Exactly over a year ago from this day, I was frantically scanning the internet everywhere for any news of the finale of Hayate.
Those were dark times. After all, the HayaNagi fanbase is quite miniscule and worst of all, not very vocal compared to other shippers -- especially Athena's. Also, to complicate things further, I would say that HayaNagi is probably the fanbase with the most amount of haters -- because as the finale approached, many former shippers who had their own ships sunk immediately jumped ship to any other ship other than Nagi while spouting all kinds of ridiculous claims against my ship.
Of course, at the end of the day, shipping wouldn't really do a thing. At this point, Hata had already drawn the final pages of Hayate and sent it to his publishers. There was literally nothing anyone could do whether or not they supported Hayate x Nagi in order to change the ending.
Still, while being fully aware of this, I couldn't help being totally stressed out. I've said it before, but I lost a good amount of weight just waiting for the ending.
And then the spoiler pages came in the Chinese forums. The Chinese-fluent Maria shippers rejoiced at the prospect that their girl would win because apparently, Hata sunk Nagi's ship back in chapter 567 (he obviously didn't).
Still, the amount of relief and joy that I felt when I saw those last few colored panels -- as chopped up as they were, was simply indescribable.
Drama aside, we celebrate that day today... well, actually, 24 hours ago if we follow Japan's timeline strictly. The haters could write all the essays they wanted to about how horrible the ending was and how any other girl except Nagi would have been so much more fitting -- but it wouldn't change a thing. NAGI HAD WON! HAYATE X NAGI IS THE CANON ENDING. The naysayers from the western fanbase were frantically editing the wiki and tvtropes articles to write this off as an "ambiguous ending," but of course, these were all lies. Lies which they, to this day, dishonestly propagate.
But don't take my word for it, the writing is on the wall. On Hata's Pixiv, Blog, and of course, in the supplemental material of Volume 52. If you couldn't take the ending in the final chapter at face value, then the additional material is right there to confirm or disprove your beliefs. Check it out for yourself if you still have doubts. It's verifiable, testable, and Hata is still alive and sometimes active on twitter to answer you. He also drew some commemorative artwork today btw. Hata's Twitter: https://twitter.com/hatakenjiro
Anyway, what were your experiences leading up to the finale? Were you on my ship? Did you ship somebody else? I'm not really interested in your personal interpretation of the ending at this point if you think Hayate x Nagi isn't a thing, but do tell me if you have any interesting experiences to share from just a year ago.
SEE YOU NEXT WEEK!
Fanart Corner
I've been drawing a lot more lately. Recently started painting in acrylic too. I think I prefer it over oil as a medium. Less messy and easier to work with. Even easier than watercolors, IMO. It's also easier to paint over than watercolors which need to be applied sparingly in order to look good IMO. Anyway, I'm still finalizing the acrylic painting and will have it up next week.
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| Why is Hata's art for today so similar to mine? I assure you, we both posted it just today. |
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| My goal here was to make her look like a 3D rendered model. Did I succeed? |
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| Did I already post this? I forgot. |
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| I think I posted this last week... oh well. |
It's hard to believe one year has gone by; it feels like the chapter came out yesterday. I was so happy when I read it. It was really difficult thinking that I'm a lone hayate x nagi supporter until I came across this blog and found few others also who support them. Even though we are few in number, our ship won. I was profoundly happy at the release of chapter 568 and shall always celebrate hayanagi being canon.
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