subarashiki hibi begins with "down the rabbit-hole i", the first chapter of the visual novel and a chapter that, on your first read, you'll likely find boring. once you get to dtrh2, you'll probably find dtrh1 to have been not just boring but utterly meaningless.
down the rabbit-hole i is a chapter best understood and enjoyed after completing the game, or even after completing jabberwocky i. on your first playthrough, the chapter will likely serve as nothing more than an incredibly confusing introduction to the main (female) cast of the game- yuki minakami, the narrator for this chapter and the following one, takashima zakuro, and tsukasa and kagami wakatsuki. if you've watched lucky star, you've probably already noticed that tsukasa and kagami share the same names as the twins from lucky star, and this is, weirdly, not just an easter egg but an early hint of sorts to one of the plot twists revealed in jabberwocky.
kagami and tsukasa are actually the shared delusion of minakami yuki and mamiya takuji, both of whom are later revealed to share consciousness alongside yuuki tomosane, being a part of a DID system. kagami, the shorter haired girl, is a delusion that appears when takuji sees his younger sister, mamiya hasaki, and kagami, the one with twintails, is a delusion which replaces the stuffed rabbit hasaki carries around with her. yuki sees hasaki and her doll as kagami and tsukasa, too, however in dtrh2 she sees hasaki without any delusions due to hasaki not being in a place where the wakatsuki sisters would be.
in dtrh1, kagami and tsukasa are introduced as yuki's childhood friends and neighbors. yuki's parents are out on a trip, and they've been tasked with watching over yuki.
one day, while on a walk, yuki discovers a girl throwing a doll off of the roof of an apartment building. at first, yuki mistakes the doll for a person committing suicide. she rushes to the top of the apartment building, only to find takashima zakuro there. zakuro explains that she was throwing the doll to test aerodynamics. eventually, zakuro offers to live with yuki as her "maid", and, in the true ending, the two go on a date before ascending into the sky via a train.
the importance of this chapter is one that, as i said earlier, can only really be realized after you've finished the game. which is to say, the story shown in dtrh1 is takashima zakuro's wonderful everyday.
the zakuro we see in this chapter, as explained by this user on fuwanovel, is akin to ayana. she is the character who is aware of everything, who seems to know the most out of the main cast of the chapter. she's mysterious and ellusive. it's also worth noting that she's not bullied in this chapter, and she ends up going on an actual date with yuki.
in looking-glass insects, the fourth chapter of subahibi, we see zakuro's perspective on the events leading up to her suicide. one of the largest factors that drove zakuro to suicide was her rape and her crush on minakami yuki (who was in mamiya takuji's body). when zakuro was raped, she believed that yuki, the only one who ever seemed to care about her, would never love her, and thus, it ended up being her final straw. the love story we see between yuki and zakuro in dtrh1 is the only instance we ever see of the two getting to spend time together and be in love without the impending death or disappearance of either party. zakuro is somewhat forceful when she asks to be yuki's maid, and i believe this is likely due to the fact that, what with this being the "wonderful everyday" zakuro wishes for after her suicide, zakuro is already aware of her love for yuki and wants to immediately progress their relationship as soon as possible.

down the rabbit-hole 2 is where the real plot of subahibi begins. this chapter is, once again, in yuki's perspective; you'll notice that chapters with multiple parts keep the same narrator/character perspective. however, the yuki we see in dtrh2 has no recollection of the events of dtrh1 and no knowledge of zakuro as a whole as of the beginning of the chapter. zakuro randomly kisses yuki downtown, and then, later on, yuki learns that zakuro passed away after committing suicide.
it's worth noting at this point that dtrh2, while being in yuki's perspective, is not in the perspective of the "true" yuki, but rather, the new one. this is particularly relevant once you read looking-glass insects and, subsequently, jabberwocky 1. while zakuro has spent her last two weeks on earth with yuki, the yuki she kisses before committing suicide is the yuki who doesn't know her, not the yuki who she discussed cyrano with nor the yuki who's possible unrequited love led her to kill herself in the first place. maybe this seems irrelevant to you, but to me, i feel like it really adds to the doomed yuri of zakuro and yuki and generally is just a really sad realization.
