Reader and Protagonist

Chapter 91.1 <— click on the link to read it. Thanks to Kinki for the donation.

March Comes in Like a Lion

This artwork totally looks like Du Ze! Except for no headphones.

 

source

Wow! What a great drawing!

This image is of the main character of March Comes in Like a Lion (3月のライオン) aka Sangatsu no Lion

I’ve actually read the manga. Weird title but it’s really a simple, heartwarming story about a shoji player, Rei. I think there’s an anime but I haven’t watched it. I think the shoji matches in anime would be a bit much. Based on the anime they take a very long time.

Of course, it’s difficult for me to understand the shoji stuff but most of it is actually about relationships.

I’d say the manga is pretty good but a little bit boring. I also feel like the romance is weird since the girl is still in middle school. It’s worth a read if you are interested in shoji, go, and similar games.

Chapter 90.1 <— click on the link to read it. Thanks to renimon20 for the donation.

Reddit is so confused

You can that the stairs in the picture have Chinese characters and their English translations on it.  What does the “add oil” in there mean? Reddit users speculated that it might mean “elbow grease” or “pour it on” or even “pump up the jam.”

A Chinese-speaking user explained it this way:

“Add oil” is a literal translation of a Chinese expression (you can see the Chinese written next to it). It means “keep going” or “hang in there”. (source)

And another explanation:

加油！Literally means add oil, but it really means for someone to gas up, or refill their energy. In other words, keep going! (source)

It seems to be a common phrase at sports events, according to this:

oh I always thought it was a figure of speech (to add oil to the fire). At world weightlifting championship i’d always hear the chinese team chant for their athletes with “(insert name here) jiayou!” (source)

Other users also weighed in about similar expression in their language:

In Swedish we have a similar saying which is literally translated to something like “put on another coal.” but it’s slightly different in that it means “go faster”. I assume it comes from when trains ran on coal. (source)

🙂 Thanks for reading.

Chapter 90.2 <— click on the link to read it. Thanks to anonymous for the donation.

I’m so excited that we are so close to the end!

Mixed Blood

The title of the novel is 混血. This can actually be translated in many different ways.

• Hunxue (pinyin version)
• Hybrid (the dictionary meaning)
• Half-breed (also a dictionary meaning)
• Mudblood (Harry Potter version; 混 means dirty, muddy, mixed while 血 means blood; in addition there is prejudice against such people in the novel’s world so this is actually pretty appropriate)
• Mixed Blood – I just chose this since it sounded the most accurate

source

 

Chapter 90.1 <— click on the link to read it.

Epicly long chapter again

Normally chapters are 3000-5000 characters. This chapter is 8,000 characters long. The next chapter after this one is 11,000 words long.

Phew! I’ll have to work hard!

By the way, I forgot if I already mentioned this or not but the manhua adaptation has started updating again. It’s in Chinese but if you read the novel here then you can pretty figure out what is going on.

You can read it here:

http://www.u17.com/comic/58328.html 

I love the manhua. Lol, Du Ze’s crying/panicked faces are the best.

Chapter 89.3 <— click on that link to read the new chapter. Thanks to Wisteria and Vi for the donations.

Weird website stuff

Hmm, for some reason the Noveulupdates.com bot didn’t pick up my latest release? Is there something wrong with my website or is their bot not working?

No idea what happened. It’s been two hours but my release hasn’t been posted on NU yet so I am posting it again. Hopefully the bot will be able to post this on the NU front page.

Edit: Wait, I think I understand what happened. The bot thought the previous post was a “news” one not a chapter release. This one should be picked up properly.

Edit2: Okay, this one is also not updating on NU. Sigh…

Edit3: It seems that it was probably manually fixed.

Anyway, since I posted twice, I’ll be shameless and plug my other project. Have you read my manga scanlation? Chapter one is here.

Bokura no Meikyu (Our Labyrinth) ぼくらのめいきゅ- A class of ordinary high school students suddenly find that their school has turned into a dungeon. It’s a web comic comedy series.

Chapter 89.3 <— click on the link to read. Thanks to Wisteria and Vi for the donations.

Regular updates every other day

I should still be able to regularly update but now it will be slower. I’ve worked hard to update daily but we are in the final stretch now and the chapters are getting super long. One update every two days should still be fast enough, I hope.

