Tuesday, May 20, 2025

LycoRogue's Reading Corner: May

Est. Read Time: 30min
This Month's Font: Lumanosimo

Oof. Man. My peeps, I thought that maybe - JUUUUUUST maybe - with my improved reading habits, this would be my year to ACTUALLY, FINALLY read every Dracula Daily email. On the date they went out, no less. I was determined to not fall off the horse this year. I was going to stay on top of it. I was going to keep up with the meme-posts on Tumblr. This was going to be my year!

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Folks, I didn't even get ON the horse this year...

A little bit of LycoRogue lore. My husband first asked me out on May 3rd. We dated for 8 years - a day shy of 100 months, to be exact - before getting married. May 3rd was our anniversary for a LOOOONG time. So, even though we are married for over a decade now, we still very much celebrate May 3rd. We go on little dates. We spend the day together. It's a day to celebrate "us" just as much as our wedding anniversary - October 2nd - is. 

Guess what day the novel Dracula starts on....

Yup. May 3rd.

Since I spent the day in my PJs and cuddled next to my hubby on the loveseat all day, I didn't even think about Dracula. 

Due to my manager going on vacation the first week of May, my schedule got shifted so I had my two days off at the start of the week. This resulted in me lucking into having a 3-day weekend: May 3rd through 5th. Hubby and I took advantage of this rare occurrence in my work scheduling by - as I mentioned - just having a PJ Day on the 3rd, and then embracing our nerdiness by "celebrating" May the Fourth (be with you) with some Star Wars binging via Disney+ (rewatching the 1st season of Andor, mostly, to refresh my memory before going into season 2). Then the 5th was our normal "need to get all of our errands done today since it's the only weekday I have off".

Which means Dracula Daily wasn't even a blip on my mental radar until I was back at work on the 6th... and then I had a bit of a chaotic day, so I didn't start reading then either.

I wasn't too disappointed since I've faithfully read the first few months of Dracula Daily for 3 years in a row. I know the plot beats. I know what happens. I know the transition from Dracula presenting to modern audiences as a comedy to finally being like "Oh! Right! This is a horror story!" I know all the jokes about Jonathan not being able to handle paprika, Dracula pretending to be his own castle staff, and crawling along the castle walls "in lizard fashion," and tossing Jonathan's mirror out the window after blaming it for Jonathan cutting his cheek while shaving.

Buuuut still, I feel like I've failed when (because?) I haven't even started.

Hacker Girl
Facebook sticker
by Birdman Inc

It doesn't help that each year past that initial one where Tumblr was obsessed with Dracula Daily, fewer and fewer people seem to participate in the annual reread as well as fewer and fewer new readers joining in. At least, among my mutuals. As has been my battle cry all year: less engagement means I'm less likely to push myself to participate in something - reading; writing; whatever.

Despite Aurora Morgen doing Dracula Daily with me yet again, it seems ne has failed just as hard as I did when it comes to actually keeping up with the entries a mere WEEK into the event! Soooooo... we're kind of failing each other when it comes to Dracula reading motivation. Whoops....

We now have "read today's Dracula Daily entry" as a joint daily task on Finch. We'll see how well that keeps us on track.

On the flipside, however, for whatever reason, that lack of engagement with other people doesn't matter to me with regards to the comics I read on WEBTOON. Maybe the visuals within each story is enough that I don't need external engagement????

I mean, to be fair, I DID fall behind on my Daily Pass unlock stories - The Girl Downstairs (Doona!) and The Makeup Remover - for a little bit. I discussed this already in my last writing update. In order to try to get any semblance of sleep, I had to forego reading as much before bed. Part of May 4th - when not spending time with Hubby or binging Star Wars content - was spent finally catching up on all of that story backlog. Considering how long it had been since I read Doona in particular, I was hours away from some of the unlocked episodes locking again. Which meant catching up on those stories took priority over using that reading time to properly start Dracula Daily.

Anyway, caught up I did, and I've been staying relatively on top of these stories since. Sure, there's still a night or two that I'm just too beat or I got started on my daily reading too late, and I again opt out of reading that night's update/unlock. I usually take time at work reading those skipped stories the next day, however. Which is when I was going to read Dracula, so, again I fail with Dracula Daily....

