The story I want to share with you today is called "Song of the Night", also known as "Nocturne", also known as "The Song that Wanders in the Night", also known as "Blood Tasting After Becoming Husband and Wife", also known as "Why My Friend Can't Meet This Kind of Good Thing." ”
Of course, I made up the book name that didn't have the title in the back...
It's a love routine, and like other everyday comics, it's unusual.
The story begins one night.
The sophomore night watchman, who has excellent grades and is very popular but a little afraid of society, is beginning to hang out at night for the first time in his life.
Like many friends who experience the night for the first time alone, the night watchman enjoys the comfort and mystery of the night excitedly, while imagining what to do at night.
Finally, after flipping through the old half-day web forum, the 14-year-old teenager decided to buy a can of beer with excitement... Uh no, juice to drink.
Just as he was hesitating in front of the vending machine, a mysterious girl wearing a hood suddenly appeared beside him, and the first words she said were:
A sentence almost scared away our underage male protagonist, if he ran a little faster, then the comic can be directly finished.
But in fact, he was grabbed by the girl, dragged to the front, and a sentence hit the heart.
"You, can't sleep?" Let me help you. ”
With a little curiosity, the night watchman agreed so vaguely.
Then the maiden took him on a wanderer in the streets of the night.
They first met three confused drunken uncles, and Night Watch was surprised to find that even if the girl did not know these three uncles, she could chat with them with only three or two sentences, as if they were a group of old friends.
When it was his turn to greet him, the appearance of the only promise actually caused an embarrassment, and he still relied on the mysterious girl to save the scene.
The night watchman was puzzled, but the girl told him—
"It's late at night, it's free time."
Immediately after, the girl invited the night watchman to her house for the night...
Just after arriving home, the girl took off her coat and invited the night watchman to sleep with... This "free" scene suddenly startled the night watchman, and just when he wanted to turn around and run away, he was caught by the girl again, and made a rather ambiguous persuasion.
Then, the boy really lay down in a daze...
Do you think the wheels of the plot will run right into your face next? Not!
Shortly after the male protagonist used the "false sleep" skill, the enigmatic girl finally couldn't hold back her excitement and revealed her pair of evil fangs!
It was really fangs, very sharp ones, and one bite was bitten on the neck of the male protagonist Night Watch.
Speaking of this, I believe that all the old drivers should be able to see that this mysterious girl is a vampire.
The reason why she "seduced" the night watchman like this was just to find a midnight snack to fill her stomach in the middle of the night.
However, to the surprise of the vampires, the blood of our night watchman classmates was actually particularly delicious, and just one bite down, the whole ghost was hilarious.
Since he has been chewed by a vampire, according to the traditional routine, as long as he is not sucked to death, the male protagonist should transform into a vampire to awaken superpowers.
Indeed, he thought so himself, but unfortunately he did not.
Because in this comic, if you want to become a family member, you need a necessary condition -
Fall in love with vampires
What's even more interesting is that our protagonist Night Watch also found that the vampire girl who had been running trains and driving yellow chambers all night seemed to be a little shy when she mentioned "love".
She herself has a strong logic for this setting, that is, vampire blood sucking is equivalent to "indescribable" plus "eating", while satisfying two primitive desires.
Wouldn't it be disgusting to think that eating a meal would assimilate the ingredients into the same kind?
Hmmm – that makes sense.
So, in order to figure out some problems (to ease the atmosphere), the girl explained and returned to the street with the night watchman.
In this way, they have a pair of small talk about the dull daily life of school, the love troubles of adolescent girls, and the problems that only occur during the day.
It was also in these small talks that night watchman suddenly realized that his former self only wanted to do something that was in line with the rules and the so-called right.
Usually life is step by step, but I don't have what I want to accomplish, and I don't have anyone I want to become.
He himself has always seemed perfect and obedient, but he can't say what interest he has, let alone any desire.
At first, it may just be because of some annoyance, or a momentary impulse.
The boy sneaked out with his family behind his back, and as a result, he tasted the freedom of the night like a forbidden fruit.
At this moment, the vampire girl stood in front of him, and every word she said before the day came was tapping his gradually restless heart.
"The world of the night is the farthest place from the troubles and sorrows in your heart.
