SHY - Vol. 12 Ch. 103 - I Am Shy

[Absum]

press F for whoever has to do the official translation for these names I guess

 

[Nolonar]

wait is this series going the yuri route or am i reading it wrong?

Love doesn't have to be exclusively romantic or sexual. Otherwise, most parents would be pedophiles, and we all know that's simply not true.

 

[AccForManga]

Love doesn't have to be exclusively romantic or sexual. Otherwise, most parents would be pedophiles, and we all know that's simply not true.

Sure but...I mean...Iko, while blushing, explicitly wanted to know if Teru's hero transformation made her naked and if it did she wanted to record it. >.>

---

Always seems odd to me that when a boy/girl tells a girl/boy "I like you" in a situation like this people know its romantic/romantic-coded yet if a girl tells a girl it or a boy tells a boy it in the exact same type of situation some people will go all "Its not like that! Why cant you just see they are friends, dont try making it gay when its not!" but yet wont complain/wont say its "just friends" when its the former examples. :/

(not really saying this to you explicitly just in general/to anyone)

Idunno, we've seen platonic love like with Teru and Pepesha but this really seems far more romantic-coded.

 

[Gogglesluxio]

Sure but...I mean...Iko, while blushing, explicitly wanted to know if Teru's hero transformation made her naked and if it did she wanted to record it. >.>

---

Always seems odd to me that when a boy/girl tells a girl/boy "I like you" in a situation like this people know its romantic/romantic-coded yet if a girl tells a girl it or a boy tells a boy it in the exact same type of situation some people will go all "Its not like that! Why cant you just see they are friends, dont try making it gay when its not!" but yet wont complain/wont say its "just friends" when its the former examples. :/

(not really saying this to you explicitly just in general/to anyone)

Idunno, we've seen platonic love like with Teru and Pepesha but this really seems far more romantic-coded.

maybe it's just roommate-coded

 

[TanyaTheEvil]

Thanks again for the translation

 

[Nolonar]

Sure but...I mean...Iko, while blushing, explicitly wanted to know if Teru's hero transformation made her naked and if it did she wanted to record it. >.>

Fair enough. It's been so long I didn't remember that particular scene.

 

[Lustrist]

HOLY FUCK!

 

[Tamerlane]

Considering past examples of her infatuation with Teru there's no heterosexual explanation for that declaration of love 😌


Little note i find neat: in that bubble Iko says 君が好きなんだ and that なんだ is prob a casual variant of なのだ which is used to indicate a strong assertion. So basically she didn't just say " i like you", she said it with full confidence and i just think that's very gay of her~

Nah, I like it better when the yuri bait is just kept as bait. After all these chapters all the yuri stuff is kept mostly as implication but never anything serious and I don't think the narrative works better with her being LITERALLY in love with shy, but more a metaphorical kinda love, like one would say of someone they admire a lot. Given we're like ~20-30 chapters behind and still no yuri tag, this is probably likely the case.

(I also still ship her with Daigo because I think her getting with the first person she inspired and saved is a nice poetic thing but that's not relevant to this)

 

[AccForManga]

Nah, I like it better when the yuri bait is just kept as bait. After all these chapters all the yuri stuff is kept mostly as implication but never anything serious and I don't think the narrative works better with her being LITERALLY in love with shy, but more a metaphorical kinda love, like one would say of someone they admire a lot. Given we're like ~20-30 chapters behind and still no yuri tag, this is probably likely the case.

(I also still ship her with Daigo because I think her getting with the first person she inspired and saved is a nice poetic thing but that's not relevant to this)

See this type of comment is exactly the type I was talking/warning about in my previous post. :/

 

[KZO]

Confession, let's go! I hope the anime gets more seasons so it can get to this chapter.

 

[Tamerlane]

See this type of comment is exactly the type I was talking/warning about in my previous post. :/

Part of the issue is in japanese culture, homosexuality is seen as something people engage with in their youth and then grow out of- at least in more traditionalist circles. Which is why in japanese media you tend to see yuri and yaoi be things between like teenagers.

I don't agree with this perspective, but in order to understand a lot of the tropes in Japanese media, you have to understand the view that there's a prominent perception in Japanese culture that they're "just fooling around." Western Media luckily does avoid this trope generally, with gay characters staying gay, bi characters staying bi, etc. I think we could do more with characters learning they are another sexuality then they think and such, but that is because of the very western and liberal perspective we have. I don't know if it's fair to interpret foreign media similarly.