There's also two stories who - along with Lore Olympus - I have been avoiding finishing. They're both of my former Daily Pass unlock stories: Divorcing My Tyrant Husband and I Abdicate My Title of Empress. While I stopped reading Lore Olympus largely because the plot wasn't as interesting to me anymore - much like how I struggled to get into the story to begin with - that wasn't the reason for me abandoning the other two. For I Abdicate My Title of Empress, I got to the conclusion of the main story; the main romance. I even read the little epilogue episodes where it talked about the secondary romance, and brought that to a lovely conclusion as well. Then, us readers were blessed with a second epilogue story about the Baldur brothers: the male leads for the primary and secondary romance plot lines. It's a 6-episode epilogue, but, until the update this past Thursday, I wasn't sure if this 2nd epilogue was the actual conclusion of the series. Unfortunately, it seems that the final 3 episodes of this series will be locked behind a pay-wall - the Webtoons Coins - and I didn't want to start up that 2nd epilogue without being able to conclude it without delay. 

This week, the latest episode had been updated. There's a third epilogue of unknown length. I'll have the same issue once I hit that episode. In the meantime, however, I can add this story back into my rotation for the next week. Then it will again be shunned until I've actually bought some coins. That way I can make sure I can unlock whichever ends up being the final three episodes of the series without interrupting that final epilogue (whenever that may be).

Which brings me to why I haven't finished Divorcing My Tyrant Husband yet. Namely, the final 3 episodes are coin-locked, and, as I just mentioned, I haven't purchased Webtoon Coins yet. I haven't had the drive to, either, considering how much Divorcing... seemed to have jumped the shark at the end there; the author seemingly scrambling for a satisfying ending as to whether or not the main character is possessing Robellia's body or actually has been Robellia ALL ALONG (as in, she was fully reincarnated and born again as Robellia, but somehow lost memory of her life prior to her presumed possession of the character).

It's such a confusing premise; I'm not in the biggest rush to conclude that story....

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Until I do pull the trigger on buying Webtoon Coins, those stories have more-or-less fallen off of my reading list, with the exception of the aforementioned reading of the 2nd epilogue of "I Abdicate..."

What IS on my reading list, however? Well, quite frankly, the same 18 stories I mentioned last LRRC. Plus two more (because I'm a masochist who loves to add to my already overwhelming reading pile). 

At the tail end of watching season 2 of Solo Leveling, I was watching a lot of content about the show on YouTube. The algorithm locked on, and started suggesting shorts about the series. One such short commented on how Solo Leveling originated as a manhwa - a Korean comic - and posed that a brand new manhwa could be "the next Solo Leveling." This new series looked familiar to me as the narrator went through a few panels and the cover art. He then concluded by mentioning that the series could be read in English on Webtoon. I rushed to the app to look the series up and, lo and behold, it was one I had just added to my subscription list because it did look interesting to me. Guess I know why.

What was the series this short suggested? Ultimate Shut-in.

Kill monsters, save your neighbors, and expand your domain, all from the comfort of your couch. When his city becomes infested with monsters, Jaehyeon discovers an ability that makes him the absolute master of his apartment building. But his ability comes with a catch -- he cannot leave his apartment. Now, he must arm his neighbors and lead them beyond their building to survive the post-apocalyptic world they find themselves in.

    - Official Webtoon Summary

Basically, the world is set up very much like Solo Leveling or Mythic Item Obtained, wherein, out of nowhere, monsters randomly started spawning on Earth. The main difference is that Ultimate Shut-in starts barely a week after mobs of monsters overran the world. There are no "gates/dungeons" where the monsters spawn and awakened heroes can clear the dungeon before the monsters can attack the masses.

In Solo Leveling and Mythic Item Obtained, the story begins years after the monster onslaughts started, the monster populations have been detained within these gates/dungeons, awakened heroes have become fairly commonplace to the point of dungeon-divers/adventurers being a profession that people train in, and society has rebounded to the point of basically prospering off of these dungeons.

