#but without a harem

[deikshen]

Crown Prince Shen Yuan (just... Crown prince, cultivates as a hobby, but no further) which is forcibly compromised with the Demon Emperor Luo Binghe in order to strengthen a peaceful relationship between the human and demon realms. And Shen Yuan is FURIOUS. HOW DARE THEY PROMISE HIM IN MARRIAGE TO SOMEONE HE DOESN'T EVEN KNOW?! EVEN IF HE'S TRACED THE POWERFUL DEMON EMPEROR, THAT DOESN'T MEAN HE WANTS TO MARRY HIM!!

Anyway, he'll do whatever it takes to break that engagement. Ha! If those tutors and advisors think he'll just stand by and watch them manage his life, NO WAY! Shen Yuan may have a boring palace life reading about monsters and plants (and trashy novels that traffic in servants when no one is looking) but it's HIS life. He decides what he'll do! They can't steal that from him!!

He will ruin that engagement. No marriage commitment is necessary, gentlemen! Hasn't anyone heard of peace treaties and trade agreements? Seriously! And he's the irresponsible young man, according to reports!

So, fully determined, he will do all kinds of things necessary to ruin that engagement. Disdaining wedding gifts? Done. Sending clearly offensive and uncharacteristic wedding gifts? Done. Dressing inappropriately for peace celebrations? Done. Get drunk and be rude and hostile to prove that he's a silly, conceited guy and that no one will benefit from marrying him? Done.

Shen Yuan does everything he has to do, but NOTHING WORKS? REALLY? Why do the damn demons at court think that behavior is acceptable!? He's being hostile!! Rude! Why do the demons think he's accepting courtship satisfactorily!? Idiots!!!

Determined to go all out and flout all the rules of engagement, Shen Yuan runs away to the Demon Emperor's palace, determined to meet him in person and ruin any expectations Lord Luo might have of him. Then Luo Binghe will see that he is a hostile, rude, noisy boy, that his life will be fucking ruined if he marries him, and that this arranged marriage is a horrible farce!!

... So he meets him in person. Oh god. Okay. Shen Yuan has new plans.

Well, their arranged marriage and peace agreements are on the table for late fall. Shen Yuan needs to fuck Luo Binghe before that, then, it will be a scandal!!! Which will make them get married quickly, without arrangements, without festivities, and of course without forcing him just the way his palace court wanted!! No fancy wedding arrangements! No more having any say over him! Ha!!

If Shen Yuan is going to marry Luo Binghe, it will be on his own terms, thank you for nothing!!

[vomitspit2]

concept with kregg.

“it’s okay … you won’t break him.”

your voice startled kregg so suddenly that he twitches in his seat, even if all you had said was a spoken through a whisper. he hasn’t expect you would be awake at this time. after the battle you went through, recovery should be the next step and — there he goes, once more thinking like a general.

looking up from the bassinet, kregg turns to soak in the image of you, flushed and exhausted but no less beautiful. at some point that he was oblivious to, you hit the switch to power on your bedside lamp.

“you can hold him. no nurses here to judge. just us,” you encourage gently.

he had been so stiff and awkward, hadn’t really settled down his nerves, when the nurse first handed his son to him. almost acting if he didn’t know the custom of letting the parent hold their newborn and it was unexpected for him, the father, to hold and cradle his son. perhaps too quickly, they intercepted your son and laid him on your chest. since then, kregg has been standing at a distance like a man gauging a grenade’s unpredictability.

kregg has a hard time with … gentleness. you think he might have not had a kind childhood — abusive if you’re honest — but you would never in a million years press for any information.

there is something in the way he twitches and recoils when shown affection that hurts your heart more than anything though.

you love your husband. you want him to experience endless floods of love for every day he might have had a drought of it. here and now, you want him to know that’s he’s capable of gentleness too — that he won’t break his son, like how you imagine his inner stewing is saying.

“my love, —.” you recognize that starting tone of his, he’s going to recoil again.

“here,” you interrupt, holding out your arms. “bring him to me. we’ll do it together.”

with the pace of a turtle, kregg wheels the bassinet over while keeping his one good eye trained on the sleeping newborn, acting like he’s made of glass instead of flesh and blood. gingerly, hopeful to not disturb his peace, you take your son into your arms before making room of the mattress for kregg. obediently, he slots himself into the spot next to you, thighs and shoulders touching.

in that moment, he starts to reflect on your earlier words when you caught him staring into the bassinet like a child looking down a wishing well. you won’t break him. he know you don’t know this yet but he was born specifically for breaking.

after a hundred years, the memories grow faded but he can still remember the feeling of his dominant hand sailing through epidermis, nose muscle, skull, brain matter, and back out the other side. he has held creatures bigger than his son and crushed them into juice with a minuscule amount of his strength. if his hands weren’t breaking, they were commanding others to do it — a long chain of violent substitution. how can you be so sure that he won’t —

“kregg. love. you did it.”

blinking away the memories, kregg looks down to the infant you two created held securely and naturally within his arms.

he hadn’t even realized you had handed him over. that could have gone extremely bad. this could still turn extremely bad. he should hand him back over to you —

but then, you’re peppering kisses into his neck and holding his cheek. that alien tenderness which is a foreign language to him is something he’s finally starting to speak.

[thepersonperson]

Sukuna’s Loneliness Part 4 (Sukuna’s Negative Rizz)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 5

Some warnings before we start.

1) This analysis deals with sexual topics.

2) I will be mainly using the TCB scans because of their accessibility. Raws are from mangareader(.)to.

3) This was written as of JJK 262 266. (I'm just going to keep updating this until I stop finding things I should've noticed earlier.)

4) The raws broke me in ways you cannot possibly imagine.

(Click images for captions/citations.)