Regardless, narratively I find the idea of this character randomly being in love with this girl very unsatisfying as it wasn't built up throughout the series and there isn't much chemistry between them right now. I've been with this series for about 4 years now and I have seen people ship Shy with everyone (Iko, Pepesha, Lady Black, Ai Tennoji , etc) and none of them have worked out, so excuse me for being a bit cautious about this one until we get more. Ignore this part, I made a mistake because I didn't realize this was the real iko.

 

[brisketsweep]

maybe it's just roommate-coded

It's up to interpretation.

Also this is absolutely framed like a confession. This is far more romantic than many confessions I've seen in actual yuri manga. I'm talking Yuri Hime, a magazine dedicated to yuri. Iko starts by taking Teru to the place they first met to remind Teru of who she is. She then talks about everything she likes about Teru and tells her that she likes her. As stated on the first page of comments, she doesn't just say "kimi ga suki," which means "I like you," but instead "kimi ga suki nanda," with "nanda" being similar to "can say with certainty that." So Iko effectively said "I can say with certainty I like you." I understand that would clutter up the bubble and be less impactful, so I'm not gonna say it's a mistake by the translators or anything. Anyways, saying that as she stands in the rain, looking back at Teru and smiling would be romantic enough, but it's what she does next that elevates this.
She falls on purpose, knowing Teru will come rushing over to her. This is what hit home the romanticism for me. Saying "I like you," got me excited, but this demonstrates the care she has for Teru, knowing her well enough to pull a fake move to get her closer. Also, sharing an umbrella is a classic.
Gotta mention how Shy has had sun imagery, what with her fire and the fact she effectively turned into a sun when she destroyed the dome. While this is obviously reminiscent of Shine, it also contrasts with Iko's crescent symbol on her hairband, as well as the fact she's gotten shadow-based powers. For anyone not in the know, sun and moon lesbians are a moderately well known dynamic in the yuri community. It also doesn't help that they fit perfectly into the yuri couple template of a cheery, light-haired social girl and a timid, dark-haired shy (or at the very least reserved) girl.
If you want more examples of that template, see:
MadoHomu (Puella Magi Madoka Magica, not canon in the thinnest sense possible, been around for over a decade. Fandom widely agrees that they're in love, many analyses of the show assume that Homura is in love with Madoka, with Homura having what is essentially a confession scene)
Mei and Yuzu (Citrus)
Hikari Kagura and Karen Aijou (Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight, not canon in the thinnest sense possible)
Chisato and Takina (Lycoris Recoil, not canon)
Hinako and Satou (Doughnuts under a Crescent Moon)
Shimizu and Maekawa (Still Sick)
Sorawo and Toriko (Otherside Picnic, though they don't slot into this as well as you'd think, but in a good way. There is no simple ship dynamic that could ever adequately describe them, insanely well written book series, read it.)
Bumbleby (RWBY, heard this one from friends. I'm glad to steer clear of that show)
The main couples from all of Sal Jiang's works.
Naori and Hinata (Alcohol and Ogre-girls)
Koga and Oosawa (The Guy She Was Interested in Wasn't a Guy At All)
Tsukushi and Hinoka (Our Yuri Started With Me Getting Rejected in a Dream)
I know there's a lot more of these, I just can't remember them for some reason. It's like when you took a test in high school and the knowledge just leaves your mind. Maybe doing this from off the top of my head is harder than I thought. Just browse Dynasty Scans for a bit and you'll see what I mean. All that's left is for them to go to an aquarium and they'll be set.

Edit: For even more evidence on my sun and moon lesbians point, while Teru's name is in katakana (spelled テル), a quick look on jisho shows that Teru (spelled 照る) is a verb meaning "to shine." This contrasts nicely with Iko's new shadow powers.

 

[MoonlightFairy]

Boss arc let's go! Thank you for the update!

 

[Suben]

Nah, I like it better when the yuri bait is just kept as bait. After all these chapters all the yuri stuff is kept mostly as implication but never anything serious and I don't think the narrative works better with her being LITERALLY in love with shy, but more a metaphorical kinda love, like one would say of someone they admire a lot. Given we're like ~20-30 chapters behind and still no yuri tag, this is probably likely the case.

(I also still ship her with Daigo because I think her getting with the first person she inspired and saved is a nice poetic thing but that's not relevant to this)

20 or 30 chapters behind? Bro, we're close to 100 as chapter 201 came out last week.

The author pretty clearly and intentionally leans heavily into bait with a lot of different relationships with Teru. Teru and Iko have a lot of ship teasing between them. Teru and Piltz to a lesser extent. Teru, Iko, and Ai almost come off as an OT3 style relationship.

