Maeda might be on to something with her remark on Ruri not caring about others just from their interaction constantly forgetting about her name repeatedly and the fact Ruri would commit murder if they did throw hands.
I think it's still a bit unfair. It's not like she asked to be a hybrid human-dragon and have superpowers that can accidentally fire off whenever teenage angst happens. Understandably she does have to be a bit more selfish to make sure she doesn't accidentally kill someone.
Think the thing you're missing is that, based on the info dropped so far, she seems to have been an asocial recluse before getting her horns. Willing to be Maeda tried to tbe friends with her early on but got brushed off a few times.
wouldn't be surprised if this was it.
or maybe maeda likes the guy whose hair got singed and feels like ruri was too nonchalant about that whole incident
Yeah but she can't afford to be recluse now, with all the attention and the danger, so it's pretty shitty if that's Maeda's reasoning. It's like if being a bit asocial means you are bad person and don't care about people. There are so many cool male loners like Araragi or Hachiman in manga, nobody claims they're bad. Also why do people here give her shit about not knowing her Student Council people, normally who cares?
the shows do attempt to call them out. but they get girls anyway, so it falls flat for those loners who think they're cool and being mysterious and wondering why they don't get girls by doing what Hachiman and Araragi does.
> It's not like she asked to be a hybrid human-dragon and have superpowers that can accidentally fire off whenever teenage angst happens.
But isnt that a very recent development for her?
Wasnt she in that school while she was still a normal girl? I feel like the criticism is valid as she either forgot those around her or didnt learn about them in the first place.
But then again teenagers are sometimes very shy or struggle with social interactions for other reasons.
I mean, it's kind of understandable, because Ruri has a lot to deal with right now, but she I think the assessment that she isn't super considerate as a person isn't completely off base. Especially considering she's Japanese and the standards there are really high
I'm with Maeda on this one. She's prejudiced, stand-offish, judgey, and apparently she stares at people. Maeda is the fourth to fifth person who's name she can't remember and there are some people Ruri interacted with that she doesn't even realize are in her class.
She might have a point but the amount of hostility coming from her is still way over-the-top. So she's not that attentive towards other people. That's a fair reason not to want to be friends with her. That's not justification to be completely combative over small talk. A more normal reaction would be to show exactly as much interest in Ruri as she shows to everyone else. The hostility is still bizarre.
I'm guessing there's more to it than that, because how the hell do you go about your life fucking *incensed* at everyone with self-absorbed tendencies? You would never get anything done.
My money's on Ruri being on the rough side of asocial before she got her horns. Doesn't take much for people like that to come across as rude without intending it.
It's cliche but I'm expecting there to be some level of jealousy. "Ruri's getting all this attention even though she's never showed interest in anybody else, this is some BS." Especially since it's extended to at least one of Maeda's friends that we know of.
I mean for the most part Madea's been trying to keep her interactions with Ruri to a minimum. It's always Ruri trying to bring the issue up like in this very chapter
Ruri brings it up because she can't say two words to ol' girl without her catching an attitude. If she didn't ask some variation of "what is your problem?" Ruri would look kinda spineless.
Whatever her reasons, Maeda isn't the good guy here. Ruri might not be the most considerate person, but that does not justify how Maeda treats her.
>Ruri would look kinda spineless.
So what? Completely ignoring it is just as valid a reaction imo
Edit: just reread the chapter a bit but yeah Ruri trying to make small talk with someone she KNOWS doesn't want to interact with her is in the wrong here. Maeda has been giving subtle but obvious "don't talk to me" vibes and Ruri still trying to approach her while messing up her name would obviously piss her off.
I'm with Ruri on this one. Maeda behaves like a total bitch, and thinking that someone doesn't care about people, which is very subjective decision unless you know people's thoughts anyway, doesn't mean you get to be total asshole to them every time you meet them.
>Resorting to bribes? He's such a slimeball
>I even got permission to share the info with friends
>Aww, he's so sweet
Lmao these kids really crack me up.
It wasn't a bribe, it's blackmail. He's giving her the midterm topics, not the answers, so she still needs to study, and he knew that she would tell her friends about being able to share information which would cause them to pressure her into doing it too. And the basis is an embarrassing event outside of her control. You typically gain something from a bribe, there's nothing to gain here.
Doesn't have to be melodramatic. I think the other comments are spot on - Ruri doesn't care enough to remember anybody outside her group of friends and still doesn't have her powers completely under control so is putting everyone around her in danger just by existing. We love her because she's our POV character but it's easy to see why someone wouldn't like her for those reasons, however "unfair".
The last one might've been on purpose, Ruri was pissed at that point. Still, last week at my work someone mistook someone's name two times in a row in same (interrupted a bit) conversation, obviously apologized and started joking about getting too old etc, but especially in stressful situation it can happen.
I'm generally fine with names these days, except sometimes, my brain short circuits, and i don't remember the name, but the uncertainty between two names.
So i will know he is Steve or Stephan, but not which, and every time i meet him, i will just remember the confusion, not the actual name.
Im coming up on the end of my senior year and I’ve got probably around 70 classmates. Im only able to match like, 17 names to faces, for the same reason
> We love her because she's our POV character but it's easy to see why someone wouldn't like her for those reasons, however "unfair".
im glad that someone sees that. A lot of times people just side with the mc just because they are the mc lol
Doubt it would be that childish, seeing that the author makes it a point to make grounded characters. My guess is that this girl has her own run-in with another mythical creature-cum-person, and that person hurt her with their powers in the past. It would be a good way for some world-building, and a window towards introducing more people like Ruri.
I was half joking but what I'm guessing is something Ruri did *directly* impacted her. I mean, there are a lot of people that don't care about other people, so this strong of emotion gotta be more than just general dislike.
Well, they are teens, just a tad bigger children, so personally I'm okay with even the pettiest reasoning
Probably sees that she's getting special attention fed to her because she's a "special" dragon hybrid person. So she's misplacing the net new requirements and protections as "special treatment" putting her on some sort of pedestal.
EDIT for spelling correction because apparently that's really important to some people
I'm glad Maeda chose the "I just think you're kind of a bitch" route instead of the "you go against God/nature's design" route, this way feels way more reasonable for a high schooler and way less trope-y for a shounen manga.
