Aria the Masterpiece: Chapter 65 Discussion

[Naphthalene]

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Aria the Masterpiece Chapter 65: 黄昏時

Start Date: December 13th
Previous Chapter: Chapter 64
Next Chapter: Chapter 66

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Aria the Masterpiece Volume 7 Vocab

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[Belthazar]

Before I post anything, I’d like to hear people’s thoughts and impressions on this chapter. Pretty please?

Also, the soundtrack for pages 163-166:

Don't even open this until you get that far.

Like, seriously.

https://youtu.be/0bqcM2Jz2CQ

[Naphthalene]

I’d like to hear people’s thoughts and impressions on this chapter.

Athena: let’s go for a picnic.
Me: きたああああああぁぁぁぁァァァァァ

Also, based on the crazy amount of skills she displayed during the trip, especially in comparison to what 灯里 did back in the days. So I thought that it would make 100% sense for her to get to the prima directly. But I also thought, nah, it’s probably against the rules, and they kept her as pair forever for some random reason, so that’s not going to happen. Then it did, and I’m really moved by it to be honest

Also also it’s interesting that she gave her second button. Not that I expect anything to come out of that.

[Kyasurin]

Well, I guessed what was going to happen as soon as Athena suggested going on a picnic… but I didn’t foresee the outcome.
Apart from that, I thought it was so lovely to see how much Alice has grown since we first met her, and how she credits her friends with her transformation.

Can someone fill me in on the second button reference? Is this something that has been mentioned before?

[windupbird]

My thoughts are she totally deserves it ^^ She really did show how much she’s grown as a person in this chapter. I kind of had a feeling that Alice would be the first out of the three to get promoted to Prima for some reason, so I was weirdly not that surprised. It did seem like a more intensive/different test than Akari’s promotion test, so maybe that unconsciously tipped me off. …Also I think I kept low-key forgetting that Alice was actually still a pair, I guess because she’s so skilled? Whoops xD

アリスちゃんおめでとう~~~!

Can someone fill me in

I assumed it was some tradition in Japan, so I Googled it and

It is! xD Basically, getting the second button from someone at graduation symbolizes that you’re the most important/most precious person to them? It seems like there are a couple theories on how this came to be a thing, this, this, and this kind of talk about the origins and meaning of it (first 2 links are in Japanese, the 3rd in English)…a lot of the sources I looked at seem to talk about it as a token of love kind of thing, with girls hoping to get the second button from the boy the like. So I’m taking it to mean that that girl really likes/admires/looks up to Alice and wants to be an important person to her.

[hachiken]

Our little Alice is all grown up. sniff 感動しました。

I’m sure I’ve seen the button thing in a high school Jdrama before. I just can’t remember which one.

You can feel the generational change is happening.

[Belthazar]

So, this is one of those chapters which I saw the anime version of long before I read the manga chapter (if for no other reason than there STILL hasn’t been an official English release of it, though that should change in just a few months). I’m trying to remember, though, whether I watched this episode before or after the first time I read the Aqua manga.

Because, see, the anime never shows Akari’s Single promotion exam, though she does visit the hill in the chapter where her original gondola was retired. So I feel like readers of the manga will be reading this with the point of view of “ohh, I know where this is going” while watchers of the anime would be all “I wonder where this is going” - aside from anything else, the anime put the Athena-fakes-amnesia story in the immediately prior episode, with the trigger being that Athena was too busy to come for a mentor-student picnic that Alice planned (rather than accidentally tearing Maa’s hat), and this episode is presented as a kind of picnic take II thing.

Either way, the point is, when Athena reaches for Alice’s second glove, it definitely hit me right in the feels like a ton of bricks. Still does, actually. I dunno, I think I thought there was a fair chance that Alice would end the series as a Single.

Though, one little goof that the anime version took the time to correct: In the manga, Athena removes Alice’s right glove first, even though every other Single we’ve seen is only wearing a right glove. Kinda gives the whole game away.

[seanblue]

and they kept her as pair forever for some random reason

They seemed to imply here that she couldn’t even get promoted to single because she hadn’t graduated from middle school.

Though, one little goof that the anime version took the time to correct: In the manga, Athena removes Alice’s right glove first, even though every other Single we’ve seen is only wearing a right glove. Kinda gives the whole game away.

While I noticed that, I just assumed she was left handed or something, so I didn’t think much of it. Of course, I already knew the ending anyway since I watched the anime. It was still pretty emotional though.

[seanblue]

Can someone explain what 入りまくり (or just まくり) means on page 143?

[Naphthalene]

They seemed to imply here that she couldn’t even get promoted to single because she hadn’t graduated from middle school

That’s what I thought, but I didn’t remember for sure if that’s what happened.
Also why apply some arbitrary rules and then disregard customs. Well, anyway, that’s what I thought.

[Belthazar]

They seemed to imply here that she couldn’t even get promoted to single because she hadn’t graduated from middle school.

I more got the impression that they were simply waiting for her to graduate, rather than her being a student acting as an actual roadblock, but I guess letting a middle school student (not a 中学生?) take paying customers might have been a little bit problematic. Remember Singles are allowed to take customers with their trainer aboard, though Akari hasn’t done it in a looong while.

[seanblue]

Maybe Akari does that all the time and the author just doesn’t show us.

[seanblue]

Also, with how the timeline in this series is nonsense, it feels like Alice has been in her last year of middle school for three Earth years.

[Belthazar]

The earlier chapter featuring Alicia’s un-birthday also implied that it’s currently 2301 AD… which is the same year Akari arrived on Aqua. Or the year after, I’m not entirely sure. I suspect they simply operate in Simpsons time.