Fighting as Communication

Baki the Grappler. This is a manga where men destroy each other’s bodies as a test of strength. It’s poorly written but the art is terrifying and I love it so dearly. Between fights of extreme violence and body horror the characters eat. And that’s it. That’s the manga.

I bring Baki up because Gege is a huge fan of Fujimoto Tatsuki, the creator of Chainsawman. Fujimoto is a fan of Gege too, but more importantly, he is a huge fan of Itagaki Keisuke, the creator of Baki. (His daughter made Beastars btw.) In a way, this means Jujutsu Kaisen has been influenced by Baki. But that’s not a surprise, a lot of manga is.

Itagaki’s work is so massively influetial on Japanese media that it’s kind of hard to grasp since it’s not as popular overseas. When listening to interviews from various Japanese creators, Baki will often be cited as a major influence. And the thing is, you can tell when a creative has read Baki. There’s nothing quite like it. If you’ve read Baki and consume Chainsawman, you will see its bones everywhere. I feel the same about Jujutsu Kaisen.

The main antagonist in Baki is Yujiro Hanma. He is the strongest creature alive. So much so that he has no one to call a rival. He’s bored. He causes trouble. He kills his wife to motivate his son, Baki into becoming stronger. His son, Baki, who he grooms into becoming a fighter that might beat him in combat one day. Kind of sounds like Sukuna, right?

But that’s not my point here. My focus is how Baki doubles as a discussion about strength and manhood. It’s aggressively bisexual. Men love each other with their fists. Straight up the main character says having sex with women is the same thing as fighting men.

And it just doesn’t stop there. The homoerotic nature of the fights is never shyed away from. Here’s an example of my favorite.

He grabs his balls and compliments their size. That’s pretty gay, right? Well there’s this reanimated prehistoric caveman called Pickle that fights Baki’s brother Jack. And how do they fight? They kiss.

I didn’t call it a kiss. Itagaki did. I didn’t say they melded together. Itagaki did. This mangaka overtly calls attention to the homoerotic nature of men fighting men, and how men communicate their love for each other through violence. And yes, it’s sexual. Itagaki wants you to read it that way.

But sometimes he doesn’t want you to read it that way. Sometimes the fights are a dialogue, an emotional conversation. Like one between father and son.

Itagaki is a master of narrative framing. When he wants you to feel a certain way, you will feel it. He also tells his readers that there’s more to the fights than just fighting.

Those are the ideas that help me see the bones of Baki in other works. Men loving men with violence. Men communicating with men through violence. I see these ideas in Jujutsu Kaisen too.

Jujutsu Communication

I’ve gone over how Yuji commucates with other people on their own terms. And a lot of it is through fighting. A conversation without words, learning how someone works. Yuji is good at using fights as tool of communication.

But he’s not the one who tells you that there’s more to the fights than just fighting. Maki does in her spar with the sumo guy.

Just like Baki. Fighting is a means of communication. Gege has told you that there can be more to the fights than fighting. It's a tool used to understand the self and others.

With that in mind, I want to reexamine a particular fight under the lens of Baki rather than Umineko.

Sukuna vs Gojo

Baki tells you that homoerotic readings of its fights are intentional. If you ask me, this probably stems from historical stances on masculinity and homosexuality in ancient Japan. Men loved men and women differently, but both were ok. That’s how Baki can have a girlfriend and his gay fights. Peak bisexual optimization.

What does Jujutsu Kaisen have to do with this? Well it has been extremely queer friendly. We have a multidue of canonical trans characters, non-binary characters, and other flavors of queer characters not disparaged for their identities, Gojo Satoru included. It may not be stated outright, but Gojo and Geto do love each other in a gay way. The subtext is so persisent it’s basically text.

In other words, Gege has already told us, yes please have queer readings of this text. It’s the same way Baki tells you, yes this is straight up convoluded gay sex. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to reread the Sukuna and Gojo fight as some ridiculous mating display between two men who are fighting over can miscommunicate their intent the hardest.

Framed as Courtship

Let’s start with the framing. The pre-fight set up. How does text tell you queer readings are allowed?

Kenjaku does. It’s romantic. It’s a date. This reading has been made valid explicitly. And if there’s room for doubt because of the sarcasm? There’s still additional support for it.

We already know how badly in love Gojo is with Geto. The fight is on the 24th of December, the most romantic day in Japan. And in a fun little Geto parallel, who declared the start of war on this day, violence underlines this new romantic venture.

That doesn’t include Sukuna who recalls Yorozu’s words about teaching love in the context of marriage.

Gojo never heard that conversation which is why the next point is absolutely insane.

The outfit Gojo initially is in resembles that of a groom at a Shinto wedding.

Shinto weddings were implemented after the Heian era. Part of the ceremony includes a priest and a shrine maiden who respectively stand to the right and left of the altar. A purification ritual will occur, lead by the priest, to cleanse the shrine before vows are exchanged. Gakuganji is the priest and Utahime is the shrine maiden. To the right and left of Gojo respectively.

The bride at a Shinto wedding wears mainly white. After the 200% Hollow Purple cleanses the area, the dark shawl is removed and Sukuna remains in mostly white.

How interesting that this battle has been framed as one between groom and bride.

The thing is, marriage in the Heian era was far more lax. There were no major ceremonies. If a man was interested in marrying a woman, he would visit her for 3 nights after receiving approval from her father. Upon the passing of their 3rd night together, the family would have an informal celebration of their union in private. Even after marriage, multiple partners were allowed and sometimes encouraged.

Yorozu’s big celebration proposal to Sukuna and banning of concubines was quite improper by Heian standards. Though it is in line with modern marriages. If Sukuna did not consume any Shinto wedding literature, he probably didn’t recognize that Gojo was dressed as a groom.

But did Gojo dress this way for Sukuna intentionally? The Toji fit served an entirely different purpose. It’s the robes and pre-fight ceremony that catch my attention. So I propose the following:

1) Gojo dressed up as a groom to die and be wed with his one and only Geto in death.

