nenena | This week's Tsubasa

So, picking up where we left off last week. Syaoran just showed up in the ruins, Sakura is there, and Sakura turns and asks, "Who are you?"

Syaoran starts to say, "I'm Li Syao--"

But then Sakura trips and falls face-first into the water that she's standing in. LOL.

Syaoran wades into the water and reaches out to help her up, but she splashes away from him. "Eeek! Don't touch me! Sorry, sorry, but I'm in the middle of a purification ceremony and nobody is allowed to touch me. I'm sorry." Commence much adorable Sakura-esque flailing.

Eventually Sakura manages to clumsily right herself. She sits on the edge of the wading pool, her feet still in the water, and talks to Syaoran. She explains how she's in the middle of a purification ritual. Syaoran says, "Then this must be right before some sort of important ceremony, right?"

Sakura is le shocked. "How did you know that?!"

"Well, purification is something that you do before an important ceremony, right? I know all about that. I've done it myself many times."

Note: I don't know much about Chinese religious traditions, but in both Shinto and the types of Buddhism practiced in Japan, this is very true. Purification before any sort of religious ceremony is a common practice. Although one does have to wonder what sort of religious ceremonies Syaoran, as a child, would be able to take part in.

Anyway, Sakura starts questioning Syaoran. "Those clothes aren't from Clow Country. Did you come from another country?" She doesn't seem at all concerned about the fact that he spontaneously appeared right in front of her a few minutes ago. Did you come from another country? indeed.

Syaoran answers, "I came from another world."

"Another... world?"

"Yeah. I came from another world, from a country called Japan."

"Japan..."

"You don't seem surprised," Syaoran observes.

"But I've heard of this before!" Sakura says, a big huge smile on her face. "From the priest... My mother. That there are more worlds than just the one that we know."

Now it is Syaoran who is le shocked. "My mother told me the same thing..."

"But it's so strange," Sakura says, "That I'm from Clow Country, you're from Japan, we're from different worlds, and yet we can both understand each other's language..."

"That's a coinci--" Syaoran begins, then corrects himself. "No. There are no coincidences in this world. Only hitsuzen."

Oh Yuuko, you've corrupted him already!

"Did your mother tell you that?" Sakura asks.

"No. My father did."

"Hitsuzen..." Sakura ponders. Good God she's adorable in these panels. Then she turns to Syaoran with a big smile. "That must be why I met you! So what's your name?"

"Li Syaoran."

"I'm Sakura of Clow Country."

Syaoran is super le shocked. "You have the same name as my mother..."

Sakura is all like, "Buhwhat?"

Then Syaoran stares at her and think-bubbles, She looks just like her. She looks just like my mother when she was a little girl. Sakura is still giving Syaoran the buhwhat? face.

Then a woman appears and says, "Oh my, weren't you supposed to be being purified?"

Sakura turns around. "MOTHER!"

Holy shit it's Nadeshiko. Holy shit. She looks gorgeous in her Clow Country High Priestess outfit and she's carrying a GIANT-ASS MAGIC WAND. Holy shit.

Syaoran looks at Nadeshiko and thinks, She looks just like the photographs of my grandmother. Oh my god ICK. This is getting VERY ICKY VERY FAST.

Nadeshiko smiles and says, "You look like you're having fun, Sakura-hime!"

Commence adorable Sakura-flailing. "I'm sorry I'm sorry but I didn't let him touch me I'm still being purified I totally swear I'm sorry but but but--!"

"It's all right. I understand." Nadeshiko turns to Syaoran. "Welcome to Clow Country, you who have come from another world."

Syaoran is surprised. "How did you know...?"

"I saw this in a dream."

Syaoran is pretty shocked to hear this. "Are you also a dream-seer?!" Isn't every woman in this series a dream-seer? Sheesh!

So now we have the scene set: Sakura looking adorable, Nadeshiko looking beautiful and mysterious, Syaoran looking shocked, and...

Cue Sakura's stomach rumbling. LOL.

Sakura is mortified and flails around some, but Nadeshiko says, "The purification ritual is finished for today anyway. Let's return to the castle. I've already made arrangements so that those apples that you love so much will be waiting for you." She turns to Syaoran. "Come with us."

"But..."

"Oh, I've already prepared some food for you, too. You like fruit, don't you?"

Syaoran think-bubbles, So it's true. This woman really can see the future in her dreams.

