#ch189

[abybweisse]

Hey Aby! In anticipation of the 205 chapter, I decided to go back and re-read Mey-Rin's and Bard's for clues of what may happen next to Snake and Finny. I noticed something interesting with both arcs - they both seem to hint at what their ultimate fates will be. While Bard's arc is all about meeting with wife and son while in a coma and he practically promises to return to them, Mey-Rin is an unwitting witness to a sex act, in an uncharacteristically graphic scene for Yana. Do you think that death is ultimately on the cards for Bard and (I guess) a marriage for Mey-Rin? Or is it all contained to their arcs themselves and does not mean anything beyond completing a mission?

⚠️ long post ⚠️

Assignments as foreshadowing?

I think that if Mey-Rin gets married, it would not be foreshadowed by her seeing sex acts through a keyhole.

She joined Qīng Bāng at a very young age and worked as a sniper, but she saw a lot going on around her. Well, as much as she could see without glasses. There were drugs, alcohol, and probably prostitution in and around the opium den, as well as throughout Limehouse district. One of her early assignments as an assassin was to shoot this guy at a hotel or perhaps in his own huge manor, right? He was a rival gang leader, and she shoots him while he's naked with some unnamed woman. He might have even been right in the middle of having sex when she shoots him. She's witnessed a lot in her young life.... Getting married to anyone would be despite the things she has seen and done. Reminds me of how Katniss finally settles down and has kids in The Hunger Games, even though she's been thoroughly traumatized by her experiences. So far, at least, Mey-Rin seems to have kept her mind pretty well intact. I hope she can continue to do so.

I think we can safely say she has somehow managed to remain a virgin up to this point, too. Otherwise, Georg von Siemens' inappropriate actions towards her wouldn't have been enough to make her question whether she was still worthy of marriage. Going by "Rin" and dressing as a boy until she joins the Phantomhive household might have been partly to protect her virtue. Good thing Haku was apparently only interested in her sniper abilities.

In Baldo's case, the interaction with Joanna and his son might be an indication he will have to break whatever promises he's made to them. At least for now. I mean, his claim he can now properly cook fried eggs is an exaggeration "Sebastian" calls out even before Baldo can fully return to the living realm.

I put Seb in quotations because I'm not sure whether Sebastian has infiltrated Baldo's coma or if he's just a nagging figment of his imagination.

Then again, maybe he will soon join them. We still don't have confirmation that he and the others safely made it out of Athena Sanatorium, thanks to a cliffhanger and moving on to the next assignment, with Finny and Snake. Next time we see Baldo et alia, they might be trying to take leave of the place... when Polaris freaking shows up, mad as all hell. Even if Ronald and William stick around and actually enter the fray (since it's another bizarre doll to take down), I don't see it ending too well. Baldo does seem to have this uncanny ability to survive, though, even if everyone else around him doesn't....

Either way, I highly doubt he will ever make it to Shanghai with the others, even if the others do. And if he stays in England and somehow still survives to the end of the series, this is most likely a false promise, as well:

Mostly because he's just that terrible in the kitchen.

I still somewhat hope Mey-Rin and Baldo end up together, despite their age difference. At least she is an adult already. Also, it was a very common practice in Victorian England for older men to marry much younger women, especially if those men were widowers. Much like Katniss again, perhaps Mey-Rin would only pair well with a man who has experienced much of the same trauma. Likewise, Baldo might now have trouble settling down with some completely innocent sort of woman. Katniss and Peeta go through the deadly and maddening games together. Baldo's been altered by war and losing his wife and son. Mey-Rin has been altered by her years as an assassin for a drug dealer and gang. Mey-Rin and Baldo have both been enlisted as servants for our earl, chosen because of their abilities and previous training; now they volunteer as pawns in this deadly game of chess against their young master's brother. Perhaps their bond will be strengthened by all this... if they live to see the end of it.

The main thing the first two assignments have in common, besides their basic instructions, is that Mey-Rin and Baldo each flashback to the events directly leading up to being offered positions as our earl's servants. Mey-Rin's flashback is triggered by Jane offering her the opportunity to switch sides. Her flashback shows us why her loyalty stays with our earl and Sebastian -- with the Phantomhive household.

