#translation: crush of the nation/class

[harrysarchive]

A request where Harry styles is a college football star student who has a crush on his single sexy proffesor, reader. One day, reader asked him to see after class

after class: h.s.

pairing: fratboy!harry x professor!reader

summary:

"i can tell you like the thought of this rendezvous with me." i smirk and she gasp.

"that is very inappropriate mr. styles."

or

fratboy harry has a hot professor and she calls him in after class.

warning:

SMUT 18+ PLEASE

p.s.a i didn't write the exact request but this is what i felt comfortable writing! thank you for the request! <3

𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐘'𝐒

𝐏𝐎𝐕

i let out an exaggerated sigh as i make my way to english literature, introduction to romantic poetry was the lesson of the week. at least the professor is bangin' hot. thick thighs, amazing curves and what looks like a d-cup set nicely on her chest.

professor y/l/n.

she was a recent graduate of the University of Georgia, the current school i was attending. a full ride football scholarship, i was the best wide receiver in the nation, uni's form all states where trying to pull me. i made the decision to attend UGA on logistics, the best football team in all the states, currently undefeated.

"you ready to see our professor?" niall snaps me out of my thoughts wiggling his eyebrows.

"bloody hell, yes. i don't think i could thank my advisor more for forcing me to do this class." i snicker and he chuckles shaking his head.

"tell me 'bout it." he comments licking his lips and i scrunch my face in disgust.

"watch yourself horan." i mumble as i see a group of girls waving at me and sending winks my way, i send them a wave before averting my eyes.

niall throws a punch at my arm before starting a light jog and i huff out a laugh before following him. sooner than later we find ourselves in professor y/l/n's lecture hall.

"romantic poetry is the poetry of the Romantic era, an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century." professor y/l/n's states as she walks around her desk, a gray pencil skirt hugs her curvy hips, her freshly shaven legs on display, and a black turtleneck that sticks to her skin like glue. "i've decided to take a different route then the normal, 'Sonnet 18 by the beloved William Shakespeare', and instead we will start this unit with something from my background, 'El Beso' by Angelina Weld Grimké. which translates to 'the kiss', Grimké wrote the poem about a love song, full of passion, yearning, and confused emotions."

i lick my lips and pull my bottom lip between my teeth, she sits back on the desk and her hips plush out even more.

i never would've thought i could listen so much in a class.

"as like your other projects in my class you will either make a short story, making it easier for the common eye to read or, you will make a photo reflection. with that being said i would also like a short summary over 'El Beso.' she smiles at the class, "any questions?" no one raises their hand except, well me. "yes mr. styles?" she cocks an eyebrow.

"what is the grade point based on?"

"like all your other projects it depends on efficiency, the structure and etcetera." she replied folding her hand in-front of her chest, "also if i could see you after class mr. styles, we need to talk."

my heart drops to the pit of my stomach and i gulp down the knot in my throat, "of course professor y/l/n."

i'm fucked.

"thank you so much for working hard today! i cant wait to see all of the things you guys have come up with. there will be a short quiz over El Beso next class so study hard!" professor y/l/n shooes everyone out, class ticked by at the slowest rate known to man kind.

i stand awkwardly at the foot of her desk and wait till she turns around beaming a smile at me.

"ah mr. styles! exactly who i wanted to see. please follow me to my office." she starts walking towards the direction of the locked office and opens it with her key.

"now no need to be scared, just wanted to talk to you about your grades." she smiles pointing me to sit in the chair in front of her desk.

she slides into her rollie chair as well and pulls out a manila folder with my name on the top right corner.

"okay it's just that you seem to be doing exceptional in my class, you are one of the top students that i have."

"but..?" i wait for the wooing factor that's bound to happen.

"but you are barely passing your other classes." she pulls out what looks like a report card you would get in grade school.

"a seventy is passing." i state bluntly as i look over the grades.

"that is true mr. styles, very true but how are you making seventy precent in all other class and passing mine with a ninety percentage average?"

it's because you make me focus.

"how do i make you focus?" she answer the question i thought was just in my head.

"i don't know okay? i mean look at you! you're the hottest professor i have! it hard not to pay attention when you are the professor!"

her eyes widen at my outburst and her ears flush, she straightens herself out and i notice that she squeezes her thighs together.

"i'm sorry? that i distract you?" she stutters putting her glasses on the top of her head.

"i can tell you like the thought of this rendezvous with me." i smirk and she gasp.

"that is very inappropriate mr. styles."

i get up and make my way towards her side of the desk pulling her chair out, i let my hands travel up her sides and to her shoulders, massaging them slowly as she lets out a whine.

"tell me this doesn't turn you on. the thought of you and me. me bending you over this goddamn desk and me fucking you senseless." i whisper in her ear and a shiver runs down her spine.

"we can't." she says bluntly causing a chuckle to leave my mouth.

"i didnt ask if we could did i, love?" she holds back an answer and i bring my lips to her neck pressing kisses on her sensitive skin, "i asked if this turns you on."

she pulls her bottom lip between her teeth and murmurs, "fuck it." before spinning around and crashing her lips with mine. i eagerly kiss back slipping my tongue between her mouth, she lets a moan slips out. i slip between her legs and my arms grab underneath her thighs picking her up with ease.

"wait," she whines pulling apart and pushing my chest.

"what baby?" i practically cry out wanting nothing more than to kiss her puffy lips again.

"the door, i didn't lock it."

i let out a chuckle before dropping her to her feet and briefly pecking her lips, quickly locking the door. y/n leans over the desk, the plump of her ass sticking out.

"so you do want this?" i muse as my hand runs along down arch of her back.

"shut up and fuck me." she grunts through gritted teeth causing my cock to swell in my pants.

i slip a hand through the front of her skirt splitting her sleek folds before my thumb makes contact with her sensitive puffy clit rubbing tight circles, her whimpers and moans start to fill the air, "you're soaked baby." i mumble in her ear and she shivers.

"please." she pleas, grabbing ahold on her skirt hiking it up and they bunch on her plump hips.

"wanna taste ya cunt first." i groan sitting in her chair as i pull down her red lace thong, "ya tryna to kill me."

pressing a kiss to the arch of her back i make my way down to her puffy cunt, jesus fuck, i spread her glistening folds pressing a kiss to her clit, she lets out a breathy moan before pushing her hips back licking a broad stripe through her folds, muffling my own groan of pleasure.

"oh harry." she shuddered pulling her hand to her mouth, trying to suppress the small moans and whimpers that were trying to escape her.

"no," i growl against her and slap her plushy ass, "let them out, i wanna her you."

her jaw fell open as a beautiful pornographic moan erupted through the room, knuckles white as they fisted the bottom of the desk, nails digging in the wood leaving small angry marks, her hips pushing back into my face.

my hands were around her thighs, pulling her closer to me, holding her still as she huffed out a breath through her swollen lips. i begged her with my actions, digging fingers into her beautiful melanin flesh and willed her to cum on my face.

"har, 'm gonna cum!" she moaned bucking her hips.

"do it." i spat shortly.

she lets out a high pitched moan as her orgasm hits her, i let her ride it out coaxing her swollen clit. my hands quickly unbutton my pants and i yank them down along with my boxers.

"got my cock leaking honey." i muse lightly fisting my bulge.

"fuck me please." she whines arching her back further.

"yeah you want my cock bad?" i tease swiping my swollen tip through her velvet folds.

not wanting to tease us both any longer i positioned my cock at her entrance, pushing inside her in one fluid motion. she moaned loudly, my hands moving to her lower back, fingers digging into her skin i groaned at the feeling of being inside her. i fucked into her at a torturously steady pace. she grounded her hips down to meet my movements, desperate for more, silently begging me to meet that soft spot inside of her. my hand moves to her neck, wrapping around her throat and she whines.

" 's good." she slurred as her legs start to buckle.

i pull her up with the hand that's around her neck, moving it to her face before turning her head to give her a bruising kiss. once we pulled away i push her down again my hips snapping faster craving a release. i looked at her like she was artwork, displayed just for me in a pornographic arch. my pace was fast, smooth and shallow thrusts, keeping my hips angled so my cock could hit that spongy place that makes her eyes roll back.

"faster h! please!" she cried pushing her hips back, i rocked my hips faster against her before looking down where we connected, i gather saliva in my mouth before spitting between us.

"that's it baby, that's it, take it like a good girl." i gasp out gripping her hips with an iron grip not letting her run from my thrust. i felt her spazzing around me and a choked moan left my lips, my hand moves around to her front and my thumb connects with her swollen pearl.

"cum for me baby." i grunt and she lets out a whine clawing the front of her desk.

she clenched around me and i let out a gasp as we both finally released. my thrusts we're starting to slow down, giving her a sharp pump keeping my cock there as her orgasm hit her. she screams my name as her eyes closed and legs shook. i stood above her as i waited for her pulse to calm down. i let out a breathy chuckle before pulling out and grabbing a tissue for the box of her desk. i quickly clean her before placing a kiss on her plump ass and pull her thong up.

"what do you want for dinner love?" i ask as she pushes her skirt back into place.

she turns around with a smile on her lips before pushing me to sit in her chair and sitting in my lap, "dunno, we haven't gone grocery shopping this week, we have nothing in the fridge."

i play with the diamond ring that rested on her left hand before bringing it to my lips and placing a kiss on it.

"i can go if you want sum pet."

"yeah been craving your chicken parm." she groans out rubbing her stomach, i let out a chuckle before kissing her lips.

"okay want anything else?"

"those crisps i like, the spicy ones." she hums running a hand through my hair, "best fiancé out there."

"yeah? 'm the best?" i tease her and she nods.

a/n: PLOT TWIST😭🤣🤣 i knew i wanted them to have a real relationship but i didn't know if i wanted it to be a "they use to date" relationship or a "they're engaged" relationship😋

also a lil introduction about me i'm 19! my full name is emily but please call me em! i am mexican (MEXICORRY RISE🇲🇽) my pronouns are she/her/hers. i've been a fan of harry since xfactor days so i'm not new to this fandom🫶🏽 that's all you get rn ;)

-all the love,

em

xo🐝

#harry styles x reader #harry styles #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles x fem!reader #harry styles x plus size reader #harry styles x poc #harry styles x you #harry update #harry x reader #harry angst #frat boy harry #harry smut #harry styles x y/n #harry fluff #harrys house #harry au #fandom #fanfic #fic reading #fic rec

[senjuushi]

Event Translation — Brand New Journey ~Italy Expedition Volume~

Episode 1: New Mission

This happens shortly before the St. Dís Island tragedy would occur— 

—somewhere, in a room filled with tobacco smoke.

Mafia Goon 1: —Don Bofonchio, the one who withdrew was indeed Bonito. 

Don Bofonchio: Ah... good work. 

Mafia Goon 1: Besides him, there may still be other moles within the Ragno family. 

Don Bofonchio: I see. Rocco, you’re with the Ragno— search for them.

Rocco: Si, leave it to me. 

Don Bofonchio: Benetta. Carcanore. 

Benetta: Yes, sir. 

Don Bofonchio: If my memory serves, Carcanore, you’d often keep company with Bonito, correct?

Carcanore: ......

Carcanore: Yep! I’ll deal with him for ya’. 

Benetta: ......

Don Bofonchio: It’s decided, then. —now, gentlemen. 

Everyone: Our oath is the law of blood*. Loyalty is worth more than our mothers, discipline weighs more than our souls.

Carcanore: ...and silent retribution for all traitors.

*scene changes to the military academy* 

—and now, at Philcrevert Military Academy.

Russell: (Player Name)-kun, I’m sorry to call on you with such short notice... Although, these missions always seem to be sudden, so you could say it’s the same as usual...

Russell: The mission this time may be a bit different from usual. The next place you’ll be going to is Italy.

Russell: The objective is to suppress the Outragers, who have been confirmed to be making frequent appearances in Naples, a major city in Southern Italy. 

Russell: Do you know about the state of affairs in Italy?

Master: 

I’d heard a bit about it in class... 

Not in detail, no. 

(CHOICE 1) Russell: Haha, of course you’d have remembered what you studied. That said, I have further information for you, so please listen once more. 

(CHOICE 2) Russell: I’ll try to summarize it for you, then.

Russell: ...as you know, (Player Name)-kun, Italy was a relatively late country to fully unify as a nation.

Russell: Due to a variety of historical and geopolitical reasons, the culture, climate, and such of the Northern and Southern parts wound up quite different. After the Revolutionary War, those differences were even greater. 

Russell: The North, which shares borders with other countries, is stable, with the government and Union headquarters in power. The South, which occupies the coast... has long been a den for the mafia. 

Russell: To make matters worse, after the Revolutionary War, a new mafia has gained prominence. Disputes have broken out inside the mafia itself, and public security is poor.  

*scene changes to a visualization of the mafia’s office*

Russell: In particular, you should make note of the rising Bofonchio Family. Supposedly, they’re attempting to crush other mafia families one after another so that they can expand their own influence.

Russell: Their methods are brutal and unforgiving, and the number of people who have been taken out on the don’s orders is easily over one hundred... The Family’s influence extends to the general populace as well, and they have become a feared presence there.

Russell: (Player Name)-kun, please be extremely wary of the Bofonchio Family— and the rest of the mafia, of course.

*visualization ends*

Russell: The mafia also has parts that are hostile to the World Union. The military academy’s uniforms may invite unwanted trouble, so in order to not provoke them, please wear civilian clothes instead of your uniform, this time.

Master: 

Understood. 

Is there anything else I should keep in mind?

Russell: Other than that… I’d say that’s it. We don’t have any information related to Noble Musketeers, so that will be omitted, for now. 

Russell: Vigilance is essential, and it would be ideal to have significant military strength involved, but a larger group would only put you in danger by making you stand out... it would be best to go with the minimum amount of people, this time.

Master: 

The minimum sounds good.

How are those people being chosen?

Russell: I’ll leave that selection to your discretion, so first, decide which Musketeers will accompany you.

*scene changes to outside the school*

Marks: Alright, preparations are complete. Let’s go, Master! I’ll follow you anywhere! 

