babao's Topics (22)

Huh... Huh. What. That was waaay sl*tier than any actual smut manga ? I'm so well fed here.

Does this have a novel btw? This series is so good, Han Maru has got to be one of the most iconic mushroom head protags ever.

I wish this series would last over 1000 chapters

Anyone else know other BL like this?

And maybe anyone could also suggest other stories with an art style like this, this one is just way too good and right up my alley I need to see more of this art style.

Thanks in advance!

Okay, so I know about the art change which was also my reason for dropping this but since it was last year it was a good enough duration of time to forget about season 1 so now I started reading season 2 with the mindset that it's a whole different storyline.

Which, surprisingly, helps a lot. Fake it 'til you make it.

The overall story was pretty green a cute. A nice quick read.

A tip for people who really cannot deal with the art change: wait for a while, whether a year or so, until S1 is kind of blurry in your head. When that time comes you can come back to read by S2 for a new read.

Just wanted to ask, does anyone know which part of the novel is this manhwa chapter?

Thank you in advance.

Is it just a few of us who can actually deduce a cover's art style and if they were going to be degenerate or not? For some reason the moment I saw the cover's pov and rendering I had a gut feeling and instantly knew something was off.

But kidding aside, there's something horrifying, raw, and disgusting about this work. It's good in a way that /nothing/ was actually good, that everything was awful thematically and in a literary sense. Art style and pacing, however, it's short, crisp, and daunting. Kind of similar to watching a car crash right before your eyes, everything happens without a moment of breath. One moment the boy is having a conversation on introductions, the next he is coerced into penetrative sex. One moment he's in class, the next he is handed that after sex photograph. The story is wrong, immoral, and sickening. But all art is art, no matter what form it takes, and which mind it came from, and whose hands had made it. Art is simply art untiliy it is labeled within the boundaries of morality and law.

What I personally like in this work was how the boy never even was sweetened into the relationship, he was never comfortable, and never found himself falling into a Stockholm Syndrome like plenty rape-centric works in this site. The morbid curiosity of the boy at the start of the story, the predictive anxiety, the lack of autonomy with his own mind and within his family, and his social ineptness, he was the perfect victim to be a grown man's emotional and sexual punching bag. Honestly... plenty children, then and now, have always been susceptible to praise and affections, especially from older and more experienced people. Children from broken environments more so are weaker to praise and affection as they grow up. Considering the protagonist's home, he must feel completely dysfunctional and the curiosity to be with an older man turned into a desire for a romantic or physical relationship - as if to counter the terrible reality his mother is having a new lover, and how his mother seems to be passive with him. Caring, but somewhat passive (or maybe the story's narrative has been twisted by the boy's POV).

This work was probably made for fetish purposes, but I find it interesting that the 'fetish' was raw trauma and aggression, the power imbalance between an adult and a child, and the depiction of genuine fear and the numbing aftermath of how it paralyzes him to give in. The victim never wanted more, he just gave in because there was no better option and death was never the easy option yet either. I feel like these kinds of writing and storylines either come from actual predators or victims who have never healed from their own traumas and now they try to recreate and project their exact emotions into tangible forms (characters) because surely this isn't the only work of it's kind, there are much more out there.

That's just my two cents though.

Hoping to get a few answers, does the duke... you know, ever get it on with Abel/Fairy?

His face card is just absolutely serving I need to see him with Abel Really Close at least Once

It's a privilege for Jaehyuk to be honest with affections. People who are able to even live a promiscuous life AND convert to a committed relationship are actually quite uncommon individuals who were raised pretty well and without that flagship generational trauma. On a logical stance, siding with Jaehyuk's sentiment and reactions are completely valid. But are we forgetting that Garam and Jaehyuk live two completely different lives and ways if handling relationships?

Jaehyuk was a straight man, no one would give a damn about his life. And then there's Garam who was subjected to take the brunt of the blame and responsibility for feeling a bit of love towards someone of the same sex. Since then he's refused to place a label on relationships. Other than that, I do feel that at least once in our lives we've actually acquainted or even befriended a person who was "emotionally constipated" but was highly attentive to our feelings (i.e. remembered important dates, or the things you say in passing). Those kinds of people may not be the best at emotional support, but they're always trying make sure you're safe even if they're awkward around you. I think Garam falls in that category, he's blunt and he isn't afraid to stand his ground, he doesn't care what others think and weighs his actions as best as he could.

