#thats a joke its more like chapter 20 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

miriamundertale · 1 year

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hi heres my current reading list for manga. still being updated. post is very very long so under a readmore. images are only if i have specific screencaps to help the big spam

The apothecary diaries

Clasic miriam strategy of reading the manga of a popular anime instead of watching it. I did not realise how like. Political drama this would be. It rules a lot. More stuff like this please.

Babanbabanban Vampire

Aw yeah. This is vampire yaoi i can get behind. This is vampire yaoi i can respect on a primal level across generations. Please give me more opportunities to fujo out about a vampire so pathetic and bad at being down bad he cucks himself.

Berserk

I guess it goes here now wtf. Curious where it goes but im not upset if it turns away from what i like. The last miura chapter was an ok open ending for me

Black clover

i originally started reading this due to it feeling like a good example of shounen as a genre with the good and the bad, and for a while was going to say its my "if you want to understand the genre just read it" rec but one piece has been here. just here 4 fun now

Bocchi the Rock!

Ill be blunt just watch the anime. I enjoy reading the manga but its pretty classical mid. mainlining shots of kikuri until the spinoff lands jokes on you im already blasted

Bocchi the Rock! Gaiden: Hiroi Kikuri no Fukazake Nikki

Hiroi spinoff This woman is too pathetic for her own good [redacted for public safety]

Im caught up, rough start but very fun overall and good horny art. hard to complain

Boku no Kokoro no Yabai Yatsu

Boku wa Kimitachi wo Shihai suru

This is one of my "this is blatantly porn" reads but its got some good fucked up elements that make it fun. i also pr it so woo

Boy's Abyss

Bungou Stray Dogs

see before reading himegoto i genuinely loved it despite it kinda getting comical with the fucked up ness near the end. now its fine, but i read for my girl chako

its pretty ok so far. i think its hilarious its made people go back and read classic lit

Chainsaw Man

God i love act two. Asa is the best possible followup to denji and seeing her and denji interract is going to make the inevitable fujimotofication of the story even more fun

Hazure Skill "Kage ga Usui" o Motsu Guild Shokuin ga, Jitsuha Densetsu no Ansatsusha

Yeah ik long name. its an isekai lite aka the whole "this is an isekai in all but including the start of an isekai" genre thats popped up lately. its very charming and gorgeously drawn

Heavenly Delusion

in terms of post apocalyptic stuff it stands out and winds up pretty fun. the art isnt something wild but stands out with its own charm

Henjo

Henjo is hornybait with fucked up age gap, so a very boring and tread upon category, but the target audience is clearly less the horny 20 year olds hunting high school girls and more the high school girls who think they can pull. An important part of the manga ecosystem.

The Summer Hikaru Died

the art style is really evocative and i do love me some weirdly fucked up yaoi. good recent pickup

Hikikomari Kyuuketsuki no Monmon

Isekai Meikyuu de Harem o

kinda slippin on this one. it feels like a bit that they abandon quickly but i do love my vampire media. Im also kinda sad the anime adaptation didnt really pick up interest in more being adapted.

In/spectre

See the solution to writing good het is to make them kinda fucked up in some way. This works even better with gay ships but two people with something wrong with themselves clicking together is too great not to use. This is me being vague so you read the manga

Ishuzoku Reviewers

I read this out of this fucked up interest in how the mangaka spends the majority of this horny isekai not worldbuilding but game designing the rules of this isekai. Its such a weird focus of priorities

fun concept fun art horny is fun fuck you

Jahy-sama wa kujienai!

Jahy is going to abolish capitalism

Ka「」Ku「」Shi「」Go「」To「

Please someone pick this up again please if you need an editor i will fucking do it just reach out

Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun

This manga is fuckin gorgeous tbh. I think its close to its endgame and im excited to see how it goes

Kagurabachi

fuck you shut up fuck you i thought it would be funny. its pretty ok shounen. needs more homoeroticism though

Kemono jihen

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon

Its a fun read and i like a lot of the character designs. It holds me pretty solidly at least

Kesa mo Yuraretemasu

Eiji masuda could make me read a manga about a wet dog undrying painted walls and id read in seconds and hype it up. Thankfully this is great above that. Romcom but entirely from an audience perspective is SUCH a fun idea.

Dramaid is watching someone with immense talent at writing domestic slice of life work REALLY hard at learning how to draw tits

The vampire dies in no time

I thought this was gonna be yaoi but instead its nothing but pathetic characters i absolutely love. Really good stuff

Mahou Shoujo ni Akogarete

Mieruko-chan

i dont need to justify reading this to you. you know its good. we all know its good. fuck you.

How is this not more popular. Great concept. Really striking art. Solid writing. I barely see anyone talk about it. Might be due to the really uninteresting anime adaptation

My hero academia

i just want to see this train crash

Natsume Yuujinchou

I love the show and the mangas no exception. Really enjoyable and yuki midorikawa's style is pleasant on the eyes

Noss and Zakuro

this is insanely cute on every level. you agree.

One piece

Its fucking real lads

One Punch Man (webcomic)

Welcome to gremlintown (we got an update :D)

One Punch Man (Manga)

thank god were free from garou arc

Onimai

goated.

Oshi ni Amagami

i like my funny vampire stories and this is a fun vampire neet one

Oshi no ko

i am committed to this idc about the outcome

Ousama Ranking

IMPLYING ANYONE EVER DOES 70-155 LMAO SORRY I LIKE READING THE MANGA cant believe you made me watch the anime. tl the missing chapters please

Please Give Me Your Blood, I Will Serve You In Gratitude

Miriam "Trashy Vampire Manga Fan" Undertale

Record of Ragnarok

i needed something trashy and fun and this does it

Rent a Girlfriend

my least defensible read. its garbage. i hate it. its horrible trash and i read it purely out of some weird revival of the author attempt to understand miyajima innately and emotionally through his work

Sakamoto days

Im sorry it took me this long to hop on. I wasn't familiar with your game.

Senpai ga Uzai Kouhai no Hanashi

This manga gives me severe dysphoria and yet i keep reading it. well not rly because its kinda gotten mega boring

Shingeki no Eroko-san ~Hen na Oneesan wa Danshikousei to Nakayoku Naritai~

Continuing her streak of having the biggest mind ever, yoshiru konogi pops off with the manga targeted towards pathetic 30 year old women who want a high school boy to a massive degree

Shojo null

Art is cracked and the energy is utterly hogwild. I love the "no actually please torture your oppressors" vibe so far

SHY

im so happy im getting updates again. anime was good despite low budget. excited for s2 yes yes yes

Skip and loafer

The art style is so lovely and its a breath of fresh air compared to a lot of the romance ive been reading lately

Sono Bisque Doll wa Koi wo Suru

Its fun fuck you. The seasonals in 2022 had a great selection of source materials and bisque doll slams it out of the park

Sousou no Frieren

the severe nature of how much this goes will never be beat.

Spy x Family

Its good and thats Fine. no clue whats going on with the manga it feels like i get maybe an update every 5 months

The Dungeon That Kills All Adventurers

another dowman sayman banger who could have predicted this

To Your Eternity

TYE is enjoyable though i think its kinda suffering from jojofication. i think it deserves an ending soon

Usuzumi no Hate

i refuse to believe this is this mangakas first work. this is fucking incredible. gorgeously drawn with an incredible concept. read now

The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You

the type of peak that could only exist to those willing to brave their own doubts. a work of art that will only exist for those strong enough to resist their hearts saying "cringe"

The Case Study of Vanitas

who could have predicted gay vampires are good

VERSUS

Why are we once again in a world where people are not translating kino by one

Vinland Saga

Man this grew on me fast. I picked it up not expecting a lot and got the world with it

Witch Hat Atelier

Yorashi Ni warau

At this point it feels like im very obviously drawn to pretty stuff but honestly its a really good read. Qifrey and olruggio should kiss already

Witch watch

I was lied to about there being vampires as a core part of things. But in return i got a really cute comedy that has just enough of the right type of derrangement to worm into my brain. Good mistake.

I cannot get over the art still, fucking gorgeous, the story hasnt really gotten stuck in my craw like some other things but the art genuinely makes up for it.

Yotsuba

Yotsuba is one of the mangas of all time

zom 100

this is one of those "i saw the start of a genre trending and assumed one of the main firestarters would be bad" stories and im glad i was wrong. it's very charming in a kinda fun childish way

#big and long im SORRY I READ TOO MUCH SHIT #if you want specific recs u can dm me or just read call of the night #in fact read call of the night #miri.edu #miri writing

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youngpettyqueen · 2 years

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🗣️❌?

🗣️ "Talk about your favourite WIP"

"rumour has it" cause its just a ridiculous silly concept. I typically focus on writing a lot of emotional stuff that leans more into angst, so this one is fun cause its just silly! its fun! there are no stakes to it its just Hawkeye being a pain in the ass while BJ takes things way too seriously. there's no heartbreaking reveal to be had, no angsty twist, its just MASH shenanigans

I like to think of this fic as like. the B plot to an episode thats got horrors going on elsewhere. like in the background of all this nonsense you've probably got something traumatizing going on but its nowhere to be seen here. this is the bridge subplot of The Best of Enemies. this is BJ and his motorcycle in Blood and Guts. this is my magnum opus and I cant wait to share it because its soooo funny for me

also its fun dialogue practice because MASH jokes and one liners are ELITE

❌ "What WIP do you find the most challenging? Why?"

the last chapter of "and miles to go before i sleep" is being such a royal pain in my ass and I WISH I knew why. im almost done im ALMOST done but the last bits are just. biting me. im not sure why because I love this fic, I love this concept ive got, but for some reasons the words will not come to me. im wrestling with myself and first drafting- as if I havent been drafting the rest of my fics, INCLUDING the first two chapters- really hard with this one

I think some of it might be because this is my first multi chapter fic since I was... 14? so im just out of practice with scheduled updating. hindsight being 20/20 I would wait to post the start of a multi chapter fic till ive fleshed out the remaining chapters more- im used to multi chapter writing with like, the actual novel im working on, which. ive been working on for several years. im USED to taking my time. and there's nothing wrong with doing that with fics! but next time id go in more prepared so I dont accidentally leave people on a cliffhanger. for over a month

(im gonna finish it in the next few days I swear I SWEAR)

? "Choose a random WIP and talk about it"

hm lets see for this one ill go with... “it’s not chicken soup, but it’s good for the soul”

this one's tagged to Carry On, Hawkeye and its just a scene of Trapper taking care of Hawkeye while he's sick. its gonna be very short, very sweet, it comes from a place of wanting to explore some Hawkeye and Trapper (and Hawkeye/Trapper) feelings and such. I dont write nearly enough with them and I want to do more! and what better way to do that than with one of my fav episodes?

fun fact about this one, I had actually started an early draft ages ago, where it was a scene between Hawkeye and Margaret instead, but I ended up scrapping it. I repurposed some of it into "a good nurse (friend, a good friend)" which is a scene with Margaret taking care of a sick Hawkeye, but its not set in that episode and rather set sometime post-s6. the original draft wasn't working for me the way I wanted it to so I ended up scrapping it, but recently I was thinking about Carry On, Hawkeye again so I decided to try and crack at it with Trapper because ive been meaning to write more with him

listen the MASH tag is full of people clamouring for more hurt Hawkeye and sick Hawkeye and what am I if not a people pleaser. im here to deliver im here to provide the hurt/comfort. also I just love to do this to him. thats how you know he's my fav because I keep putting him in situations or expanding on the situations the show put him into. this is how I show affection

#mash #fic bitching #hilariously I think im nicer than the show #cause I let him get kissed on the forehead and hugged about all of it #at some point I need to write something that isnt about Hawkeye dkjfksdhfksj #I have the one Radar and Margaret-centric fic up but thats about it really #once im through some of my extensive collection of WIPs. we shall see #anywho thanks for the ask!!

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sweetish-original-story · 4 months

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Chapter 20

Night. As the sky dyed itself darkser and darker shades of indigo there was a sound of rhythmic chopping that came from the forest, only periodically interrupted by the twitter of a teensy tiny bird with a big head, and a gruff, tired man responding to it.

"--_--_-?" Questions the the tiny pink dot, sitting on the branch of the very tree being cut down.

"I know I should call and talk to her, but I don't want to make her angry, you know?" Dulce sighs a long exasperated sigh. It's hard to work and talk at the same time. No doubt he would have had it done faster if his mind wasn't elsewhere. But it's alright. He's made time in his usual schedule for just this type of problem. Now, if this goes past midnight, THEN it would be a problem. Hed has to move his whole day around tomorrow, even close up shop if it gets bad.

"-_--_---!" Says the bird, frustrated and tired of this conversation.

"Yes, she WAS mad, you should have seen her face, it was like she saw a ghost! Im a little off sometimes when it comes to faces, but im not that dum-"

Bubo, the rude little thing, interrups with a "__---__--!" as if it were the funniest thing in the world before squealing and rocking its head back and forth at its own joke.

Dulce, at this, in a voicemore deadpan than usual, retorted. "Oh, ha ha ha ha ha ha WOW so original. A proper comedian. Ha. It's funny because I almost died. It's so hilarious that I could jump off a bridge."

One could almost hear the sound of him rolling his eyes over the chopping of the cinnamon bark.

"You'd better be glad you're too small to eat."

A loud crack, followed by another, interrupt the both of them this time. Dulce, as if on que, positioned himself at just the right angle under the tree, with one arm out. He'd been through this so many times that there was very little guesswork involved in where to stand. Of course, for most others, this would be extremely dangerous. Even with how small the tree was, one would be crushed before having even a moment to push against it. But Dulce's people were especially strong. They had to be. They lived in the middle of a forest that had been forbidden from outsiders for a reason. One could breathe in the wrong direction and summon a whole gaggle of very carnivorous creatures. He guessed that was part of why his family worshipped what are essentially magical glowing vegan fish.

If his family ever knew he had THAT thought, they would rip his jaw off and kick him in a way that would undo his surgery, if you know what I mean. But thats what most of them are! And it's a little less magical when you know how the "important" ones are made. Like going to a theme park and learning the haunted house has a real skeleton. Or finding out what hot dogs are made of. Or the day his village found out his cousin Rosa was getting married to a nobleman outside of the village.

A long creaaaaaaaak grew into a loud, wind spitting roar as the tree toppled over, heading straight for a sweaty yet stone-faced Dulce. Once again, time slowed down. Suddenly, he was smaller and softer. It was storming. And the tree was no longer little. It was huge, the size of a house, ripped out of the ground by the base. Lifting the base was his grandfather, looking like a pile of hair like kelp, and in front of the tree, ready to catch it, was his dad. In one swift move, he caught the gigantic thing just before it fell onto Dulce. When he went to lift it up so they could all walk home, the bark groaned as the thing nearly shattered under his dads muscles. Obviously, his father didn't notice it, which his grandfather loudly reprimanded him for. His father was still somewhat young and still wasn't fully used to being unable to feel his hands. They were both late bloomers, in a way, as his ritual burns came a lot later in life, according to his grandfather. Dulce wanted nothing more in his life than to be like them, but he was born weak, and he only ever trusted him to wash clothes and carry a basket for roots and berries. One day, he'd show them all how strong he could really be.

