gosh…
to be sort of(!) spoiler-free about it, i think the subtext really only starts to make sense on the second time you read this. when people start to read, they see this gorgeously drawn art and absolutely nothing that would even suggest a more pessimistic outlook… so we become disappointed and think we’ve “wasted time” on this series… when to someone who’s already read through once, it isn’t.
some stories are just better off reading without that optimistic(?) “oh this is definitely going to end how i think it will because that’s what makes me happy” type… i guess what i’m trying to say is people tend to expect so much from a series that knowing how something ends may completely ruin their experience despite not being able to fully enjoy details that the author puts in… sort of like ignoring the roadside scenery when you take a ride somewhere…
personally, to enjoy this series while thinking of how the characters perceive situations and to appreciate how, again, absolutely breathtaking and subtle the art is… its what i think most people should focus on instead of how they want the ending to go.

People go into this expecting more because it's tagged yuri. This honestly should have subtext instead, and you'd see very different comments.

freakin love it

Personally, even if the story was tagged as subtext instead of yuri, I still have a hard time understanding the significance of their relationship. I only got into the story because of the art anyway, not the supposed yuri.
Tsukiko sees Aya swimming in the school pool and they get close, everyone around them seems to think they're BFFs. By the most recent chapter 18, they're in the last year of high school but it feels like they've barely gotten closer. Aya says she wants to be a diver but when she asks Tsukiko what she's going to do, Tsukiko says "I see no reason to tell you, so I won't." I don't get it, the story hints that Tsukiko is standoff-ish and cold because of some childhood experience and she doesn't want to get close to people because eventually she'll have to move again.
But she ended up not moving away so why is her relationship with Aya still at the same stalement? The story starts during their first year, they seem to spend a lot of time together (Aya seemed to have other friends at first), yet they don't seem to actually know much about each other. Is it just too deep for a pleb like me to understand the nuances?

And having read the spoiler for the ending, it makes even less sense to me as to why this relationship matters. Like... they have smartphones, its not even the 1990s. I had to move every three years when i was a dumb kid and I still managed to keep in touch with my friends. And if the reasoning is because her phone broke, what is she, a technologically disadvantaged grandma? Surely LINE still has contact info stored like other social media.

last edited at Jun 23, 2021 7:07AM

Two people who seem not to have fallen in love seem as if they're not going fall in love, and some people are irked about that. Me, I'm interested to read about two girls who have an odd but not unhealthy relationship. The only thing that I don't like here is that Aya's delayed maturation threatens to leave her with quite limited options.

Omg Thanks for the scanlator's works! This one wasa beaituful and sometimes too hard to understand but I'm happy to read it. I hope they will bond over time as adults now.

Well that was
...
...
...
Honestly I don't know how to describe how I feel about this one. I'm normally impatient with series where there is a lot of chapters with little or no movement in the MCs' relationship, but I was strangely okay with lack of progress, in this one. I kept thinking "They will get there eventually", only to get to the end and be told the lack of progress was the point. I don't know wether that was an inventive twist, a lazy out for an author who just wanted a quick end, or an infuriating betrayal, of all the readers, who were rooting for Tsukiko and Aya to get together

Not even hand holding in the end.
The art was beautiful that's an understatement.

Yeah, am with johnb on this one, am at a loss on how to feel about it.
I really like the art, and I think I like the story?
Like some yuri stories it's kind of like watching Zeno's frog

I loved it! i don´t know why, how or what, but i loved it and i don´t care about anything else! VIva la ignorancia! coughs Anyway, i´m satisfied with this ending, i, myself, wouldn´t know how to finish this kind of story, it never got anywhere, it didn´t have a plot nor any goals by the end of it, but it was really nice to read. I don´t think we need more of this kind of manga´s, we have a perfect amount of them already in my opinion. Meaningless mangas like this are nice to me i guess, it´s not like it had anything too worth mentioning apart from the extremely beautiful art, the depictions here were unique but that´s it? i dunno, i´m not a pro so i can´t tell. Man, it´s weird, it feels weird, was this the goal of the author? Because i feel weird. I´ll reread this, i´m sure of it, i don´t have a reason to, but also not a reason not to, Why do i feel that this is memorable? What is memorable of this? The laid back feelings that sprung around and never blossomed? huh, well, that´s the end i guess, interesting.

