Okay I'm gonna need a POV swap where it's revealed the friend is the one secretly pulling the strings and she's just been pretending to be naive this whole time. Because who has that done to them in the theater and is just chill about it after the fact.

I was about to write this one off but the last 2 pages got me. I am always down for something dumb and trashy.

Shocked this doesn't have the idiot couple tag yet.

Well the obvious problem with this is, how is that any different from that ski trip, she was already determined to do the same thing :P I think that's the biggest problem with the whole manga in a nutshell, it's kinda repetitive and really likes to spin in circles doing more or less the same thing, like some kind of cartoon where villain always loses at the end of the episode and in the next one barely anything changed. I enjoyed a lot of it regardless but it could have been way better.

Yeah this is kinda why I lost interest and started skimming ~15 chapters ago. The problem with this kind of love story is that the only issue they had was their inability to communicate their feelings, so the minute they get together it's happily ever after. All of the side characters had their arcs wrapped up ages ago and didn't have anything to do in the story besides play wingmen. The author put all of their eggs in this one basket, but there's only so many times and so many ways you can have someone interrupt a confession or misunderstand something before it gets ridiculous and the audience runs out of patience. It really felt to me like the author accidentally wrote themselves in a corner because they didn't think far enough ahead, or were afraid adding in other elements would compromise the fluffy, light-hearted vibe it was going for.

Really good chapter. Drawing attention to the phone right before showing Niji try to gaslight Remu in particular was really great. I think that's the first time we haven't seen her fiddling with the phone? She definitely has this idealized image of Remu that she feels the need to preserve, but I wonder if her thing is scripting out Remu's life in her phone like she's a fictional character, and that's why she gets so upset whenever Remu does or says anything Niji doesn't anticipate. Also wonder if her obsession extends to rewriting events that don't go her way, to the point where the Remu in her phone is more real to her than Remu the person. Is she intentionally manipulating her to conform to this idealized Remu, or is she just plain delusional? I hope we get a Niji-centric chapter soon.

I also like how everyone's fetishistic hangups seem to revolve around obsession and possession. I assumed the title just referred to having weird fetishes, but maybe it's referring to the toxic possessive "love" that these characters have for each other? It makes the choice to have fetishes centered around malleable clay figurines all the more thematically resonant.

It doesn't seem like either of these idiots want to be the one who ends it, so I guess Nanase will eventually start cheating with Yuki to create the maximum amount of drama possible.

Primo fake dating scenario, I hope it keeps up the pace. Manatsu is adorable.

It's crazy how different the dynamic of their relationship is here to where it is now in the serialization. They have so little understanding or respect for each other starting out, you can tell sex and a lack of dating options were the only things really holding their relationship together. They've grown up so much... T_T Saeko especially, I forgot how crude and obnoxious she could be.

And while Nanase is possible the only redeemable person, she isn't making it clear to Yuni that she prioritizes her as a girlfriend. There is a lot of hesitation in her actions. She also doesn't have a clear view of what Yuni really wants in a lover due to little to no communication (again this is because she has a life outside of just thinking about Yuni). This is only hurting Yuni more and causing Yuni to think dramatically in a negative way

This isn't to say Nanase is a bad person. She will be a wonderful girlfriend for someone who doesnt live in fear of abandonment like Yuni does.

All my personal opinion though.

Yeah, while Nanase has done the least "wrong" so far in the story compared to Fuuko and Yuni, she was never a very good girlfriend to Yuni, or for Yuni, really. Volleyball is still her #1, and Yuni is her #2, or #3 even, which is what was causing all of their relationship problems to begin with. Like, even when Fuuko was actively cucking her right in front of her face she still wasn't even willing to say Yuni was more important than her club. Nanase quite literally just doesn't have enough room in her life to give Yuni the amount of attention she needs.

Although now I think we're starting to see her more toxic traits come out. I feel like she sees her relationship with Yuni as something that she has to 'win' or 'succeed' at. And she is shaping up to be a very sore loser who doesn't know when it's time to let go.

Ignoring the tagging situation from earlier, I do think this would've been received better if it hadn't escalated so quickly. It's a lot to cram into a oneshot and it's not made clear the MC is into it until the very end so I can see why people felt blindsided by the content. I kind of already associated exhibitionism & blackmail with humiliation since they tend to go together but maybe there should be a separate humiliation tag if people feel that strongly about it.