Sakura's all like "WAAAAAAI!" (yes she actually shouts that) and does a happy-dance. Syaoran is going to eat dinner with her! ~~Syaoran is the son of her parallel universe self and this is really icky!~~

Sakura is so caught up in her happy-dance that she trips and falls flat on her face. LOL.

So they all go back to the castle. Sakura's father is there waiting for them. Holy shit it's Fujitaka. Fujitaka introduces himself to Syaoran. "I am Fujitaka, the king of Clow Country."

Fujitaka and Nadeshiko watch Sakura and Syaoran run off hand-in-hand. Fujitaka watches Syaoran's back and says, "So it must be him."

"Yes," Nadeshiko replies. "Sakura-hime's fated person."

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

And on that note, the chapter ends. Well, my brain is broken. How about yours?

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

But...wait. Wasn't Clow her father...? GAH. WHY DOES NOTHING MAKE SENSE ANYMORE?!!

... alternate reality incest.

I'm still waiting for anybody to wake up and realize that this entire series is just a bad dream.

This is a different Sakura and a different Clow Country.

Not that that makes any more sense, actually.

Jesus. @_@ It's so friggin' easy to get confused, since the scanlations are AGES behind your summaries... But mostly because CLAMP are really writing their little socks off, trying to fuck with our minds. Seriously. All this parallel inter-dimensional tomfoolery is getting a tad ridiculous.

Well, it really wasn't a bad dream until recently... But, yeah. Kinda sad to see the "making any sense at all" leave us this way. ;~; Come baaack...

Yeah, it is INSANELY confusing at this point. There are three Sakura. UGH. In case you're confused, here's a quick rundown:

Sakura #1. The Sakura from the very first chapter. We thought that she was the Sakura who traveled with Syaoran and company on their journey, but it turns out, that was her clone. In reality, that Sakura was captured by FWR at the ruins. Status: Her body is destroyed, and her soul is imprisoned by FWR.

Sakura #2. This is the clone of Sakura #1 that FWR created. She's the one who went on the journey with Syaoran. Status: Her soul was killed, her body was snatched by Kyle, and currently FWR has her corpse.

Sakura #3. This is the parallel Sakura, from the parallel Clow Country, that's in this chapter.

Ergh. Now that I type that out, it really doesn't make much sense at all, does it?

It just proves that CLAMP has gone overboard with the complexity... Why'd they have to do this? One clone of Syaoran was fine. Surprising, a little confusing at first, but fine. Now it's just greed. @_@

Syaoran's mom has got it goin' on. Syaoran's mom has got it goin' on.

Sorry, but I couldn't resist. IT WAS ASKING FOR IT.

(*lulz*) ^______^

So, erh, this Sakura's fated person is her kid or something?

I personally would love to see one of the previous Sakura incarnations pair up with this Sakura. That, or get a giant bunny that can shoot atomic carrots out of its mouth for kicks. :P

I am so in favor of the atomic bunny arrow carrots, you have no idea.

So, erh, this Sakura's fated person is her kid or something?

It's the son of her AU self. So... yes.

Also, I, too, would welcome our new atomic carrot-shooting bunny overlords.

I hope you don't mind me asking you this. I don't often bother other people about these things. I'm trying to translate a title of a book and I've already giving it to two of my friends who speak Japanese, but neither of them are sure about the last two kanji. They are pronounced 'ai byou' according to the furigana. Both friend are suspicious of it actually being Chinese since the book supposedly takes place there.

上海哀儚

Well, 上海 is Shanghai, so I'm thinking that the last two kanji are probably also supposed to be read as Chinese, not Japanese.

I checked Jim Breen's database, and both characters only showed up as proper names, but not as individual words:

哀【あい】 Ai (f) NA
儚【はかな】 Hakana (f) 【はくな】 Hakuna (f) NA

So I'm thinking, yeah, you probably want to look for a Chinese reading, instead of a Japanese reading. I can't help you there, sorry!

Dear God, that is so messed up.

But think on the bright side. This new atomic carrot-shooting bunny could have a *gasp* profound backstory that makes complete sense!

Thought I would let you know how it turned out. I gave it to a few more people who spoke Japanese with no success so I posted it to a learning Chinese message board. Several people still didn't get it , and finally one person said that the last character was probably a kanji equivalent to meng(4) so the title is A Tragic Dream in Shanghai. No one seems to know whether it is Japanese or Chinese though as the characters have the same general meaning in both languages.

This week's Tsubasa - Chapter 190

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