今日もよろしくお願いいたします

❀---❀---❀---❀---❀ 見たい顔があるの 聞きたい声があるの 目を閉じても 喜びは心に おやすみ 明日もよろしく つづく つづく ❀---❀---❀---❀---❀ Doubt Academy 3: Epsilon

[geisha-kai]

End of dance by Melanie May Photography on Flickr

Maiko Mamechika and Chisako performed Gion Kouta at the Gion Corner in April 2010. Now, Mamechika is a retired maiko while Chisako stayed in business and continued her career as a geiko.

[hunibe]

No matter how much despair awaits them  I wish that at the end of their story The gentle light of hope will shine on them Like the sun did back in those days

Pandora Hearts, Chapter 92 (via bunnybees)

[shslgeiko-blog]

THIS IS YOUR HEART, IT'S ALIVE (listen): an incredibly upbeat, cheerful, positive playlist to remind you you're okay, it'll be okay, you're amazing and you'll get through this, from a girl who wishes nothing more than to see you smile. 

Katie reminded me this existed, so, yes. I'm.... I'm too lazy to write out the tracklist, but it's legit just 20 really positive songs for when you need a pocket Saori to cheer you on through the rest of the day :> 

[shsl-doubtepsilon-deactivated20]

DA3 : THE PHOENIX

sprites gathered from each player

video editing by drea !

THANK YOU FOR A WONDERFUL DA3, EVERYONE!

(The pictures at the end of the video will be posted in photosets soon, along with other great drawings that we weren’t able to add in time!)

[ka1to-remade-deactivated2019081]

Baby Bunnies Eating A Carrot [x]

[shslpitchman-blog]

i was looking upon saori’s sprites and i realized shay’s shirt was really small on her?? ? ? ?

in spite of the fact that shay is taller and probably broader?? ? ?

attempts to explain this phenomenon are presently in progress

EDIT: oh wait i just realized it was tied at the side ok that makes sense lAUGHS

[shslgeiko-blog]

Outfits!!

(p.s. if you like saori’s sprites, please drop by ellie’s ask box and send her some much deserved love!! i try to tell her whenever someone compliments her art, but i think it would be really nice to have you guys tell her straight up! ‘v ’ i’d really love it! she’s a huge sweetie and i’m sure it’ll make her day!!)

[shslgeiko-blog]

i hope you don't mind some anon love!!! i just wanted to say that i really really love saori's character and i'm so glad that she survived till the end ; o ; it was so nice to see someone as genuinely positive and kind as her. i think she made a real difference to the da3 reading experience,,,!! thank you for making saori in the first place!!! ; w ;

!!! OH MY GOSH… THANK YOU SO MUCH

I’m really glad it made a difference!! Mutual killing games are always so hard on characters and hard on their players by extension, and then the people who read it too!! I really wanted Saori to be a little break from everything ;o ; !! A more positive light on things when everything was so stressful for characters, their players and the readers!! So I’m really happy to hear that!! 

Thank you!! (｡´∀｀)ﾉ

[n7peach-deactivated20170412]

Tender-hearted heroes are so important to me.

Heroes that are soft-spoken and kind, that want nothing more than to take care of everyone.

Heroes that are sweet and good, that always leave folks smiling in their wake.

Heroes that see good in everyone, who want to be good to everyone.

Heroes that are gentle and compassionate, that wish to share the boundless joy in their hearts with the world.

[shsl-diplomat]

Been forgetting to do this- The final chapter end scene. I hope you guys have enjoyed these throughout the game. See you in DA4 (maybe)!

[shslgeiko-blog]

Alright so. That form thing everyone was doing before, filled with absolutely everything you'd ever (not) want to know about Saori...! 

SECTION I : BASICS

Given Name — Machiko Shiomiya

(... Although, technically, Ame Kinoshita.)

(... The name her mother gave her, Ame, was because of her eyes. She thought they looked like rain or a stormy day.)

