The halls of Blue Ivy were quiet after hours, the only sound being the soft weight of his own footsteps as he moves through the corridors. There wasn't much to rattle the walls, especially not during winter break â not when so much of the campus was home for the holidays, off spending time with family and friends alike.
The concept of going home for the holidays was not something that had ever resonated with Milo, for a number of reasons.
Firstly, his home had never quite been the pinnacle of holly nor jolly. There wasn't much festive around the holidays â a winter dinner, of course, but for a family of atheists, they generally got away with just setting up a tree in the foyer and giving gifts to each other on December twenty-fifth. He remembers when he was young, receiving small wooden toys; then when he grew, creations more like knick-knacks or statues, beautiful works (most of them now sitting forgotten back in the bottom drawer of his dormitory, which he hasn't set foot in for months â where his feet currently carry him now).
Secondly, there was no home to return to. Milo had moved on campus immediately upon admittance to Blue Ivy, and the grounds had been his home for nearly the past decade. Aside from a holiday or two spent with Clem, or potentially a visit to a friend's house, he can't remember the last time he spent the night in a building that wasn't the halls of the university. Tainted as they now are, there's an itch in the bottom of his gut, a fear: where does he go from here? Blue Ivy has been his home for nearly half his life. What does he do after graduation?
Thirdly, there was no one to spend it with â not unless he wanted to catch the train back to the cemetery in London and spend a night as frigid as the marble in his old house with two gravestones. Frankly, that seemed about as interesting as spending the holiday with his actual parents. But rather than spend the night in his room with his books as he usually would, tonight he does have an actual goal, small as it may be.
Fingers thumb the small item in his pocket, footsteps tracing his way back to the familiar door. His keycard still works â somehow; he'd half-expected it to be invalid for the semester, though he's certain he's set off some sort of trial alarm or something. Every move you make is seen â let them. At the moment, he can't bring himself to care. The door opens, and he peeks into the room.
It's empty â thank god, Theo's out. He doesn't need to hear the complaining from his former roommate. Silently, he slips inside, immediately crossing the floor to the nightstand next to the folded bed. (Covers drawn; hasn't been used in months.) Squatting down, he slides open the bottom drawer. Wooden knick-knacks clack together softly as he does so.
From his pocket comes a small wooden creation of his own, a crow, beak tucked under one wing as it grooms itself, frozen in time. It nestles in, fitting perfectly amongst the other creatures and toys â the difference between craftsmen is almost impossible to see. "Nollaig shona," he whispers, sliding the drawer shut, closing them away once again. Usually, it would be until next year â however, he has a feeling he'll be getting them back out again soon.
"Cathy." He nods to the barista; she nods back. They've grown intimately familiar over the past few months, that careful, selective, limited relationship formed outside of an active death game. Hard to really give your all to someone when all you can think about is the fact that someone in your circle is a murderer. Without another word, the coffee maker whirrs to life, starting a drink he's ordered nearly every day for the past six months. The white noise is almost helpful, and he spaces out for a moment, mental gears turning as he tries, once again, to gnaw through all the information he's received. Starting from the beginning, trying to condense it all down. What is he missing? It should be obvious. Who's slipping through the cracks? What else can he use for process of elimination?
When you have eliminated all which is impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. Even if it doesn't make any sense.
She calls his name â for what he suspects is not the first time, though she doesn't say anything about it â and that gets him to snap out of it, accepting the drink with a nod. Somehow, she's snuck whipped cream onto it, and at the raised eyebrow he gives her, she just grins. "Merry Christmas," she shrugs.
Neither asks the other why they're still here; why one stands behind a counter at a job, why the other carries a research notebook. For now, it's enough that they aren't completely alone.
"Happy holidays," he murmurs back, stepping out of the room, back towards his apartment. At least the quiet gave him a decent chance at finishing his dissertation before the final trial.
I'm starting to think this guy might be relevant to the plot. Or he's just a stalker, I dunno. But honestly, me and my friend used to hate his guts as kids. The romance subplot just wasn't for us.
Classic "too good to be true" plot today. But a pet that doesn't stink, eat or poop does raise some questions though... Did Usagi's parents get a litterbox? Where does Luna poop?? I won't rest until these plot holes are answered.
Episode 005: Scent of a Monster! Chanela Will Steal Your Love
Pets can be a big commitment, especially when youâre young - but what if you could adopt an adorable fluffy little bunny that didnât eat, didnât poop, and best of all, smelled amazing? Sounds too good to be true! Unfortunately for Usagiâs younger brother Shingo - who has rejected the Tsukino family's decision to adopt Luna - heâs about to find out that thereâs always a catch.
