Imagine Misplaying SO HARD It Flips Your Entire Position

no hiding The Good Stuff in the tags ;<

*clutching head* rodya and meursault would have such a good dynamic actually

I wonder if rodya would initially see meursault's indifference as like. a simpler version of her own feigned carefreeness and as a deliberate attempt to place himself as an outsider... only to realise that No, he really Is just Like That. and then she gets annoyed because it turns out that people who don't care about anything don't seem to be any fun.

(ofc he does actually care about a lot of things, just not necessarily his grander place in the world lol)

idk. nihilism vs absurdism. fun duo 👍 rodya would find meursault's genuine comfort with being a speck of dust in the universe baffling, while he would probably find her desire to assert her own importance pointless, but they could probably bond over little things like their shared desire to live in the present and appreciation of/indulgence in earthly joys. and meursault would probably listen if rodya wants to rant about anything without asking any uncomfortable questions. I think they could appreciate each other's presence.

uh, i am pretty sure the manga didn't have so many objects sticking out of it's panels

26-29- Ango’s epic plot armor (and other complaints)

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Welcome back to the Anti-Dazai Series! I think I should just acknowledge that I have no posting schedule at this point. But the Anti-Dazai Series isn’t discontinued— it’s just taking me longer to create than I was hoping it would. Anyway. Onto a rundown of Dazai Crimes™ in these next four chapters.

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When we last left off, Dazai said he now will get the government involved in this conflict. I sure hope he does this in a normal sensible way, like by explaining what’s going on to them and requesting backup, and not in a Dazai Way, which will most likely endanger people’s lives.

We now return to our protagonist, Atsushi.

After getting scolded (and slapped) by Dazai after the Q incident, Atsushi decides to stay in the agency’s headquarters rather than to go out and risk messing things up again. Kouyou is still being held there, and she asks if he’s here because he “commit[ed] some error that made [him] scamper away from the front lines.” 

Upon hearing that question, he makes a face indicating that she’s right, and when she questions him further, he says “I… I was just trying to protect them all…” while having flashbacks to Naomi and Haruno being injured post-Q fight last chapter. 

If Dazai had chosen something better to say other than “get over it” [the exact quote was mentioned in part 20-25, but it was something similar enough to that], Atsushi wouldn’t be feeling so useless right now. Because he did try his best, and there was nothing he could have done to avoid that outcome. The only person who can do anything about Q’s ability is Dazai, and Dazai was not there with Atsushi at the time to stop it from happening.

Of course, I’m into blaming him for not being there, but I am blaming him for not properly comforting Atsushi. The “tough love” approach clearly failed with Akutagawa, and even though he’s being a lot nicer to Atsushi, in that last Q scene we see him somewhat slip into a tough love approach again. And we see in this chapter that Atsushi is not handling it well, and is taking it quite hard.

Now back to Dazai. Let’s see how his government negotiations are going. 

Seems like he’s meeting with his old friend Ango. I sure hope this doesn’t turn violent..—nope, he’s now pointing a gun at him unprovoked. 

Well at least it can’t get any worse— ah wow it got worse. Dazai just staged a car crash. There is absolutely no way Ango survives this. 

I’m gonna do something I’ve never done before on the Anti-Dazai Series and include a screenshot of the manga, because the amount of plot armor Ango will need to survive this is. a whole lot. I’d really like to elaborate on this scene, but I’m too busy being amazed that Ango survives this.

There is absolutely no way Ango survived that. If BSD didn’t use anime physics, Ango would be very, very dead.

There is a lack of Dazai for a bit, as Kyoka gets captured by the police, Q gets captured by Lovecraft, and Nathaniel abandons the Guild, pushing Francis to speed up their plan of attack. 

But Dazai returns just in time for the Q incident (the actual Q incident, not just a mini fight by the train station). Which is good, ‘cause he’s exactly the guy we need. 

But of course, Dazai can’t handle a city-wide crisis without messing with people first, so when Kunikida approaches him asking about what this mysterious hand-shaped mark that appeared on him is, rather than tying him down to an infirmary bed and sedating him, he chains him up to a chair and simply watches as he has the magical equivalent of PTSD flashbacks [if I’m interpreting these panels correctly]. It is later revealed that not only did Dazai sit around and watch, but he filmed Kunikida for entertainment. I’ll get back to that later, once it’s mentioned in the manga, but keep that in mind.

