Back to Square One Page #034 by @Minzoku (Julie Miyamoto)

Maybe shoulda led with that, Alex. YAY SOCIALIZING AS A SECOND LANGUAGE [or third]

As this is otherwise never going to come up:

Alex is most genetically and racially similar to an African or Indian [as in, from India], culturally more Japanese. Darian is genetically most like a redhead, but treated racially most like a "Mexican" [in contrast to "Latino"] or a "ginger"--though he doesn't have a particular cultural identification. Kotaro is solidly Latino with a dash of Californian, just because I met a dude who seemed to fit the mold so well I couldn't get him out of my head.

This isn't a direct translation of "all squirrels/voles/cougars = such-and-such race" [mostly because I've diversified the cast to avoid too much species overlap and as per the interracial reality of the world they live in] so much as a mental shorthand for keeping their characters accurate to what I originally intended. I'm not pulling that lazy "race stand-in" crap, except in specific, "only in this one respect and no other stereotypical ways" way. [I'd give examples, but that feels spoilery.]

On the other hand, there are a few species stereotypes [cats always land on their feet], but I promise that "SQUIRRELS LOVE NUTS" is not one of them |=I

[come on, I'm trying to make this SORT OF clean here]

[[you can unfollow me now if SFW-ness is gonna be an issue]]

Anyway, this page was inexplicable misery to get done [due to LIFE] and is in fact posted "unrefined," but thankfully this is the end of the scene, and I will have one more page before taking an indefinite hiatus to rethink how I'm doing this. Once-a-month subpar updating really isn't working out...