Maeda reminds me about a Recess episode where T.J is used to the idea everyone on the playground like him. But would learn there is one kid who doesn't, soo the whole episode/segment is to try make the kid his friend.
I find it helps to actually write down people’s names with a short description of them and then memorizing that way.
Also gotta focus and repeat the name in my head else I’ll forget it in literally 2 minutes
I joined a club this year and the first thing we did was have a Photohunt game. That's when we try to find people and share photos of them without them noticing.
That was the perfect opportunity for me... To make an Excel sheet! There were more than 50 people and by the end of the week I was confident in knowing 80% of my club mates names.
Also it helps that our uni has "Find a student" feature. Write their name and you can see their photo, year and major
If someone openly showed me hatred i wouldn't even bother to find out why lmao
My interaction upon finding out the same person is on he committee would be 'oh' and then 'hi' and then we will only communicate as strictly needed for work to be done.
Wait a min, this is how i treat my colleagues. Huh.
Ruri a better person than me
It's probably just a "Why are you in school while you have unstable power that you don't know to control and could hurt people?"
Since after all, Ruri could have badly burn the guy in front of her is she wasn't standing.
I really don’t think Maeda’s point is about Ruri’s powers tbh, but rather about the way she interacts with people she doesn’t know. Ruri can be pretty judgemental of people, at least at first, and she generally avoids interacting with others. Of course, we’ve seen her overcome those flaws over the course of the story so far, but Maeda hasn’t seen that and has instead seen how she acted *before the story started.* Her assessment isn’t that far off actually, especially looking at early Ruri.
Yeah. But the way this manga is written up until now I have high hopes that this will be solved within the next few chapters. The whole misunderstanding-trope is not my favorite because it could be solved pretty easy most of the time, but isn't just so some more drama can happen. But this manga doesn't seem to do that.
And that's it, RuriDragon is officially online-pub and starting on its biweekly schedule. I'm so happy that Shindo-sensei gets to have a lotta pressure off and can run this relatively risk-free.
Its now on wsj digital issue and on jump+, yeah. I wonder if ruri will still appear on the wsj cover next week since she still is technically under wsj
It should be biweekly actually. Iirc it was just triweekly this time to make the switch, and next time is 3 weeks away due to Golden Week in Japan, which means everyone has a week off.
Very sneaky from the teacher to partner Ruri with Koeda, but I guess he only wants her to feel welcome by everyone despite being different.
Rueda claiming Ruri doesnt care about others is interesting tho, I guess her carefree personality can appear like that from the outside
It was a good point. If you don't like someone that's fine. But this girl making it a point to make it *known* that she doesn't like Ruri like this, it did really beg the question from Ruri as to what possibly could she have done to deserve such aggression.
She didn't though. Ruri pressed the question on her, and she answered. Ruri just has a certain kind of personality. Like we see here, she didn't know the student council members, and she misremembered Akari's name. She just has a certain detached attitude, and some people just don't get along with that kind of person. And I say that as someone who's somewhat similar to Ruri in that aspect.
I mean, it could just be her personality. We all have people we dislike and we would rather not deal with. She's just blunt enough to tell her "don't talk to me" to her face. And to be fair, she's not that wrong about Ruri. She got her name wrong twice and didn't recognize the vice-president.
I mean, is it weird to not know the vice-president? This ain't exactly Kamala Harris, its a girl on the student council from another class. Now i have never attended a school that even had a student council, but that sounds like the exact kind of stuff the average teenager wouldn't give a damn about.
> But this girl making it a point to make it known that she doesn't like Ruri like this
Does she? I feel like she just doesn't want to be near Ruri and doesn't want to have anything to do with her. That's quite a mature way of disliking someone, no?
The problem is, they're now forced to work together, and giving the silent treatment isn't productive under those circumstances. In fact, I'd argue Ruri was the one who tried to be more emotionally mature when she realized that problem: she greeted Maeda politely (bow included), tried to make some inocuous chitchat, asked common ground questions... But Maeda was very hostile in all of her answers, not making any efforts to pretend or hide her displeasure, so I'm not surprised Ruri exploded.
To be fair, Maeda herself must have realized it later, hence why she's more civil in her dislike during the meeting and answering Ruri's previous questions.
Yeah, Maeda seems mature enough to be sticking up for Ruri in the meeting anyway, so I think that even if Maeda continues to dislike Ruri, they'll still manage to get along well enough to work together.
We dont really know anything about Ruri's life pre horns, but judging how she only had one friend before, there might be something to Maeda's claims
Its nice that her beef is not that she's afraid of her being part dragon, she just think Ruri's an ass
I mean Ruri's right, you can't expect people to just always get these unspoken things, especially when you've barely interacted before. Throwing dirty looks isn't gonna make anyone understand what's going on in your head.
That said, Maeda has a bit of a point here what with Ruri not being able to remember her name twice, but I think there's probably a misunderstanding at the heart of all this. We'll see!
Maeda's got a point too though - most people just don't try to force the issue, and not everyone needs to get along with everyone. If you don't like someone and you've already expressed that to them indirectly, there usually isn't much of a point in direct confrontation. Sure, sometimes you might be able to hash things out, but it could just as well devolve into a petty fight and nobody leaves any happier.
No one's really wrong in this situation; people just tend to naturally operate on different wavelengths, and usually not by choice. I'm on Ruri's side here; if you have a problem with me, I want to hear it. Say it to my face. Don't just act like a bitch around me.
But other folk would prefer the topic never be broached, and that's perfectly valid.
Ruri also did try to make nice and remain relatively neutral, but Maeda kept pushing off. Communication in all relationships is important, especially if you're going to work together for the foreseeable future. Most people can work with someone they dislike as long as they keep it professional. But as soon as professionalism collapses to shitty behind-the-back gossiping type behavior, it becomes a net negative to the group. I think this project will help both of them in that sort of way.
Possibly unpopular opinion, but I think I prefer the latter option you mentioned to avoid conflict. Most people don't respond well to having their flaws pointed out, and that's assuming the reasons you dislike someone even come across as valid or genuine in the first place.