Cutlery: This isn’t a fun little trip— don’t get so excited. You’re really loud. 

Russell: So the team this time is Marks and Cutlery. That’s... a surprising combination. 

Marks: There’s nothing surprising about it. I’m Master’s partner. 

Marks: There’s no makeup test this time, so no complaints, either. 

Russell: Ahh, it’s that makes sense! I’d heard from Deputy Director-General Kyoudou that your score on the last Classics test was a solid 80. Going by your past scores, it’s a marvelous improvement... 

Kyoudou: I’m pleased that you volunteered to go on this mission as well, Cutlery. Do your best on the expedition, alright? 

Cutlery: I... don’t particularly want to go on this mission. I don’t have many chances to go to Italy, and Mikhael and Fal aren’t here right now, so I thought this would be a decent way to kill some time. 

Kyoudou: Haha, I see. I hope you both have good news to report. 

Notes:

*The text here references “Omerta”, which is defined as, “a Southern Italian code of silence and code of honor and conduct that places importance on silence in the face of questioning by authorities or outsiders”.

#Senjuushi #千銃士 #Marks #Cutlery #Benetta #Carcanore #Translation

[waitformethistime]

Chikawa + Love Languages (part 2: Acts of Service)

Warning: This post (and all related ones) will have Spoilers all the way up to the most recent translated chapter (112).

Part 1

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2. Acts of Service

This language is for people who value actions over words. You can tell someone you care for them all you want, but do your actions reflect that? Or maybe you don’t have the words to explain your feelings properly, so you try your best to make it clear through acts of service.

This one is a pretty prominent one for Chikawa, as they’re both rather internal people who have been burned or otherwise disillusioned by other people’s words. Chika, in particular, uses this a lot, and not just with Satowa. I consider this his primary love language specifically. I stated in Part 1 that he was a Man of Action, the king of showing not telling.

Even early on, when their relationship was at odds, we see how each of their actions towards each other affect their relationship in a positive way.

Let’s unpack:

Chapter 4: Tokise goes to an outdoor venue to watch a concert for the song they’re going to perform. Satowa accidentally instigates a group of boys and when they try to swipe or grab at her, Chika pulls her back out of reach.

Chika has a naturally protective instinct, so at this point, this wasn’t anything personal for Satowa specifically.

Chapter 5: When Satowa once again attempts to distance herself from the group after Takezou offers for them to eat together, Chika grabs her book strap and drags her along to the restaurant with everyone.

While she does protest to this, it is a step forward in her forming a softer, less Spartan relationship with not only him, but the rest of the club as well, and she becomes a true friend to them all. It should be noted that Chika, who at this point, didn’t really like Satowa much as a person, had nothing to gain from doing this.

Chapter 11: After staying home sick, Chika was tasked with bringing Satowa’s homework to her. When he finds out she lives alone and is running a fever, he makes the decision to stay and take care of her so she won’t be alone, even staying overnight.

He even cooks her egg porridge before he leaves for school. Though she initially complains about him staying without permission, she’s so touched by the gesture of being cared for she ends up crying.

Their relationship is significantly less hostile from this point, with only mild bickering rather than the hurtful insults from before.

Chapter 13: Noticing that Satowa is isolating herself still, Chika deliberately sets her up with two of the girls from their class who expressed interest in befriending her by “pushing” her out of his way.

Satowa is shy and used to being told that she should be alone, so she was initially afraid to approach these girls herself. When she realizes what Chika did, she gives a grateful smile.

Her and the girls become quite good friends in the manga, even sharing the same class together again in their second year.

Chapter 24: In preparing for their warm-up before their Kuon performance, one of the kotos slips from the wall and falls. Satowa, in trying to protect Chika’s koto, jumps right in the line of fire. Chika then protects her by holding the koto off and landing on his right wrist in a bad position, injuring it.

Though he didn’t state the true reason why his hand was injured, Satowa figured it out and was incredibly touched. She buys him snacks as a thank you in chapter 27.

Chapter 30: During their school festival, Chika and Satowa’s class do a traditional cafe. Satowa has to deal with some pushy boys who grab her wrist and won’t let her leave until she tells them her name. Chika, watching this, takes things into his own hands and pries the boy’s wrist off, gives all his information, such as his name and blood type, and gives the boy the glare of death.

Though Satowa is grateful, she has a hard time looking him in the eyes due to her developing crush.

Chapter 32: Takinami wants to use Satowa’s previous Nationals performance for the clubs qualifier song. Satowa, having a ton of trauma associated with that song and her estranged mother, is deeply uncomfortable at the idea. Chika decides to download the song on his own music player and to help Satowa face her fear of her sound, decides to listen to it with her.

This is a gesture of comfort for her, allowing her to move forward and face the song again.

(She will also repay this gesture back later in chapter 103).

Chapter 33: After assigning both Chika and Sane to 17-string to support Satowa’s solo, the club realizes they only have one available 17-string to practice on that they borrowed from Nishina. Satowa goes to her mother and begs on her hands and knees to borrow a 17-string so that Chika can practice just as much.

Though it could be argued she did this for the club in general, when she sees how happy Chika is with their extra instrument, she gives a soft smile, so it was atleast partially inspired by him.

Chapter 36: A minor one, but Chika’s mastery of the basics at an alarming rate was atleast in part due to Akira’s disparaging comments on Satowa’s teaching in a previous chapter.

He also states he wants to be able to play beside her as an equal and allow her sound to shine to the point that he’s willing to injure his hands.

Chapter 47: In chapter 43, Satowa had handed out charms that she personally made to the club, including Chika. When she reveals that she didn’t make one for herself, Chika writes her name on his so she won’t be left out.

Her expression implies she’s deeply touched by this.

Chapter 52: Upon learning Satowa’s mom showed up to the performance, Chika is the one who leads the search to find her.

He gives a soft smile of relief when Satowa and her mother reunite, knowing how much it meant to her.

Chapter 57: Satowa, with the help of Hiro, decides to make a Christmas cake (strawberry cream cake) for the club because Chika expresses his desire to have one.

Hiro notes that she even specifically chose strawberry and that it’s Chika’s favorite.

Though it was a cake everyone shared, Satowa mostly zeroes in on Chika’s reaction specifically. He’s happy.

Chapter 68: Though it was at the behest of Isaki, Chika actually does take the time and the effort to brainstorm with the flower shop lady over what he can give Satowa on a limited budget to express his feelings.

This effort doesn’t go unnoticed.

Chapter 76: Tokise goes to see the incumbent Nationals champion, Ichiei. One of the students, Luca, hugs Satowa unexpectedly to her discomfort. Chika pushes him off.

Chapter 91: I mentioned in Part 1 how this chapter was a feast for Chikawa shippers, and this is no exception. It was revealed in this chapter that Satowa took the time to frame the ranunculus that Chika got for her back in chapter 68 because she cherished it so much.

Chika is elated at the knowledge that she liked his one flower, the flower that he was previously self-conscious about, enough to frame it above all the others.

Some more minor ones also in this chapter include Chika trying extra hard to be polite for Chiharu.

And also Satowa trying to gather snacks to cater to Chika’s tastes.

No matter what, they’re always subconsciously taking each other into consideration.

Chapter 99: Satowa, on instinct, moves to wipe sweat off Chika’s face when he wakes up from a nightmare. This leads to a charged moment between them.

Though Satowa questions her own actions and is embarrassed, it says a lot that she subconsciously just wants to care for him in whatever way she can.

Chapter 102: When Uzuki shows up, Chika moves to shield Satowa with his body in a protective stance.

Satowa is annoyed by this, but she repays the favor later in the chapter when Uzuki tries to chase after Chika.

Chapter 103: Uzuki leaks a video of Chika’s violent past that goes viral throughout the internet. In a parallel to chapter 32, Satowa offers to watch the video with him so it won’t be as scary when she sees how ashamed he is of it.

Chapter 104: Satowa brings a bento for Chika to share with him so that he doesn’t skip lunch because she notices how the Uzuki situation has affected him negatively.

It’s revealed in an extra as well that she specifically has her mother teach her how to make one properly so she can do this for him.

Chapter 105: Satowa follows Chika out to where he meets with Uzuki and Abiko and records everything from the sidelines so that she has evidence for the police to avoid him being framed again.

At the end of the chapter, after watching Chika get kicked, she intervenes directly by jumping in front of him.

Chapter 106: Satowa spends the majority of this chapter shielding Chika with her own body, much to his horror.

She hugs him tightly in a protective stance while buying time for Tetsuki and the police to arrive.

Chika, after noticing Uzuki come after her directly with a steel pipe, uses his reflexes to switch positions so that she doesn’t get hurt.

Chapter 111: Satowa sits on the sidelines along with the rest of Tokise while Chika confronts Uzuki because while she trusts his privacy in getting closure, she wants to be there for him in case something goes wrong.

Chapter 112: Satowa offering up her sleeve for Chika to hold for comfort because the plane is unpleasant for him.

Chapter 113: Satowa offering him up some rice while he’s in the middle of dissociating.

While Acts of Service starts out largely being mostly acts from Chika himself since that’s his general language to show people he cares for them, Satowa catches on rather quickly and really steps up to the plate in the second half, meeting him halfway to show that she cares for him and loves him through her actions.

Both of them are people who really value actions over words, or alternatively, actions to back up the words, since quite a few of these instances are shared with Words of Affirmation.

Their relationship is very even in showing this particular love language.

Total tally count for Acts of Service:

Satowa:

Gives- 14

Receives- 15

Chika:

Gives- 15

Receives- 14

End of Part 2!

#chikawa #kono oto tomare #chika kudou #houzuki satowa

[dailycharacteroption]

Deity Drop 6: Akuma

Alright, I know what you’re thinking, and no, it’s not the fighting game character…. (Akuma’s area of concern is battle, honor, and martial arts) … damn…

All jokes aside, the word “akuma” roughly translates to “demon” or “devil”, and is generally used to describe an evil spirit of some kind, and has been used to describe great evils in a variety of Japanese religions, including their word for Satan in Japanese Christianity, or Mara in Japanese Buddhism.

This version, however, seems to borrow a bit more from the Street Fighter version, but we’ll get to that.

In any case, an Oni Daimyo is exactly what is sounds like: an oni that has become a powerful demigod among it’s kind. Unlike other fiendish demigods, however, these powerful oni don’t actually change their specific type upon ascension. An ogre mage oni daimyo is still at their core an ogre mage, as is any type of yai or other form they can take.

What exactly this means in the context of the game is unclear since there haven’t to my knowledge been any stat blocks given for them so far, but I can imagine that they might have a lot of class levels or have a stat-block based on the base type of oni souped up to the nines.

Back to the meat of the topic though: Akuma! This ogre mage oni daimyo is much like other such high-ranking oni in that he is mostly content to remain on his own, mastering his martial arts in order to become a more perfect killer. We don’t know much beyond that, but we can extrapolate that Akuma probably uses violence and death as his one indulgence, the thing that makes him an oni, rather than the more general vices of lesser oni, but then again, we don’t know that for sure. All we do know is that he favor combat, martial arts, and honor, so he probably prefers a “fair” fight and utterly crushing his competition through his overwhelming might.

Akuma is described as a seven-horned ogre mage with three eyes, which likely in the past has made others misidentify him as one of the elemental yai oni, likely to their death.

He is said to live mostly alone in a remote pagoda in the northwestern forests of Lingshen, a nation already known for the brutality of it’s military, which is likely what brought him to that nation in the first place, assuming he hasn’t been engineering that mindset all along.

As a minor divinity, he likely does not have many worshippers, but the Horned King likely attracts the worship of martial artists, both ascetic and otherwise, that seek greater mastery of their martial skills to utterly destroy their foes, often with the sole goal of proving themselves the best, pursuing an empty life of victory devoid of mercy or empathy.

Ony daimyo are mostly hermits, having little interest in making bonds with others of their kind, though they might bond together if a powerful enough individual brought them together under some great shared goal or mutual enemy. It can be assumed, though, that Akuma is the enemy of goodly deities and any that espouse empathy, mercy, kindness, or other forms of “weakness”.

As a daimyo among his kind, Akuma in theory leads an entire army’s worth of oni, though given the reclusive nature of most of these fiendish rulers, it’s hard to imagine them as standing armies. If roused to action, however, he certainly can count on a large number of oni under his command.

Akuma’s domains are Evil, Glory, Law, and War, and his subdomains are Blood, Fear, Honor, and Tactics, all reflecting his role as a master martial artist who is only in it for the personal glory and domination over all weaker than himself.

Like other lesser fiendish divinities, the Horned King has not made the jump to 2E yet, so there are no listed Second Edition domains for him.

He does, however, have an obedience, and it’s simple enough to not even have to worry about doing it in public. In exchange for undergoing martial arts forms and other training each day, his followers become resistant to combat maneuvers, and they gain access to spells that enhance endurance, imbue them with divine might, and even make them undergo a monstrous battle form transformation.

The Horned King has also, to my knowledge, not shown up in Starfinder yet either, which, given that oni are earthbound fiends like Rakshasa, could mean that he was lost along with Golarion, but he might still exist with followers lurking in ruthless martial arts dojos and maybe even the backrooms of solarian academies. Anywhere where the seeds of wanting to be the strongest fighter for no other reason than just being stronger and better than everyone else might take root.

That does it for today, but we’re not out of the evil divinity woods yet! Tune in tomorrow for more!

