#do people read long posts by people they don't follow?

[yuyu1024]

Lettuce

Pairings: Mingyu × y/n

Genre/tags: non idol, dating

Warning: 🔞 fluff but still smut, pet names (babes, baby, love, honey, sweetheart etc.), cursing, unportected/protected sex (always be safe), kinks (size, breeding, tits, etc), mention of small age gap, mention of low self-esteem/confidence and insecurities

~~~ [lmk if i miss anything]

Words: 2.6k

Disclaimers:

- this story is just made up

- english is not my first language, please be nice 😊

A/N: been away. I didnt know if I should post this or delete but then... I dont want effort to go to waste so.. 😅 i hope this is an okay one.

Have a nice day.

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"Are you still waiting for your ride home?"

You look at the group of girls standing a few feet away from you. They are from the department across your office.

"Is your boyfriend late?" She adds a follow up question

You smile, "I am." You cautiously answer.

They are not your friends so you are not comfortable to share more than that. And also they are known to be the gossipers in the officr so, any details about your personal life would be the next topic for the next few weeks if you share anything with them.

"It's already late... are you sure he's still coming?" One girl asks.

Luckily, the bus arrives just in time for them to hurry in. No time for you to even chat with them anymore.

"Thank goodness..." you sigh feeling relieved.

*pings*

🐶: sorry, im late. 😭

🐶: i helped an old lady cross the street.

🐶: didn't know she would ask me to also help her get boxes of soju in her shop.

🐶: she admitted to pretending to struggle crossing the street so she can ask anyone to help her and his son 🙃 and then made me buy a whole bunch of lettuce.

🐶: like a whoke bunch😶

🐶: you like lettuce right babe?😚

You smile as you read your boyfriend's text. You don't know if its you imagining him pouting because he feels sorry he made you wait or its because he felt used and scammed.

💖: you're so silly.

💖: its still a good deed so its okay 😊

🐶: but i am 10mins late.

🐶: i cant let my princess wait for me.

💖: i can wait. As long as its you... ♥️

You see him read the message and then not reply.

"Hello stranger..."

You got startled when Mingyu embraces you from behind and kissed you on the cheek.

"Yah! You scared me." You slap his arm

"Sorry..." he giggles and kissed you again. This time on the lips.

"Stop..." you say, blushing. "We are outside."

"So...?" He grins and then puts his arm around you. "We are a couple. Who the fuck cares?"

You roll your eyes. "You know people judge..."

"No... they are just jealous because I am dating a wonderful woman..."

You shake your head. "No... they are not jealous because of me..." you push him away. Forcing a laugh. "Probably because you look good in that double denim look."

Here you go again with your self pity and self judging. You always do this. 'This' notion that you are way below over any other girl and that you are just lucky Mingyu is your boyfriend. You always make an effort to put yourself down without even noticing that Mingyu does not like it.

He fucking loves you. Inside and out. From head to toe. From front to back. He even loves it when you are not at your best behavior nor position. He just... loves you. Period.

But on your end, even with a million reassurance, you always doubt yourself for him.

***

Arriving at his apartment, the first thing you did was announce that you are going to take a shower. You didn't even looked at him when you said it. You're not mad at him or whatever. You are just guilty and feel sorry for being down out of the blue. You didn't even talked that much during the ride home.

"Hey..." he takes you by your arm and pulls you close for an embrace. He kissed the top of your head and then forehead. "Take your time... I'm going to cook dinner."

You smile with no teeth showing. "Okay..." your voice sounding almost a whisper.

"Anything in particular you want? We have meat, fish and vegetables... like a lot of lettuce..." referring to the whole plastic the old lady sell him. "You want something with soup or fried? Ramyun or pasta?"

"Hmm... I like pasta... and a salad on a side?"

"Okay... as you wish my princess..."

The whole apartment smells like a five star restaurant. The fragrance is to die for and makes your mouth water. When you got out of the bedroom, hair still damp, you got suprised by how extravagant Mingyu arranged the dining area. Fancy plates, lit candles, wine glasses and a bottle of his favorite red win. All of a sudden, iy felt like you entered an Italian restaurant wearing your baby pink pajamas and hello kitty slippers.

"Hi, babe." Mingyu is a ray of sunshine while putting on a few more finishing touches on the table. "Ready to eat?"

"Aww..." your heart is aching with pure joy. He is the sweetest man alive.

You stumble your way to him, caused by your own feet. He managed to catch you giggling with you. You look silly but he find it cute. And then as your eyes met he immediately captures your lips for a kiss. Small pecks that got deeper and more seductive. The kisses are loud that it echoes and bounce off the walls of the apartment. He can't also stop touching every curve of your body. From your hips, to your ass and to your tits. He even lifted your shirt so he can access your bra and yank one side down exposing you boob.

"M-mingyu...." you giggle as you try to pull away from the kiss. He does not want to let you go. He keeps on chasing your pink lips whenever a gap starts to build in betweem his. "We need to eat... the food will get cold..."

He didn't answer. He leans lower so he could give love on your exposed bud. He suck it first before he lets his tongue lick it and make your squirm.

"M-mingyu..." you inhale. "The food...?"

He finally lets you go, smiling. "Fine." He chased one more kiss. "But after we eat..." and another one. "I'd like to go straight to dessert." And another one. "You know I love my dessert." He says, bitting his lower lip while grinning like a mad dog.

"You're crazy!" You pinch his nose.

"Crazy over you..." he growls and suddenly picks you up off the floor. He puts your legs around his waist and you automatically hang your arms over his shoulder to hold on.

"Yah!"

"I can't wait. I think I want to begin our dinner with dessert first." His eyes is filled with desire and he is ready to wreck you.

Kicking the door open to your bedroom, Mingyu lays you down gently but in a hurry at the same time. He is on a mission. He is not going to make love to you. He will FUCK your brains out tonight. You know that look in his eyes.

"No condoms... I need to feel you... skin to skin..." he pulls his shirt off and throws it, hitting the wall, then begins to unbuckle his belt and pants. "And I'll like to fill you up until it leaks out of your pussy." He adds, grinning

"Oh God..." you try to get a hold of yourself. Not ready for what is coming

He pushes down his pants and underwear in one go. His length springs free and is up, steady and hard. It's tip glistening with pre cum.

"Turn around..."

You do as he says and go on fours on top of the bed. He pulls your pants down, revealing a bare and wet pussy ready to be torn.

"No panties huh..."

You blush. "Well... I know we'll have sex today... I just didn't know its going to be this soon..."

Mingyu hovers on your back, hand sliding up and down your curves. "Do you want me to stop and just go on with dinner?"

You lower your heard, embarassed, even though he's not seeing how turned on and red you are. "No... I would never say no to you..." after a few breaths in you look back, cheeks red and warm. "You know sex with you is my only addiction."

"Fuck yeah it is..." he says proudly and satisfied

He eases himself in, slowly but deliciously. He skipped prepping you. He can't wait anymore. His dick is aching and wanting to feel your walls.

"I'll be a little rough to you today, babe." He smacks your ass and a moan escapes your lips. "I didn't like what you did earlier..."

"Ughhh!" He slams strong and consistent. It's driving you insane how he could hit the very back of your cervix. Actually he could hit every thing inside you. Thats how long and thick he is. "W-hat... what did... I do?" You arch your back and pushed your upper body up so he can embrace you and touch your body as he thrust your brains out.

"You know..." he grunts as he adjusts and tries to go deeper, even though he is already at the deep end of your insides. "I don't like it... when you don't appreciate yourself..." he inhales and exhales as he feels you clench and make it tighter. "Fuck! Babe!" He kisses the curves of your neck and bites on your shoulder when he feels the tightness thats make it fucking sensational for him

You ubotton your top to give him access to your chest. You didn't unhook your bra though. You just pulled the ladies out and the bra helps give them a push up.

"You are beautiful... sexy... and a wonderful woman..." he pushes your hair out of his way so he can kiss your neck. "Love yourself... the way I love you."

He then pulls out, almost making you cry and beg. But them makes you turn around to face him.

"Can you?" He asks with the most loving eyes

You crash your lips to his. Pushing your tongue in him. You didn't stop until you hear a moany cry from your boyfriend. His brows then creases when you playfully bite his lower lip. "I want to..."

"But what?" He carries you off the bed and pins you to the wall, beside the window of your bedroom. Your one leg touching the ground while the other is hooked over his forearm. "Answer me, babe."