(... Funny how Saori ended up being her sunlight.)

(The reason Saori's given name is not Ame is because after an 'incident', she had selective mutism. The adoption centre couldn't get the information out of her, so they simply renamed her.)

Meaning of Name —

満知子

ma: 満 (enough) chi: 知 (know, wisdom) ko: 子 (child) 

汐宮

shio: 汐 (eventide) miya: 宮(constellations)

Nickname — Bunny-chan, Saorin. This isn't really a nickname, but new costumers call her Geiko Saori-san. 

Birth Date — Feb 24th

Astrological Sign — Pisces

Age — Eighteen 

Race/Ethnicity — Japanese

Nationality — Japanese

Hair Color — Black, but it looks kinda purple in her sprites. Let's go with that, then. She has sort of purple tinged hair. 

Eye Color — Grey 

Skin Tone — Pale... like really pale. She doesn't see the sun.

Build or Body Type — Pretty small, with hardly any body mass. If she took off her kimono you'd be able to see some of her ribs, and her stomach tends to look sucked in. That said, she generally bulked up her arms and abs because of all her work in the labyrinth. 

Scars/Beauty Marks — She's got some pretty nasty scars along her back. Long, that both go vertical and horizontal and are pretty thick in width. 

Height — 165cm / 5’5”

Weight — 49kg / 109lbs

SECTION II : PERSONALITY

Weaknesses — Saori is very naive. She puts her trust in anyone, even people she knows will abuse the trust. She was used a lot for that predespair, when people/mainly other geisha would make her promises and then just let her down. She probably should have learnt from all that, but she still finds it in herself to blindly trust someone regardless. She believes in humankind's ability to be good just a little bit too much. 

(Maybe that isn't really a weakness, but I'll say it is because she gets in bad situations for putting her trust in people that do not deserve it.) 

She strives to be perfect. Completely flawless in every single definition of the word, and beats herself up constantly if she falters in any way. She looked to pretty much everyone in the game as "costumers" because of this, even if she did call them her friends, because to her, being perfect meant that she was still on the job. Generally this was why she decided to refer to herself as "The Sun" after Kosuke told her about that card-- because that's what they needed (and perhaps wanted?) so as her job, that's what she became. Shay, Kaoru and Imogen were the only ones that actually managed to get her to peek out. Kosuke almost got there in game, but I wouldn't say he really reached it. Maybe at the very end? But most of their interactions were simply her cheering him up and then bolting out of there, so less personal. 

Bad Habits — She twists her kimono a lot when she's anxious, or wrings her fingers, sometime to the point she'll get fabric burns. 

Proud of — Saori is very proud of herself a lot of the time, especially when she knows she's being what she thinks to be is perfect! Game-wise, she's proud of her work in the labyrinth, the farm, figuring out the mastermind... surviving. She is very proud of everyone, too! 

Embarrassed by — Breaking her professional front by mistake, being "herself" towards people she isn't close to. 

MBTI Type — idk man and i'm,, too lazy to take a quiz

Positive Personality Traits —

Positive

Loyal

Trustworthy

Selfless

Adaptable

Negative Personality Traits —

Naive

Stubborn

Too Trusting?

Slow

Secrets —  - Successfully managed to hide the fact she was literally dying through half the game, and still is. She's got cystic fibrosis, a life-threatening disease that started kicking in full-steam after she caught the Despair Sickness (and no thanks to how dirty and dusty it is down in the Gaia), and one of her lungs got infected. That cough of hers that's been getting worse? Yeah. By endgame, she would turn her head and cough into a tissue-- gurl coughing up blood is p serious u should get help for that. 

(Alright she. didn't hide it very well with all her coughing. But nobody questioned it besides from a little note in Imogen's bag for a reminder to get cough syrup for her, and Shay during endgame lmao) 

(... And then also Kaoru, who followed her into her room. Sorry small eg... see Bunny-chan cough up blood in the bathroom...) 