of course, the fact that this is the pov of the "new" yuki is made obvious regardless, due to the appearance of kagami and tsukasa, whom yuki spends most of her time with. however, upon zakuro's suicide, yuki finds herself personally invested in getting to the bottom of everything that the suicide caused, largely due to her mysterious kiss with zakuro.
at school, yuki runs into mamiya takuji, who runs away immediately after she sees him. yuki then hears rumors at her school of a "web bot project" which is predicting the end of the world on the 20th of july, which most students learned about through the school's underground message board. yuki gets an invitation to the message board from a classmate after asking about it, and later runs into another girl, who shows yuki the mysterious text messages she's been recieving from zakuro following zakuro's death. yuki investigates zakuros desk (yes, i'm watching napkin's video essay as i write this to get a refresh on the plot of this chapter). on zakuro's desk, yuki discovers writing about the "spiral matai" and the end of the world on the 20th. then, she runs into takuji again, and he's much more confident and just straight up weird.
the next day, mamiya gives his speech on the end of the world. to be entirely honest with you, i couldn't summarize this speech even if i wanted to, because i skipped through it each time i was forced to see it. it's so fucking long and boring. after the day is over, yuki makes an account on the underground message board and sees a bunch of posts about both the web bot project and the creepy, threatening texts zakuro is sending everyone. when she researches the web bot project, she discovers an address, and the next day she goes to the address to continue her investigation.
the address leads to an apartment building that seems largely uninhabited, however she runs into a young looking girl outside of it. the girl is indeed mamiya takuji's younger sister, mamiya hasaki, who invites her inside. somehow, hasaki knows yuki's name, but she brushes that off.
the story continues on as yuki investigates zakuro's death and this prophecy of the end of the world. a cult has began to form surrounding this prophecy, led, of course, by mamiya takuji.
near the halfway point of this chapter is when it begins to ease the reader in to the serious mindfuck that the following chapters contain. a few days later, yuki decides to call zakuro's phone, and she hears it ringing from inside her room- no, inside her desk. she then checks for fingerprints on it and finds her own fingerprints on zakuro's phone despite not having ever touched it. when she turns around, she sees this black figure and faints. later, yuki sneaks in to the "ark" which the cult has designated as their hideout/meeting area before the end of the world, and witnesses the rape and torture of kagami, all while tsukasa is forced to watch. she brings a naked, dismembered kagami home, talking to her about a childhood memory. she reaches the house the wakatsuki sisters live in, but it only has an old lady in it, who's unrelated to the sisters. kagami suddenly turns into a plush rabbit, with tsukasa turning into the same black figure.
yuki returns to the school, reaching the roof where she speaks to mamiya before he jumps off. this is the end of the chapter.

in my opinion, it's my own invention is the best chapter of subahibi. it follows the perspective of mamiya takuji, an otaku who's somewhat of an incel and an insane gooner. jerkmate ranked platinum probably. in the beginning of the chapter (which i should mention, is the longest fucking chapter in the entire game), mamiya is taking books from his house to his "hideout", which is under the school's old defunct pool. he runs into yuuki tomosane, a new character, who burns his manga and then instructs takuji to pay for the lighter fluid used to do so. shortly after, once tomosane leaves, we get the first meeting between mamiya and zakuro.
zakuro saw the fire, and takuji explains that he burnt it because the main heroine in the manga wasn't a virgin (i think. like i really think this is what happened but it could have been that the manga bored him). this somewhat hurts zakuro, since she also owned the manga and liked it; upon learning a girl has similar interests to him, takuji gets his hopes up, though they're soon crushed when he's reminded of his awful past with liking women. however, soon they begin to hear their bullies, and takuji forces zakuro into his secret hideout so they can avoid them.
zakuro's impressed by the hideout (excuse the image i used, but i thought it'd help for you to visualize zakuro and the drainage tank that leads to the hideout :shame:), and takuji decides zakuro should share a secret with him so that way it's more fair, considering that the hideout is supposed to be a secret and he just saved zakuro from encountering her bullies.
