#notes: and I need a break

[willabee]

not supposed to be on the table but she looks so polite

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

I know those eyes.

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[slugfishh]

college doodles

[rayroseu]

HEAD IN HANDS,,,, Just realized the profound realization that at Knight of Dawn and Meleanor's fight, I know they'll never talk it out... But I just realized that the story even expresses that fact visually....

throughout their fight and even until their death, they stayed at their "masked" form.

So, in Knight of Dawn's view, Meleanor was just a dragon and why the story makes it seem like he's just "insensitive" to the fact she's a living person too, because in that fight, he viewed her a monstrous dragon because Meleanor fought him as that. And, Dawn as a human, can't possibly interpret Meleanor's language as a dragon, much like how Humans are inept in fae language and why humans are still having a difficult time understanding faes and their morals.

The same thing with Meleanor, Knight of Dawn was in full armor in that time, so in Meleanor's point of view, Knight of Dawn was just "a piece of metals". (Like how Malleus viewed Ortho as just a "metallic technology"). Additionally, Knight of Dawn was a person who seem to want to say many things but never did(?), so Meleanor never heard him—

So their resistance, in giving up their role was expressed in the narrative decision that Meleanor fights as a dragon and Knight of Dawn will fight her in full armor and also he's a person who doesn't speak much especially in battles (much like a "metal").

Dawn was only "understood" somewhat when he crashed to Lilia, causing his head armor to fall off.... causing his "mask" to fall off

Its the little things to me OKAYY 🥹🥹😭😭

[chick-it-out]

What do you think of the song of my humble lil guy, the Black Bird?

His song is one of my favorites to hear! :D

hi i love him :) 🖤

[morriemonnie]

Somewhere, there is probably a pebble fighting for their lives in blackout

[myrkulitescourge]

can i just say, it still makes me feel a little crazy how astarion, come act 3, still can’t quite put a name to his relationship with his partner, but he WILL tell them he wants to keep them both safe.

he won’t say i love you just yet but he will say forever, for good.

[opikiquu]

these 2 gonna drive me insane

[likesdoodling]

Had the time to sit down and draw today and ended up doodling Zuko and Sokka (modern au style cause I wanted to >:D) ~ yeye

[wishing-well-art]

The one thing about Arcane season 2 that I'm still a little bit mad about is that Vi and Jinx never really talked. They had a total of 2 conversations in season 1, one where they got interrupted and Jinx was never able to tell Vi what happened in the 7 years Vi was in prison, and the second where Vi still had no clue what was going on. But that's fine, miscommunication that befalls tragedy, it's intentional, and character-wise Jinx wasn't in that kind of headspace for that to happen. But then season 2 rolls around and at no point in season 2 did they sit down and talk about what went wrong, why they made the decisions they did, and try to understand each other. We never even got a loud fight where they unloaded all the negative feelings they had towards each other, or a quiet painful confession that they felt like failures towards each other. They had so much down time that we should've seen all that, the fight in the mines and the talk in the commune should've been that, but they only barely skimmed the surface. Did Vi even find out about Jinx being injected with shimmer? Did Jinx ever find out why Vi left her that night? No, they didn't, and that's just such a shame.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Danse Macabre

[Commission]

[jynxedshapeshifter]

Another possibility for Trucy and Apollo finding out they're siblings just occurred to me. What if they find out by accident?

Trucy knows Thalassa's her mom. Like just to be clear. Phoenix asks Trucy about her in the 2019 section of the MASON System sequence in Turnabout Succession and Trucy says she "disappeared" and mentions her by name.

Now keeping this in mind, there are several ways for Trucy and Apollo to accidentally find out they're siblings.

Trucy recognizes Apollo's bracelet as identical to Thalassa's, which I don't think is likely because I feel like that should've happened already with how perceptive Trucy is without hyper-empathy

One of them gets their hands on a picture of Thalassa. Trucy mentions that Thalassa is her mom, Apollo points out that his bracelet looks identical to Thalassa's, and they think for a few seconds before realizing Thalassa must be Apollo's mom too

Trucy mentions she got her hyper-empathy from her mom, and her mom got it from her dad (Trucy's grandfather), leading her to realize the ability is genetic, so the only way Apollo could feasibly have it is if he's a Gramarye, leading them to the conclusion that they're siblings

In any case they confront Phoenix about it and Phoenix panics a bit, and when Phoenix says he needs to talk to Thalassa before they have this discussion and just makes them even more upset because "what the hell do you mean you need to talk to her? How long have you been in contact with our mom???" which makes Phoenix panic even more.

