Sofie > Recent Status Updates

UHHHHHHH IDK WHAT THAT IS OR WTF IS GOING ON BUT THAT IS NOT SAFU
SHES WEARING THE SWEATER FROM THE VERY BEGINNING

“i don’t know how to stop crying” y’all this is what we call growth!!!!! back in chapter 12, we saw rat cry and immediately get disgusted by the salty taste of tears. he put his forehead to his knee and hid his face from us, and he looked so completely alone. but now??? he hides his face again but this time, in shion’s shoulder. he doesn’t force himself to stop, he CANT. they are each other’s humanity

their relationship is so beautiful idk how much more i can take
rat feeling SO GUILTY for dragging shion into what he believes is his fight alone, and that finally breaking i’m down enough to CRY IN FRONT OF SHION????? and he looks so YOUNG in that panel too oh my god brilliant show-stopping fantastic amazing
and then calling shion (himself) an idiot as he lays on top of him like their first meeting

oh wow i LOVE how these panels depicted the realization sinking in for shion, i’m so glad he’s not just numb now and that rat is there to keep him sane!!! that’s what he’s been saying since they embarked on this mission: rat is his humanity, he will keep him human. and that’s exactly what he’s doing here in the worst of situations

this volume starting off with rat wondering if shion will be able to keep smiling once they’ve experienced the horrors awaiting them at the facility and then the first thing shion does after killing rashi is SMILE AT RAT. my love we are so traumatized i feel like throwing up

my jaw is on the floor oh my god what a climax
shion and rat being totally prepared to die alongside each other. rat being absolutely horrified that shion has had to kill someone but being too injured to stop him. rat getting pulled down into his memories to protect himself from the pain of it all. sinking into the peace for a moment but ultimately clawing his way back to reality because THATS WHERE SHION IS

oh my fucking god?????? rat finally allowing himself to accept that he’s fully let shion into his life and that his words about a potential third option really did get to him, and then wondering if any of it is worth it if shion’s goodness just gets stripped away from all of this. god my heart is aching i’m so worried about how this is gonna end

shion thinking about how pathetic the elites are to be so disgusted by the smell of garbage when he literally had to climb a tower of mangled bodies and corpses

rat. rat is a forest person. he was part of a community that lived as one with nature. he can hear the fucking wind and evoke it with his voice when he sings. he IS nature. shion has always longed for nature. every time i think these two have maxxed out their soulmatism they throw some more red string deliciousness at me

SHION WANTED RAT TO FEEL COMFORTABLE ENOUGH AND TO TRUST HIM ENOUGH TO SHOW HIM HIS SCARS ARE YOU SHITTING ME?????? AND NOW HE FINALLY DID???? plus this coming right after the flashback with safu where she’s thinking about who shion wants so badly if not her!! the threads of desire are so good in this i am losing my mind

oh my heart is breaking for safu!!!! wondering why they only ever talked about science, why shion never wanted to get physically intimate with her, why he always called her his best friend and nothing more. “shion, who do you love? who do you want do much it kills you?” ……i think we all know the answer

“nature ought to be like something that goes far beyond human intelligence” and that’s why it’s even more perverse that the scientist is using bees to fucking murder people and quite literally steal their life spans!!!!!!! shion’s connection to nature and animals is SO incredible and it’s been present since the very start when he was enamored with the storm. nature and books start revolutions iktr!!!!!!!

first of all, these two taking care of a baby is the funniest b plot ever, what a dysfunctional duo
second of all, what do you mean “miracles are easier than you think sometimes. rat said so before”???? RAT SAID SO BEFORE???????? WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN I WOULD LIKE THE BONUS FLASHBACK COMIC OF THAT PLEASE oh my god rat getting sappy all of a sudden thinking of shion and dogkeeper’s just like wtf is wrong with you

“no. 6 consumes people. it feeds on our attempts to be human, on our will to resist, on our hopes.” DAMN this coupled with the parasitic bee conspiracy is so horrifying. cause that’s how shion described the feeling of the bee starting to hatch inside of him, like it was feeding on him. i just need to know what the endgame is for the scientists like WHY are they doing all this

rat i fucking adore you so much!!!!!!! he continues to risk EVERYTHING by sending these updates to karan but it’s worth it for her piece of mind, and it’s what shion would want. it would help keep him sane too, which is much needed at the moment

secret softie dogkeeper is so lovely i wanna cry
“i won’t pray or cling to some god. i’ll show how i can believe in you two.” her faith in rat and shion is actually religious cool cool cool this found family is so fucking sweet

