Why are people calling this messed up? Sunako has a shitty life. That does not mean she is unable to fall in love. That's really condescending saying that just because she has no one to care about her, cannot fall in love with someone who does finally care about her cuz because it's a complex or something. She's not some fragile glassware that should be sheltered, protected, and barred from making her own decisions as an autonomous individual.

You know what sucks more than making a potential mistake and being hurt? Not being allowed to make a potential mistake and be hurt.

Is it the best starting ground for a relationship? Maybe not. But just because everything is not ideal sunshine and rainbows, that does not mean it is not possible for someone to legitimately fall in love. Love is more than the initial situation from which it spawned.

Oh, I'm really glad when I logged in after forever today I came back to this discussion to see how it had developed. I really like your input on this, it's some good objective insight. "Love is more than the initial situation from which it spawned" definitely summed that up real nice.

I think my initial knee jerk reaction of "omg this in unhealthy" just comes down to this weird idea I have of "If I don't reassure to myself and others that it's unhealthy, I might, or others might accidentally do this to themselves" but it's like you said.

When I think about my own relationships anyways, not all of them started from a healthy place or for the right reasons. I'm in a really good relationship now, where initially entering it I was coming out of some bad neglect and entered for the wrong reasons.

So I like your point a lot, made me think more objectively.

last edited at Nov 9, 2017 6:54AM

Loving every page from A Love Smeared In Ashes to here!

Well for non-smutty Yuri, it certainly has my attention. And count me among those that want a 3rd chapter at the very least to see where it goes from this point.....

I'd love a further chapter... or five, maybe. Seems like there's lots of room to explore how things may progress from here.

Not messed up, bunch of idiots.

Very cute. Lovely doujin , wish there was more :(

This author is great at planting an idea of a larger story in your head with just one or two chapters.

It's pretty obvious the younger sister is confusing familial love with romantic love.

1) Her mother always made it clear she didn't love her
2) Her mother abused her physically on occasion (lord knows how much verbal abuse she might've gotten) to the point she predicted more physical abuse more often
3) Her mother carelessly told her she wished she'd died in the accident instead of the father and gave her away to another family without a care in the world.
4) Though it's never said we can assume neither she nor her mother ever tried to contact each other for anything ever again. Makes sense given how the instant the mother wished for a desired death of her daughter the story tells us the daughter then saw the mother as dead to her.
5) The father rarely came into her life and, even though her showed he loved her and was most likely the only positive thing she could truly consider family, that minimal happiness quickly faded and would be forgotten til he showed up again randomly.
6) Though she had friends that added some positivity to her life she says herself that she knew she'd lose contact with them.
7) Though her foster mother took her in and was nice to her she made it clear that the only relationship they have between them is caretaker and student maid. Plus with her being gone often due to her job neither could form any bonds.

In all these instances someone either is distant with her or eventually leave her. But only her big sister calls her family, is constantly in her life so they end up having a familial and "friendly" bond, and she told her they were stuck together for life. Which showed the younger sister she wouldn't lose another person she came into contact with.

Though the big sister is a bitch, and the younger sister should not be as kind to her as she is, it's clear dealing with her is better than everything her mother put her through. So we also have another negative aspect on the younger sister's life in which the best thing she could ask for is a bitchy sister.

It's a bit sad.

last edited at Nov 5, 2019 4:28PM by

It's pretty obvious the younger sister is confusing familial love with romantic love.

I disagree. Familial and romantic love have some rather... conspicuous differences, there is no way the two can be confused. If she is having urges that go beyond familial affection, it is pretty safe to conclude she is also feeling something other than mere familial love.

And this actually can be seen in the story, when Sunako thinks to herself how she should not be trying to "entice" Yasuko. She also muses how she is "probably doing something really bad", "something that might destroy our family". Simple familial bonding with her half-sister would not cause her to think like this. Romancing her half-sister, on the other hand, would.

Your 7 points are accurate, but I do not see how they infer that Sunako's feelings are "confused".

Going further, you omitted one crucial component that is usually required for purely familial love between close family members (barring the bond most parents develop for their children right at the start), and that is growing up together/beside the other person. In fact, it is this aspect that is crucial for people becoming sexually desensitised to their family members, meaning they can not see their family as potential sexual and/or romantic material.

By contrast, these two met for the first time as teenagers and are, for all intents and purposes, complete strangers. You do not become someone's sibling by simply proclaiming it on the first meeting. Both of them are fully capable of seeing the other in a romantic light, as any two perfect strangers would be (probably the reason why Yasuko does not seem bothered by Sunako's feelings, even if she did not really pause to think about it), which makes it all the more likely that Sunako's feelings are indeed what she thinks they are, romantic in nature.

I agree with one of the previous posters, that Sunako's circumstances caused her to basically throw everything she has into her feelings/relationship with Yasuko, and considering the utter emotional void that characterised her earlier life, I actually find her outright falling in love with her half-sister to be not only plausible, but actually fairly realistic in these circumstances, and I could easily see it happening in real life under such conditions.

Though the big sister is a bitch, and the younger sister should not be as kind to her as she is, it's clear dealing with her is better than everything her mother put her through. So we also have another negative aspect on the younger sister's life in which the best thing she could ask for is a bitchy sister.

It's a bit sad.

I disagree with this as well, heavily. In the first part of the story, Yasuko is indeed "bitchy", but the situation is not as simple as that. Her never before known half-sister basically stormed into her life out of nowhere, bringing knowledge that her father cheated on her mother and had another family on the side. And now that same sister is rapidly becoming popular and beloved by their classmates. Many siblings who do not come from such strenuous backgrounds are prone to jealousy, here it is not even surprising. Made all the more poignant by the dinner scene, where Sunako pleased Yasuko's mother by a well-prepared meal and by doing a chore Yasuko herself should have done, but forgot. This really struck a nerve in Yasuko.