Did not expect people to get so upset over an exhibitionist sub fantasy considering all of the other stuff that's been uploaded here over the years.

Can't go wrong with a grumpy x sunshine pairing. Hope it stays relatively light-hearted.

At the current rate this is going, I think we've got at least 20 more chapters before they kiss and then we'll enter a new arc where one of them assumes that means they're dating and the other one thinks they're just besties who kiss.

Been a bit since the last post. Angela's Shuukura discord server is quite active and seems to be a source of motivation since she seems to be churning out chapters faster than ever.

Amawashi Pt 84: https://amawashigroup.wordpress.com/2024/10/04/part-84-the-things-miyagi-wont-tell-me-i/

Pt 85: https://amawashigroup.wordpress.com/2024/10/06/part-85-the-things-miyagi-wont-tell-me-ii/

Pt 86: https://amawashigroup.wordpress.com/2024/10/07/part-86-the-things-miyagi-wont-tell-me-iii/

We're entering the kinda angsty part of the story where Miyagi's focusing on how they'll be separated at graduation. She's pulling away by not letting Sendai kiss her and will continue trying to distance herself.
But at the same time these are some of the best chapters with how the gay chicken plays out. I can't remember how the "trade" at the end of part 86 goes down in the next chapter but I'm pretty sure it doesn't immediately get shutdown due to Miyagi's request being too much to handle.

What stands out to me with these chapters is how stark Sendai's internal attitude shift is after the culture festival. Before the separation, you can still see her actively denying how attached she is, trying to act unbothered when they talk about the future or not being able to spend time together. You can really tell the forced distance broke whatever resolve she had left because she immediately gets way more assertive and demanding in the music room, and her internal monologue afterwards is much more honest with regards to how she feels and what she wants from her relationship with Miyagi.

The best kind of angst is the stuff that hits too close to home. Good meal.

Feel like this is setting up for a fake lovers situation where she has to help someone else with their role in exchange.

Damn okay that happened faster than I thought it would. Lot of interesting directions this could go. The barely restrained slap from Hase sure is some dark foreshadowing though. I imagine Io will immediately cave and hook up with Misa again as soon as Misa is able to get them alone together and Io will get stuck in a loop trying to appease both of them until someone (likely Hase let's be real) does something extreme enough for her to make a hard choice and commit to one of them. I also expect them all to destroy their livelihoods in the process because how could they not with their careers and reputation on the line.

Hase is already doing something extreme. Io doesn't want this and doesn't seem interested in Hase whatsoever. Hase's on her way to assaulting her or worse in this very scene. This was a very uncomfortable move from her.

Right, I'm not trying to downplay sexual assault here. This stuff makes me uncomfortable too. I'm just saying I think Io will let Hase force herself on her out of fear. When I say "extreme enough" I mean physical battery on top of the sexual assault, or doing something that would create a public scandal and destroy the status quo. It's totally possible that this is what gets Io to run away for good or abandon her career to get away from her. I'm just expecting it to be drawn out a little bit given that this is just volume 2, but if everything needs to be wrapped up by volume 3 then it would make sense for the next chapter to be as far as it goes before Misa steps in to help Io escape.

Damn okay that happened faster than I thought it would. Lot of interesting directions this could go. The barely restrained slap from Hase sure is some dark foreshadowing though. I imagine Io will immediately cave and hook up with Misa again as soon as Misa is able to get them alone together and Io will get stuck in a loop trying to appease both of them until someone (likely Hase let's be real) does something extreme enough for her to make a hard choice and commit to one of them. I also expect them all to destroy their livelihoods in the process because how could they not with their careers and reputation on the line.

Chapter 7 is really cute. Koharu and Kanna are cuties. Wonder about that cupid dude and if Kanna will explain more about cupid world. Chiyo is so spicy lol

Also, this chapter somehow hints more about the possibility (theory)of Kanna being Koharu and Aki's cupid before the accident happened. Like how she was supposed to make Koharu consider Aki's feeling more and developing it into crush when Aki confessed to Koharu.