As time came back to him, the tree picked up speed again, and his memories flowed down from his head into his spine and finally settled within the veins in his wrists. His body steeled itself for impact and as if possessed, in one quick, silent move-

His body fought against the millisecond of disorientation as he realized a small branch had broken off mid fall and smacked him on the head. Well, you can't predict everything. But the tree was secured in his arm, and he was ready to go break this thing down for fresh bark and spice.

Dulce whistled to call his little buddy as a signal that it was time to tuck away in a safe spot and head home. A long "________..." called in response, as Bubo dramatically flew down from the tree, landing in the absolute most dead dying death pose Dulce has ever seen a bird do. His mouth was agape, his tongue sticking out he even had a little flower he held to his chest.

"Oh, NOOO little BABY! Guess im gonna have to go home and eat aaaalll the freezy flower pops all by myself. This is terrible!"

"----!!!!!" At hearing the words "freezy flower pop, "Bubo instantly popped up and chirped in desperation.

"Aye." Dulce said with a smug grin. "Nuh-uh. You can't do that. Dead things are supposed to stay dead, and they can't eat anything."

Bubo screeched in defiance, settling on a branch before throwing a full-blown tantrum at him, almost as if to say, "The HECK you mean NUH-UH???". Of course, to Dulce, this just sounded like a bunch of tweets from an especially feisty,food motivated bird.

"Okay, yeah, I did it, but that doesn't mean YOU can. You are dead. All the way dead. Dead bird. No come back."

As Dulce lifted the tree over his shoulder and walked in the direction of home, he tuned out the noise on the tree on his shoulder to watch as the stars shot across the sky. One in particular looked very...odd. Bright, so bright it almost lit up the night sky. Its light was golden and familiar, but he couldn't quite put his finger on why. It made him feel...scared. He stared at it for a while before confirming it was just a star and headed back into the cozy safety of the darkness.

"Okay. I'll call her."

#original character #candy #original writing #soundcloud #sweetish original #romance #sweetish upload #original story

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flyingcookierambles · 2 years

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arrgh work has been horrible lately. like. just ughghg. ive been so drained and sad that i havent even been able to finish dragalia lost’s final chapter.....

:/// :(((

at least i did this tutorial. still waiting for the files to download. even if they dont technically run right now due to not having a server to connect to, maybe someone someday in the future will make a private server like how all those MMO nerds keep everquest alive and stuff so that we can play the game again. i know that its technically just 2 days now (counting down the hours to the last 24 :(( ) but like. i have 0 time im so sad abt it ugh.

anyways! tutorial on how to save your files and all the assets below! the video’s very helpful description also has the links to the guthubs and pythons and stuff you need to run the scripts to download.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HyhRUaKV_G8

heres hoping my laptop can squeeze the eng/chinese/taiwan versions on to 20 gb, or ill break out my external hard drive or something idk.

ughhh.

i think that. im just kinda done with live service games right now. like gacha burnout + being burned by that korean kaledoscope gacha, a3! english, and now dragalia lost. like, i think i’ll still play genshin since its literally insane and seems like they’re really thinking of making it a long lived game like granblue or something and of course ffxiv which as an mmo, while still a “live service,” as an mmo i think that they are just. different? like gachas are sprinting to each and every banner, but the mmo model seems more like a light jog or marathon. of course there is some FOMO and time sensitive holiday events, etc., but mmos just seem different from gacha, especially f2p gacha. i think it may also just be that mmos as a genre/company model has more history than the more recent gacha anime gaming industry. so. like. yeah. i really do actually want to get back into other gacha that i put on hold for a3! eng and now dragalia. i really do want to see my best husbandos mammon and beel and satan in obey me, and i want to either give twst jpn a try for language learning purposes and/or finally install twst eng. and like. uhh. lol. nu carnival lol. and of course a3! jpn and enstars music of course. hahhahahaha new carnival what is that

but like all jokes aside i seriously just cant. you would think that since they’re phone apps and all i can just download them and go esp since i always have my phone with me but like. i cant bring myself to do it. ghuaoghg i feel like this is my phone being kinda old, the battery gets killed when i open games, the building i work in has no wifi and my cellular data is high enough, and work draining my energy to do anything but play genshin for 30-45 minutes in a mindless hack n slash grind for dailies and primos for saramouche and then maybe doing the custom delivery of the week in ffxiv and then going to bed. like thats it. i wake up at 6 am i go to work til 4 pm i travel home and shower i get tired i crawl into bed bc my room is cold i either read fanfic/watch youtube or i fall asleep until 10 pm and accidentally skip dinner and then i go to bed and wake up and the cycle just repeats for 7 days a week for 45+ hours a week. ughghurghru having 2 jobs was a mistake FML OTL...

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logosbot-tm-fics · 3 years

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WHOOP WHOOP ANOTHER CHAPTER LET'S GOOOOOOOOO

Take My Tea With Formaldehyde

[Start] [<Previous] [Next>]

Chapter 4: Take My Tea With Formaldehyde

(More beneath the cut)

"...so you're going on a break?"

Ariana laughed a bit, her long brown hair following her movements.

"Yeah, I'm going on a break," she replied, smiling gracefully and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Her silver earrings sparkled in the light of the studio, shimmering like stars.

"That sounds like a good decision," the talk show host flashed a smile in response, one that didn’t reach his eyes no matter how you looked at it. Everything about him was flawless, from the meticulous style of his hair to his creaseless suit – he seemed too well-practised to be real. He seemed plastic.

“May I ask you why?" he prodded, and Ariana gave a smile that seemed far more genuine, although a little strained.

"Well," Ariana said, and if you didn't know what to look for, you wouldn't have heard her voice waver, “Mostly because of my mental health, at the moment. Iskall – he's my manager – and I discussed it, and we both agreed that it was for the better."

The interviewer furrowed his eyebrows a bit, and he looked down at his cards. He didn't seem satisfied, pushing the topic further, "It has nothing to do with the alleged drama between you and Scottune then?" His voice bordered on annoyed.

"Oh, goodness no!" Ariana smiled, chuckling a little awkwardly as she fixed her skirt. “She's actually rather supportive of me taking a break. There's no drama between us."

"None at all?" He pressed.

"None at all," Ariana confirmed, nodding. Either she was ignoring his invasiveness, or she genuinely didn't notice. She paused for a moment, before joking, "Well, unless you count her stealing my lipstick…"

The talk show host laughed in response, something fake and repetitive, as though he had practised it over and over. Ariana simply smiled good-naturedly and the audience laughed along.

“That's good to hear," the talk show host looked down at the cards in his hands, shuffling them around them until he came to one he seemed to like. "Now, how-"

Zap!

Mumbo shut off the TV, he’d already seen the interview multiple times, and he wasn’t really interested in listening once again to the rest of it. Honestly, he was just using it as a distraction from what he should actually be doing.

His phone laid on the coffee table, screen facing up.

He should probably text Grian.

<Peskybird> anyway so iskall half forced me to take a break

(20:31)

<Peskybird> he was nagging about how ‘it's not good for you to work so much’ etc etc etc

(20:31)

<Peskybird> he can be very convincing when he wants to.. kinda like my dad used to be when he got concerned lol

(20:31)

<You> Isn't that a good thing?

(20:31)

<You> That he cares, is what I mean. Not him forcing you.

(20:32)

<You> Forcing someone to do something isn't good, of course.

(20:32)

<You> I meant him caring, that’s a good thing, right?

(20:32)

<Peskybird> i guess??? idk

(20:32)

<Peskybird> its kinda annoying ngl

(20:32)

<Peskybird> dont get me wrong i appreciate the support but sometimes he acts a bit too much like my parent, and i kinda feel like hes treating me like a child

(20:32)

<Peskybird> i don't really like that part

(20:32)

<You> That makes sense, I wouldn't really like that either.

(20:32)

<Peskybird> yeah

(20:33)

<Peskybird> still, im happy that he cares. its comforting :)

(20:33)

<Peskybird> anyways thats not really important lol

(20:33)

<Peskybird> how are you doing?

(20:33)

<You> I'm alright.

(21:03)

<Peskybird> are you sure?

(21:05)

<You> Yup.

(21:21)

<Peskybird> 100%?

(21:22)

<You> 100%. :)

(21:34)

Ever since Grian messaged him a few weeks earlier, they hadn't been able to stop texting. At first, they spoke awkwardly about how Grian was doing, conversations interrupted and shaky as they learned how to speak to each other again. It got better, after a week or so, and now they’re back to talking mostly as normal.

Though Mumbo tries hard not to dwell on the fact that they don’t really talk about what happened.

Each night they would stay up late messaging each other, it didn't matter how early they needed to be up. Each of them would forget about the time passing as they spoke, too occupied with talking to the other to even notice.

They'd text "good morning!" almost daily, check up on each other whenever they had chance during the day, and have long conversations at night.

Despite this, despite them texting almost constantly, they still had yet to meet up.

Mumbo never had the courage to ask, and each time either of them so much as mentioned the idea, the other would steer the topic away as if they were scared.

They also avoided phone calls, though Mumbo wasn't really sure why. Hearing each other’s voices like that shouldn't be an issue, not as much as meeting up was.

Despite that, despite their avoidance of certain topics, their skirting around ideas of doing anything more, Mumbo felt less lonely.

He missed Grian less. A lot less.

Just being able to talk to him made him happy, and he didn't want to do anything that would make it go away. He was so scared to do something that would ruin this new, fragile, good thing.

As their messages went on, Mumbo also slowly started to believe that maybe, just maybe, the whole thing hadn't been his fault.

Slowly, Iskall began to swing by Mumbo’s more often again, showing up at random times. Sometimes early, sometimes late. As if he just really wanted to see Mumbo at any chance he could.

Mumbo didn't mind. In fact, he rather enjoyed having company. It made the flat feel less lonely; more lived in.

Sometimes Iskall would stay late into the night, the pair of them laughing together for hours, which often ended with them playing Mario Kart and eating take out.

Iskall would never stay over, he preferred to sleep in his own flat. It hardly mattered though, Mumbo still really liked the company.

He felt less lonely.

Grian had sent a text that spiralled Mumbo into mild panic.

<Peskybird> can i come over?

(16:34)

<Peskybird> it’s okay if youre busy

(16:36)

Mumbo stared at the messages for a long while. His ears were ringing, his thoughts battling, as he read them over and over again. It felt like they weren’t real, like the question was some fantastical dream that his brain had conjured up while he slept.

He pinched himself. They were real.

Some part of Mumbo expected him to dwell over the message for hours, desperately trying to come to a decision about such a conflicting question, but, unlike when Iskall had asked, he found himself responding easily, sending a reply as soon as he realised that what it said wasn't a weird hallucination.

<You> Sure, feel free to come over in an hour. I have some things to do first. :)

(16:39)

<Peskybird> okay cool :D

(16:40)

Mumbo nodded to himself, feeling confident, almost excited. He was going to see Grian again– he really was! Grian wanted to come over and spend time with him!

It felt like a big step, it felt like something in his chest had finally settled back into the right place, like things were going to be okay again.

He stood from the couch quickly, elated, and had a look around at his messy flat. First things first, he should clean up.

He began to run through the apartment, putting dirty clothes into the hamper, making his bed, and washing the dishes as fast as he could. He was a hurricane of motion, trying to clean the place as quickly as possible, and feeling more productive, more fulfilled, than he had in weeks.

He wasn't sure why he felt the need to clean, really. Iskall had been there recently when the apartment was messy, and Grian was more than used to it being messy.

Or well, messy by Mumbo's standards, Grian usually found it rather clean.

So… why did he feel the need to clean?

He paused in his motion and thought about it for a second. He never felt the need to clean whenever Grian visited, not usually.

What was different about this time?

He couldn't figure it out, shaking himself out of his stupor and going to find something else to focus on instead.

That something ended up being making tea, as he slowly remembered how Grian liked his.

He preferred flowery teas, the type that tastes like sunflowers and roses. The type that smells like a flower garden. He often had milk in it, along with honey, claiming that the overpowering sweetness made it taste a lot better. That it made the tea remind him of picnics in flower fields during the middle of summer.

It was cute, Mumbo thought.

The tall man hummed softly as he poured the boiling water over the tea, and put out the milk, honey and the tea cups.

Now, he just had to wait for Grian to arrive.

He was excited.

Mumbo, as usual, hadn’t locked his door.

He expected Grian, as usual, to just wander inside.

But… this time, he didn't. Instead of hearing the old door creak open, someone shuffling in his hallway as they removed their shoes and coat, Mumbo heard a soft, almost cautious knock.

He didn’t move at first, simply staying where he was on the couch as he waited for the person to enter. It wasn't until he heard knocking a second time, slightly louder and bolder than the first, that he actually realised the person at the door wasn’t about to just waltz in.

What?

Grian had knocked.

He hadn't walked inside.

He had knocked.

Suddenly, the excitement that had been fluttering in his stomach turned to nerves, churning and ugly. This was different to what he had hoped it would be. The evidence of their falling out was still clear.

Mumbo considered shouting that the door was open, that Grian could just let himself in, but it didn't feel right to do so. Instead, he stood up on shaky legs and went to open the door.

Standing on the other side was a very worried looking Grian.

He saw just a flash of the expression, before Grian’s face quickly changed into a small smile, as if he didn't want Mumbo to see it.

For a second, they just stared at each other in silence.

Mumbo couldn't help but notice how out of place Grian looked. He seemed small… smaller than usual. He stood awkwardly, glancing around like he didn’t belong there. Like this was a place he wasn’t supposed to be.

Mumbo tried to think of something to say, desperately running through greetings and topics of conversation, trying to find something that felt right. Before he managed, Grian spoke.

"Hi," he said, raising his hand to give Mumbo a small wave. He shot him a nervous smile that made Mumbo's heart ache.

It didn't look right on him.

They made their way inside soon after, automatically settling in the kitchen. Grian sat down in his usual chair, the one across the table from Mumbo’s He seemed strangely uncomfortable in the space, shifting stiffly as he stared at every detail of the room, taking them all in like this was the first time he had ever seen them.

The two sat in silence as Mumbo poured the tea. Somehow, either because they knew each other so well, or because Mumbo had a good memory, Grian's cup still ended up with the exact right amount of honey and milk.

Grian hummed his thanks as he took a sip from the warm, sweet tea. Mumbo silently did the same, blowing lightly at his tea before taking a sip. He stared down at his mug when it settled back on the table, looking at it intently as to avoid accidentally meeting Grian’s gaze. He focused on the way the milk swirled around the dark liquid, not stirred but still mingling with it, the blooming pattern appeared akin to smoke.

It wasn't until he heard Grian beginning to stir his tea that Mumbo looked up.