(The mask she's wearing endgame is an air filter, and she carries an air tank around with her because it's so difficult for her to breath now.) 

- Despite pretty much giving off the appearance that under no circumstance would she ever kill, her strength pretty much meant that she would do absolutely anything for any of her friends, or anyone she thought highly of. I didn't get to really use it, but she was perfectly capable and ready to kill someone if... you just asked her. If you told her you murdered and you needed help to make sure you didn't get caught, she would have put false evidence up in the trials, pointing directly to someone else. She's a pretty strong voice during trails, imagine how that would have went. And, lmao, by endgame the list was actually pretty long at: Shay, Kosuke, Gei, Naori, Kahori, Gorou, Naoki, Hikaru, Kiseki... And like minus Shay and Kosuke, she would have killed any of the others on her list if someone asked, too. 

You would have gotten an "Are you sure?" and if you said yes, no questions asked, she'd do it for you. 

friends4lyfe

- That egg plushie of hers actually had a secret! It was an egg bomb. I'm not kidding. Her weapon was grenades, and right after Kaoru's death, when her opinion and trust in everyone down-spiralled, she cut open Kaoru's egg and sewed a grenade in it, so that the tab was sticking out the back that she could pull if need-be. I actually stated it right in one of her posts:

"Saori was, actually, sitting cross-legged on her bed, sewing up one of Kaoru’s stuffed animals that she’d… ah, she’d ripped. But that was fine! She was sewing it up again!”

“As she neared the a small tab sticking from the back of the egg plushie, her finishing point[...]"

I regret,, not being able to use it,, 

Regrets — Sucks, but, she honestly wishes she never went to Hope's Peak. Saori... actually didn't have to go to school! She never attended school because her life was planned out for her the moment she was adopted into her okiya. You're actually suppose to quit school if you want to be a geisha, laughs.  

The reason she did was because she wanted to teach. She wanted to open her own Geisha school one day and help train girls in the art, but in order to do so she needed to go to school. She entered high school on the side of her work, and when she was invited into Hope's Peak she only accepted because her older sister said it would probably help her with her goal. She literally did not care about "Super High-School Level"s, she just wanted to get a good education to accomplish her goal. 

Pet Peeves — Kimonos on wrong.. laughs...

Sexuality — Aromatic Asexual. Laughs. Even if she wasn't trained to never look at people in a romantic or sexual way ("Geisha sell their skills, not themselves, Saori!"), I can never, ever, ever see Saori developing any feelings beyond friendship for anyone. I know for a fact she wants to have a child, but she would either adopt or get a donor or something. Single mama all the way heck yeah. 

Day or Night Person — Day during despair, but predespair man she can't hate on Night that's when all the good parties start. 

Introvert or Extrovert — Extrovert

Optimist or Pessimist — Optimist

SECTION III : LIKES

Music — Saori's been kept up in a very little box, fed to her things that would benefit her and her training. She would have only been listening to very traditional stuff, probably almost only shamisen music, until she started entertaining at actual parties. She doesn't really like party music, because it makes her flinch a lot, but she appreciates how easy it is to dance to. 

Books — Not needed for training so... she didn't read. Honestly, she probably didn't even know how to read very well until, like, she entered in high school. 

Foods — Saori ate a lot of simple foods as she grew up, so when she went out to parties and (the nice ones) allowed her to eat, they were really fancy, deluxe dishes and extravagant sweets. She's got tastebuds that crave... royal food, basically. 

Drinks — Sake, actually. Girl used to drink it like water for the job, and it's almost a wonder she's not an alcoholic. The only reason she's not addicted to the stuff is because of how ruthlessly trained she was, and she won't allow herself to get anything more than tipsy because she's still working when she's drinking. She ended up drinking it so much she really loved the taste. 