The volume categorization needs correction. Chapters 6 through 11 are in Volume 2; chapters 12 through 19 are in Volume 3.

Personally I feel a bit stiffed by this story. It was nice to watch their dynamic and I'm grateful that this was translated, but I feel like this frustrating relationship was not exactly pleasant to behold. Like, yeah, it can be realistic and it's a story, I guess? But it just felt like a vehicle for the artist's water-y drawings and a bad chemistry. It kind of felt like a 'shaggy dog' story.

So, how is this yuri again? I mean, the story and art are fine and everything but this is not yuri. Maybe not even subtext. In hopes of not getting banned again I'd say we seriously need some qc when using the tags. Don't get me wrong. I'm not asking for a 100 percent yuri content here and I'm open to read some other genres/tags, but when there are misleading tags and I expect something that never appears, well, it's kinda disappointing. I hope I'm not the only one feeling this way.

last edited at Jun 23, 2021 10:00PM

"The distance itself is the bond."

what a unique and compelling yuri story!! i know someone else in this thread said it, but we need more ambivalent yuri stories -- not just epic tales of romance.

Well, that sure was a huge waste of time. Thanks for the effort on translating it until the end. I don't know if I was actually expecting something to happen, but the whole thing was a big let down nonetheless.

Teh yuri:

Beautiful and melancholic. I don't know that I agree it's meaningless, I think Aya has a character arc of learning to appreciate Tsukiko at a distance. And at their reunion, they find that both have found something they enjoy in life; in other words, the stress and anxiety of their youth has been answered. Maybe not exactly the way they wanted it to be (esp. for Aya), but they've definitely matured.

I enjoy stories like this, I think it prompts reflection on our relationships and their boundaries.

Can anyone tell me what did glasses girl, and love crazy girl add to the story?

Had a hunch. I could read the writing on the wall despite it being tagged yuri—it was probably never gonna end up explicit. But I still feel slightly disappointed somehow. Hmm. Probably need to let it sink in and read it again. I feel like it’s one of those stories that gets told indirectly more often than directly. Need to go back and parse it.

Yeah I loved the art for the series, really loved it. I appreciate the scan/translations and don't regret reading it. However the story and character just felt...kind of like there could have been more to them? More to their relationship. It just kind of doesn't really go anywhere and is instead awkward the whole time, it even ends with them still in an awkward relationship.

Notably I LOVE slice of life, I enjoy slow burn works, but often there feels like some bit of character progress in slice of life series. The characters learn new things, try new things, expand their relationships, so fourth. For me there iis usually meaning and progress in slice of life, even if it's mundane. Here it felt like the progress was kind of almost non existent, outside of them at the end getting jobs in similar fields as adults. Their relationship has this weird stagnant gap that feels very strange, and even without them becoming lovers I feel that their friendship...doesn't really work? Kind of but not really. It's a very strange feeling.

last edited at Jun 24, 2021 1:03AM

I don’t know what’s the main message this manga is trying to convey, I was also pulled in by the art and the theme weird beautiful girl x weird “Pollyanna” girl. But what’s the point of this manga?

So, I’ll just create my own backstory hahaha, that maybe the beautiful girl did really search high and low in order to find swimmer girl, since it’s a very accurate coincidence to bump into her specifically. Then for the ending, they will fall in love with each other as they spent their time always working together.

I’m sorry this manga is so bland that I need to put all of these here. Hahaha.

I think I enjoyed this one. It certainly had a more melancholic and pessimistic tone than most series I read but it was a good experience to watch unfold. It pretty much ended as I expected it too, with Aya and Tsukiko parting ways after they graduate and eventually meeting again later, and I think I’m ok with that. After read up to chapter 9 around a month ago, I had the feeling this wouldn’t be yuri but the art was just so captivating that I couldn’t stop reading.