Baldo's is triggered by Ada admitting her guilt as a survivor during warfare; Baldo feels much the same.

And he also develops loyalty towards our earl, Sebastian, and the other servants. Just like Jane ends up aiding the infiltrators, so does Ada.

As I'm typing this up, I realize "hunger games" describes both Mey-Rin's and Baldo's lives before: Mey-Rin is once fooled into biting a boot and is regularly given moldy bread to eat... while Baldo's battlefield starvation tempts him to cannibalize his fallen comrades. Sebastian barely arrives in the nick of time to stop him from eating the arm of Terry, or whoever that poor dead dude was, if it wasn't Terry. Sebastian shows up with a picnic basket filled with afternoon tea items and possibly more. The first thing our earl does to extend any kindness to Mey-Rin is provide her with the first hot, freshly prepared meal she's had in ages, perhaps as far back as she can remember.

Back to their assignments; they are paired with people who are in our earl's network but are not his servants. But Finny and Snake (and his snakes) are both Phantomhive servants, so do we get a major flashback from Finny, from Snake, from both, or from neither one? So far, Finny is having single-panel flashbacks and even briefly stating things he recalls to Snake and the top students. The orphanage reminds Finny of the research facility in some ways, and that could segue him into a major flashback. Since Doll is there, she could trigger Snake into one. However, before the assignments, they were the two we already knew the most backstory for, and we might never learn all that much more about either one. To deal with both characters, we might just continue to get tiny snippets here and there.

But Mey-Rin has a choice to make -- choose Jane's offer or remain loyal to our earl. She remains loyal, and Jane even helps her and Ran-Mao break up the blood collection operations there before parting ways. Mey-Rin and Ran-Mao just need to get to our earl and make their report.

Baldo still has a choice to make -- stay in England and return to our earl... or go with Lau and the others to China. Like I said before, he might never get to China, even if he tries. I do expect him to ultimately end up staying behind, possibly loaded down with fresh feelings of survivor's guilt. If Ada is still around when we get back to them, she might also decide to stay back and help Baldo take down the Aurora Society.

With Finny and Snake, I don't think Finny's loyalty could ever come into doubt. His choice might come down to whether he has to fight Snake. But I don't think Finny will see much, if any, choice in the matter if it comes to that.

Snake is probably about to hear Doll's full tale about the circus members' fates. Then his choice (and the choices of his individual snakes) is to either help Doll get revenge... or attempt to destroy her and shut down the orphanage. Snake is the last to join our earl's household, so he could end up the first to leave it (I don't think Tanaka has truly left). There's also the possibility that one of his snakes, like Emily, chooses Doll and must be eliminated.

There is foreshadowing in each assignment, but most of that pertains to what ends up happening in each assignment. I don't know what long-term foreshadowing there is in the assignments, other than perhaps some things not directly related to them... like:

The chance of Jane popping up again later because she hinted that she might

The shapes of souls and "aptitudes" hinting about soul transplants

If Layla ends up being Heathfield's daughter

If Layla/Al ends up being some experiment of Undertaker's regarding soul transplants

What I do see is each servant's loyalty being put to the test, and they must make quick, fateful decisions. Whatever choices they make during their assignments, they will ultimately affect the outcome of the story. Each assignment definitely has long-reaching consequences; they are not little bubbles of existence.

I hope I answered your question thoroughly. I stayed up too late working on this -- but not finishing it -- and have been half asleep all day.

#black butler #kuroshitsuji #baldo #bard #baldroy #mey rin #ch175 #ch189 #ch190 #yorkshire #wiltshire #assignments #foreshadowing #snake #snake's snakes #finny #finnian #anon asks #i answer #answered asks #ch205 #the hunger games #katniss everdeen #peeta mellark #katniss and peeta #tw: trauma #tw: sex mention #tw: drug mention #oct 16 2023 #long post

[nagirambles]

Rambling about Fairies - Manga Chapter 189

I forgot if I talked about all the parallels between Mystogan and Jellal before, so might as well do it again anyways.

Jellal is introduced to us as this big behind-the-scenes guy in the council. He's always involved one way or another, he's mysterious, he seems to have something up his sleeves, and he provides support to Fairy Tail (whether with good intentions or not) anything opportune. That's exactly like Mystogan, though Mystogan runs more unseen.

