Destroy It All And Love Me In Hell! - Vol. 2 Ch. 9 - Incoherency

[Eukene]

The comedy is in the volume bonuses and twitter artworks that haven't been released here yet. And even those are deeper in a way, since they foreshadow certain things.

As for Kurumi, she's not really respected at school by many people. The teacher gives her fake praise to make her do his work for him. While her club mates slack off expecting her to do extra work to make up for them. And during the school assembly, many of the students gave the impression of not caring about her. Even outside of Isanuma's clique and Naoi, there were girls looking bored and in particular one looking at her nails. The desk incident could just make them more comfortable revealing how they don't like her and start spreading rumors about her. Though that won't be too relevant for awhile, given summer break is about to start.

Kokoro could be in for a rude awakening too. Her parents took notice of her off behavior and assume it has to do with the school. If they contact the school after Kurumi does something, Kokoro could be banned from talking to her. Or they could force her to switch schools to get away from bad-influence Kurumi.

Naoi really has nowhere to go but up from here since she already reached rock bottom.

I can't comment on unreleased things and extra content is often more comedic, but I can kind of see the rest of that - Kurumi doesn't have many people she's actually close with.

I think though it would make sense everyone would have detractors since students tend to congregate in groups of like minded people, not necessarily showing she is disliked in general. Not everyone will care about school speeches etc naturally and some people will feel insecure around someone who appears to always have everything together and do things by the book, but that doesn't mean she isn't generally respected. I do remember there being certain people who are outgroup to essentially everyone (or do I mean being the certain people, but let's not talk about that), essentially the minority that lets the majority be a majority, but I can't remember anyone post elementary school being loved by everyone.

Maybe it would be best to say a good reputation with few detractors, but also few allies who would stand up for her? The girl who is clearly romantically interested in the teacher is kind of biased, as these things go, plus is maybe actually involved with him given the type of story this is.

 

[Mistilteinn]

Kurumi doesn't have many people she's actually close with.

I noticed something about the class photo. Kurumi and Kokoro are at the very edge of it as shown when Kurumi looked at it in the staff office. While Kurumi didn't want to think of what could be told from it, truthfully it reveals social dynamics. It would appear that Kurumi and Kokoro are almost outsiders. This might be part of what motivated her desire to break the photo, because on some level she might've realized what the photo said about her current situation. Meanwhile, Naoi is the wild card as of the main series, because she skips school and wasn't in the photo to begin with. A missing piece of the puzzle.

It's possible that Kurumi has no friends outside of Kokoro. Her other middle school friends drifted away from her when her behavior changed. Kokoro even lampshades it's just the two of them in her chapter 7 monologue. However, Kokoro is under the delusion that Kurumi is still popular like in elementary school, but given Kurumi's expression after Kokoro says how everyone must admire her in chapter 1, it's pretty clear Kurumi realizes she isn't popular with the student body in high school. Her speech in chapter 1 would've been before she had any interactions with Isanuma's clique, since those speeches happen on the very first day of the school year.

Plus, when the class photo was broken, Kurumi felt very alienated from the rest of the class. But even if the alienation was mostly in Kurumi's head, it goes against typical Japanese social conventions to risk social isolation by standing up for someone who potentially did something like that to the desk. And from a story perspective, it's to push Kurumi closer to Naoi by breaking down her public facade, meaning Kurumi really doesn't have any solid allies in this outside of Naoi.

 

[Eukene]

I noticed something about the class photo. Kurumi and Kokoro are at the very edge of it as shown when Kurumi looked at it in the staff office. While Kurumi didn't want to think of what could be told from it, truthfully it reveals social dynamics. It would appear that Kurumi and Kokoro are almost outsiders. This might be part of what motivated her desire to break the photo, because on some level she might've realized what the photo said about her current situation. Meanwhile, Naoi is the wild card as of the main series, because she skips school and wasn't in the photo to begin with. A missing piece of the puzzle.

It's possible that Kurumi has no friends outside of Kokoro. Her other middle school friends drifted away from her when her behavior changed. Kokoro even lampshades it's just the two of them in her chapter 7 monologue. However, Kokoro is under the delusion that Kurumi is still popular like in elementary school, but given Kurumi's expression after Kokoro says how everyone must admire her in chapter 1, it's pretty clear Kurumi realizes she isn't popular with the student body in high school. Her speech in chapter 1 would've been before she had any interactions with Isanuma's clique, since those speeches happen on the very first day of the school year.

Very nice observations - clearly both the author and you put some thought into this. The 'popular in elementary school but disliked in high school' is something of a trope and one with a real world basis, as kids start rapidly developing adult-like hierarchies Lord of the Flies style in middle school. In this case maybe not wildly popular in elementary school, so much as that people started to become more aware of how she was different than other children once they got older.

Kokoro is the type of person who would easily miss the changing social dynamics, but maybe also not care about them as long as she has Kurumi and her family.