#pathfinder #deity #akuma #oni daimyo #Book of the Damned

[cynical-cemeteries]

@mahiru-no and @soony-survived did their own versions of this so i wanna do my own too!!

there's so many on here omg......

my distinct moments are when:

i first met laphlaes back in normal mode and saw him on the screen. and just Immediately knew. i would be obsessed with him

i got prompted to pick my first contract hero and my gay ass picked lairei Without Hesitation

adding onto the last one. when i finished my contract with lairei on the last day of school all the way back in sophomore year

my monarch and mei ling first met and fram thought mei ling had a crush on her and i looked at my screen like "GAY PEOPLE IN THIS GAME????"

meeting rosanna and being like "omg a little pirate"

i found those concept board screenshots of rashad and came here to basically ask "who is this fine ass man." and then became obsessed with him

someone on here posted that concept art of bianca and phrased it like she was a guy with a pretty name and a lot of us were like "ROSANNA HAS A GRANDSON???" but she was actually a fine ass woman

i saved up enough renown to get e. laph and was excited for a whole week

i finally found a way to find fanart through korean fans on twitter and had a FIELD DAY

the official blog dropped a whole bunch of themed collections of artwork and i proceeded to have Another field day. i downloaded every single one of those pictures btw.

rashad got announced for recruitment on july 1st, 2021

i got to hard mode and saw the variations of laphlaes, lucilicca, and lairei. proceeded to go insane.

bianca got announced for recruitment on august 1st, 2021

the whole nerfing situation happened with d. joshua

i met the far east trio and fell for all 3 of them

laphlaes got his first outfit and all of tumblr just EXPLODED

solphi and alev got their first outfits and all of tumblr exploded AGAIN because of the gay ass implications

i got to meet syphfride in extreme mode and got super happy. but then it was only two stages. and i got super confused

the december 2021 holiday illustration dropped and i finally had official art crumbs of rashad and bianca

the war of the tyrants story mode got announced in march of 2022 and i proceeded to go insane

that visual for the first 4 WoT hero appearances dropped on the anniversary stream,, and i looked at raligon and felt myself becoming obsessed with another blorbo

the lairei midnight edition concept art was shown on that same stream and i could not stop thinking about it

i opened the tag and saw two screenshots of raligon's story poses from chapter 2 and i was like "OMG HES SOOOO CUTEEJSKJHDKJSAHFKJDF"

i finally got more lore on brandon and he helped me realize how much i connect with him

the official blog dropped an english translation on brandon's letter to raligon and branrali nation finally had some fucking food to munch on

w. rosanna FINALLY got announced for recruitment back in like august of 2022 but she was $45 and i proceeded to have the worst day of my entire life ever

the commander class happened. (derogatory)

#lord of heroes #loh #THATS A LOT GOOD LORD #i rb'd other two versions and said i would do some negatives but it was like. two things. i lied actually #i was going through my camera roll album for the game and was going down memory lane #this was actually a lot of fun to think about #i can like look at certain sections in there and remember exactly what i was doing when it got added #this was really fun!! i like this idea a lot #the memories of tumblr loh fandom......i will cherish them

[nebris]

George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

“It is a sign of the speed at which events are moving that Hurst and Blackett’s unexpurgated edition of Mein Kampf, published only a year ago, is edited from a pro-Hitler angle. The obvious intention of the translator’s preface and notes is to tone down the book’s ferocity and present Hitler in as kindly a light as possible. For at that date Hitler was still respectable. He had crushed the German labour movement, and for that the property-owning classes were willing to forgive him almost anything. Both Left and Right concurred in the very shallow notion that National Socialism was merely a version of Conservatism.

Then suddenly it turned out that Hitler was not respectable after all. As one result of this, Hurst and Blackett’s edition was reissued in a new jacket explaining that all profits would be devoted to the Red Cross. Nevertheless, simply on the internal evidence of Mein Kampf, it is difficult to believe that any real change has taken place in Hitler’s aims and opinions. When one compares his utterances of a year or so ago with those made fifteen years earlier, a thing that strikes one is the rigidity of his mind, the way in which his world-view doesn’t develop. It is the fixed vision of a monomaniac and not likely to be much affected by the temporary manoeuvres of power politics. Probably, in Hitler’s own mind, the Russo-German Pact represents no more than an alteration of time-table. The plan laid down in Mein Kampf was to smash Russia first, with the implied intention of smashing England afterwards. Now, as it has turned out, England has got to be dealt with first, because Russia was the more easily bribed of the two. But Russia’s turn will come when England is out of the picture—that, no doubt, is how Hitler sees it. Whether it will turn out that way is of course a different question.

Suppose that Hitler’s programme could be put into effect. What he envisages, a hundred years hence, is a continuous state of 250 million Germans with plenty of ‘living room’ (i.e. stretching to Afghanistan or thereabouts), a horrible brainless empire in which, essentially, nothing ever happens except the training of young men for war and the endless breeding of fresh cannon-fodder. How was it that he was able to put this monstrous vision across? It is easy to say that at one stage of his career he was financed by the heavy industrialists, who saw in him the man who would smash the Socialists and Communists. They would not have backed him, however, if he had not talked a great movement into existence already. Again, the situation in Germany, with its seven million unemployed, was obviously favourable for demagogues. But Hitler could not have succeeded against his many rivals if it had not been for the attraction of his own personality, which one can feel even in the clumsy writing of Mein Kampf, and which is no doubt overwhelming when one hears his speeches … The fact is that there is something deeply appealing about him. One feels it again when one sees his photographs—and I recommend especially the photograph at the beginning of Hurst and Blackett’s edition, which shows Hitler in his early Brownshirt days. It is a pathetic, dog-like face, the face of a man suffering under intolerable wrongs. In a rather more manly way it reproduces the expression of innumerable pictures of Christ crucified, and there is little doubt that that is how Hitler sees himself. The initial, personal cause of his grievance against the universe can only be guessed at; but at any rate the grievance is here. He is the martyr, the victim, Prometheus chained to the rock, the self-sacrificing hero who fights single-handed against impossible odds. If he were killing a mouse he would know how to make it seem like a dragon. One feels, as with Napoleon, that he is fighting against destiny, that he can’t win, and yet that he somehow deserves to. The attraction of such a pose is of course enormous; half the films that one sees turn upon some such theme.

Also he has grasped the falsity of the hedonistic attitude to life. Nearly all western thought since the last war, certainly all ‘progressive’ thought, has assumed tacitly that human beings desire nothing beyond ease, security and avoidance of pain. In such a view of life there is no room, for instance, for patriotism and the military virtues. The Socialist who finds his children playing with soldiers is usually upset, but he is never able to think of a substitute for the tin soldiers; tin pacifists somehow won’t do. Hitler, because in his own joyless mind he feels it with exceptional strength, knows that human beings don’tonly want comfort, safety, short working-hours, hygiene, birth-control and, in general, common sense; they also, at least intermittently, want struggle and self-sacrifice, not to mention drums, flags and loyalty-parades. However they may be as economic theories, Fascism and Nazism are psychologically far sounder than any hedonistic conception of life. The same is probably true of Stalin’s militarised version of Socialism. All three of the great dictators have enhanced their power by imposing intolerable burdens on their peoples. Whereas Socialism, and even capitalism in a more grudging way, have said to people ‘I offer you a good time,’ Hitler has said to them ‘I offer you struggle, danger and death,’ and as a result a whole nation flings itself at his feet. Perhaps later on they will get sick of it and change their minds, as at the end of the last war. After a few years of slaughter and starvation ‘Greatest happiness of the greatest number’ is a good slogan, but at this moment ‘Better an end with horror than a horror without end’ is a winner. Now that we are fighting against the man who coined it, we ought not to underrate its emotional appeal.”

–George Orwell, The New English Weekly, March 21, 1940

[nyholmrode45]

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#https://neverdieforyou.com

[reonagisolos]

Plasma au idea: au where the smith siblings are famous for being the crush ng bayan in like the 11 grade until mysterious new transfer student's jay walker comes in and steals the popularity cause of the ✨foreign charm✨ and kai gets annoyed because he likes the attention from the girls so he stupidly decides to tell him to back off during class break but it backfires and kai ends up embarrassed from the ordeal cause he wanted to look macho but just ended up looking like a dumbass cause he cussed out at him in filo and cause Jay's new, even if he knows a little bit—he's still relative trash at filipino, so be doesn't even understand half of what kai said

anyway a few days later jay tries to become friends with him and it doesn't end well cause kai is way too arrogant. Jay's hurt and Nya is just tired of her bros dumbassery and tells him to make up with him which kai eventually does and they become (sorta) friends!!!

eventually the school year ends and this is where stuff really starts kicking in— anyway somehow (cough, kais other friends leaving for family cough) jay is really the only other friend that he can probably talk to (yes facebook is a thing but i hc that kai doesn't like using it cause its overwhelming and also because he's dry when it comes to talking online) so they end up hanging out sometimes (including nya becuase same prospect and also likes annoying her bro) and stuff happens and they become good friends (with their main activities together being casual chatting then it slowly progresses to jay forcing them to play games other than ml (if you know you know) and also with kai n nya teaching him the basics of basketball because mans is surprisingly active even if he's a bit pathetic in the physical aspect (also yes both kai and nya play basketball they got it from their dad) and that's kais main stress relief—oh also at one point jay introduces cole, his best friend he met during an online game, and zane, childhood friend that moved away when he was younger but got in touch with again a few years later (minor thing but he's also dating pixal) and they get along really well surprisingly

anyway stuff happens and jaya happens post summer and their 12th grade begins with crush ng bayan #1 (nya) having a bf with mixed reactions (some were sad cause crush on nya, though most were probably like, fangirling cause that happens a lot), and goes on normally for a little bit until it doesn't cause whoops something small happened and kai has a certified Fruity™ moment and then from there developes a crush which sucks ass for 2 reasons

1. He literally has a crush on his sister's bf

2. It's painfully obvious when he likes someone so there are going to be rumors and hoo boy, that does not help

(probably while on break jay casually mentions his crush and from there he sets them up—guess that backfired in his face)

idk where it goes from here but i like this au a lot fkvkdkfk

#this is a really place specific au for my headcanons #i wanna note that both kai n nya are relatively privileged in this au #So kai n nya can understand and talk in English well enough for jay to understand #not as good as an actual speaker (also accents) but pretty good #ninjago #jay ninjago #kai ninjago #nya ninjago #plasmashipping #I've had my filo Smith hcs for a while and #Barks #ninjago masters of spinjitzu #edit: kk so this is a lot to read now that I'm seeing this again but please consider #also a lot of this au was inspired by irl events that happened b4 in my class #particularly with shipping #and moreso with the crush ng bayan #translation: crush of the nation/class

[chimeraan]

One of my favourite parts of Disco Elysium is meeting a beaurocrat from the in-universe equivalent of France who works for the equivalent of the EU or as he describes it the "International Community". He's like oh yeah ze international community is great, we step in and help developing countries become ze members of our community :) which translates to becoming members of a liberal democracy

When you ask him what that means he's like oh well it started out as a program where we'd help an emerging country standardise their metric system to ours which we expanded into a an economic union :) wherein we "sponser" emerging countries so they can become members of ze communitie internationál but you learn from him that one of its "candidate" members a developing nation is still waiting 30 years to become a full fledged member and it looks like it's never going to actually be a member. Then later you learn from a member of the failed communist revolution they thwarted in the country you live in that they basically bombed the hell out of the nation with the full force of artillery from the international community.

It's obviously a really blunt metaphor for the US, UK and EU but the great thing is that he is not really capable of seeing it any other way, he's just blind to alternatives. When you confront him about this he's like Oh no this is the way things should be, they're normal nice :) and when you say that you think that they don't look after the concerns of the working class he's like communism doesn't work :( and when it doesn't work cause you bombed the hell out of the revolution hes like well if the revolution was soooooo good would it have been crushed so easily?? Hm??

Which is great I love it, the game successfully distilled 100 years of Western imperialism and European politics into a single 30 minute conversation. It would beseech everyone to play this game.

#disco elysium

[mercerislandbooks]

For the Love of the Rom-com

While I read across genres in the Young Adult section, I have a soft spot in my heart for the rom-com. Though this genre might come across as light and fluffy, in actuality the form is able to take on topics as varied as mental health, identity, immigration, racism, and grief, to name only a few. Sure there’s romance, escapism, and happy endings, but what kept me picking up one YA rom-com after another in the last month was the window into the lives of each protagonist. More than ever I’m seeing #ownvoices authors tell stories that reflect their particular experience with the characters that they hadn’t seen in novels as young people. In turn I get a glimpse into a life different than my own and subsequently widen my world view. Here’s a collection of some of my recent reads!

Counting Down With You by Tashie Bhuiyan

The debut novel from this Bangladeshi American author (and the first novel I’ve read by a Bangladeshi American) takes the fake dating trope and turns it into a thoughtful exploration of expectations across cultures. Karina Ahmed is a high school junior buckling under the weight of Bangladeshi parental expectations and coping with anxiety largely on her own. They want her to be a doctor. She secretly longs to be an English teacher. When her parents take a month-long trip back to Bangladesh, leaving Karina and her younger brother in the care of their grandmother, Karina is looking forward to a much needed break. But her quiet month is almost immediately disrupted when, through a series of circumstances, she is roped into pretending to be Ace Clyde’s girlfriend, Midland High School’s bad boy. As the two slowly get to know, appreciate, and, of course, fall for each other, they also encourage and call out each other’s strengths. Bhuiyan movingly portrays the complex experience of a Bangladeshi American female teen, trying to meet the expectations of her more traditional parents, navigate managing her anxiety, dealing with the double standard of her gender within her culture, and learning to stand in her own power.

Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean

Given this cover, I expected something totally different from what the pages held. The main character of this “lost princess found” novel is anything but sweet and demure, the impression I had from the cover. Japanese American Izumi (Izzy) Tanaka is living her best average life with her single mother in the small Northern California town of Mt. Shasta. When she finds out that her previously unknown father is actually the crown prince of Japan, her world turns upside down. Once this knowledge goes public, Izzy is whisked away to Japan to get to know her father and become acquainted with the rest of her family. Having always felt out of place as one of the few minorities in her town, Izzy is hopeful that she’ll finally find a place where she belongs. But life at court is more complicated than Izzy can imagine, and she finds that in Japan she’s too “American.” Izzy’s voice is suffused with humor, so even as she struggles to fit in, her inner monologue made me laugh out loud. A slow burn romance with a hot bodyguard, backstabbing cousins, and relentless paparazzi shenanigans only add to the delicious fun. There’s talk of a sequel in 2022!