While Jaehyuk's frustrations are actually valid, it's just difficult to actually swallow to see your partner frustrated because of your emotional constipation. The fact that he even walked out makes matters worse. I'm assuming that Jaehyuk actually fumed due to the lack of sleep and accumulated stress, but fuming and walking out doesn't help de-escalate the situation. Should you have had doubts in the first place, you should've addressed it sooner rather than wait until a trigger point just makes matters explode.

Both sides have fair points and fair reactions, I just feel that we, as readers, take things too much at logical value instead of understanding where the individual characters come from. Garam just fucked a straight guy out into homosexuality, Jaehyuk is basically a newborn in Gay World, he hasn't had a taste of religious guilt, societal ostracization, and filial burden. I fear we wouldn't be a true veteran LGBT if we haven't had even just once in our life a taste of religious guilt - I think that seals the deal for a true lived LGBT experience. The moment Jaehyuk actually witnesses the depth and layers of dilemmas the gays have is the day he realizes how much more decisions they have to make in their relationship.

Communication is so easy to say as an advice. But no one talks about the lump in your throat or the way your stomach feels heavy when you try to speak the very words that you know can save your relationship because it opens the deepest insecurities and fears you've had for years. People like Garam know it. At the back of their heads they know there is something wrong with them which is why, in the first place, Garam was initially committed to never be in a relationship in the first place because he actually Knew that he was emotionally constipated, mistrustful, and too burdensome emotionally. But still he caved in, Jaehyuk was too convincing and sincere that maybe, just maybe, there's a way to actually change the way he perceives the world of relationships.

Nonetheless, I can't wait to see when we witness Garam being a bit more affectionate. I feel like as the years go by that you refrain yourself from telling someone you care about them verbally, the harder it gets and the more abstract it becomes as an idea in your head - as if it is such a foreign emotion that your body cringes and writhes at it like it's telling you that you don't deserve to receive affection or that you're not worthy enough to give affection. The moment that an individual like this actually starts to feel comfortable again to show affection, you just know how devoted they will be to you. It'll take time, but it is a worth it learning and growth process that heals old wounds and reinforces the one's wellbeing. And I can't wait to witness the growth of their relationship from being a rocky on-off FUBU now to adolescents navigating the unknown future together, with Jaehyuk being so pushy and Garam being someone who doesn't leave out the truth, the two of them are going to make it eventually.

Other than that, I actually did Not expect this manhwa to be pretty decent. I picked it up again a while back and reread the entire thing. It was definitely comedy but there's something about Garam and Jaehyuk that's so good. Their chemistry is no joke, I love their developments and dynamic.

Despite the comical stress for the past few chapters, I love the tidbits of good moral dialogues here and there. The majority of human beings have a tendency to have their own personal litmus test to see how a stranger or any individual aligns to their personal moral compass. Everyone has different basis the same way how the angels created different tests. Political Corruption for the sake of a terminally ill loved one versus the Trolley Problem are two different moral tests. In an economical and sociological perspective, political corruption is not a linear dilemma. Denying political corruption even if it means letting your loved one miss an important treatment doesn't solve corruption itself, one person can't cleanse the government - that just means it's another pain point in the system Wooyeol is just adding fuel to a forest fire that's been burning for a hundred years basically. Compared to a trolley problem that doesn't consider other factors, just the fact that you can choose your loved one or five strangers. The life of more or the life of one at that very moment. Poverty, social standing, economy, and whatsoever do not matter. Just the lives of six people.

Wooyeol basically just showed them how people will act Textbook Good and Bad depending on the situation, the way you prioritize matters, and the scale of the consequences. Sometimes you do it for your own good, sometimes for a loved one, sometimes to save as much people as you can. Deciding someone's stand on morality can't just be based on one aspect alone, and the moment you find it difficult to weigh someone due to the way you constructed your own moral compass, then maybe there's just more to learn and more to see and understand in this world in your life.