No matter how they find out, I, at the very least, want the fact that Phoenix and Thalassa haven't told Apollo and Trucy they're half-siblings to bite Phoenix in the ass, if not both Phoenix and Thalassa. Like Apollo's an adult and Trucy's almost an adult, I feel like maybe they should know by now?

[fumifooms]

Do you think Kui retconned Kabru and Rin as a couple? It seems so strange how Kabru treats her if he views her as a sister

Rin & Kabru relationship analysis

Skip to the keep reading cut if you only want my Kabru & Rin thoughts. Tldr of the preamble is that I don't think Kui retconned anything but I don't think Kabru and Rin were ever meant to end up as a couple, but that doesn't mean that there's no way anything deeper or more complex is happening here. Under the keep reading is my pretty full analysis of Rin & Kabru, which I'll still cover in my full Kabru party analysis eventually.

1) People do debate about whether or not Kui changed her approach to a lot of her characters halfway through the story, Kabru, Thistle and Chilchuck to name some of the biggest ones. I've heard it be an explanation for the shapeshifters even, that it's a meta joke on how characters' old behavior and appearances have now become out of character. I personally believe nothing has been retconned, that all the characters are coherent and, perhaps more importantly, that regardless of later intent the early writing makes the characters more interesting and layered. Not that the idea of there being or needing retcons has no merit at all, for example forest goblins are in-world common knowledge to be found on the second floor, but we also learn later that "goblin" is a slur against half-foots, and knowing Dunmeshi's philosophy about humanoid monsters it's odd that they never ever come up again if they exist. The anime -and iirc adventurer's bible- kept there being goblins on the second floor of the dungeon, so much like Thistle's early appearance I have to believe it's a part of canon that's not meant to be retconned, ie that's canon and accepted as such, with some degree of intent. We do know that the climax of the manga was going to happen differently with what Kui was planning in the earlier manga days, with demon king dunlord Laios, too. Regardless of all this, for better or worse we have what we have now, and we must take it all into account as the whole picture of the work's story, setting and cast– starting to pick and choose what's actually canon from the canon story is just giving up and letting the world burn lol.

2) Kui is fearless when it comes to presenting us with complex layered relationships without feeling the need for them to explain themselves or offering full closure. Marcille canonically sees Falin as a friend. Laios' succubus was undebatably Marcille. Mickbell sees Kuro as family. Were the Touden parents bad parents? Is Maizuru? Is Milsiril? Ambiguity in Dunmeshi's case is a feature and not a bug, and perhaps this short story of Kui's shows why she prefers not to cast moral judgement as a narrator on various acts and characters. There's this very neutral approach to her writing where the cast does its own thing and she just tells us what happens, and as I said closure isn't a given. I've talked about the matter of whether or not Chilchuck's wife accepts him back before, something that bothers and lingers for a lot of readers, but an example that haunts me is Mickbell and Kuro. It's explicitly stated that Mickbell continues to "still being worked hard by Mickbell" after canon, and though we have one hint of how it might get better with Kuro learning common slowly but surely, there's no 1) conclusions as to what their relationship is exactly and 2) discouraging or encouraging framing for it, there's chiding but ultimately whether the relationship is more healthy than it is unhealthy and more salvageable than unsalvageable and "worth it" isn't answered. What happens will happen, and we just have to come to an answer that satisfies us on our own :') Or hey, how Falin only starts finding herself in post-canon! It offers a nice end to her arc in canon of having a very malleable unpresent identity, but it starts another of self-exploration growth that is left open-ended. So, it's not because a relationship feels wrong or unfinished that it wasn't well-written or intended.

3) Kui doesn't lie but characters can. Characters can be unaware of things or even wrong, even with their own feelings, like Chilchuck saying he doesn't care about the party etc etc, or more widely Marcille thinking orcs are scum, or people at large in Dunmeshi believing in a modified truth of history, a version of it without the demon. These can be wrong objectively, but furthermore they can be disproved by the text, the way that Dunmeshi shows us orcs can be communicated with and peaceful etc etc and every character's racism ends up narratively or implicitly discouraged and disproven, kobolds included. The story is told by us through the characters and their actions, so it's their flawed perspective and incomplete information that we have.

So, okay. Relationships are very complex but Kui doesn't tell lies, there's no info or moments that really have been retconned. The reader is left to make their own interpretation of canon.

