I miss my fluff.

I know there’s always been an undercurrent of tension in this series. But I miss the cool-tall-girl/feisty-short-girl fluff.

Thanks, Daphie. (I think of this author as usually doing some oblique storytelling, but this makes a lot more sense now.)

Could someone please explain what she's talking about on page 26?

I took it as lovey-dovey babbling.

Lovey-Dovey Fluff genre.

Can't wait for an another entertainment industry centric mahua that will take eons to get somewhere, and that I will still follow for some good forsaken reason. Woohoo

eons to get somewhere, you say? spoiler a kiss already happened in the manhua hehe and its one of the very early chapters too.

For me the yuri webtoon problem is less about the romance pacing inside the story than the uncertain scanlation continuation. I was just culling my Mangadex library and found a surprising number of stalled-out yuri long-strip series that I had been interested in, some of them with quite a few chapters already posted.

I’d never complain about scanlators dropping a series—-we’re all reading someone’s hard work for free. But it’s my personal impression that the yuri manhua genre has more than the average share of series that just come to a sudden halt.

Can't wait for an another entertainment industry centric mahua that will take eons to get somewhere, and that I will still follow for some good forsaken reason. Woohoo

I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to say about this one, but this ^ will do nicely.

It’s been a storyline since Kanna showed up way back. Not a new plot line. And Kanna has been projecting onto Aya this whole time. Joe and Kanna have been running parallel with Aya and Mitsuki like a cautionary tale of sorts for the MCs. It’s been blatant the whole time.

Yeah it has. I think people are a bit upset because they've been waiting a while for a big moment for our main two and it seemed right around the corner but now there's a pile of previously understated obstacles threatening to extend things again. That's the vibe I'm getting. Seems more like patience is beginning to run thin.

Just imagine how Aya feels.

This manga really is peak lesbian yaoi, and I love it so much for being that. This is absolutely going to end with Misa and Io killing people and fleeing the country together.

Depending on which characters they kill, I could be OK with that.

TongTong, if you keep scolding your girlfriend, she’s going to have an orgasm. Um, wait, . .

I always struggle with plots where all that's necessary to progress is tell somebody to fuck off and move on with life. It's not actually much of a challenge, and especially in this situation, where there's barely any connection between the two ... ^^

Right—I’m ten times more interested in how Xiao-Lu’s going to let her kink-flag fly than in what happens with Shithead-chan, and the kink thing itself could be solved (as I said) with a “Kink for Beginners” pamphlet.

(Getting TongTong to believably role-play dominance/pain on her darling duckling may well be a harder lift, but all that remains to be seen.)

These two are always quite adorable in any case, so I’m not really going to complain, but . . .

Is Bai Yan really straight
There’s a lot of mix signal here

Not to mention the clashing signals of “cut her out of my life” versus “we gradually drifted apart.”

I’m looking forward to hearing from Xiao-Lu exactly what happened between the two of them back in the day.

I find it hard pressed to see the Yuri in this one. Felt more subtextie.

They want to spend the rest of their lives together, preserving their precious feelings—they are: Super-Roommates!

I guess author-san could have thrown an “Isn’t the moon beautiful?” scene in there, just to seal the deal.

At some level I understand the “horse race” way of reading romance manga, but it’s just not the primary way I think about reading stories—I’m mostly interested in what the author is doing with the pieces of the narrative and how they’re doing it. In this case, I think it’s fascinating how the strange premise, especially the 7-year gap with characters at this age (these ages), sets up so many unusual emotional complications.

Sure, as imaginary people, Aya is the “best” of the lot—brave, forward-thinking, trying to do the best with the bizarre cards she’s been dealt—while Koto and Erika are both stuck living in the past in different ways and not doing too well at it. But it’s hard for me to see the characters as the equivalent of sports teams, where I’m “rooting” for one over the other.

