on Numair's side...

He COULD ditch his surname and take Hikaru's. There's enough baggage associated with Clan Nazou to warrant it.

But he won't.

He decides to keep it and reframe the context. And living well is the best way to spite a parent that wronged him.

Scenario B: #numakaru

Also no surname changes.
On Hikaru's side, it was a request from her mother Rei.
"Dragonia" is a powerful surname that ought to not be washed away through marriage.

Even when Rei got married, her husband wanted her to keep Dragonia as a surname because Rule of Cool.

Prior to this 30% buff and the COLA letter, I was getting $889... which means I was closing the gap with the federal maximum ANYWAY, so... ???

Argh, it's going to bother me until the explanatory letter comes in, lol

I wasn't going to make the agent read the entire letter over the phone because it's 22 pages, but the summary she gave me made it sound like maybe they're finally getting the message that I contribute enough to household expenses that they're removing the In-Kind Support penalty and then some.

The federal maximum SSI payout for a single person is $994, so the agent I spoke to last week was probably right, this is likely something California tacked on

What I'm wondering is if this is for ALL California SSI recipients, or if this is just me? And if so, what triggered that buff...?

Napkin math says it's the missing $330 that was supposed to be in this morning's deposit.

Gonna assume that the brain cell got dropped and tumbled under the couch. "Oops, we forgot we're supposed to pay you more!" and sent the difference.

STILL blows my mind that I'm getting a 30% buff.

I figure, I DID just get beaned upside the head last week with a huge backpay, so I'm not gonna be too bothered if my actual January deposit doesn't reflect the new amount (and I can always just ring up the main office again)

and then 15 minutes ago, a SECOND bank app notification arrives.

"Why should I be concerned about you mortals roughing me up? Clearly I survived."

After the fight, Trollbuncle teaches Faris how to invoke his original Proto Carbuncle body as a Limit Break evolution, with a warning that doing so is super taxing. "Don't keel over, my favorite empty-headed fool. :D"

I have a similar scenario in my timeline. One of Hikaru's party members (Faris, a summoner) finds out Trollbuncle IS Proto-Carby.

Trollbuncle is COMPLETELY unbothered by the idea of fighting himself, and fondly reminisces about going on rampages and eating people who annoyed him. :}}}

finally there is Hikaru's wedding dress in "Ringbearer"

designed by Yoshi with input from the other ladies in the party + Alisaie

(it took a lot of badgering and prodding to get Hikaru to even consider wearing one, given her extreme distaste for dresses)

As for her plainclothes, they're almost entirely just generic unisex casualwear.

She DID go out of her way to get a certain black pantsuit that is DEFINITELY not closely resembling Gaia's outfit in any way, and is likely the closest one gets to "girly" clothes in her wardrobe >_>;

special note during Stormblood postgame: after the Ivalice raids, Hikaru remakes Agrias' armor from memory, having only had a few minutes to see it "in person" at the end of Orbonne.

She claims it's for historical purposes but also it's just freaking cool. :}}}

I think I got the "all party members write in the journal" part from Tales of Legendia.

I liked the idea of Hikaru's party members all writing in the book and having their own and sometimes very different ways of going about it.

meta: the reason this is separate from the Unending Journey and such is because, at this point, I have as much extra story material as canon, and I wanted Hikaru to have a means of recording such things much earlier.

for "You Are Invited" and "Ringbearer," their summaries are wedding announcements.