#like many others i wanted to see the old hime characters
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This is gonna be another long-ish spoiler post for F/SR, so don't click if you haven't learned Rider's True Name yet
Also slight spoilers for Fate/Extra CCC Foxtail and maybe Shimousa but those are old enough that I doubt people care
I really need to hear the opinion of someone who doesn't know much about Fate play Samurai Remnant. I feel like most of us where able to guess a lot of the new Servants based off connections they had to pre-established ones. Rider's probably one of two exceptions because her reveal is supposed to be this huge "what the fuck" moment - and it is, but I feel like that mostly hinges on the player knowing Fate's version of Minomoto-no-Raikou.
Ushi Gozen has been teased for years. Raikou's always been one of the many Servants that mentions how her Berserker Saint Graph isn't the only one we might aee of her (edit 1: I didn't play FGO when it first released so I didn't know this, but apparently Ushi actually shows up in the same event Raikou's introduced in). In Foxtail, we see her used as a prarallel to Suzuka, since both have connections to Oni. The most prominent tease is in Shimousa, where we actually see Ushi Gozen appear, but with the same design as Raikou for budget reasons I guess (edit 2: No we don't, that's just Raikou, but she has the Rider class so I misremembered her there as Ushi Gozen). And now she's actually here! She gets her own game! And she looks...
Girl what the fuck happened to you
I really like both of her designs to be honest. She's one of the few Servants to be wearing actual samurai armor, and she's the first to wear the helmet too I'm pretty sure. Then after Saber kicks the shit out of her, the armor falls apart and we see that she's in a much worse state than any of us expected. Her hair's cut short, her eyes are dead with noticeable bags, her skin's paler than it was before, and she barely looks like she's eaten anything. Those last two could also be said about Raikou (Raita for the love of god learn to draw human women properly) but on Rider they're noticeably worse. Also she seems crazier than her Berserker form, albeit a different kind of crazy.
When we fight her the second time in Chapter 5, she shows up with these awesome robot-like spider legs reminiscent of what Ushi-oni are usually described with. She doesn't look human because her humanity was seemingly beaten out of her. Raikou tends to suffer from what I like to call "the Altera Problem", where if used right she can be a really genuine and badass character, but 90% of the time she's used for jokes and to get people's dicks hard. However in things like Foxtail, or Shimousa (which is even more apparent in the manga), or Heian-Kyo we get to see her for how she really is, which is A) terrifying and B) a hero worthy of going down as one of humanity's best. Rider is only that first one. No jokes, no big tits, just pure unadulturated "you're gonna die" energy.
Rider's the first Servant we ever see in Samurai Remnant. She's the first one Iori encounters, leveling his house in the prologue and acting as the tutorial boss to show the player "hey you can't fucking take these guys on", and in the teaser trailer (which shows that scene) she's one of three Servants who are actually shown to us - the other two being SR's Saber and everyone's favorite bisexual dimension hopper, Musashi. I could write a whole other post about Shousetsu and Iori (maybe I will who knows) but Rider follows their dynamic. She's a strong parallel to Saber. Fuck she basically is Saber if they didn't have people like Ototachibana-Hime and Iori to keep them grounded.
All of the new Servants are super cool (with the exception of Caster that bitch ass nerd), but I think Rider's possibly the coolest. I mean, I've been wanting Samson since I got into Fate and you haven't seen me make any real posts about him because Minamoto-no-Raikou, one of my least favorite Servants, has got me in a vicegrip. I don't know if she's my favorite, but I'll definitely be saving for if she ever comes into FGO
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Wanna redo my old Bleach autism post as it’s pretty much gone anyways due to my remaking and I’m older but I’d like to do it with multiple characters this time. HOWEVER, I’m already so far into my reread I’ll go fucking insane if I do it right away as I’d have to GO BACK and reread again. Anyways, the focus was gonna be Ichigo, Orihime, Chad, Kisuke, Byakuya, Mashiro, Kensei, and Riruka. I tried to branch it out a bit so there’s main characters and then random ones but a few more is fine. I have more headcanons than this I just don’t wanna overdo it by including TOO many characters. This could be a fun project if I do it with someone else that feels the same way! Maybe get a person per character? Ichigo will be...a LOT, I’m sure. I don’t wanna forget that I wanna do this so I’m typing this out. I am VERY focused on Digimon right now and my one track mind shows but I do actually intend to do this. It won’t be an edit or anything like that. A long post more like? I can talk a lot but I’m not writer, y’know? But feedback and advice will be something I’ll take from my fellow autistic Bleach fans, naturally! Please look forward to it! And if anyone wants to join in on this, hmu!
Under the read more are some messy notes I made to get an idea...
hyper empathy (blood left over from hollow attack in the special ch n orihime healing menoly, crying for ichigo and riruka and the shinigami hurt by mayuri)
ichigo calls teachers instructors/doesnt use special titles/ says ojisan and toshiro and byakuya
ichigo that time he wondered if the water would heal a cut in his mouth (hypersensitive) also him crunching on ice was stimmy imo
ichigo prefers wearing tight clothes / orihime likes comfy clothes / kazui loves his hoodie!!!
fusiform face area: - ichigo w/ urahara / tatsuki talks abt this too / yumichika / a lot of other ppl including arrancars / idt he ever even met szayel but new oneshot he says wtf is this lmao
cognitive rigidity - ichigo doesnt like fighting unfair n believes firmly in an eye for an eye, byakuya also has this big time
taking things literally oof
kenpachi w a special interest in fighting...perhaps we add him
impulsivity - orihime jumping out windows, ichigo jumping over a fence or wtr bc he thought grandfisher was a person in trouble, kazui hopping out windows (im sorry for the window fixation its just so funny 2 me)
one track mind - ichigo planning to wait all night for ganju to return so they can fight forgetting that hes there to help rukia not double die
overstimulation
not getting social cues right / bad in social situations...self explanatory
routines, lack of eye contact, self isolates
ichigo avoids eye contact w orihime sometimes n its kinda cute hes shy...i noticed he does it a bit more during tybw w hime n i guess its cause hes aware of his feelings or smth at this pt??? not to make things abt romance but i did lfsdjakdjlkdsds he avoids eye contact w other ppl too i promise i just wanted to talk abt this bc its adorable
uneven cognitive profiles - oh big time but with what mister “black swallowtail butterfly” that thinks cutting a hollow into slices like pancakes...adopting u
uh. food stuff. TEXTURE
orihime not realizing her leg hurts much worse than her arm, chad in gen, ichigo going ‘im fine’ with blood pouring down his head
selective mutism and the variations. we know chad doesnt talk much. at all
orihime stress infodumps to ichigo (v cute) n so does mashiro n proceeds to overstimulate kensei in return lol
lots of stimming o: lots of...attention to ppl doing these things kubo...hm!
a lot of interactions simply feel like theyre between two autistic ppl who just. get each other n i like that (ichigo reassuring orihime its not a bad thing to be teh way she is - i think chad reassured ichigo that arc too! as an autie i tear up a lil)
wandering makes me think of hime wandering away from tatsuki after seeing the fireflies or dragonflies(?) / ichigo wandering away from home upon reaching there in tybw myb and him wandering alone by himself without direction at other times also...autism grief is real
scripting (KISUKE the night before becoming captain, v hime of him...what was up w/ that i’m rlly starting to believe he’s the yuzu to kukaku’s karin)
comfort items - hairpins and sub shinigami badge
not knowing their own strength pm? like ichigo using too much power during the invasion of ss n orihime having to tell him that w him responding w sorry D-:
hot heads r us
ichigo has shut downs where only ppl who know him well enough notice imo ive always looked at shutting down as not just smth that happens in one place but smth that u can carry w you all day bc thats just how it was for me going to school as a kid myb its called smth else but id block it all out so i could get thru the day after shutting down n ichigo on the day before his moms death anni felt familiar to me n i rlly like that hime notices hes tense ofc u can write this off as “just depression” but...autistic ppl can be depressed sigh -_-
baby shutdown
orihime def has meltdowns n shut down moments like so reasonably i get if ppl think “anyone would react that way” but its her whos reacting and she is autistic so...yeah haha
miss zone out ok thats all my notes for now later
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Omg is there like a specific reason Mizuhime has attracted the ppl around her to go yandere for her? Like normally it’s HER family that are the yanderes so is there like any explanation?
If you mean if there’s any evil entity that out there to ruin her life (aside from me) that’s purposely throwing a bunch of yanderes her way, then no. It’s just me messing with her 😅
I do try to make actual reasons as to why these guys would be obsessed aside from the boring old “yandere sees her and is obsessed at first sight” bs. Most, if not all, of these guys are canonically dark/grey/unstable characters from the beginning, so it’s not too far off that their love wouldn’t exactly be the most healthiest.
Gojo: Unstable af, has lots of trauma from BOTH of his lives so ofc he would be a fucked up lover in general, but he does has a very specific reason that he’s so obsessed with Mizuhime, but that’ll be revealed later (when I reveal what happened in the Heian Era)
Yuta: Also very unstable and traumatized from having to witness all the times Rika hurt someone to “protect him”. Because of Rika, he lived a very lonely and isolated life; he had to push his own family away from them to keep him safe, bullies saw him as an easy target because of his skiddish demeanor. Mizuhime is not only one of the few ppl who showed him kindness in years, but he also sees her as a savior of some sorts since she was the one who told him all about the sorcerers and got him to transfer to a better school which eventually led him to his canonical character development and all that.
Megumi: Not very traumatized as the other two, but he’s pretty grey and had a shitty life because of his dad abandoning him and his sis, his sister being put in a coma, and now he’s stuck working for a corrupt society. He has this fixation of only protecting good ppl, and he sees Hime as one of them. His yandere-ness isn’t completely out yet, so who knows what he’ll do 😃
Now... slight spoiler underneath, I guess??? It’s about the remaining characters that have yet to show up. I won’t give out too many details though.
Yuji: If you’ve read the manga, then you can see that his life is going downhill FAST (Gege please just give our boy a break 🥺). Baby’s getting traumatized left and right and he’s losing almost everyone he loves. He’s the most kindest and rational of the yanderes, but now his mental state’s being chipped away. He doesn’t want to commit any of these dark thoughts on Mizuhime, but it doesn’t help that he has two certain characters (👀) trying to push him off the edge.
Sukuna: HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA. You’ll see the full reason once I start writing about the Heian Era 💖
Choso: If you’ve seen the manga, then you know that Choso loves his brothers fiercely in a way that people aren’t used to seeing. So already it’s in his character to be intense and passionate for those he cares about, and that’s just for familial love 😩 Pls he’s basically already a yandere
Ryu & Hajime: n/a
Sorry but I’m still planning out the details for these guys, and my plans for Ryu are especially scarce. I don’t want to write anything in here for them because I haven’t fully decided on concrete ideas yet.
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While reading some Star wars prequel trilogy fanfictions I suddenly realise something. Prequel's fans use mando'a in the same way anime's fans use Japanese.
It's fascinating. How many of theses fans where anime's fans before? How many correspondance between the 2 vocabulary can we find?
Let's try with some of the most common terms used.
Mando'a (English) => Japanese used by anime's fans (not always in the original or correct meaning in Japanese but one I have often see the past 20 years.)
ba'buir (grandfather, grandmother)=> Baba (old woman), Jiji (old man), ojii-san (grand father), obaa-san (grand mother). In the two cases the terms are also used to design any old people.
ba'vodu (uncle, aunt)=> oji-san (uncle), oba-san (aunt).
beskad/kad (slightly curved, pointed saber of Mandalorian iron/saber, sword) => Katana
buir (parent/father / mother)=> otou-san (father), okaa-san (mother)
cabur (guardian, protector)=> depending of the situation it could be the same think than ba'vodu or buir
copikla (charming, cute (babies and animals - never women unless you want your head ripped off)) => Kawaii or moe except it's totally ok tu used this word for woman.
cyare (beloved, loved, popular) => i know there is one but I can remember it right now. Maybe the habit of people to use the honorific sama for the man or hime for the woman to show the characters are love interest?
di'kut (idiot, useless individual, waste of space) => baka
Gedet'ye (Please)=> Onegaishimasu, onegai
Gev (Stop it!)=>yameru or yamete kudasai
Ka'ra (stars - ancient Mandalorian myth - ruling council of fallen kings) => Kami-sama
kih'vod (little brother/sister ?) =>imouto and otouto
mandokarla (having the "right stuff", showing guts and spirit, the state of being the epitome of Mando virtue) => kakkoii (“good-looking”, “handsome”, “cool in a manly way”, they totally used the 2 terms in the sames way)
mesh'la (beautiful) => bishounen and bishoujo
Me'ven? (Huh? What? ) => nani?
Ne'johaa! (Shut up!) =>urusai ("Noisy", "Loud", "Annoying" or "Fussy". In some context heavily implied they need to just shut up)
Ni ceta (sorry (lit: I kneel) grovelling apology - rare) => sumimasen or gomenasai and other variations
ori'jate/jate (exelent/good) => sugoi
ori'vod (big brother, older brother, special friend) => onii-san, ani-ki, sempai, onee-chan and all the others variations.
osik (dung, shit)=> kuso !
Oya! (Many meanings: literally "Let's hunt!" and also "Stay alive!", but also Hoorah!, "Go you!", "Cheers!" Always positive and triumphant.)=> Yatta!
Re'turcye mhi (Goodbye - lit. "Maybe we'll meet again")=>sayounara
Su cuy'gar (Hello - lit. "You're still alive.") => konichiwa, ohaoyou, kombanwa
verd'ika (private (rank of a soldier)) => kouhai (it's the younger student or less experience worker in a company in the relation sempai/kouhai. The meaning are different but I think it's often used in the same way. With ori'vod used in the place of sempai. )
vod (comrade, "mate", brother, sister) => nakama (especially in the one piece fandom. They probably could make a contest with the star wars fandom to see who will use vod or nakama the most often.)
Vor'e! (Thanks!) => arrigato
I'm pretty sure there is a lot of other exemples. I hope my rambling was not too incomprehensible. My English is not always very good. And my japanese is almost inexistant. But, bloody hell, this think hit me yesterday evening like a train and I need to vent it somewhere to get it out of my head.
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"Never accept the world as it appears to be, always dare to see it for what could be"
The title quote is from a game called Overwatch, but I think it represents in a correct way what I want to talk about in this post.
Imagine a reality and what possibilities there could be in there is a very impressive thing. Fantasy worlds have incredible potential, they can show us from a medieval period to a post-apocalyptic scenery, in between we can find fantastic realities where we can relate to our day by day. The plot of these stories have a variety of topics, where the criticism of humanity and their behavior in different situations is the main problem. I think the best example of this is the Ghibli movies by Hayao Miyazaki.
Movies like “Mononoke Hime'' and “Spirited away” have a strong value judgment on how the attitude of mankind is affecting the world and the other kind of creatures who live there, and the way of create or find a solution for all of this problems depends of children and teenagers (protagonist on the films) who can make a strong and relevant change in the future, or that is what Miyasaki believe. And, I think it's true, motivating the future generations to see and comprehend the problems made by the old ones through the identification with the characters of the movie and their journey is a very clever way to present this kind of topics to the young ones. Fantasy and the diverse media where you can find it is an important tool to represent the problems who had and have affected our society, provide a big potential to affront problems thinking outside the box and motivate us to seek better opportunities to solve these problems.
I think many people believe that daydreaming, reading fantasy books or watching movies about this topic is a loss of time. What kind of knowledge can you obtain about fairy tales?
The potential to change how we perceive things, have a big empathy and open mind to accept other realities, and comprehend different aspects of our lives and the other people are great things or qualities we can develop through this.
So, imagine a better world inspired by novels, mangas, animes, movies, stories or any kind of media, is it a bad thing?. The short answer for me is no, to have the possibility to use my imagination and creativity to make and solve problems is something really fantastic.
Now. What do you think?
