sandwichbread

What also caught my interest in the more recent chapters was the phone call Seol-a received/made in chapter 58, right after the spicy roll cakes announcement. --It is really a hassle to upload the scene without a computer, so you have to look it up yourselves ;'(
Seol-a made plans to meet up with the caller on Saturday. Is this the same week she went to the ski resort? How many days have passes since chapter 58? It doesn't feel like a whole week has passed. If so, Seol-a must have cancelled her other 'date'. This peeked my interest, was wondering whether someone else caught this as well? Somebody on this forum was really good with FF-time flow... (Lend us your powers again to whomever the name I forgot).

Oh... I didn't pay attention to that :) I always loved loved loved how Seol-a passed up on her other plans for No-rae lol. Remember chapter 20 & 21? That deliberately-well-drawn handsome guy asked Seol-a on a date on Sunday and she was almost going to say ok, but then went with No-rae to the exhibition instead. Loved those 2 chapters.

However the ski trip was a no-brainer though. It was probably just Min-jeong who asked her to hang out. I'd cancel for the ski trip too haha.

last edited at Feb 13, 2016 11:12PM

anonymous

Now, if FF really does go with a "traditional" direct confession, well, I wouldn't be disappointed or "angry" or anything. OK, maybe slightly disappointed. :3

Oh, for sure, if a confession went something like this:

*zoomed out panel of 2 girls standing facing each other, probably somewhere scenic and isolated*
*dramatic breeze starts blowing*
"I... like you, ______."
*close up panel of other girl's rxn face* (shocked, then starts blushing/smiling/tearing up or some combo of the 3)
"I like you too!"
*they kiss, are gfs now*

I'd be pretty disappointed too haha (though I'm pretty sure ssamba won't do that). But I would like to see some sort of open acknowledgement of their mutual feelings, it could be something as overt as Seol-a just going "Would you like to go out with me?" (i feel like it's within the realm of possibility for her to do something like this), or a little more subtle like one inviting the other to some event/activity typically reserved for couples (idk like a school dance?).

I don't think it necessarily needs to trigger a big change in the way they act around each other, because yeah, that would be unnatural (and also because they're 90% of the way to acting like gfs already tbh), but it would be nice to make sure they're both on the same page. Every relationship has expectations and if it's not even established whether the relationship is platonic/romantic then there's the risk of a mismatch in said expectations and someone getting hurt. I suppose developing that "unsaid awareness" of mutual attraction is something that can and does happen, but speaking as someone with the social/emotional perceptiveness of a rock, a little communication also helps!

sandwichbread

Wow, this thread moves really fast. -_-'

Yeah, I think that each week between updates, there's roughly 10 new pages of discussion generated, a.k.a. ~250 posts. It's pretty impressive!

About the call, yup, the ski trip (Friday through Sunday) overlaps with the Saturday date. So either Seol-a canceled or maybe she forgot about it (and stood someone up lol).

Anyways, I'm excited for the new chapter + impending awkwardness too. See you all on the flipside!

Fan art by Geedsai for Valentine's Day:

節日特供狗糧 heart u all

Source:

http://tw.weibo.com/geedsai/3942233076165404
http://ww4.sinaimg.cn/large/6b408e21jw1f0y8a12j7rj20hs0hs40r.jpg

Alternative:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BBu2pVhGhL5/
https://scontent-yyz1-1.cdninstagram.com/t51.2885-15/e35/12599002_761164563984431_98539226_n.jpg
Manually modify to:
https://scontent-yyz1-1.cdninstagram.com/t51.2885-15/12599002_761164563984431_98539226_o.jpg
Note that this version is of lower quality.

 
Geedsai's back!

 
Also posted in the FF art thread:
http://dynasty-scans.com/forum/posts/159788

anonymous

I may be in the minority, but I really would prefer no confession.