I'm also leaning towards the hypothesis that Kanna was directly or indirectly responsible for Koharu not knowing love/becoming a cupid. Even if she has other less conspicuous reasons for prioritizing Koharu's needs over her own, Kanna's sense of responsibility towards her is a bit excessive for someone who's not being motivated by guilt or some other ulterior motive.

Cool to see more LGBT stuff in the autobiographical sphere get translated.

I had a pretty similar social experience growing up with the gendered expectations stuff, although it never crossed over into body or gender dysphoria. Hard to make friends when boys want nothing to do with you because you're a girl, and you can't connect with other girls because you only like "boy things."

As much as I love this kind of melodramatic toxicity, Rumi's motivation here just doesn't really make any sense and does not feel like something a real person would ever do or think. Kinda spoiled the vibe. If your setup for the twist feels more sensible and compelling than the actual twist, then you need to go back to the drafts.

I feel like part of it is that she is naturally predisposed to the sort of disposition she ended up with, but this bit that went into her childhood already really pushed her into it.

https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/my_dearest_nemesis_ch09#9

The thing with memory, for most people, is that it's usually inextricably tied to emotions. People tend to be better at recalling vibes, or at least how they felt than specific details, and those details tend to get fuzzier as time passes. And what are the things that provoke the largest emotional responses? Things we care about, things we are already emotionally invested in. Very simply, the things we don't care about or recognize as significant are the first things to be forgotten. So what happens when someone is primed to view people as a whole as largely interchangeable and ephemeral, as things that aren't worth investing time and feelings in from a very young age? You get Jiang as she is now. As far as she's concerned, her entire time in school was just her learning and maybe there were some people in the background while she was doing that.

And even then, I feel like she wouldn't have ended up in quite this state if not for Xu Qi latching onto her and making sure to alienate anyone who tried to get close to the brainy person she was leeching off
(she also seems to get a kick out of the act of driving wedges between people)

https://dynasty-scans.com/chapters/my_dearest_nemesis_ch11#8

Besides the well established bit with Shen, this page mentions ""friends"" and includes a different but completely faceless and therefore forgotten other girl whom I'm interpreting as someone else who tried to bridge the gap to Jiang despite her apparent coldness.

And Jiang isn't completely lacking in empathy, she just has some glaring blind spots. Basically, she has lived her life without attachment to people, and therefore fails to grasp when other people are attached to people. The completely cold, 'rational' thing to do if people are making you feel bad (whether by exclusion or whatever else) is to find other people. Jiang isn't grasping that it isn't the what so much as the who that really stung Shen at the time, or that other people who are emotionally invested in people can't or won't just walk away at the first notable set-back. But in the present she does pick up on the fact something she just said upset Shen in a major way, and so she tries to make up for it. But socially stunted as she is, she's only got one card to play.

Hah, guess I'm due for a reread if I can't even remember the previous chapters.

I know Jiang is supposed to be this flawlessly competent person, but how do you end up in a director position when you're this bad at reading the room and can't even empathize with people at a cognitive level.

I hope she gets an arc that explores her past and explains why her entire childhood seems to be memory-holed cuz barely having any memory of your friends or what your school life was like is not normal and makes me think she had some traumatic stuff happening in the background. Or maybe I'm reading too much into it and her being clueless is just a funny and interesting way to create conflict.

I knew Fuuko was gonna turn this into some dommy mom kink...will Yuni be into it though?

Kind of surprised Nanase is still invested in being a good girlfriend? I thought she would assume Yuni was cheating again since she knew Yuni went to meet up with Fuuko the last chapter. But I suppose she would be the kind of person to find a way to blame herself for it. Makes a good segue for Yuki to get involved in the story again.

Where did you read that Nanase knew Yuni met up with Fuuko last chapter? I don't see anything that says Nanase knew about that.

I went back and looked and I think I got confused with the text messages and didn't realize the text from Nanase in the theater was about Yuni's mom oops.

I knew Fuuko was gonna turn this into some dommy mom kink...will Yuni be into it though?

Kind of surprised Nanase is still invested in being a good girlfriend? I thought she would assume Yuni was cheating again since she knew Yuni went to meet up with Fuuko the last chapter. But I suppose she would be the kind of person to find a way to blame herself for it. Makes a good segue for Yuki to get involved in the story again.