Joaquín López
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I regret not paying more attention to Arika and Mashiro back when I first watched Mai Otome. In retrospect, their relationship progression throughout the season is a joy to see transform, from being unable to stand each other’s presence to practically promising their lives to one another. The OVAs were pretty much them needing marriage counseling.
#mai otome#arika yumemiya#mashiro blan de windbloom#dlarts#like many others i wanted to see the old hime characters#but my eyes have since been opened
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requests are open ahhh!!!! uhm, can i get a bakugou x reader where his s/o brings all the stray cats she finds outside and when they were too many of them he wanted to tell her to stop bringing in more strays but she uses her puppy eyes on him to convince him. you can choose whether to use hcs or scenarios! 🥰
a/n: of course!! this is super cute omg wait- please i have so many pets, 4 doggies, 2 kitties, my sister owns a fish, we also have 2 chickens, pets are just so cute i love them!! please i love bakugou and pet headcanons mostly bc i think im a sucker for like domestic baku fluff; also pro hero au again so they can live together <3
pro hero au!! all characters aged up 18+
headcanon: them reacting to their s/o bringing home stray cats
key: (y/n) - your name / (f/n) - first name / (l/n) - last name / (e/c) - eye color / (h/c) - hair color / (y/q) - your quirk
warnings: fluff, swearing
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katsuki bakugou
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It was just something that had happened on a rainy day while you were coming home from the grocery store. You spotted a bundle of white, orange, and black fur cuddled up under a potted plant on your doorstep.
Your reusable grocery bags hit the floor under the awning covering your front door and you knelt down, slowly app-roaching the bundle of fur.
It’s fluffy head popped up and stared at you. It was small, maybe just about a year old. You let the young cat come to your hand, sniffing the tips of your extended fingers before rubbing its head against the palm of your hand. You began to stroke its fur delicately, searching for a collar. When there was none in sight, you agreed you’d let it inside and let it get warm, feed it and then see if there were any missing cat posters hanging around, all when it stopped raining of course.
That’s how you came to own Muffin, the first of many strays you adopted off of the streets around your home.
Bakugou loved you. And he did love all the kitties too. He didn’t love when his spot in the bed beside you was taken up by five cats. Yes five. And the number grew almost every week.
“Babe have you seen my-socks!” Bakugou glanced down as he was asking his question, watching as two adopted strays, Peanut and Hime, played with his socks on the ground.
“Give me those.” Bakugou sighed, squatting down as he petted their heads, smiling to himself as he took a moment with them.
“Oh you found them.” You smiled, holding two pairs of his costume socks. Bakugou stood back up and bit his bottom lip.
He really did love you, and he loved the cats, but there were so many. Not that he didn’t make enough to cover them, or that you did either, but he was beginning to think that maybe there were too many.
“Do you think we could have a talk later?” Bakugou asked quietly. You nodded and glanced down at his leg as Peanut nuzzled his head against Bakugou’s lower calf.
“Alright, I love you.” Bakugou pulled you into his arms, pressing a tender kiss to the top of your head and then pressing one to your lips.
You made your way into the kitchen and began preparing food for all the cats, making sure their water bowl was filled.
While Bakugou was off at work, you had the day off. You went out to the store, grabbing some new toys and some more food, running a few errands, and treating yourself to some much needed self-care.
When you arrived back home, you were bringing in groceries when you noticed a tubby orange tabby cat perched near your mailbox. Smiling, you paused and grabbed the fresh bag of treats you’d bought, pulling out two you approached the kitty.
Allowing it to sniff your fingers and get accustomed to you before petting it, you offered it a treat. It purred as it licked the tips of your fingers that held the treat as you offered it another one. Rubbing it’s head against your hand after the treats, you petted it’s soft fur, examining for a collar. Much like the rest, it didn’t have one.
it hopped down from the brick of your mailbox and strutted around your legs, following as you carried the groceries inside.
The rest of your cats met you by the door as you shut it carefully behind you, the new orange tabby sniffing around and meeting the others.
At first it was hesitant, cowering by the door until Hime approached it slowly, sniffing and showing that she was friendly.
Once the orange tabby was sure it wasn’t in any danger, it began to purr as Muffin, Peanut, Luna, and Sassy joined Hime in welcoming the new kitty.
You fixed up a small bowl of food and allowed the orange tabby to wander over, examining it’s new surroundings.
“I didn’t see any new posters out today, I’ll have to look around later.” You stroked the fur on it’s back softly while it ate before stepping away to put all your groceries away.
When Bakugou returned home, you were sound asleep on the couch, all of the kitties save for Sassy sound asleep scattered around you. Including a new orange tabby.
Bakugou pulled his boots off by the door and sighed, smiling as he stared at you. You looked so contempt and so happy.
The new orange tabby perked it’s head up in Bakugou’s direction, clearly interested in the new person that stood by the door. It hopped down from laying over your chest and sauntered over to Bakugou, sniffing his sock clad feet, it lifted it’s head up to look at Bakugou.
“And who might you be?” Bakugou knelt down and stroked it’s head, glancing back over at you, still sleeping on the couch.
The tabby jumped up onto Bakugou’s shoulder, a quiet hiss left Bakugou’s mouth not expecting it. Wobbling and carefully standing back upright, the kitty stayed put on his shoulder, acting more like a parrot than a cat.
“O-oh welcome home!” You said softly as you woke up. Giggling as your tired eyes fell upon the new sight.
“Another one?” Bakugou said quietly. You nodded.
“I couldn’t find any missing posters around town, and no ads online for one in any surrounding areas. He was by the mailbox when I got home.”
Bakugou nodded and glanced around at all the other kitties you’d given a lovely home to. You were so kind-hearted. Opening your arms and your home to stray cats. Bakugou would bet everything he had that you’d adopt every stray in the world if you could.
You stood up and walked over to Bakugou, giving him a tight hug followed by a tender kiss.
“I missed you, when’s your next off day?” You asked, wanting to spend more time with your boyfriend.
“Next week I think. Look we need to talk about the strays I-” Bakugou glanced down at the cats and then back to you. As he mentioned strays, your eyes glossed over.
“I’m sorry, I just I wanna give them good homes-”
“Hey hey, don’t cry, please don’t cry.” Bakugou’s heart ached in his chest as he quickly pulled his gloves off with his teeth, tossing them to the ground as his large hands cupped your cheeks, thumbs brushing away your tears.
“I was worried but I know they mean a lot to you. I’m sorry.” Bakugou kissed your forehead. You had the cutest puppy-dog eyes, staring up at him with a small smile.
“I know we have so many, it can be overwhelming, I’ll look into good homes for any new ones I see.” You agree to look into good homes for some future strays.
“Does the parrot have a name?” Bakugou asks, nodding up to the tabby still perched on his shoulder.
“Why don’t you name this one? He seems to like you.” You kiss the back of Bakugou’s hand and giggle.
“All Might.” Bakugou said quietly.
“All Might?” You giggled again, reaching up to poke Bakugou’s nose.
“Shut up!” Bakugou huffed, reaching up to pull the kitty down into his hands.
“All Might it is.” You stroked the kitty’s head as he rested in Bakugou’s arms.
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masterlist
#bakugou#bakugo#katsuki#katsuki bakugou#katsuki bakugo#bakugou katsuki#bakugo katsuki#bakugou x reader#bakugo x reader#katsuki x reader#katsuki bakugou x reader#katsuki bakugo x reader#bakugou katsuki x reader#bakugo katsuki x reader#my hero academia#boku no hero academia#mha#bnha#my hero academia x reader#boku no hero academia x reader#mha x reader#bnha x reader
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Dream or Reality (Noctis x Reader)
I wrote this fic years ago. So, I fixed up a little and decided to post it here. I have also posted it in devianart under LastMoogleHunter. Happy reading!
“Aaaaahhh….what a boring day, always the same. There’s nothing new, nothing makes me excited.” I sighed for the umpteenth times. I see, I haven’t introduced myself, my name is [Name] [Last Name], I am 12th grade in Destiny High. This is my last year, thus was recommended in making good memories. Though…there is nothing fun, I wish Final Fantasy characters are real people. That’ll so much fun, especially if there is Noctis.....
Kyaaaa!!! I am so embarassed... ahem, let’s put that aside and let’s get onto the story.
This morning also has the same routine, wake up, bath, breakfast, school, home, dinner, sleep and so on. And coincidentally my literature teacher decides it’s fun to see her students suffer, and thus given us a homework about composition. I groan, this is going to kill my brain cells. “God, please let my life get interesting such as Final Fantasy character come to life..... Just kidding, it’s not like it can be granted anyway.” I exhaled. I put my homework and stationery on my desk and start thinking about the theme I am going to write. Not long after I start doze off.
My internal clock woke me up from my slumber. Groggily, I glance my clock and it shows 6.30 a.m. I blink once, twice and rub my eyes to make sure I am not mistaking it. In instant, all sleepiness fades away. ”Aaaahh!! I am late!!” I freaked out and with lightning speed I took a bath. While I was stripping though, something fell from my shorts’ pocket. I pick it up and examine it, it was a golden watch. Curious, I open it and something was craved on the lid ‘aeternam vinculo’ ‘what’s this mean? More importantly when I got this thing?’ I was thinking and completely forgotten the time.
“[Name]! breakfast is ready!” Kaa-san called.
“No way!” I yelped and resumed my activity.
I run down the stairs and eat breakfast quickly, “[Name], there’s still some time.” Kaa-san said.
I gulp down my orange juice, “Gotta go. Bye Kaa-san, Tou-san.” I said as I ran to school. Fortunately, the distance to school from my house is not that far. Upon arriving there, I still see a lot of students leisurely walking to the school. Looks like I am safe. I sigh in relief as I pat my chest. suddenly, I feel a tap on my shoulder and I turn around, but the sight of that ‘someone’ tapping my shoulder made my eyes widenend.
“Morning.” He said, while I blinked once, twice, titled my head and stare at him as he is an alien landing on earth. The person who greeted me is no other than the famous Chocobo head, Cloud Strife.
I keep staring at him without blinking. “You…” I could only manage a word to come out from my mouth.
Cloud looks at me oddly, “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Good morning you two.” A new voice called. Our head snap to that direction and find Tifa and Yuffie are walking toward us.
My eyes widened ‘[Name].exe is shutting down.’ I can practically hear a robotic voice said that. ‘What exactly is going on?’
Seeing my confused blank looking face, concern made to Tifa’s face, “[Name], what’s wrong?” She asked.
So, I did the most logical action I could at the moment, I pinch my left hand, “Ow…” ‘It hurt.’ I rubbed my reddening left hand.
“[Name], are you really alright?” Tifa asked again. “Don’t worry Tifa, I bet she just woke up.” Yuffie grinned.
‘It’s not a dream....? t-they are really alive...?’ I am still confused, I am still not sure if I am having a realistic dream or this is the reality. But if so, what about yesterday and the day before yesterday and the days before today? Was that reality a dream? And this is the real reality? My mind is in jumbled mess, but I am happy. My wish has come true, my wish for the Final Fantasy characters are real people and as a bonus I have befriend with them. There’s no more I could ask for.
I feel someone shakes me. “Huh?” I snapped back to the reality.
“Maybe we should get her to infirmary.” Tifa said.
“Whooa. [Name], you really sick?” Yuffie was shocked by the news.
“Let’s go.” Cloud said as he prepared to drag me.
“W-wait! I’m fine, I just dozing because I just woke up.” I said putting a sheepish grin.
“See, she’s just woke up.” Yuffie grinned again, but I can see she was relieved as well.
‘Well, I did wish something interesting like this happen. Well, dream or not let’s enjoyed it to the last.’ I smiled at my thought as we walked to the class.
Upon entering class, I no longer panic on what I saw. There are some FF characters here and there, but I spot no Noctis, ‘Well, I’ll be lying if I am not disappointed.’ I sigh softly. ‘Well, nothing goes smooth now.’
Then I heard giggles and squeals. ‘Don’t tell me this is a famous scene from shoujo manga. The moment when male lead and his group enter the classroom. If so, then… Those girls will be the mortal enemies of the female lead. After the plot milked her usefulness, she and her sidekicks will fall into ruin.’ I blinked as I looked at those girls. ‘What a shame. They look nice enough though. But, I wonder who they’re fangirling about.’ I follow the crowd’s eyes, then the door opened revealing ‘Emergency! Mayday! Mayday! All staffs please evacuate! The ship will sink soon!Eh? EEEEEEHHHHH???!!! What is happening?! Why is he here?! No... I mean… I am happy that he is here. But he being here is a problem itself to me, in many ways.’ The one who opened the door is no other than Noctis.
I stiffen when he walks to me. “Good morning.” He muttered as he walked past me to his seat which is behind me.
“Mo-morning…?” And the problem is I was suttering when I replied, ‘Now I’ve done it…. he officially think I am one of his fangirls.’ I sighed earning a few snickers from Tifa and Yuffie which I give them an odd look.
“Morning, Hime-chi.” Prompto greeted.
I am not sure who is Hime-chi is. But seeing no one responds to him, it must be me, right? “Morning…?” I greeted back hesitantly.
During the duration of the lesson, I can’t concentrate at all. Part of it is because Noctis is sitting behind me. The other part is I am frantically thinking what should I do, what is my relationship with him and the other characters. Just because some of them are my friends, that doesn’t mean all of the characters must be my friends. And I have to be careful how to act around them, so they didn’t notice my awkwardness.
The bell rings signaling lunch break. Finally, me and the group which included almost all of the alvalanche members plus some other go to school cafeteria. Minus Cid and Barret cause they’re too old to go to school anyway which I found out later the two of them are school staffs. Barret as P.E teacher and Cid as engineer. And of course, let’s not forget Zack and Aerith. We go to cafeteria to eat lunch, while the others eat and talking each other, I am thinking about a lot of thing and that mysterious golden watch.
“[Name].” A voice snapped me out of my own world and I found all of them were staring at me.
“Huh?” I blinked owlishly.
“Are you okay?” Aerith asked worriedly.
“Did they bully you?” Prompto frowned.
“Eh? Bully? Who?” I tilted my head not understanding who were they talking about. ‘…For the first time in my life I was bullied…’
“WHAT!? Those girls are bullying my little sister?! How dare they!” Zack raged.
“W-Wait a minute. I am fine. No one is bullying me.” I said quickly calming them down.
“I heard something about bullying [Name]. Who is daring enough to do that?” Another new voice chimed in.
“Ah.” I blinked at the newcomers, twins exactly.
“Stella, Luna. Where were you guys?” Yuffie asked.
“Sorry, the teacher needed us just now.” Stella apologized.
“So, I heard someone is bullying [Name]? Which idiot?” Luna smiled scarily.
“No one was bullying me.” I shook my head quickly. ‘Scary…. Does Lunafreya is this kind of character?’ I sweatdropped.
“If we are talking about bullying, then I am sure it’s no other than her and her little group.” Tifa rolled her eyes.
‘I wonder who and why would people bully me? I don’t think I’ve ever made someone mad enough to be bullied by them.’ I scanned the cafeteria and spot a group of girls glaring at me, ‘Ah. So, they are the bully group.’ Then a mop of blond caught my attention, I narrow my eyes to get better sight, ‘…Who is she? I have never meet her before, but strangely her name popped out in my mind. Tachibana Kirika-san, Noct’s fangirl…. Ah, no wonder.’ I looked at her object of affection.
“Ignore them” Noct said.
“Umm...okay.” I answered.
After that staring contest, all is well. No war break between us. The last bell finally rings, signaling the end of school. And so, as per usual ritual, apparently we always go home together. “See you tomorrow.” I waved to them when I arrived at my house.
“See you.” They waved back. I open the door only to find it is hollow of life. I found a note one dinner table ‘Business trip one week, there’s a leftover for dinner. We’ll get your cousin to stay at the house tomorrow.’ I sighed. It’s still the same,’Oh well, I’m used to it.... wonder who is my cousin. This is the first time I heard about having a cousin staying over.’