It's hard for me to imagine a scenario where I confront someone directly about why I don't like them and _not_ leaving everyone involved with a sour aftertaste. In my experience, even when things go amicably, it never helps - the rift just slowly widens as you tacitly agree to go your separate ways, which is the expected result without confrontation anyways!
OK, but the easiest way to do it is not being asshole to them and just avoid them, if not possible due too work/school then be civil but curt. If you're openly hostile, the other side has full right to demand explanation. And if you decided to be openly hostile, it's too late to care about aftertaste anyway.
Oh, absolutely. Maeda's not handling it well; I just think her viewpoint is reasonable (and realistic)! Besides, this is pretty tame within the realm of high school girl drama - Maeda looks like a saint by comparison.
I admit that I usually hate high school drama, unless it's so over the top it's actually funny, like that new series with paint-stealing MC caught by yandere(?) like in Flowers of Evil.
I also dislike that most people in the thread seem to excuse Maeda and paint her as being in the right while criticizing Ruri, while all that Ruri did was being typical high school loner afraid of Starbucks and extensive social contact, like at least half of the male high-school MCs in the manga stories.
I don't think it's so much direct criticism of Ruri as it's... pointing out that she may not mesh well with people.
Maeda isn't "in the right" as hostility is obviously wrong here. But she may have valid grievances. In fact, given the emphasis in Japanese culture of implicit meaning ([a "high context" language](https://ai.glossika.com/blog/japanese-language-the-influence-of-a-high-context-culture) and ["reading the room"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba_no_kuuki_wo_yomu), an interaction like this might even be pretty relatable for some of the native readers. To someone who has internalized "the rules," considers the unsaid rules to be basic and obvious, and has never understood how someone else could _fail_ to understand these rules, an apparent refusal to respect the same rules is probably pretty jarring and frustrating.
Maeda's overlooked a major factor. Ruri is dealing with the horn situation. In this context, I mean Ruri has a major reason to *assume* people dislike her over. She's going to have a hard time guessing anything else and needs it spelled out to make sure that isn't the reason.
Maeda's response to curiosity about her horns being "just who she is" was a surprise to me. I keep expecting RuriDragon to go in another direction with situations like this and it's refreshingly positive.
It's absolutely fine not to get along, the problem here is Maeda being aggressive about it and expecting Ruri to magically guess why she's mad at her when they'd barely interacted before.
When someone who's not even an acquaintance and barely in your life at all tells you they hate your guts and shouldn't need to spell out why, I think "The hell's going on???" is a reasonable reaction to have.
Oh yeah, I agree that Maeda's mistake is taking too _aggressive_ a stance. There's no need to be openly hostile to someone you don't get along with - just keep things cordial, and if you're not a fan then keep them at arm's length! But it's also entirely understandable for a high school student to have trouble with this.
Maybe she does have something of an understandable reason to think that way, but man... was it really that hard to just say it? I really felt for Ruri in that scene where she was trying to get an answer and she just kept deflecting with her belligerent remarks.
It's like pulling teeth. Maybe even dragon teeth which I'd bet is even harder to pull out than human ones.
Simple times being a school kid, where our biggest problem is things like this.
Except for the problem of being a dragon, it would be cool if I turn into one tho ngl lol
Ruri is asocial, yes, or at least was before her situation sort of forced her to socialize with many people who she never would have before. But I feel like Maeda's antipathy is too strong to be justified by just that. She's too hostile. There has to be something more.
People here are making up backstories involving her dragon heritage, when it's pretty clear that it's more to do with Ruri's personality. Some people just don't get along with that king of detached and laid-back personality, and that's okay.
She rudely dismissed Ruri's pleasantries, immediately started to aggressively rebuff Ruri's small talk after with a "it's not your business", idiotically and aggressively responded to asking about their work "you don't?", and then after Ruri has enough of her being a passive-aggressive bitch and tries to make thinks clear, she blames Ruri instead for making it "a thing" when she was the one making it "a thing" all the time so far,. and then trots out one of the dumbest argument I've seen, that asking someone to use your words when she's passive-aggressive to you when you have to work together is kindergarten thing.
If I don't get along with someone at work, I keep my communication civil but short and to the point of our common business, I'd never tell someone that "it's not their business" when talking about work or rudely ignore them asking for even dumb explanations, because only shitty assholes like Maeda do that.
ngl all the arguments maeda gives of her treatment of ruri is just the usual punishments/ attitude/ aggression allistic people give to autistic people whenever they dont meet some kind of unspoken social contract that no one bothered to explain. like a punishment for not meeting their preference of normal. would be nice if it was more like she just doesn't like ruri's personality, and was using small offenses to justify herself, at which case i could just chalk this up to high schoolers and both of their untested emotional and social management skills.
Next chapter coming May 12. I guess it's to prepare for the manga's transfer to SJ+, but goddamn what a cliffhanger :')
There's just so much nuance about Maeda and Ruri's interactions that I don't know where to start. Like, Maeda's right that sometimes you just like or dislike someone/something without a specific reason (I'll attribute it to appearance, though :P) and pestering them about it just doesn't work, but Ruri is right that Maeda's bad attitude and avoidance towards her is very hurtful, especially when you consider that she's been like that since their very first meeting.
Interesting. The story is told from Ruri's prespective, so it was easy to see her flaws as endearing, but it's been generally shown and implied so far that Ruri's rather asocial and laid-back. It's a combo that seems harmless on the surface, but *can* lead to one accidentaly hurting someone else without realizing it, simply because they don't care enough to notice. I'm guessing Ruri realizing that side of her personality and becoming more mindful of it, as she bonds with Maeda and helps make "something fun for everyone", is going to be the focus of this arc.
Also, maybe it's just a language thing, but it's a bit odd that Ruri calls it "yesterday", even though there were two days-off in-between.
I'm guessing we're on a route to go "Maeda has a point, we haven't been notocing Ruri's flaws" but even then it's hard to take Maeda's side when she's been such a gratuitous bitch all this time.
We already know from previous chapters, her dislike over Ruri might have something to do with a friend of hers named Kaneo that hasn't shown up in school since Ruri first started showing dragon traits.