Then there's Sekirara who is explicitly and openly in love with Teru.

Spoiler: BIG MANGA RAW SPOILERS

Said love seems to be causing Sekirara to pull a face turn as she sided with Teru against Tamlu and is allowing herself to be interrogated by Unilord and Nirvana.

Regardless, narratively I find the idea of this character randomly being in love with this girl very unsatisfying as it wasn't built up throughout the series and there isn't much chemistry between them right now.

What are you even talking about? One of the earliest chapters is Lady Black's introduction where Piltz yells at Teru about how Iko cried herself to exhaustion over Teru and then at the end Teru promises to never make her cry again with the whole scene being framed in a way like it's the hero telling his love interest not to worry about him. Not to mention that Iko gets the whole female lead/love interest "good luck" send off before Shy leaves for the dome in the Hollow arc. Or the chapter where Teru's sick and Iko's the one who cares for her at her bedside, you know the trope which is usually done between love interests.

And again later on in the raws...

Spoiler: RAW SPOILERS

Iko (along with Ai) rescues Shy when she's in danger of being consumed by one of the rings.

I get that you seemingly would rather have Teru in a hetero ship but you're straight up twisting both your own logic and the very work itself into pretzels to try and deny the very blatant yuri vibes being used by the author in writing Teru's relationship with Iko and a few other girls. Some, yeah, I don't really see like her relationship with Pepesha. But the romantic overtones of Teru and Iko's relationship are so blatant they're practically puching you in the face and have been present since the very beginning of the series.

The only argument is whether it'll actually go somewhere with Iko and Teru pairing up by the end or if it's largely bait being done to give more emotional resonance to their friendship and emphasize their importance to one another by blurring the line between platonic and romantic.

This isn't some "yuri supremacy" or "I really want a yuri ending" BS either. It's just the way the relationship between the two characters has been written since volume 1.

 

[Tamerlane]

20 or 30 chapters behind? Bro, we're close to 100 as chapter 201 came out last week.

The author pretty clearly and intentionally leans heavily into bait with a lot of different relationships with Teru. Teru and Iko have a lot of ship teasing between them. Teru and Piltz to a lesser extent. Teru, Iko, and Ai almost come off as an OT3 style relationship.

Then there's Sekirara who is explicitly and openly in love with Teru.

Spoiler: BIG MANGA RAW SPOILERS

Said love seems to be causing Sekirara to pull a face turn as she sided with Teru against Tamlu and is allowing herself to be interrogated by Unilord and Nirvana.

What are you even talking about? One of the earliest chapters is Lady Black's introduction where Piltz yells at Teru about how Iko cried herself to exhaustion over Teru and then at the end Teru promises to never make her cry again with the whole scene being framed in a way like it's the hero telling his love interest not to worry about him. Not to mention that Iko gets the whole female lead/love interest "good luck" send off before Shy leaves for the dome in the Hollow arc. Or the chapter where Teru's sick and Iko's the one who cares for her at her bedside, you know the trope which is usually done between love interests.

And again later on in the raws...

Spoiler: RAW SPOILERS

Iko (along with Ai) rescues Shy when she's in danger of being consumed by one of the rings.

I get that you seemingly would rather have Teru in a hetero ship but you're straight up twisting both your own logic and the very work itself into pretzels to try and deny the very blatant yuri vibes being used by the author in writing Teru's relationship with Iko and a few other girls. Some, yeah, I don't really see like her relationship with Pepesha. But the romantic overtones of Teru and Iko's relationship are so blatant they're practically puching you in the face and have been present since the very beginning of the series.

The only argument is whether it'll actually go somewhere with Iko and Teru pairing up by the end or if it's largely bait being done to give more emotional resonance to their friendship and emphasize their importance to one another by blurring the line between platonic and romantic.

This isn't some "yuri supremacy" or "I really want a yuri ending" BS either. It's just the way the relationship between the two characters has been written since volume 1.

I agree with all your points, I just made an error. Because I didn't realize this was Iko because of the new costume and the shadow thing. I thought this was introducing a new character. (Disjointed reading)

Mea culpa, ignore the bit about the thing about the new character at the end.

EDIT: Rereading the series now and I'll collect my thoughts in a moment, but I am starting to have doubts.

EDIT 2: I really take that first line about agreeing back after rereading this. It seems that Teru is straight given the difference in how she acts with men and women.