His hair half covered his expression while he looked down at the spoon, at the cup, at the contents swirling together into one. He seemed thoughtful, mouth partially open like he wanted to say something but hadn't quite found the words yet.

Whatever it was he was trying to vocalise, it seemed to require some effort, as he opened and closed his mouth a few times, never quite forming the words.

Mumbo waited patiently. He didn't want to interrupt Grian's train of thought, or push him into sharing what he wanted to before he was ready. Not when he was seeming to struggle so much to just phrase the words. Instead he just watched Grian stir tea.

Then, suddenly, Grian said, "Did you know that there either is," he paused for a second, brows furrowed as he collected his thoughts, "or used to be, formaldehyde in milk?"

What.

"What?" Mumbo responded, rather confused.

"Yeah. It was a preservative of some kind, I’m pretty sure," Grian continued to stare down at his cup, letting go of the spoon he had been gripping.

It was silent for a second.

The air was… odd. Not quite tense, but certainly not casual. Certainly not what it used to be, before all of this.

Then Grian spoke again, "Which means that I'm technically taking my tea with formaldehyde." He tilted his head to the side, a few locks of hair falling into his eyes as they remained locked on the mug between his hands, but his mind seemed to be elsewhere.

"I...what?" Mumbo wasn't quite following the conversation, "Isn't formaldehyde dangerous?" He eventually, cautiously, asked.

"Yeah,” Grian shrugged, “That doesn't stop people from putting it into makeup and stuff."

Mumbo’s mind was spinning, entirely baffled as he tried desperately to figure out what made Grian say such a random thing.

"Huh…interesting." Mumbo replied slowly after a long moment, unsure of how else to respond.

"Take my tea with formaldehyde…" Grian mumbled, bringing his mug up to his mouth and sipping at his tea, eyes askance.

The room grew quiet again. Mumbo, unsure of what else he could be doing, simply observed Grian’s movements. They were stuttered, somewhat stiff and robotic-looking, and Mumbo was once again struck by how out of place he looked in the flat.

God, it didn't look right at all.

Despite the awkwardness, despite the long silences and stumbling conversations, Mumbo couldn’t help but find it comforting. The two of them, drinking tea together. Despite every little detail that wasn’t as it should be, it was nice.

He'd missed Grian.

Missed his presence.

Maybe this was why they had just been texting.

It was easier to know what to say when you had time to think about it properly. Time to write and rewrite the message before sending. Time to back out, to change your mind.

That's probably why they hadn't called.

"I'm sorry."

The silence shattered like glass as Grian whispered the apology.

Mumbo blanked for a moment, his fingers turning stiff and the cup of tea falling from his grip, hitting the table with a harsh crick. He ignored the tea spilling onto the table, ignored the way that it dripped onto his clothes, looking up at Grian instead of the tea that began to drip onto the floor.

Grian's hand gripped his cup tightly, his face covered by his hair, obscuring his face, his body hunched forward. His shoulders shook, rapid shivers wracking his small form where he sat.

Mumbo stared down at Grian's whitening knuckles, at the way his bitten nails clawed at the mug, before slowly registering the tears falling down from Grian's cheeks. They kept coming, rivers passing over his skin and falling into his tea, making it splash slightly as they hit the surface.

"I'm really sorry," Grian whispered, his voice shaking just as much as his body.

Mumbo sat silently, reeling, trying to organise the thoughts that flew through his head.

Grian simply continued to cry, unwavering sobs passing his lips with a force that had him bending further, his forehead practically connecting with the rim of his teacup.

"I'm sorry for just disappearing–" he cut himself off with a desperate gasp for breath, chest rising and falling choppily, "I know it was really shitty of me to disappear, I know that I really shouldn't have done that. I'm so, so sorry, I’m sorry, I–" He looked up at Mumbo, exhaustion pooling behind his brown eyes, more vulnerable than Mumbo had seen him in a long while.

"It was really shitty of me– I’ve been a pretty shit excuse for a friend lately."

His words hung heavy in the air like smog, tangible and viscous, dripping down each of their backs with an uncomfortable grip as Mumbo slowly processed them.

"It's okay," Mumbo settles on saying, eventually. His voice was tired and gentle, and he stood clumsily from his chair after a moment, going over to the other.

"What?" Now it was Grian's turn to be surprised. "But–"

"Grian,” Mumbo said, firmly, interrupting him. “It's okay. I forgive you."

Disbelief was obvious on the other’s face, staining his expression in the same way that Mumbo’s spilt tea soaked into his trousers; creeping and gradual. It wasn't until Mumbo wrapped his arms around Grian, arms shaking and holding him perhaps a little too tight, that the other seemed to realise that he was being genuine.

"You– I don’t… thank you." Grian whispered, voice shaking, whilst he wrapped his arms around Mumbo as well. "Thank you."

"I've been able to tell you haven't been feeling well lately,” Mumbo murmured as he pet Grian's hair, “I was so scared that it was my fault. I don't blame you for disappearing."

At that, Grian let go of Mumbo, bringing his shaking hands up to cup Mumbo’s face, rubbing his thumbs tenderly along his jaw. He looked at the other resolutely with sad, worried eyes, gaze unwavering as he spoke, "Mumbo, what happened had nothing to do with you,” he looked close to tears again, eyes shining with some deep, unspoken pain, “I want to know that."

"I know,” Mumbo replied softly, closing his eyes and resting his head more intentionally in Grian's hands. “I just… got scared, I guess

"I'm sorry," Grian said again, looking guilty. "I shouldn't have disappeared."

"It's okay," Mumbo said again, "It's okay." He gave Grian a small smile. "I just want you to be alright. If you ever need anything, just message me. I'll always be here to listen."

It took a while, but eventually Grian smiled back. It was shaky and unsure, and didn’t quite reach his eyes, as if he had difficulty believing that Mumbo actually meant what he said.

As Mumbo pulled Grian in for another hug, he decided that he'd make sure that Grian knew that he'd support him.

It didn't matter if it would take years to do so.

The tea continued to drip onto the floor.

A few days later, Grian and Mumbo were out on the town, just walking around, window shopping.

Neither was really sure why they were out on a walk, but it felt like they both needed it. Needed to get some air, to just do something together. Something that wasn't watching Ariana Griande shows, or playing video games.

In Mumbo's hands was a styrofoam cup filled with coffee, while Grian held one with hot chocolate. Grian had never liked coffee, nor any other type of caffeinated drink, complaining about the headaches they tended to give him. He only ever drank one if he desperately needed energy, and even then it was just a small amount.

Both of their drinks were beginning to cool, but they still drank them slowly, using the time to just silently enjoy being in each other’s presence.

They turned a corner, and Grian spotted something in the distance, stopping where he was. Mumbo looked back at him, stood frozen in the middle of the pavement, and followed Grian's gaze, confused.

There, when he finally managed to track down whatever it was that had magnetised Grian’s attention, was an Ariana Griande poster.

It was plastered on the side of a bus stop, and Mumbo knew with certainty that it had been there for months. The album it was promoting was long-since out, with newer music being released since that one had, but the poster still held strong against the scratched up plastic, remaining clearly readable.

If Mumbo had been in a different mood, he might have taken it down and brought it home, but… it didn't feel right to do so this time.

Grian sighed, dragging Mumbo’s attention away from the poster as he spoke, "I heard that she's also taking a break." He turned to look at Mumbo, blinking quickly.

"Uh– yeah,” Mumbo replied, tilting his head to look over his shoulder at the poster once again. Ariana smiled widely on it, her brown eyes seeming to sparkle as the image stared on, unbothered by the strange atmosphere she had seemed to create. Mumbo continued hurriedly, “Iskall had to convince her to do so, from what I know."

Grian hummed, "That's good. He seems to have a talent for convincing people to take care of themselves."

Mumbo chuckled slightly, "He really does."

They stood quietly for another moment, before Grian began to walk again and Mumbo jolted to follow after him.

"You know,” Grian began, his tone conversational, “He tried to convince me to start therapy."

Mumbo was taken aback by the information for a second, before he replied, "Oh?"

"Yeah," Grian sighed. "And I thought about it for a while…" He paused, drinking some of his chocolate, "but I just… don't feel ready yet. If that makes sense."

It didn't really, but Mumbo still replied with a, "Yeah."

Grian, knowing Mumbo too well, snorted, and then elaborated anyway, "There's just… some things I feel like I have to deal with, before I get therapy. I don't really feel like it would help me much, not at the moment anyway," he sighed again. "I honestly feel more scared than comforted."

That didn't make any sense at all to Mumbo, and it must have shown on his face because Grian huffed out a soft laugh again.

"What do you mean?" He asked.

"I… I don't really know," Grian replied. "I guess there's some things that I'm too scared to face– that I don't particularly want to face. Not yet, anyway. I feel like they'd just… make everything worse, y’know?"

Maybe Grian was an expert at confusing people, or maybe Mumbo just simply didn't relate to Grian’s experience. Maybe it was a common feeling to be scared of facing one's issues.

"No," Mumbo replied, truthfully.

The laugh Grian gave was a proper one, this time. One that had his head tilting back with the force of it, his lips breaking into a grin. The type of laugh that didn’t necessarily hold joy, rather being filled with a heavy relief.

"That makes me glad to hear, honestly," he nudged Mumbo’s arm gently. "It's not a fun feeling. I wouldn’t really want you understanding that, I don’t want you to feel this way."

"It doesn't sound fun."

"It really isn't," Grian continued to smile, though something in his expression twisted slightly. It looked bittersweet. "It really isn't. "

The conversation died there, and the two continued to walk.

Eventually, Mumbo finished his drink, throwing away the empty cup in a nearby bin. A short while later, he was holding Grian's hand in his as the other continued to sip at his, at that point, cold chocolate.

Holding Grian's hand made the butterflies in Mumbo's stomach come to life, fluttering dizzily and filling him with a soft, smitten happiness that he hadn't felt in a few months.

As they walked, stopping at random stores and browsing the products. They laughed together, making jokes and keeping conversation going easily, and Mumbo started to feel… happy. He felt happy again.

Maybe this meant that things were changing.

Right?

#grian #hermitblr #ariana griande #grumbo #mumbo jumbo #hermitshipping #hermitcraft #iskall85 #tmtwf #take my tea with formaldehyde (grumbo fic)

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volfoss · 2 years

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be real with me. should i read one piece.

On one hand, yes bc I am rly enjoying it and it is one of the best shonens I've ever read. You do have to get past the ugly art (you do get used to it semi early on if thats any condolence) and how the women r drawn well. In a way lmao. I'm only 250 or so chapters in so like my thoughts may change in the future but rn it's smth where I would say yes however I do kinda wanna like give you heads up on a few things that are worth knowing before you start under the cut, discussions of some transmisogynistic content under the cut

So I haven't hit this arc yet (from what I know it starts at ch 523), but there's an arc that basically um. Fits a fair amt of really bad tropes. I'm going to direct you to this WordPress blog that is run by a trans woman and she talks about it in depth (more than I can rn as I haven't gotten there yet) and why it's um. Handled in a pretty bad way. There's also a character that's relatively similar (although tamer in terms of how he is handled) earlier on (introduced ch 129) that is clearly a sort of gender unclear character? And honestly this character could be handled worse and also better but it's also not as bad from what I understand of the latter portrayals of ppl that are GNC. One piece however does get better w trans characters and two of them are handled well (from what I understand) although they got introduced I believe in the 800s or 900s in terms of chapters. But what makes the earlier GNC rep worse is that like. One of the fan favorite characters comes out pretty transphobic towards these characters and in general so it's a heads up I feel is necessary to give (learning this initially made me go um :/ about one piece so it's smth that I do want to give a heads up on)

There's also the rly shitty archetype of man being creepy 2 women who are not interested who coincidentally is ALSO the transphobic character. So like giving u a heads up on that bc its played as a joke but it can be taken a bit too far sometimes and can be uncomfortable. The character does show up pretty early (ch 43) and is a part of the main crew so you do have to deal w him being like *that* pretty often bc it's literally towards any woman he sees.

Onto other things however, there's genuinely a lot of good in it. The women are the best written women I've ever seen in shonen (esp comparing to Naruto and jjba) and that's in spite of the um. Proportions (the post about the author drawing women literally like o><= is pretty famous so p sure you know what I'm talking about). The plot is genuinely very fun and the characters are all well written as well as their relationships and friendships. I genuinely like haven't read anything like this in terms of how genuinely all of the characters in the main group are paid attention to and not ignored in terms of their development. It's the big obstacle of getting over how the art can look at times and how the women in particular are drawn (it starts out not being too bad but like this pic was from maybe ch 180 or so)

^ the proportions are um. So in a way for sure. But I say all of this to say that I think the length and art are pretty daunting of like oh god there's over 1000 chapters/100 volumes but imo like if you're interested in it, it's worth it. If you are like interested in a certain character (ie nami. You would LOVE nami everyone should love nami) I think it's worth it to read to their backstory or to the end of their arc if they're a minor character. Imo if you wanna give it a solid shot, I'd give it at least until like 20 chapters in? If you're invested in nami and wanna stop after her backstory (very emotional will destroy u etc), that's ch 95. I think it is genuinely very good but there r also the issues and problems and stuff! I hope this very long winded post answered your question and if u need more details on stuff I'm here :)

#asks #🏴‍☠️#but um. yes. get sucked into the one piece hell (affectionate)

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illbelieveitwhenyoudo · 3 years

Text

one of the worst failings of xxxholic is how weak (and fustrating) it is when re-reading. part of this is like, it was a weekly comic so you can’t really expect a streamlined experience after 10+ years (place pin here).

but most of it is how in 3 ish chapters they completely do away with nearly 200 chapters of lessons and growth just for the tragedy of it all. if you want to be charitable, holic is sadder, more tragic on the second read because you know whats going to happen and every time someone tells the main cast that fate cannot be changed, you can cry along in sympathy. but then compare that to every single moment, storyline and monolouge about how sacrifice is just foolish, that separating yourself from the connections you have to others goes against the laws of the universe, that being in pain for someone elses sake is just showing how little you care for yourself rather than how much you care for the other person. You, reader, main character, customers of the week, need to learn how to create a world in which you respect yourself, in which the people around you respect you, in which waiting for things to just come to you is something only done by the dead. those ties we create with the world are the single most valuable thing you have other than yourself. literally 20 volumes of this and then in chapter 185 out of 213 watanuki just decides to abandon the changes hes made??? for what???? cause he has an oedipal connection to his boss??? but its okay bcs the other parallel story being told kinda needs it to happen too???? it falls so flat. and holic DESPERATELY wants to be taken seriously and thought of as having a philosophical and meaningful narative. so... why didn’t they follow through on it?

ok heres that pin... the thing is, clamp had way too much going on at the time, two weekly comics with complicated fantastical worlds meant to overlap at the same time. (during the run, at a con in paris they jokingly say that the ammount they work would be against french labour laws). i really think it couldve been a better story if they weren’t overworked. unfortunately clamp tends to be unsuccsessful when writing these long spiraling stories. the stories tend to end unsatisfyingly or just dont end at all. everyone jokes about the last pannel of X but thats like the best outcome, really. everyone hates the ending of tokyo babylon and although ive seen a couple people say they like the ending of TRC, its just been compared to the ending of holic. which is technically just on hiatus (x2).

anyways, a friend asked me if they should reread holic and i said no, but i should have said yes. i love xxxholic with all my heart.