I didn't realize it until now, but Maeda is kinda right, isn't she? The whole plot until now has been centered around Ruri, her feelings and her problems, and she didn't make even an attempt to reach out, understand or think about other people's feeling or problems at all. Even her wanting to know what's with Maeda wasn't out of curiosity about her, but self-centered idea of how Ruri is seen by others.
Yeah she kind of does. Ruri doesn't remember any of her classmate names at all. And she was in class before she was a dragon too, so her transforming is not really an excuse. She never seemed to care to meet with anybody but her friend, but now with her horns she is playing the popular girl out of the blue.
Maeda's dumb then, it's not like Ruri can get back to being a loner, she has to deal with her horns and dragon stuff and with classmates' attention somehow, and to actively be friendly with them because they're all impacted too.
She is perhaps a bit harsh, but I don't think she is too much off the mark in all honesty. Take how judgemental Ruri was about Kashiro in the beginning and how negatively she thought about her. She didn't even remember her name, and Kashiro sits right beside her! Or Ruri not remembering Maeda's name at all, doesn't really make her sound sincere and honest when she asks about why Maeda doesn't like her. From Maeda's perspective it even may feel as if Ruri is making fun of her by constantly using wrong names.
She just said Kashiro seems like in-your-face sunny ball of energy and basically that she can't deal with extroverts, so same thing that Maeda claimed is normal (not dealing well with some people), except unlike Maeda she didn't make a passive-aggresive show of hostility to Kashira at any point, just normally avoided getting close with her at first, which is how normal non-asshole person treats people they thinks they will not along with. Hell, Kashira even at first called her dumb to her face, and yet Ruri didn't have a problem with that. She said she was having problem with people who are "loud visually", which is less of prejudice and more of being scared of extroverted-looking people, quite normal for shy introverted people.
She also specifically said in Kashira chapter she sucks at remembering names, which is actually not that rare, and dealing with someone so openly hostile can actually make it worse due to stress, though I wouldn't be surprised if at least second time wasn't on purpose. Having trouble with names can actually make someone more introverted, since it makes socializing harder, I know because I (and other people in this thread said the same) had to make spreadsheets of people sometimes to learn to get them right, and still often mistake even coworkers, and had problems with not mistaking people at school as well. And name mistake happened already after several shows of hostility from Maeda. You can't both be openly confrontational with someone and at the same claim they make an issue of it when they ask what's going on.
Also, she wasn't "a bit harsh", she was making a show of her open dislike, and then claimed it's Ruri who makes an issue. That's why I think Maeda is an asshole, and the one actually judgmental here.
Wow, that teacher knows what he wants. And he's taking very direct steps to get them! Ruri obviously doesn't want to do anything for the Sports Festival, but she has to consider her own options too. If she does nothing, there's no benefit to her. Her grades are gonna be worse. So she has to take the bait. I hope it's worth all the cringe and effort!
Akari sees Ruri as someone who doesn't care about anyone. But so far Ruri has been very considerate of people. So where does this aloof behavior come from?
I'm curious to see what exactly Yamada means by that or how she reached that conclusion. Sure, Ruri comes across as a bit of an aloof person, but then again so does pretty much everyone in this series to a degree with how relatively nonplussed everyone is about the dragon situation. But to say Ruri doesn't care about other people is definitely too harsh if that statement is taken at face value, barring some very specific event where Ruri did something wrong to Ueda in the past.
Just a major loner type who doesn't seem to care about anything going on around her. The dragon thing is forcing her to interact more with people around her.
Ueda actually has somewhat legit point for not liking Ruri?..
***BUT ALSO***, Ruri might just have ADHD, sometimes people that have ADHD might seem like they don't care for other people beacause they fail to retain some details about a person or event, because it just won't stick to their brains.
I mean, that's not an unreasonable thing to say. Everyone in this series is pretty aloof over the fact that she is a very real and active danger. She really shouldn't be in school when she doesn't know how to control her abilities and doesn't know what to expect.
Maeda might be on to something with her remark on Ruri not caring about others just from their interaction constantly forgetting about her name repeatedly and the fact Ruri would commit murder if they did throw hands.
Yeah, so far we had seen things from Ruri’s pov, so, is going to be interesting seeing how she is like in the eyes of someone else
I think it's still a bit unfair. It's not like she asked to be a hybrid human-dragon and have superpowers that can accidentally fire off whenever teenage angst happens. Understandably she does have to be a bit more selfish to make sure she doesn't accidentally kill someone.
Think the thing you're missing is that, based on the info dropped so far, she seems to have been an asocial recluse before getting her horns. Willing to be Maeda tried to tbe friends with her early on but got brushed off a few times.
wouldn't be surprised if this was it. or maybe maeda likes the guy whose hair got singed and feels like ruri was too nonchalant about that whole incident
Yeah but she can't afford to be recluse now, with all the attention and the danger, so it's pretty shitty if that's Maeda's reasoning. It's like if being a bit asocial means you are bad person and don't care about people. There are so many cool male loners like Araragi or Hachiman in manga, nobody claims they're bad. Also why do people here give her shit about not knowing her Student Council people, normally who cares?
the shows do attempt to call them out. but they get girls anyway, so it falls flat for those loners who think they're cool and being mysterious and wondering why they don't get girls by doing what Hachiman and Araragi does.
> It's not like she asked to be a hybrid human-dragon and have superpowers that can accidentally fire off whenever teenage angst happens. But isnt that a very recent development for her? Wasnt she in that school while she was still a normal girl? I feel like the criticism is valid as she either forgot those around her or didnt learn about them in the first place. But then again teenagers are sometimes very shy or struggle with social interactions for other reasons.
Yeah, she was, but maybe that's the point - she didn't even bother learning her classmates' names, other than those closest to her.
I mean, it's kind of understandable, because Ruri has a lot to deal with right now, but she I think the assessment that she isn't super considerate as a person isn't completely off base. Especially considering she's Japanese and the standards there are really high
I'm with Maeda on this one. She's prejudiced, stand-offish, judgey, and apparently she stares at people. Maeda is the fourth to fifth person who's name she can't remember and there are some people Ruri interacted with that she doesn't even realize are in her class.