Chapters are normally 3k characters but the next two chapters are 11k characters long. Sigh…

It’s worth it, though. The Reader and Protagonist Definitely Have to Be in True Love will soon be complete!

image source

by an artist 2010-02-13 19:03:20 on pixiv

Chapter 89.2 <— click on the link to read it. Thanks to anonymous for the donation.

Moe Lord

If a Chinese person read the kanji in the Japanese word moe (萌え) it’s “meng.” You might have noticed that a lot of Chinese novels these days use (or overuse) the word meng.

Meng (萌) has become a popular slang word in China. Generally, it’s translated as “cute.” However, originally it came from “moe” which is actually not the same as cute. Kawaii is cute but moe is a different concept altogether.

Moe refers to:

feelings of affection, adoration, devotion, and excitement felt towards characters that appear in manga, anime, or video games. Characters that elicit feelings of moe are called “moe characters.” – source

People also use the word “moe” for other media, so long as it is a feeling of affection towards something or someone that is impossible for a person to have a real life relationship with.

There is no exact English word for “moe.”

萌主 (méng zhǔ) – Moe Lord is the literal translation of this but it simply means a person that someone thinks is really cute.

The word meng is normally translated as “cute” even though it’s not really what moe means because the Chinese have co-opted this term and most non-otaku use it to mean just cute or adorable.

Having said that, the Chinese otaku do still use meng to mean “moe” (source), meaning a translator can still chose whichever translation seems more appropriate. Since Du Ze used the term to refer to Xiu in the context of Xiu being a moe character, I believe “moe” is better to use than cute.

Besides, the gnome form Xiu might be cute but it would strain credulity to call the other forms cute.

Last, but not the least, “Moe Lord” just sounds funnier. That’s why I like it.

Moe vs Cute

If Xiu looked like this:

By Spazzykoneko, Yamavu (talk) – Image:Kemonomimi by spazzykoneko.jpg, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

Instead of like this:

Then I might have used the word “cute” instead.

Thank you for reading.

Chapter 89.1 <— click on the link to read it. Thanks to My Name is No for the donation.

Early Access

I know that everyone has been annoyed by Mr Crab 🦀 but that can’t be helped for now since the raw itself is censored.

After chapter 89 there are

• 3 regular chapters
• the finale
• the epilogue

Then there are some “extras” after the epilogue. To get early access to the extras, please read this page.

In addition, those who have donated at https://ko-fi.com/bcnovels will have the earliest access to the first draft.

So the scheduled plan is:

• first draft will be released to donors
• final draft will be released for early access (limited release)
• final draft will be publicly released

In case you don’t get early access, don’t worry about it. I will still be releasing it to the public, as usual.

Thank you very much for everyone’s support.

Chapter 88.3 <— click on this link to read it

Repetitive strain injury (RSI)

Unfortunately, I have been on the computer too much. Three days ago I woke up and could barely move my right hand without pain.

I’ve had a bit of a sore hand before but this was way more than just a little bit of an ache. I’m talking “ow wtf I can’t close my fingers over this glass of water” type of pain.

So I will have to rest and not be on the computer too much.

I’ll probably have to cut back on the daily releases for a few days until my hand is better.

Wrist Pain Relief Home Remedies

In case you’ve ever had this problem before, what helped for me are:

• rest
• cold compress – I have those reusable gel packs
• water and good food – it makes me feel better and nutrition to heal
• ibuprofen
• wrist and hand stretches
• massage

These are the hand stretches that I did. They are simple but they worked for me.

The cause of my RSI was probably just me being on the PC too long without resting. I’ll have to stop doing that. *sigh*

Thanks for reading.

Releases will be regular but probably not every day. It’s likely that I will be skipping a day or two here and there.

Chapter 88.2 <— click here to read the chapter. Thanks to anonymous for the donation.

Translation Notes

Lately, I have been putting in more translation notes at the end of some releases.

I was inspired by /a/nonymous, the scanlators of Maiko-san Chi no Makanai-san who often have notes on the food featured in the Maiko-san manga.

Their TL notes are very interesting and succinct. Here is an example:

Image source

Nice, huh? It’s simple, easy-to-understand, and very interesting. The images also help a lot.

Thank you for reading.