2) How exactly will Bai Yan's (obviously doomed) attempt to steal Xiao Lu get connected to Xiao Lu's subby sexual yearnings (assuming it does)?

imo it looks like ex-friends-that's-a-bit-too-late is attempting to manipulate that dude with a crush to interfere in some way.

Which will probably trigger some more jealousy/possessiveness/protectiveness, similar to this chapter, and somewhere along the line Tongtong's going to realize what's going on with Xiao Lu.

I agree, which is why I think that Chapter 6.5 isn’t canon to the main story—neither of them would have forgotten a direct statement of Xiao Lu’s desire for domination followed by actual whatever the BDSM community term is for collar/leash play (not my scene, but that bell was pretty cute, btw).

I hadn’t thought through why ex-friend-chan was thinking about that guy—intervening between TongTong and Xiao Lu with a hunky guy is the very definition of Doomed Plan.

Yet more evidence that all Chinese lesbians are impossibly gorgeous. And rich, or at least high-status.

How exactly will Bai Yan's (obviously doomed) attempt to steal Xiao Lu get connected to Xiao Lu's subby sexual yearnings (assuming it does)? I'd expect TongTong to be taken aback at first at the prospect of ordering her beloved partner to bark like a dog, etc. in the bedroom, but she's shown herself to be nothing if not game when it comes to pleasing her little darling. A beginner's intro-to-kink pamphlet would seem to be all that's needed to get things on the right track in the conjugal bedroom.

I am assuming this chapter was a foreshadowing of what's to come. They'll easily thwart Bai Yan's nonsense because they aren't stupid (and are already happily "married"). In the process, Tongtong will accidentally do DOM things and eventually, she'll realize Xiao Lu seems to turn to puddy whenever she's pinned against a wall to hide from Bai (or Xiao Lu will get frustrated from being "teased" and outright confess). Then maybe they'll talk about turning those accidents into "not accidents," and upping their frequency.

I guess a third question would be, given the ease with which Xiao Lu gets aroused by any suggestion of dominant behavior, whether she'll turn out to just need some light explicit kink to melt into a puddle of goo or if she'll lead them into a bottomless abyss of harder and harder BDSM role-play. (Not that there's anything wrong, etc. But TongTong's such a sweetie--and the overall tone of the series is such--that it's hard to imagine the latter outcome.)

Just re-read the whole thing, and I am left with two questions going forward:

1) What exactly was the relationship between Bai Yan and Xiao Lu back in the day? It's not entirely clear that it was a specifically romantic relationship (although it might have been) beyond Xiao Lu's crush that ended when Bai Yan opted for a boyfriend.

2) How exactly will Bai Yan's (obviously doomed) attempt to steal Xiao Lu get connected to Xiao Lu's subby sexual yearnings (assuming it does)? I'd expect TongTong to be taken aback at first at the prospect of ordering her beloved partner to bark like a dog, etc. in the bedroom, but she's shown herself to be nothing if not game when it comes to pleasing her little darling. A beginner's intro-to-kink pamphlet would seem to be all that's needed to get things on the right track in the conjugal bedroom.

EDIT: @Linterdiction: I'm not sure that extra chapter is supposed to be canon to the main story--it looks more like the fan-request/occasional stuff in some of the other chapters. If TongTong had been directly told way back then "I want to be dominated and ordered around," I don't think Xiao Lu would be so hesitant about bringing up the subject now that they're living together.

I particularly noticed on a re-read that that there were almost no references to Xiao Lu's desires for kink for long stretches of the story.

last edited at Nov 12, 2024 3:47PM

Blastaar posted:
You do argue two slightly different things, though: that Erika "knows" how Aya really feels and that she "guesses" how she feels, and I think only the latter is the case. Aya is definitely acting as if she isn't deeply affected by the breakup.

To add my two cents as the translator, I used "most likely, Aya hides her sadness and pain behind a smile" as Erika's thought, but it's a choice.

Because the Japanese is きっと, which if you look at https://jisho.org/search/%E3%81%8D%E3%81%A3%E3%81%A8 means "surely; undoubtedly; almost certainly; most likely (e.g. 90 percent)".