Meanwhile, Atsushi is fighting for his life out there. With the help of Lucy, Atsushi escapes ((ALSO. It’s really not mentioned enough, but Lucy was the one who originally came up with the idea of the mafia and agency working together to take down the Guild. I’m pretty sure the anime changed it so that it was Atsushi’s idea, but in the manga Lucy suggests it to Atsushi in this scene. I think she deserves more credit than we give her. She’s a pretty cool character.))

Atsushi makes it to the ground safely, and now has the epic quest ahead of him of delivering Q’s doll to Dazai. Unfortunately, Mark is still shooting at him, and manages to hit him, shattering both of his legs . As Atsushi lies on the ground,with two broken legs, reaching for the doll, Dazai spawns out of nowhere and grabs it. Then he reveals that he set up a smoke screen beforehand, and he activates it now.

Sure, it would have been a lot more convenient if he activated it before Atsushi’s legs got shattered, but whatever. What can you expect from this guy, other than this. 

And that’s it for this week’s chapter of the Anti-Dazai Series!! Join me next time when I’ll probably have enough content to stop grouping multiple chapters together like this, because I wanted to include chapter 30 in this entry too, but I scrolled through it and every other panel was Dazai, so I was like “nope! That’s way too much work for today!” and decided that that’ll be a problem for another day.

eXCUSE YOU regarding YGO:

…and unless someone dumps the data to an unofficial DB you better have access to judge forums. Shoutout to my boi Prohibition - "cannot be used" requires 12 A4 pages of rulings handling every possible way of trying to get that card onto the field. And some interactions can be only explained by knowing rulings of other cards that have the same (non-kayworded) effect

AKSHUALLY all percieved incongruities are all explained on the official site! That is kept up-to-date! And it depends on placement of a semicolon, not a word! we have Problem-Solving Card Text Now!! So seven or so lines of text on a card are orderly now! Old cards are reprinted with it! Modern cards are interpreted like code!

[Citation needed], but official rule patches can and will be postponed until enough money is made from outdated rules making new cards OP AF (Sangan triggering on detach early into XYZ era)

Memes about collectible card games tend to treat Magic: The Gathering and Yu-Gu-Oh! as basically interchangeable, but the truth is that each of them is fucked up in completely different ways. In brief:

Magic: The Gathering –

Official rulebook that's about nine hundred pages long

Timing and priority framework with roughly a billion different steps and sub-phases that tries to account for every edge case and technicality like a video game developer trying to stop speedrunners from clipping out of bounds

Authoritative card text resides in a massive centralised database which receives constant updates and errata, such that what's officially printed on a card may bear no particular resemblance to what's physically printed on it

So densely keyworded that a single symbol in a card's text may expand to several paragraphs of rules

Yi-Gi-Oh! TCG –

Judges' rulings in major tournaments create binding precedent which is not subsequently incorporated into the rules, creating situations where fully understanding what a card does may require a knowledge of its complete history of use in tournament play

Multiple mutually incompatible priority, timing and targeting frameworks, such that which framework is used may vary not only from card to card, but among different effects of the same card, determined by differences as small as the placement of one word

Legacy cards may receive permission to resolve their effects according to what the rules were at the time of their printing

See the difference?

I wonder if Teruko stays in her younger form so often to avoid the intensity of her own emotions.

