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Deconstruction Fic / Miraculous Ladybug

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Miraculous Ladybug

Many fanfiction writers have made Deconstruction Fics that target the original show, its characters, and even recurring tropes in other fanfics for demolition.
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    A-J 
  • Baby Boom (Shawna Canon): The fic deconstructs the "Aliens Made Them Do It and true love blooms" plot by expanding it to truly ridiculous levels. With literally the entire city affected, not everyone got paired up with someone they liked, and even if they did, the experience was still traumatizing. Some couples do become permanent, but it's made pretty clear that it's more in spite of what happened rather than because of it.
  • BURN THE WITCH points out the obvious flaw in Adrien's insistence that he and Marinette should 'take the high road' and not expose Lila after the events of "Chameleon". While he's correct that her deceptive ways eventually catch up to her and karma comes calling without them having to do anything about it, this comes at the cost of her being free to continue stringing people along until that happens. Rose pays heavily for this, having been taken in by her claims of starting a charity — and when the truth comes out, she winds up akumatized into Witch Hunter, calling for the Manipulative Bitch to burn.
    • Lila's status as a Consummate Liar who favors blatant falsehoods that could be easily disproven if investigated is also deconstructed: since her family moves around so much, she's never had to deal with the long-term consequences of her actions. This gives her a grossly inflated sense of her own deceptive capabilities. When faced with a situation where her usual tactics won't work, she sticks to them out of the arrogant presumption that she can lie her way out, despite all evidence to the contrary.
  • CONSEQUENCES: Many salt fanfictions have the class siding with Lila over Marinette and bullying her on Lila's false accusations without question. They do things like hurt her physically, ostracize her, and rip her beloved sketchbook to shreds. And they do this without guilt or remorse. In this story, this seems to be happening, even the beatings and the destroyed sketchbook...until it's revealed that it was all a hoax by the class to lure Lila into false confidence and get her to publicly confess her crimes and intentions. The injuries on Marinette were fakednote , and the sketchbook they ruined was actually a decoy.
  • Crumbling Down: Of the Salt Fic genre. It follows the Fandom-Specific Plot of Lila being on top and manipulating everyone against Marinette at the start but quickly goes in another direction from there. It does not engage in character bashing with the exception of Lila and subverts the typical demonisation of the characters in other salt fics. In turn, this fanfic is also a Reconstruction of the pre-Season 3 status quo.
    • Alya is taken in by Lila at the start and has distanced herself from Marinette, believing her to be simply jealous of Lila, but she is the first one to realize Lila's true nature when she sees her pushing a wall onto Ladybug whilst filming an akuma battle and is horrified when it sinks in that not only did she not believe her best friend, she posted lies on her beloved Ladyblog. Alya is the first one to set the plot in motion by researching Lila's lies and going to Marinette to apologize, both accepting the truth and expecting her best friend to not forgive her. This is in contrast to Salt Alya, who is a gullible, mean, and spiteful harpy who hangs onto Lila like a limpet, treats every word she says as gospel, and refuses to accept the truth even when it's hitting her in the face.
    • Adrien initially maintains his "high road" approach to Lila, but this changes when he finds out about both Lila's continued bullying of Marinette and her murder attempt on Ladybug. Usually depicted in salt fics as being spineless, selfish, and entitled to Ladybug and Marinette's feelings, here Adrien is horrified at what his naivety almost cost his friends and Ladybug and throws himself into taking down Lila. The author points out that Adrien did not have all the facts about Lila and Marinette, thinking that Lila was just telling stories for attention and not that she would do it to bully and hurt Marinette, and it is said in-story that Adrien would never have given that advice had he known the full picture. He does have one brief moment of annoyance and entitlement when Ladybug still refuses to date him despite their mutual identity reveal, but he calms down and accepts it when she points out that it is still too dangerous with Hawk Moth around because he would exploit it readily to weaken them.
    • Miss Bustier's class is usually depicted as turning on Marinette at the drop of a hat despite their friendship to flock to Lila for being more interesting. They are depicted here as being caught between the two's accusations of lying and bullying and not knowing who to believe, though Nathaniel and Juleka both reveal suspicions about Lila due to cracks in her facade when she thought they weren't looking. When they are shown evidence of Lila's true character, all of them immediately throw themselves behind the anti-Lila effort.
