high octane love fuel

a refuge where I look at pretty art & talk to myself. 囀る + devil’s minion devotee

[artemisrisen]

I think a key to unlocking yashiro’s anxiety with intimacy is for him to see doumeki’s enjoyment in sex come through. doumeki has kept himself in tight control this whole time; clinical, like it was described. with good reason, but it’s not allowing yashiro any room to breathe from the scrutiny. he’s trying but I can’t imagine this makes things any easier for someone so private with his emotions.

but when he sees doumeki’s expression as they position into missionary, he actually laughs and touches the other’s face - he relaxes! he sees doumeki isn’t unaffected! it’s the one part of the chapter where there’s nothing complicated about his reaction.

what I’m saying is, he needs to flick doumeki’s sensitive nipples (as noted in the 2007-2017 fanbook by sensei) or lick an earlobe and watch doumeki’s face contort or moan, and think - oh, I can do that to him. he likes it. and I think this will be a catalyst.

[artemisrisen]

saezuru tori wa habatakanai playlist 🌙 🕊️

inspired by chapter 66 + the love between doumeki & yashiro

curated by myself 🏹 and @winterwing-butterfly ❄️ 🦋

[kittymand]

im actually sick to my stomach

[artemisrisen]

love making playlists for saezuru 🎶 with only a TINGE of longing and the bittersweet - we’re going into ch 67 with hearts open 🤝

[winterwing-butterfly]

This will be a bit of a rant but people seriously need to stop using their preferences for a story as an excuse to call it bad writing. That is so utterly offensive and if we are talking about Yoneda Kou in specific, there's no fundamental evidence for that.

There is, in fact, bad writing out there, but Sensei is impeccable on how the narrative is connected by the tools chosen to convey the actions of each character accordingly. She's not an average creator.

We are free to openly disagree with the events in an ongoing story, but in this case it must be admitted that this is simply related to the outcomes being different from what was expected instead of blaming everything as bad writing. People need to swallow their frustrations and take responsibility for either that or their inability to understand what's going on in the plot.

And just to conclude: Saezuru's central theme is that "people are full of contractions".

Kamiya can have internalised homofobia and still sympathise with Doumeki.

Amou can envy the relationship between Misumi and Yashiro and still respect and care about Yashiro.

Nanahara can see the yakuza as family, but still keep his loyalty to Yashiro −who is not properly in the organisation anymore.

Misumi can see Yashiro as his son/successor while also mistreating and objectifying him.

Tsunakawa can be suspicious of everyone and still envy those who receive devotion.

Doumeki can be madly in love with Yashiro while completely aware of the obsessive tone of his feelings.

Yashiro can sacrifice himself for Doumeki while also using this as an escape for facing his fear of change and acceptance.

The feelings and actions of characters can coexist. Even the contradictory one.

The narrative in Saezuru is not meant to fall in a dichotomy of "green or red flag". That, in fact, would be a bad writing. This is a story very akin to reality where people are multifaceted just like that.

[artemisrisen]

nothing to add that hasn’t already been better said, except @winterwing-butterfly always prevails with an insightful read of the series and its complexities. 💜

[artemisrisen]

with ch 66’s release, it’ll have been six (literal) years since yashiro and doumeki met again after four (manga) years. I know this by heart, because I got married on May 29th six years ago and I was in my private room reading spoilers when I got the opportunity 🤭🥹

[artemisrisen]

I obviously got married on the most correct saezuru date possible LOLOL

[artemisrisen]

with ch 66’s release, it’ll have been six (literal) years since yashiro and doumeki met again after four (manga) years. I know this by heart, because I got married on May 29th six years ago and I was in my private room reading spoilers when I got the opportunity 🤭🥹

[artemisrisen]

amou-sama, please fix everything 🙏🏻📿

I’m sorry everyone around you is objectively dumber and you have to follow them all around with a mop and bucket 🧼 🪣

[artemisrisen]

I don’t want to work, I want to discuss the overarching themes of fatherhood and patricide in saezuru and how I think yashiro needs to metaphorically destroy or literally kill misumi to finally break this cycle set against him

[artemisrisen]

I had a sudden vision of yashiro talking to kamiya and calling doumeki an idiot on repeat (the usual), and kamiya finally snapping, “it grosses me out now when you call him a moron, because I just realized you’re actually saying ‘I love him’ when you do it. Ugh.” and yashiro just shuts his mouth and gets embarrassed and mad lolol

[artemisrisen]

this is just my interpretation (as so much of saezuru is) (until 2 volumes later and context is provided lol), but I got the vibe that tsunakawa was impressed with doumeki not bowing to him, and further impressed that doumeki bore no pretenses about how he felt about yashiro. and because he was impressed, he got more pissed off. “this guy is so loyal and unwavering in his loyalty- the perfect right hand man. but not to me!!! god damn it!!”

tsunakawa understands love and the lengths one will go for it, so I don’t think he’s “finished” with doumeki. I think there’s more at play behind the scenes - we’ll have to see.