2) Gojo dressed up as a groom in part as an offering to Sukuna. And because Sukuna is from the Heian era it went over his head entirely.

3) Gojo intended for both of these things at the same time and left who he would end up with to fate.

Regardless of what Gojo was going for here, it’s a visual cue combined with the knowledge of it being Dec 24th that encourages the reader to perhaps consider the fight as something other than just a fight. A date perhaps? Kenjaku made the connection and neither Gojo or Sukuna really denied it. Gojo gave the weak excuse of a death anniversary confusion. But much weirder, given how hostile he was to Yorozu, Sukuna did not object to the romantic framing in any capacity.

Am I reaching? Is this reading intentional?

When I start getting this confused by how a translated work wants me to read it, I try to refer to the original language text and anyone who knows it for missing context. Sometimes localizations add things that weren’t there or push readers towards one interpretation. So for the rest of this analysis, I’m going to be focusing on the raws.

I’m going to be honest. My Japanese fudging sucks. I can barely read kanji and can’t reliably translate anything. Feel free to correct me if I got something wrong. That being said, with what little I do know, I have discovered something interesting.

In this post I talked about how weird Sukuna’s manner of speech is. I focused on his you pronoun usage of お前 (Omae) for everyone else and 貴様 (Kisama) for Gojo since this is a strong indicator of how a character views their relationship to someone.

Here's a summary of the two points I made in that post:

1) Omae is informal and either a casual thing amongst peers or indicates the speaker's higher status. Since Sukuna is arrogant, we can reasonably assume he's talking down to people.

2) Kisama historically was a formal show of respect, but in modern times it is a hostile insult, much more rude than Omae. Since Sukuna is 1,000 years old and hates Yuji (who he uses Omae with), we can reasonably assume Sukuna was being friendly to Gojo when he used Kisama.

With that pronoun usage in mind, while examining the raws for the infamous “You Cleared My Skies” speech I found this:

Kisama. Sukuna is very happy and lavishing Gojo with praise. The assumption it was formal from the start seems to be correct. It's hard to read this any other way.

Though Japanese can easily be dubious in its interpretation, there are instances where context can cut off all other readings. I truly believe this one of those cases.

Now, to confirm Sukuna is still only treating Gojo this way I started looking at his you pronouns as he got excited post-Gojo death. Maki is the person he seems to admire the most.

He’s still just using Omae. What does that mean? Gojo is in his own fudging category for Sukuna and he has been there since the start of the manga. (For more on why this is significant, refer to this post.)

Wow ok. That’s pretty intense! We’ve got Gojo dressed up as a groom on December 24th and Sukuna treating Gojo different from anyone else. I read their fight again under the lens of explicit courtship and focused in on these specific panels.

Satisfaction. Now that’s a word that can easily carry a sexual connotation. Love as well. The parallel syntax fascinated me in English. So I decided to look at the raws and see how close they are.

Pretty much the same except for "the one who will teach you love" and "the one satisfying him now". Since the one being satisfied is Gojo by Sukuna, it really seems we can assume the one being taught love is Gojo by Sukuna.

Time to learn some Japanese again!

Kanji has multiple readings. Most have at least two. The Onyomi (Chinese) reading typically used for nouns and the Kunyomi (Japanese) reading typically used for verbs. (This is not always the case but it’s the basics.)

That’s probably why 満 is read as まん (man) when Gojo and Geto are talking about “satisfaction” using the On version and み (mi), the Kun version, when the narrator is talking about who “satisfies” who.

However 満 on its own does not mean satisfaction. It means full. To be filled. Or fullness. 足 (zoku) is added as a modifier after 満 to be read as satisfaction 満足 (manzoku). 足 usually means feet, but it can also mean to be sufficient. Manzoku therefore has a direct translation of being sufficiently full. It’s not a surprise a lot of food places in Japan use Manzoku in their names or advertising.

But what’s this? Why is this sentence written as 満たして or Mi(tashite) instead of 満足して or Manzoku(shite)? The addition of Zoku is what transforms Man into "satisfying". Without the Zoku, it’s just "fill". The means this sentence can be read as “The one filling him up now is—”

We’ve already established that the blank is Sukuna. The new problem is that he’s filling Gojo up. And boy, does that sound homoerotic to put it lightly. But perhaps I am reaching.

So I did what any sane person would do in this situation. I read hentai.

Surely if the phrase 満たして (mitashite) can carry a sexual connotation I will find it in hentai.

...

I immediately found a yaoi doujin called Fill me with your Big Love aka おっきな愛で満たして (Okkina Ai de Mitashite). Honestly, I found too many doujins about creampies specifically. (You have internet access verify this yourself.) When you search Manzokushite the results are much more in line with life satisfaction than sexual satisfaction. ...So Gege decided to use the more frisky phrasing.

Manzoku is also the name of an active sex toy manufacturer (I’m not linking them use a search engine.) and a discontinued adult entertainment news company. So the satisfaction Gojo and Geto talk about, along with Geto using 妬 (ya), the jealous kanji often used between lovers, is definitely probably carrying a sexual connotation too.

So, I’m not reaching. What the fudge did Gege mean by this?

Now that we've established that I am NOT reaching. What do we do with this information?

Well, we ruminate on the fight with the knowledge that Sukuna, of his own volition, decided to get Gojo off, probably.

I have forgiven Nanami for calling Gojo a pervert. If I watched someone bust a nut after being cut in half by his sworn enemy instead of saving the country, I too would be like what the fudge.

Anyways, the typical phrase used for an orgasm in Japanese is 行く(iku). It translates as to go. And yes it can mean to die, as in going to the other side. To die and go to heaven if you will. Which is what Gojo did with a big old smile on his face.