He slams back in you. Stronger and much deeper. Which confused you coz how? Its not like your cervix can expand. But thats what it felt when he slammed you. It didn't hurt. It felt insane actually. Insanely goodm

"You are kind... sweet... caring... hardworking... knows what you like and dislike... respectful..."

You are catching your breathe in your throat. Its like you are choking from excess pleasure. You try to speak but you can't let go of the high. So instead of speaking, you just shook your head.

"You don't agree?" He asks. Mingyu looks at you with his puppy eyes and showered you with kisses. Then he kept repeating all the good qualities you have as a person and even physically.

He really is telling you every bits about you. Everything that he loves and dislike but accepts coz it is you. It is part of you. He really do love you.

"What can I do... to reassure you?"

You put your hand over his mouth. Not to shut him down but to hush him for a second. Just for a moment until you get it all out for him.

"Fuck me!" You cry as you can't help but  cry more of his name. You are so close to your orgasm. "Nggghhhh...!"

You shut your eyes ready to explode but then Mingyu pulls away from your hand, takes you back in bed to finish, when he suddenly says the two words you didn't expect him to say while he's fucking your brains out

"Marry me..." he says.

Your eyes opens, looks at him in pure shock and bliss. "W-wha..." you can't finish your words. He was hammering you. You can't answer. "Mingyu!" You moan his name so loud when your world spun around.

"I love you." He grunts as he see you melt and when he pushed into you a few more times, he finally begins release himself you. All the warmth and every drop of him in you. "Fuck!" He exhales, dropping his body on you but not his weight. "I love you..." he says again. "So much..." he kisses your shoulder and then your cheek. "So... what do you say?" He smirks

"Suddenly?" You look at him, confused.

"Hmmm..." he scrunches his nose, still wearing the smile on his lips. "Not really..."

He then gets up, pulling out of you, which felt like you got more naked than what you are now. More exposed.

"Wait lemma clean you first."

He runs into the bathroom and takes a towel to wipe you clean. Just clean enough to be presentable but not totally wipe his seeds off you. He wants that in there.

And then he runs out of the room.

"Where are you going? Babe?" You are confused. Why is your man running outside the bedroom ass naked

Giggling as you see him comeback in and carrying the plastic bag of lettuce.

"Huh? What's that for?" You sit up and wrap the thin white blanket to your body.

"I lied. Well... we still going to have salads and all..." he is mumbling. "This should be over dinner... but... I could not help myself earlier so..."

"Mingyu... what is going on...?"

Laughing but still trying to pull a serious face. "It was true that an old lady sold me this but... as I was helping her she took the paper bag the came wit this... and I panicked." He sits down beside you. "I didn't want to put it in my jacket or pocket coz... it will be obvious... and when we walk and your cold you always put your hand in my jacket's pockst so..."

"Mingyu!" You grab his face and kissed him. To make him focus. "Just say it..." you are giggling now too.

"Okay..." a soft smile spreads to his lips. "I know... you may think... I'm still young and naive."

"No you're not..."

"Yeah but... still... anyways..." he nervously laughs. "Like I said... you are an amazing woman. Anyman who you choose to love will be the luckiest. And thankfully its me..." he then goes down to his one knee and pulls out a black box from the plastic of lettuce. "I said I didn't like what you did earlier... you looking down at yourself... but that does mean I hate you or mad at you for it... I just say that because I care.. I want you to feel... assured and happy." He opens the box and shows the most brightest ring you ever saw in your life. "If I have to always reassure you for the rest of our lives... I don't fucking care. I am up for it. I love you and I can't live a day without you." Pulling out the ring and taking your hand. "Please marry me... I will serve you and love you forever..."

You watch him put the ring on your finger.

"So...?" He looks at you with doe eyes

Letting go of the blanket covering your body, you launch yourself to him, making you guys fall on the floor. "I love you Kim Mingyu..." you say first before kissing him. "Forever is not a bad idea..." you kiss him again. "Of course I will accept."

"Sorry if I proposed to you after sex... at diner would've been fantastic"

"Don't say sorry... I do love your way..." you get up from embracing him. "It brings back to how we started."

He sits back up. "Right."

Then you stare at your ring. "Who could've guessed that... I will be marrying the guy I met and fucked at a friend's birthday?"

[thefrogman]

Back in the olden days, if you used the "keep reading" function on a Tumblr-dot-com post, it would

not get very many notes.

At all.

I am not sure exactly why.

I think people hated pressing an extra thing.

But maybe it was also a psychological phenomenon where, given the choice, they were unwilling to trust me with their time.

But if I sucked them in with a good story or a compelling image, they would get serious FOMO.

When I created a super high effort post-of-length I would get comments like, "This was way too long but before I realized it I was reading the last sentence."

That was a really good feeling.

I used to do tests to figure out the best posting strategies and I think I figured out you'd lose about 90% of your notes if you did a "keep reading" post.

So that notion was ingrained in my brain again and again from when I was very note-obsessed and I have since avoided the "keep reading" option almost like a conditioned response.

Just seeing that squiggly line appear still induces a Pavlovian fear.

But that was probably a decade ago and I did a new experiment. My story about replacing my mailbox did reasonably well with a strategically clickbaity "keep reading."

This was a promising result due to the fact that some people like to send me hate for writing a lengthy post.

I recently got a death threat for writing too much, which was a fun reminder of my M&M days (I melted men's rights activists' brains with a poorly worded analogy and they launched a years long harassment campaign).

It seems in present-era-Tumblr-dot-com many more people prefer pressing an extra thing rather than scrolling a bunch on their smartphone. The collective behavior has changed. And maybe I don't need to use tricks and running gags in order to get folks to "keep reading".

Unfortunately I started writing that ring light post a few months ago so I wasn't able to include that in the experiment. But I am going to try using the keep reading function in the future and as long as the average number of folks that usually read my longer posts continue to read my posts, that will be the standard approach.

I also tag these posts with "long post" so you can flag that if you wish.

While I am no longer in the audience-building phase of my Tumblr career, these essays and stories and educational posts take a considerable amount of time and effort to create, so I do want to make sure everyone who wants to read them is able to. But posts without hearts and reblogs can quickly die a gruesome algorithmic death. Even my most ardent followers would tell me things were not showing up on their dash. (I think replies help mitigate that, so if you like a long post, you can help with engagement.)

The collective noun is a "business" of ferrets.

Do you want to see a business of ferrets ready to do some business?

KEEP READING

I love writing and it is a huge catharsis for me. And I love sharing any knowledge I feel like I have the earned expertise to speak on with authority (technology, photography, light, fun ferret facts, etc). I wish I had the energy to be a photography teacher, but long posts on Tumblr are probably the best I can do for now.

I know my posts are super long, but I try to make them as fun and informationally dense as I possibly can. I don't like wasting people's time if I can avoid it. Though maybe I should trust my follower's attention span a bit more. I have this fear that if I am not constantly entertaining, people will click away or unfollow.

I think a good business for a business of ferrets would be selling pool noodles that look like ferrets.

So as long as I get roughly the same amount of notes I will do the keep reading. And then maybe people can lay off on the mean comments and occasional requests to end my own life because I bloviated about soft light.

100% true ferret fact..

If you ask a ferret what their business is, they will crawl on your shoulder and whisper in your ear...

[thepersonperson]

Gege is doing to his characters what they did to jfk there's so much character assassination happening djsjdsnsdjn

This ask was sent to me shortly after I complained about JJK 269 leaks. (Aka before JJK 270's release so be nice to them.) And while I still agree that chapter contained character assassinations, JJK 270 has given me a good reason for them. 

Since my other post related to this topic was trimmed down by Tumblr’s 30 image limit, I’m going to use this ask as an excuse to this burning question...

Why does everyone feel so out of character in JJK 268–270?

Notes before we start.

1) Read the light novels. They are the equivalent of Bleach's CFYOW for JJK. There is a fan translation (Book 1 & Book 2), but I will be citing the official translation from my own copies.

2) I will be mainly using the TCB scans for the manga because of their accessibility. 

4) Written as of JJK 270.

5) Read the light novels.

(Another extremely 'hear me out' discussion under the cut. Click pictures for captions/citations.)

Preface

This post is banking on the framework I set up in the previous related post so please read/skim over it. (If you don't? Just hear me out!)

Short Summary of the Previous Related Post:

Yuji is projecting a massive delusion onto Megumi that gives him a happy ending. JJK 268–270 is a mesh of Yuji and Megumi’s memories and dreams that serve to rationalize all that’s happened to them in a way that allows them to forgive themselves. Sukuna’s vessel memories are probably mixed in too.