That aside, I miss Wooyeol and Seongah (the Original), I hope they reunite soon both of them are already going crazy .

Heard that the author/artist got sick hence the latter half if the story? That's unfortunate and maybe.once they recover they can make side stories to flesh this story further. I think a promising story like this deserves to get more development.

Other than that, there's a fundamental issue we have to see here. It's that Eun-jae has low self-esteem and has an avoidant coping mechanism. We see him in a "broken" yet privileged family, we see him happy for his mother finding a new love and a new chapter in her life. As a child, you would normally feel a sense of loneliness or possession - imagine, your one and only parent was going to start a new family. That means a new husband, and maybe a new child. That new child will have a picture perfect complete family while you, a sickly and self-deprecating child have no other blood relation and you are a burden to your parent's financial state. I think Eun-jae has definitely thought of that why is why he doesn't feel that sort of grief when thinking about his mother moving on. It's because he's set in his mind he was insignificant, that he was a problem, that he was going to die someday.

The fact he's believed, even as a child, that his life was moot is a damage so irreversible that being loved won't be enough. In fact, being loved might only make it worse.

And that's what happened to him with Jin-hyeon. Eun-jae doesn't understand how to protect and nurture affection, he's seen first hand with how his parents split. No matter how much love his mother gives him, it won't change the fact he is a child born from temporary love, and now his mother is able to find a new happiness in another man. Eun-jae knows that if it's happened to his parents, it can happen to him and his future partner. Even if Eun-jae thinks he isn't suited to be in a relationship, he's already set in stone that his partner will leave him and whatever relationship they have is a temporary affection.

Cue, Jin-hyeon's existence. Someone like him is a double-edged sword to Eun-jae. As Jin-hyeon flat out stated: He loves Eun-jae more than Eun-jae loves him. Not all relationships have affections reciprocated equally, and that's true. The problem with their relationship was the massive and evident imbalance of their affections. Jin-hyeon loves too much when scaling it with Eun-jae, whose knowledge, experience, and belief in affection is drastic, will be overwhelmed by Jin-hyeon. Their relationship was a recipe for disaster that no medications can help.

Only licensed and professional therapy can actually guide Eun-jae in processing all these emotions and thoughts. Not Jin-hyeon.

It's not wrong for Jin-hyeon to love to this extent. Everything he has done in this story is what everyone would label as the "perfect initiative for communication". The problem is, these kinds of perfection is moot to a person who is terribly ill in the head.

People who are quick to label Eun-jae as frustrating either see themselves in him or that they do not understand the psychological layers of Eun-jae's mental state. He cannot be fixed by another highschooler. He cannot even love himself if he doesn't understand the foundation of a relationship, how to nurture, accept, and give affection, he doesn't understand how to maintain and protect relationships. All he understands is the transactional nature of relationships and how it is either a state of "existing or not existing". If you have it, then you have it. If you don't, then you don't.

Eun-jae never thought of living a long life, yet he found himself wanting to have Jin-hyeon's attention. He's already lost sight of Basics to Loving Yourself 101. He wants Jin-hyeon for whatever time he believed he has left instead of trying to live a long life to live through with Jin-hyeon. Right at the very start, you see the fundamental issue in Eun-jae's mentality.

And at the end, it's changed but for the worse.

He promised to love himself more, to put more love in their relationship, to make an effort in this relationship. These are all transactional actions that only further feeds his idea that he has always been the problem and he has always been the burden. I have to love myself more or else I am a burden again, I have to make an effort more of else I'll lose everything.

As much as I love both characters so much, it's just too much for 2 highschoolers to go through. Jin-hyeon is honest to a fault, he loves without restraint and freely. Eun-jae is not at the right state to accept that kind of love. Not now. Maybe the moment they graduate and go to college would be a great start of development. As highschoolers and starting to present your second gender, things will get messy. I think we can all agree high school is generally a mess, the height of puberty and all that. I have trust our couple will learn a lot along the way, it will just take time. Lots of it.

I hope we get side stories someday... These two were really good. But I have to say that the overall pacing was lukewarm, but I did enjoy the personalities of both MC and ML.