    • Miss Bustier, like Marinette's classmates, is often depicted as believing Lila's lies and happily punishing Marinette for the smallest offenses without giving her the chance to explain herself. Here, Bustier believes Lila's lies without checking them because she genuinely thinks all her students are trustworthy kids, can't imagine that somebody would feign disabilities to get preferential treatment, and in general, her desire to be seen as a Cool Teacher makes her act unprofessional at times. She's also horrified when she learns how much she screwed up by being so trusting of Lila and not trusting enough of Marinette, who she considers her best student.
    • Marinette is usually depicted as being bitter about her friends not instantly believing her about Lila and content to let them sink on their own, here she forgives them and tells them that she was only looking out for them as she didn't want them to be hurt by Lila's lies, though she does specify that she was a bit hurt that they didn't hear her out.
    • Lila's influence over the class and the school is usually hyper-inflated to the extent that she can have people beat up Marinette and then get her blamed and punished for it. Here she is not at all infallible, with her lies about Marinette being doubted and slipping up big time in trying to murder Ladybug which is caught on film by Alya, resulting in a slow spiral of doom.
  • The Dad Villain AU takes a sledgehammer to the notion that Gabriel's reign of terror as Hawkmoth was in any way, shape or form justified by having him swap roles with Tom:
    • The whole Alternate Universe is created in the first place by Gabriel winning... but his Wish doesn't focus on saving Emelie. Instead, he prioritizes screwing over Ladybug by Wishing that the magical backlash from using the broken Peacock Pin is redirected onto her and her loved ones. When his petty revenge is complicated by Nooroo escaping the Agreste Manor and the rise of Viceroy, Gabriel continues to prioritize his vendetta against the former superheroine over Emelie's safety and all other concerns, rejecting any alternatives.
    • Tom, in direct contrast to Gabriel, isn't motivated solely by the desire to avenge his wife. Protecting Marinette is also his top priority. While his grief over losing Sabine led him to drown his sorrows early on, he has a My God, What Have I Done? moment upon seeing how this has impacted his daughter and works hard to ensure her happiness — something Gabriel never bothered with. In fact, it's emphasized that Gabriel doesn't even view his son as a person, thanks to Exact Words ensuring that aside from Gabriel himself, the only ones who can remember the original timeline are those he doesn't consider to be "people".
    • Viceroy is much more clever and cautious than Hawkmoth. Rather than openly terrorizing Paris, Viceroy conducts a clandestine operation that relies upon gathering information with his butterflies and blackmailing the corrupt "elite". This also entails working with others rather than simply using them as pawns. Tom also has significantly higher standards than Gabriel, as he rather dislikes the concept of getting children involved and only akumatizes Adrien into Caspases out of duress and with their explicit consent.
  • Divergent Points: ML Salt is an unabashed Take That! at various salt tropes. The first three chapters each have Marinette, Adrien, and Alya acting like the many twisted salt versions... except it's their bodies being forced to act these roles, while their more canon-oriented selves are trapped inside crying out that this isn't who they are.
  • Dread String of Fate tackles the notion that Marinette and Adrien are meant to be together due to being Ladybug and Chat Noir, along with the series maintaining its status quo. It's a Soulmate AU Fic where the Red String of Fate is tied to Adrien's ring finger and the Cat Ring itself... and wound around Marinette's neck. This emphasizes the idea that she's not being given any choice in the matter — fate intends to give Adrien 'his lady' regardless of how she feels about it, punishing her both for trying to confess her feelings and whenever she considers giving up.
  • Duplicity dismantles the common plotline of Chat Noir betraying Ladybug after learning that his father is Hawk Moth. Rather than being Easily Forgiven while all the blame is pinned on Gabriel, Adrien loses the trust and respect of his former allies, who call him out for being willing to sacrifice others to fuel his father's selfish Wish.
  • Feralnette AU:
    • All of the pressure Marinette is under to be an Ideal Heroine makes her decide that if something's got to give, it's her civilian life which should be sacrificed. To that end, she shelves friendship and fashion, focusing primarily on her responsibilities as Ladybug.