I chose to translate it as the last one, to keep the bit of uncertainty, but it could have been "I'm sure Aya hides her sadness and pain behind a smile".

In short, there's very little doubt Erika is perfectly aware that Aya is in pain, and doesn't really care.

I guess at this point it's close to beating a dead horse, but I don't think there's ever been any doubt that Erika believes or strongly suspects that Aya is in pain over the breakup with Koto--it's perfectly natural that she would be. But Aya is making a concerted effort to appear to Erika as if she's OK.

So would Erika be a better, more ethical person if she were to tell Koto that? Would that be a consolation to Koto? Would it make Koto think that there's a greater chance of getting Aya back under Koto's "stay locked in a room with me and pretend we're back in middle school" terms?

For that matter, would Erika in fact be a better friend to Aya if she were to tell Koto that "Aya acts like she's OK, but I think she's just pretending"?

last edited at Nov 11, 2024 5:25PM

Blastaar posted:
Aya has in fact given Erika no indication that she isn’t as “fine” as she appears to be, so for Erika to say otherwise to Koto would be stating an untruth.

The thing is, Erika knows that Aya isn't fine. In the beginning of the last chapter, she recalls the time Aya was crying when Koto presented her as "the daughter of a relative" or something like that. She takes a guess that Aya isn't as fine as she pretends to be. She guesses that the breakup has left Aya in pain and distress.

While she doesn't lie to Koto, she omits to mention it. Lie by omission is a thing. By not mentioning it, she suggests to Koto that Aya, "surprisingly", wasn't much affected by the breakup.

So, while she doesn't lie, she still orients the flow in the way that'll advance her own agenda. I wouldn't call it "manipulation", but she clearly says (or doesn't say) what fits her goal, which is to peel Aya off of Koto, definitively.

I don't think anybody's saying anything different, though--things are now going the way Erika wants them to, and she's not doing anything to change that. You do argue two slightly different things, though: that Erika "knows" how Aya really feels and that she "guesses" how she feels, and I think only the latter is the case. Aya is definitely acting as if she isn't deeply affected by the breakup.

As a hypothetical, what would be accomplished by Erika telling Koto something like, "Aya is acting brave and cheerful, but I'm sure she's hurting deep inside?" Would Aya and Koto be any closer to a reconciliation or would Koto be any more likely to change her toxic conception of what a romantic relationship with Aya should be like?

What's the point of manipulating the truth to break them up

But she didn't! She told the truth of what can be directly observed: Aya is 'fine', energetic and pushing forward. "Aya hiding her pain" is Erika's own inference.

I never say Erika is trying to break them up here. What l am saying is Erika is trying to let Koto give up on Aya. Letting her know Aya doesn't even feel any sorrow about their breakup is a good way to let anyone give up.

You continue to distort what actually happens in the manga and to ignore the arguments that others here are making. Erika says nothing about whether Aya feels sorrow or not. She says, “She’s fine.” Aya has in fact given Erika no indication that she isn’t as “fine” as she appears to be, so for Erika to say otherwise to Koto would be stating an untruth.

The fundamental issue is that events are currently playing out basically the way that Erika wants them to go without the need for Erika to lie to anyone or for her to give bad advice to either Aya or Koto.

You argue that Erika’s actions make her manipulative and disgusting. Others disagree.

last edited at Nov 9, 2024 7:30AM

It's just so stupid.

On that we are agreed.

She's suck but it doesn't mean she never tried lol.

Gonna need examples of Erika trying to be manipulative.

③Chapter 16：
→"She's fine. It's even surprising."

That's the reply when Koto ask "How is Aya-chan？" Erika knows Aya is not really fine but still chose to say that. She wants Koto to move on so badly to the degree that she is disgusting me here.