Animals — Bunnies. But, yeah, I never got to tell this story but when Saori was first adopted into her okiya, she was understandably really upset because of that 'incident', so she refused to do anything. Sat around in an empty room all day, barely ate, didn't listen to anyone... she was punished a lot because of it, which really just ended up with her yelling and attacking who'd hurt her. 

(.... She was five, though, so keep that in mind. She would scratch and bite but could be pulled away really easily.)

She was outside in the garden one day and one of the other girls in the okiya found her, Aya, who ended up being her older sister (in the... geisha sense). Saori wasn't speaking, and Aya figured she'd still be ignored, so she just took her hand and led her over to this part in the garden, like between the trees and in the bushes where... a bunny was! Aya explained to her the bunny would sneak into the garden sometimes, and she'd always feed it take care of it. It was really friendly, and you could pet it if she wanted. She told Saori that she would be busy for the next week (a lie), and asked that Saori take care of the bunny for her. 

Saori reluctantly agreed, and she spent like most of the week out in the gardens with the rabbit, getting it food and water and playing with it. Sometime through the week she started talking to it, which ended up with her spilling out her heart to a. rabbit. and she broke down. Aya found her there in tears, and they spoke for a bit, and after that Saori... was on her way to being the girl we all know. 

THERE WAS... ACTUALLY A REASON FOR THE LOVE FOR BUNNIES... LMAO.... She spent a lot of time with that bunny in the garden (remember that picture that was on her blog? With her holding a rabbit? That's the one) and it was her best friend next to Aya. 

... Rip bunny. She still thinks of u. 

Sports — She's not really into sports, but a lot of her patrons chat about it, so she knows a few things here and there. Like sumo and baseball mostly, but that's it. She doesn't really hold an opinion on them. 

Favorite Saying — Her okasan drilled her with a lot of sayings, but most of them were pretty harsh. One she did like was:

雨降って地固まる, after a storm, things will stand on more solid ground than they did before.

(... Also.)

("There is good in us...!")

Color — Purple, pink. 

Clothing — I did explain this in a post a long time ago, but Saori has no need for any... casual clothes. Her entire wardrobe is just really, really fancy kimonos. The one she wears is actually a Hikizuri, a preforming kimono... it's not even a more casual one. She has those bunny pajamas Aya bought for her, and then those overalls that Monomi gave to her. Any other clothes she has to borrow from people. 

Games — Drinking games! Geisha work is sweet sometimes, because when you aren't dancing or pouring tea or playing an instrument, you're legit just talking and playing games. She's got a knack at drinking games, and one of her all time favorites is Konpira Fune Fune! 

SECTION IV : RELATIONSHIPS

Family — ????? 

Laughs, question marks aside, let's go into the history of Saori. 

She was born into a really poor family-- they basically lived on the street. They found shelter in abandoned houses on the outskirts of Gion, bummed for money... It was only her mom, her dad, and her.

Her mom was sick. She had a disease that they couldn't afford to get proper help for, but they knew a doctor that could get them medicine that was delaying her... death. After Saori was born, though, she was just another mouth to feed, and they barely had enough money for that. Her mother decided she no longer wanted to take the medicine, for they needed to buy food for Saori. 

Her dad was pissed. He loved his wife more than anything, and he saw Saori as a pest. Her mother, however, adored her. They were always together, always laughing and coloring and everything but... her disease caught up to her. Her mother died, leaving Saori with her dad. 

Obviously her dad was heartbroken. He blame Saori for her death, and after giving her a pretty nasty beating, dumped her. Saori was found by some people in the trash, she was hospitalized, put up for adoption, adopted into her okiya and then... here we are! 

She repressed everything before meeting the bunny, so she doesn't remember any of this. One of the reasons she avoided striping was because she has those belt scars on her back and she doesn't remember where they came from. She couldn't explain them if asked.

...

She doesn't have a family. In posts, I used to say "okasan" and "older sister" a lot, and those are just geisha terms. Okasan refers to the head of the okiya. She's in charge, she trains, she books the events, the money goes to her... she's more of a teacher, really. 