    • Shipper on Deck is picked apart through Alya, especially during the Enough Rope arc. Her love of LadyNoir means that when Lila spins a yarn about Chat Noir planning to confess to Ladybug during an upcoming fair, she posts it on the Ladyblog without a second thought...drawing gawkers hoping to catch sight of the heroes to the fair, along with Hawk Moth's full attention. She also refuses to consider that Marinette might not be interested in Adrien anymore or want her 'help', what with their friendship being so strained...to the point that she thinks nothing of breaking into Marinette's locker and stealing a gift out of it, assuming it's meant for Adrien and that Marinette won't mind her 'delivering' it for her.
    • Alya also deconstructs Going for the Big Scoop; she prioritizes the Ladyblog over all other concerns, endangering herself and others through her reckless attempts to get live footage of akumas. It's also pointed out that she films others without permission, treating them as nothing more than assets for her blog.
    • The concept of Expendable Alternate Universe is deconstructed by Bunnyx. While she's meant to keep her interference in alternate timelines to a bare minimum, she wrongly assumes that she's supposed to be 'fixing' them... by making them into carbon copies of her own reality. She also doesn't truly care about anyone from these other timelines, seeing them as 'Not Real'. The only reason she wants to 'help' Feralnette is that she's decided her world 'isn't right', but her concern isn't enough to compel her to do anything truly beneficial — it's solely self-centered and for her own personal satisfaction.
  • Five Times Lila Rossi Suffered The Consequences Of Her Lies deconstructs many of Lila's lies.
    • Claiming to be Ladybug's best friend on a public blog dedicated to Ladybug and Chat Noir gets her kidnapped by Hawk Moth in a Hostage for MacGuffin scheme since he reads the blog to find any information on the heroes he can use to exploit. He is quickly disgusted with both Lila herself and Mrs. Rossi and when he returns Lila, he snaps at Mrs. Rossi to discipline her daughter.
    • Chloé believes one of Lila's lies about a dance that is supposed to attract Ladybug, and when she found out she lied she vows to take Lila down and expose her as a liar. This forces Lila to stop harassing Marinette until she can deal with Chloé, and she believes that it will be easy to get her out of the way because nobody likes her due to how much of an Alpha Bitch she is. Unfortunately for Lila, she doesn't consider the fact that Chloé is the daughter of the mayor of Paris and has used this to get away with stuff in the past, so the school administration is reluctant to punish her. As a result, when she attempts to frame Chloé for cheating off her test, for stealing her necklace, and for shoving her down the stairs, it all backfires because Chloé correctly points out that Lila's claims are based on entirely circumstantial evidence and there's no way she'd even want Lila's cheap necklace because she's able to afford all the expensive jewelry she wants. She also correctly points out to Principal Damocles that expelling her without a proper investigation into these supposed incidents or even any evidence will bring her father's wrath down on the school, forcing him to back down.
    • Lila's missed school and lack of studying effort result in her getting held back a year; when her mother shows up to appeal the decision, she finds out that Lila has been lying about the school being closed due to the Akuma attacks and proceeds to scream at the principal for believing Lila's lies. Lila is quickly grounded and her final contact with the rest of the class is apology letters.
    • Jagged Stone responds to Lila's claims about him by suing her for defamation as people were starting to accuse him of doing "unrock'n'roll things" to Lila (calling Alya out for her part in the mess) and adding an "emotional damages" suit on Marinette's behalf.
    • After Lila's "lying disorder" is explained to the class, no one believes anything she says anymore. Even if she "can't help being a compulsive liar", it doesn't change the fact that she's been lying to everybody the whole time and has been trying to ruin Marinette's life with her lies so nobody has any good reason to trust her anymore.
  • Future Trading deconstructs Alix's role as the protector of the timeline, along with the concepts of Best of All Possible Worlds and Necessary Fail. According to Fluff, for the best outcome of Ladybug and Chat Noir to defeat Hawk Moth, certain events can't occur too early. Unfortunately, that means Alix is forced to see her friends suffer in the present day just for a future far from their reach. She can't let them discover each other's identities or even date each other otherwise Hawk Moth could take advantage of that, and she can't even expose Lila to free her friends because Lila is draining Hawk Moth's resources. The responsibility and sacrifices are crushing Alix, and she wonders if she'll even live with herself after everything is done.
  • Hero Chat: An odd version in that it's a deconstruction fic of deconstruction fics, specifically trying to resolve standard call-out topics reasonably.
    • When Chat Noir realizes what his incessant flirting looks like, he has a private discussion with Ladybug about boundaries and how much flirting is too much. Ladybug also clarifies that she's fine with at least some flirting, as she sees it as part of their banter.
