In one month, one of the many milestones of 2026 will be reached. It's taken 19 years, but Railgun is finally ending. The Railgun anime's upcoming fourth season should be able to cover the remainder of the manga, creating one of the only long and fully adapted stories in anime.
Unfortunately, Mikoto's adventures continue in Index, which isn't even close to being done, and feels like it will never be done, so we don't actually get any emotional closure from the conclusion of Railgun. I partially wrote '100 Waifus' so Mikoto and Touma could finally get together, because I saw the original author was never going to get around to it. After watching and reading the last of Railgun, I suggest people read '100 Waifus' next, so that they can finally get the closure they deserve.
I've embarked upon my 52nd reread of '100 Waifus' with the goal of showing the book is complete and doesn't need any additional editing. So far so good. This, along with my defeat of Skullfeather, is one of the two personal milestones I wanted to reach this year.
The end of the Winter Olympics is another milestone. It was fun while it lasted. March Madness starts in three weeks so sports are doing a good job extending throughout the year. The World Cup kicks off in June.
The newest addition to my wonderful fictional character hall of fame is Sophia from Kiyoubinbou. Just as her older sister says, she's a maji tenshi. A loli in love sporting red-haired twintails. She's hardworking, conscientious and considerate but still willing to state what she wants. It's a shame Japan and the censorship system in general will never allow her love to come to fruition with the protagonist, she's clearly the best girl by far, but I can at least celebrate her while Japan drops the baton. The series as a whole isn't that deserving of recognition, but it's like Sana from Tenshin Ranman. She's so good it doesn't matter what series she's in. Sophia receives the song Prophecy from Shakugan no Shana because of its appropriate tone of longing.
The same can be said of Katniss in Hunger Games. Hunger Games is at best a decent series, but Katniss is more than decent. Her heroic decision to volunteer for the gladiatorial combat, with a survival rate of at best 1 in 24, to replace her drafted imouto Primrose, is unforgettable. Then her acumen in combat and her judgment in who is worth her allegiance and who isn't is also praiseworthy. She also looks good and has good fashion sense. I also like that she ends up being a wife and mother. I can only say good things about her through and through. She receives the fitting song titled 'Hero of the end'.
Michio and Miria from Isekai Meikyuu also made my wonderful list. Michio for his boldness and decisiveness to acquire what he wanted, and Miria for her cute catgirl looks and love of fish as well as desperation to get noticed which is a form of courage in and of itself. Miria gets 'Judgement Day,' fitting since she's a criminal facing judgement. Michio gets 'Pain in Rain,' fitting due to the extremes he went through to afford his slaves.
In other fantastic news, Tenpure!! is getting an English translation in a couple months. This visual novel is by Circus, the makers of Da Capo, so is almost guaranteed to be great. It's been on my visual novel translation wishlist for a long time (the game came out originally in 2018), but now it can properly transfer over to a game I eagerly play.
It's clear that Iran isn't going to give up its nuclear program no matter how many rounds of negotiation there are, so I wish Trump would just start bombing already and prove my prediction correct. What is he waiting for? Nothing is going to change no matter how long he waits. Either do it or admit it was all a bluff and slink away. Stop wasting everybody's time.
Aside from his stupid, voluntary war with Iran that 80% of Americans are against, I liked the rest of his state of the union speech. I'm in favor of a booming economy, tame inflation, a gigantic drop in crime, the end of illegal immigration, stopping transgender surgeries on kids, voter ID laws, etc. I'm pretty sure most Americans are, and in fact the polls show 64% approval of the speech. These really aren't controversial goals. Trump represents the mainstream, down-to-Earth American. I like his boasting over getting to host the Olympics and the World Cup during his term, something I pointed out the moment he was reelected.
Perhaps it's just the bitter cold of winter, but Russia has not been advancing the front lines for months. It's been pretty pathetic following the daily military updates. We're now into the fifth year of the war. If Putin had mobilized like it was World War II, as I had advised, this could have ended four years ago, but he chose to keep it a 'special military operation' with low military spending and low recruitment/mobilization, so here we are. I'd like to tell him "I told you so," but I suppose Putin doesn't care so long as he eventually achieves victory, however long that will take. We won't know if his plan was good or bad until the war is over and somebody has won.
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