Just my view, but I never liked confessions in stories all that much. Also, it's also a trope that I feel is overused. Now, not to get into a huge tangent about tropes/cliches, but in short, I don't feel all tropes are "bad" per se, but The Confession™ is one that is seen really frequently in yuri stories, and heck, romance/love stories in general across all mediums, even including movies. To me, it seems like such a "typical" way to get a relationship started. Not necessarily a "bad" way, just... really typical. My hope is that FF, being mostly not typical in its storytelling and plot progression (IMO, of course), would avoid this trope.

Also, though stories != real life, how often do relationships IRL start with a straight-up confession? OK, YMMV definitely, and anything that anyone says, including myself, is purely anecdotal and not... scientifically or statistically proven. But I would think most relationships start in a more "natural" way? As in... both people know they like each other, not with some sort of major "profession of love" at a single point in time, but rather, through spending time with each other over a period of time, there is an unsaid awareness from both sides that they are attracted to and have feelings for one another. And in such a case, a confession would be purely... redundant? Is this too crazy of a thought? ;P

Now, if FF really does go with a "traditional" direct confession, well, I wouldn't be disappointed or "angry" or anything. OK, maybe slightly disappointed. :3

But yeah, that's that.

Lol I always have mixed feelings about confessions in mangas. I spent up to 11th grade in Asia. Back then I gotta say girls always expected confessions before becoming an official gf. If a guy took too much time to mutter up a confession, he's good to be gone. But after I moved to the States, if a guy asked you out on a date, it's kinda a declaration that he's interested in you. Whatever happens on the date (kissing or whatever), it means you're onto the next step. An official confession is rarely needed. Time passed and I kinda got used to my new culture. So when I started reading manga again, it was nostalgic, but sometimes annoying at the same time lol. I started wondering if it's really that needed; maybe it wasn't all that important in my home country. So I did a lil research, and concluded that confessions are mostly needed if you're in Japan, whether you're a female or male lol
http://en.rocketnews24.com/2015/09/18/kokuhaku-do-people-in-japan-do-love-confessions-irl-or-is-it-just-in-anime-and-dramas (exactly your question up there, anonymous lol)
http://www.tofugu.com/2013/10/23/japans-love-confessing-culture/
http://blog.gaijinpot.com/dating-differences-america-japan/
To me confessions put you in a vulnerable position to be rejected. It hurts to be rejected verbally. Whereas going on casual dates to see if the other person responds (well or not) to your advances (holding hands, or kissing) feels less vulnerable. On that aspect alone, I personally think Japanese are much braver than Americans (I live in the US so I don't know about the rest of the world). But........... maybe from Japanese perspective, Americans are pretty brave to start holding someone's hands before knowing how the other persons feels for sure. lol.
I'm not sure about Koreans, but I have a feeling they're kinda similar to Japanese considering how Ssamba briefly mentioned about confessions in chapter 2 & 48.

While we're still on the topic of confession...
I've been trying to dissect FF ACT 2 (ch 20-35), and realized I never paid enough attention to Ji-hwan's confession before (ch 24-26) because it bothered the hell out of me when I couldn't see much of Seol-a. But it was quite important to how the story unfold.

Ssamba is always so deliberately subtle. I love how she let us know Ji-hwan sensed something was going on between Seol-a and No-rae without having to explicitly express it out loud. Whether his character was too good to be true or not (I think we passed that *cliche* argument), after a few rereads I feel pity for him. We knew Ji-hwan was fascinated by No-rae quite early since her first year. But before he knew it she'd already dated Sung-Pyo. I'd like to say Ji-hwan was one of those people who liked taking their time to appreciate the view before taking a picture. But someone always managed to block his view before he could pull up his camera lol. After Ji-hwan unintentionally eavesdropped on Seol-a & No-rae's conversation about No-rae would never leave Seol-a alone, he felt a sense of urgency to catch No-rae the butterfly before it flies even further away from him. And we readers could easily see why No-rae would reject him. It's obviously she's never interested in him that way before. BUT their conversation gave many important insights about No-rae that we all should pay attention.