 

[Passerby_RLY]

Also this is absolutely framed like a confession. This is far more romantic than many confessions I've seen in actual yuri manga. I'm talking Yuri Hime, a magazine dedicated to yuri. Iko starts by taking Teru to the place they first met to remind Teru of who she is. She then talks about everything she likes about Teru and tells her that she likes her. As stated on the first page of comments, she doesn't just say "kimi ga suki," which means "I like you," but instead "kimi ga suki nanda," with "nanda" being similar to "can say with certainty that." So Iko effectively said "I can say with certainty I like you." I understand that would clutter up the bubble and be less impactful, so I'm not gonna say it's a mistake by the translators or anything.

The original sentence was "私はね、君が好きなんだ", in context it'd be something like "For me, it's you that I like." But the scene was so obviously framed as a confession so we opted for "I like you." to retain the confession Iko slipped in and allow for Teru's reaction to make sense in English as well.

I generally agree with your other points,

Hikari Kagura and Karen Aijou (Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight, not canon in the thinnest sense possible)

but excuse me, Hikaren are absolutely canon. Revue Starlight is a series where ship members put engagement rings on each other and sign wedding vows with their swords. On screen. And Hikaren is arguably the most heated and profound pair within such a series.
They considered each other their lifelong pursuits, and found themselves unable to separate from one another even after putting down the grandiose fated partner narrative.
They not only fought, or died, but revived for each other's sake, more than once.
If what they have isn't romance, that's just because the word can't even begin to describe what they have between them.
Yes, they never used the word "love". But they're as canon as canon can be.

 

[Passerby_RLY]

Me while reading:

"Eh? Amalareiks? You mean those girls?"

Hey now Thumping and Stigma are boys, you already made that mistake before Shy!

"Shine is Stigma"

Oh. Well then.

(but seriously what a twist; the umbrella, and it being ruined, and everything was a neat little clue in retrospect)

Oh, I forgot to respond to this.
Yeah, what Teru said was more like "those kids", our translation process was @JoaquinHawke doing the translation from Spanish and I do the translation check using Japanese. The fact that they're not just made up of girls flew over my head when I was doing TLC for the line, so sorry about that.
Not just Thumping and Stigma, but Sik Sik and Talmu are boys as well.

 

[AccForManga]

Oh, I forgot to respond to this.
Yeah, what Teru said was more like "those kids", our translation process was @JoaquinHawke doing the translation from Spanish and I do the translation check using Japanese. The fact that they're not just made up of girls flew over my head when I was doing TLC for the line, so sorry about that.
Not just Thumping and Stigma, but Sik Sik and Talmu are boys as well.

I knew Sik Sik was a boy but...I legit forgot about him lol.

Oh, could have sworn Talmu was called a girl before when Teru went to the apartment. Whoops then, looks like I am just as bad as Teru lol.

 

[Tamerlane]

I agree with all your points, I just made an error. Because I didn't realize this was Iko because of the new costume and the shadow thing. I thought this was introducing a new character. (Disjointed reading)

Mea culpa, ignore the bit about the thing about the new character at the end.

I don't think the evidence suggests what you think it does- at least in the early volumes. It's clear what Iko has is a deep respect and kindred friendship with Shy. Things like crying at your friend being injured and staying up by their side is more a sign of loyalty and not necessarily romantic affection.

In Chapter 28, Pepesha's mother tells her she is the person she loved the most. Contextually we know this isn't romantic love. Similarly, I believe throughout the entire story runs this notion of fraternal or familial love, as people do things for one another out of kindness, which is meant to juxtapose the them. Other things we can tell are not evidence due to context like if one character calls another cute, such as Lady Black calling Cute and immediately shitting on him for it. (Or the fact him and Meng have a cute-off with each other in chapter 43) If you've ever seen women interact, them calling each other cute or blushing at each other is fairly normal, and even things like hugging or holding hands is seen as not necessarily intimate.

Or the chapter where Teru's sick and Iko's the one who cares for her at her bedside, you know the trope which is usually done between love interests.

Rereading that chapter (3)) it's clear that Teru's not romantically interested in Iko. When you see this being done in other works, there's usually something more explicit to connect the idea there is more to this than a home visit. However, Teru says what she feels is embarrassment at having to take a piggy back ride from someone her own age, but a sort of relief at the same time. Her reaction doesn't seem to indicate she's embarrassed because the person she loves is carrying her, but more a teenage embarrassment as how childish it is. Given Iko knows Teru is Shy, and at this point Teru has helped take her to the school nurse, this can be seen more as reciprocity rather than romantic.

Similarly when a character is in love with another in this kind of scenario they are shown to have much more intimate shots, such as heads butting to measure temperature, embarassment when they touch, etc. Usually when they have dreams, it's something like them getting married in the future.

