Blastaar

First last impression—kind of a meaningless time-skip just for a half-chapter breakup angst fakeout.

I don’t know why manga and Kdrama writers are so addicted to next-to-last-chapter “we finally got together for good so now I’m leaving for some random reason and then I’ll come back after a time skip” endings—I can think of half a dozen such manga and a dozen Kdramas off the top of my head.

This is such an incredibly common ending to romance series. I wonder if it has to do with the mechanics of a serialized medium: you don't know exactly how long the story is going to go on, so it's handy to have a kind of pre-packaged, self-contained ending that still manages to essentially fulfill the dramatic requirements of ratcheting up the tension a bit before the conclusion. It's something that can be set up early on fairly easily (like having the Nika mention that her dad wanted her to come live with him) and can then be slotted in with very little build-up after that.

Nevri

Ok, fine schuyguy. I need to admit you were spot on. Still what a pointless and stupid bait and switch, just for the last cliffhanger and drama.

I had the benefit of reading and rereading each chapter a half dozen times in the process of translating them and checking them for release. I'm sure that gives an advantage in piecing things together. Weirdly, the resolution here is very literal. The continuation of the dire sounding final lines of the previous chapter goes like this: "I thought we'd be okay as long as I held onto her hand. But I was wrong... I let go of her hand, and we were still okay." Kind of funny if you think about it like that.

Overall, I really liked this series. I think it was best in the beginning, and there were a few moments I found genuinely surprising and unique. When Nika confesses to Kurumi that there's someone else she likes, I was shocked when Kurumi responded that she already knew, and that actually ended up strengthening their relationship. That really drew me into the story. Nothing after that really affected me the same way, but it still managed to be a cute and fun story even if I thought the drama didn't work as well after that.

Cool Girl on My Lap is the final story in the anthology. The author says she'll probably come back to the characters at some point in the author's note, but that's it for now, as far as I know.

Do you know if there are physical English copies being sold?

It hasn't been licensed in english, so unfortunately not.

That's a bummer, do you where the best place to go for physical copies shipped to the states?

I bought mine from Kinokuniya. They're a Japanese bookstore chain that has locations all of the world, including quite a few in the US, so they'll ship to you.

So just to check, this is a sequel to This Girl Will Make Me a Woman and That Red On Me. It seems to ignore the latter though since the Love Triangle isn't brought up at all - this is called a side story on the first page, after all.

Yes, this is a side story about the same characters from those other stories. I believe the others were originally released as doujins, and this one was written as an extra specifically for the anthology release.

I feel like I could tell exactly where this series was axed. I mean, it's possible that this is how the author intended it to go, but it really felt like 5 chapters ago it suddenly took a turn for the boring and cliche as it raced towards an ending.

I feel the same way. It makes me wonder if I somehow read the situation wrong in chapter 2, but looking back the only clue I can find that they didn't have sex is that they were wearing clothes when they woke up in the morning. Other than that, it feels almost like the author just changed her mind so they could have their first time again.

lol I'm so used to slow-burn Yuri that this was way too fast progress for me. Is this the end or is there going to be more chapters?

Considering that they haven't even explained the dramatic question raised in the first page of the first chapter, I think it's safe to assume there will be more.

I have to admit that I was very surprised when it was revealed they hadn't had sex yet. I thought this was pretty conclusive. But no, I guess not. And not only did they not have sex that night, but even after coming so close they still didn't have sex for the next few weeks, even while regularly sleeping in the same bed? Kinda weird.

Also, I don't know if this plays a role in the uploaders' decisions, but all those series are being scanlated by someone who actually knows Japanese, whereas the version of this series that's up on mangadex is not.

The drama intensifies, typical kodama. Its up to chapter 12 elsewhere. It'd be nice if it keeps updating here

It's licensed in English. The first line on the upload request form is NO LICENSED SERIES, so I'm guessing this won't be updated here again.

Because there are no licensed series updated here regardless...

Shh. We don't want them to find out.

The drama intensifies, typical kodama. Its up to chapter 12 elsewhere. It'd be nice if it keeps updating here

It's licensed in English. The first line on the upload request form is NO LICENSED SERIES, so I'm guessing this won't be updated here again.

As for the series, the latest chapter (15) makes me think my earlier prediction was wrong. It looks like Mayumi has grown enough of a spine to say no to Touko, and she's decided to stay with Rin. Maybe Touko will do something completely slimy and underhanded to try and force her to come back with her, but as of now, I can't see what there is she could do, short of murdering Rin. And that doesn't look like her style. Maybe she'll do something to Hinata and try to make it look like it was Mayumi's fault, so Rin will get mad at her?

last edited at Jul 20, 2020 5:19AM

I don't think this is what "gay for pay" means. She's a prostitute, but she's not just acing gay for the money. She's just a prostitute who happens to be gay.