#holic #to be clear this isnt against yuuko at all #i love their weird strained relationship and watanuki Definetly has something going on for her #but if you look at clamps writing history its not really what they were intending to be endgame or whatever lol #like i love all the themes an shit #and symbolism and etcetc #i even love how horrible adayume is #anyways #trying to act nonchalant despite spending over an hr to write 8000 words on holic #other girls have poetry on their notes app #i have thousand word essays on holic

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betawooper · 3 years

Text

rating every demon fight in kny bc i can

non-biased, completely objective rating (more or less) of every significant demon fight in kny based on a number of factors, including:

cleverness of fighting tactics

placement in the story’s timeline

integration of character backstories

cohesive themes between characters

etc

by non-biased and objective i mean i’m not skewing the rating if a death felt fair or whatever

everything past where the anime ended will be under a read more so anime onlys who havent watched mugen train, youre safe lol

oh and i reread the manga like 20+ times (reread the latter arcs at least 40 times, haha hyperfixations am i right?) so be rest assured im not pulling these ratings out of my ass

also ill randomly be bolding certain phrases just to improve readability

anyways let’s gooooo

VS NEZUKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Nezuko. Tanjirou is fending her off by putting the axe handle in her mouth, keeping her from eating him. End Image Description.]

10/10

i like how realistic it is, because yeah tanjirou would react the way to he did with zero fighting skills against a demon

very clear why tanjirou is fighting nezuko and shows a bit of worldbuilding on how normal people react to their family becoming demons

always nice to see worldbuilding

giyuu is the perfect example of a seasoned demon slayer who’s good at his job, and he juxtaposes tanjirou very well in that aspect

my only complaint is not directly in this fight itself but how nezuko is handled throughout the story as a whole

like bro, it is literally never explained why nezuko is different from demons

could have been easily explained if maybe her family’s ghosts like slapped her hand every time she wanted to eat a person but nope

she’s just built different lol

so yeah youll see future ratings get points docked off bc nezuko unlocks some secret power with no prior explanation other than she angy >:3

VS TEMPLE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a demon. The demon has a sharp-nailed hand over his neck and there are four text bubbles around him saying “But a wound like this... will heal in no time! See? The bleeding already stopped!” End Image Description.]

10/10

may be more forgettable compared to like rui but still good

tanjirou did exceptionally well in this fight and his ability to think on his feet is once again beautifully illustrated here (trapping this dude’s head against the tree trunk with the axe)

very clever

again, establishes more demon worldbuilding regarding regeneration and still being able to move without their head

and the demons burning in the sunlight thing since nezuko wasn’t able to show that

the ending where tanjirou hesitates to kill the demon also serves to show his sympathetic nature towards demons that will last throughout the entirety of the first 60-ish chapters

we’ll talk about what the hell happens to tanjirou after that

or not, it could honestly be its own post

VS HAND DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a many-handed demon. He has six hands around him, three of them covering his mouth while he chuckles, two of them grabbing his cheeks, and one holding on to the top of his head. There are two text bubbles saying “That’s how many of Urokodaki’s students I have eaten! I’ve decided to kill all of his students!” End Image Description.]

10/10

ooooh probably the first big fight against a demon in the series

oh yeah not doing the two random demons tanjirou one shot in a single blow bc eh

anyways hand demon’s pretty goddamn scary, considering the fact that this is the 5th demon or whatever tanjirou has had to face so far

very nice way to show us how much tanjirou’s innate intuition and all his other random abilities (sense of smell, hard forehead) can come together and help him decapitate this guy

i liked the mini history with urokodaki this dude had and why he had beef with our favorite mentor figure, it establishes that urokodaki was in fact a super good demon slayer and its cool to see that actually shown

i also liked that small moment of compassion tanjirou gave this demon, staying consistent with tanjirou’s established kindness

the demon’s sad tale with killing his own brother very much humanizes him when all the reader has seen up to this point is that this guy is a monster who eats people

sets up the theme of demons just being humans but being victims of circumstance that unfortunately doesn’t hold up as well in arcs past mugen train

VS SWAMP DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou fighting off three horned demons as they appear from below. There is a spiky text bubble saying “Three of them!!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not my most favorite fight but it still portrays everything alright and im not allowed to let my personal opinions mess with the rating so

i like how tanjirou mentioned the fact that he trained in conditions similar to the bog and explains how he pulled off the whirlpool form

using past experiences to aid him in the present, nice nice

tanjirou and nezuko dont quite work together very well but its yknow the first mission so ill chalk it up to simple inexperience

also the way the muzan curse thingie was hinted at here? fantastic way of showing that little bit of demon worldbuilding

...

oh god, it mentions nezuko being stronger than normal demons

ok its not a problem here per say since i can still suspend my disbelief, but later on it just becomes a glaring problem that gets worse over time

VS SUSAMARU AND YAHABA

[Image Description: Manga panels of Susamaru and Yahaba. The first one is a joyful Susamaru about to throw a temari ball. There is floating text saying “Is she one of Kibutsuji’s minions?!” The second image is an annoyed Yahaba, holding one of his eye-hands to cover himself. There are two text bubbles around him saying “My kimono got all dusty. Tch!” End Image Description.]

9/10

why dont these bitches have a good looking panel together dammit

anyways amazing entrance, the way yahaba used his hand eyes to track down tanjirou is really neat

the synergy yahaba and susamaru have is incredible, its awesome dude, they work extremely well together and it shows

tanjirou actually mixing his water breathing forms together is a god tier move and i absolutely love how he can show off his ability to think on his feet once again

establishing how yushiro’s bda works early on is really well done

establishing tamayo as a fugitive this early on is also super well done

not to get into spoiler territory but both these things pay off

how tamayo ended up defeating susamaru is literally awesome in so many ways

shows off both how smart she is by exploiting the muzan curse

and speaking of the muzan curse, we actually get to see what happens to demons who even say his name, back when it was hinted with the swamp demon

tamayo is amazing dude, and we get some real evidence of the horrible suffering demons go through if they even accidentally attempt to betray muzan :D

...

now heres what keeps this fight from being perfect

nezuko somehow grew stronger against susamaru’s temari

with no explanation

which could have been easily explained if tamayo was like “oh yeah the drug also boosts a demon’s strength temporarily”

but nope

god, i just dont like how gotouge handles nezuko’s power boosts throughout the series bc like i said before

no explanation is given anywhere

this is a huge issue, this isnt a pokemon game, you cant just kill demons and get exp at the end of every battle, level up, get some sweet stat bonuses and move on

(actually if gotouge established that this is how nezuko grew in power, than all my complaints about this would be gone, im not even joking)

anyways i get that nezuko is supposed to be “special” but thats too vague of a descriptor

how the hell is she special? ya gotta be more specific and stick with that explanation or that suspension of disbelief is going to disappear

VS TONGUE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a four-eyed demon with horns and a long tongue. He is crawling in an awkward position, one foot in front of his tilted head. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Heh, heh! I’ll slurpy slurp your brains out through you ear!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not much to say, showcases zenitsu’s true abilities really well

nicely done

VS HORNED DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a big, single-horned demon. There are three text bubbles saying “You dodged! You’re awfully lively for a human! It’ll be a treat to carve away your flesh!” End Image Description.]

10/10

would have ignored this fight if not for the fact we havent seen inosuke fight before

it definitely shows how very fast-paced and wild inosuke is

no complaints here lol

VS KYOGAI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kyogai, a demon with tsuzumi drums attached to his shoulders. There are four text bubbles around him saying “Why?! Why does everyone keep sneaking through my house? It’s so aggravating. It’s my prey! It’s my prey! Found in my territory!” End Image Description.]

10/10

establishes marechi blood pretty early on, once again expanding the worldbuilding of kny which is always cool

interesting terrain where it’s always shifting, tanjirou once again proves his ability to adapt really quickly by altering one of his forms to work with the turning room

(man, i wish the form mixing/form modification thing carried on throughout the rest of the story, but it really didnt which is just a shame)

the injuries tanjirou had prior to this mission actually affecting him was a nice touch

oh yeah, kyogai gives us more worldbuilding (which is always nice) regarding the 12 kizuki, and the aspect of him being cast out due to being weak shows a lot about muzan’s indifference towards his own demons if they arent strong

his backstory being a failed writer once again humanizes kyogai as a former human being and not just a monster

tanjirou shows his sympathy and compassion again by not stepping on his written work and complimenting his bda

well, tbh tanjirou’s actions kinda came out of nowhere but its a very minor thing and not enough to dock a point off, like it didnt affect the outcome of the fight that much if at all

(so if you see future battles where points are docked off for things not logically making sense, its bc whatever nonsensical concepts were integrated into the fight actually turned the tide of the battle and thats a big no-no)

very good fight and if you remember how kinda bad tanjirou was at accurately slicing the swamp demon, you can see that he’s already improved leaps and bounds

im so proud of him

VS MOTHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and the Mother Spider Demon. There is a light shining down from the top right on to the demon as Tanjirou slices her head off, rain following in his wake. There is floating text saying “Water Breathing: Fifth Form - Blessed Rain After the Drought!” around them. End Image Description.]

10/10

i mean does anyone disagree?

all the demon slayers getting their necks snapped by her threads was pretty horrific, probably more horrifying than anything else we have seen in the entire series if im gonna be honest

the death scene is probably the most beautiful one in the series

it reveals a water breathing form that we havent seen before thats the 5th form

as far as i know, no other breathing style has this merciful sword stroke so it shows a lot about the original water breather and what they might have been like

but enough about them, really the focus is on tanjirou bc this is like the best example by far of how kind and sympathetic he is to demons

dunno what else to say, its perfect

VS SON SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Agatsuma Zenitsu performing Thunder Breathing 1st Form: Sixfold on a spider-like demon. Zenitsu is crashing through the roof of a shed, and a zig-zag path is left behind. There are sound effects all over the panel, saying “Bam!” in large font. End Image Description.]

10/10

chose a picture without a huge spider on it bc i would like to not scare myself half to death

anyways extremely amazing fight, showcases zenitsu’s immense talent and skill, adapting the 1st form of thunder breathing to be a more versatile move

theres a moment where his backstory with kuwajima and kaigaku were revealed and his hidden insecurities are out in the open which is super nice and further develops a character weve only considered as comedic relief until now

the anime made the backstory scenes and the killing scene so much cooler

while there is no thematic connection between zenitsu and the demon, it really isnt necessary to keep this fight interesting

anyways another pretty much perfect fight

VS FATHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Inosuke slashing at the Father Spider Demon. The demon has blocked Tanjirou’s sword with his arm, and Inosuke is slamming both his blades down on the demon’s other hand. End Image Description.]

10/10

again, not my most favorite fight but it does everything right

i do have to say it was excellent how gotouge hyped up the father spider demon to be the big bad, only just so the plot twist later takes the readers by surprise

nicely done

VS DAUGHTER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kochou Shinobu and the Daughter Spider Demon. Shinobu’s back is seen and her haori looks like a butterfly’s wings keeping her afloat as she holds her stinger blade out to the side. The demon looks surprised as blood gushes from her side, arm, shoulder, chest, neck, and forehead. There is floating text on the panel, saying “Insect Breathing - Butterfly Dance - Caprice!” End Image Description.]

10/10

first time weve seen shinobu and her fighting style

what i love most about this is how much it shows her true character, appearing as a carefree and naive individual so she seems underwhelming

then bam, reveals exactly how dangerous and uncaring she is of demons, listing out the specific ways she would torture the daughter spider demon in grotesque detail

her using poison to take demons by surprise is also super clever and brings back the worldbuilding established way earlier about wisteria being poisonous to demons

amazing integration of that concept

anyways this fight really encapsulates who shinobu is as a character and thats why it gets a perfect score

VS RUI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Rui holding his hand out directly towards the viewer. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Give me your sister. If you hand her over quietly, I’ll spare your life.” End Image Description.]

8/10

not only is it a super scary fight but there is a deeper conflict between rui and tanjirou, what it means to be family

they are opposites in the sense that while tanjirou believes love is what makes a family, rui’s subconscious desperation for an unbreakable bond drives him to use fear to keep his “family” together

excellent juxtaposition of their values, and this is only further emphasized when rui expresses out loud what he was going to do to nezuko

i also like the symbolism regarding rui’s bda, how he uses threads or the “familial” bonds to cut up his fake family with it if they act out of turn or annoy him

super neat detail

alright what i dont like about this fight is nezuko (again)

mostly her unlocking her bda to turn the tide of the battle bc her mom was like “yo, wake up, your brother is going to be killed”

feels... forced ig

her bda in general is confusing and not consistent

man, i wish i could make a stronger argument for this but i do believe the problem stems from the fact that we dont ever know what nezuko is thinking, and what she thinks of tanjirou specifically

if she even cares for him as a sibling or if shes only going along with what her family is saying to her, things like that which would have been fixed if gotouge actually gave her thoughts some screen time

so the action feels pretty shallow

im also conflicted over tanjirou somehow remembering how dance of the fire god works

on one hand, hes using past information and applying it in the current setting so he doesnt die, which is understandable

but on the other hand, this was a teeny bit random?

i think what could have fixed this is if there was a scene in the beginning of the series where tanjirou was performing it himself, like practicing before he actually had to do it for new years

so that when the rui fight rolls around, it would have felt less like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

but yeah

overall super good fight, giyuu ending up having to kill rui instead of tanjirou was super good in that tanjirou didnt become a pillar this early in the series and to show how strong giyuu is

there are some odd bits regarding the ultimate “beheading” of rui using nezuko and tanjirous supposed bonds but it doesnt kill the fight entirely so it deserves its pretty high score

***under read more is manga-only fights so beware***

VS ENMU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Enmu holding his hand out directly at the viewer, with a mouth on the back of it. There is floating text to the top right of Enmu that says “Whispers of Forced Unconscious Hypnosis!” End Image Description.]

9/10

id say this fight is definitely overshadowed by the dream stuff prior to this but its pretty good in its own right

enmu fusing with the train was kinda confusing, like when was it established that demons could fuse with objects?

this worldbuilding element doesnt even appear again so yeah thats why it loses a point

how the kmbk gang end up defeating enmu is pretty sweet though, tanjirou using dance of the fire god to sever the neck bone was really nice and shows that him using the breathing style in the rui fight wasnt a one time thing

while kyojuro’s role was smaller in this part, the next part makes up for it so i cant complain

anyways ye, almost perfect score but its pretty good

VS AKAZA (MUGEN TRAIN)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza holding his hand out to the viewer’s left. There is a text bubble saying “Why don’t you become a demon?” End Image Description.]