Tired and still in term of accepting what has happened today. I am feeling really sleepy, but I didn’t dare to sleep. What if this is just a dream and I’ll wake up in the same position on my desk, as selfish as it may sound I still don’t want this to end yet. So many thoughts race in my head, absetmindedly I take out the golden watch and finally fallen asleep holding that.
I wake up with a start and glancing at my room, then realize something, FF charas. ‘Is it a dream?’ I sighed and I felt something in my hand. The golden watch, it’s still here. That means ‘It’s not a dream.’ I grinned widely, they are real. Thus, I quickly begin my routine of the day.
Arriving to the class, I greet them. Them as in the group. “Morning.” I greeted.
“Morning.” They replied. I sit at my seat and put my bag on drawer, but then a sharp pain creeps through my hand, instictively I take out my hand and trail of blood is dripping from my hand. My eyes flicker at the sound of giggles, there Tachibana Karin stand proudly at what she have done, she even raises her chin up to which I reply with raised eyebrow.
‘Truly, this is the first time I am being bullied for real.’
Seeing my bloodied right hand and still bleeding. Cloud quickly take my hand and examines it. “You okay?” He asked.
“As okay as someone will be with bleeding hand.” I remarked. Zack is definitely pissed off by the look of his face and stalks toward them.
“Why you little-“
“Zack. There’s no need to get angry.” I called to him.
Ignoring my call, he still stalks toward them, that is until Vincent holds him, “Ignore them. We should take her to infirmary.” He said.
“No no no. we can’t let this kind of things go.” Stella stepped in.
“Indeed. We’ll need to teach her a lesson.” Luna easily agreed with the older twin.
“Stella, Luna. Not you two too.” I sweatdropped.
“Let’s just take [Name] to infirmary first.” Tifa said. With that, the group accompanies me to the infirmary.
“The cut isn’t deep, it will heal in few days.” Nurse Quistis said after she finished bandaging me.
“Thank you.” I thanked her.
“It’s my job, now off you go to class.” She ushered.
“Yes ma’am.” I give her mock salute as I get out of the room.
Entering the class, I was bombarded with questions. Quistis kicked all of the out for being so noisy and too much. “I am fine.” I said for the umpteenth time.
Then Tachibana-san comes to me and asks with her sickly sweet voice, “How was your hand? Is it hurt?”
“Well, why don’t we try it to your hand. And then you’ll know whether it’s hurt or not.” I smiled eraning a few snickers from my friends as they heard my reply.
Tachibana-san’s face is red with anger and opens her mouth to say something. But then, the door opened revealing Noctis and Prompto. she quickly puts her sweet façade again to which I know that isn’t fooling anyone with decent IQ. “Good morning.” She greeted him which was ignored and laughter rose from our throats.
“If you didn’t do something like bullying his friends, you might have a chance.” I told her.
“You!” She gritted her teeth.
‘Aaah… She really didn’t get it.’ I sighed mentally. “Good morning you two. How unusuall for you to almost late.” I greeted.
“Good morning, Hime-chi. You see, we are almost late because we met an old woman on the street. She… Hime-chi, what happened to your hand?” Prompto frowned when he saw bandage on my left hand.
“Your hand...”
“Oh, this..” I said as I lift my hand. “Apparently, someone with a bad hobby finds it interesting to get me scream in pain. Unfortunately, they didn’t get what they want.” I smiled. Noct opens his mouth to ask something when the bell rang, signalling the start of class. All of us goes back to our seat. Well, in my case after recieving a hateful glare from Tachibana-san.
‘More importantly I wonder… Why is she targeting me? I mean, Noct’s female friends are not only I. There are Luna and Stella too…. Does she know I like him…? Well, I do like him as character in games before. And meeting him right now does make my feeling stronger… but, I am not sure if I like him as man… Besides…’ A certain scene from the game flashes in my mind. It’s overlapping in a scene I’ve seen here. ‘I am such a fool… obviously they are together…’ A bitter smile graces my lips.
The lessons went well, save for the ocasion hateful glare... okay scratch that, hateful glare all along. Lucnh break bell rings..... “Okay class, that’s all for today... oh and there is winter ball on the 28th December. All of you MUST come, it’ll be the last event for you. Class dissmissed.” Then the teacher goes out of classroom.
I groan inwardly, ‘Great… a ballroom.’ Note the sacarsm. The students scatters, chatting about the ball, while the group (girls only) advance to me.
“Soooo.....” Yuffie begins the conversation. “Who is going to be your date?” she asked excitedly.
“I don’t want to go.” I groaned again.
“You shouldn’t idle too long [Name], he will be snatched away.” Aerith said gigglig slightly.
“He? Who?” I titled my head. ‘Do I like someone?’
“Of course it’s him.” Yuffie answered.
“Tsk tsk tsk. As if [Name] will like another boy except from him.” Stella raised her brow.
“That dense man is too dense.” Luna giggled.
“Who is he exactly?” I frowned. But to them, my expression right now is quite funny because they are giggling.
“Don’t play dumb [Name]. all of us already know who is he. He is the one who gifted you the golden watch on your birthday.” Tifa said.
‘So, that was a gift from someone. And that someone is my crush so to speak…’ I blinked. ‘Who is…’ Suddenly the answer appeared itself in my mind.
*Poof* my face explodes to a blush. ‘It’s him. That man who is a trouble to me just by being here.’ I covered my face looking away from the evil grins on their faces.
“That time he was so shy. It’s funny, right?” Yuffie exclaimed.
“Hey, you guys.” I was saved by Reno. “Who are going to be you girls’ date?” He asked excitedly.
“Not again…” I groaned. “Reno, you don’t have any delicacy at all.” I whined.
“What happened to her?” Reno blinked.
“Just girl trouble.” Stella giggled followed by the rest of the girl.
“I mean you guys have fixed date already. Is there any point to ask?” I pouted. “I’m sure Tifa is going with Cloud, Aerith and Zack, Yuffie with Vincent. Stella is with Prompto and Luna will be going with No-.” I said.
“My date is a secret.” Luna cut my sentence.
“Secret?” I blinked.
“Yep. You’ll know when the time comes.” She smiled mysteriously.
“So, what about you [Name]? Wanna be my date?” He winked.
I snort, “No, thank you.” I flat out rejected him. “If I go with you. Your group of angry girlfriends will be waiting for me. Nuh-uh. I still want to be perfectly healthy, thank you.” All of them excluding Reno who is now sulking are laughing at his misfortune. “I am probably going alone. There’s no rule I can’t go alone.” I smiled. “…What’s wrong?” I blinked when I found them stared at me oddly.
“[Name]… You are quite dense…” Tifa sweatdropped.
“Huh?” I titled my head.
“[Name] you know, you are quite popular. If you say you are searching for a date. Everyone will probably line up.” Aerith giggled.
“…You are teasing me, aren’t you? I have a plain face you know. The one that is neither pretty, beautiful or cute. Besides, if I mean if I am quite popular, how come no one talk to me or better yet flirt to me?” I put an unamused face.
‘That’s because a certain someone made sure no one will not talk to you more than necessary. How can they have a gut to flirt with you with him hanging around you like a guard dog.’ All of them sweatdropped.
“Enough about me. What about the prince?” I turned my question to the prince that walked past me back to his seat.
“About what?” He sat back down.
“The winter ball. Who are you escorting?” I asked.
He snorts. “I don’t want to go.” He said.
“Me too. But we are forced to go.” I chuckled.
“I am waiting for someone.” He answered shortly. His answer makes the boys laugh. I raise my eyebrow at their odd reaction.
“You should hurry and ask her out, or else she’ll out of your reach.” Zack chuckled.
“Yep. After all the effort you put into.” Cloud nodded.
Zack’s word make my chest stings a bit. ‘What is this feeling?’ I blink the I shake my head to ignore it and chat with the rest of them.
Zack’s word is still ringing in my head. I am indeed curious as who is he going to ask, but I am more curious about the feeling in my heart just now. ’They are just characters from game, right? So, why did I have this feeling? Besides, I am sure he is going to ask Luna. No need to think that hard. They obviously are going to reveal it at the winter ball.’ I finally asleep while thinking about this.
Again, I wake up from my peaceful slumber before the alarm rings. I rub my eyes to get rid the alimighty power of sleepiness. The calendar on my wall made me realize this is Saturday. ‘Oh, it’s finally this day.’
As usual, I did my everyday routine, and then off to school. My peaceful day was once again ruined by Tachibana-san and the rabid fangirls follower.
“You! You dare to embarass me the other day, in front of my Noctis no less.” She screehed.
“My...Noctis...? Wow, I am not sure how to reply to that statement... Besides, weren’t you the one asked me about my hand, I just answered that it would be better for you to experience it first hand.” I answered effortlessly.
“You bitch!” She swung her hand to slap me. I am ready to dodge and prepare some wise words. But, her hand was caught midair by a more masculine hand.
I turn my head to get a better look of my savior. ‘Squall.’ I blinked at the unexpected character. ‘Rinoa shouldn’t be too far from Squall.’ I giggled inwardly at my own thought.
“You better stop this or you’ll get more than just slapping.” He growled. Tachibana-san turns pale. She and her follower quickly retreat back.
Then suddenly a girl pops out from his side. “Are you okay, [Name]?” Said girl is no other than Rinoa. ‘As I thought, Rinoa is not far.’ I chuckled at my own thought.
“I am fine.” I answered. “But, why are you two here?” I asked, I am not surprised with the characters popping out as my friends anymore. Last time, I found out Ignis is our Chemistry teacher and Gladioulus as our school security guard.
“Listen well! this isn’t over! I’ll make your life a living hell!” Tachibana-san sreeched which we of course ignored. The she stomps out here with her rabid fangirls follower.
“Just like always, you are a trouble magnet.” Squall Leonhart, which like to be called Leon sighed.
“You haven’t answered my question... Squeon.” I added my personal nickname just to annoy him.
“Your parents were worried, so they asked me to take care of you.” He said ignoring my nickname.
“I am fine, Squeon.” I said again.
Squall snorts, he lifts my bandaged hand, “And you said this was okay.”
“[Name], you are injured. What happened?” Worrywart Rinoa asked.
“I am okay. It’s just a small wound, Quistis said it will heal in 2 or 3 days.” I said calming Rinoa down.
Then, we heard some footsteps running toward us. The group are rushing to us. “Squall! Rinoa!” They exclaimed happily when they saw them.
“It’s Leon.” He grunted.
“Nooo, it’s Squeon.” I laughed. Squall only glares at me using his infamous glare.
“Long time no see.” Rinoa smiled.
“[Name], are you alright? I heard from some people Tachibana was bullying you, what did she do to you?” The now panicking Tifa asked.
“I am okay. she was just going to slap me, but Squeon stopped her.” I answered.
“WHAT?! She was going to slap you?! That damn bitch! How dare she!” Zack cursed.
“Calm down. I am not strupid just standing there waiting her slaps me.” I snorted. ‘Besides, which idiot will stand still when they are going to be hit.’
“By the way, if Squall and Rinoa are here. Does that mean they are going to be your care taker again?” Cloud asked.
“Yes, they are.” I said grinning.
“Oooooh, it’s rare that we can gather here together. So, how about we go to Chocobo Land tomorrow?” Yuffie exclaimed excitedly.
“Chocobo Land.... Well, it’s been a while, the last time we go together was on [Name]’s birthday.” Aerith said. With that said, all of us decide to go to Chocobo Land tomorrow. Unbeknwon to me, I am playing right to their trap.~”~
“Eeeeehhhh~ Why can’t you go with us?” I asked, dismayed at the fact we couldn’t spend time together.
“Rinoa isn’t feeling well.” Was Squall short answer.
But I can’t shake the feeling that something is off. “She was fine yesterday.” I mumbled.
“Yesterday and today are different.” But all I did was stare, stare and stare. He sighs, “Just go already, you don’t want to be late, right?” He ushered me to go.
“Yes~” I sulked.
Arriving at the Chocobo Land. Only Noctis is at the rendezvous point. “Hey, Noct, where is the others?” I asked.
“They still haven’t arrived.” He answered.
‘Weird. They are usually on time. Maybe Yuffie will be a little late.’ I blinked at the unusual happening. And suddenly our phones ring at the same time signalling there are messages in our group chat.
Tifa
“Sorry, my parents are out of town suddenly. Need to housesit.”
Yuffie
Some brats in neighborhood are hunting my treasure. Need to safeguard it.
Zack
Am grounded. T.T
Luna
“Sis and I have trouble escaping from arranged marriage.
Stella
“Have fun. We will arrive there late.”
Aerith
“The shop is crowded. I can’t go out yet.”
Squall
“Rinoa is sick. Need to take care of her.”
Rinoa
Sorry guys.
Cloud
“Fixing my bike.”
Vincent
“…Sleepy…”
Prompto
“Helping acquaintance in photoshoot.”
‘What kind of hellish timing is this?’ I sweatdropped. ‘…No matter how I think, they are definitely setting us up.’ I sighed softly.
The two of us look at each other and sigh. “We were set up.” He said. “So, what should we do? Should we go home?” He asked again.
“Hmmm… We’re already here anyway. So, let’s just play. Just the two of us.” I grinned. A small smile is tugging on his lip hearing my sentece. But, unbeknown to us, we were followed by eight enthusiastic stalkers plus two reluctant stalkers and cameras.
Everywhere and anywhere as far as I can see, all I can see is Chocobo. The excitement is building up. “Chocobo♪~ Chocobo♪~.” I hummed out with sparkling eyes.
“Your love for Chocobo is something else.” Noct sweatdropped.
“What can I say, I just love Chocobo.” I giggled. “Then, our first ride will be that.” I pointed to the Chocobo Jet that was quite far from our meeting point.
“Figures you will ride that first.” Noctis chuckled.
“Let’s go!” I giggled excitedly. ‘Just for today. Let me spend a quality time with him. Yes…Just for today.’ The Chocobo Jet is really exciting. “I want to ride it again.” I said enthusiastically.
“Let’s ride the other attraction first. We’ll ride the roller coaster again later.” He sighed helplessly.
“It’s a promise, okay. I won’t go home if I don’t get to ride it again.” I stuck my pinky to him.
“Yes, yes. It’s a promise.” He hooked his pinky to mine. And then seamlessly warps his hand around mine and tugs me along.
I blink at the action. ‘Alert, alert. The parameter is rising.’ A slight blush adorns my cheeks. I quickly put a hand on my cheek to cool it down.
“What’s wrong?” He asked when he saw my weird action.
“Nothing!” I squeaked in high pitched voice.
He blinks, “You are so weird.” He laughed.
“I don’t want to hear that from you.” I stuck my togue out to him.
The next ride is Chocobo Cup. “Spin faster!” I laughed cheerily as I spun the cup faster.
“You’ll get dizzy later.” Noct smiled.
‘Hm…?’ from the corner of my eyes, I think I caught a glimpse of a familiar chocobo head. ‘Was I mistaken?’
“What’s wrong?” Ncoct asked when he realized I stopped spinning.
“Ah, nothing, I thought I saw Cloud.” I shook my head. “It must be my imagination. I mean this is Chocobo Land.” I laughed. All of the visitors are wearing Chocobo headband which we get as a free gift in the entrance.
“What do you want to do next?” He asked.
“Hm…Oh!” My eyes are drawn to the shooting range not far from us. More accurately, drawn to the prizes in that shooting range. “That! Let’s compete!” I turned to Noctis.
“Yes?”
“Let’s see who will get the grand prize first!” I exclaimed.
“Yo, ojou-chan, an-chan. The point for the grand prize is 150. The rule is easy. Your gun has 3 bullets. Knock down the plate with the point written on it. collect 150 points and you have the grand prize. Easy, right?” Baku explained.
“Yep!” I nodded.
“One game is 150 gil.” He smiled.
“Give us two guns.” Noct said as he handed him the money.
“Haiyo!” Baku handed us the bullet.
“The game is on!” I grinned.
~One Round Later~
“Not fair….” I sulked. In the end, Noctis wins with overwhelming victory. I don’t understand how he managed to get 200 points, while I couldn’t even get the 10 points plate down.