... OKAY LAST TANGENT but we have to acknowledge something about canon quick too: This is gonna sound ironic considering what I said earlier but while all extras are made to be in-character they're not all canon to the storyline, so to speak. There are sort of three types of extra comics context I can think of, there are comics set in pre or post canon, like the one about the way Marcille was welcomed into Laios' party, or Falin's answer to Toshiro's proposal, which we have no reason to not believe happened in the canon timeline. Daydream Hours extras are exceptions because they're usually looser than Adventurer's bible extras, for example the comic about Milsiril visiting Kabru has a "what if" phrasing to the blurb, implying it didn't happen. Then there are extras set vaguely in time that if during canon could simply happen off-screen, like Chilchuck's extra about hearing the party members going to the bathroom, a lot of monster tidbits also fit into this, which again I have no reason to assume haven't happened. But now we get to the last type, the one set at a precise moment in canon that is impossible. My go-to example is the tidbit about werewolves, it's set during the Laios vs Lycion fight with Kabru present, and those chapters in the story had quite tight plotting, it makes no sense to consider that extra within the reality of that moment, it breaks the tone and story continuity and timespan of the scene, it can't be canon to the canon storyline. This is to say that again, although in every extra the lore is correct and characters are in-character, some extras are not "canon" to the story's timeline and can't have actually happened. And since it happened with one extra that didn't have any disclaimer of being different than any other, it does put other extras' canonity into question a bit too. Ultimately, what we get in the actual manga is above everything else in both relevance and credibility. This is about extra comics, but I don't call into question all the extra info through text we get in character blurbs and about the Dunmeshi world within the Adventurer's Bible at all, especially since it was specifically made to inform us more about canon. This is all just something to keep in mind, when talking about Dunmeshi canon.

Okay, now. In terms of rin & Kabru's relationship, as for what we see of it...

The quickest summary of how they see each other:

Rin's line reflects how she follows him out of worry, thinking that his ambitious manipulating ways will fail him and get him in trouble eventually, and how that worry is out of care and love. Kabru's line... Is more ambiguous, but we'll get into it.

We don't see Kabru and Rin interact a ton, but we do see him bring her up/think of her unprompted this time, which reveals a bit of how he sees her/feels about her and what his priorities are.

He "wants to help her get away somehow", and this out of what? Duty? Charity? Care? The companionship they once shared? Sympathy, knowing how it feels like to be under inadequate care by elves? Kabru is empathetic and wants good for people, cares about people and community, is rather concerned by the greater good instead of individualistic gain etc etc, so this attention isn't necessarily uncharacteristic on its own.

What makes their bond unique is the history between them.

It's implied they spent a lot of time together growing up, which led to Rin wanting to stick with him. Perhaps as some trauma-fueled-bond hero, but in her own words mostly because she's worried he'll get into trouble if he's left alone. She expicitly loves him romantically, started presumably before canon and presumably hasn't stopped by the end of it either.

We see his priorities here. It's notable that besides Rin being the sort of by default second most important kabru party character, she's also the one he thinks of first, understandably since he knows her best. Like above, he speaks very matter-of-factly and coldly about it though, and he seems surprisingly apathetic. It's not the thought of hostages that drives him to eat those monsters and keep strong, it's the thought of learning the mystery of dungeons and how to prevent Utaya tragedies

This moment below may seem like nothing, but it's also pretty telling of their dynamic:

Rin in the moment negatively assumes he's only frivolously interested in Namari, and although Kabru doesn't shut it down instantly with a "this isn't about personal interest" he does imply clearly with "friends" that his intent isn't to woo her (the fantranslation uses the word lovers instead iirc, so the original japanese word might be more revealing. Considering how Kabru sometimes teases Rin and provokes her jealousy on purpose like with the mermaids, it's not impossible the word was an euphemism). Rin ambiguously disbelieves this and/or disapproves. It does feel like Kabru keeps this sort of persona air when answering her, so it's not entirely hard to understand- it's true he was keeping his real reasons and intent secret: only later on does he give his party the "Laios party" spiel and mention Namari was part of it.

This can also be seen as an example of the chaperone "big sister" effect of her nagging, and of her recurring bad faith towards him. Rin chastises Kabru for behavior and stances that are understandable, like telling him he shouldn't just smile and gloss things over when being belittled, but she does have the habit of being easily jealous and lashing out because of it. But again, if you see it from her stance, your childhood friend always thinks he an handle everything alone and acts like he has the fate of the world resting solely on his shoulders, and he keeps shutting you out and leaving you to guess for his intentions, and being someone under his leadership on top of a friend makes this more alarming and frustrating. Loving him as you do, knowing him for as long as you have, you'd wish Kabru was open with you and that'd create frustration.

