— Lemony Snicket 

Sukuna knows who he wants

SLAMS FIST ON TABLE

FROM THE BOTTOM OF HIS HEART

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a moment in Sacrifice!Damen's journey

I was thinking about the scene in Prince’s Gambit where Laurent goes off on Aimeric; how you, as the reader, come to understand that his verbal lashing at Aimeric’s naivety re: the Regent is more or less self-flagellation.

We know that Aimeric and Nicaise are mirrors of Laurent. I vaguely recall Pacat herself stating they’re essentially alternate version of him, set on different paths he himself might have taken.

I don’t think that’s strictly accurate, though. I can’t imagine a version of Laurent that didn’t outgrow the Regent, because in no world would the Regent not have discarded him, in vying for the throne.

Aimeric is only a version of Laurent in the sense that, he represents that green boy who is yet to grow up; he is young Laurent in stasis. Their disparity is ridiculously emphasized by Jord’s intervening defense: “He’s just a boy.”

Conversely, Nicaise, who IS actually a boy, is more of an equal to Laurent. In book one he’s outsmarted due to his inexperience in court politics and mind games, but he’s a lot worldlier than Laurent could have ever been at his age.

Nicaise knew that he was running out of time, that the Regent didn’t love him. “He always was smarter than the others,” Laurent says, and I think he counts himself among those others.

Nicaise is in Laurent’s past situation, but shares Lauren’t present sensibilities. I might even assert that in some ways, Nicaise is the boy Laurent wishes he could have been, someone who didn’t blindly trust in the Regent’s love –only a hair’s breadth away from breaking off his influence.

That’s why he invests in him so personally, a possible element of wish-fulfillment: You’re smarter than I was, you can get yourself out of this.

Aimeric and Nicaise are, then, exact inverses of each other: a childish adult vs. an adult-like child. Both recall Laurent’s past, but Aimeric is a ghost, stagnant, while Nicaise is a window to re-writing the narrative, putting things to right.

are you still mad that I gave up long before you did?

So this is a fan art made by me, obviously, to show appreciation to the author Epic Solemnity (Dark_Cyan_Star). She made an Original Work in ao3, you guys should check it out. Here's the link: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1030773

Well, Sukuna is the biggest Megumi simp of all

does ryoumen sukuna is simp??? (what got lost in translation in ch.9 and ch.118)

yes, yes he does (but here’s an overanalysis why:)

you see there was a callback to ch.9 in ch.118 that got lost in translation

when i first read the manga in english i missed it, so i thought i’d share just so everyone knows how highkey sukuna’s simping is (this is sukufushi btw)

this is from ch.9:

the context is that megumi is fighting sukuna; nothing too out of place here

but in japanese:

if we only look at what is pronounced what sukuna is saying is “show me (what you’ve got)!! fushiguro megumi!!” (hence the english translation “entertain me”)

normally when shounen manga says “show me (what you’ve got)” it is with the phrase “見せてみろ (misete miro)” , literally meaning “let me see”

but here sukuna replaces “見” with the kanji “魅”: the pronunciation is the same (mi), but whereas “見” means “see” and the phrase “show me (what you’ve got)” is very common, “魅” means to  “bewitch”, “fascinate”, “enchant”, or “charm” (translation taken from wikitionary), and the phrase “魅せてみろ” (“bewitch me”) is virtually never used because why would it ever be used like bro you’re coming on way too strong tone it down a little

anyway so the dude is literally yelling “bewitch me!! fushiguro megumi!!” in megumi’s face (in fact the chinese translation is somewhere along the lines of “make me fall for you!! fushiguro megumi!!” which i think is neat but that’s beside the point)

but because it is pronounced like “let me see”, and “bewitch me” is a very rare phrase (it’s not in the dictionaries i think), megumi interprets it as “show me (what you’ve got)”; he never knows what sukuna really means and honestly someone should write a miscommunication fic about it

but then it gets even better:

this is from ch.118 (so SPOILER ALERT for the shibuya arc):

megumi has summoned his strongest shikigami (it’s basically self-destruct but with a more complicated procedure) and is currently out cold and dying; the only known way to save megumi is to defeat said strongest shikigami, which is precisely what sukuna is doing here