10/10

this encounter is literally amazing okay?

after the crew kills the big bad, it seems like everything is fine

but plot twist, upper moon 3 appears out of nowhere

this is the first time the reader has seen an upper moon, let alone the 3rd/4th strongest demon in existence and the way gotouge handled this twist is fucking amazing

kyojuro’s death scene really shows just how human even the strongest pillars are against demons with incredible power

its just

amazing

VS OBI DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panels of the obi-like demon. The first image shows the obi hung in the air and strung over each other like decorations, with women-shaped patterns in its folds. The second image is Hashibira Inosuke fighting the Obi demon which now has lips and eyes. There is floating text in that panel saying “Breath of the Beast: Sixth Fang - Jagged Gnaw!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

on to red light district

this fight is admittedly super forgettable and not very interesting at least compared to the main fight with daki and gyutaro

but it wraps up the sub plot of the women and uzui’s wives going missing so it gets a perfect score for not messing that up

oh and it establishes the stretchy neck thing daki has going on which is very good

VS DAKI AND GYUTARO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Daki and Gyutaro. Daki is sitting on Gyutaro’s shoulders. There is a text bubble on the top right that says “The two of us are one, after all.” as well as floating text that reads “The power of the irregular siblings...!? Next issue lead color and the fight reaches its climax!!” End Image Description.]

8/10

love how this battle challenges tanjirou’s sympathy and kindness towards demons, just simply bc daki and gyutaro are horrible people

(too bad nothing came of this, which ill explain in the hantengu portion)

daki and gyutaro are very good villains and kept this fight super interesting from start to finish

uzui acting as a foil to gyutaro is nicely integrated and properly shown with how jealous gyutaro gets over seeing uzui’s perfect form and stature

tanjirou not only mixes forms but mixes breathing styles as well, which is so fucking awesome

(too bad it was only used like once throughout the entire series, its quite unfortunate)

the super high tension right after inosuke gets stabbed and tanjirou wakes up was expertly portrayed and handled, it felt like the kmbk gang and uzui were actually going to lose

super awesome

the tanjirou and gyutaro parallels are expertly portrayed, with how gyutaro taunts tanjirou over failing to protect his little sister, and the more visual thing where tanjirou imagined his own neck underneath his blade, that was super duper nice

the ending is extremely tense and emotionally gripping, gotouge did a really good job with that artistically too

the demon mark acquisition scene was surprisingly not frustrating, considering that it wasnt really explained prior to the battle

i do think it has to do with how it was explained later just exactly how they worked so its not just some random thing gotouge pulled out of their ass

so pretty good

what i dont like is nezuko and her full power demon form

first of all where the fuck did that come from? she just got angry and suddenly shes as powerful as an upper moon

how?

that doesnt make sense???

her extremely quick regeneration makes no sense

her ability to manipulate her blood’s properties makes no sense

and it doesnt even appear again so what was the point of that existing

none of this is even explained later which annoys me

that one part where tanjirou sings a lullaby to her to calm her down was alright ig but nezuko in this fight makes me extremely irritated and frustrated

just ugh

VS HANTENGU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Hantengu opening a shoji door. He is crawling inside, his hand in a gnarled, unnatural position. There is a text bubble saying “Eeeeeeek.” End Image Description.]

1/10

swordsmith village

this fight can go fuck itself /j

no but seriously it has so many problems that it would be shorter to name its redeeming qualities (which ill do later)

first off, the nezuko full power form thing again

i hate it so much with a passion

again, where did her ability to regenerate instantly even come from???? this is never explained, ever

and why did she cut herself on tanjirou’s sword anyway

did she somehow know that it was going to turn red if she burned it?

gotouge what the fuck, there is literally no reason why nezuko would do that and we cant even read her mind to see her thought process

gotouge hates nezuko, i swear

remember when i said uzui is meant to be a foil to gyutaro in the rld fight? its pretty obvious that those two are opposites, it was nicely done

... what the hell does mitsuri’s insecurities about strength have to do with whatever the fuck hantengu has going on (which is basically nothing)?

so no meaningful connection between mitsuri and hantengu

theres no meaningful connection between tanjirou and hantengu other than tanjirou getting pissed off for like the second time

also tanjirou’s thing with being kind and sympathetic to demons was entirely dropped at this point

but instead of it leading up to a corruption arc of some sorts, it just doesnt

like honestly if something actually came of that anger he exhibited in this arc and from red light district from this point forward story-wise, i would have counted this as an amazing writing decision

but it literally doesnt so who cares

(god, i really start to hate what happened to his character after this )

and genya’s revealed motivation also doesnt fit at all with hantengu’s thing, he’s not a foil, not a parallel, nothing, there is nothing

tanjirou being the catharsis for development for mitsuri and muichirou, who he has only talked to like twice

theres definitely a better way to handle those two’s developments without his help

like gotouge, you have a big cast of characters, use them lol

i want to kick hantengu in the face for being boring as fuck (at least his clones have cool looking weapons)

doesnt even have a proper backstory, just a single spread of him being blamed for shit as a human

like... thats it? this is upper moon 4 what the hell

theres no clever form mixing here at all (regarding tanjirou) which probably would have helped with foreshadowing the 13th form for dance of the fire god/sun breathing better

also gotouge established that as tanjirou’s thing and now he doesnt do that stuff anymore which sucks

oh hey remember when tanjirou actually learned how to do zenitsu’s speed boost thing?

if you didnt, i dont blame you bc it literally doesnt appear again, ever

you could argue that he adapted it into his “waltz flash” technique or whatever the fuck that is but the way it was integrated into this fight was like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

which is just a shame bc its meant to be representative of how tanjirou and zenitsu are good pals but the way it was utilized is forgettable as hell

i absolutely loathe the crimson blade concept as a whole and im mentioning this now bc its going to come into play why future instances where this goddamn thing comes up again causes points to be lost

its inconsistent as fuck ill tell you that

at least some yoriichi stuff appeared here and not shoved into the final battle with everything else

so the yoriichi stuff later didnt come out of absolute nowhere

genya and mitsuri’s unique fighting styles expand the kny worldbuilding just a little more which is always nice

tanjirou got a cool sword out of this which would have been cooler if him and yoriichi had a deeper connection that was actually explored

but we didnt get shit so whatever

other people getting demon marks being revealed here is also okay so that again, the final battle isnt filled with absolutely everyone getting their marks at once

demon marks have their own slew of problems but its not as bad as the fucking crimson sword shit

god i hate the crimson sword shit

...

dude this section needs a tldr, even i cant sit and read through my shit

TL;DR - this fight sucks and crimson swords are bullshit (more on this later)

VS GYOKKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Tokitou Muichirou and Gyokko. Muichirou is looking to the left while Gyokko is looking to the right, both with their backs to each other. There are mist clouds billowing in the foreground and background, as well as a slash mark going across Gyokko’s neck. End Image Description.]

7/10

this fight suffers from the same lack of cohesive themes through characters like the hantengu battle bc the antagonist is given nothing

but its better

we havent actually seen mui fight before so theres no consistencies that the reader has to keep track of for now

and there arent like 10 characters in the fight so this fight gets a lot of points just for being a lot more coherent

i do like that this fight shows just how good mui is that he can defeat an upper moon by himself

mui’s backstory is neat

gyokko’s bda is very interesting too

... thats pretty much it lol

ye, anyways not the best fight but not the worst fight either

VS KAIGAKU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kaigaku holding the hilt of his blade with one hand. There is two text bubbles around him, saying “...As usual, you’re still shabby. It’s been a while, Zenitsu.” End Image Description.]

9/10

alright on to final battle arc

theres some good fights and then some really sucky ones, but this one was pretty incredible and very emotionally charged

theres a clear reason why zenitsu and kaigaku are battling each other (kai betrayed the corps and inadvertantly caused the only parental figure in zenitsu’s life to die, and zenitsu is rightfully pissed off about that)

the visual yin-yang symbolism is awesome too

zenitsu winning due to using the 7th form he created himself (which i have reason to believe was inspired by tanjirou) was the perfect ending to the fight, really couldnt ask for anything better and is a perfect example of how much of an effect tanjirou has had on zenitsu

the 7th form is what tanjirou’s waltz flash should have been lol

what keeps this fight from being absolutely perfect is lack of development prior to this conflict

(since the final battle arc is basically a culmination of all the hinted developments through the series, im going to actually factor in how much and how well these conflicts were foreshadowed)

anyways if we had actually seen zenitsu, kaigaku, and kuwajima actually interacting with each other and showing how they were essentially a family (not just through flashbacks), it would have made zenitsu placing the responsibility of killing kai onto himself a lot more tragic

but like, apart from brief flashbacks where zenitsu actually met kaigaku off screen and that one thing all the way back in natagumo where both kuwajima and kai were introduced, thats pretty much it in terms of thunder family development

so yeah its underdeveloped for sure

also one random thought, i personally think zenitsu should have gotten his demon mark in this fight, it would have been cool to see

VS AKAZA (INFINITY FORTRESS)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza’s face. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Okay, let’s get started. It’s time for the feast.” There is also floating text saying “The inspection of the strong has begun...” as well as a simple box on the lower left, denoting its the end of chapter 147. End Image Description.]

6/10

oh god please dont hate me for this

ill list the good things first how about that

this conflict was foreshadowed perfectly in mugen train, you bet the readers were expecting a tanjirou vs akaza battle after the death of kyojuro and gotouge delivered

akaza’s power is shown extremely well with how many close calls tanjirou and giyuu had while fighting him

akaza eventually giving up on his own volition was really nice and fit into the context of the battle very very well, like sure tanjirou and giyuu wouldnt understand why he gave up but us readers do know

akaza is a really good character and a good villain

now notice how im only mentioning akaza and not giyuu or tanjirou in the good aspects

bc those two are eh

no form mixing at all from either tanjirou and giyuu

i know i said form mixing was kind of tanjirou’s thing but you’d think giyuu would have gotten more creative with his moves once akaza said that he was getting predictable

(well he said he “ran out of water breathing forms” but same thing)

so its kinda bland lol

speaking of giyuu, his whole thing with his insecurities of being weak wasnt handled well (it was sort of immediately brushed off in pillar training, and its unclear what part of his character arc he was in)

like sure him announcing that he’s going to protect tanjirou is cool but it feels like he was haphazardly dropped into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

isnt he supposed to be both their foils? that wasnt really explored that well in this fight and theres no deep meaning behind him even being here just analyzing what he did in it

he could have been handled better or even given more focus is what im saying

the anatta state came out of nowhere, im sorry okay? just bc inosuke like barely hinted at not being able to sense grandma hisa bc she had no fighting spirit and tanjurou magically taught his son how to achieve this state doesnt mean it was properly integrated into the fight

if the anatta state was actually explored prior to this battle, i would have given it a pass but it just feels like a cheap and poorly developed trick to get around akaza’s technique development (which is overpowered as fuck might i add)

gotouge should have just given akaza a plausible weakness to his technique development instead, especially since they dont use or even mention the anatta state after this

the transparent world shit makes no sense but ill elaborate on that in the koku battle analysis

oh and this thing doesnt affect the score but why wasnt there a “yoriichi visage overlapping” moment when tanjirou was fighting akaza? hes an upper moon, he should have gotten those visions but he didnt

for some reason

anyways this battle was alright and has good set up but the middle and end parts didnt hold up as well bc random concepts were thrown at us without prior explanation or development

VS DOUMA

[Image Description: Manga panel of Douma licking Shinobu’s butterfly pin. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Anyway, tonight is a good night. Such fine feasts keep showing up one after another.” End Image Description.]

9/10

damn, such an amazing fight

the build up to this was properly foreshadowed

shinobu finally showing her true anger after hiding it for so long is amazing

douma is a super interesting character and fantastic villain

shinobu showing off her true power and determination against douma was sooooo nice

shinobu’s poisonous body plan is so clever and so interesting

if i was to rate the shinobu part of the fight alone, it would have gotten a 10/10 no question

the reason why its knocked down a point is because of the kanao and inosuke part

dont get me wrong, the way kanao is able to hold her own against douma by herself is pretty cool, how shes meant to parallel douma with their similar struggles surrounding human emotions and demonstrate how she has grown as a person, how she regains the ability to cry

that shit is cool, inosuke also getting in touch with his emotions after learning what happened to his mom was super neat as well

however

bc this battle takes place in the final arc with everything else, there wasnt proper build up regarding many things, the kotoha reveal especially

so inosuke feels kinda forced into the kanao shinobu and douma conflict, similar to how giyuu felt forced into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

its quite unfortunate bc if the kotoha stuff was actually explored prior to the confrontation, this “forced” feeling would have disappeared

i know some people have suggested that the douma fight should have just been its own arc, and i very much agree, it would have certainly helped fix this problem regarding inosuke and kotoha

last random thought, i wish shinobu, kanao, and inosuke got their demon marks

VS KOKUSHIBOU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kokushibou looking directly at the viewer, holding the hilt of his blade as if he’s going to pull it out. There are text boxes around him saying “This... is Upper Moon One... He’s so different compared to the other Upper Moons. He looks so dignified and majestic.” The text boxes are narrated by Tokitou Muichirou. End Image Description.]

5/10

this fight is... mediocre

at least theres a more tangible connection between muichirou and kokushibou

even though that was handled kinda poorly

tbh there really was no point to revealing that mui is koku’s descendant like at all, it just had no significant bearing to the plot of the fight

sanemi’s backstory being here is... okay ig?

idk the whole shinazugawa conflict has fundamental problems that i just cant think of any other place to put it without changing the entirety of canon

the marechi blood concept coming back was nice though

genya is there

him getting his bda was cool and helped turn the tide of the battle in a satisfying way (before kicking the bucket but thats not the focus here)

gyomei is a hollow husk of a character who barely got anything at all

but his fighting style is extremely cool and conveys his immense power very well

oh and him and sanemi are amazing at working together, like better than giyuu and tanjirou, and better than kanao and inosuke

theyre that good yet pretty much nobody acknowledges it which is sad

koku himself is pretty interesting and pretty tragic, very nice villain

but everyone together?

gonna be honest but this is such a random collection of characters, there was basically no foreshadowing that these four were going to go up again kokushibou, they are not that connected very well

i know there was this one post that focused on the theme of family that was common in all 5 characters in the fight but its just not enough

it would have been more cohesive if gotouge emphasized gyomei, mui, sanemi, and genya being like different aspects of yoriichi coming together to kill kokushibou hundreds of years after yoriichi failed to kill him

lmao its not like the 4 of them defeated koku with the power of family or friendship, they just smacked him over and over with a flail, shot him with magical bullets, and stabbed a crimson sword into his abdomen

wouldnt have been too hard to switch over to koku’s pov and go “damn these bitches are like my stupid brother”

...

speaking of crimson swords

i fucking hate the crimson sword concept oh my god can i complain about it now? im gonna complain about it now

unlike demon marks, the crimson blades werent even given any proper conditions, you just hold the stupid thing hard enough and it somehow imbues it with magical properties with no logic behind those properties

what part of crimson swords completely destroys a demon’s body in an instant? even muzan didnt go through that process when he was almost killed by yoriichi so where in the goddamn fuck did it come from

it could be explained bc the sword was left in the same spot for a long time but this tactic doesnt even appear again in a meaningful way (didnt kill muzan when tanjirou and giyuu held the sword together) so what the fuck was the point of having this even exist

its so underdeveloped and confusing and i hate it

the transparent world stuff is also confusing as shit and its pretty much never explained how they work aside from the vague “close your mind” advice, like why did it exist, it did nothing to help the present day demon slayers

its just so... poorly integrated

yeah anyways this is around the same rating as the akaza fight but a little worse bc there wasnt that strong set up beforehand

VS KOKUSHIBOU (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panel of a bag getting ripped open, pieces of a wooden flute tumbling out. End Image Description.]

