Oh good. It got fixed instead of staying a low quality MTL snipe.

Unprotected handholding?

In public, no less?!

Wow. At least have some standards, dammit!

Peak is back on the menu, boys!

MC and Alice back to vibing in excellent form. So many good shots of them having a blast and Alice being expressive again! Meanwhile, the suicidal chickens are continuing to speedrun their deaths for some reason (really, dragging Teresa into this? Did they not see what happened the last time someone screwed with one of Jinhyuk's people?) that makes you really question their intelligence.

Most importantly, though, this chapter really nailed the energy of:
https://i.postimg.cc/DwgVKFXb/i.webp

She knows what she wants and she goes for it properly with no regrets.

Gotta respect her game.

She knows that SHE didn't do it and him stepping in to lend her a hand when she needs it has kinda become a pattern at this point so...

Dude just wants to be left in peace to work on his figs. Doesn't even want to fight them and probably wouldn't even consider it if his life wasn't on the line.

I can totally respect that.

Should've specified what kind of smile. Mimi was making a perfectly acceptable one before the demand!

The very first pic really says it all, "My only way to survive..."

I doubt he's actually certain of whether or not Nie Li can actually defeat the Attendant Lord right now. What he does know is that if he goes back without that bell, the Attendant Lord is gonna kill him in a horrible way. And since Nie Li has the bell... his only option is to play nice for the moment. If Nie Li wins? He can pretend he had a change of heart. If Nie Li loses, he can act like it was something he planned all along to avoid getting killed. Either way, he's playing both sides for his survival and neither option actually means he's ready to actually let go of his grudge. It's not like a false surrender is something new and we've seen multiple variants of "Use them now while planning to backstab them later" in this story already.

Basically, I think it's far too early to say he's had a change of heart given what we've seen of him so far and how things usually go in this genre. Just look at Wu Yazi (the demon guy that got manipulated during that divine palace arc) as an example. Despite saying cordial, chill, and oftentimes friendly things? He was still planning to just kill Nie Li and Xiao Yu when everything was over. This is in spite of the fact he'd have been lost/trapped/dead without their assistance at several points during their encounter. So right now, I think it's fair to assume that precedent takes priority and this monkey hasn't had an actual change of heart. He might do so later, absolutely, but right now that doesn't seem to be the case.

He literally says he will remember the grudge for his severed tail, my guy. And you know how in these stories everyone takes offense at every minor offense even when they were initially planning to kill the person who did the "offending".

All I'm saying is, right now the monkey has a grudge and there's no reason to think he's let it go of it yet. He just knows that losing the bell means he's screwed so he's likely gonna try and cozy up to Nie Li until he can get payback in some way. Be that via getting the bell back and selling Nie Li out to the Attendant Lord in some manner, trying to strike at Nie Li during the fight in some way, or even thinking he can play the long con and consolidate power after the Attendant Lord is defeated.

Now we all know any plan he might be thinking of to get Nie Li is stupid and either won't work or get derailed by him eventually deciding against it for whatever reason. But here and now, there's nothing to make us think the monkey's actually let go of his grudge yet. After all, just because you need to stick by someone to save your own skin doesn't mean you don't want to plant a knife in their back at the earliest opportunity. Especially in this genre.

... What?

Monkey wants revenge against Nie Li for humiliating him like this. Realizes he might not live long enough to try it if he goes back to his normal stuff because Attendant Lord is likely to kill him for his failure. Is considering if Nie Lie can actually beat the Attendant Lord but is likely still just planning to lay low so he can attack Nie Li at a moment of weakness.

Another time they show the two at it on-screen?

Nice!


Time to see what our cat learns about Yvonne here. She better not try and keep this from Elsa for too long instead of getting help before this goes all the way south.

At least her heart's in the right place.

Go tell your mom you love her, folks. You never know how long she'll be around until she isn't.

Maybe I didn't explain myself well.

I was saying that it looks more like the monkey isn't giving up revenge and is instead trying to lay low and use Nie Li as a shield against the Attendant Lord's retribution with the goal of getting revenge after that was dealt with (or stabbing Nie Li in the back during the confrontation and playing it off as being his plan all along so the Attendant Lord doesn't kill him). Much like how the palace intent, rather than giving up on revenge, thinks it can lay low and hide from Nie Li until it's absorbed enough power to be able to get the revenge it wants. Basically, comparing the two as both being fools that think they can use him in some manner and then get payback on him not falling for their traps.

The palace intent is mad that Nie Li basically made a fool out of it and got away unscathed on top of allowing everyone else to grab treasures from that palace and live when it was trying to trap everyone in it and get them killed while pretending it had way more power and authority than it actually did. So once it realized that it couldn't actually face him directly, it hid inside his painting to try and build up strength and then catch him off guard and attack for that whole thing. Amusing thing being that, if the author hasn't forgotten about it, it has even less of a chance to do anything of value now than it did back when it first encountered Nie Li.

I think it's less "let go of grudges" and more, "I want revenge but I'm gonna get killed if I try right now, so imma try to scam them harder to survive the attendant lord and then get my own revenge once that's no longer a thing."


Like how that Soul Palace's intent in Nie Li's painting knows damn well it can't challenge him right now and is trying to be sneaky about getting enough power that it can go back and get revenge on him later.

She's not wrong.

Half the time, it really IS that they're way more than "friends" but it has to get toned down because of executive meddling.

We have the infamous example of Sailor Moon's dub turning Uranus and Neptune from lesbians to... cousins... that still had so much of their relationship's subtext visible that it may as well have been text leading to them being lesbian cousins instead of just lesbians. Which, let's be real, is obviously worse than just having left them as lesbians.

Matter of framing.

"The world got fixed and so people eventually recovered. unfortunately, the characters you've come to know were actually immortal, so they stayed alive long enough to forget everything that was going on until they reunited in the afterlife because the universe itself ended."

On the one hand? Humanity as a whole survived and got to continue onwards up until the planet itself was destroyed. So good end for everyone! On the other hand? The two "main" characters both spent an eternity alone with no memories because forever is a REALLY long time, as it turns out. On the mind-bendy third hand? At least they were unambiguously happy at the very end with no way to make things worse given the ending involved the end of the universe itself.

But, you know. sometimes satisfying endings are nuked in favor of trying to do something else. Because, themes and such.

Behold, the face of IMMEDIATE REGRET!
https://i.postimg.cc/JzNhyXL4/i.webp

But really, it's just good to see the newlyweds so in synch again for their underwater honeymoon.
https://i.postimg.cc/wjpmbgx8/i.webp

Can't you just feel the and kindness they share in that pic?

Looks like he wasn't as dense as people thought.

Bro knew all along and was just trying to keep chill about it.

How many starters have we had that started on four legs and ended on four legs?

There's Bulbasaur, Chikorita, Mudkip Turtwig, Popplio (technically a tail but whatever we'll count it for keeping the same non-bipedal limbs). Technically, Oshawatt and Fuecoco went from bipedal to quadrupeds.

Still, that's... 6, if you squint at em funny, out of 27. In short? Things don't look good for Mimi's smile.