Because of this I’m assuming the following:

>The battle recollection in JJK 269 is Yuji constructing explanations from his, Megumi, and Sukuna’s memories during their battle. Neither of these 3 ever knew the plan in full. This can explain why so much of the battle recollection is wrong.

>The characters we see outside of Yuji and Megumi are constructs based on their memories of these people. They’re more like representations than the actual characters.

I don’t know if it means they’re dead or not, but that doesn’t matter. I want to explore the way the characters feel off can be explained by them being memory constructs.

In the previous post, I used "Without love it cannot be seen." from Umineko to give my best faith reading of these past 3 chapters I've hated so much. This time the tool I'll be using is:

"Flipping over the chessboard."

This refers to how one should try to see things from a different perspective.

Memory in JJK

A neat touch that has always been around in JJK is characters remembering others as they last saw them. When Gojo recalls his best students, Hakari has a very different hair style from when we meet him. His recollection of Yuta's is accurate though. When Panda recalls Yuta, the hairstyle differs from what Gojo recalls. And when he recalls Kiara, he mistakenly refers to her as a guy.

This all can be explained by considering when Gojo and Panda last saw these characters. Gojo last saw Yuta in Kenya with Miguel where he changed his hairstyle. Panda hasn't seen Yuta since he's left the country. Neither Gojo or Panda have seen Hakari and Kiara for a very long time.

Their memories reflect how they last knew them. Kiara is a whole girl now and Hakari is blond. But if Panda and Gojo never saw them again? Those memories would be true to them, even if it’s no longer accurate.

And sometimes the memories aren’t accurate. See this side by side recollection of Gojo meeting Megumi from both of their perspectives.

I believe Gojo’s memory of this event is the accurate one because he’s 19 when it happens, not under distress when he recalls it, and has the Six Eyes which act like a supercomputer. Megumi’s memory is iffy because he’s 6 when it happens, has a head injury that knocks him out when he recalls this, and doesn’t have perception enhancing abilities. And though Megumi can’t recall the memory in its truest form, what he does remember still tells us a lot about his feelings towards the event and his relationship with Gojo.

The emotions child Megumi felt at the time distort what Gojo was actually like back then. Instead of a benefactor, he’s a suspicious weirdo with a funny face. The heart behind Gojo crouching down to his level, being way too honest with him, trying to give him options, patting him on the head—it’s all missing.

With all this in mind, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume Megumi and Yuji’s impressions of other characters via memory would influence how they appear in these delusions too. Yuji’s impressions probably take the most precedence since I think his will is shaping the delusions the most.

Recalling Incomplete Information 

Yuji is very good at understanding people. He can intuit their feelings and sync up with them easily. (I go over this in greater detail in this post.) But that doesn’t mean he fully understands their hearts. He gets close enough to their core to bond with them, but the little details aren’t quite right. 

If all the characters (save Megumi) we’ve been seeing in JJK 268–270 are constructs based on Yuji’s perception of them, I think this can explain everything off about them.

What made me consider this possibility was JJK 270. There’s this pattern I keep seeing... Characters’ motivations being misunderstood and being resolved by scenarios that aren’t quite right. Every time I try to explain what exactly is wrong with them, assuming their inconsistencies align with Yuji’s perception of them solves the problem.

Amai Rin

Rin is introduced as a coward. He’s unable to fight and goes along with the whims of those stronger than him to avoid getting hurt. This is why he keeps his head low as his friend is being harassed by bullies during his Jr. High days. Still, he tries to help. Just not at a risk to himself.

When Yuji saves his friend and beats all the bullies up, he turns to Rin and assumes he was part of the bully group. This simply isn’t true. He was a bystander. That’s why it’s weird for him to apologize like he was the one who beat the guy up.

Yuji’s false impression of Rin, one where he’s a bully that feels guilt over his actions, explains this. Rin’s actual guilt comes from him being a bystander—someone who doesn’t take action for others when something is wrong. He dealt with that in the Culling Games by helping Yuji and risking his life to save Angel. And he really stepped out of his comfort zone to join the medical team for the Sukuna battle. He might be the reason Yuta survived. (Yuji doesn’t know about that though.)

And what’s this? Here Yuji outright admits he doesn’t fully understand what kind of person Rin is. All he knows is that he did some good things and is trying to become a better person. So now we’ve got this other Rin that’s apologizing for something he didn’t do for the redemption he’s already earned.

(And that’s the pattern! Rin’s motivation is misunderstood by Yuji so he’s doing something that seems out of character to us readers, but is perfectly in character for Yuji’s perception of him. When I apply it to everyone else. Everything makes sense.)

Takaba Fumihiko

What Yuji knows about Takaba is pre-Kenjaku development. Yuji knows the Takaba that speaks over others, rejects their criticisms, and insists he’s funny. That’s kind of what he’s doing to Totally Not Kenjaku. In reality, Kenjaku caused Takaba to reflect on his approach to comedy and they are nearly in perfect sync by the end of it. Kenjaku satisfied Takaba.

Yuji didn’t see that battle and he hasn’t spoken to Takaba since. So he’s constructed a happy ending where Takaba has found his partner and is working towards the show of his dreams that already happened.

I also want to note that Takaba is 100% ok with sex jokes. Kenjaku makes one and he doesn’t object to it. This is just another little detail that makes everything so slightly off.

Higuruma Hiromi

Yuji knows that Higurama wants to go back to his roots. He knows that he feels guilt over killing people.

What he doesn’t know is that Higurama’s roots are him being a defense lawyer that cherishes the flaws of humanity. He doesn't want to ever look away from the impurities that even Yuji has. That’s why I think Yuji resolves his problems with him becoming a sorcerer who saves lives.

Yuji seems to think that Higuruma is like him. He’ll make up for the lives he’s taken via sorcery by saving more. That’s something he could assume from their convo, but that’s not actually what Higuruma wants. He wants to fundamentally change Japan’s legal system for the better in his own way.

Kurusu Hana

She’s the most in character of the bunch. In fact, there’s nothing out of character about her interaction with Megumi. What she represents is Yuji misunderstanding Megumi’s desires.

Yuji understands that Megumi’s type is someone with an unwavering humanity (literally the definition of Yuji’s name) via access to his memories. But for some reason (he’s kind of dumb academically), he thinks this means Hana is perfect for him. 

I think this is because Hana meets Yuji’s definition of a good person. She’s just like Megumi. She saves others for a selfish purpose. And that means…Hana does not meet Megumi’s definition of a good person. Not once has he considered her saving others as selfless. (...But Yuji has.)

And that’s just facts. Hana is kind of unhinged. She’s extremely possessive of Megumi and saves others solely to win him over. Yuji saves others because it’s the right thing to do.

Megumi’s preferences are Yuji, not Hana. Which has led to the most awkward confession and rejection scene. That might have clued Yuji in to construct an alternative. In the memory Yuji is probably recalling, Todo does clock Megumi as someone into dudes.  …The very next scene is Yuji hitting on a dude in front of his gf in a way that causes him to blush. (Yuji has not once complimented someone’s body up to this point if I recall correctly. And he’s been around some beefy dudes.)

(Yeah Nobara me too. Second most leftfield possible bisexual confirmation I’ve read in a manga. The first will always be from Baki the Grappler.)

Is this Yuji letting Megumi know it’s ok to come onto him? Is he not initiating because Hana’s forwardness freaked Megumi out? It’s possible. 

What this suggests is that Yuji is kind of fine tuning this whole delusion to make Megumi as content as possible. It’s telling that the moment Megumi starts getting super uncomfortable the scene jumps to something else.

It happens at the beginning of the chapter too. Gojo is mentioned by Shoko in a way that causes Megumi to pause. And Bam! Change scene.

Anyways, I hope this demonstrates that Yuji working with the limited information from memories is most likely the reason for everything being so funky. It’s character assassination by accident.

Why make these happy endings when this is all for Megumi?

Two reasons as to why I think Yuji is trying to give everyone a plausible happy ending.

1) He genuinely wants them to live good lives.

2) It has to be believable for Megumi to accept them as real and forgive himself.

This line may have been about Yuji, but Megumi’s not any different. He blames himself in the exact same way Yuji blames himself.

I also think there's something to be said about Yuji crafting a dream that resembles the perfect cookie cutter Shonen ending. The guy gets with girl he has no chemistry with. All these complicated plot lines are wrapped up with a neat little bow. Everyone lives and goes on like nothing traumatic happened.

Yuji is a big fan of Shonen. Straight up his final move against Sukuna is a Hunter X Hunter reference. That's not just Gege doing a reference as a fan, Yuji himself is a fan of that manga.