10/10

easily 10/10

this fight shows the tragedy of kokushibou giving in to his envy and hatred, when yoriichi cries over seeing his own family commit terrible attrocities against the people he wanted to protect

and yoriichi dies, now carrying the fact that he couldnt even save his own brother from the influence of muzan on his conscious forever

what a sad ending for yoriichi

and after koku angrily slashes apart yoriichi’s corpse, having him find and keep the flute he gave to him when they were kids to the present day gives him a small shred of humanity in the midst of his monstrous anger

VS NAKIME

[Image Description: Manga panels of Nakime. The first one shows a low quality version of her playing her biwa. The second one is a close up of her eye. There are spiky text bubbles saying “It’s Upper Rank... 4!” End Image Description.]

0/10

no nakime backstory

not even a goddamn fight

forgettable

useless

VS MUZAN

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kibutsuji Muzan in his white-haired, mouth-covered form. There are text bubbles around him saying “Not a single one was of use to me. I will crush the demon hunters tonight. I’ll massacre them all right now.” End Image Description.]

1/10

._.

i have many complaints but ill try my best to not make this another hantengu rant section lol

first off, obanai deserved better

im serious, this poor dude was forgotten until pretty much the end when we finally get a backstory out of him

and then he died

what a waste of a potentially amazing character

mitsuri getting taken out early was ehhh

pretty sure someone else made a post about her supposedly being extremely strong but she was nerfed in this battle which i agree with

literally none of the pillars work together very well, like remember how i praised sanemi and gyomei for being super coordinated? lmao that doesnt exist anymore

you could say this is caused by desperation though and you wouldnt be wrong, its just boring to sit through

that causes issues bc this now basically requires the crimson sword and transparent world concepts to be there to spice things up

but in this fight, they do nothing in the long run (except for tanjirou using the crimson sword at the very very end)

youve already heard me talk about why those two things are super shittily integrated and i cant be bothered repeating myself so moving on

kanao, inosuke, and zenitsu

they... exist? they didnt do much tbh, which i guess is the point but like, now its boring again

nezuko could have been used as a potential way to raise the stakes and make things interesting again (like “ah shit, muzan might actually be unkillable if he gets nezuko but its okay bc shes not here- oh fuck shes here this is not good”)

but nothing came of her running off except confirmation that she became human again so whatever

uzui and shinjuro are useless, why werent they at the fight?

like they could have followed nezuko and contributed to the battle even a little but they just didnt and now theres literally no point to them appearing in this arc at all

wasted potential

tanjirou

i wish him going absolutely apeshit had actual substance behind it, like it being a part of his character arc or something

i remember having this one theory that he had a corruption arc (due to dropping his kindness thing towards demons) and i wanted this to be true so badly

but it doesnt exist

not with how the series ended

god

the only thing that saves this fight from being complete trash is tamayo’s poison thing being amazingly executed

and the part where everyone got blasted away, losing limbs and shit, that made things a little more interesting again

but thats it

VS MUZAN (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kibutsuji Muzan, Tamayo, and Tsugikuni Yoriichi. The first one has Muzan and Tamayo, while the second one has Yoriichi pulling out his sword. There are text boxes saying “And the moment I met him, I understood that I was born into this world to defeat this man.” End Image Description.]

9/10

finally something good again

while short, that’s just the nature of all of yoriichi’s battles with demons

anyways pretty nice, theres a clear reason why this battle exists (shows the scenario that made the original breather get super close to defeating muzan in detail)

adding tamayo here was a nice touch

my only complaint is that it seemed extremely coincidental that yoriichi somehow developed a breathing style specifically countering muzan’s multiple organs without even knowing prior that he had all those brains and hearts floating around freely in his body

like thats kind of ridiculous, even for yoriichi whos supposed to be “blessed by the gods”

could just be me though

VS TANJIROU

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kamado Tanjirou in his demon form. The first image has his eyes closed. The second image has his eyes opened and the tumor on his face almost completely faded. There are text boxes around him saying “You will destroy the demon hunters in my stead.” End Image Description.]

1/10

hoo boy

ok first off, demon tanjirou lasted for 2 chapters

thats it

2 chapters

so thats already a problem

i am aware its meant to parallel the beginning of the series but also its ridiculous how completely vague and rushed this entire thing was

nezuko doesnt do shit through not just this battle but this entire arc which i already explained so not gonna go into it further

kanao magically having a demon cure on her made very little sense

the scene where tanjirou leaves muzan in purgatory is pretty but if you look at it in the context of everything else, its ambiguous and confusing

(if someone could explain it and see how it connects to the original theme of “demons just being victims of circumstance,” i would love to hear it)

actually you know what makes me so mad about this “fight” as a whole? there was so much potential to do more with this concept

and im not talking about him escaping and nezuko becoming a demon slayer roleswap au (even though its a pretty cool concept)

him becoming a demon could have been a metaphor for his lost kindness and sympathy towards demons halfway through the series

it could have been a punishment for letting his anger towards muzan cloud his judgement

it could have symbolized literally anything about him losing his humanity as he got stronger

but those three things are just scenarios from my head, they dont exist in this series just based off of what weve seen from these two chapters

its disappointing

the only thing keeping this from getting a 0 is the one part where inosuke couldnt chop off tanjirou’s head bc he cared about him too much

that at least shows inosuke had grown as a character

everything else is just meaningless and convoluted garbage and “convoluted” is not what you should be aiming for if this is supposed to be the ending of your series

IN SUMMARY

early kny is very good, later kny is questionable and the ending is just a mess of wasted potential and disappointment

i get why gotouge had to have the transparent world ability, crimson blade ability, and the demon marks appear before they all appeared on yoriichi but theyre all just so underdeveloped and terribly handled in the battles they are used, it makes me want to kick a wall

like lmao, i could literally think of so many ways they could have been properly integrated, hell, im even writing a whole goddamn rewrite using my ideas for these three things (link to that is in my pinned)

just, god

if you want to debate over these ratings, my ask box is open ig? idk

#kny #kimetsu no yaiba #kny meta #demon slayer #my writing #long post

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lovenhlboys · 3 years

Text

From A Distance (E.Pettersson X Reader)

Chapter 3

Masterlist

Get added to taglist

A/N: Hellooooo there!!! here is the next chapter, sorry it took me so long, I hope the others will not take nearly as long!! anyways, I really hope you like it and lmk what you think PLEASE!!! Also biggest thanks to Ash cause like, why not, she’s helped me with this and literally everything😂😂

ALSO this one is from both of their POVs, so the change in POV is signalized by:

Y/N= regular ELIAS= italics

(any other info is on the masterlist)

Warnings: lots of cursing, mentions of Pretty Little Liars, another attempt at Swedish (if its wrong pls lmk) I think thats it, if you think I missed a warning please inform me!!!

Summary: Brock has a plan... he executes it.

Word Count: 2.7k

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< ———————— >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

---------------

PRESENT (thoughts) ---------------

For you, your hardcore crush on Elias was very secretive. Only you, Quinn, and Marky know about it and you are not about to tell anyone else. Elias, he’s so funny, his humor is the exact same as yours and he never fails to make you laugh, even though he barely talks to you. He makes fun of your brother, just like you, and is extremely quick-witted with his comebacks.

And as for Elias, he's the only one who knows about his feelings, because he has worked hard to suppressed them. She has the best laugh. Elias tries his hardest to make her laugh whenever he can because every time he hears it makes his chest fill with warmth.

He has the best style and it’s so fun to see what he wears. Every once in a while there are a few questionable items, but overall, he always looks great. You love to see that he’s willing to take those fashionable risks. It’s better than what every other hockey player wears. The go-to of shorts and a t-shirt with a beanie.

She looks amazing in everything that she wears without even trying. She could be in a dirty sweatshirt and sweatpants and he would still think she was the most beautiful girl he's ever seen. Her hair, her shoulders, the curve of her hips and back, all of it was perfect. But his favorite thing had to be her legs, they went on for days and the contour of her muscles was so beautiful to him. Safe to say any day she wore shorts, Elias had to try extra hard not to stare.

He has the most beautiful face you've ever known. His jawline was immaculate, like nothing you'd ever seen. His light golden blonde hair was so unique and it reflected the light in the prettiest way, at every angle. His smile, while dorky, was also something you couldn't stop yourself from staring at, always making you smile too, at how adorable he looked when he was happy.

She is totally off-limits.

He doesn’t like you.

---------------

PRESENT

---------------

You loved your brother, but my god could he be stupid sometimes. He’d texted you TWENTY minutes ago to meet him in the break room and he still wasn’t there. You’d texted him 7 times and he hadn’t responded. You had started to text him an eighth time when the door opened.

“There you ar- Oh. Hi Elias, what’re you doing here?” instead of your brother, like you had thought, it was the gorgeous swede, wearing a pair of glasses that complemented all of his features, a light blue sweatshirt, a backwards snapback, and a nice pair of black sweatpants...needless to say he looked quite sexy. Especially compared to you, you were wearing one of Quinn’s Canucks sweatshirts (that you definitely didn't steal), leggings, you had your hair up, you didn't have any makeup on so you looked, well, not sexy (in your opinion).

“Uh, hi Y/N, um is Brock here?” he asked as he closed the door behind him and looked around the room.

“No, he told me to meet him here like 20 minutes ago and he still isn’t here,” you said.

“Weird, he told me to meet him here like 15 minutes ago,” Elias explained.

You shake your head and laugh, knowing exactly what’s happening.

“What?” he asked, reasonably confused as to what’s going on.

“Elias can you do something for me?” you asked, he nodded. “Go try and open that door, please,” you instructed him.

He walked up and just like you were thinking, the door didn’t move.

You laughed again then shouted, “OH, FUCK YOU BOESER!!”

“What’s happening right now?” Elias said tugging at the door still.

“Brock is a FUCKING CHILD is what’s happening, he locked us in.”

“What? Why?”

“Who knows?” you, that’s who. You knew precisely why Brock would want to lock the two of you in together. Because his best friend didn’t like you and he wanted the two of you to get along. You pulled this trick on Brock and his friend Julia, in high school when they had a big fight.

“Well, how long will he keep us in here?” Elias questioned.

“Why, do you have somewhere to be?” you asked him.

“No, I’m just wondering.”

“Don’t want to be alone with me that long?” You said with a laugh, even though you weren’t joking (he didn’t have to know that).

“What? No, why would you think that?” he seemed genuinely upset at your suggestion.

“I don’t. It’s just- never mind” you stopped yourself.

“Y/N, what is it?” he pushed.

“I don’t know,” you said, then you gave in to his request, “it’s just that you never want to be alone with me, and you never talk to me, I just assumed you didn’t like me”

Elias let out a loud laugh and sat down next to you on the couch, “Why wouldn’t I like you? You’re my best friend’s little sister.”

“Well let’s see the evidence shall we…”

You went on to describe the events of the summer party at Bo’s house in August of 2019. The night you felt confirmed your suspicions that the swede didn’t like you.

---------------

FLASHBACK

---------------

It was early August so you were wearing a white short-sleeved blouse with pink flowers, and a white denim mini skirt. You and Brock had arrived late because Brock was trying to get his hair all “floofy and perfect”

As you walked in, you said hi to everyone, made your rounds of greetings. Once you finished, you ended up right where you thought you would, talking with Thatcher and Troy. As you were talking, you made eye contact with Elias across the room and waved at him. But he didn’t wave back or smile or nod like you were expecting, he rolled his eyes and turned around.

---------------

PRESENT

---------------

Elias stopped you there

“Wait wait wait, that’s is not what happened” he dismissed your details of the story.

“Yes, it is! I waved and you looked so annoyed!” you insisted.

“Ok, this is what I remember...”

---------------

FLASHBACK

---------------

Elias was talking to Brock about God knows what. Brock was in the middle of talking when he glanced over and saw Y/N, Troy, and Thatcher all talking to each other. He was looking at Troy who was pointing at Y/N and Thatcher making kissy faces. Implying what he was afraid of: Thatcher and Y/N were together in some way. So yeah, he rolled his eyes and turned around, because he was a little hurt and a lot jealous. (though that's not exactly what he told you)

---------------

PRESENT

---------------

“I rolled my eyes and turned around because I thought It was so ridiculous to think that you would ever like Dems,” liar, “like I thought Stech was being stupid, that would make no sense YOU liking HIM,” he laughed, he’s a lying liar who lies. Though he did think that wasn’t even possible. Having seen how annoyed she gets around Thatcher now, the thought that she’d ever like him in a way that was anything more than ‘annoying friend that I have to deal with’ Seemed inconceivable. She is so far out of his league it’s not even funny.

You didn’t say anything, just looked down at your feet. The boy you have a very hardcore crush on right now is talking about his good friend that you had a minor crush on back then.

Elias could apparently tell you weren’t telling him something “...Y/N”

“Mhmm” you hummed, still no eye contact.

“What is it?”

“Uhh, so, here’s the thing,” you said sounding quite guilty, “I may or may not have, you know, hadacrushonthatcher… back then” you mumbled.

Elias was silent for about 5 seconds and it felt like you had died and come back to life within those seconds. “I’m sorry, did I hear that right?”

“I don’t know,” you turned to the door, “hey Brock, now that you’ve humiliated me, may we leave? I would like to go home and wallow in my self-pity.”

“No, wait Y/N. It’s fine, why does it matter? You don’t like him now?” he correctly assumed.

“God no, ew,” you scoffed.

“Ok, so why does it matter?” he genuinely wanted to know.

“It doesn’t, I guess. I just don’t want you to think I like him is all” God he’s going to figure it out.

“Yeah, no. I’ve seen how annoying he is'' Elias replied. Thinking the only reason she didn’t want him to know was that you liked a certain friend of his. The other Swede in the group. Since the incident at Brock and Y/N’s place, he has come to learn that they aren’t together, he’s familiar with the term “cuddle buddies” now which doesn’t make any sense. But he can’t deny how Y/N and Jacob act around each other. Sure, Quinn explained that they don’t think of each other as anything more than that. He even said that Marky goes on dates all the time. Even still, he knows he’ll never be the one Y/N has her eyes on, and even if she went crazy and did think of him that way, he could never act on it. Brock would kill him, and as he keeps having to remind himself: his friendship and on-ice chemistry is too important to risk.