“Bwahahahaha! Ojou-chan, you are the best! Your skill is one in one hundred!” Baku laughed merrily.
“Sh-shut up!” I cried out.
“An-chan, your skill is amazing. Usually, the guests will spend more than 3 games to get a hang of this game.” He smirked.
“This is just a fluke. My friend happens to be good at this kind of game. I was only following his advice.” Noct answered.
“Heh. I want to meet this friend of yours.” Baku smirked.
“Next time, I guess.” Noct shrugged his shoulder.
“Bahahaha! I can’t wait!” Baku laughed harder.
While those two are chatting. I am already at my own land of misery. “I am sorry Chocobo. I can’t get you. I am sorry I am such a failure.” I murmured.
“So, what happen to Ojou-chan?” Baku sweatdropped.
“She just happened to love Chocobo a bit too much. Too much that I am jealous.”
“Bwahahaha! You win the game, but lost the war. I really pity you, An-chan” Baku patted his shoulders.
“Haahh…” He sighed. “[Name]. Here, this is yours.” Something is shoved to my face. It’s the grand prize of the shooting range, Golden Chocobo.
“For me?” I blinked.
“Of course.” He rolled his eyes. “If I don’t give it to you. You’ll keep staring at me as if you are having a grudge on me.” He smirked.
“I-I will not.” I flushed.
“Ojou-chan!” Baku called.
“Yes?”
“Here. A consolation prize.” Baku gave me two droppy chocobo hat. “Thanks to Ojou-chan, I have a great laugh today.” Baku grinned.
“Thank you!” I quickly put it on my head, while keeping the headband I got on my small backpack I brought. “Noct, you wear one too.” I gave the hat to him. The said man obediently bends down his body so I can put it on him. “We match!” I laughed happily, completely missing his softened look to me.
“Bahahaha! I pray for your success, an-chan.” Baku laughed.
“Thanks.” Noct replied. While I completely don’t understand what they were talking about. “Let’s go. We still have many attractions to ride.” He tugged my hand along.
“Yes!” ‘I think whether this is a dream or reality, this will be the happiest day of my live.’
Our next destination is, “Chocobo House!!!” I shrieked at the sight. I rush to the house, wanting to see it up close and personal.
“Hey! Don’t run!” I heard Noct’s warning.
“Don’t worry! I am not a child. I won’t fall down. Hurry up! Hurry up!” I urged him.
“We need to buy tickets first.” He sighed.
“Ah.” I blinked, completely forgotten that. Noct rolls his eyes as he pays for the tickets.
“Thank you for the purchase. Please enjoy the house.” The staff smiled.
Chocobo House, truly befitting the name. The house is basically Chocobo den. Look right, there will be a lot of Chocobo. Look left, there will be a lot of Chocobo. Look up, there will be a lot of Chocobo lantern. Look down, the tile is Chocobo pattern. And in the center if the house, there is the fat Chocobo.
“….Can I take that home?” I muttered out loud.
“Will it fit in your room?” Noct sweatdropped.
“I have an unused room. It will fit there. I can just move my Chocobo shrine there.” My eyes sparkled.
“Oi oi oi. Will they even let you buy it. Rather, even if they are willing to sell. Does your pocket money enough?” Noct sighed.
“Hmmm…. I should really get a part time job.” I muttered as I trying to calculate how much the Fat Chocobo will cost.
“Wait! Wait! They are selling the miniature version of Fat Chocobo. Let’s take a look.” Noct dragged me to the merchandise counter. In the end, I buy the Fat Chocobo plushie. More precisely, it was bought for me.
“I could buy it myself. You’ve paid for the rides and tickets. I can at least buy the merchandise myself.” I pouted and frowned as I hugged the plushie.
“It’s fine. I just want to. My father told me I need to spoil you to win your heart. He even willingly and happily to let me spend money to make you his daughter in law.” He muttered.
“Hm? What did you say?” I couldn’t hear the second part of his sentences.
“Nothing. Let’s ride that next.” He pointed to the Chocobo-go-round.
“Okay!” ~”~
“I am hungry~” I whined as I sat on the park bench.
“It’s already 1.00 p.m.” Noctis said as he looked at his watch. “The food court is over there.” Noctis said.
“Yosh! After lunch, we are going to continue.” I beamed, while my companion just shook his head at my antics. “Hey, don’t tell me you don’t enjoy it. Because we know it’s a lie.” I pointed my finger to him.
“I never said I didn’t.” He chuckled.
“Then all is well.” I grinned.
We are sitting in the food court, waiting for our order. The topic of our conversation is the hellish timing our friends have. “They are definitely…” I trailed off.
“…Doing this in purpose…” He finished.
“There’s no way they have this kind of convenient timing of not going. Well, in Zack’s case… he might be really grounded.” I giggled as we glanced secretly to the seats behind us.
“He-hey! Don’t be too noisy, they’ll find out.” A familiar voice of Tifa was heard.
“But, I can’t hear what are they talking about.” Yuffie whined.
“What a sloppy tailing.” I sniggered.
“They really… have too much free time.” Noct sighed.
“They seem don’t know that we’ve know they tailed us from the start.” I laughed merrily, really enjoying this charade. From the corner of my eyes, I can see now they are fighting for food, Zack and Cloud plus Yuffie. “Let’s caught them red handed later.” I laughed.
“Here are your orders.” A kind waitress set down our food.
“Thank you.” We thanked her.
“Please enjoy!” She smiled cheerily.
“Thanks for the food.” ~”~
“Noct. Let’s go over there.” I pointed to an ice-cream stall.
“Didn’t you just eat lunch?” He blinked.
“If it’s for ice cream, I am sure my stomach will make more room.” I answered.
“….What flavor?” He could only helplessly ask.
“Sea-salt ice cream!” I said excitedly.
“Wait here.” He told me and he is off to the stall.
“Ah, I want ice cream too.” I heard Yuffie whined.
“If we go now. We’ll be caught.” Stella reminded.
“But… ice cream…” I could already imagine her face looked like a kicked puppy.
“We need to endure.” Luna said sternly.
“Here.” Noct came back with an ice cream.
“Where is yours?” I blinked as I took the ice cream.
“I am good.” He said.
“Is that so?” I licked the ice. “Mmmnn… It’s delicious.” My eyes sparkled. “Here. Have a taste. It’s delicious. Delicious food should be shared to double the deliciousness.” I grinned.
“…Then, I’ll be happy to oblige.” He smiled softly as eat the ice from my hand.
“How is it? Isn’t it delicious?” I asked animatedly.
“Yeah. It’s delicious.” A ghost smile on his lips.
“See! I told you, you should buy one for yourself.” I said smugly. I quickly devour the ice cream until I realize what have I done. *Poof* ‘He ate mine…. Indirect kiss… No no no, let’s not think about it.… Okay, breathe in… breathe out… It’s okay. It’s just indirect kiss. No biggie….NO! it’s not okay for my heart! Does he even realized what he has done! I know I was the one offered it to him, but…’
“Why is your face red? Is it heatstroke?” He frowned.
“No! I am fine! Completely fine. It’s only a little bit too hot! It’s not a heatstroke!” The completely flustered me squeaked out. “Let’s go there!” I randomly pointed a ride and hurried there, missing the knowing smirk on his face.
The clock has shown 5.30 p.m. the only remaining ride is, “Hey, Noct. Let’s ride Chocobo Wheel.” I dragged him to the line. The said man allows me to drag him, he’s suprisingly obidient.
The Ferris Wheel stops when we are at the top. “When are we going to catch them red handed?” He smirked.
“You’ll see.” I grinned mischievously. “As expected from the highest point. I can see all of them park from here. It’s beautiful.” I was awed by the breathtaking view.
“Indeed…” What I didn’t know is, he wasn’t talking about the view.
The ride has ended. We are back on the land. “Ah! I have to call Squeon, first. I am worried about Rinoa.” I said out loud, letting our stalkers hear. “If he has something he needs, I can swing to the nearest drug store.” I fished out my phone from my bag. Can practically hear the nervous choked sounds from our stalkers. I push the speed dial button number 1. A familiar ringtone rings. My smile widens when I heard that.
“Hello!” I waved to them. We catch our stalkers red handed. “I thought you all have some kind of troubles.” I raised my brow.
“Ahahahha… We were just...uh…worried about you two. Yes, we were worried.” Zack laughed nervously, which then elbowed by Aerith for stuttering.
“So, did you guys get nice pictures? Because I am expecting it.” I snickered.
“I thought you were grounded, Zack.” Noct smirked.
“Hey, everyone! The photos are done. What are- “Yuffie stopped in mid sentence when she saw us. “Ahahahaha. Hello, [Name].” Yuffie greeted me.
“Geh! Noct!” Prompto gasped.
“Yuffie~, Prompto ~ What about those pictures in your hands?” I asked with a smile etched on my face.
“O-oh, th-this is..” She trailed off, senaking a glance on me, I still waiting her answer with a smile. “Eheheheh.... Okay, I give up. Here, all yours.” She gave us the photos they took. To put it simply, those are our candid photos. There are also the others but mostly about me and Noctis.
“Awww, this one is soo cute.” Tifa cooed. The pictures she chooses is the one when Noct was eating my ice cream. The angle is good. It’s just quite embarrassing.
“Heheh. Mine is this.” Luna chose the time when I put Chocobo hat on Noct.
“Oh. I like this one.” Stella picked our competition in shooting range.
“This one is good.” Aerith liked the one where I hug the huge Fat Chocobo in Chocobo House.
“Oookay. Let’s save this for later. For the last ride, we’ll go on Chocobo Jet. I will not allow any objection.” I exclaimed happily. For the last ride. We are fortunate the ride is enough for all of us.
“It was fun! It’s been a while I play this much.” I stretched.
“We should come here together again.” Rinoa smiled.
“Agreed! But no more stalking.” I laughed.
Time sure flies fast. It’s already one week before Christmas, we the girls are shopping for Christmas gift. ‘Sooo, what should I buy? Let’s just buy what they can use everyday.’ The other girls already busy choosing their own gifts. I am just strolling in the accesorries shop. After all of us finished, we head back to home. ~”~
It’s finally Christmas. The girls agreed to gather at Tifa’s house and give a make-over to each other, while I opted to not involved which is not an option. I am also dragged in to the whole fiasco. Exactly 7 p.m. We heard the knock, signaling the boy group has come.
“Merry Christmas.” Zack said excitedly.
“Merry Christmas.” We greeted. After we greeted each other, the party starts. I give them their respective gifts. Earrings for Tifa, bracelet for Yuffie, a necklace for Stella and Luna, a phone case for Vincent, a dress for Aerith, a google for Cloud, another dress for Rinoa and a for Zack, my self proclaimed brother, I gave him a pair of shoes. For my dearest cousin, it’s a leather jacket.
I am now down to the last person, but the said person isn’t in the room. The gift is still clutched in my hand. I see Tifa tilts her head to the yard, I nod and flash a grateful smile.
I found him gazing stars. “Not going to enter?” I asked.
Noctis glances at me and then back to the stars. “Too noisy.” Was his short answer. I laugh lightly at his short, but clear answer.
There is a comfortable silence between us, until I remember the reason I searched him. “Here.” I gave him the small blue box.
“For me?” I nodded at his question. Then he also pulls out something small from his pocket and gives it to me. I look at the gift curiously. I try to guess what’s in this little black box. Seeing the blatant curiosity on my face, Noctis chuckles. “Open it.” He said. With that said, I open the box excitedly. There, in the black box there is a ring necklace. My name is carved on the ring. My eyes widened and let out a small laugh. Noctis only stares at me with raised eyebrow.
“Open my gift.” I said still laughing. With a strange look he opens the box. His eyes also widen, there in the blue box I gave him, there’s also a same ring necklace. the only difference is the carved names. Then a small laugh also escapes from his lips.
“Will you allow me to escort you in the winter ball?” He asked.
This question caught me off guard. I never thought he will ask me let alone think about it. I look left, right and then behind me to see if someone is there. “…Are you practicing so you can ask Luna?” I blinked.
“Why are you bringing up Luna?” He frowned.
“Eh? Why? Because isn’t that so?” I was taken back.
“It’s not.” He sighed exasperated.
“Then… If you are fine with me. I’ll be happy to take on your offer.” I smiled. ~”~
The day before the ball. The girls agree to meet up again in Tifa’s house right after school. They are going to match the dress they’ve bought with their accessories. “Hm? [Name], where’s your dress?” Luna asked.
“Ah, I don’t have one I was sure I am going alone, so I didn’t buy dress. I am going to wear school uniform. The rule didn’t specifically say the dress code is an evening dress.” I smiled sheepishly.
“School…” (Stella)
“Uni…” (Aerith)
“…form” (Tifa)
“You said?!” (Luna)
“Huh? Isn’t Noctis escorting you?” Yuffie blinked.
“He did two days ago. It’s just, I don’t have time to pick up dress. So, I am going to wear school uniform.” I nodded.
“Change of plan.” Stella said seriously.
“Yes. We have a change of plan.” Luna agreed.
“Huh?” I blinked.
“We are going to shop for your dress right now.” Aerith smiled.
“Eh? Right now. We don’t have that much time…anymore.” I finished timidly, seeing their scary smiles.
“Sorry [Name}. Even I can’t help you.” Yuffie said. ~”~
At last, the most dreaded day that I wish never come is finally here. 28th December, that means the winter ball. ‘Why it has to be a ballroom, can we just change to more casual party?’ I groaned.
“[Name], you shouldn’t put that kind of face. You are the prince’s date, are you not?” Zack teased.
“The said prince has the same opinion as me.” I said unamused. The girls and the boys wear a matching color, including Noct and I. Apparently, Luna called Noct and asked, no demanded him to wear a cobalt blue suit, so he can match with my dress.
The hall is decorated just like a real ballroom. There are also snacks and drinks there. Once we enter the hall, Reno instantly flies to the other side of the hall sweet talking to a group of girls. The others asked their dates to dance with them. Being a gentleman he is, our favourite prince also asks me to dance. “I can’t dance.” I smiled wryly.
“Don’t worry. Just follow my lead. Waltz is an easy dance.” He said taking my hand. We dance peacefully until someone with the name of Tachibana Kirika ruins it.
“Noctis dear~” She called with such coquettish voice that it actually made me had a goosebumps. “I am sure I can be a better partner than this plain looking girl.” Tachibana-san winked at him.
“Sorry if I am plain looking. At least, you should learn how to wear a proper make up. The color doesn’t suit you.” I rolled my eyes.
“No, thank you.” He refused politely.
But that sets Tachibana-san in rage. “Exactly what did you see in this girl?” She screeched and pointed her finger to me. “I am prettier and a ton of guys asked me to be their date.” She yelled.
Noctis narrows his eyes. “Then, you can have them to accompany you. Listen, I am tired of your antics. Don’t you dare badmouth her! The next time you do so, I won’t forgive you!” Noctis snapped. Then, Noct storms out from the hall, leaving the said girl there standing dumbfounded and biting her fingernail.
‘Wow, this is the first time I see him angry.’ I too, quietly leaving the hall searching for my partner.
“So, you are here.” I said after I found him on the rooftop. He only stands there unmoving. “Still angry?” I asked.
“Not anymore.” He answered.
“I doubt she will stalk you after your outburst just now.” I laughed.
“She better be.” He let out a snort.
“Hey, Noct.”
“Hm?”
“What was the meaning of the word carved in the golden watch?” I asked as I took out the watch from my dress’ small pocket.
“Are you curious about that?” He asked.
“Very.” Was my answer.
“That is-” He walked closer to me without breaking the eye contact. He stands right in front of me, making me wait with bated breath. He bends down so his mouth right beside my ear, and whispers softly. “Eternal bond.” After saying that, he stood straight. A small smile on his lip, satisfied with my now blushing face.
“You-! Can just say it normally.” I glared at him. The futile glare only makes him smiles. He pulls me toward him. “Wha-” I blinked rapidly as he pressed his lips to mine.