this is the only scene where the choices you make will lead to a change in the ending you recieve, so i suppose i should also mention by now that this chapter does have multiple endings, that being the "true end" and the "kimika end", the latter of which i won't discuss in detail because i never played it. by choosing for takuji to give in to his delusions, you achieve the true end- in the scene, this choice leads to zakuro revealing her secret of being an exhibitionist. i really don't know what the purpose of this scene is. anyways, you can choose for takuji to not give in to his delusions, and this will lead to the kimika end. regardless, it will still be revealed that zakuro's secret is not being an exhibitionist, and instead is that she writes and draws manga.
following this, takuji shows zakuro his hideout. while she's interested at first, upon realizing how fucking disgusting and weird takuji is (valid), she leaves. this is when its revealed that takuji often gets bouts of sleepiness where he passes out/loses consciousness for a long period of time. like yuki, takuji is unaware that he has dissociative identity disorder, however his chapter is the first where this disorder is more heavily implied due to his sudden loss of consciousness for long periods of time.
upon waking up, he checks the school message board, which he runs. then he meets with the wakatsuki sisters the next day, where kagami seems to keep reading his mind- this freaks him out, and at this point in the story, we don't fully understand why this is. this is one of the strengths of imoi in comparison to most other chapters; its gradual descent into madness will lead the reader to be placed in takuji's shoes as well. you know as much as he does about what's happening, and subahibi being fiction leads you to be unsure if what's happening is truly happening in the story, or if it's all a delusion of takuji's.
tsukasa points out a rabbit doll her brother bought for her when she was little, and says it was the happiest moment of her life. remember this! this is important..
later, he goes back to his hideout to check the school message boards again, where megu and satoko are bullying zakuro. he feels terrible for her and hopes to meet her again. the next day, he stumbles into tomosane in the school hallways, and tomosane jumps him for the money takuji owes him. he also witnesses tomosane being aggressive to the other bullies, which reminds takuji of the time tomosane first appeared- when takuji was sexually assaulted by his bullies while being forced to wear zakuro's school uniform and underwear. tomosane had appeared after, beating them up, and since then, the bullies have left him alone, while tomosane has taken the role as takuji's tormenter. in jabberwocky, we learn that the reason for this is that tomosane was created within their DID system as the "destroyer" of takuji, in order to take over his body- more about this is revealed in which dreamed it, however its not really relevant to this chapter yet.
the next day is when things truly begin to ramp up. while on the roof of a building after buying light novels, takuji sees zakuro and yuki kissing. intrigued, he follows zakuro, but instead ends up seeing three corpses on the ground outside of an apartment building. he takes a picture and eventually takes zakuro's phone, but ends up too afraid to do anything else and returns to his hideout. to get his mind off of things, he watches his favorite anime, mahou shoujo riruru chan (or magical girl riruru). however, he ends up seeing three rirurus arguing on a rooftop, one of whom looks similar to zakuro in terms of hairstyle and outfit. then, he's jumpscared by zakuro's corpse. i'm unsure if this happens during this day or the next, but instead of being terrified of the freaky ass riruru episode involving zakuro, he's actually elated by it- now, he can see zakuro whenever he wants, even though she's dead.
by this point, it's clear that takuji witnessing the corpse of zakuro has led to somewhat of a mental break or even psychosis (though i'm not well versed enough in psych to really know the correct term for this). in jabberwocky 2, the reasons for this start to make more sense; you see, takuji's DID and his entire existence is a trauma response to the death of the real mamiya takuji, who was tomosane's younger brother. so, it makes sense that witnessing the death of someone whom he felt close to (zakuro) would elicit a similar reaction, especially considering both takuji and zakuro died from falling.