Better Than The Movies by Lynn Painter

The premise of girl uses boy next door, with whom she (seemingly) shares a mutual dislike, to get to the boy she crushed on in childhood that has just moved back to town manages to squeeze in a slew of rom-com tropes with witty breeziness. Liz makes a deal with boy next door Wes that she will relinquish the parking spot they feud over daily if he will help her get a date to Prom with childhood crush Michael. Of course it ends up being more complicated than that. Liz is confident and comfortable in her own quirky skin, but is also still dealing with the grief of losing her mother, which seems to be hitting her more sharply as all the “lasts” of senior year are happening. Spending time with Wes in her efforts to get close to Michael, Liz realizes that maybe she doesn’t hate him as much as she thought she did. Movie lovers will appreciate that each chapter is headed by quotes from the rom-coms that Liz obsesses over. I appreciated the balance of snarky banter with an honest portrayal of the complicated relationship Liz has with her grief.

Love in English by Maria E. Andrew

I’d been meaning to read Love in English for months and finally picked it up. Ana and her mother have recently moved to New Jersey from Argentina to join her father, who’s been living in the United States for some time. In Argentina, Ana thought her English was pretty good, but finds that navigating high school in America is a daily struggle in understanding her classmates and teachers. Andrew uses blocks of ##### to show the parts of conversations Ana misses, drawing the reader into her confusion and frustration. Reading this novel, I was reminded of when my family hosted a Japanese exchange student in high school, and the hours she spent translating her homework from English to Japanese. Reading what it was like for Ana, I had a glimpse into what it might have been like for Miki, and it made me admire her, and all the people who come to the United States not knowing the language. I’m certainly not proficient in any other language than English. The short chapters are interspersed with Ana’s handwritten ESL journal entries, musings on the confusions of the English language and poems that play with varieties of word meanings. Ana is attracted to a cute boy in her math class, Harrison, but also bonds with fellow ESL student Neo, who is from Greece. While romance is a central thread in the story, what I found most compelling was the portrayal of what it’s like to live in a place where the ability to communicate and comprehend is limited. Ana’s perseverance and curiosity in the face of that challenge is inspiring.

The Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss by Amy Noelle Parks

Last but not least I decided to continue my theme of YA rom-coms in my current audiobook and cued up The Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss. Set at an elite boarding school for math and science prodigies, this is a dual POV narrative Evie and Caleb, best friends since childhood. Evie is one of the few females at their prestigious school, and excels in math and physics, but hasn’t shown any interest in the opposite sex until new guy Leo catches her eye - with his physics proof. When Evie decides romance might be worth exploring with Leo, Caleb has to figure out how to be supportive, despite the fact that he himself is also secretly in love with Evie. Alternating chapters between Caleb and Evie’s POV mean that we get to see what’s going on internally for both of them as Evie embarks on her first relationship with Leo, Evie and Caleb team up for a national physics competition, and the course of love takes twists and turns. While there is plenty of swoony romance, I also loved the way that Evie has grown to learn to live with her anxiety and how she sets the boundaries she needs to take care of herself while also pushing herself beyond her comfort zone. Parks does an excellent job of making the all the math and physics approachable for the layperson.

There are many more YA rom-coms to choose from in the Teen section, so stop by and see what catches your eye!

— Lori

#island books #lori robinson #ya romcom #counting down with you #tashie bhuiyan #ownvoices #tokyo ever after #emiko jean #better than the movies #lynn painter #love in english #maria e andrew #the quantum weirdness of the almost-kiss #amy noelle parks #summer reading #librofm

[rockislandadultreads]

Gay Fiction: Book Recommendations

Bolla by Pajtim Statovci, David Hackston (Translation)

From the author of Crossing--a National Book Award finalist – comes a dazzling tale full of fury, tenderness, longing, and lust. April 1995. Arsim is a twenty-two-year-old, recently-married student at the University of Pristina, keeping his head down to gain a university degree in a time and place deeply hostile to Albanians. In a café he meets a young man named Milos, a Serb. Before the day is out, everything has changed for both of them, and within a week two milestones erupt in Arsim’s married life: his wife announces her first pregnancy, and he begins a life in secret. After these febrile beginnings, Arsim and Milos’s unlikely affair is derailed by the outbreak of war, which sends Arsim’s fledgling family abroad and the timid Milos spiraling down a dark path. Years later, deported back to Pristina after a spell in prison, Arsim, alone and hopeless, finds himself in a broken reality that completely questions his past. Entwined with their story is a recreated legend of a demonic serpent, Bolla: an unearthly tale that gives Arsim and Milos a language through which to reflect what they once had. With luminous prose and a delicate eye, Statovci delivers a relentless novel of desire, destruction, intimacy, and the different fronts of war.

19 Love Songs by David Levithan

A resentful member of a high school Quiz Bowl team with an unrequited crush. A Valentine's Day in the life of Every Day's protagonist "A." A return to the characters of Two Boys Kissing. 19 Love Songs, from New York Times bestselling author David Levithan, delivers all of these stories and more. Born from Levithan's tradition of writing a story for his friends each Valentine's Day, this collection brings all of them to his readers for the first time. With fiction, nonfiction, and a story in verse, there's something for every reader here. Witty, romantic, and honest, teens (and adults) will come to this collection not only on Valentine's Day, but all year round.

Rainbow Milk by Paul Mendez

An essential and revelatory coming-of-age narrative from a thrilling new voice, Rainbow Milk follows nineteen-year-old Jesse McCarthy as he grapples with his racial and sexual identities against the backdrop of his Jehovah's Witness upbringing. In the 1950s, ex-boxer Norman Alonso is a determined and humble Jamaican who has immigrated to Britain with his wife and children to secure a brighter future. Blighted with unexpected illness and racism, Norman and his family are resilient, but are all too aware that their family will need more than just hope to survive in their new country. At the turn of the millennium, Jesse seeks a fresh start in London, escaping a broken immediate family, a repressive religious community and his depressed hometown in the industrial Black Country. But once he arrives he finds himself at a loss for a new center of gravity, and turns to sex work, music and art to create his own notions of love, masculinity and spirituality. A wholly original novel as tender as it is visceral, Rainbow Milk is a bold reckoning with race, class, sexuality, freedom and religion across generations, time and cultures.

The Knockout Queen by Rufi Thorpe

A dazzling and darkly comic novel of love, violence, and friendship in the California suburbs Bunny Lampert is the princess of North Shore⁠--beautiful, tall, blond, with a rich real-estate-developer father and a swimming pool in her backyard. Michael⁠⁠--with a ponytail down his back and a septum piercing⁠--lives with his aunt in the cramped stucco cottage next door. When Bunny catches Michael smoking in her yard, he discovers that her life is not as perfect as it seems. At six foot three, Bunny towers over their classmates. Even as she dreams of standing out and competing in the Olympics, she is desperate to fit in, to seem normal, and to get a boyfriend, all while hiding her father's escalating alcoholism. Michael has secrets of his own. At home and at school Michael pretends to be straight, but at night he tries to understand himself by meeting men online for anonymous encounters that both thrill and scare him. When Michael falls in love for the first time, a vicious strain of gossip circulates and a terrible, brutal act becomes the defining feature of both his and Bunny's futures⁠⁠--and of their friendship. With storytelling as intoxicating as it is intelligent, Rufi Thorpe has created a tragic and unflinching portrait of identity, a fascinating examination of our struggles to exist in our bodies, and an excruciatingly beautiful story of two humans aching for connection.

#Fiction #gay fiction #lgbtq books #lgbtq #queer literature #queer lit #Book Recommendations #reading recommendations #to read #tbr #booklr #library #new books #diverse stories #diverse books

[seiin-translations]

2.43 S1 Chapter 5.2 - Stand By Me

2. ESCAPE

Random girls: oh no the girls are fighting

Translation Notes

1. Koutairen is the abbreviation for the All Japan High School Athletic Federation.

2. Kuroba calls his relatives おんちゃん and aunt is おばちゃん, so yeah

3. Economy class syndrome is “deep-vein thrombosis said to be caused by periods of prolonged immobility on long-haul flights.”

4. Murderer was in English in the original text

Previous || Index || Next

The bridge in the middle of Monshiro Town and Suzumu City was the goal of Haijima’s daily jogs. At the end of his jog, he dashed across the concrete bridge that was shining silver in the scorching August sun, then made a U-turn at that same speed and ran down to the riverbank. “Uwah!” His soles slipped on the overgrown summer grass. He ended up sliding down to a flat area of the riverbank on the enamel bag he carried on his back.

Hah, hah…He lay there for a while, breathing heavily. In the shadow of the bridge, the temperature felt a little cooler than on the bridge. He could feel the dampness of the summer grass soaking into his hair.

He got up unsteadily, put down his bag and took out his ball. He imagined that he was tired at the final stage of the game and purposely began to do one-person passes before he could catch his breath. With an overhand motion, he threw the ball directly above him. He continued to set the ball rhythmically no higher than a centimeter. The sound of the ball being softly flicked echoed in the quiet riverbank for a while.

The concrete piers rising from the riverbank had several colored chalk marks on them, though they were already fading. The marks were used as the attackers’ positions, and he set the ball to them. He spun around and hit the bouncing ball with a jump back set at the exact same height. He turned forward again and set the bouncing ball again. This time he intentionally changed the spot he hit it to. The ball deviated somewhat and bounced up. He then ran to chase it and crouched down and set the ball while he was underneath it. Gradually, he purposefully shifted to spots where he hit the ball to harder and harder places.

Haijima’s sets were characterized by their “speed,” but they were sets that crushed the attacker’s will, or sets that didn’t “allow for themselves to be hit,” so to speak. As the ball moved in a parabolic position, it had time to drift near the top before it began its free fall. If he set a ball that overlapped the top of the parabola with the attacker’s highest jumping point, the attacker could use that time, even if it was only a few tenths of a second, to draw out his power and hit the ball as hard as he could. In order to always have that kind of set, he had been refining his technique by focusing on unparalleled accuracy in ball handling.

Immediately after hitting the pier with a back set, the ball bounced back with a bang and he flipped it up with his elbow, still facing backwards. He jumped up to the high ball and hit the mark accurately with one hand. Technically, he could keep on doing this for an hour or two without dropping the ball. However, his legs couldn’t keep up, his toes got caught in the summer grass and he pitched forward. As he slid forward, he stretched out his body hard and thrust the back of his hand into the gap between the ball and the ground.

Although he connected with it through willpower, that was as far as he could go. The ball was flicked low in front of him and crashed into the grass.

He sprawled out on top of the grass, his chest heaving as he gasped for breath. The blue summer sky spread out above the slope pierced his eyes, and he raised his arm to cover his face.

“Shit…”

He let out a curse under his arm.

“Why do I have to do this…”

In addition to withdrawing from the semifinals of the Fall Tournament, the school gave them the severe punishment of refraining from club activities for the time being. It wasn’t that it was settled that they were guilty, but rather that the current situation was completely grey. Okuma said it was in fact because it was grey. If the fact that the scandal was real were to leak through some other channel and the school had received the report but not taken any action, the school would be on the hook. There were several such incidents a year, regardless of the type of sport. Okuma was a little more familiar with that sort of situation—it was the school’s way of protecting itself by taking strict measures, he said.

Since they weren’t banned from practicing on their own during the summer break, Haijima continued to practice on his own, just as he had done when he wasn’t a part of the team. Since he didn’t know when the next competition was going to be, he hadn’t made any adjustments for a tournament, just blindly practicing everyday to beyond the limit of his stamina, much less stopping at the limit. However, even if he practiced until he couldn’t move, he couldn’t see the effect by himself. There was only a growing sense of futility, no sense of accomplishment at all.

What am I doing here all by myself? What’s the point of practicing by myself? There’s no point in this unless I’m in a place with a net and there’s someone to set the ball to——.

Fading chalk marks on the bridge piers. The reason they were fading was because he didn’t have to practice alone anymore before, and because he didn’t draw over them these days, even when they were getting fainter.

---

It had been a month since club activities were suspended. September 2nd, the second day of the new semester—they only went to school for the morning yesterday, so today was the real first day of the new term.

When he pedalled his bike to the station, he saw the train arriving at the station building. He pedalled faster and charged in front of the station, then immediately got off his bike and jumped over the ticket gate. Monshiro Station was a desolate little hut, so the platform was right in front of the ticket gate. He ran and made it just in time through the gap in the doors as they were about to close.

A dark green afterimage intruded his vision and he momentarily felt dizzy. He took off his glasses, wiped the sweat off his face with his shirt, and exhaled. The fan spinning on the ceiling blew a strong and lukewarm wind that ruffled his hair.

I pedalled my bike as hard as I could for just a little bit, but I’m tired…

As he leaned against the railing by the doors and put his glasses back on, he noticed a tall person wearing the same uniform as him standing in front of the priority seats.  

“Granny, if you don’t tie it up properly, they’ll all fall out.”

While giving something that sounded like honest advice to the old lady sitting in the priority seats, the person was tying the mouth of a supermarket bag that was filled with some kind of fruit and then putting it on the overhead rack.

“Thank you, young master. I wish my son was as big as you.”

“Your house would get more cramped with people like me in it. My mom keeps saying I’m getting in the way.”

“Well, isn’t your house big enough?”

“Our house is wide horizontally, but it’s stuck verti…”

Kuroba also noticed him and cut himself off.

“Oh…hey, you’re kinda sunburnt.”

I was wondering what he was going to say first, but it was that? He sure has it easy.

Kuroba was dressed in his uniform, a white shirt and pants. There was a rule about ties, but few male students wore them in the summer. A colored T-shirt was showing through under his shirt, and Haijima couldn’t judge if that was cool or tacky because he didn’t have the evaluation standard for that. Haijima was just wearing the white shirt.

The only bags he had was the flimsy school bag designated by the school (it wasn’t designated to be flimsy, Kuroba just flattened it himself), and he wasn’t carrying the enamel bag for club activities. When he clicked his tongue with the implication of Look at you, just enjoying your vacation like it’s natural, Kuroba flinched a little and pouted.

They averted their gazes and leaned against the railings on either side of the door. There was no conversation that would stimulate them, so there was silence. Haijima planned on going home after doing some more self-practice today, so he had his usual enamel bag slung over his shoulder, but he couldn’t bear the weight on his shoulder and put it down on the floor. The single ball, his own that was used for outdoor practice felt terribly heavy.