Her devotion to Fukuchi despite his faults -> A childish crush

Her intense pride + rage that she must endure horrors for the sake of national peace -> Constant tantrums that seem disproportionate to the situation

Her sadism going unfulfillled during an interrogation and the storm of emotion that arises from that -> Cluthing Jouno's hand and wailing like the child she is embodying

haven't paid theory-grade attention to the plot, but how about just… talking him out of it? 1) there was an amazing theory way back that dove deep into why fukuchi is so… disliked by the fandom; with the tl;dr being (amongst others! <3): "he keeps subverting expectations" - NOT having a final boss fight is 100% more of that. he did go "you have 5mins to suss out my real motives". Season with "in middle of the fight villainous monologue ranpo wakes up and wisely keeps quiet as we works out all the bits"/"atsushi joins with the actual answer clenched in his teeth, cue drama" to taste 2) teruko and fukuchi go way back, given fuku calls the other fuku 'sonny' in the flashback. the request in [villain origin story] flashback can be read as "stop (pointless) deaths", two fukus chapter has the "saving your comrades from death and ending the war, are two different things." => the objective is End-of-Death scenario* (or perhaps, some other form of 'making the world unchanging'?) why? - has to fuck with atsushi's heard harder than "world peace (with a side of totalitarian dystopia)"; thus the goal has to be something he'd personally approve of (world peace being too vague and far-off vs no orphans ever), which could potentially overwrite the means used to get there - goal smaller than (the current) world domination angle would create too much noise - escalate the stakes even harder like a proper animu * BSD makes me keep thinking in SCP Foundation terms. It's quite the assist here, as this subplot tends to have Heroic Optics to it.

so i’ve been thinking

i know, dangerous

in all honesty, what is our cast of characters supposed to do about Fukuchi..?

i’ve already made my rant analysis (that you can read here if you’re interested) about how Fukuchi is really just an old man with a time traveling stabby stick that makes for a horrible OP villain. up until now, when presented with such a crisis, either soukoku or shin soukoku will partner up and defeat the big bad… or at least they had weaknesses, like Dostoy not anticipating Dazai was going to find him at the end of the cannibalism arc, or how most of his henchmen and underlings were eventually foiled or defeated to come to a satisfying conclusion that set us up for the next story beat. even Ranpo has his weaknesses, and his whole character is centered around knowing everything

well, we know for a fact that that’s not going to happen this time considering our usual duos and their friends are having some technical difficulties at the moment...

so that makes me think…

who is left to fight at this point..?

obviously we have Fukuzawa, who is currently fighting, and Atsushi is... around. but, the character on my mind the most at this point is Mori, since he’s been missing for quite a long time now. this by itself isn’t a big deal considering side characters often go literal years without any story time. however, this becomes a bit more interesting considering what’s happening to the rest of the Mafia and the world right now in bsd

so, i’m going to analyze some pieces that might be added to this 4d chess board of a story line. including more than just Mori. however, i’ll be talking about Mori quite a bit in this post, like almost half of it actually, so if you don’t feel like reading this, that’s fine

🔺minor spoiler warning for chapters 30/31, 50, and 84, and Dead Apple and Stormbringer. also spoilers for basically the entire current arc up to the most recent chapter as of writing this (ch 105) since i talk about most of the main events/situations🔻

I’ll start by taking a moment to talk about the European android everyone knows and loves(?) from Stormbringer…

Adam Frankenstein

Ah yes, the android, the myth, the legend, and the being that made me cringe so hard i got face cramps the first time I read him chewing and swallowing multiple pieces of gum like candy. That Adam.

We never see him or even hear of him in any other part of the story, including the main manga. He’s kind of just in Stormbringer and never brought up again, supposedly living somewhere in Europe doing android detective things. We haven’t even gotten a hint or any foreshadowing that he might show up in the main story, either. The reasons I think he may show up now are kind of simple to be honest.

He’s an android. That’s it. He’s, y’know, not made of flesh… And he doesn’t have blood.

What makes blood important right now? The vampires. Considering we know that Bram can transform a human, alive or otherwise, into one of his minions by ingesting their blood, we can probably assume that this is how it works for the other vampires as well. Therefore, Adam is at a major advantage against such an enemy since 1. his body is made of metal that couldn’t be damaged by Piano Man’s wire guillotine or regular bullets and survived the heat of Chuuya’s first Corruption with minimal damage, and 2. he doesn’t have blood. He does have this blue substance that I assume acts something like oil or fuel for his body, but since he’s most definitely not human, this doesn’t count as blood for him. He can’t be turned into a vampire. I don’t even think Fyodor could hack him or put a virus into his system, like he did to the Moby Dick (which is technically an ability that got turned into a mechanical ship). If anything, the vampires would just break their fangs trying to bite into his neck.