“Yeah well, Marky’s great too,” he said, pulling your attention from the way he looked in those glasses, and that hat...damn.

“...Yeaaaah?” you said, suddenly quite confused as to where he was going with this. You nodded your head, wordlessly telling him to continue.

“And, uh, I think he’s great… really…. great'' he almost seemed annoyed by what he was saying. More importantly, you were extremely lost.

“Elias, stop being vague. You're confusing me,” you said plainly.

“What Y/N, do you not know what I'm getting at?” he said, assuming you knew what he meant, continuing to stay all vague and Swedish.

“Obviously not,” you rolled your eyes and looked back at his still annoyed face.

“You and Marky? I think he's great...you know…” he paused and took a deep breath, then mumbled, “for you”

You burst out laughing, “Elias Fredrik Pettersson”

“Fredrik?” he whispered to himself with a smirk at the way you said his full name.

“I’m not dating, nor do I want to date Jacob Markstrom.”

“Yeah right,” he said in his classic sarcastic tone.

“I don't! Our personalities clash so bad! Have you not noticed that?” you shouted trying to make it clear to him.

“I mean, I don't know” his face was turning red at his seemingly wrong and laughable accusation.

“Ok, Elias, look at me,” he did with his goddamn beautiful eyes, “Think about it,” you told him.

And he did as you said.

---------------

FLASHBACK

---------------

One night, in particular, stood out, it was about 4 weeks ago and the Canucks were on the road. Quinn and Elias were sitting on Quinn’s bed. The door burst open, Y/N ran in, Jacob following close behind.

Y/N sat next to Quinn and tucked her head into his neck.

“Woah, Y/N/N what’s wrong?” Quinn held her head and hit pause on the episode of Pretty Little Liars they were in the middle of watching. Elias turned and watched the events, knowing he’s most likely going to just be an observer for the rest of this interaction

She pulled her head out of Quinn’s neck. At this point all of them were sitting up, Jacob on his bed, the other three all on Quinn’s, “Marky is an ASS,” she said, looking directly at Marky.

“I am not, she’s being a drama queen,” he defended himself.

“I’m sorry have you met her?” Quinn laughed, “She’s literally the complete opposite of a drama queen”

“Fine, ask her what happened then” Jacob gestured at Y/N.

“Y/N/N” Quinn asked her to continue.

“Well” she started, “this dumbass Giraffe tried to get me to talk to the ever so beautiful Gabriel Landeskog.”

“How is that so horrible, he’s such a nice guy?” Jacob seemed genuinely confused.

“I’m not social Marky!! I don't do that, he so hot and I looked like an idiot.”

“No, you didn’t. oh my god,” Jacob said, rolling his eyes. “du är precis som Elias (you are just like Elias)”

“aj (ouch)”

“God, I hate it when you guys do that” Quinn whispered.

Y/N continued, “JACOB, I said, and I QUOTE, ‘Woah, damn’ and then stood there staring at him like an IDIOT”

“You did not?” Quinn said, laughing.

“Huggy, I swear to god, I will slap you” she turned and looked at Quinn with legit murder in her eyes.

“Ok, but yeah, Marky you don’t do that shit to Y/N. She’s just like me, we don’t socialize well.”

“I don’t get it, like I know you’d rather stay in when I want to go out, I just didn’t think it was this bad.”

“Fuuuuuuuuck,” she said, shoving her hands in her hair, “I looked so stupid. And did I mention HE’S HOT”

“Wow, you really have a thing for Swedes, huh?” Quinn quipped.

Her eyes widened. “Quinn Hughes, shut the actual fuck up” she shoved the giggling defenseman. Quinn just stayed laying down and continued to laugh, he then looked at Jacob with a knowing glance and a grin, and Marky giggled. Elias assumed it was because Jacob was aware of Y/N’s feelings.

Elias had been observing this interaction from afar, afar meaning about 2 feet away on the opposite side of the bed. He completely agreed with her, if he was shoved into an uncomfortable situation with someone he’s never met, he’d act just about as stupid as she did. And even he had to admit, Gabe Landeskog is hot as FUCK.

“Ok, Y/C/N/N, I’m sorry. But I didn’t know it was that bad. Side note, how come all of my close friends except for like 3 are super antisocial. I mean look in this room. You three are the exact same.”

“Wow… this right here, THIS is why you are only good for hugging” she gets up and walks over to the other bed where Marky is sitting.

“You’re so sweet to me, you know that?” sarcasm evident in his tone, he hugs her.

“Marky, you know I’m not sweet.”

---------------

PRESENT

---------------

Elias grinned to himself at that. She was right, she’s not sweet. She’s not mean but she surely isn’t sweet. Just like him. And she was the perfect amount of smartass, beautiful, loving, funny, antisocial, tough, and strong. She was literally everything he could’ve wanted.

Before he let himself get too lost in that thought of her again, he responded “ok, yeah I guess.”

“Didn’t Quinn tell you that I don't like Marky like 10 times?”

“Yeah, but I just- the way you guys act around each other. It just would make sense.”

“Well, now you know.”

Silence filled the room once more, you looked over at Elias. he was smiling and looking down at his hands. You continued to be mesmerized by just how beautiful the boy in front of you looked. With his backwards snap back and sweats, it seemed as though he had just thrown on a random outfit, and to anyone else that was probably what they would think. But that didn't matter to you, he was just so pretty and it filled your brain with too many thoughts. thoughts that you knew you shouldn't be having about him because he clearly wasn't your biggest fan. But that got you thinking even more (which is dangerous), he was acting different, it seemed as though he had let his guard down. He's never done that with you, in fact it felt like when you were around him, his guard was reinforced. He looked a little softer, sweeter, the guy you met at the Dice-and-Ice gala, you think. All you wanted was for that guard to stay down, giving you access to the guy you had a crush on, not just his hard outer shell.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< ———————— >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

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heavenaintaniceplace · 3 years

Text

so i found my mother’s copy of the jw (new world translation) bible and i decided to yoink that shit for disposal but not before i realized there is a lot of lines highlighted in the book from when she was being manipulated by the jw lady that convinced her to do “bible study” for years. and what do you know if the lines the lady had my mother highlight weren’t the same lines that jws use to justify their cult beliefs! all the lines are cherry picked, no actual study, just the lady manipulating and priming her to accept their beliefs by presenting so called “biblical proof.” so here is some of the things that stand out before i finally rip this thing to shreds and through it away.

literally the whole book replaces every instance of the tetagrammaton with “jehovah” because they want people to believe its been “removed from the bible thousands of times because they don’t want you to know the true name of god”. the whole thing is translated with an agenda to make them look right and everyone else wrong and to make people believe they have some secret hidden knowledge (they don’t they’re liars). putting this under a read more because its very long.

heavy TW for everything related ro religious trauma, the jehovah’s witnesses, bible passages and christianity. incredibly long post. i plan on burning the jehovah’s witness copy of the bible, no joke.

the imago dei part of genesis to try and convince her that humans were super special to god

genesis chapter 3, the serpent convincing eve to eat the fruit of knowledge so that she would accept their version of the original sin doctrine and that women are cursed

chapter where cain kills abel to convince her that this was the first murder in human history (obviously incorrect)

highlighted the part where god kills everything on earth with a flood to groom her into expecting god to do it again later and seen as fair and just and part where god “gives” noah every living creature (because fuck other organisms apparently)

part of leviticus where (in their version) theyre like “no soul must eat blood” (what the fuck) to justify not allowing life saving blood transfusions

deuteronomy part about “jehovah being one” to justify being non trinitarian (they don’t believe jesus is god or that the holy spirit is god, this is meant to lure people who are already christians away from their denoms and into theirs)

“thou shall not kill” is highlighted for some reason and i don’t know why

highlighted job 1:12 to emphasize that they believe satan is in control of the world because god allows it and job 26:7 that has a note saying “the earth hangs there” when talking about sheol to convince her of where earth is relative to “heaven” and using a bunch of “face of the waters” creationist language to make it vague as possible. job 27:5 to make her believe that “no one is righteous” and that saying so is sinful

part in psalms that assures that “wicked people will be no more if you just wait a little while longer” (this is the apocalypse imminent narrative they use to groom people with fear of dying or leaving but also to get them warmed up to the idea of mass death). “the righteous will inherit the earth and live forever” narrative so they believe that jws will live on earth forever after being resurrected while everyone else (whos not a jw) is killed by god

psalms 91 to drive home the fact that these people think theyre invincible in every meaning of the word, to natural disasters and disease etc

proverbs 6 part about “false witnesses”. jws believe that three jehovah’s witnesses have to be present to verify that a crime (like domestic or sexual abuse) actually happened or the governing body and elders don’t care. literally. the “false witness” narrative is used against survivors and people they want to silence in their organization and emphasizes how much jehovah hates “false witnesses” aka people brave enough to talk and victims

proverbs 12:18 about “wise and unwise tongues”, basically anyone that speaks out against the jws are “unwise” and harmful

proverbs 22 about raising children (”train up a child”, if you don’t know it already this is a child abuser dog whistle) that implies that indoctrination will last until adulthood if done right. this is especially bad because this copy is from the early 2000s when i was in kindergarten. this woman had been lurking on us since i was an infant.

proverbs 27 about how neighbors near is better than brothers far away. the implication here is that fundamentally family who aren’t jws don’t matter

ecclesiates 5. i genuinely think its warning people to not ask too much of god or risk his anger, thats the vibe im getting here because the wording is confusing as fuck

isiah 40:22 trying to hammer in the notion that god is greater than anything especially “worldly” governments (except the governing body ofc /s). isiah 43:10 the “you are my witnesses” to justify the name “jehovah’s witnesses” and shoehorn the idea in

daniel 2:40, the idea of an indescribable kingdom, the whole kingdoms in the “last days” conspiracy they use to convince people the “last days” are coming

matthew 4:8 where jesus is persuaded by satan by offering every kingdom on earth. the point in text is “don’t worship anyone except god” but the point of the jws is that nothing on earth actually matters

matthew 6:9 (nice), the our father, meant to make the reader to ask god to hasten the kingdom of god or as we ex-jws know hasten the apocalypse and the death of people they dont like

matthew 16:24, meant to convince people to leave everything behind and join the jws, “disown yourself” aka “die to yourself” toxic bullshit repackaged

matthew 19:9, to convince people that divorce even in instances of domestic abuse is wrong because the governing body won’t allow it and loves to control women

matthew 24:4-14, “anyone who doesnt speak for the jws is a false prophet” and warms people up to the notion that war is necessary; also that evidence of war is a sign of the “last days” and that this is supposed to be good news. ongoing war and the hope for global genocide is “good news” to them.

matthew 24:21. this one is meant to make people feel the apocalypse could happen at any time and to be afraid of it, a great war is coming and only the “chosen ones” (jehovah’s witnesses) will survive when everyone else dies. there’s a paper bookmark on this page. makes me wonder.

mark 8:34. the “die to yourself” bullshit, the idea that the cross was a “torture stake” because jws believe that wearing crosses is idolatry and they want other people to believe their quirky beliefs so they accept heavier things

matthew 10:28, “anyone who follows jehovah and jesus will literally live forever!” but also that “no one is prepared to leave their family for jesus and thats shameful because you should want to sacrifice your entire family!”

mark 11:24 “anything you pray for earnestly you get”. this is spiritual bypassing btw. and :25 “ask for forgiveness and be automatically forgiven no matter what you did” is also fucked

matthew 15-23: jesus (almost) gets wasted while being crucified etc, not sure why this one is highlighted unless im missing some jw bullshit here

luke 20:27. don’t understand this one but they’re threatening “heavier judgement” on people

john 5:28, promising resurrection through jesus after people die but only for the Good tm people (the jws)

john 6:15. how jesus is about to be arrested but goes to a mountain. dunno why this on is underlined

john 11:24. bringing home the same “jesus will save you from dying if youre a jw” bullshit. john 14:6 “jesus is the ONLY way ever! there can’t be anything else except jesus” indoctrination tailored to make you co-dependent. john 17:3, hook line and sinker of promising resurrection and “eternal life” again

john 17:15. here is the “we aren’t of the World tm” shit meant to make you feel outcast from everyone else who isnt a jw, setting up “the world” (everyone else) as other

acts 15:25. “follow the jw rules because the holy spirit you to”

romans 10:10, spread jw beliefs and witness as much as possible. romans 12:9 “hate everything jehovah hates so you’re not a hypocrite” basically means hate other people the jws don’t approve of

corinthians 6:9 (nice but not so nice this time) “anyone we don’t like won’t inherit the earth” translation: anyone we don’t like won’t survive the apocalypse thats definitely happening soon so always be afraid. “homosexuals” are changed to “men kept for unnatural purposes for this one.” still homophobic.

corinthians 7:6, the idea that everyone has a gift that needs to be exploited and used by the jws

corinthians 15:33. “don’t participate in any activities with any outsiders because it will lead you away from jehovah!! fun is ‘drunkenness’, you’ll loose your resurrection if you do!! non jw people are bad influences!!”

2 corinthians 7:1. your body and flesh is defiled, you need to be cleansed in order to be good

galatians 5:20. “having human emotions is sinful! struggling is sinful! being angry is sinful! having a bad day is sinful!” basically that being human is inherently wrong or something

ephesians 3:14. tries to make people believe everything is owed to god only and that obedience is good so they fall for cult power structures later. 4:28 here is just the top of the page being labeled “new personality” and thats all we need to know about indoctrination and cult personality vs actual personality. also “let not the sun set with you in a provoked state” being used against people still angry about being wronged and hurt by others and its been used against me a lot of times

ephesians 6:4. make sure the jw fathers provide the most discipline to children, literally uses the phrase “mental regulating of jehovah”. it couldn’t be more cult like at this point.

timothy 5:8 makes people believe that men alone are expected to provide and if they don’t they’re worse than “those without faith”. no pressure though!

timothy 6:19. wants people to neglect everything actually happening in favor of the “real life” (”eternal life”) instead and to constantly prepare for that instead of actually living life. dedicate your whole life to jw activities

titus 2. women need to be subjects to their husbands but also homemakers, live to glorify their husband, chaste and definitely not mentally ill or showing any symptoms. what the fuck is titus i never heard of this shit until today.

hebrews 1:7-14, trying to convince people that angels live to serve god but also has some superseccsionist/replacement theology (antisemitism) vibes going on

james 2:23, wants people to believe that god “putting people to the test” is actually a way to become “jehovah’s friend” and that being put to the test (read: suffering) is actually a good thing because it primes them to accept suffering as their fault later on. james 4:7 “everything evil will vanish if you rebuke it long enough!!”

peter 3:9 the “god’s timing is always right” gospel bs and encourages people not to do things themselves but to wait and also that jehovah will be on time when its time to start another global genocide. how encouraging! peter 3:13, the same “end of world near” scare tactic, “new heavens new earth” promise to eradicate everyone the jws dont like as that is jehvoah’s “promise” to the witnesses

1 john 3:8, their version of the original sin doctrine, the devil is the source of all evil scare tactic etc

short detour: every instance of “servant” is replaced with “slave” in this version. it makes me feel ill.

revelations 7:16, wants people to believe that god will take away all their pain and that they won’t need food or water to survive anymore (bullshit). also the jehovah’s witness 144,000 chosen people bullshit is here too but not highlighted

revelations 12:7-13, a depiction fo michael drop kicking satan and the implication that satan has always been in charge and not god because they want people to believe that. also that the devil will fall to earth and try to eat jws

revalations 14-4: virgins get dibs on heaven and god i guess. i dont know what the fuck is going on. 14:6 an angel yelling fear god from above, probably where the jws get most of their apocalyptic imagery from that they use to scare children into believing they could die at any minute

so now that we finally got to the end of that mess, their version of revalations ends with jesus saying “yes, i am coming quickly” and “may the undeserved kindness of jesus christ be with the holy ones.”

joking aside, everything highlighted in this copy of this book has been used against me and my mother for years and is a huge part of the reason i have religious trauma now. everything she was told or encouraged to highlight aided jehovah’s witness indoctrination and propaganda, her own indoctrination and eventually mine which apparently started even earlier than i thought.