‘Unable to process. [Name].exe crashed.’
I suddenly wake up from my nap and look at my surrounding. I am in my room, the same room before all of that happen, my workbook is still on my desk untouched. “I see, that was a dream after all.” I said disappointed. I blush again remembering the last part of the dream. “What an outrageous dream I had.” I sweatdropped. I put my finger on my lips as if I can still feel the warmth.
“[Name], you idiot. That was just a dream.” I scolded myself. “Rather than thinking about it, I should take a bath.” I mumbled walking to the bathroom. Unbeknown to me there are a ring necklace with my name and a golden watch with its lid opened on my desk.
“Our bond is eternal”
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saturday night — i. midoriya
pro-hero!izuku midoriya x gn!reader (might have some indications for a fem reader)
warning ; alcohol consumption, suggestive content
it was late. and the fatigue mixed with the drinks you had accumulated with izuku made the evening all the more dangerous.
it had started out as a reunion dinner with former high school students. a simple evening to catch up on old times, and to escape for a few hours from the exhausting work and worries of life.
10:12 pm.
you were happy to see them again. or even to go out for the first time in many weeks. your new job at that big company was sucking up all your personal time and energy. so this outing with your childhood friends was just what you needed. a mixture of euphoria, laughter, and broken glass.
and then you could tell that you were not indifferent to the sidelong glances of the host of the party. you did not miss seeing his cheeks blush every time your hands brushed against each other to grab the bottle.
it was a game of cat and mouse that you had been playing since the beginning of the evening, and your friends had not failed to point it out.
“oi deku, are you going to make out with y/n in front of us or are you going to serve us this dessert?" yells bakugo.
“ i don't think it's necessary for you." said denki in a mocking voice.
"what do you mean you shithead ?! "
1:02 a.m.
there were about ten of you at the beginning, the excitement keeping you awake, while tenya's bedtime stories provoked laughter that you all missed.
but as the hours passed, the number of people leaving increased. only the most drunk stayed, namely you and midoriya.
2:32 a.m.
“i think i have to go izuku... otherwise i'll do things i might regret.” you say, staggering slightly.
two big, strong hands came to stop you from falling over head first. a goofy smile stretched your cheeks as you met your savior's gaze. two sparkling, starry eyes stared back at you. he was as drunk as you were, yet he managed to get you to sit on his couch. his hand rested gently on your arm for a little longer than necessary. a bitter taste filled your mouth as he finally pulled it away. what you wished was that he'd lowered it a little more.
"i-i don't think you should drive home, y/n.
"mmh, i was thinking of taking a taxi deku, im drunk not stupid.”
he raised his eyebrows before draping his muscular arm over the back of your seat on the couch. you still remember how he was in high school, so small and vulnerable. he had that innocent look that managed to charm all the girls and you first. but now? puberty had hit him hard. izuku had certainly grown to 6'2", and gained more than 50 kilos of muscle due to his job as a pro-hero, but there was also a much more serious expression stretching his features. his look was neat, classy.
"what makes you smile like that?" he said in a half-amused, half-serious voice.
you shook your head. you couldn't admit that you were drooling over his well-built body.
"i remember our nights in the dorms watching those conspiracies videos on YouTube. and you'd laugh at me if i told you i missed those days.”
"and you'd laugh at me too if i told you that i missed that time too.” he said gently.
it was at that very moment that you finally noticed that you were close. too close for two people who had been drinking all night. too close for two exes. too close for two people who seemed to still have feelings for each other.
you'd have to be blind to ignore the two eyes you were giving each other all night. those glances sometimes accompanied by smiles. but you knew it was wrong. you knew it was impossible for the two of you, impossible to go back to the good old days when you were just a couple in love and teenagers, still unaware of life's problems.
his hand, now caressing your cheek, jolted you out of your dreamy thoughts.
"stay here tonight.”
you didn't know if that was an order or more of an advice. but what you did know was that you wanted to listen to him terribly. it would have been easy to kick off your shoes and fall asleep in his arms. but even though you'd had many drinks, you were still sober enough to know what was right and wrong.
"you know i can't, izuku.”
the flu on your face intensified slightly. as if you were in danger of escaping at the slightest false move.
"you would laugh at me if i told you that i miss the time we were together. he said weakly, his voice pleading.
a dry laugh from you echoed through the room. he was an asshole to get your hopes up.
"that's the alcohol talking izuku, go to bed and let me call a cab." you huffed.
but he had only one gesture that required very little effort to make you stay. all he had to do was to put his lips to yours, and you would be his all night.
and that's what he did. he kissed you as if it was the end of the world, his arms wrapped around your waist. the young man wanted to feel your body against his, to feel your warmth, to taste you in your entirety. his desires for you, which he had been struggling with all evening, were satisfied thanks to this single kiss.
that quarter of a second seemed to last for ages. but every idyllic dream is always brutally torn apart by reality.
that reality in the story of the two of you was the engine of the car that had just parked in front of izuku's house. it was that reality that kept you from jumping on your ex's neck. that reality was ochako uraraka.
the young brunette entered the house with an exhausted smile on her lips. her eyes shone when she noticed you. you were a good meter away from her boyfriend, looking ashamed. but ochako was too tired to understand the situation.
"i'm glad to see you, i'm sorry i didn't make it to dinner. but work obliges haha.
you avoided his gaze, while picking up your things in a hurry.
"it's okay, we can always do this again some other time.
"i can give you a lift if you want, you look pretty drunk." she said worried.
"it's okay baby, she'll call a cab, right? "
izuku looked at you indifferently. his eyes, which were filled with desire for you a few minutes ago, were replaced by disinterested eyes. a new cold character was standing in front of you.
" thank you ochako. but he is right, i will call a cab... “
uraraka nodded and went to her boyfriend's arms. you saw from the corner of your eye that he only needed a glance to warn you to do something. the shadow of a smirk disfigured your expression.
you were naive to get your hopes up like that. izuku since your youth was known to be a heartbreaker. although you were his childhood friend, you were no different from his exes. even though izuku was a good person as a hero and friend, he was still a man who liked to feed on the love people had for him. he didn't have to hesitate to torment you all evening.
so i guess you didn't have to feel bad about leaving traces of your lipstick on his shirt collar.
"good night guys.” you say a smirk on your face.
tagging ; @escapenightmare @candy-hime
#bnha x reader#izuku x reader#midoriya x reader#izuku midoriya x reader#bnha angst#izuku x y/n#izuku angst#izuku x you#izuku midoriya imagine#izuku midoriya x you#a reposter ‼️‼️✨
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Ok ill bite whats the worst mg series
alright, whats the worst magical girl series in your opinion?
Thanks you two for letting me do some yelling.
The obvious guess would likely be one of the recent edgelord shows right? Magical Girl Site or something similar? But nay I say, for while MGS and Day Break Illusion and such and what not generally tell you what to expect right away. Don't like super violence and suffering? Watch something else is the clear message from the get go.
One of the bait and switch series then like Madoka or maybe Yuki Yuna? For what faults they may or may not have, at least these series do something and are interesting, even if you're not huge on what goes down in the series.
A parody then? They range from affectionate to banned in New Zealand but regardless of quality and their feelings for MGs, it's a parody. It's a joke and shouldn't be taken seriously (plus they're usually short so you can just forget about them forever).
So what makes a series terrible then, I am sure you are asking. IMO? Setting expectations for an interesting and enjoyable series, and then dashing them to hell.
Come with me below the cut, as I talk about Key Princess Story: Kagihime Eternal Alice Rondo!
Spoilers abound so if you care about those for a 15 year old series, click away.
Background: Kagihime was a 4 volume manga that ran from 2004-2006 that was picked up for a 13 episode anime adaptation near the end of its run. The manga is created by a pair (Kaishaku) who you may know for making Magical Nyan Nyan Taruto. Kannazuki no Miko, and Steel Angel Kurumi, and the anime had a script written by the same writer (Mamiko Ikeda) for Tenshi Ni Narumon who also did some script writing for Princess Tutu and Seven of Seven. The anime also had 6 character music videos which are fairly simple but a nice addition to the series for the main girls. Discotek has been publishing the anime in the states in recent years, and the manga was brought over by *squints at book spine* Dr Master Publications.
The Premise: Girls transform and enter weird outside of reality spaces to fight each other with giant keys to take each other’s stories to create a third Alice In Wonderland story.
Well, an off-brand Alice story written by Alternate L. Takion, rather than Lewis Carroll/Charles Dodgson, that while the series uses all the aesthetic hallmarks of the tradition Alice, the little we see of the in universe Alice story is clearly different. Which is fine, at the end of the day, it’s still about someone who loves the Alice stories and wishes there was more, and even makes his own fanfiction version. His? Oh yeah, while the girls do all the fighting, the main character is Aruto, a teen boy who loves Alice, and for reasons we don’t know till late game, can enter the liminal spaces that the ‘Alice Users’ fight in. He chases a girl who looks like the Alice he sees in his story, who is named Arisu, and gets roped into this fanfic battle royale. He is also the older brother of the very needy Kirihara, who also ends up being and Alice User. As does Kirihara’s bff Kisa. To round out the group of enemies-turned-friends-who-will-work-together-to-collect-the-Eternal-Alice-without-having-to-fight-eachother group is a young genius researcher Kirika who wants to know more about Aruto’s connection that allows him to enter the spaces where the girls fight.
Then there’s all the other girls, some of whom still have real importance to the story and some who have a few panels or 2 scenes total. But with a whole bunch of girls to design, the creators reached out to a whole lot of other people to have them create designs! Eventually the battle gets down to the last few girls, there’s a confrontation with the guy running the whole thing, and while the anime and manga vary quite a bit the whole time, in both version Aruto ends up with Kirihara. Oh and Arisu was created by Aruto’s super imagination powers.
The Promise: Here on is subjective, particularly with what I personally saw as potential from this series. because I need you to understand how much I want to like this series.
~Alice in Wonderland themed: I know some people aren’t alice fans and that’s fine you do you but as a big alice fan this is great. We have a few alice episodes and themed characters amongst series like CCS and MGRP, and even Alice themes in other series like Tweeny Witches and Alice 19th. But damn it I am down for Alice series.
~Giant Keyyyyyyyys: Yeah yeah Kingdom Hearts but these keys are much more staff like for a lot of the characters which ads and air of elegance rather than the KH ones that for me at least feel well designed for big ol props rather than actual weapons. We also get...
~Weapon variety: It counts as a key if it’s a thorn whip that can be shaped like a key right? How about a giant pocket knife? Crossbows can also be keys. Hush. And we have this variety because
~Guest Artists: For magical girl series where we have a variety of outfits designed by different people, we have Kagihime, Uta~Kata, and uhh I guess Magia Record? But that’s a mobile game with a hella number of characters and with how mobile game works I wouldn’t count it just because it’s less the intent of the series to have variety and more the nature of having lots of girls. (Precure doesn’t count because unless I missed a memo each season’s set is still by one designer). If a series isn’t about a team and therefore doesn’t need cohesion, bringing in other artists is a great way for variety and new looks.
~The long term goal: Fighting with other people who love the same piece of media you do in hopes of creating new material that will be viewed as official? That’s just fandom nowadays. But it’s a legitimate interesting concept, and opens up so many doors for a message for the series, be it ‘what you create is no less valuable than the canon work’ or ‘it’s hard to let go when something you love doesn’t have more to it but you can still love it for what it is’ or ‘bond with the people who like the thing you like ya idiot instead of fighting about it’. The concept is interesting and there are so many narrative ways you can take this.
~Gays: Between the anime and manga, we have at least 5 wlw. Is it a magical girl series without some gays? (side note- the manga had a short thing where the MC wears a girl’s uniform and is pretty comfortable in it and while there is no way this was the intent, between that and the emphasis on the stories that live in girls and how the fight zones have no men, I’m just saying, Trans girl Aruto.)
~Greater Fairy Tale Premise: We meet a Little Match Girl based MG who is obsessed with Andersen rather than the Alice books, and touch on a Sleeping Beauty character in the manga. The manga at least implies that classic stories and fairy tale authors uh. Live on in a liminal space as immortals with world warping powers within that world and there could be opportunities for other girls in the real world to fight for Little Mermaid 2: Electric Boogaloo.
The Good: Everything has positive points, no matter how bad it is.
~Character Designs: Some of those looks slap. As do most of their weapons.
~Backgrounds: I have a strong opinion on backgrounds in anime that can be easily boiled down to old watercolor backgrounds good, modern filtered photos as background bad, and as a 2006 series, this might not be Memole nice but they’re quite attractive.
~Splash Pages: Easily my favorite thing after the designs, each chapter’s title page for the manga just has a character standing in a setting. Which is not everyone’s thing I’m sure but it’s a nice simplistic way to let the characters breathe imo. Even if at least some of the settings were deffo traced. But that’s how backgrounds work to some extent? If I ever get to the Met again, I am tracking down this exact photo, but here is a likely candidate for an example.
~Different Versions: I do not understand the need to make an adaptation that tries to be a 1:1. Kagihime had the same ideas and characters and did some of the same beats but very much had a different finale story and a lot of changes in the middle (like the Alice cops in the manga). Again, not something everyone probably wants I’m sure, but I very appreciate this, especially since the Anime kept good pace with the number of Manga chapters (reading the manga again while watching the anime at 3.8x speed just now was very interesting to see the different interpretations of events in a different medium.)
The ‘Fine’: Yeah.
~Anime Visuals: Look 2006 was still early enough into digipaint that I will give it a total pass on these. The colors are too bright but in a very bland way, the lineart is nothing interesting, and the faces are. Iffy. But it’s not total garbage to look at (probably helped by backgrounds and character designs...) it just came out in an era where not enough people knew how to stylize things to account for the weakness of the tools of the time. (It was 4 years earlier but I feel Kagihime is the polar opposite of Chobits with its painfully bland color palette while still being just. Flat. Sorry for the drive by Chii.)
~Music?: There sure were songs. Obviously, they are nothing to me.
The Bad: CW for.... somehow all the big things to an extent.
~Fanservice: Look, I am fine with fanservice, especially for a series that’s, ya know, not targeted at kids, big Mai Hime fan here even if I would recommend skipping the panty thief episode. And honestly the series generally isn’t fanservicey, at least by the modern standards of having the camera choosing under the skirt rather than an over the shoulder shot like I’ve seen plenty in other shows. Even the sexier outfits like the rose whip dominatrix aren’t bad BUT. When the girls fight. One takes her phallic key and drives it into another girls chest between the boobs while the loser cries in pain and then her book comes out and when the victor rips out pages, the loser’s clothes also rip. It is very SuperS Amazon Trio assault metaphor-y. There’s also a bit of fanservice with the sister becauseeeee....
~Incest: If you read the premise up there, first wow good job because I’m sure not re-reading that, you might have noticed I said MC ends up with his sister. As someone who is a big mythology fan and watches plenty of anime, I have a decent tolerance for your obligatory ‘oh we’re siblings but actually cousins so our feelings are okay’ or whatever the fuck Citrus has going on I don’t know that series and I don’t vibe BUT. I have limits and boy did this series go beyond that because multiple episodes are dedicated to the sister being in love with the brother? And the brother returns her feelings but knows that they are wrong so he put everything he likes in his sister into his version of Alice who, of course, physically manifests as Arisu who he creates accidentally with his uh. Magic imagination powers. But again in both versions MC still ends up with his sister. Hey, at least the manga eventually said the boy was adopted when the sister was like, 3, so if nothing else no blood relations? The anime did not ad this. -_-
~Under Utilized Characters: Arisu’s gradual revelation that she has no childhood memories because she isn’t a real person is so interesting and they don’t do nothing with it but also? That’s the kind of thing I personally would love to dig into and Kagihime, while touching on this world shattering revelation, easily loops back to So Anyway She Should Fight For The Man and to hell with developing a life or personality outside of what has been written for her. The rest of the main 5 were 2 note characters which. Could be worse? The most interesting character ends up being the child genius who accidentally murdered her childhood bestie (and/or lover? depending on version) and her coming to terms with that (the friend is alive but the version changes how and why she thinks she’s dead). Then the villain has the motivation of ‘i lost my creativity and now have become an immortal living outside of normal space and am getting girls to fight each other because that’s like a story so I’m still relevant right?’. But shoutout to the anime for then taking death of the author literally. The numerous other girls are canon fodder outside of like. The manga version of the dead gf and the little match girl.