Since he’s in Europe, which is where our two jail kings and their entourage are, it’s more likely that Adam will appear in the jail scene with Dazai and Dostoy. I’d honestly be happy to see this because it would be interesting to see how he and Chuuya would interact now after so many years apart if Chuuya is ever cured of his, y’know, vampirism. Since he most definitely isn’t going to just die. It would also introduce a new character for people who haven’t read Stormbringer, which could reignite interest in this god forsaken arc for those of us who have given up on getting more than a few cliffhangers and a reminder that Fukuchi sucks every new chapter (trust me, I feel you).

Moving on to another semi-short analysis for a character we haven’t seen outside of light novels. And the mildly disappointing adaption of one said novel.

Shirase Buichirou

Another character who is also in Europe, specifically London, is Shirase. At the end of Stormbringer, he and Chuuya parted ways on somewhat good terms when Shirase heard of a group called the Stray Sheep in Europe, which he joined. Nothing has been heard of him since, similar to Adam. The only reasons I bring him up here is that 1. he’s in Europe, same as Adam and the jail kings, and 2. he is also connected to Chuuya (and is familiar with Dazai, to some degree, but this isn’t important).

I’m hesitant to say he’ll appear in the story considering we truly have no idea what the state of the BSD world is right now. Japan is overrun with vampires, and there’s probably nobody left there who hasn’t been bitten unless they’re a major character in the story (that hasn’t already been bitten). We know that the vampires have been moving out by disguising themselves with sunglasses and stuff to hide their eyes and complexion and getting on planes. Where those planes went to, we only know it’s somewhere overseas. There’s also mentions of fictional countries that only exist within the BSD world, similar to Kenji’s home town being a fictional one from a novel written by the irl Kenji. Fukuchi mentions he “needs to control half the nations’ armies” in order to carry out whatever plan he has, and it’s probably safe to say this has already come to fruition since he threatened to set the vampire army in motion if One Order wasn’t unlocked.

The likelihood of a character like Shirase appearing without being a vampire is much, much lower than Adam, and for more reasons than just because he’s a regular human. Shirase has no ability and is not named after an author or any other real-life person (that I know of), therefore it’s very unlikely he’ll be revealed to have one unless he wields an ability weapon like Fukuchi’s sword. Which is also highly unlikely. Given these conditions, he’s probably already been turned into a vampire along with the rest of the organization he joined. Another possibility for his inclusion is just to be killed off (by, perhaps, a vampire Chuuya). Or he might make a joint appearance with Adam, but I still doubt he’ll be a major character unless he’s there to die to further the plot.

Not to mention Asagiri has mentioned many times that Chuuya’s story is a long one that’s full of hardships, so perhaps one of those hardships may just be having to kill an old friend.

Sorry Shirase fans, but that’s just my thoughts on the matter.

From here on, I’ll be discussing Mori and how he’s appeared and disappeared throughout major story arcs and how he’s interacted with the ADA since the cannibalism arc. I know he’s apparently a controversial character to talk about because of his ability and the comments he makes about underage girls and whatever, so if you don’t feel like reading this part, that’s fine.

In case you’re interested in another character appearance, I have added a few honorary mentions at the bottom of this post.

Mori Ougai

Port Mafia Boss. Underground doctor. Ex-military doctor. A third of the Tripartite Framework. And one half of the first version of soukoku before it was known as soukoku.

His titles honestly don’t mean much to me as the only thing he continuously claims to motivate him is his position as the Boss, which is reasonable as his entire livelihood is dependent on the organization and its success. He fills his role well as a clear villain character with extremely black if not straight up non-existent morals, which we get plenty of examples of during the Dark Era, the Guild arc, and even the Cannibalism arc. The currently arc also proves that he’s both willing to provide some aid to the ADA, as well as make manipulative requests of them despite the horrible position they’re in currently for his own potential benefit. He is truly, wholeheartedly, an evil character.

