#eng server

According to The Dragon's Image:

Regarding the Diasomnia insignia. Malleus says:

"It depicts the dragon from that the Thorn Fairy supposedly transformed into"

"They say her conflagrant breath was potents enough to burn down stone bridges."

"Diasomnia students thus bear her insignia wth fear engraved upon their hearts."

According to The Thorn Fairy's Crow:

"The Thorn Fairy did not have the most... reliable of subordinates."

"But she had a single crow so capable, it was effectively her right-hand man."

"It was a capable scout...' "And it guided allies as confidently as it stood against foes."

Malleus considers it skilled.

According to A Fearful Power:

According to Malleus, the reason "why the humans didn't invite the Thorn Fairy to the party" was because "people with power beyond conventional norms inspire fear."

"The Thorn Fairy was of a supreme caliber..." "...so the humans must have seen he as utterly unworldly."

"It's all too easy for (Malleus) to imagine how she..."

According to A Different Perspective:

Malleus wants to research the gargoyles in the Thorn Fairy's castle by reading in the school library.

"Allegedly, they were dreadful enough to send any would-be intruders running."

Malleus says "Using gutter-gargoyles to strike fear into the heats of her enemies..." "The Thorn Fairy definitely had a different perspective than most."

According to Across a Century:

Malleus was told "the Thorn Fairy enjoyed telling fairy tales."

"She once regaled a guest with a tale of lovers bound toogether across a century."

(Sebek "often entreats (Malleus) for anecdotes of the past." / And "has the highest praise for all of them, no matter what they're about." / Leading Malleus to muse if "Perhaps I have a knack for storytellng...")

According to Leagues Beyond:

(consisting of both Malleus and Sebek)

Sebek expresses his belief that Malleus is "bound to eclipse even the Thorn Fairy herself one day!"

Malleus disagrees.

"The Thorn Fairy is said to have been the most powerful of the Geat Seven by far." Malleus says "I can't even hold a candle to my grandmother yet. The Queen is leagues beyond me."

According to Perfect Decorum:

(consisting of Malleus and Lilia)

"They say that when the Thorn Fairy wasn't invited to a party..."

"She still maintained perfect decorum despite her offense."

(Said in context of Malleus not getting notice for the housewarden meeting and Lilia telling him not to "sulk" and to "learn from her".

To which Malleus replies to not "patronize" him, and that he "knows these things. Really.")

According to Alongside Me:

(consisting of Malleus and Jade)

Malleus and Jade speak of how "The Sorcerer of the Sands once located an individual-- a "diamond in the rough.""

"And he even scouted the man personally." Jade says "Maybe that's how one finds good talent."

Malleus remarks on how "The Gargoyle Studies Club gets no applicants" and considers reaching out to any "promising individuals" he sees in person.

He'd prefer people who would "appreciate and study gargoyles alongside (him)"

According to Hide-and-Seek:

(consisting of Malleus and Jade)

"It seems the Fairest Queen had a hidden chamber in her castle basement."

Jade asks if Malleus' castle in Briar Valley has any secret rooms.

Malleus "actually searched the castle as a child, hoping to find one."

Malleus says "Eventually I discovered a place I'd never seen before and hid myself there."

Malleus found amusement in seeing his retainers "running around frantically searching" for him.

Though Lilia found him in no time once "drawn into the commotion".

The English-language adaptation of Twisted Wonderland can suffer from the occasional discrepancy, but part of what seems like a mistranslation is sometimes an accurate translation of the meaning behind the characters’ dialogue; they’re just not saying what they mean!

In order to understand the language rules that Yana is breaking, let’s have a quick rundown of what the rules actually are.

The Japanese language involves three different alphabets:  ・Kanji: Adapted from Chinese kanji, Japanese kanji have largely evolved over generations, though there is still a lot of overlap between the different writing systems ・Katakana: phonetic symbols for words adopted from other languages ・Hiragana: originally based on kanji, hiragana are also phonetic symbols

Here is a screenshot of Ruggie using all three alphabets (plus romaji, the roman alphabet) in a line of dialogue: Green for the romaji, red for the kanji, purple for the katakana and blue for the hiragana.

In video games, novels, manga, subtitles and any place where there is kanji, there will often also be small hiragana (or sometimes katakana) written alongside it to tell the reader how it is pronounced. This is called “furigana”.