pause, rewind—some background info for this scene: in ch.9 (at the end of megumi’s fight with sukuna, when megumi is desperate) megumi tries to summon his strongest shikigami, i.e. he wants to self-destruct and take sukuna out with him—hence why he says the things about how he never once regretted saving yuuji—but yuuji comes back (and promptly fucking dies) so sukuna never learns in ch.9 that megumi wants to self-destruct to kill him

but here in ch.118, megumi has summoned that strongest shikigami, and sukuna approves of its strength, saying “if it was me from that time, it may have been able to defeat me”—if megumi had summoned the strongest shikigami in ch.9, sukuna might have lost

basically: sukuna is really fucking impressed (cf. ch.9, where he tells megumi to “show me (what you’ve got)!!” or “bewitch me!!”)

you see, in the second-to-last panel with the hands, sukuna says “you showed me the way… fushiguro megumi!” which is not necessarily an inaccurate translation, but the callback gets lost in translation

look at the raw scan:

in the panel with the hands, once again we have the very rare phrase of “魅せて” (“bewitch”) but this time with past/present perfect tense

if we only look at what is pronounced, in ch.9 we have “show me (what you’ve got)!!”—and here in ch.118 we have “you have shown me (what you’ve got)… fushiguro megumi!!”

but looking at the rare phrase with the kanji “bewitch”, in ch.9 we have “bewitch me!! fushiguro megumi!!"—and here in ch.118, sukuna is saying “you have bewitched me… fushiguro megumi!!”, which is strangely maybe romantic?? tbh however you look at sukuna’s dialogue it’s a nice little callback to ch.9

the entire plot with sukuna in shibuya is some really really—and i cannot stress this enough—really fucked-up shit, but at the same time im endlessly entertained by the idea of sukuna being the megumi simp to end all megumi simps so there’s that

dazai’s queer coding in bsd

content warnings: mentions of sa, and dazai typical suicide mentions. includes stormbringer spoilers

As it is pride month and Bungou Stray Dogs is perhaps the fruitiest anime of all time, I will be discussing Dazai’s queer coding and why I believe he is gay, instead of the popular bisexual headcanon. I am referring to mostly anime-only content, with the inclusion of light novels and minor manga moments.

Keep reading

I didn’t have the patience to read through the incomprehensible Chinese translation of Google, that is why I didn’t get to finish it. But I loved the morally ambiguous start of the story, it was interesting and mind-blowing with it’s complexity in both characters and the relationships. 

Ah, I really wished that the translations in Ao3 would just update, so I could satiate my thirst for this fic.

I finally finished reading 47 days to change in chinese.  It’s seriously been an ordeal to read this fic, on the count of me struggling through the chinese and the fic itself being sometimes too intense for my fragile constitution.  what drew me to it ultimately was how interesting the premise of the story was, and the manner in which the drama unfolded.  i’m not exactly sure how i feel about it though?  It is for sure one of the most original and interesting fics I’ve read.  I’d like to say elements of it are challenging, but i don’t think challenging is the right word for it.  perhaps if one wants to keep on reading it, they shouldn’t have any expectations of closure or of sound ethics.  

spoilers below

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I'm just adding fuel to the fire

Fushiguro and Ryomen Sukuna

Diving into the mythology surrounding Fushiguro’s shikigami Makora. Disclaimer first: I am no expert, just a humble myth buff.

This is the hand seal (mudra) Fushiguro make to call forward his domain expansion. This mudra is associated with deity Bhaisajyaguru (薬師如来). Bhaisajyaguru is Buddha of healing from Mahayana Buddhism and known also as Yakushi Nyorai in Japan. Yakushi Nyorai has been known to release disease and pain from sick people. The believe of Yakushi Nyorai is the first to develop in Japan after the introduction of Buddhism to Japan.

Yakushi Nyorai is also the Buddha at the center of the Twelve Heavenly Generals (十二神将 read as Juuni shinshou) legends. Originally, the Twelve Heavenly Generals are yaksha or devils who were converted to Buddhism because of Yakushi Nyorai’s teaching. They are then tasked to protect Bhaisajyaguru and his followers.

So it is not actually surprising that one of Fushiguro’s shikigami is based on one of the Heavenly Generals.  

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