He might be right when he called me sunburnt… When he turned the direction of his face, he could faintly see the frames of his glasses faintly reflected in the door glass. He had been practicing outside for overwhelmingly longer than usual, so he felt unusually burnt. I spent a lot of time outside yesterday too…so much that I don’t even remember how long I practiced. He wondered if that showed how tired he was.

Even though it was September, it was still blazing outside. However, the scenery of the paddy fields flowing outside the train window had become quite autumnal before they knew it. The growing rice plants were beginning to hang down their ears as though bowing. He squinted his eyes at the dazzling golden glow of the paddy fields reflecting the sun that had been shining brightly since morning. It seemed to overlap with his current situation, where he could only look on at a brightly sparkling world from a dim place, which made him feel even more frustrated.

Their participation in the Spring Volleyball Tournament’s preliminaries was hopeless at this stage. The semifinals would be held at the end of this month, and the two schools that would advance to the finals for both the boys’ and girls’ teams would be decided. Two months later in November, the finals will be held for the right to represent the prefecture at the National Tournament, where there was only one spot for both boys and girls. The Spring Tournament Final Selection, where representatives from all over Japan would gather, would be held in January of next year.

They had completed the application, so it seemed that they still weren’t officially non-participating yet, which was rather like a state of limbo. Even if they were allowed to resume their activities in the second semester, it would be difficult to rebuild a team that had fallen apart during the summer break in less than a month. It would be fine if their goal was to participate—but what Seiin, Haijima, Oda wanted was a ticket to Nationals. They needed the ability to beat all the teams in the prefecture and rise to the top.

What about Oda…he wondered if he had already given up on the Spring Tournament. As the days went by, he had a feeling that he was the only one feeling irritated like this every day, but when he saw Kuroba’s reaction, like he had forgotten something completely important, that worry turned into certainty.

Every time the train stopped at a station, the number of passengers and density within the train increased. Right before Nanafu Station, it became congested like it was rush hour, and the two stood side by side with their backs against the door. The two tall boys blocked the door glass, turning the inside of the car dark and causing the passengers near them to somewhat keep a distance from them.

There was a group of girls in Seiin uniforms chatting animatedly. He could tell from a glance that they belonged to a sports team, and from the logo printed on their bags, he could tell that they belonged to the girls’ softball team.

“Oh, you’re the first-years from boys’ volleyball.”

They seemed to know their faces and called out to them.

“We heard about it. Your club activities got suspended.”

They said in a teasing tone. “Yeah, well,” Kuroba said with a stiffened face and took a step over to him. While pulling his bag to between his legs with his foot, Haijima gave a side-eyed glare at Kuroba. …Don’t chicken out. What’s with that “Yeah well” and that half-smile. Aren’t you the reason why.

“…You, get a clue. It’s thanks to you that the Spring Tournament has become a total waste. We missed out on Inter-High and the National Meet, so this was our last chance to go to Nationals…”

He spat out in a biting voice, with the back of his head against the door glass. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kuroba’s shoulders jump.

“I, I know that much. It’s Oda-senpai and Aoki-senpai’s last year, and I feel awful about that. But if that’s the case, then you should trust me even more.”

He was just as persistent as he had been a month ago. Haijima had no idea what he was being so stubborn about. Was there anything in this world that required him to stubbornly prioritize it over the Spring Tournament? If it were him, he would say no.

“It’s not just the third-years. Why don’t you think about yourself too? We’ve only got three chances.”

He emphasized “three chances.” If he could, he would do it dozens of times, but he could only go there three times in his life.

The Spring High School Volleyball Tournament had been held in the first gym of the Yoyogi National Gymnasium in Tokyo for a long time as a March tradition, although there had been some changes to the outline of the tournament since it was moved to January. Since elementary school, Haijima had watched those recordings to the point where the tapes were literally worn out (some games were only recorded in analog form, so he went out of his way to have them shown to him on a VCR). He had imagined dozens of times, hundreds of times, that he would be fighting on that orange court—not the multi-sided court they had been playing on until the quarterfinals, but the center court right in the middle of the gym. Ever since elementary school, he had only been imagining that both when he was asleep and awake, only to suddenly realize one day that he had only three chances to actually try to go there, and that truth felt absurd to him.

When he decided to leave Meisei Middle School and go back to Fukui, he thought that with this, he had nothing to aim for anymore. But Oda’s words shone a light on what he had once stored away in a dim place.

“I honestly believe that this year’s Seiin will definitely be a team that goes to the finals.”

“Lend me all your strength.”

Can I really trust him…? If that’s the case, as long as I give it my all, I’ll get us there. After the summer training camp, he was at the point where he was becoming more and more convinced that he could make that a reality with this team, and he couldn’t step on the brakes twice.

“I can’t wait until next year. If this year’s ruined, then we lose one chance. Three chances will become two. And even if we could go there three times, it still won’t be enough.”

Why doesn’t he understand…really, how many years does this guy plan on being in high school?

“Were we told that… You seemed to be attached to the Spring Tournament, but that’s because you’re from Tokyo, right? What’s the difference between this and Inter-High or the National Meet?”

Kuroba’s tone of voice also became a little stronger. What had been sulkiness gradually became something like resentment and lashing out.

“If you wanna be in the Spring Tournament so badly, I’ve got an idea for you. You should go back to your old school in Tokyo and compete with them. You don’t care what team you’re on, as long as you can be in the game, but not Seiin. You’re only thinking about yourself anyways, aren’t you?”

“…? Why do I have to be told that? No matter how you look at it, you’re the one who’s not thinking about the team.”

Their voices, getting louder and louder, attracted attention from around them. The girls’ softball team was exchanging whispers that sounded like “Boys’ volleyball is splitting up.”

“You don’t know the rules of Koutairen (1) in the first place, do you? There’s one where it’s a general rule that if you transferred schools, you’re disqualified from participating in games unless six months has passed. If I transferred to Meisei right now, even if I get accepted, there’s no way I’d be able to compete in the Spring Tournament preliminaries anyways.”

He was starting to feel very annoyed, wondering why he had to explain all that in a place like this. As expected, Kuroba looked as though he didn’t know about such a rule, but he still snapped back, saying, “W-Well, if that’s the case…”

“You want to go back if you can be accepted, right? I knew it.”

“I didn’t talk about that at all. Let me say this clearly, even if I’m accepted, who’s gonna want me as their teammate again? I…”

His voice caught. The words that had congested in his throat were spat out in small chunks.

“I’m…the setter who caused his teammate to attempt suicide…after all…”

Kuroba widened his eyes and became speechless.

That face suddenly disappeared from his vision with a surprised “Oh?”

The train had just appeared at the station and the doors had opened. Having suddenly lost the support of his back, Haijima almost fell onto the platform.

Passengers, including many in the Seiin uniform, surged towards the doors. The current of people pushed him and he jumped onto the platform on one foot, but his bag he had put down on the floor was left behind and he hurriedly pushed his way through the crowd to go back. A large rectangular bag was slumped between people’s feet. While almost getting kneed several times, he reached for the strap and retrieved the bag.

The departure bell began to ring, so he quickly retrieved it and was about to jump off the train, but just as he put his foot down the edge of the train car, he suddenly felt hesitant.

…What’s the point of this whole day? I’m just going to school and killing time between classes, not even doing any club activities, and yet I’m just going to go home tired.

He saw Kuroba’s head in the stream of people heading for the ticket gate. It was like a rock sticking out of the shallows, his height one head above the others. While walking with the current pushing him, Kuroba turned around and shouted something at Haijima, but Haijima turned back and went back inside the car.

He sat down on a vacant seat and threw his bag out onto the aisle. Of course, the Seiin students had all got off at Nanafu, so there was no one else left who was wearing the same uniform as him.

That’s what he thought, but then he saw Kuroba’s trouser-clad legs step over the bag in front of him and stop.

Blinking, Haijima looked up.

“What the hell are you thinking…”

Kuroba, looking a little flustered, was panting heavily.

“Why are you coming back here too?”

“You’re skipping school? What are you gonna do?”

“What, you say…”

He was about to answer “Nothing really,” but then fell silent.

It wasn’t as though he had any destination or goal if he kept riding. But…

He just thought of one.

“…Kuroba. Come with me.”

“Huh? Where?”

Kuroba darted his eyes about.

“Tokyo.”

“Huh? What are you doing there?” He looked like he still didn’t understand yet.

“I’m going back. ——To Meisei.”

***

“…Huh, Yori-chan came back? …No, it’s fine, yeah…I owe you, Uncle. I’m begging you, please don’t tell anyone until tonight. It’s not like I’m running away home, I’m with a guy who knows Tokyo, so there’s nothing to worry about.”

Kuroba, who had been talking in front of the station attendant’s office, came running back and said, “I kept you waiting. Here.” He pushed half of the bundle of tickets into his hand.

Fukui Station was in the center of the northern part of Fukui Prefecture and a terminal station where limited express trains stopped. The express train from here to Maibara in Shiga Prefecture and the bullet train from Maibara to Tokyo cost about 13,000 yen for a one-way trip—not an amount that a high school student could afford after making up his mind on the spot, so they had Kuroba’s relative who worked at the station to arrange the tickets for him. He didn’t know if tabs were a thing at train stations, but it felt like it was Kuroba’s tab.

With a humble look on his face, Haijima received the ticket.

“You asked me to come with you, but you used me as your wallet.”

“It’s not like that. I’ll repay you. My dad will be there when we get there.”

“Well, I don’t really mind. Oh, that relative of mine just now is my aunt’s…Yori-chan’s mom’s younger brother.”

“I don’t get it.” The relatives and aunts got mixed up in his mind. (2) Were there really hundreds of relatives related to the Kuroba family around here?

“Yori-chan went out of the prefecture to play again during vacation, but he arrived on a night bus a little while ago and came back to town the same time as us.”

Since the departure time of the special express train was approaching, they talked as they ran up the stairs to the platform and jumped in through the nearest door.

It was a weekday, but the unreserved seats were quite packed. Most of the passengers were in two categories: groups of young people on summer vacation since universities were still on break, and businessmen on business trips. They looked terribly out of place in their high school uniforms, but thanks to Haijima’s enamel bag, which was easily recognized as something for club activities from an outsider’s perspective, they should look like they were going to an away game or something.

Kuroba found two empty seats and took the window seat first. Haijima shoved his bulky bag into the overhead rack and sat down in the aisle seat. The two of them were taller than most people, so it was quite a bit of trouble for them to tuck their legs in.

“The seats are so cramped in limited express. Won’t we get that economy class syndrome thing?” (3)

“It’s only a little over an hour to Maibara. Bear with it.”

“Accused of misconduct, then skipping school in the new semester and escaping outside the prefecture, can my situation get even worse…umm, how do you put the seat down, oh, here?”

As he continued to complain, Kuroba pushed down the back of his seat one notch, and when he thought he was going to rest his back on it, he pressed his face against the window and said excitedly, “Oh, it looks like we’re setting out already!” Even though he had been complaining about his situation, he was completely acting like he was on a school trip, saying, “Let’s buy a station lunch if they’re selling food in the train. I’m starving.” This guy fundamentally has weak self-awareness.

It shouldn’t have been reassuring at all to bring along a country bumpkin who got excited just by riding the express and having to take care of him, only adding to his burdens—but he convulsively invited Kuroba. Even if he hadn’t depended on his wallet, he didn’t think he would have even thought of going if he was alone.

Kuroba made an “Mmm?” sound and stirred, rising from his seat. Haijima was fed up, wondering why he couldn’t stay calm like that, but it seemed that he got a call as he took out his vibrating cell phone from his back pocket. As soon as he checked the caller, he got a startled look on his face. “Itoko…ah, not Yori-chan, but my cousin, Itoko.” “Your relatives sure are complicated.”

He thought he was going to answer, but he only indecisively stared at the message, not even attempting to respond.

“What if it’s an emergency?”

“No…we had a little fight, and she was staying angry at me, so what’s with the sudden…”

Kuroba clamped the phone between his hands and the vibration eventually stopped.

“Ah, she stopped.”

His voice when he said that sounded a little disappointed as he breathed a sigh of relief.

The gravity from the front lightly pressed him against his seat. Haijima imitated Kuroba and lowered the back of his seat down a notch, resting the back of his head against it and relaxing. He slowly closed his eyes and turned his attention towards the vibrations beginning to come from underneath his buttocks and the muffled sound of the train as it gradually picked up speed. He didn’t mind the feeling of being wrapped in a thin barrier, something characteristic to long-distance trains.

It’s been a while since I felt this feeling. In the winter of my second grade of middle school, I rode the express train in the opposite direction…

“Haijima.”

It came from next to him. It was no longer high-spirited, but calm.

“You’re not seriously going to transfer schools, right…?”

“You’re still saying that?”

Haijima answered curtly and opened his eyes.

“If you’re not, then what…”

“Who knows.”

“What do you mean, who knows?”

Kuroba’s voice became a bit wild, as though he was impatient, but even if he said that, it wasn’t as though Haijima had any specific predictions about what would happen.

After that “test of courage” incident at the summer training camp, he began to have nightmares from time to time. He didn’t really hold a grudge against Okuma and the others for their prank. It was just that those people didn’t know his circumstances, and it made him realize that he was still dragging along what happened at Meisei.

It might be that something would be put behind him for the better, it might be that something worse would happen. It might look foolish to be desperate and going out of his way to have his wounds gouged out, but in any case, if he stayed here, then this summer would end fruitlessly in a state of limbo. For Haijima, this current situation where he couldn’t go forward or back was unbearable, to the point where he thought that it would be better to just destroy everything once and for all.

“I thought if I met Souta, it would play out one way or another.”

“Souuuta.”

Kuroba repeated the name in a strange monotone, then cleared his throat like there was phlegm stuck in it.

“Hey, if you don’t mind me asking…what happened at your Tokyo school…?”

“I might as well. I’m the one who made you come with me, so it makes sense for me to tell you. We have time while riding anyways.”