The first 2 questions No-rae asked Ji-hwan were these, "Do you like me?" and "Do you love me?" Ji-hwan easily answered her first question, but then was dumbfounded and speechless by her bold second question. Before Ji-hwan could say anything, No-rae proceeded to reject his confession based solely on the fact that she doesn't love him.

Ji-hwan: Is love necessary to just date someone? These days it's more common to meet and slowly get to know someone if they leave a good impression.
Ji-hwan: And that will eventually turn into love.

And I found no faults in his reasonings. It's what people do.
Even our Seol-a used to say, "But it's fun if you have a boyfriend. You won't get bored or lonely." (ch9)

No-rae: But those kinds of things...aren't any fun.
No-rae: I'm not into relationships that don't have any meaning behind them. (t/n: literally, relationships for the sake of having relationships)
[...]
Ji-hwan: I can love you.
Ji-hwan: And I'm confident I can make you love me too.
No-rae: ...Really?
No-rae: Can you really do that?
Ji-hwan: ....
No-rae: Promises shouldn't be taken lightly. No matter how small it is, there's no promise that I don't take seriously. Because you can never predict human nature.
No-rae: A feeling that you're going to fall in love...I once believed in those feelings too
No-rae: I had an exceptionally strong feeling.
No-rae: But...it all ridiculously crumbled in one moment. My feelings, my trust.

With a sensitive soul like No-rae, what happened with Sung-pyo left a scar and made her feel insecure. To prevent herself from being hurt again, No-rae is waiting for something more rigid, something more-like-love, something that she could trust will last. Thus it explained why she ran away after realizing her feelings for Seol-a. "Don't go down something that isn't a path" was her reason (Ssamba never explicitly portrayed anything against gay people in the story, but both protagonists' hesitant attitude throughout the series speaks for itself). So her decision to stay by Seol-a as friends afterwards was already a big step forward for No-rae.

But doesn't it make you wonder if Seol-a had gone through with her confession in chapter 48, would No-rae have been emotionally ready to accept it?

Maybe. Maybe not.
But we certainly know how ready No-rae is now...

But doesn't it make you wonder if Seol-a had gone through with her confession in chapter 48, would No-rae have been emotionally ready to accept it?

Hmmmmm....possibly not. It's always so hard to pinpoint when the best time would have been because even in our own lives we only ever get one chance.

You're not gonna stay up for the chapter, right?

Tiger

You're not gonna stay up for the chapter, right?

Haha no.. I will soon knock a glass of wine and go to sleep, dreaming about tomorrow.

Tiger

You're not gonna stay up for the chapter, right?

Haha no.. I will soon knock a glass of wine and go to sleep, dreaming about tomorrow.

If you were gonna try I was gonna be like, "FF will get here sooner if you're asleep lol".

I think some people do stay up? May they not die.

anonymous

I may be in the minority, but I really would prefer no confession.

Just my view, but I never liked confessions in stories all that much. Also, it's also a trope that I feel is overused. Now, not to get into a huge tangent about tropes/cliches, but in short, I don't feel all tropes are "bad" per se, but The Confession™ is one that is seen really frequently in yuri stories, and heck, romance/love stories in general across all mediums, even including movies. To me, it seems like such a "typical" way to get a relationship started. Not necessarily a "bad" way, just... really typical. My hope is that FF, being mostly not typical in its storytelling and plot progression (IMO, of course), would avoid this trope.

Also, though stories != real life, how often do relationships IRL start with a straight-up confession? OK, YMMV definitely, and anything that anyone says, including myself, is purely anecdotal and not... scientifically or statistically proven. But I would think most relationships start in a more "natural" way? As in... both people know they like each other, not with some sort of major "profession of love" at a single point in time, but rather, through spending time with each other over a period of time, there is an unsaid awareness from both sides that they are attracted to and have feelings for one another. And in such a case, a confession would be purely... redundant? Is this too crazy of a thought? ;P

Now, if FF really does go with a "traditional" direct confession, well, I wouldn't be disappointed or "angry" or anything. OK, maybe slightly disappointed. :3

But yeah, that's that.