I’m curious about how a tsunakawa and yashiro conversation would go NOW, though. how many variation of “stupid” would yashiro call doumeki before he’s backed into a corner and tsunakawa realizes this insane devotion goes both ways lolol

[artemisrisen]

“doumeki is ungrateful to the sakuraikka.” doumeki clocked in and did the work, and did it very well - well enough that tsunakawa wanted his attention and loyalty very badly, to his great chagrin. doumeki also saved niki, by himself, with no intention to “get ahead” or be promoted but simply because she was a little girl that needed to be saved.

imagine the sakuraikka as a business run by the same family for generations and doumeki’s role is just a corporate job. suddenly the talk of disloyalty and ungratefulness is a little stupid imho - it’s a role as a means to pursue other things in life. some people crave to be part of a system like that; doumeki did not. yet he still fulfilled his duties to a tee - not just taking over with yashiro entirely but balancing between the two - until the very end, when his most base instinct took over and he had to choose. saving yashiro wasn’t intended as a slap to tsunakawa’s face; it happened because he loves yashiro the most and will protect him above all - which, duh. this is a romance. I think some of you don’t like that aspect (that the driving force of this series is the romance) and try to downplay it as much as possible. 🤷🏻‍♀️

had to get this off by chest because sometimes the doumeki haterade chatter gets a little too loud for my liking. lol. I’ve hated plenty of characters with a lot of passion so it’s just preference at the end of the day - but I want some common sense involved in the discussion, not just “every single thing he does is actually really bad and wrong.”

[artemisrisen]

nanahara got a phone call in chapter 61 from “sakuraikka”, which I have to imagine was kamiya. so kamiya has nanahara’s phone number. so maybe kamiya can call nanahara and tell him that yashiro’s boyfriend just got ordered to kill kai and will prob spend the next 50 years in jail, hint hint hint someone way smarter (yashiro) should hurry up and fix this please

(I do think yashiro needs a fucking break for the rest of time because why does he always have to save the dumbass men in his life?)

[artemisrisen]

a crucial piece of info is revealed in chapter 65: kamiya’s sister was killed by their abusive father, and kamiya subsequently killed their father for it. kamiya confesses this in the hotel, when he found out that doumeki acted similarly (attacked his father to protect his sister) while tsunakawa was berating doumeki for everything in the garden. he also says he wishes he had done it sooner, so she would still be alive.

so now this is very interesting and obvious parallel to be drawn between the two, not to mention it gives clarity to why kamiya is the way he is. imagine killing your own father, even justifiably, and still having lost your sister - no one in the world would ever be trustworthy again.

I think this solidifies kamiya’s begrudging respect for doumeki and also sets kamiya up to do something on doumeki’s behalf. I just don’t want him to take the fall either 🫠

[artemisrisen]

Wanted to say thank you! for your brilliant insights into the mind of the beautiful disaster called Yashiro

I try, but he’s a slippery thing! sometimes I’ll reread an older chapter and realize how my interpretation of him or the scene has changed since I last read it; I find that to be so astonishing. he’s really just the character of all time

[artemisrisen]

Thank you for existing. Thank you for loving saezuru. Thank you for writing stories that did stupid things to my heart. I will stop blabbering now. But thank you.

what a sweet note to get in my inbox!! I’m so glad to hear my old writings still get some traction 😌 and here I am still loving saezuru years and years later, same as always 🌕

[artemisrisen]

I’m not asking for much next chapter - just a delirious + fever-stricken doumeki to mumble, “kashira, I love you,” while he’s falling asleep, and then for him to wake up to yashiro sleeping next to him in bed (the reversal of their first time). please please please 🙏🏻

[artemisrisen]

sensei’s decisions for ch 64 are superior as usual and once again she is working at a level that we cannot anticipate 🥹