What we see from Teru is she dreams of Iko as her sister, not her lover. Because at this point in the story, that's who she reminds her of. Her coming up to greet her at school is treated as someone with social anxiety overcoming their shyness to make friends, etcs. This chapter doesn't prove your point. It proves you WRONG-especially as Iko says she's come to the realization heroes are just like normal people, and that carries with it some implication of mundanity over romanticization or idealization of a partner.

In chapter 89 she says she's her best friend, not her romantic implication. This is from a ring that can read her heart and her thoughts, and if it was stronger for it to say "love interest," I'm pretty sure it would.

Teru, Iko, and Ai almost come off as an OT3 style relationship.

I saw this at first and didn't knew what it meant, but doing some research, I disagree by a lot.

Ai already has a character who's implied to be her love interest in Tokimaru. Hence why he tracks her down everywhere and is very protective of her at all times to make sure she doesn't get hurt. This is different from Iko because you can see AI and Tokimaru arguing like an old married couple in chapter 34 and how she calls him an idiot, but is still very flustered by him according to her body language and generally just being a tsundere. Unlike Teru-who does good things out of a sense of obligation or duty-or Iko-who does it out of reciprocity-Ai has no incentive to be nice to Tokimaru and she's trained to repress her emotions, so her being flustered or doing good things for him like preparing him meals seems much more along the lines of being interested in him. He's wearing a scarf she gifted to him which she says in chapter 37 is like a second skin to him, and she gets notably flustered at this, and the fact he's half naked. Not to mention chapter 50 showing them to have a close bond since childhood. Narratively, the fact you ignored this is a big whole in your analysis and kinda shows your own biases. (Oh yeah and we know it's romance because AI OUTRIGHT SAYS HE IS in chapter 65)

The closest we get to Teru being interested in Ai is in chapter 35 when she blushes when she accidentally sees her in the shower and even then she asks why she's blushing. God forbid a shy girl be embarrassed by accidentally seeing her friend naked. Totally means she's gay.

Not to mention that Iko gets the whole female lead/love interest "good luck" send off before Shy leaves for the dome in the Hollow arc

They're about to conduct a military operation. This makes complete sense as they're ABOUT TO CONDUCT A DANGEROUS MILITARY OPERATION. Are you seriously telling me wishing someone luck before they risk their lives is a sign of romantic intention? What are you on?

Then there's Sekirara who is explicitly and openly in love with Teru

Kirakira is clearly shown to be out of touch with reality, thinking she can have 3 kids with Teru and instantly proposing to her. If you think this is meant to be anything but creepy, you missed the point.

I get that you seemingly would rather have Teru in a hetero ship

My ship isn't happening based on her reaction to falling on Niravana in chapter 85. She like instantly is into him. I thought her getting with Iko's brother would just be good because it book ends the series by inspiring him like her sister inspired her, and would make her and Iko sisters in law.

I also remind you

Spoiler

Nirvana saved her from a ring as well

As I went through the story, I am steadily reminded of a CS Lewis quote:

Those who cannot conceive Friendship as a substantive love but only as a disguise or elaboration of Eros betray the fact that they have never had a Friend. The rest of us know that though we can have erotic love and friendship for the same person yet in some ways nothing is less like a Friendship than a love-affair. Lovers are always talking to one another about their love; Friends hardly ever about their Friendship. Lovers are normally face to face, absorbed in each other; Friends, side by side, absorbed in some common interest. Above all, Eros (while it lasts) is necessarily between two only. But two, far from being the necessary number for Friendship, is not even the best. And the reason for this is important.
... In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets... Hence true Friendship is the least jealous of loves. Two friends delight to be joined by a third, and three by a fourth, if only the newcomer is qualified to become a real friend. They can then say, as the blessed souls say in Dante, 'Here comes one who will augment our loves.' For in this love 'to divide is not to take away.

They remind more of Frodo and Sam. Not all love is romantic or sexual. Just because Iko (along with Ai) save her from one of the rings does not mean the undertone is sexual or romantic.
Future volumes may change this, but I don't know if having them be a couple actually improves the story. In fact it might actually take away from a lot of the emotional weight of some of the moments. The love her, at least in my reading up until the current chapter seems SISTERLY and not ROMANTIC from the framing.

If this changes in the future, it's fine. I just don't think it's good for the story nor does it fit well with the themes of the series.

 

[AccForManga]

You could have just said you are Anti-Yuri instead of typing all that since that seems to basically what it boils down to. Any justification for your view for the gals not to be into each other.

The fact you earlier said you would rather Shy be with Daigo, a literal small child, instead of a person her age was already...odd enough.