SLBP Nobuyuki route (to chapter 9)
May. 21st, 2020 09:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
waterscrollOkay, this was the route I wanted. Definitely different from others, and much more enjoyable than the last couple of routes I've played.
MC joins the Takeda as a poison taster, but the post is mostly ceremonial, since no one wants to poison Shingen. At one point she drops a hairclip, so it's possible someone figures out that she's a woman, but no one makes any comments so it seems like things are ok.
Then a few weeks later she gets a request to join the Sanada. She's a little baffled but in time she gets to know them and develop loyalty to them. She especially feels a connection to Nobuyuki, who like her has been pushed into taking care of his younger brother after the death of a parent. There's an interesting gender thing here too, in that Nobuyuki calls himself Yukimura's replacement mother and (unlike all the other men in this game) doesn't fight. The way they bonded over Nobuyuki taking on a feminized role to care for his brother and MC dressing as a man to care for her brother reminded me of the beginning of Mitsunari's route, where they bond over both being crossdressers, and it was very sweet.
Eventually, after MC admits to Nobuyuki that she is a woman, he asks to marry her. He tells her that he is impressed by her loyalty to her family and the lengths that she was willing to go to for them, and the risks she's willing to run for them, and he wants that for the Sanada. They barely know each other at this point, but she recognizes that being willing to risk things for their families is something that they have in common, and she agrees.
Oddly, Nobuyuki's dad agrees, even though she's a commoner.
Then politics happens and the Sanada need to send a hostage, for Reasons. MC volunteers, because of course she does. By this point she's as loyal to the Sanada as to her family of origin. On her way to being a hostage, she figures out that if she wasn't the one being sent, it would be Yukimura. And yeah, that possibly one reason that Nobuyuki wanted to marry her so quickly was to protect his brother. But she's fine with that, she's glad she's able to help protect Yukimura and the Sanada.
But, the hostage situation is a bust. She manages to figure out that the clan she's hostage to has already betrayed the Sanada for the Uesegi. Nobuyuki gets her out of there and brings her home, where everyone thanks her for her service.
Then he says, okay, you've done what I needed you to do, now you can go home. He explains that he's been following her since she arrived at the Takeda with the intention of using her for this purpose. He thought maybe he'd marry her anyway, since she does seem to be well liked by his clan, but he's realized he can't love her the way she deserves. So, time for her to go.
I expect, because of the genre, that this is all going to be resolved happily, and he'll realize that he loved her all along blah blah etc. But this level of coldly manipulative surprised me, and the fact that it was all to protect his brother actually made it sort of sweet. So I'm liking this route a lot so far, it's the first route in a while that I've felt the need to spend tickets just to see what happens next.
And oh, I never mentioned that I finished the Ieyasu route. I thought it was ok but for some reason I couldn't connect to it. Maybe because I am so much Team Mitsunari in every (fictional) universe and especially this one. (Not making any RL historical arguments here! Just how they are written.)
In other fannishness:
I'm still watching Guardian slowly, I'm up to episode 22. I don't really have much to say about it at this point, except that I like Ye Zun a lot and I'm glad to see that he gets a lot of fanfic.
In genderbent Hakuouki,alias_sqbr gave me a good idea for the next Kazama piece, so I'm working on that now.
MC joins the Takeda as a poison taster, but the post is mostly ceremonial, since no one wants to poison Shingen. At one point she drops a hairclip, so it's possible someone figures out that she's a woman, but no one makes any comments so it seems like things are ok.
Then a few weeks later she gets a request to join the Sanada. She's a little baffled but in time she gets to know them and develop loyalty to them. She especially feels a connection to Nobuyuki, who like her has been pushed into taking care of his younger brother after the death of a parent. There's an interesting gender thing here too, in that Nobuyuki calls himself Yukimura's replacement mother and (unlike all the other men in this game) doesn't fight. The way they bonded over Nobuyuki taking on a feminized role to care for his brother and MC dressing as a man to care for her brother reminded me of the beginning of Mitsunari's route, where they bond over both being crossdressers, and it was very sweet.
Eventually, after MC admits to Nobuyuki that she is a woman, he asks to marry her. He tells her that he is impressed by her loyalty to her family and the lengths that she was willing to go to for them, and the risks she's willing to run for them, and he wants that for the Sanada. They barely know each other at this point, but she recognizes that being willing to risk things for their families is something that they have in common, and she agrees.
Oddly, Nobuyuki's dad agrees, even though she's a commoner.
Then politics happens and the Sanada need to send a hostage, for Reasons. MC volunteers, because of course she does. By this point she's as loyal to the Sanada as to her family of origin. On her way to being a hostage, she figures out that if she wasn't the one being sent, it would be Yukimura. And yeah, that possibly one reason that Nobuyuki wanted to marry her so quickly was to protect his brother. But she's fine with that, she's glad she's able to help protect Yukimura and the Sanada.
But, the hostage situation is a bust. She manages to figure out that the clan she's hostage to has already betrayed the Sanada for the Uesegi. Nobuyuki gets her out of there and brings her home, where everyone thanks her for her service.
Then he says, okay, you've done what I needed you to do, now you can go home. He explains that he's been following her since she arrived at the Takeda with the intention of using her for this purpose. He thought maybe he'd marry her anyway, since she does seem to be well liked by his clan, but he's realized he can't love her the way she deserves. So, time for her to go.
I expect, because of the genre, that this is all going to be resolved happily, and he'll realize that he loved her all along blah blah etc. But this level of coldly manipulative surprised me, and the fact that it was all to protect his brother actually made it sort of sweet. So I'm liking this route a lot so far, it's the first route in a while that I've felt the need to spend tickets just to see what happens next.
And oh, I never mentioned that I finished the Ieyasu route. I thought it was ok but for some reason I couldn't connect to it. Maybe because I am so much Team Mitsunari in every (fictional) universe and especially this one. (Not making any RL historical arguments here! Just how they are written.)
In other fannishness:
I'm still watching Guardian slowly, I'm up to episode 22. I don't really have much to say about it at this point, except that I like Ye Zun a lot and I'm glad to see that he gets a lot of fanfic.
In genderbent Hakuouki,
alias_sqbr gave me a good idea for the next Kazama piece, so I'm working on that now.