Episode 006: Protect the Melody of Love: Usagi Plays Cupid
Another episode cut from the original Dic English syndication, with a moody plot and striking visual direction. A chance encounter in the rain finds Usagi embroiled in a story of adultsâ unrequited love, relentless stalking monsters, and Jazz piano.
Episode 007: Usagi Learns Her Lesson: Becoming a Star is Hard Work
Teen idol Mikan Shiratoriâs new talent show âCinderella Caravanâ promises to catapult Usagi & Naru to stardom! Unfortunately, the fame has gone to their heads, and theyâre not even famous yet. The two find some alternative partners, but their friendship isn't all thatâs at stake when Usagi and Luna investigate behind the scenes.
Episode 008: The Girl Genius is a Monster: The Brainwashing Cram School of Horror
Okay, so maybe Usagiâs grades arenât the greatest, but whatâs she supposed to do? Sign up for one of those after-class cram schools like the prestigious Crystal Seminar? No thanks; all the students there have practically turned into zombies⊠except for Juuban Middle Schoolâs resident genius and ice queen, Ami Mizuno. Could she be connected to this sinister behaviour?
Reply to or reblog this post with your thoughts on these episodes, or make some brand new posts! Don't forget to tag them with #SailorMoonRewatch2024!
Please make sure to read the FAQ if you have any questions.
Below are extended translation notes, so spoilers ahead.
We have just started uploading onto Youtube as well! Since stuff hasnât been taken down yet, please support our releases by watching on YT rather than other third-party sites.
Thank you!
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Velgear Riva / Vi bal du
This was explained by a TL note in-episode, but Iâll repeat it here for posterity. Since I am more confident now that Yuudias is just speaking Velgearian, we will now be translating his dialogue a bit more literally, just writing out the sounds as we hear them and avoid making them proper English words.
This also means Iâve removed the capital letters on âVi bal duâ, since Iâm taking it to be an actual sentence in Velgearian rather than an assortment of... something? Iâm not quite sure why I placed the capitals in the first place.
Anyway, âWar To Zen! Maniac You Die!â is also Velgearian and, in the future, will be transliterated as âWaa tu zen! Meiniak yu dai!â so people donât get the wrong idea about what heâs saying.
âKawai Tell.â
âYou canât tell?!â
âIâm Kawai Tell, and Iâm parched.â
Some more Japanese wordplay that had to be changed a little bit to fit into English.
äčŸă (kawai) means âdryâ or âparchedâ, while ăŠă (teru) is a special verb ending that makes it present tense. Therefore, Kawai Tell is quite literally âIâm parchedâ in Japanese. That is his name. I expect the dub to name him something like Drei Theosty or something.
Whenever Kawai Tell says âkawai terundaâ, it is left ambiguous as to whether or not heâs saying his own name or just that heâs parched. Itâs like Omaeno Ushiro all over again, but played much more straight.
The pickles/cucumbers
In Japanese folklore, kappas love cucumbers, and a way to get one to not eat you is to throw a cucumber engraved with your name at it.
This isnât the weirdest one by a mile.
"A kappa washed away by the riverâ
âEven monkeys fall from treesâ
Kawai Tell is referencing two well-known Japanese idioms. Kappas in Japanese folklore are masters of swimming and living in water. The idiom âeven monkeys fall from treesâ or âa kappa washed away by the riverâ means that even experts can make mistakes and nobody is perfect.
For his summon chant, Kawai Tell is saying, more literally, that kappas arenât being washed away â theyâre just drifting and coasting along!
Earthdamar /Â âshirikodamaâ
Okay, this is the weird one.
With more context from this episode, I am led to believe that the Earthdamar is referencing the âshirikodamaâ, which, in Japanese folklore, is a little white ball inside your anus that kappas love to take. Itâs said to contain your soul.
The origin of the myth is probably due to bodies that have drowned in rivers or streams coming back with an open or extended anus as a result of undergoing post-mortem underwater.
Not saying that the Earthdamar is that exactly, but... with how Yuuhi is positioned after being beaten by Kawai Tell and how he needs to put the Earthdamar âback in his bodyâ.... itâs a good guess as any.
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I moreso just wanted to share a bunch of weird kappa facts. Enjoy!
