Chapter : Concentric Crowns & Crescent Cravings
The rain had decided to fall sideways again, drumming on their balcony’s metal railing like a legionary on parade. Inside, the living-room lights were lowered to a honey-gold hush.
1 Eriko and the Purple Dyarchy
Eriko’s desk looked less like a piece of furniture and more like a tactical map of Late Antiquity. Sticky notes formed tiny frontiers across a spread of books: Panegyrici Latini here, Lactantius’ De Mortibus Persecutorum there, and—dead center—a reproduction of the porphyry Tetrarchs relief from San Marco.
She took a slow breath, tracing the sculpture’s braided arms.
Four men, one stone, one empire.
Diocletian’s ideological masterstroke, she mused, wasn’t merely administrative. By pairing Jovius with Herculius, Augustus with Caesar, he’d staged an embodied analogy: plurality that remained indivisible—con-cordia cast in porphyry. No wonder later bishops scrambled for language to describe three hypostases sharing one ousia.
On her legal pad Eriko sketched an arrow from “JUPITER-FATHER” to “PATER NOSTER” and another from “FILIUS VICTOR” to “FILIOQUE.” With a wry smile she wrote:
Even the Council of Nicaea keeps purple dust on its sandals.
2 Sammi and the Ring-Shaped Revelation
Across the room, Sammi nestled into their corduroy sofa, a package of matcha-white-chocolate doughnuts balanced perilously on her knee. Shio Usui’s Doughnuts Under a Crescent Moon lay open to Chapter 34, the panel where Subaru, cheeks blazing, realizes that Fuuka’s gentle patience isn’t pity—it’s love. Sammi reread the speech bubble aloud, softly:
“I want to be the place you come home to.”
A lump formed in her throat. Just last month Subaru still doubted whether a “messy” girl could deserve romantic happiness. Now she was daring to define it. The resonance hit Sammi like warm sugar: hadn’t she, once upon a suitcase of dysphoria, feared she was “too much” to love?
She bit half a doughnut, savoring the sweetness, then reached for her phone and typed a quick note for Eriko:
Subaru’s arc = dissolution of the old imperial self?
She would spring that comparison later, when her philosopher was most unsuspecting.
3 Fault Lines Converge
A thunderclap rattled the window. Eriko pushed her chair back and stretched. “Sammi,” she called, slipping into her soft-lecturer voice, “did you ever notice how marketing posters under Diocletian always depict the emperors embracing? Arms interlaced, two pairs—but you can’t tell whose limbs belong to whom.”
“Mmm,” Sammi answered without looking up. “Almost like a manga panel where bodies blur because feelings outrun the ink.”
Eriko chuckled. “Exactly—but with more beards and less screentone.” She crossed to the sofa, sitting at Sammi’s feet. “The point was to reassure citizens that four rulers could function as one mind. The early Church later had to do something similar—explain how Father, Son, and Spirit are distinct yet consubstantial.”
Sammi shut her book. “So you’re saying the Trinity chats in a group DM titled ‘Team Empire’?”
Eriko rolled her eyes, delighted. “More or less—though I suspect their emoji game is terrible.”
Sammi twirled a strand of red hair. “Funny. Fujiwara—uh, the editor—worries readers won’t buy Subaru and Fuuka as equals. They come from such different workplaces, different confidence levels. I keep yelling, That’s the beauty! They fit because the gap lets them stretch toward each other.”
Eriko blinked, recognition dawning. “Perichōrēsis.”
“Peri-what-now?”
“The dance of mutual indwelling in Cappadocian theology. Each divine person envelops and is enveloped by the others without losing selfhood. Your manga couple… they ‘perichoreo.’ They revolve like dancers under a crescent moon.”
Sammi’s grin went wide. “Eriko, you just spliced fourth-century Greek jargon into a yuri manga analysis and made it work. That’s illegal in at least twelve provinces.”
“Diocletian would legalize it with an edict.” Eriko clasped Sammi’s ankle through the blanket. “May I borrow your volume?”
Sammi handed it over. “Trade you for a mini-lecture: how exactly did a four-man boardroom turn into a three-person Trinity?”
Eriko leaned back, the manga resting on her knees now. “Well, imagine the empire’s ideological scaffolding as a set of nested rings. The Tetrarchy’s ring was broken during the civil wars; Constantine welded a new ring around his dynasty, branding himself the thirteenth apostle. When bishops wrestled over divine hierarchy, they unwittingly recycled imperial language: homonoia, concord, even the imagery of radiant crowning. The difference? They trimmed the roster from four to three—but doubled down on the claim of indivisibility.”
Sammi’s eyes danced. “So Constantine basically re-cast the show with fewer leads but higher stakes, like when Doughnuts shifted from office ensemble to intimate dyad.”
Eriko snapped her fingers. “Exactly!”
4 The Moment of Fusion
Outside, the rain eased to a hush. Sammi patted the cushion beside her. “Come here, professor. This panel—look.” She pointed to Subaru and Fuuka leaning over a single umbrella, the crescent moon a sliver above.
Eriko studied it, then turned the page to reveal Subaru’s confession in a quiet side-street. The lantern light mirrored the glow of Sammi’s desk lamp across the room.
“It’s a porphyry relief in paper form,” Eriko whispered. “Two figures carved into one emotional stone.”
Sammi took Eriko’s hand. “And your Tetrarchs—four emperors hugging it out under Jupiter’s watchful eye.” She squeezed. “Every era carves its own way of saying we belong together.”
Eriko exhaled, a soft shiver of gratitude. “Sammi… thank you for being the footnote that makes my thesis breathe.”
“And you,” Sammi said, “are the meta-narrative that makes my fluff profound.”
They laughed, lips brushing in an almost-kiss that lingered like incense.
5 Coda: One Empire, Two Hearts, Many Doughnuts
Later, they stood by the balcony, sharing the last doughnut as the storm clouds broke. A shy crescent moon peeked out, silvering the wet city streets.
Eriko raised her half-circle of pastry. “To emperors who learned to share a throne.”
Sammi tapped her piece against it. “To manga heroines who learn to share a future.”
They ate in silence, chewing the same sweet lesson: multiplicity is only scary until you taste how well the pieces fit.
No comments:
Post a Comment