It really got me thinking of the friends I’ve had who have parted ways with me. It gives a person a lot to think about regarding the relationships they have with the people in their lives. It presents a choice to the reader, to be the distant and indifferent Tsukiko or the persistent and personable Aya. Or at least that’s my interpretation. Maybe after Covid is over, I’ll see if some old buddies wanna grab a drink. However, I absolutely see why this series gets a lot of hate. It was a hard to follow a lot of the time, the story really doesn’t go anywhere and the characters literally do not develop at all throughout the story. There is no change in Aya and Tsukiko’s relationship from chapter 1 all the way to chapter 19. But even so, I still think I might call this one of my favourites

Also the ocean is awesome so I like it

last edited at Jun 24, 2021 2:47AM

Now this was shitty, huh!

If someone asked for a phrase to define this series it will be either "you know what?... Nah, forget it" or "should I tell her?... Nah, better later (meaning never)"

At the beginning I really liked this series, I liked the characters and the "relationship dynamic", obviously slow. I repeat, AT FIRST. Then at some point they fucking started to strike us with so many senseless metaphors and monologues and Freudian shit I didn't get at all, and not because I am stupid but maybe because I'm uncultured? Maybe I should have read Kant o Descartes before approaching this masterpiece?

When chapter 17 came out, I was still saying to myself "wow this series is so good" for some reason (mainly because of all the ocean and fishes drawing) and by the end of it I said wait, they haven't made a single advance all this time? Aya never made the approach she intended, did she? Tsukiko keeps treating Aya like they barely knew each other, right? Even after going on "dates" and hosting her at her house, etc.

The graduation scene was the real and undeniable proof that the whole point of this manga was to make no advance at all in the main relationship, when Aya says something like "shouldn't this be memorable or something?" And Tsukiko goes like "hell nah bitch I don't even know you"

I feel like a really lost my time and the author lost a really good chance to make a nice manga cause they had some very good characters (at first) and an interesting pace (that actually became infuriating at last, but well). Obviously I'm no mangaka, I just express what I feel at this point like a fan, and if somebody actually enjoyed this, I don't intend to make them feel bad.

last edited at Jun 24, 2021 1:59AM

This sure is a story that went nowhere

And I'm not even saying it in terms of Yuri, I just mean their relationship in general makes barely any changes and both seem really unbothered in the end when they end up meeting by chance. Its a very unsatisfying ending and what I thought was a good pace at the beginning ended up being a slow build to nothing.

What do they even do in these chapters apart from hang at the pool and have internal monologues where Tsukiko imagines Aya as a fish?

last edited at Jun 24, 2021 2:22AM

It may be a bit of a meme, but "all of the emotions a woman throws at another" remains the best definition of yuri I have ever heard (source: irua, but I've also seen it elsewhere in the JP community). In that sense I'd call this series both absolutely yuri and a love story.

Tsukiko is a tsundere who fundamentally stops herself from reaching out to others due to a childhood of disappointment. She's fiercely independent and refuses to hold expectations towards others. Despite this, her encounter with Aya ended up completely transforming her life. Aya is completely responsible for Tsukiko's interest in marine biology (see ch. 1 where she first picks up a reference book) and the first proactive steps she took to define her own life (choosing to stay with Aya throughout highschool, and choosing a career path that would allow her to be together with her). Despite Tsukiko's refusal to show any outward sign of their connection, her relationship with Aya is completely mutual.

On Aya's part, the series was about her journey of coming to understand and accept her connection with Tsukiko -- to see through the tsun and percieve the dere hidden like the moon behind the clouds at night. By the end of the story, Aya arrives at sufficient faith in Tsukiko that she'll no longer push her away herself out of frustration at Tsukiko's lack of (apparent) reaction. This is a consummate form of their relationship and in this state Aya is basically invincible. While unnecessary, it is completely possible to extrapolate the emotional consummation of the relationship in the climax into some form of physical consummation in the future.

In any case, no regrest throwing my money at the Kindle raws of this series. Really hope the author will continue writing (and drawing!) for the genre.

last edited at Jun 24, 2021 2:30AM

tbh, despite there not being yuri in the end, I quite liked this overall. it's a bit of a bizarrely non-eventful story, even more slice of life than some slice of life manga