I think Yuji is trying to make this fiction a reality because it's the only way he knows how to cope with his trauma.

JJK 269’s Character “Assassinations”

I promise I still hate this chapter. But I won’t deny how fun it is to pretend these are all delusions Yuji created for Megumi’s sake. I went over Kusakabe to cut him some slack in the previous post, so let’s do everyone else.

(The chapter’s formatting as one long unending nightmare makes it hard to separate this stuff out by the character. I’m just going to do groups this time.)

The 2nd Years

The most common complaint from readers outside of Kusakabe telling Yuji he should’ve died is Maki being really fudging mean to Yuta. Maki is mean, but she’s not that mean. You could assume this is her showing Yuta she cares and that her anger scales with worry but… Here’s a side by side comparison of her getting angry over Yuta risking his life in Vol 0 vs JJK 269.

Pretty big difference I think. Here is a Maki with a Yuta she thinks is about to die vs a Maki with a Yuta who is 100% ok. And the only reason she even gets mad in Vol 0 is because she had no idea Yuta did something that risky. Maki already knew Yuta was going to body hop if all else failed, so her reaction here is disproportionate, especially since he survived.

Speaking of survival, the first thing Maki, Panda, and Inumaki do when Yuta survives in Vol 0 is ask if he’s ok and thank him for saving them. This doesn’t happen in JJK 269. They're all very protective of Yuta after the events of Vol 0. We see them defend him from Gojo for being a little mean about his training. They’re all against the plan because of how much they value him. The 3 of them not checking in on Yuta immediately after the fact is wildly OOC.

The explanation I have? This version of Maki is based on Yuji and Megumi’s memories of her. (And let’s remember that Megumi claims he can’t openly respect her and the other 2nd years outside of Yuta.) When Megumi and Nobara mourn Yuji’s “death”, Maki does this to them.

Maki also intimidated Yuji pretty bad when they first met. Her, Panda, and Inumaki went along with bullying Yuji after he came back to life. It makes sense that Yuji would up Maki’s meanness. He’s not been around her long enough to know she’s not like this when it comes to people she cares about. 

I do think it is weird Maki is pre-awakening levels of mean. This could also be Yuji trying to return to the time before everything went to absolute hell. Or...because she’s Yuji’s construct, this could be him expressing his anger at Yuta for defiling Gojo’s body in a very roundabout way. From both Yuji and Megumi’s perspective, Yuta didn’t discuss this beforehand and used it as a last second plan. And that’s kind of how the conversation goes. Everyone talks about Yuta’s Yujo plan like he didn’t clear it with them first.

It’s also telling that they harp on Yuta over Miguel and Larue. Miguel said no help unless Sukuna’s domain was down. Everyone except Yuji knew that. There was never a scenario where they’d help from the start. But to Yuji who only heard they might show up? It’s a missed opportunity.

Say if you were, trying to find a reason for such a horrific defiling of a loved one’s body. Wouldn’t you try to reconstruct the crime by considering the motives and methods? That would help give you some closure, right?

I think that’s what Yuji is doing for himself and Megumi. Yuji is trying to figure out why things went the way they did through a blend of what Sukuna intuited and what makes the most sense to someone who never had full knowledge of the plan. 

And if you think about it, this is still a happy ending for them. They’re all absolved of their guilt surrounding the outcome of the battle. Even if they screwed up, they’re all still alive and able to move forward in a better world. They did the best they could, so it’s time to move on from what happened to Gojo. Thinking about that too much would break someone.

Mei Mei and Ui Ui

Mei Mei is out of character in a way that’s unique compared to everyone else. She’s still herself, but with less…yikes. It’s odd since Yuji has seen how awful Mei Mei can be and is deeply uncomfortable with how she treats Ui Ui. He’s not missing information about her motives so why have we gone from this to this?

I propose this is an extension of Yuji’s denialism. (We’ve seen how avoidant he is with Gojo’s death.) Mei Mei is grooming Ui Ui and has made it clear this is all for money. Ui Ui is being abused, but he’s so attached to his abuser that separation would break him. How do you make a happy ending out of that?

Well, you can soften those edges. Spin a tale where Mei Mei is an over-doting sister who would kill for her cute little brother. She doesn’t touch him inappropriately, she just plays with him. She loves money as much as him! No abuse here! She’s not someone who would kill a child for cash.

And in a weird way this whole Simple Domain debacle mirrors Gojo killing the higher ups. If Maki is Yuji's rage towards the Yujo plan, then this could be him trying to process his mentor slaughtering a bunch of old people in mass for his sake.

It probably helps that Yuji wasn’t there to see Mei Mei tell Ui Ui to die for her. There’s no way he knows she was paid to help kill him either.

Mei Mei doesn’t care about the well-being of other people. She’s just a hardcore capitalist who loves money and will do anything for it. But this version of her can be less terrible to Ui Ui while still getting her cash and that’s sort of ok I guess? Yuji has moved on from this and so will I.

The Megumi & Nobara Problem

The 1st years going on like nothing happened after Sukuna has made readers feel betrayed. It flies in the face of everything that’s been established for them when it comes to mourning.

As stated in CFYOW, JJK Thorny Road at Dawn, Chapter 5: At the End of a Sidewalk, this is how the trio deals with grief.

Despite knowing Yuji for only 2 weeks his death screws with Megumi and Nobara pretty badly. In the manga, it looks like Nobara is more upset because she’s visibly in pain, but I think the light novels show they’re equally shaken. 

This is why the non-reaction to Gojo’s death makes no sense. Megumi has known Gojo for a decade. He’s 6 when he first meets him and 16 when he dies because Sukuna used his Cursed Technique (CT). Nobara knew Yuji for 2 weeks, and didn’t see him for another 3 months. In all that time, Gojo was her teacher. She knew him longer than Yuji. When she “dies” Gojo is on the same tier as Yuji and Megumi to her.

So why is it that in JJK 268, Nobara thinks of Gojo as a creep? Why did she toss his letter despite him being one of the people she thought of in death? 

Well… When Yuji came back from the dead via Gojo’s prank he heard Nobara say this.

Nobara is prone to saying out of pocket nonsense to people. If she thinks it, she says it. Yuji also doesn’t understand Nobara’s thought processes (Just like Amai Rin he admits it too!). Nobara tries to hide her feelings to appear tougher than she is sometimes. So I think Yuji has done to Nobara what he has done to Maki—upped the meanness and neglected the heart.

And though Nobara being a construct can explain her behavior, this still leaves us with Megumi who is definitely not one. Why is he acting like Gojo meant nothing to him?

Megumi in particular is super fragile when it comes to his feelings. This is how stressed he gets when he learns exactly why Tsumiki is in a coma.

She’s not even dead and he’s halfway to a mental breakdown. The idea that he can just look at her grave once after having a hand in her murder and move on this quickly makes no sense. Inadvertently killing his defacto guardian he’s been raised by for 10 years should be upsetting him to a similar degree. (Maki said Gojo treated him like a precious treasure!)

When Megumi is on the verge of death he thinks of Tsumiki, Yuji, and or Gojo. It’s always at least 1 of those 3. There’s no way Gojo dying and having his corpse reanimated for reasons Megumi might feel responsible for isn’t screwing him up.

Unless…Yuji is suppressing his memory on purpose. He can’t even cope with what happened to Gojo, how is Megumi supposed to? How can either of them forgive themselves for that if they acknowledge it in full?

When Sukuna tries to tell Megumi to give up, he looks miserable. Every time Sukuna has verbally kicked Yuji while he’s down, he’s done it with a big old smile and laugh. He doesn’t hold back and goes for the throat.

Sukuna is being very nice to Megumi here when he doesn’t mention Gojo at all. The only death he blames on Megumi is Tsumiki. Everyone else? Nothing. That’s weird given that Sukuna will pass the blame of his kills onto Yuji to torment him.

Is this Sukuna a construct or is he playing nice because he respects Megumi? Who knows. Whatever happened here seems to point to Gojo’s memory being suppressed for Megumi’s sake. 

And why might Megumi accept this suppression? Why does he seem to be going along with Yuji’s delusions? The Unlimited Void brain fog. Megumi brings attention to it after he wakes up. 

If Sukuna can’t think straight after Gojo brain damage, neither is Megumi. Still Yuji has to be careful. If Megumi thinks too much, the illusion will be broken. 

What does this mean for them?

Well, the character assassination isn’t real (probably) which is a good thing! Other than that? Not a clue. We’ve got a real catbox situation here. I can’t tell who is dead anymore.

