A Cool Girl and a 12cm Promise - Ch. 1 - The Promise

[Erricane]

Congrats to Ziki-sensei for getting this serialized

 

[Kitosen]

nice to have a serialization
thanks for the chapter

 

[UnluckyGrape]

Nice, good on the author to get their first serialization. You love to see it : D

 

[BakedBanana]

Nice.

 

[ZeroWrath]

Nah that ain’t no girl

 

[comedyxtragedy]

THIS REMINDS ME OF HORI AND KASHIMA.
Approve!

 

[Liar]

I FUCKING LOVE COOL BEAUTIES!

I'M SO HAPPY THAT A COOL BEAUTY IS THE MAIN LOVE INTEREST!

 

[SirArthurIV]

"12cm promise" sounds dirty.

 

[Yugseto]

Finnaly a serialization!

 

[69_funny_number]

This is lowkey gay af lol

 

[noobplant]

Are we gonna get longer chapters with the serialization? Kinda wish they fleshed out the story more

 

[Waffuru]

is this a gateway comic into yaoi

 

[benderboyboy]

Wait, it got serialized! Woohoo!

 

[outinthegardener]

That's expected with highly stylized artworks in certain mangas that end up being very androgynous. That's why it's so easy to gender-bend and cross-dress manga characters...

Therefore it makes sense to rely on the author's information to understand what the characters are if gendered characteristics don't follow social conversion or there isn't the cop out of drawing big breasts or highly detailed eyes on women, for example.

Many manga authors readily play with this, and in my opinion, it's perfectly okay. Take a look at this example from Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out:

https://mangadex.org/chapter/d146c81d-8815-4cfc-9649-2b976a9f51d2/7

Mind you that this comes from Take, an author that exaggerates sexual characteristics on his characters a lot to convey gender.

On the other hand, this author is using their artstyle own to tell am unique story and mess with the expectation of the readers, and that's pretty refreshing.

Thank you for saying this. Manga has always relied on a "simplification" of the human figure, because it's a) stylized for branding/moe and b) easier to draw before your deadline. I don't see people complain that anime heads borrow some proportions from cats, which means we're all furries ;p

It's important to distinguish between Sexual characteristics (comparatively wider hips and narrow shoulders, having the pelvis tilt forwards, more narrow wrists) and Gender characteristics (fashion and behaviors that vary from culture and era). The whole premise of this story is that Ibuki exists in the Sex/Gender grayzone. Saying she's too androgynous, in a story about being androgynous, is like complaining about the apple being too apple.

 

[Pengy_Z]

So I'm glad this got serialised but I think the addition of a pinky promise with their first meeting is worse than the pre-serialised version.

In the pre-serialised version tomo took an interest early but their first meeting is something an innocent child might say to anyone who's sad about being tall. Her reaction is implied to her thinking this kid is weird but not thinking too much about it. Its implied that later this mundane moment becomes very special to her. He becomes cool to her as he becomes her friend, her knight and her biggest supporter of her being herself.

Here the moment feels unnatural lashing out is supposed to be a sign of her trauma regarding her looks and abilities but is a weird reaction to a kid you've just met trying to comfort her and weirder for her to earnestly pinky promise with someone she has no reason to trust. Also suggesting the pinky promise is weird for tomo why does he want her to believe him they've just met and he's unaware of the bullying she's experienced???

I appreciate more of them as kids but it needed spacing out. First meeting he tells her he'll be taller and cooler than her when they grow up and she says nothing. Next day he runs up to her because they are friends now to her surprise, he gets teased for being around her but he shakes it off easily whilst she lashes out at him for drawing attention to her, that's when he makes the pinky promise.

Yeah, I have to agree. The webcomic handled the "coolness aspect" of the ML a lot better than this serialization is doing, and I feel like this feels a little bit more generic than the original (which is weird because the original is about as generic as you could get). I'm still probably going to read because this specific genre (cool short ML, cool tall FL) basically doesn't exist elsewhere except for a side couple in nozaki kun, but if they don't do both characters justice, it'll just be a pale imitation of the webcomic, tbh.

 

[Foreus]

-make a boy
-call them a girl
-profit

 

[M1cro]

Finally got serialized hopefully we will get longer pages

 

[Eighty-six]

If I'm being honest, I wish the author did just a LITTLE bit more to distinguish Ibuki as a girl (and I understand she's supposed to be boyish and cool in appearance and manner). But, to me, it really feels like the author just drew a tall high school boy and said "this is a girl." She's TOO boyish looking for me to believe she's actually a girl.

But whatever. It's just a nitpick.

Thanks for the translation.

Seconded.

It looks like we might have entered the "1) Draw a boy 2) Call it a girl" era of reverse traps.

 

[RiseOne]

After serialisation, I was expecting longer chapters but it literally feels like I'm reading the same thing the 2nd time.

 

[RC1138Boss]

Nice!