This is a fine example of how your personal antipathy towards the characters distorts your “analysis” of the story. Yes, we are shown that Erika assumes that Aya is suffering emotionally from the breakup with Koto, but Aya is presenting to Erika precisely as Erika describes her. Almost certainly Erika’s description is exactly what Aya would want her to tell Koto.

Well, you would convince me if Erika didn't show her disappointment the same page and her annoyance next page.

To note, Koto had been talking all about Aya the moment Erika sat in her apartment. Then why suddenly got annoyed？ You can see Erika's face was full of hope after replying Koto that Aya is pretty fine, but turned to great disappointment (in the same page) when she found out Koto still only focused on Aya.
(Of course, if you can't tell it from the picture. We can't continue this pointless talk)

Obviously we are shown what Erika is feeling and thinking--I never said we weren't. But the challenge was to present concrete evidence that Erika has been manipulating the truth in an attempt to break up Aya and Koto. In that case, how Erika feels is irrelevant to the matter of what she actually says and does. She is telling the truth about how Aya seems to be doing, and under the circumstances it would not be reasonable for her to say anything different even if she didn't have feelings for Koto.

l just don't know where your hostility comes from. But l guess l don't actually care. You are free to hate me.

Your emotional projection has now reached ridiculous proportions. I do find your readings of the story (or rather your judgmental evaluations of the characters as if they were real people) to be unconvincing; the fact that you somehow interpret that as "hatred" of you personally is of a piece with the way you read the story.

She's suck but it doesn't mean she never tried lol.

Gonna need examples of Erika trying to be manipulative.

③Chapter 16：
→"She's fine. It's even surprising."

That's the reply when Koto ask "How is Aya-chan？" Erika knows Aya is not really fine but still chose to say that. She wants Koto to move on so badly to the degree that she is disgusting me here.

This is a fine example of how your personal antipathy towards the characters distorts your “analysis” of the story. Yes, we are shown that Erika assumes that Aya is suffering emotionally from the breakup with Koto, but Aya is presenting herself to Erika precisely as Erika describes her. Almost certainly Erika’s description is exactly what Aya would want her to tell Koto.

Erika is not Aya’s therapist or someone whose job it is to reveal to Koto what Aya is really feeling, nor would it be her place even if she were an entirely neutral party to facilitate the obviously unhealthy relationship that Koto wants to have with Aya.

You of course are free to be “disgusted” by anything you choose.

last edited at Nov 8, 2024 8:50AM

Her reappearance is related to Erika but I strongly think that her disappear is also somehow related to her. My guess is: they talked (Erika, Aya) with each other after the "kissing scene" (deja vu moment confirms it) and she became jealous, so she wrote a paper at the Tanabata. Maybe it's not that simple but... lol

That’s all perfectly logical and may well turn out to be the case. The question of why Erika felt guilty after Aya disappeared, however, doesn’t necessarily depend on Erika a) having supernatural wishing abilities, or b) having conscious knowledge that she has such abilities.

I’m sure any number of people in history have had the misfortune of saying something in a fit of emotion to someone they were connected to like, “I wish you were dead!” or “Why don’t you just go away forever?” only to have that person die or disappear without seeing them again, leaving the first person feeling terrible forever without actually believing themselves to have supernatural mental powers. (Although bringing someone back unchanged after seven years via a Tanabata wish would probably cause a reconsideration of the whole matter.)

Of course, if we get a flashback of a demon appearing to Erika at the middle-school Tanabata festival offering her three wishes in return for her immortal soul, I’ll take all this back.

I give up. This is a manga not a novel. Sometimes we can simply tell character's emotion from the picture. The text is not the only and usual way to show it. But l guess it's pointless since you can't even sense Koto's unhappiness in chapter 7 when it's like a piece of cake to me. And l don't have the obligation to teach you.

Lol. Like any other person familiar with the criticism of comics/manga/manhua/bandes dessinées/fumetti, etc., by “text” I mean the combination of the words and the pictures that are actually on the page.

In other words, what the manga actually shows rather speculation or projection about what did or will happen.