OMG would you two fucking kiss already!?

All aboard the troll train!! Choo choo!! Shou is the machinist and we're headed to trollville!!

Seriously, this is gonna kill me a thousand of times.

He better gives a yuri ending... and make a continuation of Prism in webcomic format... it's the least that he can do after all this suffering!!!

Eh? it's the same one who did Prism??
He could start that over without the tracing or something?

Sometimes I imagine Shou with the same face and smile of this subject, as they are cut from the same cloth, xd

And speaking of the chapter itself, it was interesting, plus it gives the feeling that lately are focusing on the feelings of Ran, which makes me wonder if the end of the fourth volume will be focused on Ran Like the previous volume, or instead it will focus on Keiko with a visit to his mother or fixing their problems with the ex.

More seriously, hasn't Ran been pushing Keiko for a while now to sit down with her ex like adults and settle things once and for all? Whether getting back together or walking away doesn't matter, although obviously the latter would be better for Ran.

Actually a lot of the story parts have to do with Ran building Keiko up to the point where she can face her demons. Not just the ex but her mom too, and as we saw earlier dealing with simple things like seeing kids playing.

Tapping into this, if there is any yuri to be had in the end, having Keiko move on from her demons is the best place to start. Hard to have a real relationship with someone who hasn't settled things properly with their ex (especially when it was largely a one-sided fault on their part), and even harder when they're still stuck on a difficult relationship with those closest (parents, in this example).

Granted Keiko never really seemed to have a close relationship with her mother at all, but just being able to tie those ends off leaves a LOT more room for a lover to jump into and be held up properly.

More seriously, hasn't Ran been pushing Keiko for a while now to sit down with her ex like adults and settle things once and for all? Whether getting back together or walking away doesn't matter, although obviously the latter would be better for Ran.

Actually a lot of the story parts have to do with Ran building Keiko up to the point where she can face her demons. Not just the ex but her mom too, and as we saw earlier dealing with simple things like seeing kids playing.

Tapping into this, if there is any yuri to be had in the end, having Keiko move on from her demons is the best place to start. Hard to have a real relationship with someone who hasn't settled things properly with their ex (especially when it was largely a one-sided fault on their part), and even harder when they're still stuck on a difficult relationship with those closest (parents, in this example).

Granted Keiko never really seemed to have a close relationship with her mother at all, but just being able to tie those ends off leaves a LOT more room for a lover to jump into and be held up properly.

Doesn't hurt that Ran ends up in the position of the one who stood by Keiko no matter what, and worked to help her heal.

@takachi It's possible that the next chapter will be the talk with the ex, but then again, so is the visit to Keiko's mom, it has been mention quite a while ago, and it hasn't happened yet.

Guess we differ on the enjoyment of drama. I've had more than enough drama fics/mangas/doujins to last me quite a while and I really don't want to see any more. What's happening here isn't really drama though, and Shou hasn't shown that he writes it like that. I guess we'll see.

I would think the Ex would be first. All things considered he's much easier to deal with emotionally for Keiko than her mother. He's been her first stable partner and putting the miscarriage fiasco afterwards in which shes pushes him away and he can't cope they would seem to have an okay relationship.

Her mother on the other hand with what we know is a sack of shit of the higest degree ever since her early childhood. I'm sure there's so much baggage there that could make a confrontation at this point detrimental. She needs to deal with the "small stuff" and get more support from Ran because to me the mother looks like the final boss.

Remember in order to grow, you have to do it small steps at a time ( Wuxia/Xianxia novels represent! )

last edited at Aug 28, 2015 10:30PM

I can't help wondering what it is about Keiko that Ran likes so much. What does she provide that Ran continues to have one-sided feelings for her?

To be honest, if you remove your yuri googles, Ran's emotional involvement toward Keiko may be totally non romantic.

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

We seek yuri here because Shou wrote yuri before, but there's no indication that this is actual yuri or that any romance, even one-sided, is taking place.

when I sugested this I was suddenly not making much sense shrug* good times

Keiko could be a better husband more than her ex-boyfriend.

