It is a story about self discovery, and the long road to recovering one’s own identity after years of abuse and self neglect. V’s story is one we can all learn from.
I’ve heard that there’s been a lot of V hatred, and uh… That’s not okay.
Listen, I’ll be the first to admit that at the beginning of MysMe, I really disliked V. Not hate him, per se, but… Disliked him. And after the secret stories? I only pitied him. He was characterized originally as the “brooding artist” (and thanks, but I’ve had enough of that mess) who romanticized mental illness, mental pain, until it came back to bite him in the ass.
We can’t, no, we shouldn’t deny that in some way V is to blame for Rika’s breakdown, though I don’t doubt she would have lost it eventually by losing herself to her own delusions and machinations. Where V faltered, is in his lack of understanding. He didn’t understand himself, he didn’t understand other people, but most importantly? He didn’t understand that true love is something one must feel for one’s own self before feeling it for another person. He appeased the shit out of Rika, and he obsessed- YES RIKA, OBSESSED- over her until she snapped, and in turn, she obsessed and wounded him until he couldn’t see himself as anything other than “Rika’s Sun.” Until he lost himself. Until he defined himself by the actions and suffering she inflicted upon him, by only his past pain and failed attempt at renewal.
In a metaphorical sense? The neglect and carelessness he inflicted upon Rika was really in the end the abuse he inflicted upon himself. That’s not to say “he deserved it.” Far from that. He never deserved it, no one deserves that. No one deserves to be dammed with the incapability of loving themselves. Least of all those who were not taught selflove from the beginning.
V learns that you cannot define yourself by the love you give others, nor by the love you wish to receive from others. You must define yourself by the love you feel for your own, personal self.
After struggling through “Another Story,” fighting for this wonderful man’s freedom, from his abuser, from his own self hatred from his own self-abuse…?
I see people treating all the bullshit in V’s route as a lover’s spat and I’m like???
ok, but creating an entire cult and manipulating and drugging SEVERAL PEOPLE into it is more than some sort of petty lovers’ drama
it just so happens that there was an infatuated mentally ill, emotionally conflicted, depressed, love depraved, abused man who used to be in a relationship with a mentally ill, paranoid, depressed, delusional, also love depraved woman in the midst of the story.
like… mint eye did not stem from v and rika’s relationship, mint eye was also a thought and an idea that rika had long before she even brought it up to v. mint eye existed before the rfa, did you forget how we see preteen saeran being abused and drugged in secret ending one, waaaay before the rfa existed?
i don’t know if I should feel concerned or morbidly amused at the fandom’s treatment of this. give the v route more credit than that, the story is way more than two people who fell in “love” and then argued.
there are elements of abuse, neglect, torture, mental illness, manipulation, betrayal, trust and change.
rika and v’s relationship isn’t the main focus and it isn’t what started all of this, neither is it what ended it.
heck, the whole point of days 8-10 of v’s route is convincing v that him turning himself over to rika would accomplish nothing, because even if he wants this to be only between him and her, it’s… really not. There was no “them” in this situation.
i mean, it’s v’s route, so the main point of it is to make him feel better and heal him and restore his sense of self and ability to love himself, so many people might have missed that point.
but like… this is so much more than that. It’s a complicated series of events that needs to be treated with sensitivity and thought.
V’s route is not a “lover’s spat”. It stopped having anything to do with an argument between lovers (and lesbihonest V and Rika’s “fights” consisted of rika having an episode, yelling her throat raw at v, and him just sitting there and taking it, this is canon and shown in a VN) the moment Rika took a child- an abused, vulnerable child- and drugged and abused him further into a cult, alienating him against the only person who ever loved him and even possibly being the reason behind his D.I.D symptoms. Also, there was that little thing where…y'know, she kinda dragged another whole bunch of people into her cult. That was nice.
My point is… There’s a lover’s spat, and then there’s blinding your fiance and running away to fully moderate a cult 24/7. There’s a lover’s spat and then there’s having an unhealthy infatuation towards your ex and being convinced that letting her torture you will solve the world’s problems.