None of that is set up yet in Ultimate Shut-in. It's still so new into the monster apocalypse that no one is sure if there are survivors nearby, and, if so, how many and whether or not they will prove just as hostile as the monsters. Basically, think just about every Zombie Apocalypse movie/TV series. 

The news, cell towers, power, and water all seem to have been cut off way earlier than expected, which makes people panic all the more as they decide whether or not they can survive hunkered down in their homes.

One such person? Jaehyeon. When we first meet him, he's at his wit's end. Before the news blackout (along with literal power blackout), there was some reporting of heroes awakening with supernatural abilities to help them fight against the hordes of monsters. Jaehyeon is one such awakened hero, but he has no clue how his ability is supposed to help anyone, least of all himself. His power is called The Ultimate Shut-in, and it throws up an impenetrable barrier around his top-floor apartment. Perfect for keeping him safe against the monsters, except, along with keeping the hostiles out, it keeps him IN. No matter how hard he tries, he cannot exit his apartment!

Which means he can't get more supplies like food or water, he can't check in on his family (since cellphone service is gone), and there's no way he can fight the monsters even if he wanted to.

That is, until one fateful day when a flying monster saw him through his balcony window and dived for him. It slammed into his barrier like a bird smacking into a window, and it died from the impact. Despite Jaehyeon never physically attacking the creature himself, since it was his power that effectively killed it, he still got the experience points (EXP) for the monster's death. Such a high-level monster gave him enough EXP to level up, which opened up a bunch of new strategic possibilities.

First and foremost, he now has a magical "digital" store. He has an allotment of store slots, so he can't go ham, but he can fill each slot by scanning an item he physically has on hand. The scanned item will be added to his store's inventory - filling one of the slots - and an infinite amount of that item will forever be kept in stock. He can buy as much of it as his money allows (and he earns money along with EXP with each monster death). Now he doesn't have to worry about running out of food or water!

He also discovered that he can spawn items purchased from his store a few feet outside of his barrier (and he can throw inanimate objects through the barrier as well). He quickly learns to combine the two - spawning from his store and just straight up chucking things - to attack monsters from his balcony. His power quickly turns his apartment building into a Tower Defense game.

Then he levels up enough to start a community. His barrier expands. He can now leave his individual apartment and walk the entire top floor; visiting neighbors and granting them protection as well. In exchange, he can turn them into his vassals. The more they kill the more money and EXP he also earns! As he turns them into his vassals he also helps them become awakened heroes themselves. Granting them a greater chance to protect themselves and others, clear out the monster hordes, and help Jaehyeon further level so his own powers can evolve and expand as well.

It's been fun watching Jaehyeon basically play Tower Defense. It's awesome to learn about these community members he takes in, and so many of them have had that traumatic experience with the monsters that you're rooting for them to find a way to build a peaceful life. I will throw out a bit of a trigger warning, however, (and the episode itself does have a trigger warning attached to it), one such tragic backstory is of a young mother who witnessed her small child being brutally killed by goblins the day the monsters first spawned. It has been a delight seeing her literally Mama Bear (spoiler: her awakened power is she's a werebear) and just take out all of her grief and rage on any/all goblins in the area. (Remember: it's not even a month since her son died)

Likewise, one of the younger adult characters (he's in his early 20s, I think?) is in a panic because his sickly grandmother was home alone when the monsters started attacking, and he's worried for her health and safety. Watching him push so hard to try to get to - and hopefully rescue - his grandmother is so heart warming. Especially with Jaehyeon doing all he can to help the guy rescue his grandma.

There's action. There's strategy. There's heart. There's tragedy. There's little moments of comedy to help lighten the mood. I enjoy the artwork. And, at least so far, none of the characters have been assholes. That's bound to show up later in the series, once Jaehyeon's community is better established, but at least his first 100 (there abouts) citizens have been a helpful community that are willing to work together to help everyone thrive.

Also, Jaehyeon's power magically turned the water and power back on for anything within his barrier, so his citizens are just happy to have a steady supply of food, clean water, safety, warmth, electricity, and the ability to shower/wash their clothes/wash dishes. YAY!

I'm excited to see where this series goes and if it truly can hold a candle to Solo Leveling.