It would be a shame not to continue doing such a thing. ”
"And jumping out of the daily prison, what makes you feel?"
Perhaps it was at this moment that the Night Watch, like one of his predecessors, realized, "Human beings have limits, and his own limitations are even stronger." ”
He didn't want to go on like this anymore, he needed a help.
Then, a bold decision came out in the back of my mind—
He's not a man anymore!
Finally, our night watchman bravely stood up and announced loudly to the vampire girl in front of him that he was going to try to fall in love with her, only begging her to assimilate himself.
In exchange, the maiden only had to suck a little of his blood every night as a delicious snack.
A lime-like night ghost love story has thus begun.
In the days that followed, they flew at night, shuttled through the streets and alleys, observed and experienced another picture of the world under the filter of night, and felt the thousands of worldly feelings given to people by the hustle and bustle of the day in silence and darkness, and the sequelae that could not be digested.
"Song of the Night" is a manga series published by Kotoyama (コトヤマ), the author of Rough Snack War, published in Weekly Shonen Sunday in August 2019, and published by Kokukan and Todate Press.
The painting style is unique, the subject matter is relatively niche, it belongs to the kind of quite interesting, like the special like, do not like the really like the slow hot fan.
The uniqueness of this love story is obvious, one of which is that the time is located at night, which itself has a little ambiguous and unclear color.
The second is that as a love film, there is actually a lot of space to discuss interpersonal relationships and growth issues.
In this regard, Qinshan's style seems quite real.
The male protagonist is not good at expression, the female protagonist is addicted to playing games, and this kind of social fear deepens the configuration of the house can reflect many problems.
The first question That Kotoyama asks in the comics is why more and more people like to stay up late.
This question is answered at the beginning:
Because people are not yet satisfied with today's day.
As a small expert in staying up late, I put aside the time of work and insomnia, but more of a "reluctant to sleep" mentality in staying up late, even if I get up the next day and get up sleepy to death.
Even though I didn't have anything to do at night, I really felt free.
Behind this "freedom," however, is the pressure and bondage that comes from the daytime.
Looking back at our childhood, I believe that most people have been clearly defined by various interest classes and homework arrangements as soon as they are born.
With the increasing number of inner volumes, this "forced arrangement" is gradually becoming younger and more serious, and even occupies most of our time except sleep.
When we don't have enough time to arrange ourselves to satisfy our desires and indulgences, perhaps the only time we can squeeze out is night.
The second lies in the "sense of loneliness" that is gradually scarce in the current environment, or a "sense of boundaries".
In fact, in the days when we are forced to work, we are also "forced to socialize" at the same time, and we are becoming more and more tired under the constraints of social rules.
This forced social state does not bring people closer together, but directly violates the boundaries of individuals.
This is well reflected in the manga "The cocktail party in the company is really annoying".
Ms. Kiyomi Shirakawa is an editor of a magazine.
She sees the company's cocktail party as a mental burden and is troubled by sexual harassment in the workplace.
One night, when she was once again fleeing from the company cocktail party with her tired body in tow, she suddenly remembered that she had received a very comfortable massage in the sleeping house of Shichikusa half a year ago.
That's right! As a vampire living in modern society, you can't do without the ability to make money!
And Xiao Shu's job is to open a massage room (she herself calls it a "sleephouse") to help others relax and sleep, the kind of business that is very serious.
In the small talk during the sleep massage, the night watchman learned that Bai He actually liked to be alone at night, there was no heavy work, no false smiles, no noisy noise and rules, and some were just alone clean.
Chatting and chatting, Bai He actually cried out.
In a long-term high-pressure working environment, she has long had enough.
At this time, the company called again, telling her to rush to work overtime at two o'clock in the middle of the night — during the time when she should have rested.
At that moment, the night watchman was deeply aware of the strong grievances and despair that appeared on Bai He's face.
Night watchman did not want to let Bai he go to the company, he felt that it was not normal to go to the company to work overtime in the middle of the night, and he did not want to see the woman in front of him leaving before he was fully happy.
The Seven Grass Grasses also understood and directly threw Bai He down the stairs.
Catching her as she was about to land, the two stood together in the middle of the road.