RAT KEPT THE FIRST AID KIT OF COURSE HE FUCKING DID MMMHMMMM who’s sentimental now bitch
also the shift from shion saying he wants to go back to no. 6 to then saying he wants to go back to rat’s room instead???????? and that’s what pushes him (and rat!!!!!) forward instead of trapping him in place like thinking about no. 6 did

oh rat is NEVER gonna let shion live that goodbye kiss down is he

rat immediately getting pissed at himself and the world and cursing it all after mercifully singing that man to a peaceful death. he is REALLY struggling to clutch onto this idea that he and everyone else should be angry above all else, even in their very last moments on earth. it’s like every time he does something to ease someone’s pain, he has to backpedal and overcompensate in the opposite direction OUCH

OH MY GOD AND NOW THIS TOTALLY REFRAMES SHION BEGGING RAT TO KEEP HIM HUMAN!!!!! not only does he keep him human by awakening feelings and introducing him to experiences he’s never had before, he keeps him human by not letting him slip back into blissful ignorance. rat is the voice that tells shion: “no. you need to look this in the eye before running back to what’s comfortable”. their yin yang is insane

AND also just like shion wants to go back to no. 6 for the first time since escaping, i also had a moment of oh my god no take me back to dancing in rat’s living room. it’s so fucking human to want to escape into comfort when you’re faced with the worst of reality. distractions are a tool that should be used sparingly and with full knowledge that most of the time, they are just bandaids on bullet wounds

the tone of this has been relatively cozy so far even with the slight detours into horror sci-fi, so this marked shift REALLY hits. i feel exactly like shion in this moment. we got lulled into a false sense of security in west block, we forgot the true horror of no. 6 cause we really hadn’t SEEN it yet. but now here it is. we’re trapped with it just like shion

one of the prisoners asking eve to sing one more song and that getting him shot???????? oh rat feels so fucking guilty, that panel of him gritting his teeth afterwards was so telling. just another piece of evidence for him to prove his mindset that unguarded emotionality gets you killed

THE ONLY THING THAT GLITTERS FOR ALL TIME IS-
ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING?????? the cut off right before what i assume is “love” is diabolical oh my god that was so effective

rat saying that songs and stories can’t actually save anyone because all they do is distract people from their suffering is SO telling about his character. he’s definitely connecting it to shion too and how he’s been a dangerous “distraction” for him. and yet. he still sings.

shion feels like rat is the embodiment of his heart, that he is what makes him human. there’s SO MUCH to unpack there. so for shion, what does it mean to be human? if it has to do with rat, then i’d say it’s about free will and freedom and thinking and FEELING for yourself. it’s about love and understanding. all things that are tantamount to their relationship and how they change each other for the better

my brain is so overwhelmed with these first 40 pages that i don’t even know what to say besides oh my god????
rat FINALLY realizing that shion is more than just this sheltered naive soul, that he has an intensity of his own, the DANCING?????, more of shion’s names for the mice (and them sleeping with him come on that’s adorable), and i can’t even begin to parse through rat’s vision what the FUCK was that

THEYRE THE SUN AND THE NORTH WIND SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UPPPP and rat's singing voice was compared to a breeze before holy shit the nature symbolism is everywhere
also this is exactly the type of teasing i wanted from dogkeeper thank you very much

oh my god even the chapter titles being "the curtain rises" and "the stage grows dark" emphasizing the idea that rat's cruelty, while it clearly comes from a very real place of pain, is still a performance that he feels he has to put on in order to survive and especially now that he's not just surviving for himself. having shion around has made him simultaneously more caring AND more cruel, AND SHION UNDERSTANDS THIS

once again, a lesser manga would have this difference in mindset between rat and shion be a massive breaking point in their relationship but every time it comes up, it's ALWAYS a conversation. it's always a catalyst for self-reflection for both of them. these questions of morality are treated with the depth they deserve by the narrative and the characters themselves and that is SO REFRESHING