the next day, takuji can feel the fear within his classmates following the announcement of zakuro's suicide; however, above all else, he feels intense anger towards his classmates for having driven zakuro to kill herself. he later investigates zakuro's desk, hallucinating that her desk is actually her, and having sex with the desk. this is an insane scene in the vn, but also represents the point where takuji begins to believe zakuro was in love with him. he decides to be the one to avenge her, with the act consummating their relationship. he reads the writing on zakuro's desk, and sees the same prediction his mother had about the end of the world on the 20th of july. despite hating his mother, when he sees the writing on zakuro's desk, he begins to think that she might have been right all along. takuji thinks back to how terrible of a child he is, and ends up deciding to do something about it.
after a long, long period of takuji slowly losing his mind, running into ayana and then hallucinating ghosts following him around, he ends up waking up in his secret base to magical girl riruru. there's writing all over the walls of his base about riruru, and she starts talking to him. she tells him that he's the savior, and shows him the journey of "a hundred million years", which ultimately convinces him that he's the savior. as the savior, his goal is to continue the prophecy his mother had, and return everyone to the end sky on july 20th.
takuji rediscovers zakuro's phone, and learns of the bullying satoko, megu, and kimika put her through. with more empathy and sympathy for zakuro after knowing what she went through in more detail, takuji decides to manipulate the school to regret what they all did to her. he not only wants megu and satoko and kimika to regret their actions, but for every other classmate who didn't take action to feel regret, too. thus, he decides to use zakuro's phone to send messages to everyone. these messages include prophecies of the end of the world, and are meant to come off as cursed to incite fear within everyone.
the next day, everyone is horrified at the text messages; tomosane appears once more, but is pissed off with how suddenly cocky and smug takuji is acting. thus, the two of them battle at the roof of the school. takuji wins, and then runs into yuki, whom he acts just as cocky with. then, in the entrance to his secret base, he runs into ayana again. while takuji maintains the same arrogant and cocky attitude, ayana still has the upper hand, leading takuji to fear her. however, riruru later comforts him, telling him that ayana won't do anything.
ayana is such an ellusive character within subahibi, and i feel terrible for not talking more about her in this shrine of sorts, but i genuinely have no idea where to even start with her character. i've thought about her constantly since i started the game in february 2025, yet i have never been able to comprehend her or come to a solid, satisfying conclusion about what she is. i'll write more about her later, but for now, all i can say about ayana is that she is a recurring character who holds more knowledge about the events occuring in each protagonist's chapters than the protagonists themselves, almost representing the reader with the amount of knowledge she has.
the next day is when the same annoying ass fucking speech occurs, this time from takuji's perspective as he's the one who gives that fuckass speech. he predicts that someone will die soon. then he runs into kimika for the first time, and she's incredibly depressive and a bit crazy despite having presumably been one of zakuro's bullies. while she seems menacing at first, takuji attempts to scare her by talking about the cursed messages and she just listens, then proclaiming that takuji is her savior and deciding to follow his orders. takuji reveals senegawa, one of the teachers at the school, will die tomorrow, and orders kimika to watch her every move. then, after going to his base to set up the messages from "zakuro" that will push senegawa to die, he runs into riruru again. she orders him to go to the roof, where this terrifying sequence occurs with ghosts and a corpse haunting the school and the hallways. on the roof, he witnesses the battle between the "holy surge" and the "black surge" of rirurus, leading to so much bloodshed and different parts of each riruru falling down, such as their arms and legs.
takuji uses these fallen limbs to recreate a riruru, putting her back together.
the next day begins with kimika rounding up more people to join takuji's cult, explaining senegawa will die since zakuro hated her the most. at his secret base, takuji runs into a crudely drawn riruru, the result of his attempt to piece riruru back together following the battle. back at the old pool, everyone in the cult witnesses senegawa's death, including yasuko. yasuko had met yuki in dtrh2 earlier the same day, and is incredibly confused at how differently takuji is acting. again, later on in the vn this is revealed to be due to their DID and yuki being in takuji's body, however at this point in the story, we don't even know that she's confused due to her earlier encounter with yuki. thus, takuji reasons there must be an imposter. this part of the story, while not seeming all that relevant, is still a cool hint to the later plot twist.