"Since everyone is not normal, why not indulge it?"
"When you walk to the middle of the road, who wouldn't want to indulge?"
Shirakawa laughed.
Xu was that the massage really relaxed her, or because the jump just now was too exciting, she laughed out loud for the somewhat angry teenager in front of her.
Although the teenager does not understand his own difficulties, he really hopes that he can truly be happy and relaxed.
She went to work anyway because that was her job and she couldn't do it.
She couldn't be willful because of a child's innocent words, but the honesty of the night watch did make her a lot happier.
I like the end of this article quite a bit.
In fact, "All Night Song" is full of many similar plots, making the audience feel innocent and cute but not losing their reality.
When boundaries are blurred, people tend to compensate for the "boundary" with some kind of "falsehood", but this compensation is only a stopgap measure.
In contrast, "solitude" and "quietness" are more of a scarcity and buffer, so we begin to draw this "loneliness" from the night to make ourselves feel at ease.
Having said so much miscellaneous, are you all about to forget that "All Night" was originally a love affair?
Admittedly, there are many other aspects of the manga, but it performs just as well in love-related plots.
What impressed me the most was the end of the article "My Parents Are Not Home Today".
After spending a long time with the Seven Grasses, night watchmen discover that vampires also have their difficulties.
They have to restrain their desire for blood, they have to face the eyes and opinions of others, they have to face the moral ethics of human society (although they are not constrained), and most realistically, they have to face a detective who hunts vampires...
"Night Watch, what did you really want to do after you became a vampire?"
"Why on earth would I want to be a vampire?"
The night watchman was also confused.
After countless nights he had seen, after being questioned by his best friends, and after he had faced unknown dangers, he found that he still knew very little about the vampire race.
All he saw was the joy of wandering around at night with the little grasshopper.
But life is not only happy, trouble and trouble are the norm.
Surprises are only the gifts of life, and ordinary daily life is the truth of life.
All of this, in essence, is seven passions and six desires, and there is no difference between human beings and human beings, he wavered.
He had asked Xiao Xing's vampire friends, and the detective who hunted the vampire.
Eventually, he invited Xiao Shu to his home to learn more about it.
But Xiao Xing's answer was:
"The reason you feel happy at night is because the 'everyday' of the night is 'abnormal'.
Your daily routine should have been daytime and on campus. ”
"When the night becomes your routine, can you still feel the same excitement?"
Are these things that make you feel happy now gradually becoming routine? ”
Eventually, the words end with The Little Wattle licking the tooth marks on night watchmen's neck instead of sucking blood, and then leaving.
And the best statement I've ever seen about this episode is the statement of an older brother in the comments section:
Many of the love affairs we have seen end with the male and female protagonists happily together (of course, there are also be).
But what Qinshan thinks, it seems, is that after "being together", are those that belong to daily life and peace.
Time does not stop because of the joy of love, and the beginning of love is always full of all kinds of surprises.
But when you recognize the truth behind love, when those passions gradually fade, do you dare to create surprises, dare to make the flame of enthusiasm go on?
"Loving others" is not an emotion, but an ability.
The size of ability determines the tone of emotional life and mixes the taste of daily life.
We are getting older, but the ability to "love others" is not necessarily stronger than that of a 14-year-old.
This point is reflected in "All Night Song", not only by the male and female protagonists, but also by the life patterns of other characters.
As a love fan, the content of its discussion is not limited to daily life, not limited to love, but multifaceted.
It seems that there is no main line, but it can be vaguely perceived that the author seems to be in the next big game.
Suddenly the whole life, so that at some point you will think that this is a battle fan...
In terms of plot, it seems to be slow and hot, and suddenly cheerful.
It has few sweet and greasy shows of love and affection, and more empathy and understanding (and your aunt laughs).
And the style of painting is also good, from the inside to find a cover or memes and the like can also be ...
This is the brilliance of "All Night Song".
It sees something a little higher than it does on a daily basis and bluntly throws out these questions.
It doesn't try to tell you anything, but rather maps the topic of "in love" to each other problem situations, allowing the reader to think in some places.
And what does Kotoyama, as a manga author, think?
"Let's seek redemption together in the night!"
She wrote so sincerely at the end of the volume.