Hnggg robot yuri that’s good shit. The comment about the 2020 Tokyo olympics made me laugh though, that didn’t age too well.

Yeah, too bad about the delay. I guess we don't get to see the robots until next year.

I spell it as "sempai" because that's how it's pronounced. ん isn't the same as "n". The moraic nasal is pronounced differently depending on the following sound. Before the bilabial consonants, "m", "b", and "p", it takes the form of the bilabial nasal, "m". That's why "tempura" is the standard spelling, not "tenpura".

This is also why "grandpa" becomes "gramps" instead of "granps"

I hadn't thought of that one. The example I would use is something like how the same prefix is "in" in "invincible" but "im" in "imperfect".

But that's sorta a different issue, since there is a single accepted English spelling for most English words. When you're spelling out Japanese words, there are several competing standards, and sometimes people ignore all the standards and just go off and do their own thing. Kovachi Luka is not the "right" way to romanize 古鉢るか by any standard, but that's how she spells her name.

I'm positively in love with this manga. Is there any way to support the author?

Buy her manga. This one is published in Galette, and you can sign up online to support them through fantia: https://galetteweb.com/supporters
https://fantia.jp/fanclubs/3169

And you can also buy this manga in particular. Though they haven't been published in a compilation volume yet, she's selling ebooks of each chapter online for 165 yen. The process of buying these can be somewhat complicated, depending on where you live, since online bookstores tend to region-lock their sales of ebooks. But it is possible to get Amazon.jp and probably other Japanese webstores to sell you ebooks by using a Japanese address from a mail-forwarding company (you can get from for free from https://www.tenso.com/en just by opening an account). The manga title in Japanese is 私の可愛い子猫ちゃん

Plus she's written a ton of other manga, and some of them have been officially translated and released in English (and other possible some other languages). If you don't live in Japan, those will be easier to get your hands on than the Japanese originals. Buy some of those.

last edited at Jul 1, 2020 4:52AM

I love stories like this, where both characters are kinda messed up and awful in complementary ways. And they both ended up getting what they wanted, so it's a happy ending!

igenetycs posted:

Hey all, if you're a fan of the series and would like to see it continue, please consider purchasing a copy of the latest volume! Her recent tweets seem to indicate that the series is at significant risk of cancellation: https://twitter.com/kovachi_luka/status/1273874683549462530

I'm not certain that suggests it's at risk of cancellation so much as she can't simply keep writing until they're completely through high school. At the pace they're going that'd be like 200-300 chapters or more and the story progression wouldn't really be able to keep up with that.

"I really want to keep writing this till they graduate. If you haven't bought the tankoubon yet, I really wish you would" seems to imply that one of those things is related to the other.

But who knows. It's not like she comes right out and says they're going to cancel it. Maybe she just wants people to buy her manga, a common and reasonable desire for a mangaka to have.

last edited at Jun 27, 2020 8:39AM

Am I the only one that bothered by the fact that Senpai is spelled as "Sempai"?

I spell it as "sempai" because that's how it's pronounced. ん isn't the same as "n". The moraic nasal is pronounced differently depending on the following sound. Before the bilabial consonants, "m", "b", and "p", it takes the form of the bilabial nasal, "m". That's why "tempura" is the standard spelling, not "tenpura".

It's common localization of it. When spoken, Senpai is read as Sempai, so to make it easier for readers to read properly, I guess, it's often written as Sempai. As far as I know at least, translator here could have different reason to write it like that.

It's not a "localization", it's a choice of romanization. Different romanization systems have different priorities. Some always render ん as "n" for the sake of allowing consistent transliteration between kana and the roman alphabet. That's an important consideration in translation textbooks or academic papers on linguistics, but it's completely unnecessary in fiction translations aimed for an English-speaking audience. Other romanization systems change how ん is rendered for the sake of informing readers how words are pronounced, and I think this is a much higher priority in these types of translations. Ultimately, there is no perfect romanization system, so I go with what I think best fulfills the needs of manga readers.

Also, so far as I know, basically no scanlators consistently follow any of the formal romanization systems. According to the Kunreisiki system, "senpai" is correct, but "shi" and "chi" are wrong (し is "si", and ち is "ti). According to the Hepburn system, "sempai" is correct, as are "shi" and "chi". Over the years, lots of people have told me that "sempai" is wrong and I should be writing it as "senpai", but I've never seen anyone complain that "chan" is wrong and I'm supposed to be writing it as "tyan". According to these complaints, the right way to transliterate Japanese is to follow most of the rules of Hepburn, except for the one that says that ん should be written as "m" before bilabial consonants. Oh, and Hepburn uses vowels macrons for extended vowels, while Kunreisiki uses accents, but no scanlators use either.

last edited at Jun 18, 2020 11:56PM

I am definitely fed up with this... Not that the story is bad, or the situations are not funny sometimes... BUT THIS CLOSET Won't spit them out anytime soon will it ?