On the flipside, the other series I recently started up I KNOW is a great story. Last month, Hubby finally signed up for the streaming service Dropout. One of the main reasons is for the comedy game show Game Changer. The other: the D&D Actual Play series Dimension 20. I already talked about this - using, I think, the exact same wording - in my last blog post.

The reason I bring up Dimension 20 in my reading update is because its first campaign just became a Webtoon original comic: Fantasy High.

When girls at Aguefort Adventuring Academy go missing, six heroes who meet in detention band together to investigate their new high school for clues. This gang of self-anointed “Bad Kids” sets off on a wild journey, encountering vicious corn chowder and debaucherous wizards, among other perils that threaten their lives and the world they know and love. Based on the hit Dimension 20 show helmed by Brennan Lee Mulligan.

    - Official Webtoon Summary

I already teased a little bit about this series in my last update, but now I can dig into it a bit more.

First and foremost, the Webtoon summary fails to include the original campaign concept that Brennan Lee Mulligan pitched to both his players and then the audience: "Now we can answer the age-old question of 'What if John Hughes ran a tabletop RPG game?'"

So, the setting of Fantasy High - Elmville - is supposed to be that classic John Hughes' style Americana town. The weirdly anachronistic suburb where the characters themselves act as if they were modern teenagers, but the buildings all scream "USA in the 50s". Naturally, there's also "the bad side of town" where buildings are run down; borderline slums. On the flipside, there's the "rich side of town" where the uppercrust live. There's abandoned factories with a bunch of employees reliant on the factory now unemployed for years. Of course, there's also a cute little ice cream/shake parlor.

Ya know, your basic small Americana town you'd find in the likes of The Breakfast Club or Pretty In Pink. In fact, the main set-up for Fantasy High - a bunch of kids with seemingly nothing in common become friends in detention - is ripped right out of The Breakfast Club. Five out of the six Bad Kids even map pretty well with the titular Breakfast Club.

But first, how about we meet The Bad Kids?

Fabian from Fantasy High Gorgug from Fantasy High
Adaine from Fantasy High Kristen from Fantasy High
Fig from Fantasy High Riz from Fantasy High

These guys are just adorable! No shade on the artist for the original official artwork for the campaign, but I love the glow-up Denaseey gave everyone. Plus, they all actually look about 14/15 now. They're supposed to be freshmen, after all. The campaign's official artwork does make them look a bit more... late-teens/early-20-somethings.

Fitting for a John Hughes campaign, given how old the actors where while playing high schoolers.

Official Fantasy High banner
Art by Victor Rosas II

Anyway, as I mentioned, a lot of the players can map their character to one of the members from The Breakfast Club.

  • Fabian, son of a famous - and filthy rich - pirate, was incredibly loved and doted on at home. Perhaps too much so, and he starts off a bit full of himself, believing he cannot fail at anything he attempts. This prospective Bloodrush (basically American football) player would be Elmville's equivalent to Andrew Clark, a varsity wrestler.
  • Gorgug, a half-orc adopted and raised by gnomes in a house becoming increasingly far too small for him to literally fit in, is kind of a gender-swapped Allison Reynolds, the withdrawn loner. He's gangly and doesn't know how to fit in his own home or with his own parents (who don't understand his barbarian rage). This awkwardness translates to him struggling to make friends and hiding in the corner as much as possible to avoid accidentally hurting anyone.
        Case and point, while the above image I pulled of him is while he's raging, the image I shared last time is more-or-less a better depiction of this absolute cinnamon roll.
    Panel from episode 1
    of Fantasy High
  • Fig, who was a preppy cheerleader who believed herself an elf just the year before, discovered over the summer that she was actually a Tiefling (specifically, a half-devil) when her horns came in and her skin changed color. It was a rude awakening to both Fig and her elven father Gilear that Fig's mother had clearly cheated on her husband. In his hurt, Gilear refused to interact with Fig. This, paired with her mother refusing to discuss Fig's fiendish heritage with her, has put Fig on a self-destructive rebellious spiral. Clearly, she's a gender-swapped John Bender, the rebellious delinquent.
  • Adaine, the neglected younger daughter of the Elven ambassador, fills the role of popular socialite Claire Standish (although, Adaine's older sister Aelwyn does better fit the "popular socialite" trope...). Her family is rich, and Adaine does try the "daughter of an ambassador/diplomatic immunity" card to get out of trouble quite frequently. However, Adaine is fairly down-to-Earth due to her parents' neglect and constant comparisons to Aelwyn.
  • Finally, Riz, son of a police detective and deceased special agent, has a hard time making friends despite his efforts. Instead, he hones his own detective skills, proclaiming himself an official junior detective (despite his mother's objection that there is no such role within the police department). While we don't know how academic Riz actually is, he can still more-or-less fit the role of Brian Johnson, the socially awkward academic of the Breakfast Club. 