Sunako is basically a stranger who appeared two years ago, and is now seemingly winning the hearts of both Yasuko's classmates and her own family. It is certainly understandable she would lash out. Not justifiable, mind you, but most definitely understandable.

Moreover, Yasuko openly explains she is being a bitch towards her half-sister on purpose, for her mother's sake.
Couple this with the fact the setting is Japan, and again you get something that, while not justified, is certainly easy to understand. We are talking about a culture where keeping the image is paramount, where families are perfectly willing to let their own mentally disabled kids be permanent shut-ins rather than providing them medical treatment, as that would make the situation known and would bring shame upon the family. A culture where divorce is such a taboo it is sometimes censored from anime, of all things. Imagine what it means to bring an illegitimate child into the family in such a place. The fact Yasuko's mother (and father) were willing to do it speaks volumes, it was definitely not a decision most Japanese would make lightly.

If anything, it is kind of weird how Sunako is so popular, in real life chances are she would be mercilessly bullied for her origins (and Yasuko herself would probably be bullied too, by simple virtue of familial association with the "bastard child").

When you factor this in, it becomes really easy to see where Yasuko is coming from with her hostility. But even then, when you read her explanation, it kind of feels like she is actually pushing herself to be this awful towards Sunako, especially given how she later breaks down specifically because Sunako protected her and refused to lay the blame for the ruined dress where it belonged, on Yasuko herself. This is not a reaction of someone who hates the other person and is being awful towards them out of malice. This is a reaction of someone who feels bad over what she is doing, and thinks she deserves to be blamed (which she does). A far cry from a simple "bitchy sister".

And that is just the first part, in the second one Yasuko is not "bitchy" in any way. Slightly adversarial, but it is obvious it is good-natured now. And she openly boasts (maybe not the smartest move) about Sunako's feelings for her. It is evident she is pleased with the situation and is now enjoying their interactions.

I liked it. The second part really completes the original.

Cried at "help me", and Yasuko's tsundere "welp you're family now".

Big kudos to Yasuko-mom for stepping up like that.

Nurse could be an problem, though. :O

Amusing how the doctor is always eating something.

I wonder if Yasuko knows about either Sunako's abuse, or her own mother paying Sunako for housework. I suspect not, in either case.

Edit: oh, looking back at Ashes, "I wish I'd been adopted into the Hosoda family", yeah I'm pretty sure Yasuko is totally out of the loop. I'm not sure she even thought much about why Sunako is living with them beyond "our dad died".

last edited at May 9, 2020 1:04AM

You do definitely get the impression that Yasuko is not privy to the whole of the story. She does seem to see things a bit simplistically — "You're family now, so I'm stuck with you" is really glossing over a whole lot — but it does speak to her essentially good heart.

I think a lot of this conversation has been stumbling over the idea of "unhealthy" relationships. Would it help to add nuance? Presumably, a healthy relationship would be characterized by clear communication, equal feelings, and/or each partner understanding the other — and there are certainly some shortfalls on those metrics. But I think we need to distance "unhealthy" from "toxic". We all do a number of things that aren't particularly healthy — but won't kill us (quickly) either.

I think for the most part that this is a relationship that will need a lot of work and communication to be stable, long-term — but that it's not in an inherently bad place to be doing that work from.

(You can quibble on the incest part, but I usually figure it's something of a red herring in a relationship where genetic reproduction doesn't enter into it.)

I'm... a lot more sympathetic to Mamako here than in the first story. It seems like a lot of the structure she's set up is both to provide and to give herself the emotional distance to not be taking out her husband's infidelity on Sunako — and she really does seem to have gone to great lengths to rescue her from her mother. To loop back around to my first bit, a lot of Yasuko's bullying could probably have been avoided if Mamako and Yasuko really had talked about the situation — that she didn't need to punish Sunako — but Mamako was presumably trying to shield her daughter from some very sad realities. Paving hell's highway, as they say.

last edited at Jun 6, 2020 7:32AM

So... sad and FLUFFY. But still sad...

Ahh that's gooood! Somehow with all the incest yuri I've seen and read I don't feel as if I've seen the special sort of relationship that half-siblings have really fleshed out in a story like this until now. I want to see more stuff like this!

I liked it. The second part really completes the original.

Cried at "help me", and Yasuko's tsundere "welp you're family now".

Big kudos to Yasuko-mom for stepping up like that.

Nurse could be an problem, though. :O

These are still really really good for me.

The right context is the secret ingredient for making someone tear up at "I'm stuck with you for the rest of my life".

Ok when i read comment that this has some dark content after finishing i was sure they all mean her live with mother and not relationship because her relationship is healthy if you dont consider law because her emotions is like others, that she developed crush on her after love with time is normal because this is still her felling for her sister not some false felling
I dont know why you can write that love developed because someone is accepting you as you are is bad i think that she even know that her sister behave like this because she has her intention

It's not one of the best stories on the site. Not even close. And yet, I've reread it multiple times. No idea why.

It appeals to me a lot too. I was having fanfic ideas a while back, which could easily have been longer than the source comic. :D

I know part of why: I like (pseudo) incest. But that "don't be dumb, we're family now, so I'm stuck with you for the rest of our lives" line is, in context, rather heartwarming in its grudging way. (Can't even call it tsundere at that point, it's just a strong expectation about family.)

(One of my fic ideas was the clash between the expectations of Yasuko [she's family] and her mom [pushing Sunako out the door at 18])

(the other ideas were smut)

Still wish I knew what their age was.