There’s also the term 心天 (tokoroten). It refers to a dish were a semi-opaque white substance is pushed through holes to create noodles. Literal translation using the kanji for heart 心 (kokoro) and the kanji for heaven 天 (ten). (Don’t ask me why them being smack together turns the Koroko into Tokoro. I don’t know.) Which in slang refers to prostate orgasms. This has nothing to do with this analysis I wanted to drop this fun fact in here. …And this image of Sukuna clutching his heart while looking at someone he sent to heaven.

(This is a reach but the idea of this being an elaborate gay pun amuses me greatly.)

I have another fun slang term: 賢者タイム (kenjataimu) which directly translates to sage 賢者 (kenja) time タイム (taimu). This refers to post-nut clarity sending someone into a meditative-like state.

Oh that’s a bit familiar. Sukuna was giving sagely advice to Kashimo and reflecting on satisfaction and love.

And what’s this? Mitashite has made a reappearance! Sukuna is saying “I’ve never thought about needing another person to fill me up.” Which 1. further supports the 'The one satisfying/filling him (Gojo) now is—Sukuna.' reading and 2. suggests Sukuna is a top suggests Sukuna really doesn’t have sexual interest in people. (Since the context of this convo is relationships and love.)

By the way. Acts of eating in Japanese can be modified to carry sexual meanings. It’s a bit more suggestive than English, but it carries over pretty well I think? 肉食系 (nikusokukei) refers to someone who aggresively pursues romantic or sexual relationships. Composed of the kanji 肉 (niku) for meat, 食 (ta) for eating, and 系 (kei) class. If you noticed, 食 isn’t usually read as Soku. It becomes Soku when paired with Niku for some reason. (I don’t know why someone please help me.) Side by side the kanji 肉食 (nikusoku) means meat-eater.

食 is still interesting on it’s own. The 食べる (taberu) reading is normal eating. The 食う(kuu) reading is an innuendo. It can mean to devour someone, like a cannibal, or devour someone sexually.

Sukuna has made it very clear that his eating of people is literal. There’s no innuendo. In fact, if you read into it, he’ll kill you (rip Yorozu and Kashimo).

Gojo, however, appears to be his sole exception to this rule. When Sukuna tells Kashimo not to spoil his pleasure he uses the kanji 興 (kyou). This of course can be directly translated as pleasure, but the Chinese reading of it can also indicate intense excitement or sexual arousal.

Sukuna is pretty good at double-entendre wordplay if his earlier stunts with the kanji for Enchain doubling as Megumi Activities if read a different way is anything to go by. He's a fan of Chinese literature. It's not a stretch to assume there's more going on here.

And if notoriously homophobic Reddit dudebros are posting things like this. Maybe there's a lot more merit to this reading than I can currently grasp.

I’m still pretty convinced Sukuna is aroace. That of course doesn’t bar him from pursuing romantic or sexual relationships. Sometimes there’s the one exception. Sometimes the desire to be with and please an allo partner allows for engagement of activities they aren’t into. Sometimes the actions are pursued without the emotional attachment because they physically feel good. There’s also the gray-scale and demi labels to consider.

With that in mind, I want to emphasize this all points to how important Gojo is to Sukuna regardless of sexuality. He tried to engage with and understand Gojo on terms he won’t for anyone else. And he’s been pursuing this connection relentlessly since the start of manga.

Sukuna’s Negative Rizz

Ok I established that reading the Sukuna vs Gojo fight as unhinged courtship is supported by the text. That doesn’t really say anything about Sukuna sucking at it.

But, my dear reader, that in of itself is proof of his negative rizz. I had to sit down. Learn about Heian era and Shinto wedding rituals, learn more Japanese, splice seemingly unrelated manga panels together, read hentai, and know that Gege is into yaoi to come to this conclusion. I had to rip every little shred of characterization and context apart and rearrange it into something comprehensible.

You know who can’t do that? Gojo.

As far as Gojo is concerned, Sukuna hates him. Kisama is an extremely hostile you pronoun in modern times. And if Gojo can’t tell Shoko (his closest friend after Geto) is stressed over him being used like a meat puppet by her visibly falling back on her addiction, he’s going to default to the assumption Sukuna hates him just as much as everyone else.

And Gojo does just that. He assumes he failed to reach Sukuna. Despite how often they did hand to hand combat and weaponized their knowledge of each other, Gojo believes they never had proper conversation through fighting. He dies not understanding Sukuna, convinced the other was not trying to communicate with him at all.

And if you recall, all of this fight occurred while Sukuna was wearing Megumi’s face. That boy is pretty much Gojo’s adopted child. From my experience, most single parents do not go looking for clones of their kids as partners.

If someone wore the skin of my family member I would assume they were trying to torment me. And torment Gojo Sukuna does. He draws attention to Megumi’s soul being used as collateral and attacks him with the 10 Shadows. We as the audience know this is all for the sake of getting past Infinity using his Shrine. Gojo doesn’t know that. He’s fighting an evil dude who is puppeting the body of his son for god knows what reason.

Seriously, Sukuna sucks at communicating intent.

In Part 3 of my examination of Sukuna’s loneliness, I said Dismantle is a tool Sukuna uses to understand. And that him upgrading it by making Gojo the center of his world was indicative of his desire to reach him. I also said his refusal to use it on Yorozu was him expressing how little interest he had in her.

Yorozu is pissed by this. She sees it as Sukuna rejecting her and I don’t think she’s wrong. Sukuna saved his special Cursed Technique (CT) for Gojo while turning Yorozu down. If we’re considering all the wedding imagery and references that started with Yorozu, I’m certainly allowed to read that as him saving himself for Gojo. (Think of how he lied to Gojo about being the first one he killed.)

There’s also the fact that Yorozu saw their battle as an expression love and lust—that the usage of CT is a type of foreplay under certain circumstances since it is an extension of the self. Combine that with the established premise that fighting is a type of a communication thanks to Maki vs Sumo Guy and you can start to see the courtship logic behind Sukuna’s treatment of Gojo.