Yet despite everything there's trust here. There's familiarity and a degree of comfort, even when Kabru always refuses to fully open up. A promise from Kabru means something to her, it's worth something, she does trust his word and morals even when she knows he can be dishonest. She's used to Kabru, and through thick and thin she wants to be there to support him in his goals and look after him.

But below, his priorities are reaffirmed. He literally pushes her out of his way in that first page, to get to laios who represents his goals, and then figuratively by brushing her off. I think it's very interesting that the look her gives her feels alike to the look he gives Laios shortly before, those sort of empty eyes. They make me think it's his mask-on "business mode" look, and when it's a matter of business things have gotten serious and he will not entertain irrelevant matters. Like Rin's feelings. My first instinct's always been that his look at her meant a resounding "shut up", but it's true it could also easily be a "come on, catch up", especially since he goes on to explain that they mustn't have meant harm in the first place.

It's not only the look that's cold though, because you'll remember, "catching the culprits" was the promise Kabru made to her, the one she trusted that made her agree to their party's plan at all in the first place. Even though the phrasing wasn't precise on that front, by giving up on confronting or punishing Laios' party at all he's breaking his promise, and doing so very dismissively.

It's the distance of it, in how cold he is to her, how distant from him and pushed away by him she feels. It seems to say that yes, the teases he does are meaningless bones he throws at her, the moments they share are below him and below his goals, this is what's important to him and this is how Kabru wants to treat her when push comes to shove. With harsh chiding of his own and then calm explanations, as if while she's heartfelt with him he's indifferent with her.

Although, like how in the end he doesn't want to kill Laios despite it being the safe choice, there's much to say on wether or not he would actually throw her under the bus in the end even if cornered. He always steels himself for the worst, but he's also more talk than bite when it comes to truly being effortlessly ruthless and he prefers to find peaceful and humane solutions. In the end though, the hostage situation more or less tips the scale both ways, even if it'd be easy to say he was simply hiding his concern.

Okay and now to quicken things up this is where I start dividing interpretations as "good faith" as in believing Kabru's explanation that he has a strictly sisterly attachment to her, vs "bad faith" where there is potential for considering romantic interest on his end.

To start with the least questionable:

"We're talking about how cute your smile is, Rin." Good faith: He's complimenting his friend, wants her to not feel insecure, wants her to feel more confident and likeable desirable, because he's nice or because he cares about her. It does make her happy in the end, after all. Knowing it would, he might even have said it just to demonstrate his point to Mickbell with her reaction. Bad faith: You know she likes you, isn't this weird to go out of your way to say? He's not lying exactly, but they were moreso talking about her attitude around smiling, and he could just as easily have deflected or said "Oh, nothing much". Bringing up her appearance or how cute she is could also have made her self-conscious, she's not really the kind that likes public attention- but he knows her the best and it shows, after all. In the end, it doesn't sound like something you'd just tell someone you know pines after you that you want to turn down or discourage from pursuing you.

"When she furrows her brows, I assume she's smiling inside" is also weird to me. Sure she does have this weird situation with emoting going on, but claiming Rin is never angry is factually wrong and always dismissing that anger feels belittling. But this approach to reading Rin and interacting with her would explain why he always teases her, I suppose.

But this is kinda what I mean when I say they are close, in a way, the way he knows how she is with smiling, the way he's comfortable saying things like this to her despite not being someone you just have to interact with occasionally. There IS familiarity there IS intimacy, it's just odd and inconsistently applied.

Kissing her: Good faith: This is an urgent dangerous situation and kissing her is the quickest and most direct way to shut her up, which in his situation he does not have the luxury of time or ressources to think through solutions better. We don't fully know the details of incantation magic's workings, had he slapped his hand over her mouth maybe her lips could have continued moving and chanting so she could have still finished her spell, compared to kissing where it stop both lip movement and sounds from coming out. Plus, kissing her has the added effect of heavily shocking her. In a 'what if' bluray bonus comic Kabru's party faces shapeshifters and he suggests everyone get naked as a quick solution, so it is implied there too that physical intimacy and privacy aren't something he puts above practicality. Bad faith: Gag her. Hell, shove your finger down her throat. 'Master of human anatomy and psychology' here decided he had no other choice than kissing her. In that 'what if' extra I mentioned, Kabru did find another much less practical way to deal with the shapeshifters and went through with that instead, knowing no one would be happy getting naked. Also "It's too bad she looks like a monster", hello what? Neutral: Perhaps he chose, because either way in any case he did choose to, to kiss her precisely because he's mr. master of psychology, because knowing it was Rin he decided kissing was the best approach specifically because it's her, knowing it'd shock her etc etc, regardless of it being tactful or not or if it'd hurt her or even encourage her love for him.