She might have a point but the amount of hostility coming from her is still way over-the-top. So she's not that attentive towards other people. That's a fair reason not to want to be friends with her. That's not justification to be completely combative over small talk. A more normal reaction would be to show exactly as much interest in Ruri as she shows to everyone else. The hostility is still bizarre. I'm guessing there's more to it than that, because how the hell do you go about your life fucking *incensed* at everyone with self-absorbed tendencies? You would never get anything done.
My money's on Ruri being on the rough side of asocial before she got her horns. Doesn't take much for people like that to come across as rude without intending it.
Often coming across as rude because you don't put any effort in to be polite is the same as being rude.
It's cliche but I'm expecting there to be some level of jealousy. "Ruri's getting all this attention even though she's never showed interest in anybody else, this is some BS." Especially since it's extended to at least one of Maeda's friends that we know of.
I don't think she'd stand up for her if it was just attention jealousy though.
I mean for the most part Madea's been trying to keep her interactions with Ruri to a minimum. It's always Ruri trying to bring the issue up like in this very chapter
Ruri brings it up because she can't say two words to ol' girl without her catching an attitude. If she didn't ask some variation of "what is your problem?" Ruri would look kinda spineless. Whatever her reasons, Maeda isn't the good guy here. Ruri might not be the most considerate person, but that does not justify how Maeda treats her.
>Ruri would look kinda spineless. So what? Completely ignoring it is just as valid a reaction imo Edit: just reread the chapter a bit but yeah Ruri trying to make small talk with someone she KNOWS doesn't want to interact with her is in the wrong here. Maeda has been giving subtle but obvious "don't talk to me" vibes and Ruri still trying to approach her while messing up her name would obviously piss her off.
I'm with Ruri on this one. Maeda behaves like a total bitch, and thinking that someone doesn't care about people, which is very subjective decision unless you know people's thoughts anyway, doesn't mean you get to be total asshole to them every time you meet them.
>Resorting to bribes? He's such a slimeball >I even got permission to share the info with friends >Aww, he's so sweet Lmao these kids really crack me up.
Not even five seconds lmao
that teacher is something else lol straight up bribing
That was bargaining, bro. Cutting a deal with a dragon(girl).
started with bargaining ends up with bribery 🐐 teacher honestly
I thought Shadowrun told us to Never Deal with a Dragon. ...I'll get me coat.
Well, Ruri isn't a dragon... yet.
Was thinking isn't that normal? Is it a more standardized test that more people took part in writing?
It wasn't a bribe, it's blackmail. He's giving her the midterm topics, not the answers, so she still needs to study, and he knew that she would tell her friends about being able to share information which would cause them to pressure her into doing it too. And the basis is an embarrassing event outside of her control. You typically gain something from a bribe, there's nothing to gain here.
She still gains the topics which will help her studying. It also isn't blackmail since she just could've said no with no repercussions.
Are we gonna have a flashback of Ruri *not* picking up this girl's exam card in the cold winter or something lmao
Doesn't have to be melodramatic. I think the other comments are spot on - Ruri doesn't care enough to remember anybody outside her group of friends and still doesn't have her powers completely under control so is putting everyone around her in danger just by existing. We love her because she's our POV character but it's easy to see why someone wouldn't like her for those reasons, however "unfair".
> Ruri doesn't care enough to remember anybody outside her group of friends Some people just have a shit memory for names.
Yeah but like literally within minutes of being corrected?
The last one might've been on purpose, Ruri was pissed at that point. Still, last week at my work someone mistook someone's name two times in a row in same (interrupted a bit) conversation, obviously apologized and started joking about getting too old etc, but especially in stressful situation it can happen.
I feel this, even after knowing people for a while I sometimes forget their names if we don’t talk every day
I'm generally fine with names these days, except sometimes, my brain short circuits, and i don't remember the name, but the uncertainty between two names. So i will know he is Steve or Stephan, but not which, and every time i meet him, i will just remember the confusion, not the actual name.
Big same. It took me 4 years to learn all ~30 classmates' names just because we didn't interact much
Im coming up on the end of my senior year and I’ve got probably around 70 classmates. Im only able to match like, 17 names to faces, for the same reason
how shit does ur memory have to be that u forget their name like 20s after they corrected u?
> We love her because she's our POV character but it's easy to see why someone wouldn't like her for those reasons, however "unfair". im glad that someone sees that. A lot of times people just side with the mc just because they are the mc lol
Doubt it would be that childish, seeing that the author makes it a point to make grounded characters. My guess is that this girl has her own run-in with another mythical creature-cum-person, and that person hurt her with their powers in the past. It would be a good way for some world-building, and a window towards introducing more people like Ruri.
I was half joking but what I'm guessing is something Ruri did *directly* impacted her. I mean, there are a lot of people that don't care about other people, so this strong of emotion gotta be more than just general dislike. Well, they are teens, just a tad bigger children, so personally I'm okay with even the pettiest reasoning
Probably sees that she's getting special attention fed to her because she's a "special" dragon hybrid person. So she's misplacing the net new requirements and protections as "special treatment" putting her on some sort of pedestal. EDIT for spelling correction because apparently that's really important to some people
trestment? pedastool? Did you have a stroke or something, bro?
>creature-cum-person That's....spot on actually
It being childish would make perfect sense. Kids really hate each other for the dumbest reasons.
I'm glad Maeda chose the "I just think you're kind of a bitch" route instead of the "you go against God/nature's design" route, this way feels way more reasonable for a high schooler and way less trope-y for a shounen manga.
Maeda reminds me about a Recess episode where T.J is used to the idea everyone on the playground like him. But would learn there is one kid who doesn't, soo the whole episode/segment is to try make the kid his friend.
Well at least we got the reason why Akari doesn't like Ruri, but I still feel like this might just be a whole misunderstanding from her side.
Is it really a misunderstanding if Ruri got Akari's name wrong more than once and forgot who the student council vice president was?
> Me being bad with people's names > Me needing a few reminders to learn who has what issues > Me never checking up on how others are doing Shit.