If we are to read “The one who will teach you love is…Sukuna” there’s another adorable caveat. Yorozu uses the you pronoun あなた (Anata) for Sukuna.

It’s an informal you pronoun used by people learning Japanese. Native speakers try to avoid using it as it can come across as rude. But in the context of love? This is colloquially called the wife pronoun as its often used by a wife to her husband.

If you wanted to localize its usage in the way Yorozu means it, Anata might become “you, dear”. So here we have Sukuna dressed in white, like a bride to Gojo’s groom, thinking of him as Anata.

The problem is, Gojo doesn’t know that. Sukuna never bothered to open his mouth and say this was an act of love. Sure he told Kashimo in the most roundabout way possible, but Gojo was the one who needed to hear that. If a courtship is going to be this diabolically complicated, there has to be clear hints for the other party. JJK is not Umineko where there’s a witch that can revive the dead over and over until the idiot finally understands this was all for them.

Gojo also doesn’t have access to the kanji Sukuna uses to describe certain techinques or words. He hears the phonetics and runs with whatever best fits the context. This means there’s no way for him to catch the double-meaning unless he’s a certain type of lingust, which he is not. His manner of speech and personal interests don’t line up with the flowery language of the Heian Era. The types of written works Gojo is into are historical war politics from the Sengoku period (known for violence more than the fine arts), Shonen manga, and physics/math.

And what's this? According to CFYOW (the canon light novels): JJK Thorny Road at Dawn, Chapter 3 Asakusabashi Elegy, Gojo doesn't even like ancient poetry. You know, the thing Sukuna enjoys and tries to communicate with.

The Kokin Wakashu Gojo off-handedly disparages is a compilation of Hiean Era poetry known as Waka. This was the primary means of communication amongst the noble class and spiritual leaders at the time. And the thing is, this poetry is supposed to be read into. Down to the quality of stroke and paper, not just the kanji written. Especially for courtship.

It’s not that Gojo is stupid. He just doesn’t specialize in the studies that would give him a more critical ear to Sukuna's words. And Sukuna doesn’t seem to understand that no one in the modern era communicates like this anymore.

If you didn’t know, this is why Japanese characters introduce themselves they often describe what kanji their name is spelled with. Take for example: Satoru. He uses the kanji 悟 meaning enlightenment. This kanji can be read as Go instead of Satoru. Additionally, the name Satoru can be written in kanji as 聡 for smart, 智 for wisdom, 知 for knowledge, 了 for understanding, 哲 for philosophy, 聖 for virtuous, or 暁 for daybreak. That’s 8 different kanji possible if you hear the name Satoru.

This is why Sukuna’s wordplay for everything else can be easily missed by other characters. They hear the words and cannot read the kanji like us. Context decides what Sukuna means for them. And since Sukuna’s context for most is violence and insults, it’s very hard for them to think about his words in any other way.

And boy howdy does Gojo miss it. Sukuna straight up calls him his husband and it took me several rereads to catch it. While mocking Gojo for being unable to open his domain, Sukuna calls him "painfully ordinary". This is localized from the word 凡夫 (bonpu) which can also be translated as unenlightened. (A layered insult! Sukuna is pretty much saying Gojo's sorcery is so boring he shouldn't even call himself the Honored One.)

The thing is...Bonpu is comprised of the 2 kanji 凡 for mediocre, and 夫 for husband. (Please note that there are many other ways to call Gojo a ditz without using the kanji for husband.) And an update from the Replies: Turns out there's layers to the gayness too.

It's come full fudging circle. Gojo came dressed as a groom for a wedding and Sukuna thinks they're already married. The miscommunication is off the rails.

But wait! There's more...

Earlier I mentioned that the kanji for Enchain doubles as Megumi Activities. Let's break that down more. (Unfortunately the Twitter account of the person I referenced may or may not be nuked so here's this screenshot I've doctored.)

So we have the translation of Enchain from 契闊 (Keikatsu), which might be better localized as Separation.

This term comes from a Chinese poem about lovers who are husband and wife in The Book of Odes, Section I (Lessons from the States), Chapter 3 (The Odes of Bei), Poem 31 (Banging the Drum). (Here's a link to the full poem and context of it.)

In summary, it’s about a soldier who is on the brink of death, having lost nearly everything after being abandoned by those in power, lamenting the happiest days of his life with his love are ones he can never get back. (Hey that sounds just like what Sukuna did to Yuji!)

Keikatsu specifically comes from this passage:

“Our vow is beyond death and life”, I and you are together I always remembered. I will hold your hand, And together we grow old.

Too pitiful we are faraway apart, The distance separates us to meet again! Too miserable this takes forever, And it does not let us fulfill our vow!

Keikatsu is used to exemplify how the physical distance between the husband and wife prevents them from fulfilling their wedding vows. And that's just what Keikatsu/Enchain does to Yuji and Megumi, it causes painful separation neither of them wanted.

Keikatsu also tells Yuji exactly how Sukuna plans to do it. 契(kei)闊(katsu) can be written as 恵(kei)活(katsu). The kanji 恵 can be read as Kei or...Megumi. (It's the literal kanji used for his name.) The kanji 活 (katsu) can mean "activities", which is how we get Enchain=Megumi Activities.

A two for one special! Sukuna mocks Yuji for being so close with Megumi while telling him exactly how he's going to destroy their relationship.

It seems this has nothing to do with Gojo until you consider the 3rd possible reading from wordplay with 契闊 (Keikatsu). The kanji 契 when read as Kei refers to a promise, pledge or vow. When 契 read as Chigi? It can refer to sexual intercourse, especially between husband and wife.

So we have 契闊(keikatsu, separation), 恵(kei Megumi)活(katsu, activities), and 契(kei chigi, spousal sex)活(katsu, activities). It's no wonder he erased Yuji's memory of it.