Sukuna projects delusions when someone he’s connected with is dying. Yuji projects delusions when he’s dying. Both of them are kind towards the people they’re interacting with in this space between dreams and reality. They try to give people endings that leave them satisfied.

JJK 270 ends with the hunt for a curse user who can distort perceptions of reality. This curse user is initially mistaken as a cursed spirit. That sounds like Sukuna I think.

I’m pretty confident this happy ending illusion will be shattered, that's for sure.

My Final Answer

I'm betting it all on this being a delusion. This is a kind of prediction that will either age well, very badly, or interestingly. I don't know what's in store for the final chapter...but I do have some ideas I'd like to speculate with.

"Without love it cannot be seen."

This time I'm going to use this phrase very literally. I'm going to make one final gamble on the assumption that love is the answer. So let's go back to Love itself—one of those reoccurring themes in JJK.

Love is a curse in JJK. It has the power to distort reality and transform loved ones horribly. Desperation to save a loved one from death over and over has resulted in extremely traumatic things. Yuta turned his childhood crush into monster that caused havoc for years. You can pin blame everything that has happened in JJK on Gojo being unable to get over the loss of his loved one, Geto.

Hana could've vanquished Sukuna on the spot, but she didn't because she loves Megumi. It's something a lot of people blame her for. If she had just killed him there, the Sukuna battle wouldn't have happened. But that's not really the truth. The only reason Sukuna even got his powerful is because Megumi refused to let Yuji die.

Megumi and Yuji going back and forth trying to save each other have been acts of love driving the plot of JJK since the beginning of this manga. If Megumi actually died on Yuji? Who knows what would happen.

...

A lot of readers have been on a very funny copium because of these last 3 chapters. Some of them joke that they are just one massive Takaba-induced hallucination. This theory has some merit to it! After all, his CT does two things:

1) It distorts reality.

2) By sheer force of will it bends people's souls to his whims.

One of the biggest complaints about the past 3 chapters has been the Merger plot ending abruptly. As of JJK 270 Tengen and Sukuna's remains have been mixed into the barrier around Japan and everything is just fine according to Gakuganji.

People wanted to see what the Merger would do, just like Kenjaku. In universe, Tengen made a prediction. They guessed that the impurity from humans would dominate and consume everything. The impurity that Higuruma wants to protect. The impurity that Higuruma sees in Yuji.

Would Sukuna activate the merger and kill Megumi to spite Yuji? Absolutely.

Would Yuji do or become anything to save Megumi's life? Absolutely.

Do whatever you want with this information.

[spockandawe]

Oh, this is interesting. To me. I'm not sure it's interesting to anyone else! But I'm on my computer for once and FULL of words again, and I'm delighted to talk to myself given half an excuse.

So, I made a post about Long Live Evil! Because I cracked open the book and was absolutely taken aback by how transparently it seemed to be an SVSSS reskin. I wrote up a goodreads thing (it's whatever, I'm going to rehash the main points here too), because I was also full of words and beans after finishing the book yesterday, and after polling online friends, I was surprised to see that the comparison didn't seem to have organically occurred to anyone else, when it was so naked to me. I know there’s a TON of transmigration and isekai stories out in the universe, and pointing at one single book was a big claim, so I just had to assemble all my thoughts! I find this so interesting! And I reblogged my initial one-off post with a little more elaboration about some of the things that jumped out at me, then got on with live and went back to chipping at ORV and GHG, and shotgunned MADK this afternoon.

This is a subtle nod and a wink to my passionate love for these kind of... morally grey main characters! Calling them villains might be a bit much, I don't think there are many true villain protagonists out there (LLE included), and even Devil Venerable has a demonic cultivator who's doing demonic shit and killing loads of people... but with the ultimate balance of the heavens and earth as his priority. This kind of story is my jam. I was recced this book on the basis of transmigration and sketchy protagonists being my thing. I can't rightfully call SVSSS the best cnovel I've ever read, but it is my favorite. And I've probably reread it more times than any other cnovel.

So, that SRB post, huh? I put Long Live Evil behind me, and honestly even following up on the sequel is mmmmmdoubtful, but THIS snagged my attention again. First, the comparisons she's calling out as incorrect are wild to me. Draco and Harry? What? Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian?? (I had to ponder that one for a hot minute, but I bet you anything it's about 'the golden cobra' and 'the last hope' and that's just silly, they're not wangxian, they're MOSHANG)

I was recced LLE in one friend group, but I had an anti-rec from my book club friend group. My book club friend hadn't been at all impressed by it! And she's cool, and I talk up svsss and mxtx to that crowd every so often, without really expecting them to read it. I talk about transmigration as a plot device that I love, and the things that can be done with it! But with that connection in mind between the books, as I started LLE, I was jokingly defending the honor of SVSSS to this crowd, so I admit I was primed to recognize similarities.

I really truly did not make it far in the book before locking it down. I was getting vibes basically from the moment Rae started gushing about her problematic fictional fave, I referenced 95% certainty shortly after she makes the jump to the fictional universe, the golden cobra was 98%, Lia Mingyan's, I mean Liu Mingyan's lack of sex scenes was 99%, and the first pov section for Marius-jun was where I gave up and called it as a sure thing.

It'll be very funny if I'm wrong! I don't think I'm wrong.

Plenty of spoilers to follow, because I identified this inspiration early, I guessed basically every plot twist early, I don't have the patience to dance around spoilers while explaining how it all lines up.

Now, I said this elsewhere, but it bears repeating: I don't think this is plagiarism. I think it's tasteless to accuse an author of stealing and repurposing characters to her face. But I think it's also tasteless to repurpose characters as nakedly as happened here! Again? If I'm wrong? That's why I'm talking to myself on my blog and not messaging her directly (?????? who even does that). What are the stakes for me being wrong here? I look like a clown online? That would be terrible, I've never done that before! It's not a crime to write in ways I find distasteful. It's not a crime to write a book I think is not good, even apart from the use of fictional influences. But I like talking about my feelings online, and I can't be stopped!

But there's two aspects of this that make me somewhat uncomfortable in a less fun way. Both are contingent on the big IF. If this is inspired by svsss, I think it's not a classy move to take a Chinese story in a Chinese setting, inspired by the modern Chinese literary scene and classical Chinese fantasy, and just dump the characters into a generic western setting. Fanfic? Have fun and try to be respectful. Profic, making money off it? Ehhhhh. The question of how much change is necessary is a tricky one! It's not one I'm equipped to answer, this is not my wheelhouse or my place to speak. But it doesn't make me feel good!

However, here's where I have more personal stake:

Again, if this is inspired by svsss. It really doesn't feel great to see a queer story (a smash hit in more than one country!) stripped down for parts and made into a heterosexual story. It's not all heterosexual, we get side lesbians, we get men with homoerotic tension. But the central ship is now a guy and a girl. And it... stings a little extra, because in the story of svsss, the idea of assumptions about default (hetero)sexuality are such a central theme. A queer man has written a trashy, oversexed stallion novel where the hottest guy in the universe collects the hottest women like pokemon, and it sells so much better than the more personal stories he tried to write. He has to write this pandering trash to make money to live, he can't live on the more authentic stories he tried to tell before. The protagonist is the projection of his own insecurities and self-hate, and the protagonist's right hand man is his projection of his own ideal man. Another man transmigrates into the book, assuming that he himself is straight, assuming the protagonist is straight, and the force of their love changes the course of the entire narrative. In retrospect, it's upsetting to see those load-bearing themes casually carved out of the story and the hollowed-out remains used like this.

Anyways, in their place, now we've got running gags about how the heroine's tits are BIGHUGE now and she can't keep her balance because her GIANT HONKERS keep tipping her over.

I'm a little more bothered than I was yesterday! On the other hand, since I saw SRB's post, I've been chewing on that central ship. Full disclosure, it was one of my favorite aspects of the novel! My other favorite aspect is the dynamic between the golden cobra and the last hope (the moshang, which I think some people misdiagnosed as wangxian).

I know that the central ship here is the thing that's LEAST comparable to svsss, and the biggest roadblock in the way of my theory. On the other hand, I think it was the thing that HAD to change if this story was going to repurpose svsss without getting called out for being a classic 'bro can i copy your homework' adventure.

For this section, let's assume that I'm right and let's roleplay an author trying to figure out how to change Bingqiu into something not-obviously-Bingqiu. How do we need to differentiate Rae and Key from Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe.

First, we eliminate the martial sect thing. Easy peasy! That's a wuxia concept, and this book goes full nondescript western fantasy. She's not his teacher, he's not her student. And if she's not his teacher and he's not her student, why does this woman have power over this man, to build up the resentment that inspires him to turn the tables on her later? Well, in nondescript western fantasy, she's a noblewoman of some kind, and he's a servant of some kind. Noble lady treats servant like garbage, servant resents her. Doing great.