The one member of The Bad Kids that doesn't translate to The Breakfast Club (mostly because there were only 5 Breakfast Club members and 6 Bad Kids)? Religious zealot and prophet/cleric of the Corn God Helio, Kristen. She was basically raised in the equivalent to a Mormon home. She actually requested to get detention in hopes that she'd be able to convert the other students.

Spoiler: Kristen ends up getting a bit of a rude awakening about her religion and MAJORLY 180s. I'm currently watching the Sophomore Year campaign for these characters, and I think Kristen might be the "baddest" one.

Before then, however, these six kids have to become an adventuring party. And what better way than for the detention they meet in to be interrupted by an evil corn chowder monster attacking the cafeteria?

Throughout the campaign itself, they also combat against a motorcycle gang of dancing greasers; elemental cheerleaders at a house party; a zombie DJ at a night club filled with werewolves, vampires, and zombies; and a haunted arcade. (Among others, but that's getting into spoiler territory)

All of those battles are in the pursuit of a mystery Riz has been trying to crack all summer: the case of the missing Aguefort Academy female students. One of the missing girls is Riz's former baby-sitter-turned-friend Penny. He's determined to find her and the other missing girls, all while more girls continue to disappear. After the corn chowder incident, the other five Bad Kids are just as determined as Riz to sort out what on Earth is going on at Aguefort. It IS a school to train future adventurers, but is it supposed to be THIS perilous???

Anyway, the campaign was fantastic. For the debut season of this Actual Play series, the characters are engaging and endearing, the vibe around the table is welcoming and fun, the story Brennan weaves is intriguing and intense, and the weekly set-pieces they built were amazing! I do highly suggest watching it if you're into TTRPG Actual Plays.

For obvious reasons, the Webtoon adaptation does have a few tweaks. The introductions to each character and their families is shifted slightly, so we haven't truly met too many of the characters' parents yet in the comic. Also, because it doesn't really add anything to the plot, the adaptation removed some running gags, such as nearly every player failing acrobatic rolls in order to jump onto the cafeteria tables during the corn chowder attack; resulting in just about all of them wiping out as their characters try and fail to hurdle the tables. Other running gags, such as Fig joking about Vice Principal Goldenhoard constantly flirting with her (and him becoming flustered as he frantically tries to deny it before anyone starts to believe her), also seem to be removed to make the story as a whole a bit more sanitary for a broader audience.

They did, however, keep in the running gag of an increasingly confused Gorgug asking just about every man he meets if they are his biological father. Again, I love this adorable half-orc with my whole heart. He is my son and I will cut anyone who attempts to harm him! (The fact that his player Zac Oyama just gives that "loveable, awkward nerd" vibe is probably part of why I love Gorgug so much....)

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Moving on to the last new addition to my reading list. Yes, I said I only added two new stories, and I already told you about them: Ultimate Shut-in and Fantasy High. However, I was recently surprised by yet another new addition to Webtoon: an adaptation of the original Fullmetal Alchemist manga! In truth, however, I didn't officially include it in my count for my current reading list because I'm planning on saving it for later. No clue how much later. But I already know the story. I've watched both anime adaptations of it, as well as the live-action adaptation, and so I'm not itching too bad to read it right as it comes out. Might wait for a decent amount of episodes are uploaded first so I can binge? Either way, the Fullmetal Alchemist (FMA) series will probably be saved for when "I'm bored and need something to read outside of Mythic Item Obtained" just like I do with the Avatar: The Last Airbender comic The Promise.