Lol I always have mixed feelings about confessions in mangas. I spent up to 11th grade in Asia. Back then I gotta say girls always expected confessions before becoming an official gf. If a guy took too much time to mutter up a confession, he's good to be gone. But after I moved to the States, if a guy asked you out on a date, it's kinda a declaration that he's interested in you. Whatever happens on the date (kissing or whatever), it means you're onto the next step. An official confession is rarely needed. Time passed and I kinda got used to my new culture. So when I started reading manga again, it was nostalgic, but sometimes annoying at the same time lol. I started wondering if it's really that needed; maybe it wasn't all that important in my home country. So I did a lil research, and concluded that confessions are mostly needed if you're in Japan, whether you're a female or male lol
http://en.rocketnews24.com/2015/09/18/kokuhaku-do-people-in-japan-do-love-confessions-irl-or-is-it-just-in-anime-and-dramas (exactly your question up there, anonymous lol)
http://www.tofugu.com/2013/10/23/japans-love-confessing-culture/
http://blog.gaijinpot.com/dating-differences-america-japan/
To me confessions put you in a vulnerable position to be rejected. It hurts to be rejected verbally. Whereas going on casual dates to see if the other person responds (well or not) to your advances (holding hands, or kissing) feels less vulnerable. On that aspect alone, I personally think Japanese are much braver than Americans (I live in the US so I don't know about the rest of the world). But........... maybe from Japanese perspective, Americans are pretty brave to start holding someone's hands before knowing how the other persons feels for sure. lol.
I'm not sure about Koreans, but I have a feeling they're kinda similar to Japanese considering how Ssamba briefly mentioned about confessions in chapter 2 & 48.

Never in my life I had witnessed in real life someone who confessed to a person, you know, like those in the mangas. I live in Philippines, and I don't know if it's a tradition or in the culture, but in my experience living here all my life, when you like someone, the one thing that people do first is to be friends with the person, and not some straight up confession. You get close to them as much as possible, maybe flirt with them in a subtle way, but you will never hear a confession out of nowhere lol.

I think the difference is that, in Japan, when you confess to someone, it's either you get dumped or you date, whether you're someone they're not close with, or someone they've been with for a long time, but here in PH, when you say that you like them, it's either you ask them to date you and they agreed, you are allowed to continue being friends with them, you get rejected, or let you court them. And when they let you court them, that does not mean 'you're dating' or you're boyfriend/girlfriend, it only means that the person wants to see what you have to offer, they want to see how deep your feelings and how serious you are. And the most hardest thing here, is the possibility of you being 'busted/rejected' at the end.

In short,
JP = PH
Casually dating = Mutual Understanding Stage (can also mean Courting Stage depending on the situation)
Exclusively dating = Relationship

Tiger

"FF will get here sooner if you're asleep lol".
I think some people do stay up? May they not die.

Haha exactly!!!
May we rejoice in Seolrae tomorrow.
Happy Valentine's Day everyone!!

With a sensitive soul like No-rae, what happened with Sung-pyo left a scar and made her feel insecure. To prevent herself from being hurt again, No-rae is waiting for something more rigid, something more-like-love, something that she could trust will last. Thus it explained why she ran away after realizing her feelings for Seol-a. "Don't go down something that isn't a path" was her reason (Ssamba never explicitly portrayed anything against gay people in the story, but both protagonists' hesitant attitude throughout the series speaks for itself). So her decision to stay by Seol-a as friends afterwards was already a big step forward for No-rae.

One thing I like about No-Rae is her stand towards relationships now, I guess after her last relationship, she now knows the consequences of impulsive actions, the risk of getting into something you're not 100% sure. She isn't a brave person, that's why she'd rather be cautious. It's rare to see a girl that stubborn about love, you know, the kind of girl who wants a love so certain that you would immediately know what is it just by pointing to it.

(points to Seol-A) That is love.

lol.

