I'm currently hard at work re-reading and re-editing 'In Another World with 100 Waifus' for the 33rd time. I'll probably finish my work today or tomorrow, but for now I wanted people to understand my reasoning for two of the most important changes -- Sena and Bell are in, Ageha and Orochimaru are out, of my fictional character hall of fame.
Sena is from the recently released Xenoblade Chronicles 3, a game I'm playing right now and falling ever deeper in love with. I'm also falling ever deeper in love with Sena. She has a beautiful body and is always showing off her bare midriff, which means we actually get to enjoy it. But she also has a beautiful face, beautiful perpetually burning blue hair in a cute short sidetail, a beautiful voice, and an ingenuous personality that just wants to be liked, to be helpful, to be useful and to be appreciated by others. There isn't an iota of malice in her entire soul. Oh, and on top of that, she's insanely strong and her Oroboros form is sleek, techno-cool, and hot.
I've seen a lot of character designs in my life but Sena is completely unique. It's a shame her name isn't unique as well. She has to share it with Haganai's Sena who has blue butterflies in her air instead of blue fire. But by replacing Ageha, who also isn't a unique name, the unique name count stays the same. Ageha has little going for her. She's good looking in the classic Rumiko Takahashi style, but her personality is full of flaws for comic effect. She throws bombs at people who annoy her in the least, breaks things, wastes money, and abuses her servants. She's also a hero who saves lives every day fighting evil Shinigami, so it's not all bad. She also loves Rinne, and anyone who loves good things or people can't be too bad themselves. There's also the advantage that Ageha is firmly connected to '100 Waifus' via Sakura Mamiya, while Sena is only tangentially connected to MOMO from Xenosaga. But when you take into account all the personality advantages Sena has over Ageha it's no contest. The new girl has all the momentum.
As for Bell Kranel, he's a hero in the most basic and primordial sense. Straight out of Greek Mythos, he acts like a hero as he battles minotaurs and the like, saving his friends and strangers alike with unlimited empathy. When he arrives everyone can take a breath of relief because things are definitely going to turn out okay from here. That's the type of reliability we're talking about. He also has a great way with girls, thinking they're all pretty but not letting them sink their claws into him and get in the way of his adventuring goals. He's pure of heart, like Sir Galahad. He has a great character design, with shocking white hair and red eyes, fighting with two daggers and his all-famous 'FIREBOLT!' spell. And with Yoshitsugu Matsuoka voicing him, everything feels twice as intense and passionate.
Bell replaces Orochimaru, the exact opposite of a hero. An almost unparalleled villain, who specializes in being creepy, gross and completely sociopathic. He'll kill thousands of people if it makes him one thousandth stronger than before. Because he always follows his own self-interest, which to him is mainly about avoiding boredom, he isn't always doing bad in the world, half the time he's doing good, but not due to any moral compass, it's always only by coincidence. Though you have to admire Orochimaru for being so effective at being evil, he's still evil, and I'd rather a pure-as-snow good guy be Christopher's son than a black-as-pitch snake monster.
Though Orochimaru shares a franchise with Sakura Haruno, it's dubious whether she'd really be thrilled to have a son named after him, given the hard times he put her through. So I think having a non-connected child named Bell will be seen as an improvement to her.
Actually I'd say the theme of these two replacements is pure-as-snow souls replacing very compromised ones. It's a major upgrade when looked at this way.
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