And to loop back around to the beginning of this a little, I think it really is key to this reskinning that Rae is a SHE. If the central ship remained queer, it would be so, so hard to pull away from the most identifiable thematic aspects of svsss. And pieces of what remain are... kind of bizarre for a normie heterosexual ship where our protagonist is aware that she's transmigrated into an impossibly desirable sexpot character!

Shen Qingqiu never considers that Luo Binghe might be interested in him because Luo Binghe is about to have a HAREM of beautiful women, he's the most heterosexual man of all time, and Shen Qingqiu is straight too! Besides, Shen Qingqiu is his teacher! He half-raised Luo Binghe! Even if Luo Binghe was bent, he wouldn't be interested in an old man like Shen Qingqiu!

Rae is 20, occupying a 24-year-old body. Her character's sexiness is relentlessly remarked upon from start to finish. Key is 18. Why is Rae so sure that he looks up to her as... a mentor, as an older woman? He almost goes down on her! He makes out with her! And she's like 'ah yes, it means nothing. lol. so funny how these things happen.' Bruh, at least after Luo Binghe kissed Shen Qingqiu, Shen Qingqiu finally got hit with the clue stick. Binghe didn't try to blow him only for Shen Qingqiu to keep noodling on about how Binghe definitely isn't into him in any sense, even the most oblivious man in the universe managed to catch on.

Why doesn’t Rae think there’s any chance of genuine attraction here? Yeah, I get that she's coming back from terminal cancer. She's doing great. She knows that the fictional character she occupies is one of the most desirable ladies in the land. He’s a teenager. He’s not expressing disinterest. A lack of horny for sexy lady ought to be more surprising for her. But I guess she’s slightly older than him and that small age gap has been magnified by the transmigration, so she conceptualizes herself only as his teacher, I mean mentor.

I’m not even mad at this dynamic. I love their chemistry, the ‘boss’ thing is cute, but lordt, I have to wonder if it’s meant to substitute for ‘shizun.’ But you know where this comparison really falls apart? Key isn’t really THAT much Luo Binghe.

At least, he isn’t in terms of personality. I mean, we’ve got the mysterious magical heritage, the healing factor, the unbeatable fighting skills, being beaten repeatedly because of the protagonist (tbh it’s sexier when she’s responsible, rather than just being a bystander), being yeeted into the abyss, I mean the ravine, to rise again and assume power as the merciless ruler of all the land. Oh, and he comes back from the dead still bearing the scar that represents her betrayal. In the original novel, he turned on her the moment he got his opening and was responsible for coming up with her gruesome torment.

(Also, Shen Qingqiu being terminally ill isn’t canon, but it’s very popular fanon, and it’s hard to ignore that with how hard the narrative lingers over Rae’s terminal illness as her gateway into this fictional world)

But! But the things that are different! Luo Binghe is a smart and sweet teenager, who had a rough start on the streets and has a tragically deceased single adoptive parent, but that’s their only backstory parallel, he doesn’t blacken until he’s thrown into the abyss. Not like Key, Key is a murder-happy sociopath, a former street kid who fought the odds and made good, and who’s a lot sharper and cleverer than the upper classes think someone like him should be. He utterly destroyed a righteous cultivator clan, I mean glassblowing guild, for the sake of revenge. Once our heroine scores a number of trust points with him, we unlock secret backstory about how as a small child, he experienced deeply formative hand trauma.

He’s Xue Yang.

It took me a moment to process the wangxian allegations SRB mentions in her post, because I was trying to figure out how someone would be aware of wangxian, and read that backstory, and somehow miss it. But it’s fine, I’m pretty sure they were actually talking about the golden cobra and the last hope! So LET’S TALK MOSHANG.

It was so funny. I was liveblogging the book to friends, because honestly, I do not jive with the buffy-esque joss whedon relentless quip-quip-quip writing style. I was struggling to stay engaged when the narrative never took a moment to breathe. And I perked up at the introduction of this new character! He seemed kind of fun, kind of meta, Key came over to share Secret Info with him, and I messaged the friend who recced this to me (also an svsss appreciator) ‘lol, what if he’s shang qinghua. just straight from svsss shang qinghua.'

Reader, a second transmigrator has hit the narrative.

Now, in some ways, he’s a disappointment to me. He’s not nearly as interesting as Shang Qinghua. Adding the author to their own narrative is way more fascinating to me than just dropping a rando into the story. But I’ll take what I can get, I think multiple transmigrators are almost always a fun decision. And for the queer reasons I mentioned above, I think Shang Qinghua ties into the themes of his novel a lot more strongly than Eric does here. I don’t want to call him ‘the golden cobra’ every time, I get more self-conscious every time I write it. And honestly, the reveal of Eric’s full Eric Whatever name feels a little awkward and… pointed compared to the sheer opacity of Shang Qinghua’s existence. Never mind what his name was in the real world, we don’t even know his name before he was a Peak Lord. I’m not upset we got a name or anything, it would make certain fannish activities a lot easier if Shang Qinghua had additional canon names, but it was an interesting detail in light of how parallel the characters are.

Okay! He’s not the author! He’s still a super-fan. He transmigrated into the book years before the LLE main character, and has settled in pretty well. According to canon as Rae knows it, he’s fated to be killed by his own favorite character. He’s fast-thinking and fast-talking, and scattered and all over the place, but dangerous when cornered and more competent than he looks. He deals in information and manages a network of spies. He’s a creative! He and the main character banter relentlessly and get along like a house on fire. He and the king’s trusted ice-cold right hand man share a weird codependent dynamic that’s part hostile, part homoerotic.

Marius has complicated feelings about not-shang-qinghua. Eric is a coward, he’d rather talk fast and lie than stand up for anything, he cowers and cringes and isn’t honorable. He and Mobei-jun also shared a deeply formative experience in their youth, where as a teenager in distress, Eric/Shang Qinghua appeared before them and announced their devotion. In Shang Qinghua’s case, it was offering to serve him (and saving him from huan hua injuries), and in Eric’s case, it was declaring him to be his favorite character (and saving him from sad teenaged isolation), but man. And in the end, after a long, fraught relationship, Marius/Mobei-jun is furious and strangely distraught when Eric/Shang Qinghua abandons him.

Guys, it’s not wangxian.

I think it hits less hard when Marius’s themes of family violence aren’t allowed to sit directly in the narrative, and when it seems like some vague berserker rage thing rather than Linguang-jun just bluntly wanting to murder him for practical reasons, but hey! This was still, genuinely, one of my favorite parts of the story. I wanted more more more of them, I would read this moshang au any day.

After that, the parallels get a little more nebulous! The comparisons between the abyss and the ravine are pretty obvious. I’m not sure why we decided to build our city and palace right on top of the pit of people-eating ghouls rather than literally anywhere else, but it means we don’t need to take a special field trip to Jue Di Gorge, which means we can do the bait and switch where it turns out Key was a heavenly demon all along. The temperamental King Octavian, the young master of the palace, one might even say the xiao gongzhu if they were feeling spicy, jealously tries to romantically monopolize half our main ship and has the other half flogged with a magic whip.

I already mentioned that Rae brings up that Liu Mingyan — wait, I said I’d change some answers so it wasn’t obvious I copied — Lia doesn’t get a sex scene in the books even though loads of other people did, just like Shen Qingqiu praises Liu Mingyan for her untouchable image in such an oversexed, gratuitous book. I don’t think it would be right to call Liu Mingyan a white lotus heroine in either SVSSS or PIDW, but her archetype is in that wheelhouse, and Lia is just a white lotus rival played straight (and played deliberately, another touch I liked). We don’t have made up animals like black moon rhinoceros pythons in LLE, but we do have leucrotas, which are like a lion and a hyena and serve no narrative purpose.

Oh, you know what else I forgot to mention? Rae gives Key one of her red ruby earrings, and he refuses to sell it, and stubbornly holds onto it until the bitter end. Is this Xue Yang holding onto the last piece of candy Xiao Xingchen gave him, or is it Hua Cheng determinedly keeping Xie Lian’s red coral earring with him even through his own death? Por que no los dos?

There are things that are original in here. I know that this presentation undersells how much of the book is original. The trouble is, almost everything I thought was good is something that either was lifted from another person’s creative endeavors, or is being tainted by association with all the other naked lifts. Some of the noble ladies have an archery contest! That’s pretty new and fresh, huh? We didn’t have any archery contests in SVSSS!

Yeah, but we sure did in MDZS. And MDZS is already in play, because we’ve already got one character who’s just copy and paste Xue Yang.

