Terra thought some gay thoughts, pulled out a shotgun, and upgraded the close relationship of roommates to the even closer relationship of accomplices.

Volume 2 of the manga came out on the 6th, we've updated the QR code link in the credits in case you'd like to support Tanaka-sensei. The next chapter is due to release on Jan 17. And in case you're following the novels in Japanese, the 4th and final volume in the series will be releasing on Jan 22.

I love this chapter so much! Something really cute about her being unable to sleep (nice fish pillow detail) due to thinking hard about how it's possible to be gay and immediately getting to action with no hesitation! Sorry Gendo clan, but she's already claimed that girl.
We're finally getting some real tension and action, so hopefully there isn't a delay again because I really want to see how this part will play out in the manga. I did think that the trackers would have a more.. spacey design, Outer Wilds style, but practical and functional but anyway we got some fun Terra running and rolling shots so I'm happy.

The art has also come a long way since the first chapter, and honestly his style has only gotten more charming. That page art(?) for this and the previous chapter were seriously adorable.
also, Horse. Truly a scary creature.

Terra thought some gay thoughts, pulled out a shotgun, and upgraded the close relationship of roommates to the even closer relationship of accomplices.

LMAO.

Dam whipping out a gun like that, gives me a warm fuzzy American feeling on top of the hots for a woman defending her wife.

Their base ship is called Idaho, so I guess it was only a matter of time for a gun to pop up!

Of all the characters, I sure wasn't expecting Terra to be the one to be packing a shotgun, but let's go!

Congratulations to Terra for realize that lesbian couples are a thing!

Congratulations to Terra for realize that lesbian couples are a thing!

It does beg the question: What exactly happened in the past that seemingly erased their existence and installed a strict patriarchy?

Terra reminds me of Milly Thompson from Trigun in the best possible way, and the reveal that she's packing heat brings them even closer together in vibes. I love it.

Also, horse!

Congratulations to Terra for realize that lesbian couples are a thing!

It does beg the question: What exactly happened in the past that seemingly erased their existence and installed a strict patriarchy?

I'm hoping the story gets more into it, but I'm not sure there needs to be a single event for things to get this way. It's been three centuries since the Circs arrived at FBB, and there are a couple of points that suggest the strict patriarchy is the result of steady backsliding over generations.

One factor is probably the relatively limited population, since the clans are only about 20,000 strong (and probably smaller in the past). There are going to be the same small town pressures towards conformity in play, and the severe isolation only strengthens that power. Given that the Circs were highly multicultural to begin with, gender/sexual minorities would probably be the most visibly non-conforming parties, and be among the first nail in need of a hammer.

Chief Xeon also says some stuff hinting that gender relations are generally constructed to facilitate population/capital growth. This might be related to the Circs' resource curse, in that any AMC clay obtained beyond meeting the Circs' needs is a valuable export. This economic structure would incentivize overdevelopment of the fishing industry, while other sectors of the economy become underinvested. In a lot of places, this gives industrial representatives a lot of power, and their response to obtaining that power is to crack down on civil liberties, education, and public funding to make it difficult to organize opposition.

At Endeavor clan, this structure seems to have evolved to a point where it has semi-independently invented something resembling Umberto Eco's description of an ur-fascist ideology. Xeon's monologue in chapter 8 explicitly touches on that since it mentions will-to-power, the cult of motherhood, and a subtle disdain towards cultural production over economic production.

At any rate, a necessary component of generating productive labor worldview is compelling women to bear children, and to do so requires reducing/stripping them of their agency to refuse. This structure is definitely baked into the twister/decompa dynamic — comphet only, strict gendered division of labor, framing it nominally as a partnership but making the Twister the voice of authority, and loosely treating women/decomping as an irrational force to be controlled. Given fishing is a prestige job among the Circs, it is likely that this worldview filters down to the rest of society as an ideal to emulate.

Both of these factors alone would probably gravitate towards a cisheteronormative worldview over a few generations, regardless of how progressive the initial founders may have been. Whatever upheaval scrambled the Idaho's fan media repository and resulted in the collapse/destruction of eight clans probably just accelerated (or marked accelerations of) those trends.

Sorry to make this post even longer, but a couple of extra tidbits from the novel's prologue (it's good, read it!) but the fact that Magiri essentially performed a lovers' suicide, followed by the implication her subordinate Sivi Endeavor (a woman) subsequently received credit for Eda and Magiri's accomplishments under the less obviously gendered name C.B. probably speaks to how lesbianism might have been viewed following that event. The fact that Magiri and Eda also led a revolution against more conservative/less visionary leadership likely further complicates things.