Plus, when the class photo was broken, Kurumi felt very alienated from the rest of the class. But even if the alienation was mostly in Kurumi's head, it goes against typical Japanese social conventions to risk social isolation by standing up for someone who potentially did something like that to the desk. And from a story perspective, it's to push Kurumi closer to Naoi by breaking down her public facade, meaning Kurumi really doesn't have any solid allies in this outside of Naoi.

This does seem to be the event that will change the social dynamic at the school - either her taking the blame and losing the facade or else someone she dislikes taking the blame for what she did. The second would change how she relates to the social environment since, by doing the 'wrong' thing yet becoming more respected, she would become more aware of the flaws of that social environment.

 

[Mistilteinn]

Kokoro is the type of person who would easily miss the changing social dynamics, but maybe also not care about them as long as she has Kurumi and her family.

I have to wonder about the not caring part. In the flashback, the original Japanese had Kokoro think that she was happy that someone as "outstanding" as Kurumi reached out to her. This could be seen as her happy a popular girl reached out to her. It's once again linked to Kokoro's draw to perceived perfection.

And when the flashback skipped ahead to their other friends leaving, it had Kokoro deny that Kurumi had changed at all...because some random classmates gave a surface level compliment about Kurumi running so fast in gym class. It's very possible Kokoro struggles to differentiate someone being polite or making an off-hand comment from genuine admiration for a person.

Kokoro strikes me as the codependent type. She tied her identity and self-esteem to being the "popular girl's" friend. That's most likely why Kokoro gets so hostile when Kurumi's perfection is challenged, as it would also challenge her own sense of identity and self-worth.

 

[Eukene]

My reading is that it's less about popularity and more about her perceived perfectness - she's the class president, gets good grades, tells off bullies, athletic, kind, polite, humble, etc. She is like a hero to Kokoro and Kokoro has this static image of her that she wants to be true. So if the student population turns against Kurumi then I think I Kokoro's first impulse would be to blame the students and feel less invested in the social status there, with the only exception being if she is not able to interpret events in a way where she can maintain her image of Kurumi.

The desk could be what causes Kokoro to lose the image, but more likely she would simply attribute this to the corrupting influence of Naoi. This isn't entirely wrong since Kurumi wouldn't have done this without Naoi, though of course we know Kurumi already had these feelings pre-Naoi. It will be very interesting to see where the whole desk thing goes.

 

[deathpigeon]

Also, while Kurumi wouldn't've done that without Naoi, she went well beyond what Naoi expected. Naoi barely even suggested she do anything, then. She just gave her the wood carver and told her to figure out what to do with it.

That was much more Kurumi than Naoi.

 

[Mistilteinn]

Also, while Kurumi wouldn't've done that without Naoi, she went well beyond what Naoi expected. Naoi barely even suggested she do anything, then. She just gave her the wood carver and told her to figure out what to do with it.

That was much more Kurumi than Naoi.

Yep, Kurumi constantly blamed Naoi for everything even when Naoi always gave her vague instructions that Kurumi always chose to go nuclear with. Kurumi knew she could've taken a pen or an eraser off the teacher's desk, yet she took the class photo which she knew would be noticed. She could've carved something like a small butterfly or whatever on her own desk where no one would notice it, but instead she was angry at Isanuma and went all out on Isanuma's desk.

That's not even getting into things like Kurumi's first thought being to self-harm with the carving knife, while projecting the idea onto Naoi.

Naoi to some degree knows Kurumi has issues, but she was at the meeting with the teacher and missed Kurumi considering the self-harming. And Kurumi fantasizing about murdering Isanuma is something Naoi couldn't know, because it was only shown to the reader via Kurumi's thoughts. Basically, Kurumi is potentially dangerous to herself and others and no one knows that in the story.

There were also some concerning bits with Kokoro in chapter 8. Near the beginning of the chapter, her seeming trail off might not have been one, meaning the actual line might've been intended to translate as "Because Kurumi-chan is mine..." before Kokoro snapped out of whatever happened to her mood at that moment. So Naoi's disturbed face might've been because Kokoro was acting unhinged and not solely because she found out that Kurumi was in a relationship. And then of course there's later in the chapter where Kokoro violently slams her hand down on the desk out of jealousy. Yandere Kokoro isn't off the table yet.

 

[deathpigeon]

The thing Naoi knows most of all is that there's a lot that Kurumi is holding back for the sake of others and the thing she wants is for Kurumi to stop that, to act on her feelings for herself instead of shaping herself into the image of others.

This is why, for example, when she told Kurumi to strip and she did so, she got angry.

 

[Bruhtea]

this hurts to read

 

[IAM_GARV]

Did i miss something here? how does this bitch knows that the desk is spoiled by Kurumi and is dedicated to her

 

[deathpigeon]

Did i miss something here? how does this bitch knows that the desk is spoiled by Kurumi and is dedicated to her

She doesn't. She's just pinning it on someone she hates.

 

[silverpetricof]

Thank you for the translation.