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 2:09AM

I know it's Sunday morning here and it's a Valentine's morning, so... I just wanted to say that I love all of you <3 Even our cute grumbling Nyaa-chan. <3

Here's a short fanfic, which perfectly expresses my point of you on confessions. I start where the last chapter ended.

The lights are off. Both girls are lying on their beds, trying to fall asleep. Both remembering the almost-kiss scene from a few minutes ago.
Norae: hey Seola, are you asleep?
Seola (with a somewhat hoarse voice): no.
N: you Ok?
S: uhmm
N: you sure?
Seola doesn't answer
N: does your knee hurt?
S: uhmm, a bit
N: want me to do you a light massage?
S (after a pause): uhmm...
Norae gets up, goes to Seola's bed, sits next to Seola's knees, carefully gets Seola's leg from under the blanket, and starts massaging it softly.
N: you know, Sungpyo also had an issue with his knee, but he'd never let me do this, despite I specially learned the technique...
Seola suddenly moans in excitement as Norae touched her upper leg. If not for the darkness, you could've seen her face and ears were shining all red.
Norae grins but gets embarrassed at the same moment too: hey what was that, you perv!
Seola doesn't answer anything.
Norae continues with the massage, her hands are getting higher and higher: ah, your legs are so slim and beautiful!

Seola moans again, this time louder
Norae giggles and continues
S: Norae... Norae, I... I...
Norae bends to Seola's ear and softly whispers into it: yes, I love you too. After that she kisses the top of Seola's ear. Seola turns her head to face Norae, passionately embraces her, and they start kissing.

Then comes the sunny morning scene. The girls are sweetly sleeping together. Ina enters their room to wake them up and with a giggling face, looking at the cute couple, announces that it's the end of the fanfic: Happy Valentine's!

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 2:28AM

@ccip

sandwichbread

Wow, this thread moves really fast. -_-'

Yeah, I think that each week between updates, there's roughly 10 new pages of discussion generated, a.k.a. ~250 posts. It's pretty impressive!

About the call, yup, the ski trip (Friday through Sunday) overlaps with the Saturday date. So either Seol-a canceled or maybe she forgot about it (and stood someone up lol).

Anyways, I'm excited for the new chapter + impending awkwardness too. See you all on the flipside!

The activity this past week is not at all normal. We filled up about 12--honestly closer to 11--pages for chapter 63. (@NicLarkin started the ball rolling early that day, just clipping the end of page 214.)

We're at page 225 with 63 chapters. 5617 posts (exincluding this one).

~3.57 pages per chapter
~89.12 posts per chapter

Chapter 62 was just about average, starting at page 210.

Other times we had page dumps were after spats and the longest between-chapters page generator was probably the hiatus, last summer, after which the art thread was spawned, I believe.

Chapter 63 just generated a ton of excitement. heh

11 pages ~> 275 posts
1 chapter of 63 ~> 1.6% of what Ssamba's shared (ignoring specials)
275 of 5617 posts ~> 4.9% of posts in this thread
11 of 225 pages ~> 4.9% of pages of this thread

3x the average (assuming normal distribution of posts across all other chapters, which means that given the actual distribution this number of posts is slightly more than 3x the posts we usually have between chapters)

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 2:40AM

Jesus freakin' Christ, someone can compile all these analysis posts (such as this one above by ieeheh) and publish The Science Of Fluttering Feelings lolo

But seriously though, to all the obsessed perceptive people, nice job for all these analyses! Interesting stuff to read. :3

 
@ ieeheh

About the "confessions" cultural stuff and the links you posted...

Fascinating stuff... I did not see it from the perspective of this being a "major cultural element".

(The video in the first link is especially neat to watch. Although it does show that there are also some differing opinions on the matter.)

Unsure if Koreans really do it similarly as the Japanese, but it wouldn't surprise me too much if it were the case, given that the two cultures have many similarities.

Now, with that in mind, I'll say this.