~Battle Royale: This is not a thing I have an issue with generally. Again, but Mai Hime fan, I need to read MGRP 11, BUT by not developing the non-main girls there is no emotional connection which makes them just canon fodder and that’s boring as sin for a royale system. The initial main character fights revolve so much around the MC guy being there that they fall flat, and the 2 or 3 final battles in both versions still feel without any stakes. Also for a royale thing most of the characters don’t actually die, which cool! Neat! Except when they do? Some nobodies and a somebody are murdered (at least in the manga) and the tone never feels like it’s supposed to be upping the stakes, it’s just. Some people are dead now. And do you want to guess which of the main characters died?
~Gays: Oh boy the best friend of the brother-complex sister is in love with her and (in the manga) dies. She does apparently get better for the last chapter but the death itself is only felt by the rest of the cast for a page or two before we go back to feeling sad big brother wants to kiss his mentally generated sister clone rather than his actual sister u_u. Bury your gays is nothing new, but I wonder if it was also intended to be justified because Guess Who Is Creepy and a bit Perverted? Oh look the lesbian keeps the used swimsuit of her beloved and manipulates events to get an indirect kiss and when she sees the sister trying to strange Arisu for a moment she decides to do it for the sister? It’s not good. You want bad gay rep in a magical girl series, well here ya go. We also had a nobody in the first(second?) episode whose story pages reveal her having a kiss with a girl, and then we also have the prodigy again and- in the manga- her. Uh. childhood lover who she thought she killed but the girl has been wiping her mind over and over so prodigy remembers ‘killing’ the friend and not the she’s alive so she can keep? fucking with her? Toxic!
~Sexual Content: But wait you say, you already covered fanservice! Ah but that is sexual content for titilation. This is sexual content for dramatic backstory! The red riding hood character was sexually assaulted, another character was manipulated into sex first as a teen and then more often to ‘get into the publishing industry’, and the same writer forces some aggressive kisses on the MC. None of it is gratuitous which is nice, but also, was it necessary? Not making a new point for this but read riding hood’s dog was also murdered so unnecessary animal death gets tossed on in there.
~Male Lead: You can have a male, non magical character as the main character surrounded by magical girls. This is not how to do it. If I can make a vicious and hopefully not understood reference, Aruto is basically Tate from the Mai Hime Manga. If you understood that, I am so sorry. If you didn’t, congrats! Don’t read the manga. Or do and send me asks about the iconic final page of the first volume (18+). Anyway, this dude is boring, everything revolves around him, BUT I’ll be generous and say at least this isn’t a harem series? It looks like it out of context but it’s just a triangle with a fun attached scientist and token lesbian.
~Premise: They didn’t make good use of it. The initial goals of ‘take other girls pages from their soul books because if we get enough we unlock a third alice book’ is good! And then we add the twist that that was never going to happen and either if we get all the pages we can grant a wish, or these fights are just happening for the amusement of and asshole. Either way, yeah okay I guess. But at no point do we ever achieve this forbidden wish granting book and the asshole just. Lives. Nothing happens to him. His peers don’t even dunk on him. The only real changes from the beginning and the end of the series are: the siblings are now chill with dating, and the scientist lady won’t turn into a child in magical spaces. Oh. Yeah.
~Why did we make this adult a child sometimes?: I think we know why. Stop trying to get those types of folks to watch your already meh series. I also could have sworn at points in the past looking up images for this series I’ve seen extra art for Yuuri the Thumbelina-y Alice User that seemed like it would fit alongside anything by POP. You know, the Moetan guy. If you don’t know, god I wish that were me.
Wrap Up: I have definitely forgotten some points and am well within my rights to ad to this whenever I remember more points but uh. Yeah.
Listen you want an alice themed battle royale with nice outfits? Rozen maiden is right there. Battle Royale magical girl series that’s good with fanservice? Mai Hime. Series with different outfits while being based on a classic story? Pretear.
Hope anyone who read all of this at least got what I was saying, even if they don’t agree with it. And thanks for reading because whoops.
#why do ya'll let me write so damn many words#thanks ya'll for letting me write so many words#kagihime eternal alice rondo#long post#text#not fashion#whoops 3k words
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S5 Ep13: How to Get Away With Cheating in the Card Olympics
It’s been a little while since Pegasus made a card that screwed us years after it was developed...and so it’s time for it to happen again. Good ol Pegasus, screwing us all and not even knowing he’s doing it.
First off, it took me until this episode to realize that Leon and Zigfried are German and Leon is playing a Grimm Brother’s deck. I guess I didn’t notice before now because Leon was hiding his identity. But now that I know his deck is because he’s just German it’s like...well OK. That’s kind of cute. Better than that time they had the American play a deck filled with guns.
And that actually...fully explains why they are all dressed old timey. I didn’t pick up on it until just now...they’re referencing old ass fairy tales. But wtv, I still like my reaching theories of why Zigfried dresses like...that.
PS, my twitter just notified me that lots of people are getting a ‘Hime Haircut’, which is exactly the doo that Zigfried wears this season with the cropped side bangs. And like...are we sure? I see Kpop wearing it and Tik Tok kids wearing wigs but...I have yet to see a Hime in the wild. Course I haven’t gone outside in like a year so...maybe tens of thousands of people really did do a Hime Haircut during the Quarantine.
But, damn it, I decided to look at some photos, and a bunch of them looked pretty bad, but a couple looked pretty dope, and now I’m a little bit tempted to get a Hime...but I feel like it took a decade to get out of my bangs phase and like...Do I need two layers of bangs? I have naturally straight hair, I could do this, this haircut was made for me, but...
I just don’t know if I should get a haircut that looks like I’m an anime cosplayer when I can’t back it up. Nope. Cannot get this haircut. I know this haircut was made for teenagers or artists in their 30′s, and literally no one else, but no, this will be a mistake just like the side bangs I gave myself in 2006.
(looks over at scissors)
(read more under the cut)
(get it? Cut?)
Leon recalls that his brother very nicely gave him a card, and he’s so excited to finally do any activity involving his crazy ass family, that he just blindly does it.
This entire episode is about Yami not doing a hellscape when he witnesses cheating, and like...it is S5...it’s been a little while since anyone’s done a real good cheat on him, and he opened the door to darkness, and they got devoured by their own Tamagachi. It’s been a while.
And like the curse of Episode 13 was just a theory I had--but this particular Episode 13 is probably the most tame of all the 13′s (and yet, the most un-tame of this arc, which is a pretty chill arc, overall)
Yet...while this episode still fits in with their universe because the Kaiba’s are very proud so they can’t admit their duel disk has a flaw and therefore can’t forfeit the game, it kind of stretches the imagination a bit for the sake of the plot. Straight up we have a LOT of characters in this arc and they all just stood there and watched it happened.
It could have been also because this is like...televised...that no one wants to start throwing this little boy off the nearest blimp. I just wish that was addressed in the episode, other than “listen...Kaiba must allow this card to be played...or all his Duel Disks are lies.”
His Duel Disk almost caused the end of planet Earth a few weeks back, so I think it’s fine. I think this is a negligible problem to have when your disk shoots projectiles out of each end and has sharp folding edges in the shape of a blade--almost attempting to slice your face off every time you wave that thing around.
Yes, he’s trying to restore his reputation after the whole Dartz thing...but this is like...not that bad in the scale of things that have happened in the past several seasons. Maybe it’s just the last straw that broke the camels back here? One thing too far--’your disk played a broke card, Kaiba, I am pulling my investments and I refuse to go to your theme parks. I was here when you blew up that island. I was here when your company was literally bought out by the illluminati...but if that duel disk can’t play cards correctly--we’re done here.’ And TBH...that’s a very Yugioh mentality to have.
Like remember that time that Elon musk threw a brick at one of his new weird looking cars and the windshield cracked? But he was like “Oh...that was just a...listen the windshields don’t shatter, you saw nothing.” and still released the car anyway? Was kind of reminded of that.
Now...he didn’t actually go into the Dev room, we’ll go into how the hell he got this card, but first, a visit to the Kaiba Dev room.
OOOOOOooooooooh
That’s so bright!
It reminds me of how in the 90′s, the only real thing I knew to do on my computer was change the colors of the UI, so I just used the ugliest ass UI known to man for my family’s computers. I hope these computers have a mouse that leaves a tail behind and I hope that mouse is in the shape of a flying sparkling dragon.
Anyway, Duke speaks what’s on our minds:
Meanwhile, Pegasus, watching this happen over a glass of wine from inside his bathtub at Castle Pegasus, takes one very long sip while sinking into a pile of bubbles.
Seto at first is like “I literally own this tournament so thanks for losing? I don’t know why you threw it out into the trash but thanks?” But Zigfried pressured him so hard that everyone on Earth would judge his ass, and tried so hard to change the definition of what cheating even is, that Seto relented almost as if to shut Zigfried the hell up.
Zigfried explained that, technically, it’s still reads as a legal card on the disk and isn’t reaaally against the rules. Even though the rules say it’s against the rules--what are rules anyway?
Thankfully we have the King of “I dictate what the rules are AKA the rules of the universe, which I would show you, I just don’t feel like it right now, and I’m a little worried about opening that Pandora’s box, but I clearly know the rules of this card game, as stated on this Home Depot plaque that Seto gave me after I won the last tourney.”
Leon gets pretty upset about this--not so much screwing Seto Kaiba, but over the fact his brother stole his only chance at trying to beat Yugi Muto fair and square. So, trying to retain what little card honor he has left, Leon tries to self sabotage so everyone can just go the hell home.
OK so...do you think he put a floppy disk into the paper card? Like straight up how did he do that? Feel free to post your theories because like...how do you hack a paper card? Like do we even have a canon explanation of what these cards are or what they are made out of and how they theoretically work?
Anyway, now that they’ve spent a good portion of this episode discussing if this card should or should not be played, and the ethics and philosophy surrounding that, we find out that none of this matters because Zigfried was actually just stalling.
(He hacked the card so it had a virus like straight up how did he DO that without making a new card?)
Huh.
Y’all, what if I could just delete Google?
Can you imagine?
Like I know this is a kid’s show so it follows kid’s show logic and I will absolutely allow this ridiculous master plan and I will not question it, but think with me for a sec:
What if you could just delete Disney?
Damn. That’s some Y2K scare tactics propaganda right there. That’s some good YA dystopian fiction stuff.
Yo is Zigfried the good guy? He’s not, but if this were a YA novel he would be, right? Good on him.
I...do not know how the logic in Zigfried’s brain works, but if someone deleted all the files in my collaborators company and showed up at my front door and was like “I heard you were looking for a new collaborator?” I’d stick him face first into a blank paper card.
Which is, logically, the next step to Zigfried’s plan that no one has bothered to tell him yet. You just don’t mess with Pegasus, especially after all the stuff he went though with getting murdered by Mai, and Dartz showing up, he’d be so pissed right now. He might not be technically magical anymore--but it’s clear after last season that he’s still magical enough. This is a man who’s let out into the wild maybe a couple of scary cards--but hell knows how many are buried in his huge ass castle just waiting to do a murder.
This is just Zigfried hassling a hornet and the hornets nest is like...right there.
And so next episode we are going to...destroy the card? Hell, next episode might be entirely a card game and I might only have 2 caps.
Anyway, just letting you know that I typed this last night, and then had dreams that I got a Hime Haircut and hella loved it, woke up at 5:30 AM thinking about that haircut, and have since been just...
...I mean I shouldn’t do it...I cannot give myself unironic Von Schroeder hair...
...
...but what if it’s dope though?
(and here’s the link to read these from the beginning in chrono order from S1. Wish I categorized in seasons but alas I did not have that forsight back when I thought there were only 3 seasons of Yugioh total. I have since learned.)
https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono
#yugioh#YGO#yu gi oh#episode recap#photo recap#S5#Ep13#Yugi Muto#leon von schroeder#zigfried von schroeder#seto kaiba#grandpa muto#mokuba kaiba#and literally everyone else who stood there and just watched it happen#Just thinking about how one hacks a card and I feel like that's totally possible but how though?
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I watched the first episode of the new Taiga Kamakura dono no 13 nin.
I love games (Kuon for example) and mangas set in the Heian/Kamakura era thus I also love when a Taiga is set in the Heian/Kamakura era, it‘s so rarely done (many prefer to tackle Sengoku and Bakumatsu since the viewers are more used to the characters, Heian/Kamakura is also way more complicated thus this might also be a reason).
I have also been to Kamakura once when I was 17 thus it‘s nice memories.
So far the Heian/Kamakura Taiga I have seen were Yoshitsune, Taira no Kiyomori (I also own the condensed DVD) and parts of Kusa Moeru.
Despite no liking Sanadamaru by Koki Mitani (characters and plotlines I considered important were neglected or downplayed, unimportant characters and stuff got way too much screentime, also Sanada Taiheiki is way better) I am giving Kamakura dono a chance.
I really liked the opening song.
The Hojo clan is a fascinating theme and I think that the era after Yoritomo dies is so interesting since it‘s pure chaos. Puppet youngster shoguns, assassinations, plotting courtiers, rebellions non stop. Many of the people involved in this stuff (Hatakeyama Shigetada, Wada Yoshimori, Minamoto no Yoriie, Miura Yoshimura) have already been casted thus we will likely see these events in some extent.
I also think that the idea of a ruthless family is cool (the last ruthless characters were in Fuurin Kazan). Most of the Taiga characters are too nice and considerate of others.
I could even understand if the Hojo are portrayed as plotting since if they don‘t it might be their clan that will be toast since they era they lived and ruled in was brutal.
Since I know too much about the era I know the ages of the characters and they are super off this time in the beginning for basically everyone.
The Taiga starts in 1175. The real Hojo Yoshitoki was born in 1163 thus only 12 years old at the time. Yoritomo was in his late 20s, Yoshitoki’s aunt Yae who was Yoritomo‘s first affair/wife and mother of Sentsurumaru was in her 20s, Yoshitoki’s sister Masako in her late teens, Hatakeyama Shigetada was 11 etc.
I understand though why they want to depict the Ito clan since Yoshitoki‘s mother was an Ito and the sister of Yae (both Yoshitoki‘s mother and Yae were daughters of Ito Sukechika). The Ito family will later play a role in the story of the Soga brothers again.
Several female key characters like Hime no Mae (very interesting since she was an employee of Yoritomo and a Hiki clan member), Iga no Kata (ruthless character) and Yoshitsune’s Shizuka Gozen still haven‘t been announced yet I am curious about their casting.
One thing I am really happy for is that Imai Kanehira will appear in Kamakura dono. He is my favorite character in the Heike Monogatari thus I always love when he appears in Heian/Kamakura era media and his relationship with Yoshinaka is the most touching. I hope his fierceness and his relationship with Yoshinaka gets enough screentime and I hope that the battle of Awazu is well done.
The costumes so far don‘t impress me since I have noticed many recycled costumes from earlier productions again like in Sanadamaru.
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Bloom Me A Flower, Maybe Two
(AO3)
Summary: Silly fluff, Kaneki meeting his daughter for the first time and giving her a name.
Word Count: 1,582
Notes: This was the first work I ever shared online and I deleted it along with my account during a particularity difficult time. Although reading it now, I see a lot of things I would like to fix, I am still proud of being able to share it.
*****
“Touka is in labor. Come quick.”
The call was short, like all of Ayato’s calls, but it was enough to send a jolt of panic through Kaneki’s body. He was on the outskirts of the city with some members from the United Front and was preparing to start running in whatever direction led to the hospital until Hide placed a calming hand on his shoulder, implicitly understanding the terrified look on Kaneki’s face, and telling him they could take Marude’s car.