Her older sister, Aya, is not blood related, obviously. When you become a maiko, you're paired up with an older geisha in your okiya that will help with your training. You follow her around, go to events with her-- that sort of stuff. Aya was bound to her as her older sister when Saori became a maiko! 

Best Friend — In general, Aya, but since the game started, Shay! She looked to Kaoru more as a younger sibling, so while she did see him as a best friend, he was closer to family. 

Other Friends — Kaoru, Kosuke, Imogen, Gei, Mitsu. (Chiemi?)

She thinks Dante and her could have been good friends (too bad ya killed him, gurl)

Enemies — Chie. Chie.... CHIE............... 

A nice fun fact! Saori defaulted her vote every since trial but... three times.

The first she voted for a suicide for Emiko, because she wasn't convinced Kozure murdered her. It was meant to protect him.

The second time was for Chie. 

The third time was a suicide for Minako, because she decided she'd vote whatever Shun told her to. If he said he did it, she would have voted for him. But, suicide it was... so she went for that.

(And then, of course, mastermind vote! But yeah, during trials she only actually voted for three people, and only one of those three was going to result in bloodshed. And that was Chie.) 

Love Life — laughs

SECTION V : EXTRAS

CASUALLY JUST. DOESN'T. ANSWER THIS SECTION. ha. haha. .. . 

[shslgeiko-blog]

LET IT ALWAYS BE KNOWN THAT I WAS WHO I AM (listen): "I act this way because this is who I am. As foolish or naive or perhaps even stupid as it sounds, if this is the very last place I will ever see, and if these are the last people I will ever meet, then I will treat them as well as I can. I will spend my last days, my last months, not as someone who has been twisted by the mechanics of this game, but as… myself."

a fanmix for saori, from her morning to night. 

PART 1: morning 01. A GOOD DAY (MORNING SONG) priscilla ahn || 02. CHECKING THINGS OFF OF A TO-DO LIST EARLY IN THE MORNING lullatone || 03. GROWING UP run river north || 04. RAMBLING MAN laura marling || 05. THE WEIGHT OF US sanders bohlke

PART 2: afternoon 06. SVALKAR VINDEN den svenska björnstammen || 07. KOKO DAKE NO HANASHI chatmonchy || 08. MONARCH manicanparty || 09. SETTLE DOWN kimbra 

PART 3:  evening 10. MOWGLI'S ROAD marina and the diamonds  || 11. BODY mother mother || 12. WHAT IF THIS STORM ENDS? snow patrol || 13. APRES MOI regina spektor || 14. BORIS boy

PART 4: night  15. GREEN EYES nataly dawn || 16. YELLOW sara bareilles || 17. TIME hans zimmer || 18. MIDNIGHT coldplay  + BONUS TRACK 

{art by astronami} 

[shslgeiko-blog]

OKAY THAT'S IT...! My inbox is empty, so with that i won't be doing anymore hearts/stars ;o ;; !!  

[shslgeiko-blog]

yuu heart? even though...he died so fast lmao

YUU SAGARA★☆☆☆☆☆ 1/6 !classmate

"... Perhaps this time we'll have a chance to get to be... something like friends?" 

WAILS SOFTLY.... KATIE I WISH I COULD GIVE HIM A HIGHER RANKING BUT... RYOTA....

Saori really liked Yuu! He was someone she knew she'd have a lot in common with, and when they met up in the bank with Mitsu she was like!! woah!! these are people I can see myself being really close friends with!! Mitsu was an educator, Yuu was culture... HER DREAM TEAM...!

And I won't even say that Yuu murdering Ryota was what changed that, because Saori probably would have still thought of him as an (almost) friend, but then he had to keep on talking 

not only did he kill Ryota, but he was calling him a monster that deserved to die and suddenly slamming down random notes saying that he was probably the mastermind behind all this, and bye saori will be hearing none of that, especially on someone she met and considered a friend too 

Yuu gets..... one star because of their first encounter, and also how guilty he seemed in the first trial 

[shslgeiko-blog]

Heart for Satori huh?