"It's too bad she looks like a monster." Good faith: It's a neutral enough statement that he could mean a couple of different things with it, including wishing he could see her reaction better or speak with her more easily. If we go with the "I wish I wasn't kissing her as a fishman" angle, well, he really hates monsters to a traumatized degree so pseudoincest may be preferrable over monsterfucking. Fair enough. Bad faith: The fantranslation translates it as "it's a shame" instead of "it's too bad", which does lend itself to a less neutral reading, but wether that's reliable and telling or not would depend on the original japanese sentence of course. He could have meant "I wish she looked like anything else but a monster", but "I wish she (at least?) looked like herself when I kissed her" is the most direct interpretation, and then, well. That's pretty damning. To me it sort of feels odd that'd have been the phrasing if that was the case, especially since Kabru especially has noticeable reactions to monsters like shaking, horrified faces and dramatic thoughts. This is his internal thoughts and "Too bad she looks like a monster" feels very casual- the same type of casual that he has when deflecting not being interested in Namari to Rin, aka him being more playful. "I wish she looked like herself when I had to kiss her", like man. Okay. There's a lot of leeway you can give him but it's still odd.

Good faith: ??? I do struggle with this one. A friend of mine has the interpretation that this is an epic own of sorts, that by "always like this" Kabru meant "unable for me to hear you" so he likes not hearing what she says. Reardless, wether his assumption is accurate or not, Kabru is taunting/teasing when he says "look at me, not the mermaids", to what could have very well been just Rin noticing his staring and telling him to focus, and "You'd be cute if you were always like this", and like always he's very casual as he does it, says it like it's nothing, so it could mean nothing deeper. Bad faith: Why do you have to say any of this, what do you think it accomplishes, this counts as flirting in most books. It doesn't make her mood better, it doesn't shut her up, so I can only imagine Kabru simply enjoys doing this, it entertains him for one reason or another. Why do you keep calling her cute why is this a pattern that is forming. Neutral: Presumably, Rin is also unable to hear him since they all wear the earplugs. This would mean that beyond his gesturing, his words aren't meant for her to actually hear.

So.

My honest reaction:

Kabru what is this............. Huh. Kabru. What do you mean

The issue

It's less intimidating when analyzing each piece of interaction one by one to slowly form a wider picture, but it's still quite the puzzle. Because ultimately, what he feels for her aside, he is both pushing her away and encouraging her crush on him. He is both keeping her out and leading her on. He is both trying to keep a distance and throwing her bones to latch onto. And huh. Why though.

He's too socially savvy not to know Rin likes him right? Right? He even teases her about being jealous. He has to. He hassss to. And then obviously he has no intent of reciprocating. Especially since he's a huge flirt with anyone and Rin makes it clear she feels jealous.

Then, it feels kinda cruel...? You don't have to flirt, or taunt her because you know she likes you, and blow her off like that without ever having a serious talk. And like I said, shove your finger in there instead of kissing her. Did he do it because he prefers her being kissed over her puking? Was it out of pity? Throwing her crumbs of attention? Is him wanting her out of the elves' grasp just pity? Is it soooo easy for Kabru to tease her and kiss her despite having no feelings of his own, borderline mocking how deeply she loes him and what it means to her? Is doing all this "for her sake" too, like bringing her along was? Just. Free Rin. Free Rin of this.

In the end, what side of "does Kabru like Rin or not" you fall on pretty much depends on wether you favor a consistent "good faith" reading or a consistent "bad faith" reading, which impression you got while reading. But I hope I was able to show that both sides have reasons to think it and both are coherent interpretations of canon, neither are just being dense or difficult for the sake of it. A Kabru interpretation differs almost person to person. Personally I think the ambiguity itself is telling, which is why I usually land with a weird ambiguous situationship characterisation with them, they're a third secret thing and Kabru's feelings for her are complicated imo. He doesn't love her but he doesn't not love her etc. Dungeon Meshi largely lets the reader come up with their own interpretations of details, Kui herself said interpreting characters however is readers' freedom, and the story also avoids romance in general.

Although, there's debate as to wether he even leads her on at all, and personally I think it's pretty undeniable regardless of his intent, if anything even just going by effect.

All I can safely say is that this is not the behavior of someone smartly turning someone down.

Potential 'why's

BUT you could almost say he's purposefully trying to hurt her by being jokingly flirty and casual about it all, which could be to push her away and discourage her from pursuing him, wether it be for her sake or his own. It is a ship post, but I explore this stance a bit in my previous kabrin post if you're interested and unafraid of shippy brainstorming.