Furigana’s purpose is to tell the reader how to pronounce a kanji. Here are some examples of furigana in everyday life:

From left to right: In Toboso Yana’s manga “Black Butler”, furigana are listed alongside every single kanji, no matter how simple the word may be. In the Twisted Wonderland novelization, furigana are only listed alongside more complex kanji. In Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, even simple kanji are given furigana, to make it more accessible for all ages. This sign in a park also includes furigana over all kanji used.

Now that we know what furigana is and how it’s used, here is how Yana is using it for wordplay:

When Trey uses his unique magic on JP-server, this is what we see:

The command itself is inside the 『quotation marks』, where we see a combination of kanji and hiragana. Above it are a small line of furigana that are, in this instance, written in katakana.

The kanji/hiragana phrase is read as “bara wo nurou”, which should be what the furigana above it is saying, and would be what it would be saying in a normal situation, but it isn’t.

If you have your audio on you know that Trey is saying, aloud:  “Doodle Suit”, with “suit” referring to a “suit of cards” and “doodle” being just that, as his magic is overwriting (or “doodling” over) other people’s magic.

And if you’re on the EN-server, you know that Trey’s unique magic has been translated as “paint the roses”, which doesn’t match his audio clip at all.

And that is because “Doodle Suit” is the katakana, while “bara wo nurou" is the hiragana/kanji beneath it. And "bara wo nurou" means, “let’s paint the roses."

Yana is using furigana as a literary device, telling us that “Paint the Roses” is what Trey is saying, but he is pronouncing it as “Doodle Suit”.

English doesn’t have different alphabets to play with so authors can say “this is what the character is saying aloud, but it’s not what they actually mean”, so the translation team has had to decide on which set of text to use for each person’s unique magic on a case-to-case basis.

Riddle, for example, has a voice clip that matches the English-language translation of his unique magic, “off with your head”...mostly.

When Riddle uses his unique magic on JP-server, this is what we see:

Just like Trey thereis a combination of kanji and hiragana, with a small line of katakana above it that is supposed to be telling us how it’s pronounced, but is instead introducing entirely new sounds altogether.

The actual command itself is read as “Kubi wo hanero”, but Riddle is pronouncing it as “off with your head” (which is what it says in the katakana), so in his case the words he is saying and the English-translation of his unique magic match, while Trey’s do not.

(Note: “mostly," because “kubi wo hanero” is the literal line said by the Queen of Hearts in the Japanese-language dub of Disney’s original Alice in Wonderland movie. Much like the English “Off with his/her head” said by the Queen in the English version of the movie, it is technically a command to a third, unspecified person, but the EN-server translation chose to match to Riddle’s voice clip instead of translating literally, though that meant losing the direct homage to the original line in the movie.)

Other characters with unique magics that, like Riddle, were translated according to their pronunciation rather than their meaning are Cater, Ruggie, Jack, Azul, Jade, Floyd, Kalim, Vil, Idia, Malleus and Rollo.

What we end up with is three different things happening every time someone uses their unique magic:

What the character is saying out loud (the katakana)

2. What they actually mean (the kanji/hiragana)

3. How EN-server translated it (varying by situation)

Another interesting example is Jamil’s Unique Magic, which is actually said as “Snake’s Enticement / Invitation” but pronounced as “Snake Whisper”, which EN chose to write as “Snake Charmer” (this is not the English-translation of what “snake charming” is in Japanese. Snake charming is 蛇使い, while Jamil’s unique magic command is 蛇のいざない, so "charmer" was invented for EN).

Other characters with all-new versions of their unique magics created for EN are Deuce, Rook and Epel.

And unique magic isn’t the only place where Yana takes advantage of the various possibilities offered by furigana!

Floyd says the word “legs” and “us” aloud, but what he actually means are “fins” and “mer-people”.

Jamil says “Kalim” aloud, but what he actually means is “the heir of the main house”. This is a particularly significant use of furigana, as it illustrates how much weight the word “Kalim” has in Jamil’s opinion, beyond being just Kalim’s name.

Yana is, of course, not the only mangaka ever to do this. This kind of wordplay can be found in almost every form of Japanese-language media that there is, and is often used to make puns that are wholly undetectable if you don’t know the language.