#ex christian #haanp.txt #ex jehovah's witness #ex jw #exvangelical #religious trauma

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wetalkedaboutthisshinji · 3 years

Text

More Jojolion Long ass texts

TOTAL SPOLERS TO THE LAST CHAPTER

I just have lots of thoughts about recent Jojolion revelations.

It took me a while but I think I´m finally at peace with the fact that the Calamity Arc was 90% sure the climactic Jojolion arc and that Tooru is Part 8´s entrance to the Jojo Big Bad Gallery TM, a supervillain group truly on the level of the Disney Villains. I´m only half joking lol.

It hurts bc I was (and still am) a strong believer on Big Bad Kaato. I LOVED the idea of a female Big Bad, especially one that gray and I was very curious about seeing her stand in a Stand Battle.I love evil ladies and that blinded me�� I don´t even think Araki chickened out or anything, but that Big Bad Kaato clearly was never the idea for the story he had. Still, Kaato´s scenes, while too short, were damm cool, and Space Truckin´is a damm cool stand, but I still wish we had seen it more. I wonder if it could be used offensively? It at least can trap people from a distance, which is very useful. Im so angry bc its power was sooooo good for some JJBA weird moves, but alas.

One thing I love about Jojolion is that it completely goes against the normal tropes of a shonen/seinen battle manga in that most of the characters are just....people. It really is a Twin Peaks TM plot with more fighting. With the exception of the Rock Humans and Jousuke most of the characters are, like, some guy from town, at worst kinda shady and mean. We have housewives, a model, a divorcee, local businessowners, some doctors and an oddly viscious agriculture university student. Of couse Part 4, which Jojolion mirrors, had some of that, but IMO you really get more of a sense of normalcy on Jojolion, maybe bc Araki changed his way of writing a lot, maybe because Jojolion is more of an ensemble story, maybe because it´s less episodic. So you take these randos and give them superpowers and involve them in fights against supernatural beings and I think that´s part of the reason why the fights are so quick and to the point. Characters like Mitsuba or Kaato are really just normal people that happen to have stands so it makes sense for them not to do the whole strategic Stand Battle. And it bought us some awesome moments. Looking back maybe there were a bit too many “this character looked helpless but NO” but damm if it didn´t hype me up when reading it.

So, yeah, Kaato had her role, did her thing, and got Kei’d. And she was never evil, but rather, like Jobin, more morally gray and she died a martyr. And I wish both had more to do, but the part is long and Araki clearly wanted it to be a 3-way conflict with a clearer villain.....

evil twink Tooru.

Ngl I was at first really against Tooru and wanted him to be just a big antagonist and not THE big bad. After I calmed down and reread some past chapters I feel much more appreciative. I like how he really has a different dynamic, being a "mistery villain" but in a different way to Pucci or Diavolo. He really looks harmless and Araki clearly worked HARD with the misdirections. Theres a reason there were some fools (like me) still arguing against him being tbe antagonist. I checked his intro again back on the Doctor Wu fight and I really like how totally whatever the scene is the first time around. He absolutely could have been a minor character. Rereading it the whole thing is SO ominous AND everything Tooru says has a double meaning. I also like that his oddness can be chalked up to being a romantic rival to Jousuke, which threw off lots of folk (likeAs for WOU I'm also starting to like the fight more and more. The power over causality def is on the same level as power over time or space and I like how the characters are forced to think of loopholes and try out different ways to hurt him, playing with his "kill list" and such. I also like that WOU has limitations and that the Dr. and Tooru have to work with them to be deadlier, which makes them both so much smarter. I KINDA dislike how at the end he turned out to be so stupidly poweful that only Go Beyond can hurt him, which is not the worst Deus Ex Machina (Jousuke had to "figure" out his own stand --thats kinda symbolic for someone with duch a complex identity) but its a bit cheap for a 20+ fight.

Of course the real insanity is how unique of a stand WOU is. I dont think we had ever seen a stand this autonomous and smart? In my opinion thats what makes the fight so unique and Tooru so powerful. Its only balanced stat-wise in that neither Tooru or his stand buddy looks particularly powerful offensive or defensive wise in a conventional fight. Not that they needed it. Cant help but wonder how the hell could they add Tooru as a fighter if theres another JJBA fighting game. Maybe a double fighter?

Finally you gotta love the Magritte (hope im spelling it right) references with the doctor. Araki clearly was having fun and it added some "classic art" thing to the part. Kaato's attack and all of calamity also looked great, if we ever see Jojolion animated Im sure it will be a feast for the eyes.

Ofc maybe all this bs means nothing if Araki does pull a 180° next chapter. But thats the Jojo experience.

If anyone´s interested in this, how do you feel Tooru and WOU stack up against the other Jojo Big Bads?

#jjba #jojolion #tooru #kaato higashikata

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buckysbest · 3 years

Text

IT WAS GOOD UNTIL IT WASN'T

CHAPTER TWO: CAN I?

PAIRING: Steve Rogers x Reader

Series Warnings: NSFW TOPICS, Manipulative/Toxic tendencies, sad boi steve rogers, cheating, alcohol

Series Summary: Heartbreak follows her everywhere and Steve Rogers is nothing but the latest victim, at least thats what she thought? Now she can't shake the feeling of him no matter where she goes.

Word count: 1.8K

A/N: Hey lovelies! Sorry I haven't been posting much, I am have just had a lot going on the past few weeks. I absolutely adore all of you (@lookiamtrying im talking to you extra) and I cant wait to see what you guys think!

ps sorry for any typos lol I really wanted to give you guys something today

Series Masterlist coming soon // Masterlist Coming soon

You could pretend you weren't petty and you could pretend he didn't have your blood boiling, but you knew you’d only be lying to yourself. At the sound of her voice, your stomach had dropped practically through the pavement and you were pissed.

Your “vacation” in Miami now officially cut short as you found yourself leaning back into your increasingly uncomfortable plane seat. You drummed your nails on the back of your phone as you began to actually consider the consequences that would follow the impulse purchase of your ticket.

You knew you shouldn't go back. You knew what kind of message this sent.

It practically screamed your need for attention from your boy in red, white, and blue while also displaying the jealousy you couldn't quite push down for all yo see

But you just couldn't help yourself.

If he was going to disrupt your plans this heavily, the least you could do is return the favor.

The sun was just rising over the wing of the aircraft as the flight attendants made their final rounds and speeches to the nearly empty plane. The pounding headache from your night of partying was only worsened as the roar of the engines seemed to get louder and louder. In an attempt to mitigate the pain, you pushed the power button on your phone and shoved it into the seat pocket beside you. Your head found the back of the seat with a small groan as your frustration with yourself only grew.

In need of some peace, you let your tired and heavy eyes drape shut. Much to your dismay, they only provided a screen for the tortuous highlight reel of his hands on your body to play upon.

This was going to be a long flight.

---

As the wheels of the plane finally landed, you quickly gathered your limited belongings and headed straight for the exit. Your rushed departure from Miami couldn't have been more obvious to the other passengers and pedestrians around you. The early morning business class was filled mostly with people in professional wear which provided a stark contrast to your, albeit, slutty and glittering minidress.

Your heels echoed throughout the airport with each step toward the exit of the building, disrupting the stillness of the morning. As you finally crossed the threshold into the fresh air, your driver waved you down excitedly. The pain in your head worsened once again as your agitation grew and you slid on your sunglasses with an eye roll.

“Miss. Y/N, it is really so lovely to see you, we all missed you so much! Your father was incredibly excited that you decided to come home early!”

As you walked further from the building, he rushed around you, gathering your belongings from you as he continued to sprinkle you with unnecessary compliments.

“Mhm, yeah, Thomas, that's really lovely- truly, do you mind though, can we just skip home and just go to the penthouse please?”

The request surprised him a bit, probably because your father prepared him for a different sight exiting the airport. Instead of a burnt out party-girl chomping at the bit for the comforts of home, he was met with a hungover and irritable heiress already smothered over her newly acquired lack of freedom.

The serenity of the ride into the city allowed you a moment of reflection as hints of guilt began to pool in the bottom of your stomach. While your attitude didn't completely improve, you did feel bad for the way you had spoken to Thomas because in all fairness, the limo was far warmer and comforting than the unwelcoming New York air and you knew he was simply doing his job.

The tension in the vehicle seemed to diffuse a little as you got closer to your apartment. Your eyes and energy had rather refocused on the real reason for your return as you turned to your phone, staring at the messages Steve had left you.

3:15 (We’ll talk in the morning, ok?)

3:20 (Sweetheart, look, if it's really important, I can stay up for a bit longer)

4:00 (did you at least get home safe?)

5:00 (doll, you're making me nervous, please just let me know your safe)

You bit your lip in concentration but your eyes were drawn away from your phone before you could craft a response as the car found itself coming to a slow stop. Thomas made his way to your door, opening it and offering you a hand as you stepped out and took in the building. After the all-too-long ride up the elevator, your mind was settled as you entered your top floor home. It was just how you had left it two months ago and it felt good to be back.

“Just a moment thomas, I just need to get changed”

Thomas awkwardly dismissed himself back to the car as you walked into your bedroom and subsequent closet. You paused under your closet archway briefly to finally type the response you had been thinking over.

8:00 am ( can I come over? or do you have company)

Your nails met your lips as you nervously awaited his response.

8:00 am (wait what? are you home already?)

8:00 am (you know you can come over anytime )

A smile grew on your lips at his timely response. Your hands rummaged through the variety of drawers lining the walls of your wardrobe before stopping to feel the lace of a white set of lingerie you knew he couldn't resist. Sliding it on, your eyes gel onto the perfect outfit for your intended purposes.

The black velvet top and matching skirt hugged your body in a way that should be illegal while your diamond-studded pumps found their way onto the floor replaced by equally stunning white pumps. They rubbed slightly on the blisters you had acquired in the past week as you quickly made your way back out the door after grabbing your handbag from the couch.

‘He lived right down the street’ you repeated to yourself as traffic dragged what should have been a five minute ride into a fifteen minute endeavor.

The anticipation of being reunited began to expose itself as your skin began to glisten and an excited glow rose onto your face. Before Thomas could even put the car fully in park, you had already opened the door, saying a quick don't wait up before slamming the door shut.

Your legs couldn't seem to move quick enough as you walked through the hallways until you reached his door. Your heels must have given your arrival away because before your knuckles could even knock on the door, he swung it open and pulled you into a tight embrace.

“I am so glad you're safe”

His warm breath tickled your neck as he mumbled the soft words into your hair. A small smile found its way onto your face at the notion before you raised yourself onto your tippy toes, whispering back an “I missed you”.

You could feel the silence and comfort in everyone of your muscles as they relaxed into the man you knew all too well. You turned around, stepping into the threshold of his home without breaking the strong grip that he still had on you. Taking the small note, he released you slightly, pulling his large frame through the door as well before he shut it gently. His eyes softened as they met yours for the first time in two months.

“What are you doing home?” A small smile raised onto his face as you took another step into him, laying your head on his chest.

“I already told you, I missed you,” you replied as his hands that laid respectfully on your lower back were lowered by your own mischievous hands. You placed a soft kiss beneath his ear, “Did you miss me too Cap?”

A small groan left his mouth at the nickname and you knew you were close to getting what you wanted.

You lead his hands once again lower, this time to the bottom of your skirt, prompting him to slide it up a bit. Your hands finally left his as you reached them up around his neck and leaned in.

His lips met yours halfway in a movement that could only be described as desperate.

The slow and agonizing pace that he had tried to set for you was now gone as he patted your thighs and you jumped. He carried you to his bedroom, tossing you onto the bed and crawling on top of you.

His mouth then began to make its way down the side of your neck, eliciting a loud moan from your painted lips. A satisfied smirk momentarily appeared on his face as he lifted his eyes to meet yours. They seemed to search your eyes for a moment before they broke away from yours with a small frown. His hovering form came down as he placed his head on your chest with a groan.

“What's wrong cap?” you joked slightly as you ran your hands through his hair.

“Steve?”

“I can’t do this doll.” His sweet eyes raised to meet yours and you could immediately tell they were filled to the brim with guilt.

“Of course you can Ste-”

“You don’t understand y/n,” he said with a deep sigh before pulling himself further back and standing up. He began to pace slightly as he continued with a frustrated groan, “I- fuck- “

Your eyes widened at the uncharacteristic language and behavior of your golden boy as his eyes met yours once again. “I-I finally found someone who will give me what you cant y/n.” He paused momentarily, as if being hit by the recoil of the gun he had just fired into your heart. “She, She really sees a future with me doll and, and I-I can't just throw that all away for nothing” he says. His words and his eyes were laced with propositions and it really appears like he's trying to convince himself more than you.

Nonetheless, your heart dropped to your stomach and you could feel tears threatening to brim at your eyes. “Nothing? Am I nothing to you Steve?”

“Oh- of course no- I didn't mean it like that,” he sighed as he quickly walked back over to you.

You extended an arm out before pulling him back onto the bed and flipping him over. Straddling his hips, you leaned down and laid into his chest. His arms once again found their way around you, if only because of muscle memory. You held this embrace for a moment before sighing out your own proposition.

“I’ll go Steve… I’ll go and leave forever if you really want…. Just tell me..” You leaned your head up slightly to meet his ear and whispered,

“Is that what you really want?”

#marvel masterlist #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers one shot #steve rogers smut #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers #steve rogers x you #self insert #x reader #steve rogers series

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