To be honest, if you remove your yuri googles, Ran's emotional involvement toward Keiko may be totally non romantic.

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

We seek yuri here because Shou wrote yuri before, but there's no indication that this is actual yuri or that any romance, even one-sided, is taking place.

If you try to read it like a normal Slice of life, you will at least notice a lot of subtext. But apart from the honmei chocolate and Ran's dream there is no real indication of yuri. People commenting on Shou's website don't mention yuri anymore, they now seem to think Stretch is coming to an end.

sequel: yoga kappa#

To be honest, if you remove your yuri googles, Ran's emotional involvement toward Keiko may be totally non romantic.

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

We seek yuri here because Shou wrote yuri before, but there's no indication that this is actual yuri or that any romance, even one-sided, is taking place.

So I let a friend to read Stretch that has been saved on my phone. She doesn't know where the source is, and she isn't a manga person either. She's straight too... And yet she can tell the yuri subtext elements in it. Well, maybe she was biased. I also told her she might be biased.

Then she let another friend to read it from her phone. She said she should let me read it because I might into this stuff...

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

Hard to reconcile that with "honmei chocolate", which I gather is not something you give to family members, and her recent fantasizing about being in a romantic relationship with Keiko.

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

Hard to reconcile that with "honmei chocolate", which I gather is not something you give to family members, and her recent fantasizing about being in a romantic relationship with Keiko.

She is her ''Senpai'', really think about that for a second

I think this story is a, maybe throwback you could say, about the Senpai-Kouhai relationship, which is just probably something very alien outside of Japan

She cares a lot for her, as maybe she would for an older sister who has life issues.

Hard to reconcile that with "honmei chocolate", which I gather is not something you give to family members, and her recent fantasizing about being in a romantic relationship with Keiko.

She is her ''Senpai'', really think about that for a second

I think this story is a, maybe throwback you could say, about the Senpai-Kouhai relationship, which is just probably something very alien outside of Japan

From the discussion here about honmei chocolate, and the context of a good many other manga, it seems to be something you do not give in a Senpai-Kouhai relationship.

to be fair, at one point in life, didn't you admire someone so much that you got confusing messages from your brain that was very much like love but not really? ヽ(*・ω・)ﾉ

No? must have been just me then

Honmei choco, heavily sighing, romantic dream...I don't think that Ran cares about keiko only because she is her "senpai". She must have other feelings for her, love or not, whatever it is, their relationship is already more than just a senpai-kouhai relationship. And I reckon that honmei choco is only given by a person to someone they like or love, other than that it's giri choco.

It is possible that this series is coming to an end, but I really hope that Shou doesn't let it end without settling Keiko's issues with her mother and her ex.

I think I am being a bit misunderstood here, Ran keeps calling her Senpai throughout, they seem to be on an entirely different level than normal friends but Ran still thinks of her as her Senpai even tough they are years away from school already, I know that there are other stories that take place after school where those grown ups reenact those ''Senpai'' addressing forms because, well you don't get any younger, do you it's just this void of ''Friendship <<<<<< ------ >>>>>> Lover'' that I fail to understand completly right now and subsequently don't really have a name for it and I just think an Senpai-Kouhai relationship is an manifestation of this, I don't believe it's ''just'' which would mean I think of it as an downgrade of sort

last edited at Aug 29, 2015 11:34AM

Ran calling Keiko Senpai in a culture where married couples call each other "Father" and "Mother" doesn't seem particularly unusual.

well, but we are talking about two established individuals we know a lot about and yet so little, not some passive cultural thing

I will stop here though, don't really have to add anything anymore, anything else would become spam-short

It's just a phase.

I think Ran calling Keiko "senpai" is mostly out of "old habits die hard" rather than anything else.

Soooo σ^_^; About Ran Dreaming about dating keiko does that mean finally there is a hope that they might end up tougher , Yes I think there is (Cuz I don't think dreaming about been with her mean nothing , this shit ain't straight in my opinion |(￣3￣)| , I think in the next chapters things will get more interesting after reading Rans dream Chapter I have some pretty high hopes for some developments some shoujo ai hopefully.... (⌒-⌒; )