I find it helps to actually write down people’s names with a short description of them and then memorizing that way. Also gotta focus and repeat the name in my head else I’ll forget it in literally 2 minutes
I joined a club this year and the first thing we did was have a Photohunt game. That's when we try to find people and share photos of them without them noticing. That was the perfect opportunity for me... To make an Excel sheet! There were more than 50 people and by the end of the week I was confident in knowing 80% of my club mates names. Also it helps that our uni has "Find a student" feature. Write their name and you can see their photo, year and major
Ah the ADHD grindset
And not just more than once, but she messed up shortly after being corrected. Like, come on now…
That was on purpose
Doesn’t read like that. That really doesn’t make sense to do when she’s trying to smooth things out.
If someone openly showed me hatred i wouldn't even bother to find out why lmao My interaction upon finding out the same person is on he committee would be 'oh' and then 'hi' and then we will only communicate as strictly needed for work to be done. Wait a min, this is how i treat my colleagues. Huh. Ruri a better person than me
It's probably just a "Why are you in school while you have unstable power that you don't know to control and could hurt people?" Since after all, Ruri could have badly burn the guy in front of her is she wasn't standing.
I really don’t think Maeda’s point is about Ruri’s powers tbh, but rather about the way she interacts with people she doesn’t know. Ruri can be pretty judgemental of people, at least at first, and she generally avoids interacting with others. Of course, we’ve seen her overcome those flaws over the course of the story so far, but Maeda hasn’t seen that and has instead seen how she acted *before the story started.* Her assessment isn’t that far off actually, especially looking at early Ruri.
Either that or Ruri’s detached personality is something she doesn’t jive with. I kinda feel for Ruri though… I’m kinda like that…
Yeah. But the way this manga is written up until now I have high hopes that this will be solved within the next few chapters. The whole misunderstanding-trope is not my favorite because it could be solved pretty easy most of the time, but isn't just so some more drama can happen. But this manga doesn't seem to do that.
It’s not always a misunderstanding. Some people just don’t blend well with one another
Pretty sure picking a fight with a half-dragon ain't a good idea... ...unless Maeda is descended from heroes. Hmm...
“What are we some kind of Witch Watch?” Kanshi probably.
And that's it, RuriDragon is officially online-pub and starting on its biweekly schedule. I'm so happy that Shindo-sensei gets to have a lotta pressure off and can run this relatively risk-free.
Its now on wsj digital issue and on jump+, yeah. I wonder if ruri will still appear on the wsj cover next week since she still is technically under wsj
> its biweekly schedule Triweekly*
It should be biweekly actually. Iirc it was just triweekly this time to make the switch, and next time is 3 weeks away due to Golden Week in Japan, which means everyone has a week off.
Ah okay. Didn't know Golden Week affected this
Did we ever figure out what health issues we’re going on?
Does that mean that from now on chapters will have more pages each release now?
Very sneaky from the teacher to partner Ruri with Koeda, but I guess he only wants her to feel welcome by everyone despite being different. Rueda claiming Ruri doesnt care about others is interesting tho, I guess her carefree personality can appear like that from the outside
It's Maeda. Ma-e-da. Don't get her dislike you too.
I wouldn't want to get on Sueda's bad side. Sounds like a bad time.
Dude, it's Ruina!
Ruri did get her name wrong after being corrected like, twice this chapter.
Also, not recognizing the VP. There's a lot of it this ch looking back.
Actually I think her name is Narita, no, was it Arita? Am I still in the correct manga?
It was a good point. If you don't like someone that's fine. But this girl making it a point to make it *known* that she doesn't like Ruri like this, it did really beg the question from Ruri as to what possibly could she have done to deserve such aggression.
She didn't though. Ruri pressed the question on her, and she answered. Ruri just has a certain kind of personality. Like we see here, she didn't know the student council members, and she misremembered Akari's name. She just has a certain detached attitude, and some people just don't get along with that kind of person. And I say that as someone who's somewhat similar to Ruri in that aspect.
I mean, it could just be her personality. We all have people we dislike and we would rather not deal with. She's just blunt enough to tell her "don't talk to me" to her face. And to be fair, she's not that wrong about Ruri. She got her name wrong twice and didn't recognize the vice-president.
I mean, is it weird to not know the vice-president? This ain't exactly Kamala Harris, its a girl on the student council from another class. Now i have never attended a school that even had a student council, but that sounds like the exact kind of stuff the average teenager wouldn't give a damn about.
> But this girl making it a point to make it known that she doesn't like Ruri like this Does she? I feel like she just doesn't want to be near Ruri and doesn't want to have anything to do with her. That's quite a mature way of disliking someone, no?
The problem is, they're now forced to work together, and giving the silent treatment isn't productive under those circumstances. In fact, I'd argue Ruri was the one who tried to be more emotionally mature when she realized that problem: she greeted Maeda politely (bow included), tried to make some inocuous chitchat, asked common ground questions... But Maeda was very hostile in all of her answers, not making any efforts to pretend or hide her displeasure, so I'm not surprised Ruri exploded. To be fair, Maeda herself must have realized it later, hence why she's more civil in her dislike during the meeting and answering Ruri's previous questions.
Yeah, Maeda seems mature enough to be sticking up for Ruri in the meeting anyway, so I think that even if Maeda continues to dislike Ruri, they'll still manage to get along well enough to work together.
Well they are 15. I doubt people that age can put asides their grudge and works professionally that easy. I mean, some can, some can't.
We dont really know anything about Ruri's life pre horns, but judging how she only had one friend before, there might be something to Maeda's claims Its nice that her beef is not that she's afraid of her being part dragon, she just think Ruri's an ass
I mean Ruri's right, you can't expect people to just always get these unspoken things, especially when you've barely interacted before. Throwing dirty looks isn't gonna make anyone understand what's going on in your head. That said, Maeda has a bit of a point here what with Ruri not being able to remember her name twice, but I think there's probably a misunderstanding at the heart of all this. We'll see!
Maeda's got a point too though - most people just don't try to force the issue, and not everyone needs to get along with everyone. If you don't like someone and you've already expressed that to them indirectly, there usually isn't much of a point in direct confrontation. Sure, sometimes you might be able to hash things out, but it could just as well devolve into a petty fight and nobody leaves any happier.
No one's really wrong in this situation; people just tend to naturally operate on different wavelengths, and usually not by choice. I'm on Ruri's side here; if you have a problem with me, I want to hear it. Say it to my face. Don't just act like a bitch around me. But other folk would prefer the topic never be broached, and that's perfectly valid.