If the "confession" is nothing more than basically "making things official", but otherwise, both people already already have some sort of feelings towards each other, then that's fine. Making things official is a good thing. Because leaving things vague and up in the air is being "not confident" in your relationship, which is definitely not a good start.

However, I suppose what I like less is certain kinds of confession scenarios in fiction. For instance, two people just met, and one person immediately falls in love with the other and confesses. Because you know, screw "getting to know each other" or any of that crap! Skip over all of that and just start dating with zero information! Or another scenario, one person likes the other, but the other has no such feelings. So the first person has to actually confess to get something to happen. But this would mean that the other was not even considering it until that confession, which strikes me as trying to "force" a relationship to happen rather than having one come to life naturally.

... And yes, I am purposefully exaggerating these scenarios to portray them in a negative light. Pseudo-strawman FTW! ;D

But yeah, I hope it's kinda understood what I'm getting at. I often see manifestations of these scenarios or variations in fiction. (Although sometimes, it's not too noticeable when it's well executed enough.)

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 3:14AM

@takachi
Lol funny. Hope it'll be in my dream tonight.

@anonymous
Yeah I'm pretty much on the same page with you though

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 2:46AM

I love the new art from Ssamba. (Still doing this tumblr view thing, ha-ha.)

...It is new, right? I can't tell when it was posted. I don't even know if I've linked the blog post property. :?

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 2:54AM

@ffins07 you're a good critical analyst and now you're a statistician too? Lol
Regarding the pictures, it was from 2 years ago already.

ffins07:

I love the new art from Ssamba. (Still doing this tumblr view thing, ha-ha.)

...It is new, right? I can't tell when it was posted. I don't even know if I've linked the blog post property. :?

It's new... if you're a time traveller. ;D

2014.08.21. 19:08

 
I ought to post some of the official art in the art thread one of these days. The thread mainly has fan art, probably because there is just so much more fan art than official art (which is normal), but still, having the official art there would be nice.

In the past, I opted not to post it just because I assumed most FF fans have seen most of the official art. (And there isn't all that much.) Also, it is because it's very hard to find a lot of the official art in the best, original version. The ones that ssamba posted on her blog are fine. But for the ones that are only seen as banners or "covers" on Comico, it seems like all you ever find online are lower-quality, resized versions.

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 3:33AM

Oh... Eheh. (^__^ ; )

I don't know how to navigate the blog, so I could have missed anything.

P.S. Putting my foot down on the urge to re-read the entires series NOW, so that I can go to bed (and hopefully not miss the release by too many hours).

P.P.S. No-rae's hands are a hot commodity. (Re-read chapter 45; hence, the need to re-read bug. >>)

ffins07:

Oh... Eheh. (^__^ ; )

You mean ieeheh.

*gets booed off stage*

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 3:38AM

I know it's Sunday morning here and it's a Valentine's morning, so... I just wanted to say that I love all of you <3 Even our cute grumbling Nyaa-chan. <3

In the past, I opted not to post it just because I assumed most FF fans have seen most of the official art.

If they're not on Dynasty I don't think most fans have seen it, so I think it's a good idea to post in the art thread anything you find, official or not, like the ones from Ssamba blog that ffins07 linked, a lot of people uses only Dynasty so they don't go out of their way to see what other sites have, specially if the site is not in english.

last edited at Feb 14, 2016 6:03AM

Yee haw
I'm awake and ready!!

Yee haw
I'm awake and ready!!

Just in time! I thought you're not sleeping at all lol

@Nya-chan

I know it's Sunday morning here and it's a Valentine's morning, so... I just wanted to say that I love all of you <3 Even our cute grumbling Nyaa-chan. <3

Cute! (^__^ )

P.S. I totally slept. Just not very well... :'(

P.P.S @ieeheh, I often don't know how to respond to posts in which some states an opinion about me or something I've written, or if a response is even expected. I hope I haven't offended anyone by not responding. Anyway, to the first bit of your post: I'm no statistician, but I do like numbers. I started hanging on the thread and Comico numbers as my excitement for 63 overflowed, hehe.