So that was how he found himself squished in the backseat between Takeomi (Yoriko was already with Touka) and Itou (just excited about seeing a baby) while Hide (for the father’s emotional support) took the front seat and Marude (who wouldn’t allow anyone else to drive his new car) drove, grumbling about having to leave the mission early.
Itou was excitedly asking Kaneki a lot of questions like is it a boy or a girl? (he didn’t know, they wanted to keep it as a surprise, but he could’ve sworn Kimi slipped and said a she during their last appointment). Natural or cesarean? (natural if they could help it, despite his own objections to Touka having to put herself through so much pain after seeing that educational video). Would the child eat normal food? (Most likely if Kimi’s predictions were right, and they usually are). Did they have the nursery ready? (It’s been ready for a month with Urie personally doing the drawings on the wall). Will they have anyone to help the first few weeks the baby is born? (They had so many people volunteering to help that they couldn’t schedule all of them, and he and Touka wanted to spend the first night alone with the baby to bond anyway). What were they planning to name the baby? (They actually had no idea, but it wasn’t due to lack of trying).
Question after question, Kaneki appreciated Itou trying to take his mind off worrying about Touka but he really couldn’t focus with him at all. He had read too many books and too many disaster birth stories on mom forums to be able to just relax, and he hated that he wasn’t there to support Touka through what was probably the most painful experience of her life. He kept asking Marude if he could speed up and the man kept telling him, through gritted teeth, that it was the fastest he could go in a residential area.
After what seemed like an eternity, they finally reached the hospital and Kaneki all but jumped through the window and into the hospital, running up the stairs to the birth ward. He was met with Yoriko who was crying outside room 125 (the room they booked in advance, Touka thought it was a lucky number), and she came running towards him as soon as she lifted her head. “She is so beautiful, Kaneki, so beautiful. They both are.” she said through sobs while hugging him tightly.
Kaneki mentally beat himself up for missing the birth (and considered beating up Marude before the more sensible version of himself took over) but he returned Yoriko's hug and thanked her. “Go in, she’s waiting for you” Yoriko gently pushed him to the door "I'll join everyone in the cafeteria so you can find me there if you need anything".
Kaneki stood for what seemed like another eternity at the door. He was overwhelmed by so many emotions that he felt a little tingling at the tips of his fingers. On the other side of that door was Touka, and their child, the child she fought so hard to keep, the child they both tried building a better world for, the culmination of all their hopes and dreams. He was so happy and scared that he felt his heart could stop any moment now.
He braced himself and opened the door to be met with an immense amount of sunlight (unusual for this time of year). Once his eyes adjusted, he was witnessing the most beautiful sight in his life. His wife, Touka Kaneki (whom he expected to be exhausted after such an ordeal), was absolutely glowing, looking at the bundle in her arms with the biggest smile he had ever seen. The scene was so perfect that it looked like a painting and Kaneki took a few moments staring to preserve the memory in his mind.
“Touka, I am so sorry I missed the birth” he apologized quietly, but Touka looked up at him, still beaming, and gestured him to come closer.
“It doesn’t matter, you’re here now, come look at our daughter” she turned the bundle towards Kaneki so he can see.
“She has sesame pudding hair!”
Those were not the first words Kaneki wanted to say upon first meeting his daughter but he couldn’t help himself. Touka laughed and nodded “I was surprised too but it’s cute, I like it”.
Mesmerized, Kaneki couldn’t help but agree as he gently stroked the hair of his sleeping daughter with his finger. “Poor thing was exhausted after the birth and Kimi doing her exam so she is just taking a well earned rest”, Touka brushed her cheek with her finger and the little girl scrunched her nose, much to her parent’s delight.
Kaneki was still in awe, he had read and heard stories, but nothing could compare to the feeling of warmth spreading through his body now. He moved his finger to his daughter’s hand, and she quickly gripped it. He read about this instinct in babies but in that moment, it felt like she was welcoming him.
“We need to give her a name; I can’t keep calling her Usagi forever. Unless…” Touka looked up at Kaneki with a mischievous glint in her eyes.
“We are not naming her Usagi! We discussed this already!”
Touka pouted playfully and turned to look at her child’s face again. “What will we name her then?”
They went through Kaneki’s list of names with meaningful kanji again, Touka rejecting each one again saying they were too old, too pretentious, or just didn’t feel right, then they moved to the names suggested to them by friends and family (Ayato being a huge supporter of any variation of Usagi), but none of them felt right either. They finally got to the list of ridiculous names Hide sent them after creating an online poll with Saiko. Surprisingly enough, Usagi was the most normal name on that list. Kaneki put the list away after reading the first few names, not wanting to name his daughter Toyotama-hime or after a manga character.
With Touka resting her head on his shoulder, Kaneki tried to brainstorm a good name but he was drawing blanks. His eyes drifted back to his sleeping daughter, noticing for the first time the blanket wrapped around her “the hospital has some really nice blankets, don’t they?”
“Oh this isn’t from the hospital, Yomo gave me this. He embroidered that flower on top himself, with Uta’s help of course”. As he felt the intricate design on the blanket, Kaneki couldn’t help but feel his heart swell a little at the thought of all those people in his life that loved him and his family, those people who willingly intertwined their lives with his and allowed him to be part of theirs. It’s been months but he still wasn’t sure if he would ever get used to the feeling.
“It made me really happy” Touka suddenly spoke up after a long period of silence, her voice a little somber “back when we first moved underground, I was really afraid we would spend the rest of our lives there, if we managed to live long enough. I never liked that place when I was little and I really dreaded the idea of us dying in a place with no sunlight.”
She had never spoken so candidly about that before, and Kaneki’s heart ached a little at the memory of all they went through during that period.
“But I prayed back then that we would get a sign, even if it’s one flower blooming through a crack” she looked up at him again, eyes filled with tears and a small smile on her face “I didn’t think my prayers would be heard but they were, I got my flower when I found out I was carrying our daughter, and I just knew things would turn around, I would make them turn around myself if I had to” they both chuckled through tears as Kaneki brought her head to his lip and kissed it over and over again.
Kaneki felt his mind clear for a moment and as if it was lurking there all along, he finally thought of the right name.
“How about Ichika?”
“Huh?”
“For a name, how about Ichika?”
One flower.
“Ichika” Touka whispered the name then repeated it, a little louder each time, her face brightening up as if she had finally found what she was looking for, “Ichika, do you like that name?” The little girl in her arms suddenly sneezed and woke herself up. She looked up at her parents with big curious eyes and a little smiled formed on her lips.
“I think she likes it.”
“Kaneki Ichika, has a nice ring to it” Kaneki felt a strange sense of pride at his name being carried by the symbol of hope to Touka and himself.
“And it’s really useful for keeping track of the kids in the future” Touka joked, gently elbowing Kaneki in the ribs.
“You want another baby already! Aren’t you tired?!”
“Not right now! Maybe in a few years. I want us to take our time getting to know little Ichika first”
Ichika made an incomprehensible baby sound that her parents interpreted as agreement.
Overjoyed with the prospect of raising a small child in a world that will be much kinder to her than it was to them when they were little. Kaneki and Touka couldn’t wait to build their life with the new addition to their family.
Their story had just begun.
#touken#fanfic#ken kaneki#kirishima touka#Touka Kirishima#kaneki ken#ichika kaneki#kaneki ichika#kanetou#tg#tgre#tokyo ghoul#My writing
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Mysterylover Watches Bleach Episodes 164-165: All My Faves Try to Straight up Kill Each Other
(adding a cover pick from now on I think)
1. So back to Uryu and Renji’s fight huh. Dammit why Shonen always gotta leave the MCs bleeding to death for like 20 episodes.
2. I guess I should be responding more to their fight, I mean I like these two as well. But we just ditched the fascinating “What does GJ want with Hime” plot for these shenanigans, so I’m just a tad bit impatient to get back to that.
3. FINALLY BACK TO ICHIGO. Nel is ok and she’s saying his name a lot while he doesn’t respond. So he’s apparently dead?
4. WHEN THE HELL DID GRIMMJOW GET HERE? WASN’T HE THREATENING ORIHIME A LITTLE WHILE AGO? (Also Nel and GJ appear to know each other. )
5. GJ why are you kicking Ichigo? AND WHAT THE FUCK HE HAS A TIED UP AND GAGGED ORIHIME UNDER HIS CLOAK IN CHAINS?!?! HOLY CRAP DUDE
6. Hime is now looking at what appears to be Ichigo’s corpse. OMG GRIMMJOW BROUGHT HER HERE TO HEAL ICHI? Are you heel turning GJ? Also Ulqui is returning to Hime’s cell to find the evil girls and castigate them.
7. Nel is begging Hime to heal Ichi. I don’t think she needs any encouragement honey. Ill admit Nel’s constant screaming is a little annoying so I do kinda feel GJ when he tells her to shut up (assuming she’s some kinda immortal instead of an Actual Kid)
8. Hime is, of course, healing him, but struggling with it. GJ explains Ulqui did it. OK so GJ is mad at Ulqui for Taking His Prey and Hime does in fact succeed in healing Ichi. I got you GJ. No one else is allowed to kill Ichi while you’re around.
9. Just as GJ name drops Ulqui Ulqui appears. He’s like Candyman.
10. Damn so now almost all my faves are in the same room. We’re gonna have a four way fight between Ulqui Ichi GJ and Hime? yes. Or whatever will happen here.
11. Ulqui: “WTF Are you doing Hime?” GJ: smirks. Hime: “Um...it’s complicated”. Ulqui: Hand her over. GJ: Attempted murder. OK so GJ is officially betraying the bad guys? I think? I mean he’s trying to kill Ulqui so clearly he’s not in a good position here.
12. We do get GJ vs Ulqui which is cool and blows lots of shit up. They’re legitimate threats to each other though. Hime is standing there shielding Ichi and like “WTF WAS THAT?” GJ reveals he sealed Ulqui in another dimension.
13. HOLY CRAP HIME REFUSES?! GJ CHOKES HER?! AND SHE STILL REFUSES. HOLY CRAP SHE’S REFUSING TO ENABLE THIS SELF-DESTRUCTIVE SHIT ANYMORE. Oh my god.
14. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a healer character in a Shonen do this before. Like even Recovery Girl in MHA - she said she wouldn’t but she always does anyway. Hime being the first ever to legitimately say “NOPE. ENOUGH’S ENOUGH. GO AHEAD AND CHOKE ME DUDE I DNGAF. WON’T DO IT.” Holy crap.
15. Ichi jumps in with what little strength he’s got to stop GJ choking Hime. Thanks Ichi. Though he immediately asks Hime to heal him and GJ. Even though she just said she wouldn’t.
16. Oh. Oh. I get it. This is the GOLD OL FASHIONED SHONEN RIVALRY THING. GJ has apparently decided to replace Uryu as The Rival. (Does this mean I have to switch to Ichigo/GJ? I have no idea how old GJ is supposed to be, but I’m down for Immortal Rukia x 16 year old Hime so clearly we’re working on vampire rules here)
17. Oh and it looks like Hime did heal them. Dammit Hime (or not dammit cause we’re gonna get this fight.) Ichi tells the ladies not to worry about him. Um dude you end up hospitalized every goddamn arc.
18. HIME PATS NEL ON THE HEAD. OMG HIME’S ADOPTED HER TOO. She and Nel debate about whether or not Ichi will really win. Hime explains that Ichi wouldn’t lie, and that she knows him well enough to know that.
19. See this kinda stuff is why I don’t mind that these two are gonna be the Official Couple the way most Shonen couples tend to annoy me. Hime genuinely knows Ichi as a person, she’s not watching him from a distance and never a part of his life. She genuinely knows his whole story, what makes him tick, and who he really is. It’s not perfect per se but it’s so much better than what I’ve seen in any other shonen couple’s development.
20. Ichi and GJ’s fight keeps going still with lots of big flashy moves. LOL GJ is annoyed that Ichi isn’t excited to kill him for hurting Rukia. Senpai isn’t paying him enough Rival Attention.
21. Please don’t kill Nel or hime to motivate Ichi to want to kill you GJ. I like you but you’re on thin ice with that Choking Hime thing from earlier. GJ is confronting him about why he didn’t just grab Hime and leave and end this arc right there. Hm.
22. GJ makes an interesting point here. He claims Ichi came here to fight and not to save Hime. You know I was thinking this back in the first arc, where it seemed like he was prioritizing fighting people over saving Ruki. Like this arc though he’s been way more focused on the saving part of things though so I’m not sure if that’s true here. Like has he grown since then? Or is GJ actually right?
23. Ichi notices that GJ seems to be aiming at Hime. Holy crap dude that’s cheating. And wow Ichi instantly goes Hollow Masky to save her! And all feral-y and shit. You know I feel like that sorta proves that he really is here for Hime, since he didn’t start fighting this way until GJ threatened her.
24. Well those were two really good episodes! Nice development for GJ and Ulqui, Ichi and Hime. So many of my faves got some good focus here. I feel like I need to legitimately process it for a sec.
-So Hime is starting to feel like she doesn’t want to enable Ichi’s Constantly Fighting to the Death thing anymore. Interesting development, I wonder how that will play out going forward?
-Ichi’s motives have been cast in an interesting shadow. Is he only in this for the thrill of a good fight (like Goku) or is he in it to save his friends (like Naruto)? Which flavor of Shonen hero are you Ichi?
-Grimmjow seems to have officially betrayed Aizen for the sake of a good fight and has identified himself clearly as Ichigo’s rival. Interesting - i guess this has been building for a while.
-The development of Ichigo and Hime’s relationship in this episode was really interesting. It raises great questions about Ichigo’s side of things - was he doing this for a fight, or because he cares for Hime? Little of A, little of B? This is gonna be good
#Bleach#mysterylover watches bleach#orihime inoue#ichigo kurosaki#grimmjow jaegerjaquez#renji abarai#ishida uryuu#ulquiorra cifer#neliel tu oderschvank#ichihime#lol grimmjow has some serious issues#he's this show's vegeta isn't he#i had a feeling#it's so ironic to me#that ichihime gets so much less fandom love#than pairings like naruhina or izuocha#yet it's so much better developed#(so far anyway)#than either one of those two#like as early as chapter 3#ichi got to do more in hime's life#and she in his#than most shonen ever let#the love interest and protag do in their whole runtime#i mean it's not my otp or anything#but i can definitely appreciate good#character development
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Sacrifice
SO, this is angst based on an episode from TVD, which I used to watch. I had in mind almost recreating an episode but then thought “nahhh” So at least I tried to innovate!
This is a one shot, so no updates after that because I love making people suffer, obviously.
Slight OOCness, because it’s a rather dark world.
TRIGGER WARNING : Major character death + mental issues that are camouflaged but not that much
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One does not decide their fate. You are born from your mother, grow and meet people, if fate is merciful, you meet the one you were created to love. You spend a lifetime with them, you learn how to love, how to care, how to live. You get to understand what it is like to choose for the first time. And, after a life worth of adventures, stories and feelings, you are put to rest.
Once upon a time Ichigo and Orihime believed in this reality. Believed that life could be harsh, but they would climb out of the pit of darkness to reach the sunlight, and enjoy it.
.
.
.
Like all days, it was sunny. In their minds, the vast grass filed in front of them was always illuminated, the light breeze always brought new and known scents to their noses, and they could feel whole again. They could feel the warmth of the Sun, the touch of the other on their hand. The whisper of the wind caressing their ears.
In their inner world, all was alright. All was safe and loving.
The exterior world was corrupted by uncaring people. It was dark and messy and cruel, nothing good could ever come out of it.
Especially people.
Their families had left, stolen away by the frightening death that loomed over each human being. From the father, whose childish behavior always pushed Ichigo out of his skin to the sisters and the brother that loved their sibling in the purest way possible. The sisters looked out for their brother, asking for his protection and his support. The brother watched over his sister, calming her when the world was latching onto her, pulling her out of the black waters of her mind.