Keep in mind, that when Sukuna uses Keikatsu, the only vow that he has made at this point is his promise to kill Gojo. He eventually does that using Megumi's body during a fight framed between groom and bride. And for reasons beyond their control, Sukuna and Gojo have been unable to fulfill that vow through lengthy separation.

Notes from poem "Banging the Drum" Sukuna references include the following:

"And during the operation, he lost his horse, which was a desperate situation (horses in ancient time carried soldier supply and weapons, are life companion for soldiers in advance or retreat), he lost his horse, his supply, maybe his armor and weapons, and the road he was facing that we may lose his life so he may never go back. In all these mess, he started searching, and somehow at this hopeless moment he started to revisit his happiest moment, when he together vowed in marriage ceremony with his wife, and he was even afraid that he might never see his love again."

"And His last statement for his true value is his home, his love, his fulfillment of his vow is his true duty. Hero's duty is to pursue love."

In Buddhism, which JJK is heavily influenced by, horses are a pretty big deal. Horses can represent the path to enlightenment, especially since The Buddha's horse is what takes him on this journey away from his wife and children. They separate in the end though, the horse dying of a broken heart.

Remember how Sukuna called Gojo unenlightened? He sort of guided Gojo to enlightenment using Mahoraga, whose Eight-Handed title is a reference to the Eightfold Path to be followed for enlightenment. Buddhist enlightenment is centered around liberation from suffering. (Just check the wiki entry to verify this.) Infinity was the source of Gojo's suffering and Sukuna cut right through it.

Sukuna has been running around with a broken heart for a good chunk of the post-Gojo fight. And if you take that into consideration with this poem and all the other symbolism, he's somehow a Buddha, a Bodhisattva, the dying husband, the widowed wife, and the heartbroken horse all at the same time. Not unlike his wordplay taking on every possible meaning at once.

But my point here is that Sukuna might’ve seen his fight with Gojo as consummation of their marriage. (There's probably a joke in here about the husband reaching climax while leaving his wife unsatisfied.) Remember in the wise words of Itagaki Keisuke, "Fighting and sex are exactly the same!"

In Conclusion?

This is possibly one of the most bizarre and elaborate expressions of love I have lost my mind over. Sukuna gave everything Gojo ever wanted from Jujutsu violently. He did it in such an unpleasant and cruel way that the target of his affection thought there was nothing between them. Sukuna also hid his intent under social norms that no longer exist. Unless Gojo happened to be into ancient literature, there was never a scenario where he would catch onto this. Sukuna's failure is critical on multiple levels.

It’s impressive. It really is. No one knows how Sukuna’s strange little brain works so he’s stuck being loner without anyone that fully understands him. (I’m still thinking about how Uraume didn’t know Sukuna was a twin for over 1,000 years.) He’d have to let people in and tell him outright, but he’s just like Gojo so I guess that’s never happening.

[smallidarityfan]

smallidarity highschool au

came up with this au like actually 2 years ago where it's mainly empires 2 smallidarity centric, with Jimmy as a student council member and Joel as an honours student who doesn't like the way Jimmy runs things around the school.

As payback for the regulations Jimmy put up that Joel thought was stupid, Joel does these elaborate 'The Office' style pranks on Jimmy (specifically) while Jimmy retaliates by trying his best to dig up dirt on Joel. This banter goes on for a while— however Joel ends up doing the pranks less as a statement, and instead more just to see how Jimmy would react... with his comical, cartoony villain yells, and... weirdly cute face....? (YAOI YAOI YAOI YAOI)

very very old au drawings below:

from July 2023

😭😭 joel does NOT look like a highschooler here 😭😭😭😭 (i also wanted to draw angst in the first two ig idk a year later it's pretty cringe [i am still cringe]) (also partially inspired by when I read "Go for it, Nakamura!" and the mc reminded me of joel for no actual reason. or maybe i was just thinking about that manga while drawing smallidarity. idk)

from November 2022:

I think these doodles were genuinely the first instance of me converting from being against mcyt shipping to for shipping LMAOO

[kernelongeforce]

More Dante. Genuinely in love with EnEi endgame éuè

[odder-outlet]

NOW YOU MAY FEAST. FEAST UPON THE EVIL LOVE TRIO. IRUMA AND HIS TWO FREAKS

[idontknowmyownmind]

When Cale 13, he somehow end up in Mogoru Empire territories

Cale create new identity as a dancer just for fun

At first, he did it for fun but he found his love for dance

He occasionally went there to dance and take a break of his trash persona

NO WS

Accidently pull interest of three crown princes, Alberu, Adin, and Valentino

Idk how they found out his true identity but

Being the more bold one, Adin send an envoy to Henituse county, telling everyone his intention, and asked the count for his eldest son hand on marriage

Doesn't want to lose, doesn't let the county to recover the shocking news, Alberu and Valentino also move

Now, the hottest rumor in the whole continent, even the whale and dragons heard about it, is about the trash young master got courted by three crown princes

[cautiouslyyyoptimistic]

Im so sorry but I just cannot understand people that read the entirety of scum villain and then say they don't like binghe. He's awful, toxic, overbearing, ect. Like?? Yes, but also no??? Did you not read the book? Or even looked past the unreliable narration?

Like, I get it, you're reading it in the moment and sqq is a super fun and imaginative narrator, he easily traps you in the same mindset that he has. Trapping you in the world of genres, tropes, character archetypes, what makes a story a story. So it's easy to get clouded like sqq and just scratch your head and try to figure out what type of character archtype luo binghe will turn out to be. If he's not the stallion protagonist harem master anymore, than what is he? So you read book 2 and the start of book 3 and you think, "oh! If he's not gonna be the toxic male power fantasy anymore, than he's gonna be the toxic male love interest fantasy you see in BL!"