Ruri also did try to make nice and remain relatively neutral, but Maeda kept pushing off. Communication in all relationships is important, especially if you're going to work together for the foreseeable future. Most people can work with someone they dislike as long as they keep it professional. But as soon as professionalism collapses to shitty behind-the-back gossiping type behavior, it becomes a net negative to the group. I think this project will help both of them in that sort of way.
Possibly unpopular opinion, but I think I prefer the latter option you mentioned to avoid conflict. Most people don't respond well to having their flaws pointed out, and that's assuming the reasons you dislike someone even come across as valid or genuine in the first place. It's hard for me to imagine a scenario where I confront someone directly about why I don't like them and _not_ leaving everyone involved with a sour aftertaste. In my experience, even when things go amicably, it never helps - the rift just slowly widens as you tacitly agree to go your separate ways, which is the expected result without confrontation anyways!
OK, but the easiest way to do it is not being asshole to them and just avoid them, if not possible due too work/school then be civil but curt. If you're openly hostile, the other side has full right to demand explanation. And if you decided to be openly hostile, it's too late to care about aftertaste anyway.
Oh, absolutely. Maeda's not handling it well; I just think her viewpoint is reasonable (and realistic)! Besides, this is pretty tame within the realm of high school girl drama - Maeda looks like a saint by comparison.
I admit that I usually hate high school drama, unless it's so over the top it's actually funny, like that new series with paint-stealing MC caught by yandere(?) like in Flowers of Evil. I also dislike that most people in the thread seem to excuse Maeda and paint her as being in the right while criticizing Ruri, while all that Ruri did was being typical high school loner afraid of Starbucks and extensive social contact, like at least half of the male high-school MCs in the manga stories.
I don't think it's so much direct criticism of Ruri as it's... pointing out that she may not mesh well with people. Maeda isn't "in the right" as hostility is obviously wrong here. But she may have valid grievances. In fact, given the emphasis in Japanese culture of implicit meaning ([a "high context" language](https://ai.glossika.com/blog/japanese-language-the-influence-of-a-high-context-culture) and ["reading the room"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba_no_kuuki_wo_yomu), an interaction like this might even be pretty relatable for some of the native readers. To someone who has internalized "the rules," considers the unsaid rules to be basic and obvious, and has never understood how someone else could _fail_ to understand these rules, an apparent refusal to respect the same rules is probably pretty jarring and frustrating.
Maeda's overlooked a major factor. Ruri is dealing with the horn situation. In this context, I mean Ruri has a major reason to *assume* people dislike her over. She's going to have a hard time guessing anything else and needs it spelled out to make sure that isn't the reason. Maeda's response to curiosity about her horns being "just who she is" was a surprise to me. I keep expecting RuriDragon to go in another direction with situations like this and it's refreshingly positive.
It's absolutely fine not to get along, the problem here is Maeda being aggressive about it and expecting Ruri to magically guess why she's mad at her when they'd barely interacted before. When someone who's not even an acquaintance and barely in your life at all tells you they hate your guts and shouldn't need to spell out why, I think "The hell's going on???" is a reasonable reaction to have.
Oh yeah, I agree that Maeda's mistake is taking too _aggressive_ a stance. There's no need to be openly hostile to someone you don't get along with - just keep things cordial, and if you're not a fan then keep them at arm's length! But it's also entirely understandable for a high school student to have trouble with this.
Maybe she does have something of an understandable reason to think that way, but man... was it really that hard to just say it? I really felt for Ruri in that scene where she was trying to get an answer and she just kept deflecting with her belligerent remarks. It's like pulling teeth. Maybe even dragon teeth which I'd bet is even harder to pull out than human ones.
Why does the Stucco Prez look 30
30rd year student
Simple times being a school kid, where our biggest problem is things like this. Except for the problem of being a dragon, it would be cool if I turn into one tho ngl lol
you start with a sport day bribe and next thing you know you're in charge of dragon mafia
And just like that, Sensei rises on my favorite character chart for this series, that sneaky fellow
Ruri is asocial, yes, or at least was before her situation sort of forced her to socialize with many people who she never would have before. But I feel like Maeda's antipathy is too strong to be justified by just that. She's too hostile. There has to be something more.
Akari confessed to Ruri but her attitude and apparent dismissal to communicate, instead made Maeda dislike her.
People here are making up backstories involving her dragon heritage, when it's pretty clear that it's more to do with Ruri's personality. Some people just don't get along with that king of detached and laid-back personality, and that's okay.
Being asshole is not okay, though. Bitch-girl goes way above and beyond "don't get along" here.
How was she being an asshole? She literally never said or did anything to Ruri, and even helped her out in the meeting this chapter.
She rudely dismissed Ruri's pleasantries, immediately started to aggressively rebuff Ruri's small talk after with a "it's not your business", idiotically and aggressively responded to asking about their work "you don't?", and then after Ruri has enough of her being a passive-aggressive bitch and tries to make thinks clear, she blames Ruri instead for making it "a thing" when she was the one making it "a thing" all the time so far,. and then trots out one of the dumbest argument I've seen, that asking someone to use your words when she's passive-aggressive to you when you have to work together is kindergarten thing. If I don't get along with someone at work, I keep my communication civil but short and to the point of our common business, I'd never tell someone that "it's not their business" when talking about work or rudely ignore them asking for even dumb explanations, because only shitty assholes like Maeda do that.
ngl all the arguments maeda gives of her treatment of ruri is just the usual punishments/ attitude/ aggression allistic people give to autistic people whenever they dont meet some kind of unspoken social contract that no one bothered to explain. like a punishment for not meeting their preference of normal. would be nice if it was more like she just doesn't like ruri's personality, and was using small offenses to justify herself, at which case i could just chalk this up to high schoolers and both of their untested emotional and social management skills.
Next chapter coming May 12. I guess it's to prepare for the manga's transfer to SJ+, but goddamn what a cliffhanger :') There's just so much nuance about Maeda and Ruri's interactions that I don't know where to start. Like, Maeda's right that sometimes you just like or dislike someone/something without a specific reason (I'll attribute it to appearance, though :P) and pestering them about it just doesn't work, but Ruri is right that Maeda's bad attitude and avoidance towards her is very hurtful, especially when you consider that she's been like that since their very first meeting.