The prologue also notes that the Circ society has been in a state of cultural stagnation/economic recession since the invention of the pillar boat shortly after Magiri's death. This probably has to do with the resource curse mentioned above, the lack of incentive for further innovation once basic needs are easily met, and an extremely strong desire to maintain social stability. Circs are often described as "unimaginative", and Terra's active imagination is treated as really freaky by everyone around her (including Diode, at first).

At any rate, the setting sucks as a place to live. Back when we first started scanlating this, I recall coming across some Ogawa tweets about feminist theory he had been reading back when developing the series, and I'm really impressed by how seamlessly he seems to have integrated it into the work.

last edited at Dec 26, 2024 11:28AM

The importat is she know how to shoot

Man apparently got nailed in the face and it only broke his goggles, plus no damage to the surroundings? Assuming it must've been loaded with rubber bullets or some other less-than-lethal ammo

Assuming it must've been loaded with rubber bullets or some other less-than-lethal ammo

It outright says rubber bullets.

"one in every home" Terra is 100% American, I can't read it any other way now. I'm gonna give her a slightly redneck accent in my head when I read her parts now.

Defend the wife!!

It's here! The moment where things get real!
I love Terra's reaction to Diode pointing that she does want to escape, how hard the realization that there's no way to but leave the planet must have hit her. So the problem is... How? With how much Terra likes Diode though, I don't think Diode is going to be worrying about Terra not wanting to follow her for much long. :3
I love the cultural shock, and also their deck dresses.

So, with this I believe that it's quite certain that the manga is only going to adapt the first volume of the novel. Those who have read the novel, even if only up to what's currently available in English, must have noticed how certain events have differed from the other between the two versions, but this time, a whole 2 chapters were skipped (9 and 10) and went straight into chapter 11.

Anyway, I'm incredibly excited to how this is going to play out in the manga, this part is The part! Seriously, what's coming next is going to be awesome!

Also I just wanted to mention how I love the difference in the thickness of their legs on the first page, really does get across their difference in body structure.

If anyone's curious, this attack scene does go a bit differently in the novel, so a short summary of it:
Diode wasn't fainted on the floor like that, when Terra arrived at the attic, she was being carried away by them, and upon hearing Terra's voice, they threw the light grenade so they could escape, but thanks to her mask it didn't affect her, so she shot three times, hitting one of them with the first, missing the second shot, and apologizing for shooting them as she fired the third shot. The blood left behind was also one of the few signs confirming that they were there.
Then she runs towards Diode, not caring about anything else, asking if she's okay, if she was hit by any of the shots and holding her up in her arms. Since her senses weren't fully working then, Diode resisted Terra's embrace for a moment, questioning if it's Terra which causes Terra to tighten it, and what allowed her to ascertain that it was Terra was... caressing Terra's chest with both hands lol so it wasn't as reserved as it happened here.

The Endeavour clan seems culturally analogous to the US, not just because of the names and the gun culture. Before the fishing duel, Xeon professed a reverence for personal freedoms within reason, and 'their women' do technically get a much wider choice in their profession compared to the other clans. (We're told Gendo basically exports their girls to the other clans after a mandatory decompa training, and in the novel version Diode tells Terra about how she was treated by two other clans she visited before she found Terra.) This still ends up working as a more gentle flavor of the same repression of women's autonomy, as kinseijoshi explained above.

I can't believe she's American

Congratulations to Terra for realize that lesbian couples are a thing!

It does beg the question: What exactly happened in the past that seemingly erased their existence and installed a strict patriarchy?

So did you know that some of the key leaders in the English Peasants' Revolt of 1381 were women? Up until recently I didn't, and I'm kind of a peasants' revolt fan. But it just didn't seem important to subsequent male commentators and historians, so they kind of disappeared. There's a lot of stuff like that. This is a more extreme case, but then it's a society that's gone through some serious changes and loss, loss of records and stuff. It seems pretty plausible to me even without any major deliberate decision to cover up (not saying there wasn't one, just that it could have happened just by general prejudice and minimization).

The Endeavour clan seems culturally analogous to the US, not just because of the names and the gun culture. Before the fishing duel, Xeon professed a reverence for personal freedoms within reason, and 'their women' do technically get a much wider choice in their profession compared to the other clans. (We're told Gendo basically exports their girls to the other clans after a mandatory decompa training, and in the novel version Diode tells Terra about how she was treated by two other clans she visited before she found Terra.) This still ends up working as a more gentle flavor of the same repression of women's autonomy, as kinseijoshi explained above.