You know the ones. They're incredibly sexy, incredibly tall, needs an incredibly in depth course on the meaning of consent and boundaries, and the narrative never punishes them for doing weird and out of line shit, but actively romanticize it. Which fits binghe in some respects, but not all of them, same as the stallion protag box. So I can understand you and sqq's apprehension throughout the story. Waiting for the hat to drop already. Is binghe a cute wholesome wife or a possessive bloodthirsty demon lord?

But then you and shen qingqiu are supposed to learn the lesson near the end that binghe is a person!! With thoughts and feelings and grievances he wants addressed!!! That ultimately he is in the exact middle of the harem master protag to toxic yaoi male lead scale, but also not on the scale at all!!!

Because, ultimately, he is just a guy that desperately wants to be loved! To be wanted! That's it! And shen qingqiu realizes this and takes this complicated emotional wreck of a man and promises him that love and companionship. Shedding the notions of following some sort of thought out narrative and live out their happy ending. Because scum villain's story does end up happy. Messy, but happy. Shen Qingqiu is not suffering. He does not regret choosing Luo Binghe. They are both happy and in love and they both deserve each other. So like, what more do you want?

[mayhemchicken-varneyposting]

I have so much to comment on chapter 40 but I'll try to be brief

19th century misogyny says the wife spreading information a bad thing. What if he had attacked someone else while she kept her mouth shut? God forbid she takes action that can bring results without asking permission from men.

Under such circumstances, ignorant people always do what they have heard has been done by some one else before them and in an incredibly short space of time the propriety of catching Sir Francis Varney

If this was a story where he was just a home invading criminal then all of those ramblings would have made sense. However, as you said this is a literal vampire, why are you mocking them, they are literally right. This is not Hotel Transylvania. If the narrator made no statements, I would have taken the Bannerworth disgust towards the mob as them being classist. While they do want to permanently stop him if he won't listen, they have code of honor, for the opponent to fall in fair fight, now that they know him. So a gentleman pistol duel is in this case way more civilized than the barbaric, foreign stake method.

If you think about it the Crew of Light is a small mob, storming places, prawling and not interested in fair fights. Which,

It is fascinating to me how the mob are othered in a way Varney, the literal monster, never is. Varney is humanized throughout the text, even while he is biting people and committing crimes

...reminds me how several retellings do exactly this with Dracula. But yes the mob's crime is they are being bloodthirsty and violent while poor.

Rymer seems to have a serious problem accepting the conceits of his own story. In several places, during a scene which might otherwise be quite good horror, the narration undercuts the tension by commenting derisively on how stupid the character is for being afraid. And of course, he never quite wraps his head around the idea that believing in vampires is sensible in a universe where vampires are real. It all wraps back into his classism and contempt for his audience, of course--he is much too concerned with sneering at hypothetical superstitious poor people in this universe to consider that, in the universe of his story, they really aren't being superstitious at all.

The comparison to Dracula is interesting. There is definitely some classism in the way Dracula adaptors tend to treat characters such as the Romanian peasants, compared to how Stoker portrayed them (always a massive L when your politics come off worse than a 19th century white guy), but I think the humanization of Varney and Dracula come from different impulses. Honestly, I don't think Rymer could write a compellingly inhuman villain. Varney is human because it doesn't occur to Rymer to write him another way, and he's sympathetic because it sold periodicals like hotcakes. I don't think Rymer particularly identifies with or even likes Varney; not that he dislikes him per se, but he never views him as anything more than a vehicle for telling stories. Adaptors of Dracula, on the other hand, tend to project onto Dracula as a power fantasy. He is not only sympathetic, but powerful, suave, and capable of seducing and/or domineering any woman he wants. In both cases, human characters in opposition to the vampire character are portrayed monstrously with the goal of making the vampire more sympathetic, but Dracula adaptors are (I hope) not trying to make a sweeping statement about how evil and stupid poor people are.

Or, to sum up, Dracula adaptors make the mob a villain because they want you to see how cool and likeable Dracula is; Rymer makes Varney sympathetic because he wants you to see how bad and terrible the mob is.

[kaxtwenty]

What if you, just you, could change anything about any Gundam series/movie/ova/novel/etc. what would you do with that kind of power?

I would give G-Witch 12-24 more episodes, focus more on Suletta and Aerial's sibling bond over the main romance (Sulemio will still be there I promise--please don't kill me), do the Earth arc proper, include the plans for Miorine's mom to be Earthian in the show, better representation of the Earthian characters' plights an- I'm just turning this into FMA: Brotherhood aren't I?

[inthst]

It's so weird that in remarried empress, Sovieshu is portrayed as the bad spouse for having two wives yet in men of harem Latil is portrayed as the hero of the story despite having more than five husbands.

Rashta is portrayed as the villainess for plotting yet the guys in MOTH are portrayed as political for doing the same thing.

Two stories written by the same author.

Like

[midnight--sadness]

before just now, i hadn't written the word "gihussy" in nine whole days

i've been going through withdrawals fr 😖🤧

[randomrangerwhite]

It just really interesting and not unironic to me that people's biggest issues in Genshin is...supposedly the lack of male. And then they somehow use this to make it seems like lack of equality and that Genshin is somehow bad because they introduced another woman character.

But like...when have people EVER made this sort of stink with other games or media in general that have high male cast compared to women? Like DBZ or any Naruto fucking fighting game.

Yall wanna complain about lack of men in a Hoyo games. Go play Tears of Thermis then if you want more boring Hoyo men.