Oh, for the uninitiated, here's the official Webtoon summary for FMA:

After losing their mother to an illness at a young age, two young and talented alchemists, brothers Edward and Alphonse Elric, attempt the forbidden act of human transmutation to bring her back. But little did they know there was a heavy price to pay for breaking the ultimate taboo in alchemy. Edward loses his left leg after the transmutation fails, and his only remaining family, Alphonse, is taken from him. Desperate to bring his precious brother back, Edward sacrifices his right arm in exchange for Alphonse’s soul and successfully binds him into a suit of armor. The brothers must now embark on a journey to regain everything they have lost.

ⓒHiromu Arakawa/SQUARE ENIX CO., LTD.

That's a pretty decent broad-strokes summary of the series, but it is way more than that. First of all, there are artificially-made humans - homunculi - and each is named for a different one of the Seven Deadly Sins. They are the main antagonists of the series, but the Elrics' fellow alchemists are also routinely villainous. A third main antagonist is the anti-alchemy terrorist Scar who specifically hunts down and slaughters alchemists. Finally, there is a world-ending conspiracy afoot amongst all of this relatively low-scale conflict. As the Elrics attempt to find a way to reclaim all that they lost that fateful night they attempted human transmutation, they must also avoid Scar, bring fellow alchemists to justice, thwart the homunculi, and unravel the conspiracy in time to stop it.

There's a reason this series is still so beloved roughly 20 years later. It is intense. It is hilarious. It asks tough questions about morality and survival instincts. It shows many shades of love: romantic love, familial love, platonic love, love for one's country, love for one's work, love for one's duty, love for knowledge, love for power, etc. It has characters you will root for and boo against for years to come. It will pull at your heart strings. There are two scenes in particular - both involving young children - that I will still openly weep about. (One is an internet meme that my friends and loved ones enjoy sending to me as a prank just to give me psychic damage....)

MOVING ON!

So, those were all of my new reads, but what about existing ones?

As I mentioned, throughout the month of April - and the start of May - I was actually up to 20 different series, on top of Dracula Daily.... but I'm not going to count Dracula since I haven't truly started reading it yet....

That list is now back down to 19... unless I decide to start up FMA. I should probably not pile too high onto that read list though, considering where I'm at with Dracula... I'll be losing even more stories shortly, however, so I could probably work in FMA after all. Or it's time to go back to the massive subscription list I have on Webtoon. That said, I kind have already done that, which I'll elaborate on in a minute.

Either way, there will be quite a few change-ups by my June update, I'm sure. First, I read the 100th and final episode of The Dragon King's Bride on May 13th. It was a nice ending. Classic "And they lived happily ever after." I'm not mad. We get a few flash forwards so we could see Lucina and Hakan over the first decade or so of their marriage. They reflect back on their lives before getting married, and how they have both grown since their wedding. Things are resolved nicely. The author did indeed explain Puka's disappearance during the war, but it did seem a bit like the author forgot about him and had to shoehorn in an excuse. There's also room left for spin-off or sequel stories to grow out of the ending. All-in-all, one of the more satisfying conclusions to a series that I've read on Webtoon. A nice send-off for one of the earliest stories that I had started reading on this platform.

Another series I'm about to say farewell to, though, was shockingly short. Also on the 13th, after I had read the conclusion of The Dragon King's Bride, I brought up relatively new series Office Romance from Hell. Only to see "(Series Finale)" listed behind the episode number! What!? We only get 64 episodes!? (Also, I've torn through 64 episodes already? How did the 100 episodes for The Dragon King's Bride feel that much longer? Same with the 77 episodes I'm up to for I Am The Villain!) Anyway... there's still an epilogue to the series, so I have at least another month before I officially have to say goodbye to these characters. I'm just surprised that the ruler of the underworld and a mortal could fall in love, combat opposition from the lord of heaven, and find their happily-ever-after in such a short time! It was a lovely ending, but it felt so abrupt. You barely had a chance to get to know the characters. I wish the author had slowed down a bit, and gave the story and the characters more room to breathe. Some stories are just short, however. And what little bit we did get was statisfying. I'm just hoping that the epilogue episodes will help me feel like I have closure with these characters.