“I-It’s not like I’m curious or anything, okay? You don’t have to talk about what you don’t want to talk about.”

“Don’t get so weirdly worked up over it.”

Although he said that, this guy was someone who paid attention to the needs of others by nature. Unlike him, he could be considerate in order to not hurt others. …Oh, was he coughing because he found it hard to ask? It was then that he realized that the excessively high-spirited chattering might because he was finding the right moment to broach what he wanted to ask.

“He’s the guy who…attempted suicide, right? What kind of person is this Souta…?”

“Yoshino Souta. My volleyball buddy since fourth grade.”

Haijima began to play volleyball when he was in fourth grade. The Haijima family was a father-son household, but his father came home late and he had to stay home alone for a long time, so he was enrolled into a local elementary schooler volleyball club as a substitute for after-school childcare. The club itself wasn’t a full-fledged one, as its main objective was to improve the physical fitness of children, but Haijima became more and more absorbed in it, to the point where volleyball became everything to him before he knew it. Volleyball might have become something like a parent to him.

It was at this club that he met Yoshino Souta and Komukai Tetsuto, and they would later play together at Meisei Middle School. Although they went to different elementary schools, they invited each other to continue playing volleyball at the same middle school, and they all took the entrance exams for Meisei Private Academy Middle School.

“Our coach was named Minami-sensei, who took care of us older kids under the head coach, and the one who told us about Meisei. Sensei told us that it was a powerhouse school in Tokyo, with great facilities, and that they worked closely with their high school to nurture their players over the long term. So we all promised Sensei that we’ll definitely go to the Spring Tournament from Meisei High.”

“Heh…With such a good team and environment…” How did something like that happen? He seemed to want to say.

Why did it become like that, really. When he was in elementary school, everyone got along well. They all looked forward to the days they had club, and there was never a conflict of opinions that created a bad atmosphere.

However, that was probably because their positions were fluid and they were playing volleyball half in fun. As they started to play a serious and strict team, the disparity in ability and physique became more and more apparent, and their old relationships changed before they knew it. Haijima himself probably realized it quite late, but it seemed that everyone distanced themselves from him from the very beginning.

“Can’t you get it up there? If you don’t do that, I can’t do anything either.”

There was a time when Haijima lost his temper because the attackers’ serve return rate was terrible.

“You don’t do receives, so don’t talk to us about anything. If you’re gonna tell people to do something, do it yourself first.”

“If I do the first touch, then I can’t be the setter. If I’m not in the middle, there’s no offense. The left’s job is to receive first and foremost. It’s the job of all of you to connect to me. I’m not gonna let someone who’s not gonna do that to spike.”

Haijima thought he had said something obvious. Even thinking about it now, he was sure he wasn’t wrong in theory. No matter what formation it was, the setter didn’t take part in the reception. However, his statement made the atmosphere rough.

Apparently, this kind of thing would happen so often that his teammates would go online to enthusiastically badmouth Haijima to each other in order to vent their frustrations. Someone’s mother must have happened to see their screen, and shocked by the situation, the mothers overreacted and it reached the coach in the form of harsh advice from the parent’s association.

“Haijima, why did you have to say things that way…? I’m not a teacher at this school, so I won’t delve into it that much, but could you please think over your words a little bit more? That’s why, even though it’d be fatal for us if we don’t have you, you’re benched for the next game.”

The mothers’ cooperation was important not only in terms of funding, but also for training camps and away games, so the coach was probably reluctant to speak out. He decided to temporarily drop Haijima from the starting lineup for the tournament in the fall with the sense of “appeasing them.”

It was on the very day of the tournament.

Yoshino Souta attempted suicide by slitting his wrists.

The direct trigger for this was the fight with Haijima during practice two days ago, apparently.

“MURDERER…do you know what that means?” (4)

“…? Um…what was it again?”

He was suddenly asked a question and gave a quizzical response. He didn’t want to give him a quiz, so he immediately said the answer.

“A killer.”

Kuroba’s seat suddenly creaked as he sat up and looked at him. Haijima only gave him a side glance and purposely continued to speak detachedly.

“I also didn’t know until I looked it up in the dictionary, so I guess they weren’t really good at bullying. Even if they drew graffiti with a word I couldn’t read, it didn’t really affect me. …Until I went home and looked it up.”

The Yoshino incident spread outside the club, probably embellished, and he ended up being harassed in school. When he came to school in the morning, there were words carved on his desk, or his textbooks and school shoes went missing. It was of course unpleasant and disgusting to see his shoes lined up in front of the fence on the roof (which was of course off limits as a general rule). Going to school because he had club activities remained the same in middle school and now. Haijima didn’t have any reason where he had to cling to his classes to the point of struggling to find what he had lost and being treated as entertainment as he did that. Staying home from school was an easy decision.

“So with the end of the second semester, I stopped going to school for a month, and I transferred here for the third semester…and you know what happened after that. …That’s pretty much it.”

The blood drained from Kuroba’s face. It rubbed him the wrong way a little, wondering why he was making that face even though he wasn’t the one who had those things done to him. He understood, though. He’s got that kind of personality, so he sympathizes with me and feels sorry for me. But it actually hurt him to recognize anew that he had been through something that made him be pitied.

“…Haijima. After hearing your story, I have a feeling that you really shouldn’t go there… I think going back to a place like that would make you feel painful feelings again, and nothing good will come of it…”

“You’re the one who started it. You told me to go back to Tokyo right now.”

“Oh, that, well, that was more like tit for tat…”

“Take responsibility. I don’t need you to get cold feet. Because…I might be the one who’s getting cold feet.”

“…”

Kuroba kept stiflingly silent. The passengers sitting in the seats in front of them reclined their seats like they had arranged it beforehand, making it too cramped for them. Still silent, the two obediently bent their knees. The four knees in black pants tightly lined up before them.

A small vibration began sounding at the window. Kuroba’s phone, placed on the window frame, received another message. Kuroba took his phone and muttered, “Ah…it’s Itoko again.”

“Why don’t you just answer her?”

Haijima moved his legs aside to make room for him to leave, but Kuroba shook his head with an “Oh, no…” and pressed the power button on his phone. “It’s fine.”

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#2.43 #2.43: Seiin Koukou Danshi Volley-bu #2.43: Seiin High School Boys Volleyball Club #2.43 translation #2.43 book 1 #2.43 seiin high school boys volleyball team

[historic-old-guard-lover]

Historically Booker’s native language would be Occitan and not French . He would also probably deeply resent standard / Parisian French since the government did their damnest to erase regional languages and still do it today .

Agreed! There was another post about this, but since I got an ask (I love you, anon) I’ll elaborate. Buckle up for a primer on the evolution of the French language with a brief aside for troubadours, traveling musician-poets you wish were still a career option. No, being a rock star is not quite the same.

In the early medieval period (as early as ~900CE), the country we now call France had a language divide between the northern and southern regions. In the north, they spoke langues d'oïl which is what eventually became modern standard French. In the south, they spoke Occitan or lenga d'òc and a modern form of this language is known as Provençal. Looking at the regional sub-dialects, the more northern Occitan begins to sound like a langue d’oil and the more southern dialects begin to sound like Spanish.

As I touched upon in a previous post, this is because they all share similar roots as a romance language. Even though modern standard French is a langue d’oil, occitan managed to sneak a few things into the language. If you’ve learned French as a second language, you’ll know that when you respond yes (oui) to a negative question (you don’t like cheese? / tu n’aimes pas le fromage?) that you use a different yes (si). This is a skeleton of Occitan! 

The why of the invention of “standard French” is, as most “standard” things are, a detour into nationalism. In 1635, Cardinal Richelieu (under Louis XIII) founded the Académie Française (French Academy) which was tasked with standardizing the French language so that it could be exported to the rest of Europe and used to gain further prestige of the role of French philosophers during the Enlightenment. During the French Revolution, it was disregarded, but Napoleon Bonaparte restored it as part of the Institut de France (Institute of France) in 1803. To this day, the Académie is tasked with publishing the French dictionary and inventing new words for things such as “e-mails” so that the French needn’t stoop to using English loan-words.

Another part of this was the Toubon Law (August 1994) which required French (the standard French from the Académie) to be used in all official documents and advertising. It required all advertising to use French and even set a certain percentage of music on the radio that must be French. This law was literally the government going “let’s make the French french again.” If a school doesn’t instruct in French (modern, standard French of course), then they can’t receive government funds. The only exception is Breton-language schools (Breton is as north as it gets and is a langue d’oil so it still helps crush Occitan).

Since the previous paragraph probably made you mad as heck, let me give you some irony to laugh at: some French people refer to this as the loi Allgood (“law” Allgood). To explain this joke, it helps to know that Toubon is the last name of the Minister of Culture at the time the law was passed. If you break down his last name, it sounds like “tout bon” in French which translates to “all good.” People took this law saying make everything French, goddammit and replied, sure thing Minister All-Good. I love it.

Now, for the troubadours! I learned standard modern French in high school, but at university I came across Occitan because of those romantic poets. I’ll put this aside below the break so you can continue on with your day if for some reason you’re not interested in medieval French rock star-poets...

Let me begin by quoting the Wikipedia definition:

A troubadour was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages (1100–1350). Since the word troubadour is etymologically masculine, a female troubadour is usually called a trobairitz.

Right away you may notice a few things: 1) they wrote and sang in Occitan; 2) it was an equal-opportunity field (though it was rare for a woman to be one). The first Troubadours were mostly noblemen, but later ones could come from any social class. Yes, you read that correctly: egalitarian travelling poets! If that doesn’t sell you on these performers, I don’t know what will. The troubadours spread their tradition throughout Europe and the only thing that could stop them was the Black Plague.

As you’d expect, they mostly sang about love. A lot of their poems were about courtly love and chivalry, but they could also get bawdy. The especially good performers would be sought after by courts like famous painters. Troubadours are essentially the apex bards: romantic, witty, charming, talented, and able to make serious bank.

To finish this, I will leave you with one of the bawdiest troubadour poems I know of, Farai un vers, pos mi somelh (The Ladies with the Cat) by Guillem de Peiteus. It’s essentially the story of a dude who has sex with these women who pick up a knight on a pilgrimage (though it plays with reality and this guy’s fantasies). I’ll include it in the original Occitan, and then a translation by Robert Kehew (I believe), verse-by-verse. Forgive me for my commentary in between, but I just want you to understand how freaking clever this poem is!

Farei un vers, pos mi somelh Em vauc e m’estauc al solelh. Domnas i a de mal conselh,    E sai dir cals: Cellas c’amor de cavalier    Tornon a mals.

While sound asleep I’ll walk along In sunshine, making up my song. Some ladies get the rules all wrong;    I’ll tell you who: The ones that turn a knight’s love down    And scorn it, too.

The singer is establishing himself as a troubadour. The protagonist is dreaming, so we should be careful about what is real and imagined. He’s also invoking the trope of the philandering knight constantly falling in love and breaking his heart.

Domna fai gran pechat mortal Qe no ama cavalier leal; Mas si es monge o clergal,    Non a raizo: Per dreg la deuri’hom cremar    Ab un tezo.

Grave mortal sins such ladies make Who won’t make love for a knight’s sake; And they’re far worse, the ones who’ll take    A monk or priest-- They ought to get burned at the stake    At the very least.

The Middle Ages were not at all chaste; yes, monks and priests were having sex. This isn’t as sexist as it may come across on a first reading however. He’s not saying women shouldn’t have sex (he’s actually saying that it’s a sin not to being having sex), he’s just upset that women who are clearly willing to have sex are turning *him* down. He’s not going to get any awards for feminist of the year, but he’s not the worst. I’m sure this would rouse cheers from a tavern.

En Alvernhe, part Lemozi, M’en aniey totz sols a tapi: Trobei la moller d’en Guari    E d’en Bernart; Saluderon mi simplamentz    Per sant Launart.

Down in Auvergne, past Limousin, Out wandering on the sly I ran Into the wives of Sir Guarin    And Sir Bernard; They spoke a poper welcome then    By St. Leonard.

These are recognizable locations along a pilgrimage route. There’s a good chance that these names are replaceable (Bernard can be replaced with any last name that rhymes with a saint) and this song could be used to goad the audience. And no, he hasn’t had sex with these ladies yet. They’re just saying hello (for now).

La unam diz en son latin: “E Dieus vos salf, don pelerin; Mout mi semblatz de bel aizin,    Mon escient; Mas trop vezem anar pel mon    De folla gent.”

One said in her dialect, “Sir Pilgrim, may the Lord protect Men so sweet-manned, so correct,    With such fine ways; This whole world’s full of lunatics    And rogues, these days.”

I think most would agree that this is happening in the knight’s sex-dream because she’s just sweet talking him. The awesome part is that the “dialect” reflects the singer actually adopting a Northern French language (they’re mutually intelligible). Guillem didn’t have to go that hardcore, but he did.

Ar auzires qu’ai respondut; Anc no li diz bat ni but, Ni fer ni fust no ai mentaugut,    Mas sol aitan: “Barbariol, babariol,    Babarian.”

For my reply--I’ll swear to you I didn’t tell them Bah or Boo, I answered nothing false of true;    I just said, then, “Babario, babariew,    Babarian.”

This guy just mocks their accents as a reply. Wildin’.

So diz n’Agnes a n’Ermessen: “Trobat avem que anam queren. Sor, per amor Deu, l’alberguem,    Qe ben es mutz, E ja per lui nostre conselh    Non er saubutz.”

So Agnes said to Ermaline, “Let’s take him home, quick; don’t waste time. He’s just the thing we’d hoped to find:    Mute as a stone. No matter what we’ve got in mind,    It won’t get known.”

In this stanza we see two repeats and a new thing. First, the names are easy to replace (Agnes doesn’t even have to rhyme with anything) so that this can be done to call out a specific woman’s name. Second, the language skills are being flaunted again as this Occitan-speaker is just casually showcasing that he can sing about sex in other languages too, thankyouverymuch. Lastly, this is WOMEN voicing their desire, not men. The man is silent, they think he’s incapable of speech. This is two women in a poem/song getting to steer the story how they please. Stepping back, this is a guy’s sex-dream so you could argue he’s just got a kink for dominant women, but regardless that’s a pretty cool way to turn masculinity on its head.

