9-nine-ここのつここのかここのいろ 9️⃣ Week 5 (Visual Novel Book Club)

This is being read as part of the Visual Novel Book Club. Another VN, BU$TAFELLOWS, is being read at the same time, feel free to join both clubs!

Home Thread Here!

Current week start date: January 27, 2023
Previous week (Week 4) :infinity: Next Week (Week 6)

Pace

We’re aiming to read approximately 10-12.5k characters per week! A suitable enough end point will be selected each week (feel free if you have a texthooker and it hasn’t been posted yet!) and posted within the thread. @ccookf has helpfully begun compiling a spreadsheet to display progress through the days:

Updated progress spreadsheet (contains spoilers, tread carefully)


This week's endpoint: 11.5k characters.

To clear ambiguity, this scene’s location is the cafe.

Discussion Guidelines

  • Please use spoiler tags for major events in the current chapter(s) and any content in future chapters.
  • When asking for help, do your best to provide context. Pasted text, screenshots, descriptions, etc. Unlike book clubs we can’t flip to relevant pages, so we may need a little help identifying exactly what is being discussed.
  • Feel totally at ease to ask questions or give your thoughts, any time! Clubs live and die by participation, and asking whatever question you have, no matter how silly it may seem, helps others who are reading it and even the answerer themselves.
  • Have fun, and do your best to interpret anything said with as much good faith as possible :slightly_smiling_face:

Participants

  • I’m reading along
  • I have finished this part
  • I’m still reading but haven’t reached this part yet
  • I’m no longer reading

0 voters

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I swear, I’ll actually jump in and participate here someday. :joy:

I’ve just overextended myself a bit, so haven’t gotten around to this yet. :sob:

8 Likes

That’s okay, take your time :slight_smile: . The VN is turning out to be pretty nice so far, I’m sure you’ll have a good time when you decide to jump in, and these threads remain on follow afterwards so we can still jump in (and silently wink at each other in an evil fashion with forbidden knowledge from the future).

7 Likes

I tried reading that page on Agastya and wow, that was way over my head. I can’t tell if they’re just using words that are cool or if there’s an actual connection to these things. Honestly hoping it’s the former so I don’t have to do the research T_T

spoils as usual

From how things were going I thought they were going to do more with the Parfait queen. I thought it was kind of anticlimactic that things ended up as a brief staredown with nothing happening, but at the same time with my concerns over the previous section and Sophie’s explanation on her (un)involvement maybe that was for the best. There were some bits I didn’t really get, but it sounds like she’s surprisingly limited in her actions despite the flashy teleports.

The following day was pretty much all the boldness I was expecting from 4/28. They don’t really seem to think things through, but at the same time Sora’s idea of just planting a note like that was pretty smooth. The chibi bit was also cute as hell, so I’m glad for that. Yoichi on the other hand… give a man some space, it’s been like two weeks.

And finally Kousaka… I get that Kakeru is trying to show off, but did they really have to OK the plan of letting him talk alone with the person who is seemingly charming men? No wonder this game (future spoilers)has a bad ending. At this point I’m going to be impressed if they actually manage to catch the petrification user without getting some deus ex luckina.

planning tangent

There’s about 3,030 characters left in 4/29. I started reading 4/30 today and ended at a point that’s already 7,833 characters without what I would consider a major scene change. Going by what I’ve seen so far, I’m starting to think the rest of the VN is focused on developing the characters and plot, but at the same time I think part of that is that Loopers has really skewed my idea of filler content. It seems like everything I’ve been reading has had something going on and I’ll probably have to revise my idea of a busy day.

4 Likes
Spoilers for this week's content

Very interesting content this week, quite a few things happening.

I liked that we found out that the powers have some nuances - Sora being unable to become unnoticeable when she’s already in the spotlight, for example. It’s also interesting that when we saw Kujou use her artifact in the fire-illusion incident, it was all very flashy with her crest glowing and stuff, but it’s clear that Kousaka and Sora can activate their powers very stealthily.

I am guessing we might find out soon enough, but here’s my speculation on how Kousaka’s power works:

Like Kakeru, I suspect she only has one artifact. I believe the power of the artifact is not to charm men specifically, but instead it’s a sort of hypnotism or suggestion that allows her to implant an idea on someone’s mind. So step one is that she uses the artifact on herself, implanting the idea that she’s actually a bold, daring, outgoing person. This changes her personality, and at this point she can use her power again on anyone. This would entail that she can actually use her powers on both men and women (otherwise it wouldn’t work on herself).

The thing I am confused about is what’s the deal with the post Kousaka made in that Agastya forums? From the content it seemed that she was struggling figuring out how to use her powers, but she seemed to readily use it on Kakeru without any troubles.

Looking forward to what we find out next week!

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Week 5 content spoilers

Yeah now that you mention it that was pretty stupid :joy: . Out of the three I guess it makes sense that the most outgoing person would do it, in this case Kakeru. They could have met her all together, but I suppose if she is the 魔眼 user it’s probably for the best that she doesn’t know who the other users are, less exposure. Didn’t stop her noticing Kujou regardless.