I loved the way he went seamlessly from "We're great because we respect freedom" to "In other news, no freedom for you!" . . . which is, yes, a pretty American kind of thing.

So nice how it was translated as Mr. Squid, cute... I did expect them to be portrayed as considerably intimidating, because like the whales, they're large-sized besshu and can pose some danger, but I like this cuter take on them too and how they use their bodies as a whole to attack rather than tentacles.
Also found Terra feeling bad for them adorable... and how Diode notices it and goes along with it, but this time, being considerate of Terra got them in trouble, sadly.

We're nearing the climax so I'm really excited for the next chapter (I really like this part in the novel), but almost certain now that the adaptation won't go past the first volume. I'm guessing we'll only be seeing 3 more chapters at most. orz
I hope that I'm wrong though... but with the amount of things that were skipped, I'm keeping my hopes low.

DAMN THIS CHAPTER WAS AMAZING!!

but

MR. SQUID :'CCCCCCCCCCCCCC

Falling into a gas giant is pretty scary... I wonder if their ship was totally annihilated? It can't imagine a reason they would eject the cockpit by itself.

We're nearing the climax so I'm really excited for the next chapter (I really like this part in the novel), but almost certain now that the adaptation won't go past the first volume. I'm guessing we'll only be seeing 3 more chapters at most. orz
I hope that I'm wrong though... but with the amount of things that were skipped, I'm keeping my hopes low.

Yeah given that the novel series ended I'm not optimistic either :(

Yes, I'm just repeating myself but the manga adaptation has skipped over a lot of details, and those are incredibly noticeable even if you've only read up to what we've translated and made available of the novel online so far.

I love the manga too, on its own it's seriously good, but with the amount of things it's left out, I really don't think it'll be going much further. Without spoiling anything, the scale of things change quite a bit, so there's a lot more to its world Terra and Diode weren't even aware of. The manga hasn't really been able to show just how much those two are a bother to the norms and how far it's led them to, and how despite the Circs themselves seeing how much it could benefit them as a whole, there's a constant attempt at keeping them within said norms. Controlling them, ignoring that they only could achieve that because they strayed from the "proper path".
It really does seem like there's some sort of limit on the manga. I feel that those details not being present has taken away from how much FBB feels like a cage (it still feels like one, but the manga hasn't brought up much the world outside of it), and the slight change in the two's personalities comes exactly from not showing and changing certain moments, again due to said limit.

Still! I'm really, really looking forward to seeing this part drawn, things get kind of wild and I hope that Tanaka Ahiru manages to shove in a little of a certain moment despite not having the same base for it. It's a seriously funny scene, I love the way he draws expressions so seeing that drawn by him would be nice.

Volume 4 gave, in my opinion, an incredibly beautiful close to their story, their relationship, and the setting itself, so it's a shame that we likely aren't going to be seeing that in drawn form. It took me a little while to recover from reading it... It's awesome. Twinstar Cyclone Runaway is awesome and it's crazy to think how there seem to be no prospects of it getting officially licensed.
I would love to talk a lot more about it but I don't want to spoil anything (Thankfully most of the things I say can't be 100% trusted because I misremember things a lot lol), so when the manga is done, I hope people give the novel a try too, because things get a lot more intense on a scale I hadn't expected while first reading it, and I think it's one of those works that currently really stand out in the yuri genre as a whole, similar to the way Urasekai Picnic does. In the sense that, it's not just the characters that are elaborated, with their own complex inner world, but the setting itself as a whole is elaborated and affects how those characters behave and think, and is also affected by the characters themselves, and the yuri is an important part of it.

It's hard for me to evaluate the light novel on its own merits quite yet, given that all the parts I read so far were already covered by the manga, but I do feel like I unlocked a whole new layer of a story I already knew, and I have been looking forward to every update since I took the plunge. Comparing it to its SFF yuri light novel peers, the relationship writing in TCR is as delicate and high-definition as it is in MagiRevo (if not more), while the world building is as meticulous as it is in Executioner; the latter already shines through mostly unimpeded in the manga version, but the light novel really helped me fully appreciate the former.

It really is, I'm not sure how else to say it, "more" gay. Of course, reading the manga you can tell something is going on between these two, but reading the same story beats in the light novel feels almost like reading ahead of the manga because the romance is so much more upfront.

last edited at Mar 7, 2025 10:56PM