La unam pres sotz son mantel Menet m’en sa cambra, al fornel. Sapchatz qu’a mi fo bon a bel,    El focs fo bos, Et eu calfei me volentiers    Als gros carbos.

Under her cloak, one let me hide; We slipped up to her room’s fireside. By now I thought one could abide    To play this role-- Right willingly I warmed myself    At their live coals.

Yes, this dude is saying he’s more than happy to let the women take charge. Don’t kink-shame him.

A manjar mi deron capos, E sapchatz agui mais de dos, E noi ac cog ni cogastros,    Mas sol nos tres, El pans fo blancs el vins fo bos    El pebr’ espes.

They served fat capons for our fare-- I didn’t stop at just one pair; We had no cook or cook’s boy there,    But just us three. The bread was white, the pepper hot,    The wine flowed free.

A capon is a castrated rooster, fattened for eating. He’s being fattened (and emasculated by letting them take control) before the women get down to their  fun with him.

“Sor, aquest hom es enginhos, E laissa lo parlar per nos: Nos aportem nostre gat ros    De mantenent, Qel fara parlar az estros,    Si de renz ment.”

N’Agnes anet per l’enujos, E fo granz et ac loncz guinhos: E eu, can lo vi entre nos,    Aig n’espavent, Q’a pauc non perdei la valor    E l’ardiment.

“Wait, sister, this could be a fake; He might play dumb just for our sake. See if our big red cat’s awake    And fetch him, quick. Right here’s one silence we should break    If it’s a trick.”

So Agnes brought that wicked beast, Mustachioed, huge, and full of yeast; To see him sitting at our feast--    Seemed less than good; I very nearly lost my nerve    And hardihood.

So yes, he’s joking about almost loosing his boner and there’s that language play again. The big part of the ending, however, is the imagery of the red cat. Cats are typically associated with women, and the color red tempts the mind into thinking of it as female passion or some kind of prowling sexuality (with undertones of evil). The subtext here is that they’re going to test him by letting this cat scratch him up to see if he’ll cry out. If he can keep his mouth shut and allow the womens’ passions, he can stay. If he can’t, he’s out. Ultimately, I’m going to say that this poem is subtly for women’s empowerment. Go scratch up your knights, ladies.

#the old guard #historic #reference #sebastien le livre #booker #french #nationalism #language standardization #occitan #troubadours #i wish i was as cool as troubadours #so underappreciated #asks #lovely anon

[shhhlikeme]

Hello, could I have a request? If it’s not too much of a bother, maybe about kenma having a crush on a foreigner who’s still new to speaking Japanese, so he teaches her how to speak better, gets to know her better and finds out she’s also a gamer? Sorry if it’s too specific, I love your writing!! 🥺

Thank you so much for reading my work! I adore Kenma he is everything so thank you for requesting him. I didn’t want to stop writing this! I hope you like it!

Kenma x Foreign Student Reader

——————————

You were the absolute ONLY thing that could take Kenma’s attention away from his Nintendo switch

When you trotted into class silently that day as a new student that just moved to Japan from [Your City] Kenma just scribbled in his notebook like he always does when the teacher is talking because he didn’t hear you come in

The teacher asked you to introduce yourself and you did, shyly and in less than accurate Japanese

This got catboy’s attention

When Kenma heard your angelic voice he lifted his head up from the paper for the first time that day

Baby boy is smart af. He doesn’t even need to listen in class and he gets straight A’s

His eyes widened when he saw you. You clearly weren’t from here and he didn’t know how he felt about that

He takes a mental note that you looked.....different.

Um, good different.

VERY good different. He realized, as he studied your features

Kenma thought you were beautiful and although your introduction had grammatical errors, he found your mistakes quite adorable

You sat in front and to the left of him which was ideal for Kenma because you couldn’t really see him staring

Since Kenma is a gifted student he is always abnormally bored in classes. His teachers always took away all of his electronics so he didn’t even try anymore. This current Modern Japanese class was no exception until you joined, and as the days went by he found himself not even missing his electronics for the first time in his life because he shared that class with you

He has you to look at now

You were so pretty and interesting to him.

He wished he could talk to you

Hiding behind his hair so that he wouldn’t get caught with red cheeks and all, he sighed admiringly as he watched you listen diligently to the teacher. The way you looked when you were concentrated made Kenma’s stomach hurt because you were just so cute. Watching you made him wish he had Kuroo’s confidence when it came to girls

Maybe he would ask Kuroo for advice, albeit a mortifying thought

Day after day in class Kenma watched as you read the teacher’s lips in hopes of slowing down the language in your head better. When everyone got a worksheet in class Kenma always did his work fast and just smirked to himself because you would quietly sound out everything you were reading and translate it to English.

So cute

Kenma knew his fair share of English because of his American gamer friends, so when he heard you translate a Japanese word incorrectly, which would have been detrimental for your grade on this paper, Kenma wanted so badly to jump in to help you

But he was anxious

In silent panic, he watched you whisper the wrong answers out loud because you had translated one early sentence incorrectly .

Oh no.

You were going to fail!

What would Kuroo do??? Kenma thought.

In his animated mind, he conjured up an air bubble version of Kuroo looking down at him and lecturing him, telling Kenma that: “you are like blood that should flow towards the blood that has the most attractive body covering it which is obviously a reference to the cute foreign girl you have a crush on so STOP BEING SUCH A WUSS AND HELP HER, KENMA!”

Kenma shook his head violently. The air bubble version of Kuroo disappeared.

God, even in his made up thoughts his best friend was obnoxious

Kenma’s volleyball team, Fukurõdani’s volleyball team and Hinata all knew Kenma’s true personality.

They knew that Kenma wasn’t a shy person like most people initially think when they see him alone in the corner. In fact, he wasn’t shy at all. He just didn’t like people. Learn the difference.

And when Kenma did like specific people he still wanted them to stay at an arms length

So why did he like you so much? He was convinced that he wouldn’t mind having you closer than an arms length because of how pretty you are. Kenma liked looking at aesthetically pleasing things, and in that respect you were much much better than his games or his volleyball friends.

But jumping in to save your assignment still wasn’t him. It just wasn’t Kenma. He didn’t chat to others in class and enjoy it like everyone else in this school. He liked chatting with Kuroo, Shōyō, and his gaming pals, sure. But everyone else was slightly annoying.

But not you.

He wasn’t annoyed by you despite the fact that he’s been watching your embarassing quirks for over a week now. He felt quite the opposite for you, actually...

Completely unaware of Kenma’s daily analysis of you like you always were, you smiled as you finished your work. Ready to leave, you collected your paper, preparing to hand in the open-book assignment worth 40% of your grade. But before you stood up you felt a delicate hand on your arm, halting you.

“Uhhhh.......” You look up to see the most gorgeous boy you’ve ever seen in all the countries you’ve been in. He had striking cat-like eyes that made your heart beat faster and his voice was soft and alluring.

With a serious face, he removed his hand from your arm and pointed to your sheet. In perfect English he said, “That means “theatre audition” actually. Not “movie theatre.”

You were shocked that his English sounded better than your Japanese

Kenma felt a burst of pride within because he could infer that he impressed you with his English

You blushed and quickly started erasing the subsequent answers. “Oh my gosh, thank you so much.”

You expected the gorgeous boy to walk away after that but you were even more taken back when he pulled up a chair next to you.

His sudden movement blew breeze in your direction which wafted the mango-scent of his shampoo toward you. You almost salivated. His hair was so shiny, he was so beautiful and to top it off he smelled to-die-for.

“You made minor translation errors in question 1, 4 and 5 too. Mind if I help you? My name’s Kenma.” He asked hopefully, still speaking to you in impeccable English.

You introduced yourself too while blushing some more and of course you accepted his help

Throughout the rest of class, Kenma, talkative as ever—asked you a bunch of questions in order to get to know you. You shared with him that your parents were divorced and that you decided to move from [Your City] where you lived all your life with your mom to move in with your dad in Japan for high school and University because you loved/missed him. You told him that your dad spoke Japanese to you as a baby but you lost a lot of it living so far away and having no one to practice with.

Kenma became more and more intrigued by you. He could listen to you talk all day which would probably give his best friend a heart attack since Kuroo was put on a strict talking time limit that kicked in after 3 hours.

The more the cat boy learned about you the more he wanted to learn. Especially when you mentioned that your favourite hobby included gaming.

Kenma, being fairly asexual but attracted to you, was unfamiliar with the way the concept of you gaming turned him alllll the way on.

He imagined you beside him during his gaming weekends wearing a baggy t-shirt & just your underwear underneath like he wears.

Damn

He flushed

Let’s just say Kenma had trouble shifting inconspicuously under the desk to adjust his tightened pants when he thought about you gaming.

He mentally prepared to get himself off on the thought as soon as he got home tonight

Yep. You officially had him wrapped around your finger, and you didn’t even know it.

You had no idea that that conversation would go on forever

You had no idea that Kenma had always denied tutoring others when the Modern Japanese teacher asked, and that is why the teacher gladly allowed you two to work together

You had no idea that the rest of the class was ASTONISHED by the quiet and stunning setter of Nekoma (who does everything in his power to not be approachable and avoid social situations) going out of his way to keep a conversation going with another student

You had no idea that all the Kenma admirers were soooooo jealous of you right now

You had no idea that Kenma would glare back at the girls who glared at you and try his best to become your friend in the coming weeks

You had no idea that you both would enjoy every moment of your close friendship. A bit too much

You had no idea that, weeks later, Kuroo would force Kenma into confessing to you, even if it was over your favourite game as avatars... and you would cry tears of joy

You had no idea that you would lose your voice cheering for your boyfriend at Nationals........twice.

You had no idea that upon graduation you two would adopt an adorable kitty and name her -cinema-

You had no idea that years later, Kenma would become the husband of your dreams and that shortly thereafter you would give birth to the most beautiful cat-eyed baby girl that was a splitting image of her stunning bearded father

Just imagine daddy Kenma all grown up with a beard omg

No.... as you sat there in class trying to repeat after him the Japanese sentence on the worksheet, you absolutely had no idea

But

When Kenma asked for your number at the bell and you blushed beautifully again, he felt butterflies in his stomach by the sight, and that’s when

He did have an idea that all of that would happen.

Because love-struck Kenma wouldn’t accept anything less.

#haikyuu!! #haikyu requests #haikyuu boys #haikyu #daily haiku #kenma x reader #kenma x you #kenma kozume #catboy #nekoma #karasuno #haikyuu suggestions #kenma fluff #kenma sfw

[7r0773r]

The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon, translated by Richard Philcox

The colonized world is a world divided in two. The dividing line, the border, is represented by the barracks and the police stations. In the colonies, the official, legitimate agent, the spokesperson for the colonizer and the regime of oppression, is the police officer or the soldier. In capitalist societies, education, whether secular or religious, the teaching of moral reflexes handed down from father to son, the exemplary integrity of workers decorated after fifty years of loyal and faithful service, the fostering of love for harmony and wisdom, those aesthetic forms of respect for the status quo, instill in the exploited a mood of submission and inhibition which considerably eases the task of the agents of law and order. In capitalist countries a multitude of sermonizers, counselors, and “confusion-mongers” intervene between the exploited and the authorities. In colonial regions, however, the proximity and frequent, direct intervention by the police and the military ensure the colonized are kept under close scrutiny, and contained by rifle butts and napalm. We have seen how the government’s agent uses a language of pure violence. The agent does not alleviate oppression or mask domination. He displays and demonstrates them with the clear conscience of the law enforcer, and brings violence into the homes and  minds of the colonized subject. (On Violence, pp. 3-4)

***

A world compartmentalized, Manichaean and petrified, a world of statues: the statue of the general who led the conquest, the statue of the engineer who built the bridge. A world cocksure of itself, crushing with its stoniness the backbones of those scarred by the whip. That is the colonial world. The colonial subject is a man penned in; apartheid is but one method of compartmentalizing the colonial world. The first thing the colonial subject learns is to remain in his place and not overstep its limits. (On Violence, p. 15)

***

The colonized intellectual has invested his aggression in his barely veiled wish to be assimilated to the colonizer’s world. He has placed his aggression at the service of his own interests, his interests as an individual. The result is the ready emergence of a kind of class of individually liberated slaves, of freed slaves. The intellectual calls for ways of freeing more and more slaves and ways of organizing a genuine class of the emancipated. The masses, however, have no intention of looking on as the chances of individual success improve. What they demand is not the status of the colonist, but his place. In their immense majority the colonized want the colonist’s farm. There is no question for them of competing with the colonist. They want to take his place. (On Violence, pp. 22-23)

***

The people discover that the iniquitous phenomenon of exploitation can assume a black or Arab face. They cry treason, but in fact the treason is not national but social, and they need to be taught to cry thief. (Grandeur and Weakness of Spontaneity, p. 94)

***

In these poor, underdeveloped countries where, according to the rule, enormous wealth rubs shoulders with abject poverty, the army and the police force form the pillars of the regime; both of which, in accordance with another rule, are advised by foreign experts. The strength of this police force and the power of this army are proportional to the marasmus that afflicts the rest of the nation. The national bourgeoisie sells itself increasingly openly to the major foreign companies. Foreigners grab concessions through kickbacks, scandals abound, ministers get rich, their wives become floozies, members of the legislature line their pockets, and everybody, down to police officers and customs officials, joins hands in this huge caravan of corruption. (The Trials and Tribulations of National Consciousness, p. 117)

***

A country which really wants to answer to history, which wants to develop its towns and the minds of its inhabitants, must possess a genuine party. The party is not an instrument in the hands of the government. Very much to the contrary, the party is an instrument in the hands of the people. It is the party which decides on the policy enacted by the government. The party is not and never should be merely a political bureau where all the members of government and dignitaries of the regime feel free to congregate. Alas all too often it is the party which makes up the entire political bureau and its members reside permanently in the capital. In an underdeveloped country the leading party members should flee the capital like the plague. With the exception of a few, they should reside in the rural areas. Centralizing everything in the capital should be avoided. No administrative pretext can justify the bustle of the capital already overpopulated and overdeveloped compared with nine tenths of the territory. The party must be decentralized to the limit. This is the only way to revive regions that are dead, the regions that have not yet woken up to life. (The Trials and Tribulations of National Consciousness, pp. 127-28)

***

But can we escape vertigo? Who dares claim that vertigo does ot prey on every life? (Colonial War and Mental Disorders, p. 185)

***

Comrades, have we nothing else to do but create a third Europe? The West saw itself on a spiritual adventure. It is in the name of the Spirit, meaning the spirit of Europe, that Europe justified its crimes and legitimized the slavery in which it held four fifths of humanity.