They're similar in almost ironic ways.

Jellal was the lord of the tower of heaven, a king ruling a country that only served him thorugh a false narrative painting Erza as the villain and him as the savior. Mystogan, too, is the king of Edolas, ruling a country that worships him as a hero-- they brand the earthlanders as the villains, so he's the one hero of the story that saved the world.

While Jellal is notorious for always showing up and everyone's blood running cold at the sight of him, why can't he stay dead? --- but when Mystogan shows up, everyone burst into tears of joy, because there he is! There he is! They're overjoyed to see him alive and well.

The character of Jellal and Mystogan are fascinating, yes.

I do wish we got more scenes of Lily meeting Earthland Jellal. There was potential there. I think Lily would hit him.

#rambling about fairies #fairy tail #ch189 #it's a parallel #edolas arc #fairy tail jellal #jellal fernandes #mystogan

[mqfx]

“I can’t stand this anymore.”

The crowd turned to the direction of the voice and Xie Lian too lifted his head. The one who spoke was actually the buff street performer.

He scolded, “Are you honestly doing everything this monster tells you to do? From what I see, he’s just babbling nonsense. Even if it was true, just because he can’t die doesn’t mean that this isn’t murder!”

The bystanders around him advised him, “Buddy, wake up, everyone here is about to die!”

The street performer defended, “Aren’t I here too? Wouldn’t I die too? But did I do anything?”

[...]

The street performer pointed at the couple that were the first ones to go up and said, “It’s true that I don’t have a wife and son, but if I had, even if I had to die, I would never let my son see me resort to using those methods, let alone to guide him hand-in-hand in doing it. If your child grows up to be a criminal, it’s the parents who are to be blamed. If you’re that eager, why not let your child take a stab at you?”

The wife had a full face of misery. “Don’t curse my son! If you want to curse, curse at me instead!”

The husband was furious. “Have you lost your mind? You want my son to kill his own mother and father? How immoral!!”

The street performer probably didn’t understand what the word meant, and retorted, “Killing is still killing! At least it can be called courage if you let your son kill you. Speaking of which, why don’t you guys go for the strange creature in the mask?”

#ch189 #tgcf reread #HERE'S PROOF! HERE IS PROOF THAT WHITE NO-FACE WAS WRONG! #HERE IS PROOF THAT THE COMMON PEOPLE ARE NOT ALL ENTIRELY SELFISH OR EASILY MANIPULATED #cry counter: 8

[gradelstuff]

He’s just going straight for the kill now ff

#reading mmha #ch189 #so much for info gathering lol

[oya-oya-okay]

The material is taken @plague-of-insomnia ❤️

<<Kuroshitsuji|Black butler>> [COLORING ch189]

#Kuroshitsuji #Black butler #Kuroshitsuji ch189 #Sebastian Michaelis #Michaelis Sebastian #Bardroy #Bard #Kuroshitsuji Sebastian #Kuroshitsuji Bardroy #Kuroshitsuji Bard #kuro spoilers #Manga coloring #Coloring manga #Coloring #Colorization #oyaokaycoloring

[questioningespecialy]

Makoto is redeemable [WN ch189]

(Now then, I don’t know about that, but we might need to prepare ourselves.) (Sari)

(The reason why we were tasked to be his guides today was most likely because of what Raidou answered to father’s question of marriage, right Sari?) (Lucia)

Baha!!

M-Marriage?!

(I am still on hold, and Ane-sama has completely rejected it, right?) (Sari)

On hold…

On…Hold?

Means that she can’t decide yet.

Not a rejection.

Not a rejection?!

Are you serious?

But as expected, it is impossible with a little girl.

Ethically impossible.

Even in 2d games, those were routes I normally avoided.

And in truth, even if I try to imagine it…yeah, it is impossible.