On their wedding night they'll still be pretending to all their guests that they're just friends.

schuyguy posted:

It's pretty obvious that the next chapter is going to start and they're going to be moving in with each other or something. She's just fucking with us. Again. Maybe Nika's dad decided that she'd move to live with him for the rest of high school, so they're finally getting back together after spending some time in a long-distance relationship.

Idk. When next to last page have them finally happy with thoughts like "It's fine. I won't let go of that hand again. As long as I won't let go of that hand, it'll be fine..." and then last page starts with clearly aged up character looking at photo of 2 of them thinking "That's what I thought." and follows it with "Back then...", all I can think about is that it means she's reminiscing on how their relationship ended and in next chapters we'll see flashbacks of how it happened.

I'll happily be proven wrong though.

I'm now actually kinda happy I didn't end up translating it myself, cos I'd probably want to drop it by this point.

Oh ye of little faith. I know this is going to have a happy ending. Most of the time, you can just tell.

Going by the note on the title page, I think this is the second-to-last chapter. The author has trolled us with these cliffhangers enough times that I'm not taking this one too seriously. I even called the bike one here.

The reason I think that Nika's dad made her move is that line on page 73. There's a quote about her dad wanting her to live with him from way early on in the series, and there's no reason she'd remind of us that unless it plays a role here. So I'm pretty confident in my guess: time skip a couple years, Nika has been living with her dad, but now that she's graduated, she and Kurumi are going to reunite and move in together.

We'll find out in three more months.

last edited at Sep 26, 2020 6:17PM

WTF. You guys thought last cliffhanger was bad? Well, new one is on another whole level of terrible. I feel so stupid for hoping for them to just happily date now without more annoying drama. They just can't catch a break. Being lesbian is suffering.

It's pretty obvious that the next chapter is going to start and they're going to be moving in with each other or something. She's just fucking with us. Again. Maybe Nika's dad decided that she'd move to live with him for the rest of high school, so they're finally getting back together after spending some time in a long-distance relationship.

last edited at Sep 26, 2020 6:16PM

thank you for this gem, so cutee

p.s.: the tittle shouldn't be something like like "I'm spinning around you" or anything giving the idea of one orbiting the other? I just felt the tittle a bit odd, sorry if it's rude to point out something like this

The verb 紡ぐ generally means "to spin thread out of fiber", but that's not all it means. Since the object of the verb is 傍白, which means "theatrical aside", I think it's clear that 紡ぐ is being used metaphorically, as it often is, to mean "to tell a tale". There are similar metaphors in English, like you can say "weaving a tale" or even "spinning a yarn" to mean "telling a story," but I couldn't see a way of naturally working those into the title.

I'm pretty sure 紡ぐ cannot mean "to orbit" or "to spin around" something. It's not that kind of spin.

"Can we go further? It's my first time but I'll do my best to make you feel good." Pin to bed. Cut scene to the next morning, where they're sleeping together in a narrow bed, not naked but definitely wearing less than they were.

Is the dispute whether they had sex at all, or whether they had sex within the next minute, vs. some longer period of foreplay and increasingly heavy petting/makeout and then sex?

I was just saying that we don't know that they just immediately threw off their clothes and started licking each other, though that's certainly a possibility.

Honestly, I did wonder for a second if maybe the author is going to come back later and say that they haven't had sex. That would be pretty funny way to fuck with us.

To clarify, I don't think it was quick because they had sex shortly after confessing, or anything. I've had one night stands with people who were virtually strangers, so yeah, it can happen pretty quickly. But generally, I spend at least an hour making out with the person before either of us starts to undress. What is weird in this one is that their first kiss and agreeing to have sex happened within fifty seconds, tops.

I don't think it's implied that they have sex immediately after one kiss. Look at what exactly happens in the panels: Nao asks, "Can we go further?" and tells Haruka she loves her, and then there's a time skip to the next morning. The specific order of the events that follow is purely up to the reader.

last edited at May 16, 2020 7:12PM

Well, I think IRL it'd be bizarre for things to progress so quickly - or at least in a long term relationship that lasts, but I don't think entering into a relationship is the main story of the manga, but the whole career conflict feelings of the MC (dating someone succeeding in something you quit for mysterious reasons is probably going to be a source of angst, but hopefully growth too). I'm interested in seeing where this goes.

You really think this is bizarrely fast? I think this pace is fairly normal. They spent several weeks or months getting to know each other before their first kiss, so if anything they're going kinda slowly for college students (from what I remember), but that's probably due to the inexplicable absence of alcohol.

I do agree that this isn't a typical romance manga. There's a point to all this that goes beyond the standard, "when will they get together" drama.