making the writing feel awkward and fake. Besides, if the dynamics felt well fleshed out and realistic, they would shape the way the characters interact and act, and how they deal with situations, thus being plot relevant.

The shonen genre has so much happening all the time, the stakes are so high, the dynamics are so rooted in big events and the relationships carry enormous weight and implications. Yet they barely get developed, and it feels so stupid, so plain, the absence of something so important noticeable like a constant void, a shapeless nothingness present in every scene. It makes the characters feel like cardboard figures. Jujutsu Kaisen is already getting a better job than many, but I doubt it will do enough for what I've heard, and I fear I am bound to feel let down, and bound to feel unmoved.

After all, if not enough time and care has been given to develop a dynamic, I am not going to feel pressured by the high stakes; if not enough time and care has been given to develop the dynamic between Megumi and Yuuji, as good potential as it has I am bound to feel little for this last confrontation between Sukuna and Itadori, and his effort in getting Megumi back.

[helioraesol]

To be honest, I'm torn on how to feel about the war flashback arc going on. On it's own, I really enjoyed reading it. It's a very emotional story and I love how it fleshes out the war setting that makes up the entire plot of the series. I also really really miss the Forgers. Yor hasn't shown up in a proper chapter since the beginning of the year, and the family as a whole has taken a backseat recently. Yet when I find myself being upset at so much attention being given to, let's be honest, side characters, I have to ask myself: "If I started reading Spy x Family a year into the future, would I be complaining as much?" I don't know. Part of me wonders if the reason I'm so upset is that I have to wait weeks between chapter releases; and every single time I check it out, it's another two weeks without the characters that made me fall in love with the series. I know this current arc has taken a toll on Endo's mental wellbeing, per his twitter, so the conclusion of the flashback arc will come next chapter. I trust that him spending 6 chapters on this will be important to the main plot in the future, and dare I say twiyor? I miss my Forgers, but if anything, I have to have faith and let Endo cook.

[loveletterworm]

on the topic of deliriously specific visions of deltarune chapter 3. This is one that is really inconsequential and I guess is more in the territory of like. those elaborate chapter 3 fanfictions where they just make up every character. But I don't think I've ever seen anyone else ever try the thing that I think would be cool, which is that a secret boss for chapter 3 could have a greyscale color scheme because that would not be out of place in the TV-themed chapter (especially for a secret boss, i'd say), but would also have visual overlap with the goner npcs from undertale...I just sort of feel like someone else would have thought of that but I've never seen anyone that has. I think it would be clever.

[whattheskyknows]

13 students update: progress has been slow but I am getting there!!!

[kn11ves]

my comic is live right now!

kyle and rex is an absurdist drama set in a stagnant afterlife where everyone lies, cheats, manipulates, and hurts each other in order to gain political power and admiration from the public.

with characters constantly haunted by ghosts of the past, trying to stay on top of the food chain despite constant betrayals and having their secrets held up above their heads, comes back kyle, from his long stay back as a guiding spirit on earth, to take back reigns of the throne in the inbetween. though much like everyone else, hes got a long list of dirty laundry that many are aching to reveal. there are no real friends here.

⸻

updates every 2 weeks, at 6:30 pm central US time! (SP & ENG)

WEBTOON: english link + spanish link

TAPAS: english link + spanish link

FANEO: spanish link

[calamitoustide]

sometimes i look at my own writing and im just… im just…

[nanami-kento-archive]

Chapter 100

[pagesofkenna]

doing the math and i'm pretty sure chilchuck is getting his bow back next week, and we might finally get to meet the canaries (the elves), if not next week then definitely the week after!

[fisherrprince]

Im about to make a whole osp style video on the importance of pacing and spacing in relation to whump or an authors decision to seriously harm a character

[syoish-aot]

lemme tell you guys about writer's block....

.....it's blocking