More than a decade ago, there was a manga and anime of 5 high school girls in a music club that spent most of their time drinking tea and eating cakes. Yet, they have the potential to be great with their skill and music.

Have you wondered how their future will go on? At that time, someone drew a story, saying that it wouldn’t go well.

And only one had reached the star.

From the artist of the “Yukiyukite Senshadou” series that terrified Girl Und Panzer community for a strong, dark story. TK, of circle Takotsuboya, had made a doujin trilogy that shows the “what-if” story of 5 girls of Ho-Kago Tea-time from well-acclaim K-ON! series on how the situation may go in a darker direction, and how their future may go on against the cruelty of the real world.

Now more than a decade after the doujin was first released. This doujin trilogy is published again by the artist in high-resolution, digitalized files. All in its dark glory.

TK said There are corrections to drawings and dialogues compared to the original release. But I haven’t found noticeable changes yet.

If you wish to support the artist, you can buy from these sites.

DLSite
https://www.dlsite.com/maniax/work/=/product_id/RJ01031027.html

DMM
https://www.dmm.co.jp/dc/doujin/-/detail/=/cid=d_262597/

Artist links

Artist Site: http://takotuboya.jp/
Pixiv: https://www.pixiv.net/en/users/1108775

Thanks for the digital trilogy, I did not know about this one since I can hardly follow stuff nowadays.

Very easy for anyone into scat to tell at least one glaring difference. Unless their policies changed again, Eisys has nothing to do with this (assuming this is from DLsite).

This is puzzling as I do not recall TK being a fan of having works forcefully censored (digital PPC) or censoring them beyond the 'legal minimum' (stulta lex sed lex).
https://e-hentai.org/s/4223316697/2571274-47
https://e-hentai.org/s/c7f3b87283/204636-47

Base +37, goldenargo85 +7, blabbo +6, andystevens1997 +9, ccib00 +11

Much better, realistic and grounded in the canon's premises than TK's later GuP series. One thing I would have done if I were him was cut the 20,000,000 yen guitar diversion. Making the girl a bit culpable is theory for this kind of thing so I can understand the tradeoff when Manbiki was a single. But he had to bend Yui's character (the anime really bumped up her reticence, but even in the manga Yui wasn't this shameless) and really warp Mugi's (and only for ONE frame) to force it to work.
While turning 250,000 into 20,000,000 accents the issue (which is even a juristic issue, not just moral), it's still present without the exaggeration. Grouped as a trilogy the balance of advantage would be to keep Yui & Mugi the same as in the original, which better accents the tragedy and impact, since this hits harder if read as Anime!HTT bent by AU events rather than a AU HTT given AU events.

Beyond that though, Yui's demi-voluntary prostitution before being forced to sign a contract is not only non-gratuitous, but perhaps a precondition for the plot. The pain and the fact she had to ask her mother for a second loan right after an advance must have motivated this Yui to try harder - not enough to break her superficial lazy image, but enough for a faster growth curve. TK cleverly hints at this by showing how hard Ui had to work here to pretend to be Yui, as opposed to the relative ease in the anime (and even more so in the manga).
It also seemed to have caused some permanent damage to her sense of restraint, whether out of empathy or ethics.

Mio seemed to have reacted to all this by being more competitive, taking over composition from Mugi. If Canon!Yui ever had ideas on songwriting she kept them to herself (the anime puts her at a physical distance) but here she proactively seizes Mio's strawberries. For those who think Mio won't get jealous ... well, check out Episode 17 of K-On!! to see how she reacts to Yui's lyrics getting selected, and think what if this happens all the time.
As for Azusa, by the time she joined Yui's faster growth curve means Yui's better than Azusa and so Azusa never grows more relaxed and concentrates her respect for Yui at the expense of the others.
Finally, Yui being better seemed to mean they can't push her around as much, so Yui never learns (or even really tries) to read sheet music (one eventual nail in her coffin).

The end result of all this is that while HTT probably looks similar to Canon on a day to day basis, internally it's much less cohesive and career-chasing took over for all five girls. The pathos of Mio and Azusa are given the spotlight in the 2nd and 3rd parts of the trilogy (accented by sex), but TK does a good job of hinting at Yui's suffering behind the stage smile and faux pas (some I think Canon!Yui won't have made) that's all we see of her.
It really does hurt to think Yui (for her clear status) isn't even allowed to sing her natural pitch, that a girl who could sleep at a drop of a hat now needs to overdose on alcohol and pills, and of course her end, even as Yui tries (and this part reminds me most of her canon self) so hard to not disappoint and reassure everyone she's fine.

And with so many chances to break away.
If only Sawako is not so blinded by Yui's talent in this timeline and realized Yui might have factored in her limitations when choosing to be a cashierwoman.
If only she realized the naive girl needs at least an escort to survive the entertainment industry that has destroyed far more savvy candidates and sent Ritsu and then Azusa who want to be musicians anyway - Yui is probably big enough in this timeline her label would nod at her carrying two not quite first-rate companions.
If only Mugi was more explicit in saying she will feed and protect Yui while she takes a very long rest ...

It hurts, it really does. Great story that stays close enough to the characters's canon characterizations to have an air of "reality". Of all the sex scenes, the Ui and Mugi scenes are the most gratuitous. I understand doujinshis need sex scenes, but when compared to the other scenes that actually push the story, they feel a bit un-necessary.

Last edited on 14 August 2023, 07:52.

Base +6

Yui's pubes look more generic than the original.

Base +6