I can work with either, but I must say I'm leaning more towards team "cute fuzzy little bat".

Like this?

Pretty much, although I was imagining more of a skooshed bat face.

This is . . . a story about torture?

I can work with either, but I must say I'm leaning more towards team "cute fuzzy little bat".

why did this feel strangely anticlimactic?

If I had to guess, all the false starts had your guard up, so as they headed for the confession you weren't so much eagerly anticipating it as bracing for the rug-pull. It did also develop rather suddenly in a way . . . just as I was thinking that's it, they're going to avoid each other for a while now and stew, we get "I have to say goodbye by confessing properly" and then . . . she does?!

Even so, it still hit me pretty solidly. I grumble, but this is really good.

last edited at Nov 27, 2025 3:16AM

Pinches self . . . did that really happen? Am I imagining it? I MUST be imagining it, but all the commenters seem to think it happened . . .

Ten years, bah. My wife is 15 years older than I am and that's fine. She worries about it a bit, but it's not a huge issue. Thirty year anniversary coming up next year.

Which like, isn't "evil" perse, just part of how devils work and their inhuman morality.

Hate to be a stickler, but "their inhuman morality" is exactly what we technically call "evil". They're devils, that's kind of the point.

I suspect that dog's name is not actually Fresh Cream but rather Creme Fraiche. It's a weird thing for a translator because the English term is actually the French term.

"A businessman like you certainly knows not to make bad decisions".

Ah, sure. Businessmen. The superior class that is well known for never taking stupid, rash decisions.

Hee! But it's a good line . . . enlisting his vanity in getting him to leave her the hell alone.

So this Kamikaze Girls thing sounds like it could be fun.

Nice to see Strawberry Shake is still silly.

There must be some rule that historical yuri can only have bitter-sweet endings.

There isn’t a specific rule, but there was a common trope in yuri literature, maybe around the 1960s in Japan, where yuri stories often had to end tragically. Authors weren’t allowed, or at least weren’t encouraged, to write openly queer happy endings. My information is a bit fuzzy, but I remember watching a few video essays and reading some articles about it. If I find them, I’ll link them. :)

Outside of Japan as well there's a lot of things with same sex relationships where there was push back against them being allowed a happy end

You see similar dynamics going even more broadly . . . anyone remember the movie "Million Dollar Baby"? It's a movie from not so long ago about a woman boxer. She fights, she triumphs, if it was a movie about a guy boxer that would have been the triumphant end, but since it's about a woman instead she breaks her neck in the ring and eventually dies and her big payday just goes for her hospital bills.

I like other Battan stuff and will probably like future Battan stuff, but I didn't like this. I was neutral about the object of the other two girls' affection, but I kind of actively didn't like either of the other two, so I wasn't going to be happy no matter who got her.

So, anyone know what's the joke with Yazawa?

She's Yua's childhood friend. For a hot second, Reina thought she was a competitor for Yua, now she's become a wiki page for Reina to access for getting to know Yua even more.

The "Yazawa" thing is a trend/affectation some gals get into, because being cutesy is a number one goal. I've always thought that it was either mimicking grade schoolers or Pokemon, not sure if either is accurate.

Source: wife is big into gal culture, and one of my best friends' little sister was a gal throughout Middle School though University, so I got to experience a bit of early 2K gal culture when I lived with my best friend in Japan for a year.

Thanks!

Such a powerful confession

It was.

On the spelling of Desert/Dessert, I had a tabletop RPG character once who ran a restaurant I called "The Dessert Oasis".

So, anyone know what's the joke with Yazawa?

Y'know, the tag says comedy, but I don't think this chapter was very funny . . .

So let me see if I understand this correctly—they really are glad to see each other. They are excited to spend time together. When they’re together they don’t want to say goodbye. Each one thinks the other looks cute in what they’re wearing. They’re excited to spend time together—wait, I said that already, didn’t I?

If they weren’t both girls, I’d almost think there was something going on between them. The way they’re excited to see each other and spend time together, I mean.

Well, if, yeah. But they're both girls, so nah, couldn't be.

I like it. A bit messed up, cynical where cynicism is very much warranted, but still with heart where it counts.

That seems like a nice length for something like this. Much longer and you'd have to start inventing annoying complications, which would be annoying.

last edited at Oct 9, 2025 12:50AM

As these things go, it's really not that toxic. Perhaps both the most toxic and the most interesting thing here is what Soprano is doing to HERSELF, in trying to completely bury the shy part of her personality. I'm wondering how that's going to work out.

"It's unthinkable" she says, while thinking it.

I guess it's inconceivable, even.

We're just calling anyone a villainess now.

Well, when she laughs she goes "oHohoho!" in proper villainess style . . . wasn't that always the main qualification?

"My, you've certainly grown since middle school!"