There’s a thermocline of trust in this book that fell off for me sharply, and it turned a lot of this into a guessing game of ‘wait NOW what the refrance? owo'

I’m probably on a hair trigger by now, but I’ve also probably missed some things. And I’m sure this is a synthesis of multiple influences, because most stories are. But this feels like cooking and trying to season your dish with a little salt and then the container lid just falls off.

Emer isn’t a clear parallel to an existing character! Love that for her! Love a lady with an axe, especially if she gets a nice girlfriend! On the other hand, in terms of backstory? Wow, she’s been raised with our protagonist since early childhood, as not-quite-foster-siblings, but she was always the clear unfavorite and harbors a lot of resentment over that. Oh, and once Rae entered the story, Rae started trying to speedrun an enemies to 'hello hiiii we should bestiessss' arc with her. I think she had to have an axe, because a whip or a sword would make the Jiang Cheng and/or Liu Qingge vibes a little uncomfortably strong. She doesn’t follow their character arcs! But the disappointing thing is that it felt like she was just there to facilitate pasting the frankenstein patchwork of the narrative together rather than having an arc of her own.

(why did Marius stop to give her a sword lesson? Why did she immediately sneak onto the roof to eavesdrop on the king?? It’s hard to give her credit for being an original character when none of her original actions make sense in the greater universe)

Oh, I almost forgot, we’ve even got magic plot macguffin plants. While Binghe is in the abyss, Shen Qingqiu needs to get the Sun And Moon Dew Flower Seed so he can build an escape hatch for himself before Binghe wrecks his shit. Rae, on the other hand, needs to secure the Flower of Life and Death by an arbitrary deadline as an escape hatch so she can go back to her original life rather than being trapped here forever. Very different! There’s even little side tangents about how these plants can be so beneficial to others, Zhuzhi-lang is desperately trying to secure a seed to build a new body for Tianlang-jun (which Shen Qingqiu enables him to do, despite not knowing what he wants it for), and Rae thinks about how the flower could “save someone on the very doorstep of death,” and gives it away for that exact purpose. So different!

I need to cut myself off, otherwise I’ll keep going. Truly, there is original content in here. It was just all the stuff I didn’t like. The character quipping was. God. There sure was a lot of it! By sheer volume, that’s a lot of original content. Some of the extended cast was interesting, I enjoyed the Horrors and their brothers, I liked Valencia. Now, I didn’t like how basically every girl ADULT WOMAN in this cast was in shitty teen mean girl mode. I didn’t like how immature every character interaction period was. I lost track of how many times Rae was going around in sexy clothes and rando servants were like “HARLOT,” out loud about a favored noblewoman, you know, as you do. Especially when her bodyguard is pulling against his choke chain just waiting for an excuse to do a murder. I don’t need Rae to be the picture of flawless maturity. But nobody is mature, full stop, not even the set dressing servants.

For a less loaded example, the cumplane friendship dynamic is here, practically intact. Shen Qingqiu can't snipe about authorial choices, because Eric isn't the author, so instead Rae and Eric squabble about favorite scenes and favorite ships and such. But it isn't nearly as charming when we don't see these two characters dropping their dignified Peak Lord cultivator roleplay to talk shit with each other. Rae and Eric never have a filter once in this book. They are always Like This, it isn't a secret face that gets unlocked when they're bouncing off each other, they are never circumspect, never have a filter, never have any idea they shouldn't be speaking their full thoughts at full volume 24/7. Even after this starts to have material consequences when they're inevitably overheard! It's an immersion-breaking level of immaturity, which is terribly frustrating when the original dynamic that I loved is only changed in such minor ways.

And another thing that actually tastes way more sour than it did on first reading – Valencia is probably the least mean girl of all the women in the cast. She’s delightful. Too bad that in every scene but her last one, Rae, who repeatedly references her own experiences having her body and appearance ravaged by cancer, cannot for love or money stop talking about how uggo Valencia is.

I know this is an adult novel. The characters are, by age, adults. There’s almost an oral scene. God, I wish we’d gotten the oral scene. But by every other metric, the characters are all high schoolers and I’m an exhausted adult muttering to myself ‘they’ll grow out of it, please GOD let them grow out of it.’

Again, none of this is a crime! Nobody forced me to finish the book! And I did enjoy the book. Parts of it! But that very distinct partial enjoyment experience almost forced me to dissect my own emotional response. And truly, other than a few flashes like Valencia, almost everything I enjoyed about the book was something I could trace directly back to one author, and mostly to one book by that one author. I… enjoyed half of the book. And if I can track most of that half back to mxtx and svsss, I really think that says something about how much wasn’t done to make the inspiration behind this book the author’s own.

It's disappointing! I read this book because I like svsss, I read it because I want more books like svsss, I read it because I trawl the novelupdates tags looking for more books that will hit me the way svsss did. It doesn’t taste good to be served reheated svsss with expired buffy sauce drizzled on top. It tastes even less good once I have a minute to think about what turning an m/m meditation on sexuality and self-image and assumptions about others into a m/f snooze does to the themes I loved so much. It stings to see an author rehash a book that was/is so important to me, and see what they kept and what they threw out, and be like ‘oh, so… these were the elements that mattered to you?’

Again, I hate to be redundant with this, but. I think calling this book plagiarism would be overdoing it. I think it’s tasteless. I don’t think being tasteless is a crime. It remains wild to me that she’s getting messages calling out her supposed inspiration, even if I’m simultaneously criticizing the judgment of the people making those specific comparisons. And I ABSOLUTELY understand why she’s reluctant to own up to the specific inspirations behind this book, because good lord. If it was me, I’d be professionally embarrassed too.

It’s not my job to be the book quality police, but I think someone as experienced as this should be able to do a better job of synthesizing inspirations into something original. I dropped ‘can’t afford to offend my scheming disciple’ earlier this year, because that narrative couldn’t shake the taste of stale svsss fanfic, and it was much more subtle than this is. Once again, if I’m wrong, this post will be retroactively VERY funny and I’ll be all ears to see what her inspirations actually were. I don’t think I’m wrong.

[euryvices]

weird things about my town that lowkey remind me of tma

god, this is going to be a long post.

okay so. i grew up in a town in the middle east (about 200 people), with my bestfriend Whom I Will Not Shut The Fuck Up about apparently, and it was a strikingly different experience to most people who've grown up in the middle east, or in america. it was yk, a rich people town, populated and run mostly by generational wealth owners. as a result, our town was very hush-hush, despite it being in the Crackass Of Nowhere.

i started listening to tmagp about two months back, under the instructions (*cough cough coercion cough cough*) of my lovely moots (im looking at you @forflightlessbirds and @need-a-name-101) i've noticed a few things which may be...off.

the first thing i need to clarify are the rules. we had five of them, that nobody really stuck to, but we all knew of. the rules in and of themselves are normal things any parent tells their child, but weirdly specific. there weren't really any repercussions if we didn't stick to the rules - but most of the time, we didn't like breaking them. they were, as follows :

don't tell strangers your real name, and if you do, run and tell the head of the community center.

if people approach you about 'coming to god' (i.e, christian/muslim/jewish missionaries) tell them god has moved.

do Not enter the junkyard at night. (we broke this one)

always carry a knife. most of us were given jade knives, but my bestfriend got a gold one. ive teased him about it most of our lives, even after we shifted.

take a buddy with you everywhere, and if you can't find one, don't go out.

me and my brother have broken all these rules about once at least, except for the knife one and the junkyard. me and my bestfriend broke the junkyard one though. we shifted together when we were barely teens. first, we lived in the uk, then in the states. we headed back home and barely spoke for a year before he died, at the ripe old age of 17. i miss him, but thats not the point.

it was only after we moved, that we realized how truly Fucked Up our town was. we were living in the middle of war ravaged county, and we had swimming pools, and ipads, and sunset cocktails? obviously i didn't realise it as a kid, as a pre-teen even - but looking at it from the outside feels like a gut punch.

now here's where im going to yap about the similarities between tma and my shitstorm of a childhood and hopefully Will Not Piss Anyone Off. if you're from my town - you'll know exactly what im talking about, and i seriously hope you reach out and/or message me.