Or, inversely, maybe to him leading her on is a way to spare her feelings. Maybe he feels guilty about her liking him, or maybe he feels like he has to repay her somehow. Where his behavior when teasing her in early canon is rather provoking, most often I'd call his demeanor towards her placating if anything. We do see that Kabru prefers letting people down easy, except when shit is serious in the dungeon I guess, and he tries not to rattle people.

Personally, my favorite niche reading is I think it's his way of avoiding confrontation. He doesn't want to lose her, so he gives her just enough hope to hold onto so she'll keep following him, unknowing that Rin follows him out of a sense of duty of her own rather than romantic hope, because he always underestimates people's like of him like Laios does, assumes that people like him less than they seem because even when they do it's a version of him that's tailored to be likable. So he does this to keep the status quo going and keep her interested without having to reciprocate or commit.

I do think he also takes her for granted a bit. "Whenever she frowns I imagine it's a smile instead" what are you talking about. Like I said earlier, it feels weirdly dismissive and belittling to treat her anger as if it was something else, even assuming it to be joy- and there's merit to calling the anger Rin often shows a misdirected feeling, because yes, it's out of worry and care and love and she has a hard time emoting outside of a harsh-seeming scope etc, but is this what's going on here? His words leave me equally intrigued and concerned.

And like, her caring anger coupled by her nagging and scolding and looking after him unconditionally, I'm sure she does frustrate him sometimes and makes him feel stifled especially with his background at Milsiril's, making the big sister comparison very understandable... ... BUT THEN WHY LEAD HER ON.

What he could feel

Okay so first of. "She sort of feels like how it'd be like to have a big sister" and "I see her as a sister, I strictly see her as if we shared family ties and she was the blood of my blood" are different. Kabru being like "Man, I wished she looked like herself when I had to kiss her" does not feel like a brother-sister thing to me, personally.

But hey, going with the opposite angle too- "She's like a sister to me" can be an easy shorthand to say "I care about you but I don't see you romantically or sexually at all" and it can be "you are deeply important to me and our bond would remain no matter the distance or time we are apart" and even "I can't imagine my life without you (no romo)". In many languages like french, the word soulmate instead literally translates as 'sister soul', as in a twin soul etc etc-. A husband and a wife, too, are family. This is to say that both familial love and romantic love can run very deep, with a similar intensity just in a different nature, platonic or romantic. Kabru doesn't necessarily feel very strongly towards Rin even with the sister angle, but what I'm saying is that if it isn't just a catchphrase to let Rin down easy, whether something he would tell Rin or just something he tells himself, then it's not entirely out of the question Kabru would mix up the nature of that affection he feels for her. Maybe being childhood friends, he thinks it makes sense for it to be what he feels for her. I don't think this is necessarily farfetched because we see that Kabru neglects his own needs heavily for the sake of his goals, he doesn't recognize or acknowledge his needs for social connections or things like sleeping, cooking and keeping his living quarters orderly. I think it's in character for him to dismiss outright that he could be in love with someone, and even for him to suppress it, because he can't let anything be more important to him than preventing more Utaya tragedies. If you subscribe to the idea that Kabru wanted to be Laios' friend at the back of his mind, this is in line with that.

Regardless of the "truth"/intent, I agree Kabru treating 'his sister' Rin the way he did in canon is really mega major weirdo of him though.

He sees her as a sister, or he believes he does. With a romantic angle, it could mean: Denial, repression, having a bond that feels as deep and immutable. Leading her on because: wanting her near but still pushing her away, being interested and scared to admit it, thinking he shouldn't let himself have this, not interested but still wanting the safety net of her.

Again with my own interpretation, I think he loves her the way one loves a safety net. What I and others may mean when we say that we think Kabru doesn't love her but he also doesn't not love her. I think this is why he's both taking her for granted and caring, dismissive and considerate, her "brother figure" but also the guy who will flirt with her without a second thought. A safety net the way one is comforted by a big sister mayhaps, who's disapproving yet always unconditionally there to help. But family and comfort are so closely tied together, it's unsurprising they get entangled sometimes, a lot of behaviors can be seen as both romantic and familial and it's just a matter of the facts and perspective, because in the end what they are both is loving- and canonically, Rin loves Kabru romantically and Kabru cares for Rin like a sister.