(If you don’t have the intention of becoming a bride, then at least take the job of gathering information. If anything happens, become the shield of Raidou and die; better the impression he has of the demon race. Is what he is trying to tell us huh.) (Lucia)

(Or it might that he is telling us to witness his power and reconsider our decision.) (Sari)

(Fuh…true. Honestly speaking, he is outside the boundaries of common sense. I could tell that I wouldn’t be able to win even if he is handstanding. No, I knew it already. Without even making a single stance, he disappeared without leaving a shadow behind. But his attitude of making light of his own power is just…) (Lucia)

(I feel like it is a bit different from making light of his own power. He felt like a normal person that has obtained a large power.) (Sari)

(In that case, he is even more dangerous. If a person exerts this much power with a notion as if it’s his everyday life, it would be a disaster.) (Lucia)

(Yeah, that’s why it is necessary; an existence that makes sure Raidou doesn’t point that power at the demon race.) (Sari)

(…So you are saying that’s you or me? But…thinking of age and looks, unless Raidou has quite a peculiar sexual preference, it would end up being me.) (Lucia)

I don’t have such sexual preference!!

#tsukimichi #tsukimichi webnovel #tsukimichi fantranslation #WN ch189 #Raidou #Sari #Lucia #it is impossible with a little girl

[lovesmcfashion]

Check out this listing I just added to my Poshmark closet: SALE SALE OFF SHOULDER SLEEVELESS EMBROIDERED DRESS WITH ZIPPER BACK CD CH189S.

[kinglua]

i just read kuroshitushi ch189 and i gotta say I'm cringe again cause that was fucking good

[every-sanji]

End card

#one piece #sanji #black leg sanji #everysanji #baroque works #alabasta #ch189 #ft. bon clay

[opbackgrounds]

Crocodile is such a great villain 

#opbackgrounds #one piece #ch189 #sir crocodile #he's a bastard but I love him

[abybweisse]

Ch189 (p4), Falling back to life

Notice the extreme use of light and shadow here. Sebastian steps into the light and casts a strong shadow. That light represents death, and Sebastian is blocking him from walking towards it.

Sebastian pops up to tell Baldo he cannot cook even the fried eggs he's promised to his family, and that he will require more training.

His wheat field "world" starts to crumble, as ghostly figures of Ada, Lau, Conny, and Nicholas try to pull him into the darkness... also keeping him from walking into the light. That abyss symbolizes a return to the living, so hopefully he will wake up next chapter.

And... yeah.

Lucas wants to join Hinawa (though it would mean in death), and he jumps, trying to land on her cloud, but he's alive and not meant to join her yet. It's not his time. So, he falls, following Boney.

Ch190 will hopefully have the Kuroshitsuji version of this (being discovered by Wess and Alec)...

...which is probably waking up in the operating theater of Athena Sanatorium, with Ada, Lau, Conny, and Nicholas standing over him.

#black butler #kuroshitsuji #ch189 #short chapter #chapter release #chapter review #baldo #bard #bardroy #baldroy #sebastian michaelis #ada #lau #conny #nicholas #athena sanatorium #mother3 #lucas #boney #hinawa #wess #alec #jun 19 2022 #part 4 #part four #ch190

[bokunowtv]

So I just remembered where I’ve seen this guy before:

He was helping evacuate people at Kyushu during the High-End fight.

He looked cute, look at that smile! I’m sad he’s dead.

#bnha 296 #bnha spoilers #i mean i think nobody cares about this rando #so not really spoilers #ch296 #ch189 #ch190 #rereading these chapters after that ra/endeavor parallels post #my commentary

[mqfx]

A voice came from behind. “If you don’t come to my side, then you will never win against me, and you will always be defeated by me.”

Xie Lian panted and said darkly, “...Come at me anytime!”

After a pause, he slowly enunciated each word, “It’s only right now that I can’t win. You can defeat me countless times, but you can’t kill me. As long as you can’t kill me, one day, I will surely defeat you!”

When that ghost fire heard his words, it blazed even more ferociously, like it was going to brighten the entire night sky.

#ch189 #tgcf reread

[dailyakaashi]

#akaashi keiji #fukurodani #haikyuu!! #ch189 #he's hiding under bk's armpit :)

[valenbeastarszone]

YES GOSHA KILL THAT BITCH

#beastars #beastars manga #spoilers #ch189 #KILL MELON'S DAD WE BEG YOU

[iiloffy]

#one piece manga #opgraphics #opedits #sanji #one piece #reread #ch189