takuji also mentions the wakatsuki sisters, but no one knows what he's talking about- thus, he deduces this must be the work of the "black surge", a belief that only grows as the story goes on. he orders the cult to get drugs and a riruru poster. when they come back, they've brought asumi, who wants to join their cult. however, asumi is also a teacher, and takuji believes that being a teacher is one of the greatest sins of all and is wholly unforgivable. he asks who inspired her to become a teacher, and she says her father did.
what follows next is undoubtedly one of the most hard-to-watch scenes of the entire vn (which is saying something), so i'm not gonna go into detail about it. all i'll say is that takuji tells her to have sex with her father in order to make her lose all of her humanity to reduce her to nothing (or something like that, i don't really remember).
asumi does what takuji told her to do, and then returns, but she did a lot of other unneccesary things (luckily not involving her father), and takuji is disgusted by this. the other cult members also brought back a riruru poster, and with it, takuji manages to bring back riruru's true form, and she asks him to meet her father, who is god. he wakes up the next day to kimika, and goes to the roof where he meets ayana instead. he considers ayana to be "dark riruru's dregs" or something along those lines, similarly to how he views the wakatsuki sisters, tomosane, and yuki. ayana explains the role of the creator, destroyer, and harmonizers, which are takuji, tomosane, and yuki, respectively. then he runs into tomosane, who once more challenges takuji to a fight. however, takuji ends up stabbing tomosane after nearly losing to him, and the wakatsuki sisters witness this scene. kagami is pissing off takuji, so he takes her to the base/the cult's "ark" and orders them to rape her while tsukasa watches. this is the same scene that we see in dtrh2, so there's no need to go into detail about it.
after a long scene, takuji meets with yuki and then jumps off the roof to ascend to the end sky. that's the end of the chapter, so i'll go into my analysis now!

1. who is yuki tomosane? what the fuck is the "creator, harmonizer, and destroyer" even about?

(note: i'm going to be talking about jabberwocky 1&2 here, too) the creator, harmonizer (actually the preserver in hinduism), and destroyer are concepts within hinduism that i will 100% get into later. yuki tomosane is the destroyer, minakami yuki is the harmonizer, and takuji is the creator.
within the DID system of the three in subahibi, takuji is the "creator" due to having been created following the death of the real mamiya takuji. you see, the takuji we witness in the main chapters of subahibi is actually mamiya tomosane, the half-brother of the true mamiya takuji. tomosane witnessed the death of his half-brother after takuji tried to kill mamiya hasaki, and the trauma of the entire event led to tomosane developing a disorder in which he believed he was takuji.
yuki is the "harmonizer", having been created after takuji within their system. she's supposed to be the "ideal" takuji, and is based off of the real minakami yuki, who also died in childhood. she's friendly and gets along with everyone, as we see in dtrh2.
the "destroyer" is the role given to the new yuki tomosane, and his goal is simply to get rid of takuji.
in shaivism, the three roles of the creator, preserver, and destroyer are given to brahma, vishnu, and rudra, who instead of being separate entities, all exist within shiva and are forms of him. there are two other actions not a part of the trimurti, that being illusion and grace. there are two other actions within shiva, too; ishana, who represents revelation, and tatpurusha, who represents "structure of soul and how the individual merges with the infinite".
a popular theory regarding subarashiki hibi is that all the main characters are different faces of ayana, further supplemented by the end sky 2 ending. with this theory and knowledge of shiva within shaivism's view on the trimutri (which is the creator, preserver, and harmonizer), i feel like we can come to the conclusion that ishana could be represented through ayana, with zakuro being a representation of tatpurusha. tatpurusha represents ananda shakti, which translates from sanskrit to "bliss energy" or "energy of joy". while, as you'll see later, zakuro's life within looking glass insects is hardly anything akin to this, the story of subarashiki hibi begins with zakuro's wonderful everyday, which is revealed to be yuki's hallucination. zakuro's route being the "true end" of this chapter denotes her as being an important character, and thus the wonderful everyday we see here is directly tied to zakuro. this basically explains how her being a representation of tatpurusha makes sense.