What I want to focus on the most is his hand in moving the pieces on the chess board, so to speak. We know that Dazai and Dostoy are both sitting on the board, presumably in control of every piece, but is that really true? Remember, Dazai is only the way he is because Mori manipulated and taught him to be that way, which we can see from the parallels in how they act when making threats or doing something morally wrong. The comparison between Dazai’s attitude and Mori’s in chapter 30 is telling enough, seeing that Mori’s expression when he murdered the previous Boss 8 years ago (as well as when he talks with Hirotsu in this chapter) is almost identical to the one Dazai makes as he says his thinly veiled threat to do the same to Mori. The anime makes these expressions even more similar than they are in the manga, but I take everything studio bones does with a heavy grain of salt at this point… And not just with BSD

The last time we saw Mori was when he was mentioned in chapter 91 as the liaison who informed Tanizaki and Kenji that it was time to come out of hiding. He appeared normal and not infected by the vampire virus, which isn’t much of a surprise to me. Stormbringer showed that he’s more than capable of avoiding death, and by proxy, avoiding the master assassin Verlaine. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to assume he was able to avoid the hive mind army of vampires that are just regular soldiers, and most of the ability users that have been infected are mafioso who Mori is very familiar with. However, whether or not he’ll intervene in the prison arc is not what I plan to discuss here.

The previous two characters would only make sense to appear in the prison because of their relationship to Chuuya and their location. Mori is Chuuya’s Boss, sure, and sure he probably wants to keep Dazai alive and on his radar, but Mori is still in Japan and knows that Meursault isn’t a place to be taken lightly.

No, I think Mori is about to become a player in the battle against Fukuchi.

My evidence isn’t necessarily anything concrete or even any foreshadowing, such as with chapter 84 when it was pretty obvious that Akutagawa was going to show up to aid Atsushi when he was saying he was all alone, or back in chapter 31 where it was obvious that soukoku was going to reunite for a big fight.

Fukuzawa, so far, has been the only person capable of standing up against Fukuchi alone and not being beaten within seconds (except Tachihara, but, well… yknow). So this alone is interesting to me because Fukuzawa is one of the strongest fighters in the ADA, and arguably one of the strongest fighters in the entire story considering his ability has nothing to do with his raw swordsmanship and martial arts skills. Keeping that small fact in mind, I want to jog your memory of the battle that happened in chapter 50 between Fukuzawa and Mori. Both of them are afflicted with the cannibalism virus, which is probably causing them to feel horrible with symptoms, but they still face off in a 1v1 that looks a little unfair. Mori has his ability, Elise, that does whatever he tells it to do and is basically a highly skilled and deadly combat ability. Fukuzawa, while still an ability user, only has his sword and his physical talents. His ability is a support ability that works on his subordinates, he can’t use it to fight like Mori or Fukuchi. However, he still holds his ground extremely well and even destroys Elise within minutes if not seconds of the fight starting, and Fukuzawa deals the fatal blow to Mori first. Even though Mori also severely wounds Fukuzawa just seconds later, it’s more important that this fight showed us that they are practically equal in combat skill. Not to mention Natsume makes an appearance to tell the two of them to stop fighting since both of their organizations need to survive to uphold the Tripartite Framework, which is something they both agree to disagree on basically.

There’s also the events of Dead Apple where, while under the effects of Shibusawa’s fog, Mori and Fukuzawa are fighting their own abilities and struggling. However, when they meet and switch opponents, they easily take down the other’s ability. They even share a few lines of dialogue that shows they’re familiar with each other’s fighting styles and tricks, similar to their explosive meeting in chapter 30 during the Guild Arc.

Now let’s look at the situation Fukuzawa is in right now. His subordinates are in all danger, and the only one that could potentially be coming to his aid is Atsushi, which is a possibility that I’ll mention at the end of this post. However, doesn’t this setup of our protagonists in a life-or-death situation with no help in sight, seem a little familiar to you?

Dazai was surrounded by soldiers in chapter 31 when Chuuya arrived to (begrudgingly) help him out, on Mori’s orders. Dazai was literally dead in Dead Apple when Chuuya showed up to punch him in the face (deserved) to save him.