Conclusion

I've said before that I think you can call them each other's best friend and that that's sad, and I stand by it. I think it's easy to argue that Rin is the one who knows Kabru best currently in his life, and the reverse is true for Kabru knowing Rin best. It's lonely, for both of them I think, Rin's kind of tough love is not working for him and Kabru is not filling Rin's emotional needs.

The reason why Kabru might feel like he has to get Rin out of the elves' grasp is because she has no one else, at least no one else that was deemed important enough to have been referred to or implied at all. And Rin calls him out for his shallow behavior and his unhealthy habits. They're close enough and weirding others around them enough that people like Mickbell notice when they heatedly do their song and dance and argue but hey, this is just another monday, and how Mickbell asumes she cleans his place up for him because that's what intuitively makes the most sense- it's the first thought, the most intuitive. Rin would do anything for Kabru and devotes herself to helping him, after all.

Reminder that this is the guy we're talking about:

I think her concern is worried tbh, he doesn't know what a DUST CLOTH is and he's pretty unhealthy, forgetting to eat and drinking to go to sleep, overworking himself. He'd easily work himself into an early grave. He neglects himself. I've said before in my Kuro x Kabru post that I think Kabru focuses so much on the bigger picture and saving the world that he forgets that he himself is important too, that he's truly special to some people, that he's even some people's hero, not just the world's, and I think to a degree it's good that Kabru has someone there to ground him and scold him when he's being thoughtless or overthinking, to try to show him that he's loved and valued, in her own way which he claims to understand so well like he does her smiles.

Kabru's a character where fan interpretations especially differ, he's hard to read when it comes to the details, so his relationship with Rin is very much a grey zone, especially when trying to precisely pin it down. I think though that it is a mistake to say that Rin isn't special to him in some shape or form.

I talk about human connections as a big theme of Dunmeshi sometimes, as this thing everyone needs but may deny themselves or deny that they do need and want, and Kabru and Rin are part of that theme, to me.

Post-canon, Rin and Kabru continue to see each other, presumably semi-regularly, which is an implication from an extra that we don't get with the other Kabru party members. They stay in touch, because what tied them together was never work but a personal tie.

This ask took long af to write up but it's gonna make my Kabru party analysis easier later yay. Little preview of the chart i made.

I'll remind that Mickbell and Kuro's relationship is also stated to be of a familial nature. Contradictions aren't always mistakes, people are made of them! Just like how ambiguity can be a narrative tool, complexity and dissonance can be a feature and not a bug.

[the---hermit]

"why do you write like you're running out of time?" well, that is because I am in fact running out of time

[beaulesbian]

And what's with the third sword?

[lynn-tged-posting]

tged webtoon ep 171 spoilers and thoughts but i'm mostly just going "YAY I LIKED THIS MOMENT" and more below the cut

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DEMON KING LLOYD HELLO. HELLO?? WHAT. WHY?? BUT WOW. HOLY SHIT. I REALLY REALLY LIKE THIS

I LOVE WHEN CHARACTERS GAIN WINGS AND HORNS AND . GHGHHGHGHHG AAAHHH ITS MY FAVORITE THING if you didn't already know dragon lloyd was like one of my favorite all-time panels so this is VERY AWESOME FOR ME YAYYY YAAAAYYY HAHAHA

LIKE SERIOUSLY LOOK HE GOT FANGS N SHIT AND. OH MY GODD THE SMOKE SLIPPING PAST HIS LIPS IM SO??? THAT'S SO COOL. I LOVE WHEN THEY DO THAT WITH SMOKE AND MONSTROUS FORMS OF CHARACTERS

genuinely i need to draw this asap. pacing issues aside i am obsessed with how sick this is. i love this a LOT

ok ok back to the top bc theres some stuff i wanna touch on from before demon king lloyd got revealed! because...

"master lloyd taught us". "master lloyd taught us". "master lloyd taught us". "master lloyd taught us".

EXCUSE ME WHAT

YOU'RE TELLING ME THAT OFF SCREEN, LLOYD TOOK TIME OUT OF HIS BUSY ASS DAY. TO TEACH THE KIDS HOW TO PLAY SOCCER. AND THEY HAVE PLAYED ENOUGH TO BE FAMILIAR ENOUGH TO PLAY ON THEIR OWN. WHICH MEANS THAT LLOYD . PLAYED SOCCER WITH THEM . AND WE FIND THIS OUT. NOW?? I. GGHH. THATS SO. CUTE. IM GOING TO BITE HIM. THE FUCKER. WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS TO ME

the fact that they go up to ask him im going to EXPLODE?!?!?

he looks so nonchalant abt it here im cryinf

AND LOOK AT THEM GO THIS IS SO SO SWEET IM VERY GLAD LYRA GOT TO PLAY WITH THEM I LIKE THIS A LOT

this scene, and the beginning scene where the adults were just so casual with her and treating her as a living person with feelings and someone that they can talk to was so so heartwarming i oooghhh my heart

AND THEN THERE HE IS. SMILING IN THE BACK. YOU ASS.