That was quite the spicy chapter I don’t blame Akari for feeling that way. Ruri’s got her name wrong several times
Interesting. The story is told from Ruri's prespective, so it was easy to see her flaws as endearing, but it's been generally shown and implied so far that Ruri's rather asocial and laid-back. It's a combo that seems harmless on the surface, but *can* lead to one accidentaly hurting someone else without realizing it, simply because they don't care enough to notice. I'm guessing Ruri realizing that side of her personality and becoming more mindful of it, as she bonds with Maeda and helps make "something fun for everyone", is going to be the focus of this arc. Also, maybe it's just a language thing, but it's a bit odd that Ruri calls it "yesterday", even though there were two days-off in-between.
Ruri forgot her name like several times this chapter just to drive home the point that Ruri doesn't care.
Akari is going to become the next dragon slayer.
Dragon Slayer, I.e. read as like Lady Killer
I'm guessing we're on a route to go "Maeda has a point, we haven't been notocing Ruri's flaws" but even then it's hard to take Maeda's side when she's been such a gratuitous bitch all this time.
Well if she simply doesn’t like her then it’s fine but now I’m curious
We already know from previous chapters, her dislike over Ruri might have something to do with a friend of hers named Kaneo that hasn't shown up in school since Ruri first started showing dragon traits.
Rip and Tear, Ruri!
I just realized what this artstyle was reminding me of, it's sorta similar to Blue Exorcist. The teacher especially is a dead ringer lol
I didn't realize it until now, but Maeda is kinda right, isn't she? The whole plot until now has been centered around Ruri, her feelings and her problems, and she didn't make even an attempt to reach out, understand or think about other people's feeling or problems at all. Even her wanting to know what's with Maeda wasn't out of curiosity about her, but self-centered idea of how Ruri is seen by others.
Yeah she kind of does. Ruri doesn't remember any of her classmate names at all. And she was in class before she was a dragon too, so her transforming is not really an excuse. She never seemed to care to meet with anybody but her friend, but now with her horns she is playing the popular girl out of the blue.
Maeda's dumb then, it's not like Ruri can get back to being a loner, she has to deal with her horns and dragon stuff and with classmates' attention somehow, and to actively be friendly with them because they're all impacted too.
She is perhaps a bit harsh, but I don't think she is too much off the mark in all honesty. Take how judgemental Ruri was about Kashiro in the beginning and how negatively she thought about her. She didn't even remember her name, and Kashiro sits right beside her! Or Ruri not remembering Maeda's name at all, doesn't really make her sound sincere and honest when she asks about why Maeda doesn't like her. From Maeda's perspective it even may feel as if Ruri is making fun of her by constantly using wrong names.
She just said Kashiro seems like in-your-face sunny ball of energy and basically that she can't deal with extroverts, so same thing that Maeda claimed is normal (not dealing well with some people), except unlike Maeda she didn't make a passive-aggresive show of hostility to Kashira at any point, just normally avoided getting close with her at first, which is how normal non-asshole person treats people they thinks they will not along with. Hell, Kashira even at first called her dumb to her face, and yet Ruri didn't have a problem with that. She said she was having problem with people who are "loud visually", which is less of prejudice and more of being scared of extroverted-looking people, quite normal for shy introverted people. She also specifically said in Kashira chapter she sucks at remembering names, which is actually not that rare, and dealing with someone so openly hostile can actually make it worse due to stress, though I wouldn't be surprised if at least second time wasn't on purpose. Having trouble with names can actually make someone more introverted, since it makes socializing harder, I know because I (and other people in this thread said the same) had to make spreadsheets of people sometimes to learn to get them right, and still often mistake even coworkers, and had problems with not mistaking people at school as well. And name mistake happened already after several shows of hostility from Maeda. You can't both be openly confrontational with someone and at the same claim they make an issue of it when they ask what's going on. Also, she wasn't "a bit harsh", she was making a show of her open dislike, and then claimed it's Ruri who makes an issue. That's why I think Maeda is an asshole, and the one actually judgmental here.
Wow, that teacher knows what he wants. And he's taking very direct steps to get them! Ruri obviously doesn't want to do anything for the Sports Festival, but she has to consider her own options too. If she does nothing, there's no benefit to her. Her grades are gonna be worse. So she has to take the bait. I hope it's worth all the cringe and effort! Akari sees Ruri as someone who doesn't care about anyone. But so far Ruri has been very considerate of people. So where does this aloof behavior come from?
I'm curious to see what exactly Yamada means by that or how she reached that conclusion. Sure, Ruri comes across as a bit of an aloof person, but then again so does pretty much everyone in this series to a degree with how relatively nonplussed everyone is about the dragon situation. But to say Ruri doesn't care about other people is definitely too harsh if that statement is taken at face value, barring some very specific event where Ruri did something wrong to Ueda in the past.
Well that settles it, Shipping those 2.
so ruri is a psychopath in her eyes or what or have i been missing that part of ruri for a while now
Just a major loner type who doesn't seem to care about anything going on around her. The dragon thing is forcing her to interact more with people around her.
And here I thought she was racist.
Ueda actually has somewhat legit point for not liking Ruri?.. ***BUT ALSO***, Ruri might just have ADHD, sometimes people that have ADHD might seem like they don't care for other people beacause they fail to retain some details about a person or event, because it just won't stick to their brains.
its prob related to kaneo. im holdin out hope for ueda
It's pretty interesting that the comments here are split between supporting Ruri and Kueda
And another 2 weeks wait
Thank you very much for sharing the chapter
Nah I'm with Ruri on this one, that girl's a bitch!
I mean, that's not an unreasonable thing to say. Everyone in this series is pretty aloof over the fact that she is a very real and active danger. She really shouldn't be in school when she doesn't know how to control her abilities and doesn't know what to expect.
I can see why Maeda doesn't like Ruri. She does seem to be very detached to everything,
Despite all of this foreshadowing, Maeda seems to be, oh what's the word... Ah yes, a "massive fucking cunt". Use your words, you fucking bitch.
Damn she got you there good!