Atsushi rarely wins on his own, but with Akutagawa’s help and the singularity created by their combined abilities, they’re able to defeat almost any enemy. And when Atsushi was desperate for help in chapter 84, Akutagawa arrived, even if it was on Dazai’s orders.

Fukuzawa is currently losing the fight against the OP time traveling stabby stick wielding grandpa, putting him in a dire situation of trying to save the ADA while not dying in the process. So, will Mori come out from wherever he’s hiding to provide aid to Fukuzawa? Will zenki soukoku come back and parallel the other soukoku’s reuniting/working together to defeat the big bad? It’s hard to say, honestly, but I do believe it’s entirely possible considering Mori has been strangely missing in the story after agreeing to aid the ADA. Well, the ADA needs aid. Badly. And it’s about time they finally got some.

I think Fukuzawa and Mori have the potential to defeat Fukuchi together considering their both equal in strength, so perhaps putting their finely tuned skills together is what will prove to be our deus ex machina that defeats Fukuchi’s self-induced deus ex machinas that are honestly getting pretty damn tiring at this point.

There’s also the fact that Mori had originally agreed to aid the ADA on the condition that one of their members transfers to the Mafia, so perhaps Mori showing up to aid Fukuzawa will be a manipulation tactic to force them to agree to let him choose who he wants to join, since he only actually wants Yosano out of the deal. However, it’s possible that maybe Tanizaki will be the one to change organizations? He did offer to go in Yosano’s stead in chapter 65 when the deal was originally proposed by Mori, who straight up lied about what Fukuzawa told him over the phone that the one person Mori couldn’t choose was Yosano. Mori is a very, very smart man, so he probably knows that if he forces the ADA into enough of a corner under the guise of helping them, he can get what he wants out of them as well. He could also allow the majority/some of the ADA members to die or come close to force Yosano to heal them and work for him one way or another, since we saw in her backstory in the military that Mori isn’t above shooting someone to make Yosano heal them because now they’re “close to death”. He most likely hasn’t changed much in those ways over the years, so I’m expecting to see some extreme manipulation taking place on his part if he does come back into the story.

Honorable mentions that came to mind as I was working to gather potential suspects:

Atsushi

He’s there, kind of, I guess. So much of the arc recently has been like 2 pages of one perspective before changing to the next that I’m not even sure if he’s still the main protagonist anymore. /j

Since he’s also at the airport where this whole *gestures wildly* thing is happening between the two Fuku’s, it would make sense that he at least shows up during the fight. We also know he’s actively looking for Fukuzawa because he can’t decide on what to do next now that he knows what the DOA is after.

The only way I see Atsushi being implemented in the battle is if he gets super upset or angry over seeing all his friends and coworkers in serious trouble, and either Fukuzawa releases his ability (if that’s even possible) from Atsushi and allows him to use the full power of the White Tiger to fight Fukuchi, which could potentially defeat the time-traveling sword since the Tiger’s claws can cut through abilities. The other option is he goes feral? I don’t really know to be honest. Maybe he just gets his ass beat again by Fukuchi. Who knows. I’ll just be over here preparing the party poppers for Kunikida’s promotion I guess.

Verlaine

Why? For fun.

He’s never appeared in the main story line since he lives in the Port Mafia’s basement basically. But considering the Mafia kinda went up in flames (or vampires, I guess) it’s possible he’s on the move now. Whether he’d appear in the jail, to save Chuuya, or appear at the airport, potentially under Mori’s orders, I honestly don’t know. But, since he’s part of the Mafia and another character we haven’t seen, and the cover of volume 22 as well as other official artwork has been featuring several Stormbringer and Sheep references, some people believe we might be seeing someone from that cast of characters in an upcoming chapter. But honestly I think they might be on as much copium as I am…

It would be funny to see Verlaine show up and just crush Fukuchi in like 3 seconds while the rest of the protagonists couldn’t defeat him though.

Ango?