ishana represents the chitta shakti, which is the "primordial cosmic energy that governs all functions". while in shaivism ishana is just a face of shavi, in the context of subarashiki hibi and the theory involving ayana being each protagonist, i think her being a representation of ishana makes the most sense. she knows everything that's happening in each characters' life, and, if its to be believed that she is each protagonist, she controls all living beings within the story. most interestingly is that within the pancanana, ishana is the "sky" of the panchabhutas, and its direction is upwards. subarashiki hibi places heavy emphasis on the sky throughout the entire story. i'm not sure if sca-di intended to reference shaivism with subarashiki hibi, but at the very least, you can't deny that the correlations are there.

2. why does wakatsuki kagami know everything takuji thinks?

this won't be a long one but i feel like this should still be clarified since, like, it really confused me when i read subahibi for the first time. as i mentioned in dtrh2, kagami is a hallucination in place of hasaki's rabbit doll, which takuji gave to hasaki when she was young. thus, obviously it can "read takuji's mind", since it isn't even real and "kagami" is just a figment of takuji's imagination. if this knowledge/reminder is confusing you on how kagami could be raped if she isn't a real person, in which dreamed it, a chapter i will not be covering because it's kind of boring, its revealed that in reality, the doll was raped and crucified.
i'll mention now that the reason why we don't ever see anyone be confused at the fact that takuji orders everyone to rape a plush doll is because takuji unconsciously blocks out anything that goes against the world he's built up in his mind, hence why he hallucinates hasaki and her doll as tsukasa and kagami.

unlike with its my own invention, i did indeed play both routes of looking glass insects, not just because i'm a lesbian and wanted to see yuri, but also because looking glass insects is the most depressing chapter of subarashiki hibi, if not one of the most depressing chapters in any visual novel i've ever read. i've seen it be described as "torture porn", and at times i'd have to agree with that. i've seen some interesting theories on why there's so many h-scenes for a chapter that is meant to be focused on zakuro's descent into madness following her rape, but ultimately i'd have to argue that this chapter is just one of the weaker chapters of subahibi in terms of how it gets across its message. but let's get into the recap.
looking-glass insects opens with zakuro and takuji seeing a couple. while takuji is disgusted by the couple, zakuro hopes for them both to be happy, an example of the former's pessimism and the latter's optimism. while at school, zakuro's approached by megu and satoko, who order her and kimika to come to the washroom. not much happens, but megu and satoko ask for zakuro's notebook and concert tickets. zakuro obliges, walking around the school and ending up at the old pool.
this is where we meet takuji. it's the same scene that imoi opens with, just from zakuro's perspective; when at takuji's secret base, zakuro is marvelling at how it feels like the rabbit hole alice falls into, and even sees a jar that seems to have marmalade, which she once again relates to alice in wonderland. however, the marmalade is... not marmalade, and she runs away, suddenly brought back to reality and disgusted by takuji.
at home, zakuro goes on the school message board, where she's cyberbullied. following this, she opens an anti-bullying forum, however on there she's being harassed by a sort of online stalker, so she exits the forum.
the next day, zakuro is left to walk around the school, being without her notebook due to having given it to megu and satoko the other day. this is where she runs into takuji once again, though with a much more different demeanor than last time.
looking glass insects is one of the few chapters where we see the faces of each of takuji's alters while within his body; the image on the right is an image of yuki as she looks in takuji's body. maybe this somewhat calls back to the trimutri i mentioned earlier. anyways, this takuji is obviously different, not the same disgusting one that zakuro met at the pool yesterday. he's reading classic literature, and zakuro finds herself infatuated with him, unable to focus. he lends her the book he was reading.
back in class, zakuro runs into megu, satoko, and kimika, again. this time, they're broke and zakuro's roped in to a conversation about how to make money. then, zakuro returns to the base to give takuji his book back, and instead ends up seeing writing on the walls of the old drainage tank that reads "WHY AREN'T YOU A VIRGIN?!" and "DIE YOU SLUT!. she gets freaked out and leaves.