the things everyone knows the things. they're just. there. kinda like the bogeyman your mom scares you with when you don't eat lunch except most of us have just accepted that they're real

old man hanna if you've lived here, you know him. he's weird, he's kooky, and he's got a million books and tape recorders and vinyls. he's maybe the only person in that place that doesn't come from money. he hates electronics, says they can't capture things the way old school stuff does

the graves now, our town is mainly christian. uber arab christian. we've got graves, we've got cemeteries. but outside it, on the outskirts, lie a long line of unmarked graves. are they from the arab-israeli war? the gulf war? lord knows

the 2015 blackout this was the creepiest thing that happened here. the blackout, and then the radio stations playing that reading of the bible? my parents shut everything off and rushed me and bulos to the master bedroom

the skydiving institute i have no idea if the government approved this godforsaken place, but it was there. it led to the disappearance of nahren, who was deathly afraid of heights but she said she was ready to face her fears

the church when i shifted to the uk, i saw the proceedings of the greek orthodox church there. and let me tell you - it's so different to our church. for starters, our church doesn't even seem to have any affiliation to the goc, even though it should?? the entire thing is so different

the pond now this is rather controversial. our town's pond was created in the early 70's, but no one knows How or Why. realistically, there shouldn't have been any water supply that far inland. and the water should not be that salty. we don't acknowledge it, and no one drinks from it, even if its really hot. there's a sign outside that asks parents to hold their children tightly when passing by the pond

the soldiers they're mainly american (at least the one i met was), but they rarely enter our town. and when they do, they can only stay in one specific motel - we're not allowed to talk to them. once i did, though. im still...fucked up from it

there's a lot more, but i don't think y'all wanna know about my fucked up town anymore. just writing this is giving me the heebie-jeebies.

we usually aren't allowed to leave our town once we're in it. but my dad got special permission for us to leave, before the divorce. so we did. and then my parents got divorced. which made our family Not Happy, so we weren't exactly welcomed back.

that being said, i don't think there's anything really wrong with my town. it's just a bit...different. and i love it. even if it doesn't seem to love me right now.

god, i think i need to go lay down. i hate remembering all this.

[hughungrybear]

Some blogs really do feel like they love sucking the joy out of the shows that most people watch. I get it - people are free to criticise shows that don't jive with whatever artistic/creative sentiments they have. But some posts by specific blogs really do feel like it was written by a pre-pubescent teenager trying hard to be edgy.

Somehow, I sort of get it. After all, negative reports do sell. It's one of the main reasons why news people rarely broadcast "good" news and if they do, it's highlighted as some type of "special" report. As if good rarely comes in real life. Psychologically speaking, bad reviews do bring the likes and re-blogs that some people seem to crave.

But these blogs fall into a pattern. They would follow which show is currently trending, post some positive reviews at the start, then when they find a following, start nitpicking every small detail and write long essays about it. Afterwards, you will find that most of their writing are just them making mountains of criticisms out of a tiny, microscopic molehill.

So, what am I trying to say here? As an avid watcher of these shows and reader of blogs, you need to be more selective which blogs you follow. It is easy to get swayed when somebody you like and respect (to a certain extent) starts hating the show you are currently enjoying. Suddenly, you start to hate the show too for no good reason other than because you read somewhere that the show is not that good.

Despite the criticisms, I always find Marie Kondo's approach to life to be the most practical — if it stops bringing you joy, DROP IT. Use the 'unfollow' button generously. You don't owe anyone anything.

Now, I'm not saying you should turn a blind eye to any criticism. But you do need to be selective and determine the valid criticisms from fallacious and unjustified ones.

[camplease]

i'm pretty sure i have the most unpopular campal opinion in the fandom being someone who does not romantically or sexually ship them or think that's canon, but also being someone who's not morally opposed to people who want to headcanon their relationship that way, and not being upset if people even chose to interpret the text that way (as long as they don't insist that it's unreasonable or unsupportable to interpret it as platonic)

[benevolenterrancy]

AND IT'S COMPLETED! Last chapter finally posted!

The Torchwood team manages to get themselves dumped into the middle of the Korean War and have to struggle their way through injuries, medical staff, time anomalies, demon hunters, and more general confusion than even they're used to dealing with on the regular in order to find a way home.

Meanwhile the MASH crew get a bunch of British spooks who just may win for being the weirdest patients they've ever had, and that's saying a lot.

[fluffle-writes]

I wanna. Pick them up in my mouth and shake 'em around like a dog obliterating a squeaky toy

[icewindandboringhorror]

Apparently I can meet my goal of roughly 400,000 words in 6 months if I just somehow write at least 2,200 words a day ghbjh... Almost 2,500 today... huzzah...

[trashyandtiredsol]

sol. Sol. Sol. Sol. Sol.

SOL.

ilysm.

you are so friggin extraordinary.

never change.

you're amazing.

Kept trying to think of some paragraph long response to this but I'm absolutely shitty with words-

SO

Tam. The feeling is very mutual- for you and everyone I've talked to at some point since I've been on this hellsite we call Tumblr /affectionate

Talking with everyone on here, sharing my art with everyone- just existing with everyone on here and seeing what y'all create has turned into such a huge aspect of my life (especially my social life like- y'all ARE my social life at this point 😅)

Plus I'm fuckin so glad I decided to try out Tumblr when I did cuz it was around a sorta traditional point in my life (moving outta a toxic ass house and away from a toxic, isolated life and my ex supposed father figure). Coming on here and talking with you and everyone else brightens my day and I'm glad to be a part of everything :3

[svtskneecaps]

so what i'm putting together from osmosis and the wonderful livebloggers and the incredible arkanis english updates account is something like this

Prefeito Jota: Hello, I'd like to hire you to investigate what happened in my city/island(?)!

Bagi, who was previously "invited" to a mysterious island/city by its elected official, subsequently trapped on the mysterious island/city, investigated the deep mysterious history of the island/city, came to no conclusions, found her brother after years of searching, was separated once again from her brother, gained and lost an adopted daughter (possibly to being kidnapped by the island government, which was evil), gained and lost a demon fiancée (possibly to being dragged back to hell, so there's no way to find her), gained and lost a close demon friend to dubious circumstance (did he die for his children? is he with skeppy in the gas station?), and has had an unknown amount of time to process and/or suppress all of this: Sure! :D

[dawntheduckrb]

I'll stop posting wips eventually but it's been five days since I've said anything and I don't want anyone to think I'm dead/dying/stuck in a ditch and withering away, so here's 10% of the reason I disappeared (the duck is stuck in rendering hell) (and my little baby laptop is screaming at me every time I open up this file)

I might still be mostly lurking for a little bit so please be patient with me in the meantime 🙏🙏

[bookwyrminspiration]

do you happen to have any recs for blogs that post a lot about reading???? sending this ask to you because you're the only blog i follow that mostly talks about books lol and i think it'd be nice to see more book related stuff

If you mean blogs that talk about a variety of books and reading in general, I don't know that there are many I can recommend; most of the people I follow (which isn't many) are fandom specific. Two I can think of, @morhath and @annabethisterrified, post about reading fairly regularly, including a variety of books instead of one fandom specific.

But otherwise, looking through tags of specific books I've enjoyed and finding people who post about them can lead me to people who read in general. Since if they read one thing, odds are they've read more. Which is rather intuitive, but it's true of how I find people

Looking through tags like "bookblr" and "bookworm" may also lead you to some people--though there will also be a fair bit of aesthetic people in tags like those usually, so depends on what you're looking for. You can also check those posts from other tags people use, and figure out which ones have the kinds of people and posts you want to find

Branching out and finding more book-in-general related blogs is actually something I'd like to work on myself--don't worry mutuals, I mean to do so alongside my current posting, not to replace it. I'm not going anywhere

I wish I could be more help with this, but hopefully this is a start! If anyone else has any others, please feel free to add them :)

[scarletfasinera]

Anyway since I can't send an ask because of character limit and I gave up after trying to write it three different ways and it not working, I'll just. Idk write a short vague post back? I'm assuming a vague for a vague is fair (don't worry I don't want to be mean I just have no other way of navigating this situation.) Since I'm exhausted & but want to at least express my view of it.

Idk just on the off chance they see this or one of our shared mutuals shows them or something. My "weak subtext" post had absolutely nothing to do with Adam Warlock, I didn't even remember that I reblogged that poll before making my post. I had seen like six other polls after the Adam one, bc I was actively looking through the blog, that did the exact thing my post was about, the blogrunner (who shall remain anonymous) had Pointed Out in private that it was happening and gave several examples & it was distressing them so I checked the blog myself and commented on it, which was why I made the post. Not the Adam poll in particular which I didn't remember and wasn't thinking about. I do not know enough about Adam to say anything about either the text or the subtext or anything, so I just. Wouldn't? It really baffled me that it was read that way.

Anyway. Farewell beloved mutual we barely knew ye...

[o-wyrmlight]

Cookie your tags are so good ssjkfdkfhskdjh

Thanks I grew them myself in my garden