We see Ango last in chapter 95 when it’s revealed he’s the one that demanded a seal be put on One Order, at Dazai’s request as part of his plan to counter Dostoy. He hasn’t been a big player in this arc beyond being the coordinator early on for the ADA’s moves, but since they all were reunited and came up with their own plans, he’s been more active as just a background character acting on the messages from Dazai. But, since he is the final piece of the Tripartite Framework, I thought I’d just mention him here as well. Natsume clearly wants the three organizations to work together, so I wouldn’t be surprised if Dazai has also given Ango a message or plan to relay to Mori. I don’t think he’ll ever be a super big part of the current events, though, just more of the background coordinator.

The Guild?

We kind of see them and then we don’t. We know Fitzgerald wants to work with whoever is winning, which as far as we know, he thinks is going to be the ADA. He was giving them aid in exchange for Yosano healing Mitchell, but we don’t really see anything come after this agreement is made? Atsushi and Kyouka get into one ambulance with Mitchell inside to bring her to Yosano, and at the same time, Yosano (along with Tanizaki and Kenji) are attacked by the government who set up their own trap unknown to Fitzgerald and Atsushi. We know Fitzgerald didn’t set them up because in the first few pages after we see the government attacking, we see Fitzgerald explaining why he didn’t go with the 74 plans Alcott prepared that included selling out the Agency’s location. Technically, it only happened because Tachihara is a Hunting Dog, so he betrayed the location of the meeting since Mori sent him and the other Black Lizard captains for security, and Tachihara is using his metal manipulation to pretend as if there’s an ability user attacking them with the government so they have to retreat after Kenji is severely injured. He’s also there to prevent Atsushi from reuniting with Yosano just a few minutes later. Which is truly impressive since he’s technically fighting himself the entire time? Wow is that symbolism of him as a character if I’ve ever seen it, that’s for sure. Not to mention he also stabs himself with Gin’s knife, just *chefs kiss* of a character I really wish he wasn’t killed/vampire-d whatever the fuck happened because he deserved so much better. But anyway, we never see the Guild again after this. So we have no idea what they’re currently doing, nor have we seen the other branch of the “Guild” that Steinbeck created at the end of the Guild arc since the end of that arc. So, I doubt they’ll come back.

The Clock Tower?

They’d have jurisdiction over Meursault, but it’s hard to say if they’ll step in. They haven’t been a part of the story at all beside Agatha’s little cameo from chapter 12. On a side note, I believe Agatha’s ability will be something along the lines of causing death in accordance to the lines in the poem “Ten Little Soldiers” (obviously I’m not putting the original name here) since her ability is named after the mystery novel And Then There Were None that’s about ten people dying on an island of various means that follow the reasons in the rhyme of the poem. It’s quite interesting, actually. But back to my main point, I don’t really see why they would suddenly come into the story now. If anything, they might appear if Fukuchi decides to try and use his vampire army against the governments of the world and create a world-wide coup d’etat with One Order.

Is this a copium-driven fever dream of a hope to have? Haha, fuck yeah it is! But I’ll let the copium win today if it means having at least a little hope that Fukuchi’s arc of shitty OP-ness will come to an end soon. Please. Asagiri I’m begging. I’m on my knees. Just PLEASE

Anyways, that's my thoughts on the matter. This theory was a little out there and not really based on too much evidence, but I still felt the need to write up this post, or else the brainrot might actually get my final braincell and it'd be all downhill from there.

As always, I hope you enjoyed, and thanks for reading. If you have your own idea of what you think will be the thing to defeat Fukuchi, feel free to say it in the comments or send a message to my Inbox on my profile. We can cope theorize together :)

**i just finished editing this oh my god this is so long i’m sorry i just had a lot of brainrot about this and i’m desperately awaiting whatever is going to end Fukuchi to the point i want to do it myself

Natsume and Dazai in Fifteen

Bungou stray dogs spoilers maybe!

I am rewatching bsd and I have just noticed. We know that Natsume sensei during Dark Era is in Bar Lupin in cat form, hanging around Dazai, Oda and Ango. And now he is Haruno's pet Mii-chan, so he is close to the ADA.

But I haven't seen anybody mention that he appears in the Fifteen arc too! I didn't notice at all the first time I watched it but now I was like WAIT A SECOND!! He even appears during the second epidode opening. I had to check the markings of the cat and yes, I'm pretty sure it's the same cat.