YUUTO IKEDA☆☆☆☆☆☆ 0/6. ....

"Did you manage to see it? What I meant way back then? That there is good in us?"

WOAH I GUESS YUUTO TIES WITH CHIE 

Man, Saori doesn't really.... have much of an opinion on Yuuto. He was really just this PROMISE hovering over her head the entire game, constantly reminding her that she needed to prove to some dead kid that there was good in the students. It acted as fodder to keep her going so strong through the game, but even then.... it was only her promise doing that, not... Yuuto.

Yuuto was.... just some stranger. She could've waved him off as a victim off the news channel, and maybe that's why it was so easy for her to yELL HIS NAME across the courtroom during the final mastermind discussion. 

She doesn't like robo-yuuto very much. At all. He was pretty nasty with that speech of his (and called her a bitch, thanks!), but she understands that isn't... that wasn't the Yuuto that came back! So she just hopes that he still remembers her words from way back when and... actually believes them. At least slightly. 

[shslgeiko-blog]

☆ (IDK IF YOURE STILL DOING THEM BUT)

KIKUYO SHIRABE★☆☆☆☆☆ 1/6 !classmate

"… Don’t let him down again."

VERY SHOCKING TRUTH: 

Saori was jealous of Kikuyo. 

Like not anything about about her, but her relationship with Kosuke. HA hah a ha. Like after that restaurant thread with Shun and Kikuyo and Kosuke, and Saori ran into Kosuke briefly and suddenly all what he could talk about was how much fun he had with Shun and some chick named Kikuyo whose SMILE ALONE could make Kosuke look so thoughtful 

(and i wish i were joking but she was so incredibly bitter i had to go back on her relationship page and duck down a star from both kosuke and kikuyo oh my god)

(i doubt anyone noticed that but„ yeah that was a Thing) 

Like her thought process around Kikuyo was basically just a constant she makes Kosuke happy, she makes Kosuke happy, she makes Kosuke happy just to keep out reaLLY UGLY THOUGHTS 

I’m amazed this went on for so long without anyone really knowing but yeah dang Kikuyo she really wasn’t too fond of you. She was grateful for her assistance in trials, but there was always that really dark, dark thought of: you better not let him down or i fucking swear— 

And Kikuyo did!! Which sucked because after her death Saori was suddenly in a group hug with Shun and Kosuke and she was in Kikuyo’s place and that’s where she wanted to be that whole time and when she finally got there she…

realized that didn’t want to be that replacement. she wanted to be… herself… and she wanted that to be enough for Kosuke. 

and that was the story about how saori is not really all butterflies and sunshine and marigolds 

The one star is just she makes Kosuke happy. 

[shslgeiko-blog]

☆

SHUNICHI HIKESHI★★☆☆☆☆ 2/6! classmate

"You're important to him. Please make him smile again."

SHUN.... 

After the first trial she was... avoiding him like the plague lmao. She wanted to apologize for what she said, considering her words hurt him, but at the same time she was ashamed to face him. So she... didn't. She avoided him, she made sure she didn't have to speak with him and... it worked!

And eventually her guilt and shame faded out as she noticed how close he and Kosuke were getting. And... AND TO BE PERFECTLY HONEST the only reason her opinion on Shun is ""positive"" is because of Kosuke. He gets a bonus star for making Kosuke happy. 

If it... weren't for Kosuke, I'd say Shun would be at zero, possible one, and most of them hit spot on what Naori called him out for that one trial. When he was productive, he was!! so productive!! and she looked up to him! but then there were times when it felt like he was purposely derailing things, and then she... was less impressed. 

(but regrets.. regrets that gelato thread never happened......)