Blu-Ray episodes will come out one at a time every Friday, until Iâm done with the full first season (1-13).
The next episode should be up on September 3rd, barring surprise events. Weâre out of the RR era and into tempsubs now!
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Please use either MPV or MPC-HC to view the Blu-Ray episodes. I do NOT recommend using VLC.
Please check the post for episodes 1&2 to see why.
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!! This is NOT a final release !!
Nor are any of the files on Google Drive. They will be polished and edited one more time before being put up on Nyaa. Stuff I decide on changing halfway through these episodes will eventually be changed for Nyaa release.
Until that happens, the Google Drive folder is more like a âfinal draftâ than a finished product. I will not be going back to change font, styling, or certain wording until Iâm done with all the other episodes first.
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Extended Translation Notes
Typesetting changes
The same as my post on them here for episode 62.
TL;DR
Bahnschrift -> Gandhi Sans Bold.
Athelas -> Berlin Sans FB Demi Bold (for Luke)
White text, black outline, colored shadow for summoning chants for the sake of readability
Bakuroâs font is Lato Black. Itâll be the default font used for most summoning chants unless itâs a special or important character, in which case Iâll stylize it differently.
These are what the subs should look like:
If they donât look like these images, please reblog or reply to this post with a comment. Iâll try to fix it before final release.
Minor wording changes
âRulesâ ->Â âFormatâ
They very clearly say ârulesâ in English over the course of this episode, but in the midst of translating this I realize that a more appropriate localization may be âformatâ because thatâs what we would actually call something like Rush Duels in English.
Rather than ârulesâ, itâs very clearly a new âformatâ, which makes more sense for English speakers. When the final version is released on Nyaa after Iâm done with everything here, Iâll probably scrub through previous episodes to switch ârulesâ to âformatâ, unless itâs fine as it is in context and makes sense.
You may see one or two ârulesâ in the subs for this episode; they were kept intentionally. Otherwise, weâll mostly be using âformatâ whenever they refer to Rush Duels like this again.
So if you havenât noticed, Dragiasâ name has been on a wild rollercoaster ride since the start of this series. A lot of people are used to Dragears as it was the initial translation by YGOrg. This is not really wrong, by the way.
The reason why there is so much switching is due to localization. With the official release of the SEVENS Puzzles & Dragons collaboration event for global servers, we learned that the TCG name for Dragias is âMultistrike Dragon Dragiasâ.
This also backs up an earlier-released pillow set with English monster names, so you can expect to see âYamiruler, the Dark Delayerâ and âPrima Guitarna the Shining Superstarâ in the subs after finalizations are made.
Why? Because I believe in using the TCG names as that is what people will be most used to once the game releases here in the West (and yes, it is coming). I have already been using TCG phrasing for various other terms, like âtribute summoningâ instead of âadvance summoningâ, or âspell cardâ instead of âmagic cardâ.
As we get more news on the TCG release of Rush Duels, I will be changing card names accordingly.
Light Bullet -> Light Blast
Some more minor Dragias changes. This is the name of his first attack. I felt like âblastâ was a lot more accurate than âbulletâ which is just the literal translation of ćŒŸ (dan).
Bakuroâs lines
RoadRush:
âRush Duels [have] got very shallow rules, where even I, who has difficulty remembering things, can remember them easily.â
This is just a straight-up mistranslation. Unfortunately, this is not what Bakuro said.
It should be something more along the lines of âRush Duels are so shallow that even I, someone whoâs just learned it, can grasp it so quicklyâ. Bakuro does not have a faulty memory.
èŠăă can mean âto rememberâ or âto memorizeâ, however its second definition is also âto learnâ. What makes this definitively âto learnâ is the presence of the ending ă㊠(-tate), which is used to signify when itâs someoneâs âjust doneâ something.
In this case, Bakuro has âjust learnedâ Rush Duels.
ć»ć (haikan)
âceasing publicationâ
When Bakuro is defeated, he says these words. Earlier in the episode, they were translated as âshut downâ, but the word specifically means âceasing the publication of some news or articleâ which also includes things like magazines.
The reason the subs say âreport... overâ instead of âceasing publicationâ or âshut downâ is because I just felt like it was a really weird set of words to say out of context. I instead opted for something that makes more sense in English, like Bakuro whoâs just finished reporting from the scene, therefore âreport overâ.
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For people interested in the raw BDMV vs encoded final video comparisons, click here. (Click the image in the center to swap between âraw BDâ and âencodedâ).