I SEE YOU BEING KIND AND EMPATHETIC AND SELFLESS LLOYD. YOU LOST THE NONCHALANT WAR. YOU CAN'T ESCAPE

christ. i fucking HATE him /j /aff

it is also VERY silly that they're so casual abt. destruction like that HELPPP they got it from someone sob sob, though i imagine since most of the estate consists of people who have done construction it probably isnt that big of a deal when things get destroyed every now n then

and lyra looks so damn happy,,, god im so glad she had a good experience, she really needed one :')

also i completely LOST it when the kid got mad at lyra for not responding with a yes or no HELPPP JESUS CHRIST

again they,,, got it from someone HAHA though honestly i think it tracks. kids can be straightforwardly brutal in their language, especially when they don't really have biases or cares for who they are speaking to. as crazy as this instance looks (LMFAO) i think this fits well with the context of the straightforwardness of children and considering the person who they look up to at the estate. i think it was good for lyra to meet a human child her age who can speak straightforwardly and not skirt past things, if that makes sense? i hope it does!

AND THE DEMON KING TRANSFORMATION i already talked abt it above but i wanna point out this blue system box here

a power outside of the system?!?? what does this mean for the protagonist of the new prequel bk_moon is writing?? is the weather forecasting included in this???

my first assumption right now is that the demon king power is just an in-world power system while everything else (ie the weather forecasting) is external, blue-textbox system. maybe? so lloyd got the demon king power which comes with skills separate from the ones that the system can provide? that would explain why there's no indication of lloyd trying to use the weather forecasting, he probably can't use it,,,? except i dont know why artanis can use it in that case. most likely i am overthinking it LMFAO

semi-related, i am a little confused as to why artanis did this? i guess she really, really trusted him w this power? or maybe her weather forecasting noted that this would be something good to do i have no idea,,, it Does feel a bit sudden i won't lie, i'm not sure how earned this is

also javier and everyone else not reacting that much to the demon king status. SENT ME HAHA "... nothing's changed." LOL

deadpan humor never fails to make me giggle ily javier

also loved the moment where the two of them were bein serious for a sec,,, they've got a job to do they've got people to protect. lloyd will stop fate and javier will be right besides him...

i think showing them at emily's wedding really cements how much they really, REALLY need to fight fate now. the novel events happening is very very bad, but it feels like now that so many people, emily especially, have found THIS much happiness in their lives,,, failing to stop fate will hit even harder. i really like the analogy of a taut bow that the dragon king used when he first described it, bc it's really REALLY showing how much the repercussions will hit if they fail. im praying they succeed,,, please,,, i need a happy ending or i will curl up and turn into an actual shrimp irl.

and now the demons have to build the pantara railroad,,, artanis's expression omfg

she really didn't,,, know,,, she trusted him that much,,,, girl,,,

but it's ok. it'll be a net positive trust! that's how lloyd does things!!! and then soon we'll get the happy ending where we can get the eye of summer and beat up fate and then silly fun times YAYY <- probably copium

some other thoughts of note that i had with a dear mutual (hi sprout :3) about this ep:

we were talking about how the plot seems to be paced right now, and honestly i'm of the opinion that while yes its Technically moving, the way they're ending each ep in this current arc makes it feel like it's going both very slow and very fast, that is to say it feels like it's not moving at all

bc they're like "okay NOW we're gonna do the build project" and it's been like that for several episodes now. pieces are moving but we're going past the point of it all too fast (especially the whole demon king thing. mentioned this before but while cool, doesn't feel as earned simply bc we're both tackling each point and yet blowing past all the points, so it's a lot less satisfying than it should be (despite how awesome it is,,, oh lloyd you give me so much internal conflict </3))

it does make me a lil worried that they're gonna timeskip the hell out of the pantara railroad build. however this episode, although it still has a weird pacing/movement issue, does feel a little bit better than the last two imo, so i have hope that it'll turn out okay, that it'll start heading up! i'm actually really excited to see where they go with this and i'm sure that even if the pacing is still goofy i'll have some kind of fun with it (seriously the panels this ep were wonderful HAHA)

anyway that's all for this week! extremely excited for the next ep,,, ill see yall then,,, lets go pantara railroad arc!!!