that night, she's recieved an email which asks zakuro to recall a "battle at the stone tower", and it also tells her that she will experience a great change soon. she has no idea what they're talking about, and ignores it. the day after, she once again meets takuji on the roof. he gives her cyrano de bergerac, and she makes the connection between the plot of cyrano and takuji himself.
in cyrano de bergerac, the story generally follows a man who is ugly but smart and a man who is handsome but dumb in the ugly man's quest to win the heart of roxanne. the handsome man speaks the ugly man's words, and zakuro connects this to takuji, who seems to have two people within him- the nice takuji, and the weird one.
the next day (take a shot every time i say that), while on the train, zakuro meets takuji again. by this point, she has a crush on him, and while speaking about literature, they reach a stop at the amusement park. unable to hold herself back, she takes his hand and the two go on a date.
on their way back, they decide to get something to eat first, heading to the bar where takuji works. they meet a flamboyant cross-dressing man whom takuji addresses as "master", and there, takuji plays the piano for her.
the day after, zakuro cooks an extravagant lunch box for takuji, and the two eat together. however, as they do so, zakuro begins to realize strange things about takuji that don't add up. for example, the takuji on the roof has no recollection of his secret base, and she's heard rumors that takuji is really strong and beats people up. when she heads back, she runs into kimika, who catches on to zakuro's crush on takuji. this is where the story splits; kimika tells zakuro that takuji is dangerous and she shouldn't get too close to him. she seems to be hiding something or otherwise be distressed, and as the player, you can either decide to ask kimika more about it, which will trigger the "kimika end", or just brush it off and go back to class, which leads to the "true end".
later that day, at a restaurant, megu and satoko bring out a camera. they force kimika to lift up her skirt and masturbate for the camera in an effort to get a porn tape to sell to make money. in the true end route, zakuro sits idly by, and doesn't take any action to stop them. once outside, kimika confronts megu and satoko, and ends up whipping out a baton in an effort to fight them.
following this, megu and satoko leave kimika and take zakuro with them, where they force zakuro to do drugs, not telling her what it is, and then force her to do all sorts of sexual acts in public while they film. this includes making zakuro have sex with an employee at a karaoke bar.
even the next day, this humiliation and assault continues, reaching a peak when zakuro is once again forcibly drugged and gang raped by her male classmates. following this, she can't help but feel filthy, crying and screaming as she goes home. she wanted her first time to be with someone she loved- she wanted her first time to be with takuji, not for it to play out the way it did. she goes on about how she's nothing more than a worm who deserves to be crushed and stepped on, about how she was stupid for thinking she had any right to dream due to being a "disgusting, fat, dumb bitch".
at school the next day, megu and satoko realize they've gone too far, as zakuro is acting hopeless and broken, yet they show little remorse. what follows this is the turning point for zakuro's psyche, similar to the mental break faced by takuji in the previous chapter. she begins to hallucinate god, who calls her disgusting, mocks her, and makes fun of her, while she repeats over and over again that she doesn't want to die. she meets takuji on the roof, but even he's disgusted by her, calling her disgusting, too. however, she meets ayana on the roof, too, after running from takuji. ayana tells zakuro god has no power over her, and assures her she hasn't gone insane, but zakuro remains hostile towards her. however, at the same moment, she recieves a text from the same person who sent her the earlier message about the "battle at the stone tower".
the message tells zakuro they're aware of her suffering, and that, soon, one of her problems will dissapear. later that day, shiroyama, one of the men who raped her, falls off the roof and dies. zakuro is elated, however, ayana sees her in the hallway and assures her its just coincidence.
ignoring ayana's words, she leaves to meet with the sender of the messages, which happens to be two girls around her age. at a cafe, the two girls tell zakuro about their past lives as magical angel princesses. they explain that, when fighting har megiddo, he punished them by sending them to an earth where they would experience nothing but pain and suffering. their past lovers (in zakuro's case, takuji), were attacked by a specialized psychic bug which slowly began to erase their memories and turn them against each girl.