Yes, the European spirit is built on strange foundations. The whole of European thought developed in places that were increasingly arid and increasingly inaccessible. Consequently, it was natural that the chances of encountering man became less and less frequent.

A permanent dialogue with itself, an increasingly obnoxious narcissism inevitably paved the way for a virtual delirium where intellectual thought turns into agony since the reality of man as a living, working, self-made being is replaced by words, an assemblage of words and the tensions generated by their meanings. There were Europeans, however, who urged the European workers to smash this narcissism and break with this denial of reality.

Generally speaking, the European workers did not respond to the call. The fact was that the workers believed they too were part of the prodigious adventure of the European spirit.

All the elements for a solution to the major problems of humanity existed at one time or another in European thought. But the Europeans did not act on the mission that was designated them and which consisted of virulently pondering these elements, modifying their configuration, their being, of changing them and finally taking the problem of man to an infinitely higher plane.

Today we are witnessing a stasis of Europe. Comrades, let us flee this stagnation where dialectics has gradually turned into a logic of the status quo. Let us reexamine the question of man. Let us reexamine the question of cerebral reality, the brain mass of humanity in its entirety whose affinities must be increased, whose connections must be diversified and whose communications must be humanized again.

Come brothers, we have far too much work on our hands to revel in outmoded games. Europe has done what it had to do and all things considered, it has done a good job; let us stop accusing it, but let us say to it firmly it must stop putting on such a show. We no longer have reason to fear it, let us stop then envying it. 

The Third World is today facing Europe as one colossal mass whose project must be to try and solve the problems this Europe was incapable of finding the answers to. 

But what matters now is not a question of profitability, not a question of increased productivity, not a question of production rates. No, it is not a question of back to nature. It is the very basic question of not dragging man in directions which mutilate him, of not imposing on his brain tempos that rapidly obliterate and unhinge it. The notion of catching up must not be used as a pretext to brutalize man, to tear him from himself and his inner consciousness, to break him, to kill him. 

No, we do not want to catch up with anyone. But what we want is to walk in the company of man, every man, night and day, for all times. It is not a question of stringing the caravan out where groups are spaced so far apart they cannot see the one in front, and men who no longer recognize each other, meet less and less and talk to each other less and less.

The Third World must start over a new history of man which takes account of not only the occasional prodigious theses maintained by Europe but also its crimes, the most heinous of which have been committed at the very heart of man, the pathological dismembering of his functions and the erosion of his unity, and in the context of the community, the fracture, the stratification and the bloody tensions fed by class, and finally, on the immense scale of humanity, the racial hatred, slavery, exploitation and, above all, the bloodless genocide whereby one and a half billion men have been written off. (Conclusion, pp. 237-38)

#frantz fanon #book quotes

[kendrixtermina]

The “Genocidal Edelgard” Shallowtake

I was not going to make a post about this because it’s most likely futile and not going to convince anyone nor do I believe in dinifying the purity police with attention, but maybe it will let some ppl know that they dont have to let themselves be shamed for liking the wrong video game character

Whatever might have been the case in the distant past when Nemesis was around, by the “present day” the Nabateans are not at all some commonly oppressed stereotyped minority - the setting is chock full of characters that fit that bill a lot better like Dedue or Cyril. Characters that are ordinary humans not magic dragons. 

And even that is more founded on general purpose xenophobia than from the specific, relatively new early modernity construct of racism. (the dedue situation probably comes the closest)

Sure, Seteth and Flays have to hide from their old enemy the Agarthans, I see how some might find that relatable etc. but most of the population isn’t aware that they exist at all. They hold high status positions, are worshipped by the local religion and Rhea all but rules the entire continent (and says so herself to Byleth in that speech about how she was just “ruling this wayward country in your stead”, “you” being Sothis) - though that is mostly Rhea’s doing of which Seteth and Flayn are relatively innocent. 

The interviews pretty much confirmed that the Nabateans constituted the local aristocracy and that many humans genuinely saw the Elites as liberators - though there was definitely also an element of ppl going around killing random Nabateans to gain superpowers, not to speak of Nemesis’ very obvious very unambiguous mass murder. Not wanting to be ruled over by foreign powers is understandable, though obviously killing them all down to the last civilian was just flat out evil - its certainly not a simple situation, we can all agtree Nemesis & the Agarthans were evil but there is no clear defined good guy. 

There are historical conflicts you could compare this to, perhaps some conflicts in Africa or the middle eastwhere different groups took turns being the ruling class after the latest war,  but it’s not at all like the modern USA or early modernity colonialism, and forcing every real or, in this case, imagined scenario inherently dependent of fantasy elements, into this one framework from the present or near past isn’t conductive to understanding at all. 

And in the present day, by the time Edelgard is alive, we are talking about three specific people that she has good reason to dislike individually. Not any sort of group at all. 

She calls Rhea a cruel beast because that’s all she’s ever seen Rhea to be. She’s the shadow tyrant who rules her world, who created the crappy world Edelgard grew up in. It’s no different Cubans thiking badly of the castros after suffering through famines - or, no need for such extreme examples really, ppl call their least favorite politicians monsters all the time. 

She’s wrong to assume that Seteth & Flayn are wholly on board with this, but on the other hand, it’s not at all a far-fetched assumption to make: They hold high positions in the church though they ostensimbly just appreared out of nowhere one day. Do you have to be an evil bigot to assume that the brother and right hand man to the tyrannical god-queen is condoning & supporting her actions?

The truth is of course that underneath her pseudo-parental facade Rhea is sort of a scared girl, very lonely, very afraid, and ashamed, in a shallow, childish way, for “breaking the rules” just because they are rules. She says she can’t trust anyone, that she feels lonely & isolated... and while no one can blame her for distrusting humans after the slaughter of her people, but the reason she can’t trust Seteth is that she’s keeping her bad deeds secret from him. He wasn’t there the whole time, he just showed up a few decades earlier. 

She sees herself only as filling out for Sothis and doesn’t quite grasp that she’s in charge, very much a follower personality bent on stasis & regularity. 

Is Edelgard obliged to try & unravel the complex psychology of the tyrant who rules her home to correctly deduce why she would deceive even her own family? By all intents and purposes, Edelgard is the one getting rid of an oppressive government that doesn’t let ordinary humans let a say at all. A government where ppl of others faiths and nationalities are typically oppressed unless they work directly for the church.

It’s like having a disdain for, say, Ivanka Trump. She holds a high position in her father’s administration despite having no obvious qualifications, she appears to be profiting & making bank from her father’s atrocities, she certainly hasn’t done anything to stop him or disavow him the way that, say, her cousin Mary did - if you suffered under Trump’s regime you’d be very justified in assuming that Invanka is probably a bad person.

Flayn only looks young (She might not if we saw her in other clothes). I mean, Kronya could badly impersonate a schoolgirl. At the very least they’ve supported the regime by refusing to question their own side and they show some however benevolent belief that it is their duty to “guide” the people. Leaving her to the Agarthans is certainly questionable, but no more so than doing it with Rhea herself, under the assumption that she’s guilty and that it’s a sacrifice that will prevent larger chaos. The agarthans had their plan long before they created Edelgard as we know her, and she couldn’t stop their plots all on her own. 

You could say that it’s callous, distasteful or a deal breaker - as the death knight is her direct subordinate & she makes a personal appearance in mask, I would argue that she definitely knew & sanctioned the kidnapping - but she’s no more callous towards Flayn than towards anybody else. 

Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re evil, or that they deserve to die.... and Edelgard would agree with me.  She doing all this to prevent death – flipping the lever on the trolley problem so it crushes one person instead of five so to speak. She always gives her enemies the chance to surrender, unwilling allies the chance to leave, and jails enemies whenever leaving them alive wouldn‘t lead to further death… even the ones she has the most personal reason to hate, like the PM.

As servants of the church who have chosed to back her enemies, she’ll certainly kill them if she has to, but not any more than any other enemy. At no point anywhere in the story does she say anything like that they need to die on principle. Nowhere at all. Indeed there is much evidence to the contrary.

The church paints her as being completely against the religion or even wanting to set herself up as a satanic godess cause it‘s good politics & they don‘t get what she‘s doing – to an extent her own credibility & messaging is compromised by her secretive and at times unscrupulous actions, no one said she was perfect. In truth all she wants is to have the church out of politics, you know, what we have in nearly every modern country outside the vatican and saudi arabia.

You can absolutely let Flayn & Seteth go on CF and there is no word, no fuss about it anywhere. No „make sure to kill em all“ which would certainly be there if the narrative wanted to portray Edelgard that way. It requires the mediation of Byleth as someone they would talk to & not immediately assume the worst of, but, they see the church as the embodymet of all that is good & fighting its enemies as their sacred duty so of course it wouldn‘t be possible for just anyone to talk them down. It‘s framed as Flayn letting Byleth go cause they saved her life once, even if we know from behind the screen that she wasn‘t going to survive a fight to the death against the player-controlled faction.

Heck, even when it comes to Rhea, the one most guilty that Edelgard has the most reason to loathe, she‘s ultimately surprisingly gracious. She gives her the option to surrender – and this is not a lie, she discusses this with Byleth in a lecture question, and seriously ponders the possibility. Here Byleth gets a range of options like „stab her in the back“ and „keep the church under imperial control“ but you know which one nets you the support points? „Strip her of her authority so she can‘t interfere in politics“. She wasn‘t gonna mess with the religious folks & their religion at all, just make it so it‘s separate from government. Rhea could even keep being pope, if she could be satisfied without having complete supreme authority (and ripping her precious artifact out of Byleth‘s chest) – even when she puts her down she‘s not 100% without pity, telling her that „Your duty is done“ (the translators mucked this up)

Couldn‘t be any further from „lets kill them all on principle“.

What really annoys me is how ppl go and twist everything Edelgard says out of context to ascribe a motive to her that just isn’t there.

Common examples:

„If you have Flayn or Seteth fight her she‘ll say they need to die because they‘re nabateans“

Actually what she says is this: „You are a child of the godess. You must not have power over the people!“ Not getting to be privileges rulers anymore =/= being opressed. Stay out of politics =/= Diediedie. Also, this is from the VW/SS boss fight, where they have literally come to get her in her own capital.

„Linhard & Leonie don‘t tell her & hubert about Indech, probably cause he expects that she‘ll go & kill him„

What he actually says is: „Lake Teutates is a place that concerns the saints of the Church of Seiros. It may become bothersome should the two of them find out...“

„It may be bothersome“ as in, „we might get in trouble“, for doing the possibly very inadvisable thing of waltzing into what could possibly be an enemy location to satisfy personal curiosity. If it‘s something related to her agenda she might take over and Linny wouldn‘t get to investigate as he pleases – at very most you might construe it as Linny fearing that they‘ll be accused of consorting with the enemy, but „bothersome“ suggest possible annoyance not imminent murder.

The whole scene ends with Linhard telling Byleth to fill her in later. Doesn‘t sound at all like he expects her to go back with a harpoon.

„She said Claude isn‘t fit to be a ruler cause he‘s a foreigner“

What she actually says: „I understand your ideals are not so far removed from my own. But without knowledge of Fodlan‘s history, I cannot entrust its rule to you“

Now without the additional contexts that Claude won‘t get until after the fight, it might easily feel a bit like the former with the raw spots he‘d have from his backstory, but what she means is that he‘s ignorant of the Agarthan threat – which he is. Edelgard is all for making peace with Almyra and sees fostering isolationism & prejudice as one of the many faults of the church.

Once Claude basically kills Edelgard for information, he winds up having to take care of the storm she had been holding back. But to his credit, he DID „finish the job“ and get the info. But he didn‘t have it at that point.

And I don‘t mean any of this in the least bit as a diss of Claude - He is the smartest character, so there would be no plot if he got easy access to the info.  At this point, they both think they can probably do better, and more importantly, both their backstories have made them so that they won‘t let down their guard far enough to cooperate in this scenario.

That‘s also why the outcome in CF is contingent on Byleth‘s choice. - You‘d sort of have to trust that he will also act so as to minimize casualties.

Very disingenious since many players wouldn‘t necessarily trigger these dialogues.

I guess because Adrestia got a vaguely central-european aesthetic (partially; all the countries are hodgepodge mashups and there’s more than enough spanish or ancient roman vibes there) and central europe existed only for those 12 years of tyranny I guess, even though many other places have had similar BS happening, including the US that delights in making craptons of movies about their faraway victory because their governments haven’t added much of value to the planet as of late. -.- 

Faerghus (vaguely french/ russian - not at all places where nothing bad happened ever) has actually annexed some territory from their northern neighbors in the recent past, not to speak of the whole Duscur atrocity - but no one seems to go around laying that at Dimitri’s feet, because it would be nonsensical - he was a child at the time and as an individual he is super against it and champions a policy of reconcilliation if he gets to rule. after all, there wouldn’t be much of a plot if the characters inherited three perfect faultless problem free countries. 

Edelgard, too, is completely against the previous administration under Duke Aegir (which was in charge during the Bridgid war). She deposed him and is plotting to do the same with Arundel once she can politically afford to do so. For all that one can understand why she would chose the other path  (depending on how much she knows about what Edelgard’s doing and why) it makes all the sense in the world for Petra to support her on CF or if not recruited, because again, she got rid of that previous administration. 

#edelgard #edelgard von hresvelg #fe3h #fire emblem: three houses #fire emblem three houses