This is just before Dazai meets Chuuya for the first time.

This is just before the final scene with Randou. The "party" was happening in the second floor that the cat is looking at, and later Chuuya and Randou would fall just where Natsume is standing after Chuuya came flying through the window. I'm sure he watched all the fight.

And now I'm wondering if all this was planned by Natsume, and Mori followed. Because it's strange, he was witnessing everything from the beggining. Mori even mentions Natsume's phrase "only a diamond can polish a diamond". It's too much of a coincidence. Maybe he is the one pulling the strings all the time, he could actually be the one that "created" Soukoku. Or it's just a coincidence and he is just watching...

Anyway, it's even more obvious now that Natsume is always keeping a close eye on Dazai and they wanted us sto know it.

yess so much space for Deep Ideas. how about… Akutagawa is fine, because he was ordered to prep himself for combat - but Tachihara being kept away from it, didn't have that order and thus just idled, so when (assuming Fuku didn't want the plan capstone to be as in anime; too much wiggling in the manga) Dracula stops working Tachihara is stuck like that. This would have Implications about Jouno's situation - let's say Asagiri's impenetrable plot armor kicks in, Tecchou + Kenji just contrivance his location out before Aya jumps off the tower. Here, we got options:

Tecchou moves him to Yosano at Hunting Dog speeds

due to Fukuchi quite liking Hunting Dogs, he's already in a location that's just good enough to stabilize him, so back to your boi Tachihara

Given the context, what about status of HG as an unit? wouldn't Fukuchi throw a lot of suspicion on the group? Obv they're not getting decommissioned, but either (or both, lel) on thin ice, or just… most of their bodymods removed (in preparation of), breaking the unit apart. The former could be used to create tension with Mori's requests, the latter via 'well now you're full-time mafia! It's a good thing you like it here, yes?'

Tachihara Meta below the cut-- heh, cut. Get it?

So I think his eyes were healed up when he was turned and he'll be fine.

But oh my god, the angst of the blinding not going away is so interesting to me. As much as i think a blindness arc would be so interesting, would there be any reason for magic vampiric healing to not fix his eyes? Idk, maybe a loophole or something.

I think Fukuchi blinds him so callously, not even turning around, because he knows that it will be healed. I think Fukuchi actually cared for the hunting dogs. They were under his command and he was responsible for them. Even if Tachi did turn on him, it was because Fukuchi was being evil on purpose to push humanity to his goal.

Anyway, back to Tachihara. I want to find a way to facilitate this cuz I want him to talk to Jouno and learn how to cope with this loss. Maybe find a way to use his metal ability to sense metal in the environment and "see" through his ability.

And imagine if he decides to go to Yosano for help, cuz he can't stand never being able to see the world again. Never being able to see the people be cares about. And she helps of course. And they talk and he learns more about how his brother died and how Yosano tried to stop that madness but was forced into a corner by none other than Mori. I think Tachihara would feel differently about staying in the mafia if he knew that Mori was the true culprit.

Maybe his injury was healed and his body is healthy but his mind is shutting down his vision out of mental trauma. He has to go to therapy to process his fucked up life and regain his eyesight. What a journey.

Ah fuck I'm writing this, ill call it an AU if I need to, if canon doesn't follow this thread.

for exactly one (1) person posting in this tag, because nothing quite irritates as much as 'somebody is WRONG on the internet', even if it is oneself.

>you should look at why i avoided feminine things >fyi, my blog is password-protected

If you have adopted a new interest, it means it came from somewhere. Which is to say, your enviroment - the interests of your peer group, attitudes found in your family, even the sites you like to visit. And somehow, within ten years most of these new interests coalesced into tastes and behaviors typically seen as feminine. While you percieve the situation as “embracing both“, outwardly you’re as girly as the majority of the society wants you to look like - since it doesn’t care about what you think. This raises the question - are you really 100% okay with everything, or are you just trying to tell yourself that, hoping to honestly believe it at some point?

Some nebulously defined ideology has nothing to do with it. Because you really are a sum of outside influrences, no matter what they are and what they are going for.

So, how did the brainwashing fail, exactly?

character development