the girls reveal they've had similar experiences to zakuro, both having been raped and having boys they like, and ask zakuro for her help. to regain their power, they have to perform a ritual called the "spiral matai", which involves facing a near-death experience.
the next day, zakuro is filled with a newfound sense of hope and belonging, and even in her meeting with ayana on the roof, ayana assures zakuro she won't interfere. she runs into takuji downtown, who is nice and similar to the takuji on the roof, however he has no recollection of zakuro. she's hardly phased by this, and kisses him and warns him of a sky full of anxious words. after this, the two girls meet up with her, a bit confused by takuji's presence. leaving to perform the spiral matai, the two girls begin to get cold feet once on the roof of the apartment building. zakuro is angered by this, and the two end up being taken with her as she jumps off the roof.

i mentioned this in the very beginning of this section, but in my opinion, looking-glass insects is incredibly shallow for a visual novel that otherwise is very, very well-written. honestly, i'm inclined to believe that it's simply because it's a story that focuses on the struggles of woman, as written by a man.
first of all, this has been mentioned by other people before, but i find that all of the rape scenes in looking glass insects don't convey the actual torture zakuro is being put through. sca-di did not set out to write a chapter which romanticized or sexualized rape, and while the writing absolutely sticks to that, the artwork used alongside it doesn't necessarily fit with this idea. i personally believe that it wasn't necessary to show the rape in detail, and that's not for the sake of censorship but rather to get the point across. zakuro experienced one of the most terrible things man can go through, and for it to be drawn in a moe art style does it a disservice. if it had been replaced by a black screen while still being voiced and with descriptions, it could have been much more terrifying, as well as a bit more immersive. i really hope i'm not being insensitive when i write this, that's not at all my point; just considering how immersive dtrh1 and imoi were with experiencing the fear of the protagonist, there's no reason for looking-glass insects to avoid that with its art.
as well, the perspective of the artwork just doesn't work with the experience zakuro's going through. it's a point of view as if you're megu or satoko or one of the men, which is such a huge downfall for a chapter not meant to romanticize rape. if the artwork was necessary, being in zakuro's pov or at least with a darker color pallette could have just as well portrayed the fear and hopelessness zakuro had been experiencing without attempting to make it erotic.
looking-glass insects does have its strengths- the length of its scenes and the length of the story, despite taking place in a shorter span of time than most other chapters in the vn, lead to an incredibly hopeless atmosphere while you play it. however, despite how much i've been working to find a meaning to this chapter beyond it just being an explanation of why zakuro killed herself, i genuinely can't come to a solid conclusion.

while there are two kimika endings in subahibi, the kimika end in looking-glass insects is undoubtedly one of the more notable endings, because it changes the entire trajectory of the chapter and, in turn, changes the plot of subahibi as a whole. as such, it's definitely not "canon", but i do feel like it's a very welcome addition to looking-glass insects, especially to read after finishing the true route.
kimika's ending, in my opinion, is kimika's "wonderful everyday". in this route, after choosing to talk to kimika instead of go to class, the same events that begin the true route transpire, however zakuro decides to take kimika's hand and escape from the restaurant to prevent her from being further sexually assaulted. following this event, the two team up, with kimika using chemical-based "bombs" made in the science club to attack satoko, megu, and the male bullies, eventually culminating in the two girls nearly being gang-raped at a park before takuji (as tomosane) comes in and fights them. following this event, megu and satoko stop bullying kimika and zakuro, and the two girls befriend takuji. the takuji on the roof (yuki) is gone, however, kimika and zakuro end up falling in love and dating.
i love ship wars and i honestly fucking hate people who ship kimika and takuji, specifically because of this ending. while it can't be zakuro's wonderful everyday because that's clearly dtrh1, the kimika end of lgi has kimika at the forefront of the story alongside zakuro and focuses heavily on their relationship, thus it's kind of obvious it's her wonderful everyday. i don't have much to say about this route, but it is really, really funny and if you've played subahibi i urge you to play this route if you haven't already. it feels like sca-di added it both to build off of kimika's character and to give the player a much-needed breather following the events of the true end.