But now, all this happiness they could vaguely remember had been taken away. Vanished, disappeared in thin air. Where did they go? Where were they all now? In the sky or in the dirt?
There were no such things as an answer.
“Let’s get going, Orihime.”
The rough voice brought another wide smile on her face. She felt his hand hold hers tenderly, and nodding her head, Orihime followed him docily, letting him lead the way, like he always did.
The world was upside down : debris of buildings here and there, some gigantic from a building or a skyscraper, others small enough to step on. Blocks of stones and piles of wood and iron littered the floor, waiting for more scavengers to dig in them, try to find what was essential to live.
But living was not possible anymore. Not after bombs were dropped on Japan. It was said it was that way all over the world, but no one could say for sure. Was it true the world was destroyed by a radioactive menace? Was it true that the peoples of the Earth were reduced to nothing but wandering all day long to survive for another day?
Orihime could never know. Her world was a golden field with a orange-haired man sitting next to her.
Ichigo talked to her. Explained what he saw, what he felt, what was happening aroudn them. Anything he knew Orihime would love, he described it to her, from a rare seagull to a tiny sprout on the ground, trying its hardest to get some energy. Many times, Ichigo would snark a remark, something along the lines of “it’s fighting to exist, just like us.”. Orihime could do nothing but hold his hand tighter.
For months now, they walked the day to stop at night, cuddling closer no matter the heat of the weather, holding the other close. Closing her eyes didn’t change a thing : she was still in the field with him. She was still watching his traits shift to something relaxed and she was still amazed by him.
Ichigo shifted closer to her, taking the light bag off her back to let her poor spine breathe a little.
“What are you thinking about?”
She smiled. What an obvious question.
“You.”
She heard him chuckle, the sound soft.
“Ah, even in this situation, you keep on saying that.”
Orihime felt his other hand on the top of her head, caressing the not so souple hair, pushing a few strands out of her face, not that it mattered anyway. She didn’t say anything, only placed her chin against his hand.
Even in this situation, where the world she couldn’t see anymore was destroyed, their families and friends dead, Orihime would still be strong enough to smile. If it was fate to live, and if things happened for a reason, then all the suferring of today would vanish tomorrow, and they would meet again in the golden fields.
.
.
.
When two people travel together in a hostile place, it has its advantages and its inconvenients.
The first being only worrying about one person. No time wasted thinking about a potential individual that got lost. And with Orihime not being able to walk two steps alone, it was easy to stick together. The food, found in a deserted cafeteria or an abandoned house, was also easy to share.
The second... Their number was low, and if they encountered any threat, it was hard to outrun it, or to fight it. Orihime was Ichigo’s number one priority. Always had, always will be. But that only pushed him deeper into the danger.
And it was during the night they would feel the weakest. Ichigo could stand watch, not Orihime. Orihime could sleep, not Ichigo.
When one dreamed of the same place with the same person, the other was haunted by the nightmares of the reality laid bare in front of him. Destroyed houses, rotting corpses, violence in each corner.
One does not decide their fate. They are born with protection in their names, and it is their way of life to live by it. It is not their choice what they see or what they think.
He can’t help but think he should travel alone, leave Orihime to a safer place and come back to her once in a while with what she needs.
But if thinking is not up to him, then feeling is.
He can’t bear it. The thought of letting her be alone. Without him. He aches the moment he thinks of leaving her. So he doesn’t.
He aches the moment he sees her white eyes focus on nothing but her last memory of him, of them, in the field near a barn they used to like.
He aches when he knows how much she must suffer from being stuck in one place.
But because he feels and because those feelings lead him, he keeps them going. In a way, he started to believe fate would be kind after it is cruel. Maybe they will get better soon.
Until he knows they won’t.
Scavengers, unknown men and women, hiding behind old rusted glasses and torn rags encounter them one day. Without any discussion, any word, they attack them, they push them to the ground to rob them. Ichigo wants to fight, but Orihime grabs his hand, his arm, his body to have him close.
The golden fields in her head are starting to burn.
The foreigners attach them far away from each other. Ichigo is near an old electric pole, tied smartly, no chances of him getting out without getting injuried. Orihime on her side, she is told to sit near the fire, because what can a blind girl do? She can’t run, she can’t escape, she can’t help.
The golden fields in her head are burning now.
Ichigo watches her cry, clear tears coming out of foggy eyes, her head tilted to the sky, not daring to speak. And he sense she’s lossing it.
Not because they are seperated by a few meters. Not because he’s not holding her hand. Because she, who couldn’t see the world, couldn’t perceive how evil it had turned, encoutered it by herself. And the only safe place, physically and mentally, was getting ripped away from her.
Ichigo tried to fight his bounds. He tried to have this tiny shape of light and hope in his mind, that the day he would have fate on his side was here. That he could free himself, and her, and go back home.
It lasted for hours. Her crying, his pulling. Both were silent, one to not bring attention, the other too shocked and petrified to move.
Maybe it was luck, maybe it was fate, but they managed to get out. Ichigo shuffled his hands out of the ropes, pretending to sleep as a guard looked down on him. He turned around and the orange-haired man stood up abruptly to wrap an arm around his neck, suffocating him enough to make the lad fall unconcsious on the ground.
.
.
.
But there was nothing he could now.
The fire of reality and fate had burned the golden fields.
There was no Sun. No wind. No gentleness, no caress. The orange wasn’t just a mass of hair next to her anymore. It was all she could feel, from the sky to the clouds. The ground was dark and bloody, the piece only shrinking into chaos.
She couldn’t walk anymore. She couldn’t run, or hide, or talk or anything! All was gone! All she hoped, all she yearned, all she saw was gone!
Even the hand on her arm, the same as always, the same touch and same pressure on her skin, it was different, and it was bad.
Everything hurt. Nothing was bearable anymore.
“Orihime, please... We gotta go now, or they’ll get to us...”
“I don’t want to move.”
He stopped pulling her arm, instead cupping her face. She couldn’t feel his eyes on her own. All was gone.
“What? Hime, come on, now is not the best time...”
“Why... Why are we doing this?”
Ichigo didn’t answer, nor did he asked what she was talking about. He only hissed an insult. Orihime’s void eyes blinked, and she waved her hands to him, messily touching his sides. It was wet.
“I don’t want... I can’t have this anymore! I can’t get going like this! And neither can you, Ichigo... So please... Let’s go home.”
Her hand pushed against the fabric of his vest in a relfex to stop the bleeding he had gotten from the guard. She had heard some fighting by Ichigo’s side, but he had assured her he was fine.
Liar.
“Orihime...”
“Don’t tell me can’t!” Tears kept spilling, getting in her mouth, on the side of her nose, dropping on the floor. “I’m tired, tired of doing all this! I’m tired of suffering everyday, of knowing you suffer too! What kind of life could we have here! Huh? Nothing!”
“... I know.”
“I just want to be home... Just want to feel the sun on my face again...”
A little click was heard, and Orihime closed her eyes, lips curling into a smile. Ichigo breathed out, voice shaking but calm and determined.
“... We’re going back home. To Sora, to Yuzu and Karin. To my father and mother.”
Ichigo pulled them close, sliding a cold and hard gun in Orihime’s hand, their foreheads brought together to feel warmth.
“I can’t wait to meet them... And so that I can talk to Sora about you. He’ll be glad.”
“I’m nervous... I hope he’ll like me.”
The two chuckled, and Orihime leaned closer to gently kiss him on the lips.
“He will.”
One does not decide their fate. You are born from your mother, grow and meet people, if fate is merciful, you meet the one you were created to love. You spend a lifetime with them, you learn how to love, how to care, how to live. You get to understand what it is like to choose for the first time. And, after a life worth of adventures, stories and feelings, you are put to rest.
Once upon a time Ichigo and Orihime believed in this reality. Believed that life could be harsh, but they would climb out of the pit of darkness to reach the sunlight, and enjoy it.
They were not always surrounded by light. They were not always surrounded by warmth.
They knew they wouldn’t be in the sky or in the ground.
They knew where their place was.
They knew where the sunlight was, the same place they would feel warmth, always.
There were two loud bangs. One soft thud, as their bodies fell together.
Then laughter, the golden fields perfect again, with the new Sun, the new wind, the new caresses, and the joy of meeting new faces.
Now, and forever, they were put to rest, and fate would never be cruel again.
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I’m not certain that people will like it, since I wrote that in an hour and with a loud loud mind.
I hope you guys do not hate me too much haha
#bleach#ichihime#ichihime fanfiction#ichihime writing#ichihime headcanon#ichigo x orihime#ichigo kurosaki#orihime inoue#ichihime AU#ichihime angst#angst#post apocalyptic#potentially triggering#it's not too much#i think i could do worst#but that will be enough for now#will review the errors later
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I’ve missed two days now so I guess I’m just gonna be sporadic with this ;_; but I managed something for day 4 of Triweek!
The theme is “Grief.” There’s a lot of grief in Tri and at first I planned to do a bunch of short snippets for several characters, but Daigo’s ran away with me. I really REALLY liked Daigo and Maki in Tri, and I so wish Maki especially had had a more satisfying arc (like, I don’t mind her having a “bad end” as they say, it just felt underdeveloped, and Nishijima’s sacrifice was moving but it left me wanting to know so much more about him). I also especially loved Daigo and Taichi’s interactions, so I guess mix it all together and you get this ficlet.
By the way, thanks to the folks who liked/reblogged last time ^^ This fic isn’t as silly but I hope you still like it.
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Tri week day 4 - Grief - Dream Big
When they made it home at last, it was to find - nothing much had changed.
Except, of course, for absolutely everything.
Home was such a strange idea. A place where he could eat till he was full, sleep the whole night through without the vaguest fear that something might come creeping up on him while his guard was down. Still, Daigo fell back into those comfortable patterns, of being a child in a house with parents to look after him, with practiced ease. It was silly. He had just saved the world. That meant he was an adult now, or at least it should.
But whether or not you're a hero, mothers are mothers. And his would insist on interrupting his favorite movie to ask what he wanted for dinner. And he'd whine at her about it. Whining felt amazing.
At first a day didn't go by without Bearmon crossing his mind. After all, his partner had accomplished so much. He'd morphed into such a grand evolution. There was nothing else like it. So the separation was... well, he felt with all that, it ought to make it easier.
It didn't really.
What a pity that they'd had to leave that not-so-distant world the way the did. So much unexplored. But they'd go back one day. He really believed so. They'd gone through so much that how could they not? And when they did, imagine the stories Bear- Baihumon would have to tell him.
He kept on believing it even after he fell out of contact with the others, other than Hime-chan. Their homes were scattered all over the country. Fora while they sent each other, but the years went by and everyone got busy, and... at some point, Daigo suspected it was just easier to focus on other things. Normal things sustaining normal lives.
The further they grew from it, the more their adventure felt like a game of make believe they'd let sink down from the clouds. It was time to send it back where it belonged.
Hime-chan wouldn't say so, but Daigo could tell she resented them. Of course she would see it as leaving their partners behind. And what Daigo would never tell her was that, sometimes, he wished he could do the same as them.
Because Hime-chan wouldn't let go. No matter what. And Daigo couldn't not see the damage. He waited and waited for time to heal her, or at least blunt her grief. It never did. Turns out a dull blade only hurts more.
One day she'd be like her old self, pretending she wasn't laughing at him, then shooting him coy, backwards glances. The next day...
Daigo had no time for grief.
Life was short. If the digital world had taught anything, it was that.
It made him impatient. He itched to run. But he couldn't. Because he couldn't leave Hime-chan behind, and she couldn't leave her partner.
So he helped her with her research. He followed her to the bureau, helped build it from the ground up. Mochizuki Meiko could be the answer, he thought for a while. Hime-chan loved that girl. Visiting her made Hime-chan light up, like she hadn't since she was a child. It wasn't a look she never had even while they were dating, much though it hurt to admit.
Adults have children in order to relive their childhood through them, he'd heard. Like some kind of symbiont. Or parasite.
Watching Mochizuki interact with Meicoomon brought back a flood of memories, but they seeemd to be all good ones. Full of light. This, Daigo thought, would help Hime-chan heal from the pain of losing Bakumon when nothing else could. She would finally be able to come home.
If only he knew.
If only he knew.
---
Why did he try to rescue Yagami? As if there was any chance he'd manage to reach him in time to pull him to safety. The earthquake had been overkill, honestly.
Stupid, he was stupid. He should have stayed put. At least he'd be in a position to help the kids stranded on the other side, who were certainly dealing with much more than a bunch of high schoolers knew how to handle. No matter how much of a genius Izumi was.
He was stupid. He didn't regret it.
Daigo didn't have time for regrets.
He'd liked Yagami since the day he met him. Before starting his stint as the calligraphy teacher at the high school, he'd been briefed on each of the so-called "Chosen Children" enrolled there. Sure, they piqued his curiosity, but there was no call for concern that he'd have trouble with his role of the hands-off observer. No, he had nothing to share with them. Anything they might have had in common had been lost long ago.
That Yagami was fun, though. Not the class clown, though all signs pointed to he'd absolutely been one when he was younger. But he'd grown up somewhat shy, at least around girls, which provided a convenient source of ammo for Daigo to tease him without mercy. Yagami got on well with classmates and teachers alike. He seemed, overall, open and good-natured, which made Daigo's job easier. (Both the observing and the teasing.)
But the kid wasn't so easygoing that keeping a lid on his secret had been a walk in the park. All the kids surprised them on a daily basis. Daigo had pegged Ishida for the suspicious type from the start, but he'd never expected him to go all James Bond like he did.
He liked Yagami and he thought Yagami liked him back. He was the type that bonded through jokes and ribbing and wasn't so emotionally demonstrative. That suited Daigo fine. There were certain other similarities between them too, but Yagami didn't need to know about those.
The way his scowl pulled his whole face down whenever he disapproved of Daigo never ceased to amuse. That he had no problem disapproving of a teacher was almost as funny as the fact that he believed he hid it well.
It was like having a little brother, a sort of mini-me. Perhaps, if he ever had a son, if that was ever in the cards for him, he would turn out somewhat like Yagami. Without the hair.
All of a sudden, Daigo felt he understood Hime-chan a lot better. So much for remaining detached.
... He supposed he could do worse. Than Yagami. For a son.
In fact, Yagami was probably better than him.
Daigo wondered, if Yagami ever lost his partner, what he would do. Would he never stop searching? Would that one moment in time consume the rest of his life, until finally it destroyed him? Like Hime-chan?
Or would he just... go numb, like Daigo?
Watching castles in the sky crumble one after the other and let it roll off his shoulders like it was nothing. Nothing, just the toll of living.
Daigo knew Hime-chan had drowned. He didn't know what made him so sure of it, but he supposed he just couldn't shake the feeling that nothing less than an ocean could put out that unrelenting fire of hers.
And he, Daigo, was adrift. Letting the current take him where it would, year after year. On and on. The river ran on, and on, and on, and on.
So the irony of dying in an explosion was not lost on him. All that cinematic drama, wasted on a guy who wore crocs to work. Whose rare bursts of anger always tumbled stillborn into the air, and who had just let himself get used to that.
He couldn't even get angry about dying.
He'd lost it, he guessed, in his Faustian bid to rid himself of grief.
Yagami's eyes were bright with sheer desperation. Daigo watched him trip around the small, dark room like a wild animal in a cage. All the while insisting he believed in that third hidden option, that choice that would make this all okay. If he really believed in it, he wouldn't look so panicked.
Ah, thought Daigo, with a sudden burst of clarity, like the bell of a clock striking the hour, so it was despair all along.
There were many things he owed Yagami, things he ought to tell him. But now he just talked. Talked selfishly, knowing somewhere, Yagami was screaming himself hoarse. That love and betrayal and confusion were about to reach a fever pitch. And he'd have to make a choice. Rage, or numbness.
Or... maybe a hidden, third option.
Daigo raised his fist.
"Dream big,"
he said.
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