The next one that is winding down - and only has seven episodes left for me to read - is my beloved Not Your Typical Reincarnation Story. Another one that truly started me on this Webtoons journey. A story that inspired me to write a fanfic - of which I will be talking about more in my end-of-month update. A wonderful story of love and trust and battling against seemingly insurmountable odds. A story with some of my favorite artwork out of all of the stories I've read on Webtoon. The story that pointed me towards Lemon Frog's writing in the first place. Man, I'm not ready to say goodbye!!!! It's a good thing I still have over a month before I have to let this story go.

All-in-all, this leaves open two new Tuesday slots and a Monday slot. At least, it will in the near future. However, I kind of preemptively filled those slots already. Ultimate Shut-in effectively filled The Dragon King's Bride's Tuesday slot a couple of weeks before I officially concluded the series; causing a bit of an overlap. Likewise, despite NYTRS not relenting its Monday slot quite yet, I've basically already replaced it with Fantasy High. So, I guess Office Romance from Hell is the only one I actually still need to replace? Even so, I have at least 4 weeks to figure out what to slide into my soon-to-be-vacant Tuesday reading slot.

Yes, those are the only changes, which means neither Dark Water, Retired Demon King, nor Rental Hero are back from hiatus yet (and neither is The Fateful Invitation, but I'm less concerned about that series). No further changes in my reading list also means that I'm still reading At Your Mercy. Now that we're a bit further into the story and the main character Delinda has successfully proven herself not a fool (*big groan*), the plot has largely shifted to whether or not she can trust Prince Iskan and the mystery of how her previously possessed character Ruyan died. I have to admit, I still find Ji-an's possession of Delinda quite annoying. The other characters she interacts with, though, are intriguing enough that, paired with the mystery of what happened to Ruyan and why Ji-an was transmigrated a second time, I'm still hooked. So it's still on my weekly Sunday Reads list.

Finally, although I'm not including it in my overall reading-schedule-count because I have already completed it in one sitting, I did stumble across a suuuuuper short series on the 14th. As I finished reading this week's release of I Am The Villain I noticed two suggested reads. One in particular looked like it was just the characters from I Am The Villain, and it was written by the same author: Sejji. It was simply called High School Days. Turns out, as I expected - considering the cover art characters looked identical to I Am The Villain - High School Days is a side project AU of I Am The Villain.

Unfortunately, High School Days is only 27 episodes long, many of which are just a simple image. This project was clearly used to help Sejji with creative blocks and/or warm-up images. Get the "what ifs" out of their head so they can focus on I Am The Villain instead. It also hasn't been updated since 2022, so it's probably (sadly) dead. Such a shame, because it was really cool to see Sejji reimagine the core cast of IATV as modern high school kids. Seeing certain scenes replay out in the modern setting was also very cool.

Lucy is still the same goofy, clumsy, determined, and charismatic girl that we fell in love with in IATV. She also still pulls a full harem of men to her side.

Instead of her personal knight/bodyguard, Noah is Lucy's childhood friend. A very protective friend that she feels safe and comfortable around. One who is fighting desperately against his romantic feelings for her, fearing they are not appropriate to have given their current relationship. Noah also routinely gets injured in his attempts to protect Lucy or do things for her. This resulted in her always keeping bandages on hand to mend him (her medical training from IATV shining through). At one point, Noah came to "rescue" Lucy from a heavy rain when he realized she wouldn't have an umbrella. They joked about him being her "knight in shining armor". Very cute, Sejji, I see what you did there. Noah also ends up catching a bad cold from running in the rain to bring Lucy said umbrella, and then refusing to huddle together under it on their way back home. Lucy ends up nursing him back to health, and he nearly lets his romantic interest slip in his fevered daze; surprising and mortifying himself later when he realizes everything he thought was a dream was real.

As for Leo, sadly we haven't gotten much of him. He protected Lucy - making Noah jealous - when his basketball went wide and nearly hit her. (We'll ignore the curious question of how he had enough time to get to her before the ball if he was the one who threw it...) He also accidentally splashed her with rain water when he drove his motorcycle too quickly through a puddle in the road. He ran back to apologize, especially when the puddle-soaked Lucy proceeded to slip and fall a moment later due to how slippery her shoes were.