These are turning out to be my favourite parts of the VN :joy: . I’m enjoying the voice acting a lot.

That’s a pretty interesting theory! I’m trying to remember something and perhaps I’ll end up misremembering how it went and butchering it instead, but does anyone remember Kujou theorising at Kakeru’s home after the fire incident that the artifacts’ powers could be a manifestation of their desires and she was kind of ashamed that her inner desires would give her the power to steal things?

Edit: well now we know that the artifacts have powers themselves, but maybe they are attracted to a user in particular depending on their personalities or what they desire? And with that in mind, here comes my first explosive theory of the VN :joy: :joy: → Yoichi as the 魔眼 user, he’s always so fixated on girls. Maybe it’s no coincidence that he was the first to mention the statue of the girl, I don’t know. We need to see if the next victim is another girl. We also need Parfait Queen to make an appearance and see if she knows something about the whole thing, she seems rather suspicious about everything.

But anyways:

Cut of a picture from an Anki card I made back then

It might be the case that Kousaka doesn’t really know how to control it or it’s not something that triggers on purpose but as a protective mechanism? Perhaps she wrote the post at a time she wasn’t controlled by it and in reality she’s a very shy and socially anxious person who wanted to fit in and is doing things to be liked. The post might have been a cry of help, I guess we need to wait until next time we meet her :thinking: .




Week 6 planning tangent @ccookf

You mean apart from those 3k characters in 4/29, from the beginning of 4/30 to those 7.8k there’s no clear fitting endpoint and the scene continues? So, 10.8k characters in total and no clear end for a while still?

As long as there’s no massive cliffhangers, I don’t dislike the way we cut this week personally. I’ll try to start reading tomorrow and give you a hand, see if we can find an alright spot :wink: . We can carry it over to the 9-nine home thread to keep this on-topic.

4 Likes
Spoilers

The chibi parts are always so cute! Kujou getting teased and blushing was just too great haha.

I had semi-Loopers flashbacks when Haruka started talking. Not sure if its just me, but her voice seems to be mixed way lower than everyone else’s in the game. Even just hearing her and the MC talk back to back, it felt considerably quieter. I checked the sound settings and she was already maxed out, so might have to lower everyone else’s to compensate :sweat_smile:

Haruka seems like an interesting character so far. Hard to really judge her with her multiple personalities at the moment though. I think one of the characters mentioned that when she went お嬢様 mode in front of all those guys that it sounded off. I’m not sure if they meant her tone or the words she was using, but I’m glad they said something cause I read a lot of stories with お嬢様 type characters and Haruka felt off in comparison :joy: The scene in the cafe was funny though when she suddenly went ですわ and the MC was getting confused why she was talking like that.

Since the cafe scene started off with her being all shy and then the sudden change, I am guessing she can’t control it properly yet still. I think if she had a better control, she would have changed her personality sooner? Hard to say for sure with the information we have so far though.

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spoilers

If it’s the part I’m thinking of I had to look at the localization and they described along the lines of “she’s totally forcing it” as in trying to hard to be something she’s not.

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Another week down! I’m happy with how quickly I’m making it through these, though to be fair, this is the only real Japanese learning thing I’m doing as I ease my way back in.

Fun section

Seeing that this ended at 10 weeks (though the last week is longer), I can tell a big cliffhanger is likely and those later games will be necessary when we’re really working through introducing and developing characters still. That said, I’m enjoying it a lot. Could do without Yoichi, just, in general.

Like everyone else though, I loved the chibi bit and the general banter between Kakeru and Sora. Very charming characters. I really like the theories here on Kousaka – I find it very unlikely she’s the culprit, but I thought her scene in the cafe was really well done. The way it ended personally didn’t actually bother me much because of the ambiguity it’s all laced in. She feels malicious in the moment but never quite overtly. That promise at the end definitely reads more like a threat. I’ve been finding this whole thing nice to read simply because of the character writing, but her introduction to the story is probably the most interested I’ve gotten in seeing how it’s all going to unfold so far.

Oh, and a question. Clearly the VN club is gearing up for its next pick – I’m behind in so many posts in my absence, but I’ve been looking back a little and it does seem some people are planning to continue this as a spinoff, correct?

4 Likes

I’m glad you’re back and enjoying the VN so far! As for if we’re continuing the series as a spinoff, we kind of talked about it briefly here. In short, it seems like we have interest in continuing to read it as a spinoff but are awaiting to see the results of what gets picked for the next round since it might be difficult to find time for both the main club and the spinoff.

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That’s fair, yeah. Personally I already picked up all 4 of them at once when getting part 1 so I’m pretty committed to seeing the rest through – I’d like to keep up with the main club, but I’m also waiting to see what gets chosen and how I’m feeling at the time, as I’m still feeling things out for returning to Japanese. With the main club picking up speed, it’d be a decently large commitment. Don’t want to deprive the main club of participants, but for my own sake I guess my preferences are leaning towards definitely continuing this now that I’m in, and hoping I feel strongly enough to make the time for the main one too.

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