[spookitordukeit]

Bro, imagine if the main way that Harper learned how to get along with the skeletons is if one of the skeletons was home when Harper got home, and Tortellini was just making biscuits in the air, so happy, just cause they were petting her. Imagine if the swap!sans was just scritching her tummy right where she wanted him to, and she is just purring like a motorcycle without a muffler? I think that would help them win Harper's heart, like it would (and has) me with my fiance

(My cat only likes me and will tolerate my mom, but Taco now loves my fiance and will go and lay on him, but doesn't allow fiance to pick him up like only I'm allowed to do with him)

Little miss Tortellini is certainly an effective way to get in Harper’s good book! How someone treats animals is pretty indicative of their character, especially how someone treats her animal.

Tortellini is more then a regular house cat, she’s a Magi, and essentially Harper’s service animal. She will definitely be a big part of this story, and there’s a few boys who will get on either Harper’s bad side, or her good side because of how they treat her precious kitty.

Blue is definitely eyeing up The Pasta Cat (Tortellini) and he 100% will be sneaking pets whenever the chance arises. She’s just too fluffy for him to resist! Those big eyes looking up at him, begging for a treat of whatever he’s cooking— how is he supposed to say no to that??? Sure Harper said not to touch her cat— and he feels a really guilty about it… but he’s being coerced by feline manipulation powers!!

(He is weak to the Big Baby Kitty Eyes)

I Image Tortellini looks like this:

A diluted  calico/tortoiseshell, (can’t tell the difference, I think calico is the one with white patches???) with a fluffy tail and little tufted ears. Long, elegant whiskers, green eyes, and mid-length fur that is deceptively thick and you can sink your fingers into. Very soft. Much fluff. Pretty kitty. A very proper little lady.

Cats are definitely the best way to a persons heart! It’s such an honor when a cat who only really likes one person decides that You Are Acceptable. You may pat, just once ☝️

And ✨Taco✨ is such a freaking adorable name for a kitty I can’t— AUOWGH (-10 physical damage)

[randomnameless]

tbh, I stopped caring about houses that much when I found out that it's an otome/dating sim game with srpg gameplay sprinkled on top. In other FE games, you either gather supports by pair ups or by having units standing against one another. And mechanics like cooking in Fates were done to get some more stat boosts. And even if the avatarization of the game started with New Mystery, Robin and Corrin feel more like customizable characters than an avatar for the player.

In houses, Byleth is like every typical dating sim protag, that does not speak and the few times they do is by having the player choose options that may raise heart points with a character or lower them, you have to find lost items and when you give them back you gain heart points, you have to give them gifts to gain heart points and cooking now doesn't give you any beneficts in battle and only works for, you've guessed it, getting heart points. And let's not kid ourselves, tea time is like the "dates" in otome games, in which you can spam gifts till you raise the affection to the max. The only thing that distincts those points from the otome ones, is that those are necessary for proficency and for unit classes.

Heck, we even have a ring to give to the chosen blorbo in order to get a special custom made cutscene, when in pasts games getting an S support gave you a broken unit to deploy and a little blurb of text during the credits. And of course, calendar/day systems are also common in these tipes of games too.

People complained about awakening and fates for turning the franchise into a dating sim, but 3Houses is literally one in and of itself, and yet is praised as peack FE experience and as peack srpg.

(I could also argue that is because of this otome nature why the characters are "tell don't show" with their given trauma, unlike in pasts games when it was "show don't tell" (Nino, Reison, Camilla, Leif, Soren...))

Well,

When you put it like that, it becomes obvious that the other games (FEH, Engage) mentionning Fodlan are stuck on the uwu monastery part of the part 1 and not the, y'know, events happening that will lead to part 2 because as you said, the SRPG aspect is just "sprinkled on top" lol

However, the "pair up your units and build their relationships!" has been a non gameplay mechanics for decades now (FE4's was a gameplay mechanic, it had no support convos - FE6 added the support convos and gave a small gameplay boost but it didn't commit and we had no endings, FE7/8 had endings, FE9 had convos but FE10 removed them and yet had endings depending on the pairs, etc etc) even without avatars.

Then we entered the avatar era and if it added the "my waifu and my bae" shenanigans, FE13/14 were still more centered on the story aspect that on the "dating sim" aspect, as in, even if you could raise affinity with a character by doing X or Y, it wasn't really coded in a minigame - came FE16 which you analysed perfectly : tea time, gifts, eating, S-support CG, etc etc.

That being said, FE is a RPG, meaning it has characters : you play FE for the solid gameplay but you also build characters, and imo the best way to develop and write characters is to interconnect them with other characters, and/or with the plot/lore.

Sure, Arden functions as a wall/tank. But through the 5 lines he has, you learn that he is part of a group of knights, has friends who often tease him but is relied upon by those people and takes pride in that, he'd also like to find a wife someday and has self-esteem issues.

Is he as developped as, say, Xillia's Alvin? Hell no! But they're characters from two different genres, Arden has those 5 lines that puts him above any "generic" armor.

(I find it interesting how UO and in a way, FE11, gives you the opportunity to play with generics instead of playing with named characters, in UO generics will turn out to be better since you can change their growths, but they're generics. Do you want the RPG of the Tactics/Strategy aspect?)

So, I'd say that support conversations are important, I love Saias and Ralf to bits, but I'm sure I'd love them more if they had more lines. And since support through battle can be a chore (hello FE GBA and trying to get Bartre and Karla's supports when she joins 2 chapters before the end!), I initially welcome any way to grind those supports faster lol.

However, it can quickly spiral in, well, the otome mechanics we have in FE16 - if you want to build support then why not have an entire mini-game for that, and meals and chorals and whatever else?

It's all about finding balance between developping your characters without turning your game in a dating sim or what I'd call "playing the sims and pairing those dolls with those other dolls you like".

Still, let's not kid ourselves, nowadays the "dating sim" aspect of the series is, while decried by some, very popular - and FE is first and foremost, a series that has to sell.

3H is not peak SRPG not peak gaming experience or even in FE gameplay that'd be FE5 but I can't ignore the fact that its dating sim aspects might be part of the reason why it's still very popular.