Finally, there's Arthur, who is just as awkward around Lucy as he is in the main series. They ended up meeting in the library when they both reached for the same book and accidentally brushed hands. The two awkward beans then didn't know how to be in the same area without blushing. Then, when they noticed how heavy the rain was and Lucy started to shiver from the cold, damp air, Arthur recreated the scene from IATV where he protected Lucy from the rain with his cloak. Except, being a modern-age dude, this Arthur didn't have a cloak. Instead, he took off his sweater and plopped it in her arms before walking away while ignoring her confused protests.

Continuing the parallel with the main comic, a jealous Noah ended up placing his zip-up hoodie over Lucy's head to help shield her further from the cold rain (so it looked like the cloak-draping scene). In kind, she returned his hoodie by also draping the hood over his head and wrapping him tight within the sweatshirt.

So cute. These precious beans! We even get to see one of Noah's adopted younger siblings (not all of them, though). On the flipside, we, unfortunately, didn't get a chance to meet Lucy's adopted brothers Alexander or Theodore.

Such great potential. It's a shame Sejji seems to have abandoned it. 

Oh well. C'est la vie. At least I have NINETEEN other stories I can read to help ease the pain! As well as Dracula.

OH! Speaking of! I just made a fun discovery. Apparently Dracula Daily has sparked a trend of fictional works within public domain being periodically emailed for free to Substack subscribers. I can't recall if I had mentioned this when I first signed up, but, shortly after the conclusion of my first year subscribed to Dracula Daily, I had signed up for Edgar Allan Poe Fortnightly. Then, last year while meeting up with a friend, they told me about Whale Weekly, a TWO YEAR! committment to reading Moby Dick within the same length of time the book takes place. Fast forward to just this morning, when I discovered two more such Substacks: Frankenstein Weekly and Les Mis Letters. Despite being nearly 140 days into Les Mis Letters, I just recently started seeing an influx of content about it on Tumblr. Seems it's 2025's Tumblr Book Club novel the same way Dracula was in 2022. I might be skipping this one, however. Struggling enough as it is with my old "book club" classic novel.

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Edited by LycoRogue

It is such an awesome trend, though! I love how stuff like this gets people excited for classic literature again while making the previously daunting novels more bite-sized and manageable within this fast-paced modern era of limited individual free time. I hope it both continues and expands.

Now to get people to still talk about Dracula instead of flooding to the "new kid on the block" (Les Misérables). Although, that is kind of a big ask. Les Misérables has been a Tumblr darling for ages now.... Either way, some engagement would really help me stay on track with Dracula Daily. Plus, I just love chatting about what I'm reading.... clearly.

That said, in case you do wish to have reading discussions with me, here's a reminder of everything I'm reading. There's Dracula, of course, and everything on my Webtoons weekly reading schedule:

  • Sunday:
  • Monday:
    • Not Your Typical Reincarnation Story
    • Seabird and the Wolf
    • Fantasy High
    • Daily Pass Unlocks:
      • The Makeup Remover
      • The Girl Downstairs (Doona!)
    • Mythic Item Obtained
  • Tuesday:
  • Wednesday:
    • I Am The Villain
    • Daily Pass Unlocks only:
      • The Makeup Remover
      • The Girl Downstairs (Doona!)
    • Mythic Item Obtained
    • Catch up on any missed episodes thus far that week
  • Thursday:
  • Friday:
    • My Child Will Have a Different Father
    • Writers Legacy
      • Which feels all the more appropriate to read with everyone focusing on Victor Hugo's works right now with Les Mis Letters....
    • Daily Pass Unlocks:
      • The Makeup Remover
      • The Girl Downstairs (Doona!)
    • Mythic Item Obtained
  • Saturday:
    • Obsidian Bride
    • Daily Pass Unlocks:
      • The Makeup Remover
      • The Girl Downstairs (Doona!)
    • Mythic Item Obtained

Now to stop dillydallying with this blog update and officially get started on my Dracula read. I'll catch you next month with an update on how well I did. And I'll see you in a little less than two weeks for my writing update.

I'm hoping I actually have one this month....

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