    • There's also some to the 'Adrien is starved for his model job' plot point. Yes, he's thin and on a strict diet, but he has a nutritionist who's making sure he's fed a healthy amount for a boy his age, and his activities as Chat Noir are taken into account. In fact, his nutritionist is having trouble making sure he's getting enough food, since his high metabolism only spikes higher once the superheroing is taken into account.
    • While most authors will try to portray Adrien's mother as better than Gabriel and that Adrien's suffering happened under Gabriel, canonically she's only been gone for about a year. She was entirely complicit with what Gabriel did to Adrien (albeit better at explaining herself).
    • Marinette's friends may have fallen for Lila's manipulations, but they're not her brainwashed minions; they just think that Marinette was jumping to conclusions about the extent of Lila's lies (Alya thinks that Lila's mom wouldn't just allow her to skip school while she said she was in Achu). They end up figuring out that Lila's bad news by Spotting the Thread on their own.
  • The Hero of Paris humorously deconstructs a plot point from "Backwarder": namely, Hawk Moth deciding to akumatize someone while hiding in a public restroom. Unlike in canon, his usual Evil Is Hammy mannerisms do not go unnoticed by the people outside the restroom (especially since he's delaying a train in the process), and as a result his secret identity is accidentally outed by an "Ugly American" Stereotype who decided to livestream him for kicks.
  • How Miraculous Should Have Ended deconstructs a number of the series' elements, usually for humor purposes.
    • Marinette and Adrien's ability (or lack thereof) to keep their secret identities secret is a common target; for every moment in canon where they could have accidentally revealed their identities (e.g. Marinette transforming with barely any cover in an open park in "Stormy Weather" and Adrien as Cat Noir accidentally revealing he knows Kim’s name in "Animan"), there's a scene in the fanfic showing it actually happen.
    • Chloé's bratty behavior ends up under more scrutiny here, with her constantly getting called out on it and facing consequences for her actions; additionally, her behavior and her frequently being targeted by akumas mean that Ladybug and Cat Noir are more prone to going the Refuse to Rescue the Disliked route than in canon.
    • The more questionable Love Square-related actions Marinette and Adrien take are frequently taken apart — for example, in "Copycat", Alya is creeped out by Marinette apparently having Adrien's entire schedule, and in "Glaciator", Cat Noir is called out by Ladybug for his entitled behavior towards her.
    • Hawk Moth's more nonsensical decisions and plots are subjected to frequent lampshading, whether through him instructing his akumas to make smarter choices than they did in canon or others (including himself) berating/mocking him for his poor choices.
    • In canon, the fact that most of the akumatized villains are people Marinette and Adrien know generally isn't commented upon. In this story's version of "Bakerix", Cat Noir notices — and between Marinette's loved ones being frequent targets and the fact that her grandfather wasn't akumatized until she finally met him, he comes to the conclusion that Hawk Moth is targeting her for reasons unknown.
  • Jerk in Sheep's Clothing, while it does give the class some serious Laser-Guided Karma for believing Lila's lies so easily, deconstructs the myth that Marinette did not buy the Blatant Lies because she is somehow intellectually and emotionally superior than her peers. In the first chapter, she reminds herself—and the readers—that she fell for Lila's lies in "Volpina" and only saw through the liar when she bluffed about being friends with Marinette's alter ego. The main plot of the story itself revolves around her love story with Henri LeRoi, a boy who acts like a kind and honest friend to her but is actually a cruel and manipulative bully. He tells the lonely and love-starved Marinette that he cares for her unconditionally and practically swears his complete loyalty to her, showing that anyone can believe a liar if they tell you what you want to hear.
    • It also deconstructs many salt fics that have original or crossover characters who show support to Marinette against Lila. Henri takes on this role of Marinette's sole trustworthy ally, the one who will stand by her through thick and thin, who does not hesitate to call the class out on their crap about Lila. In reality, he's doing this not out of the goodness of his heart, nor out of concern and affection for Marinette, but to manipulate her into thinking all her friends are selfish bullies who don’t give a crud about her.
    • Also deconstructed in this fic is the way Marinette is portrayed in many salt fics. In most salt stories, Marinette is perfectly okay watching her former friends get bullied and humiliated by the OC/crossover characters, enjoys getting petty vengeance on them, and using her connections to break their hearts and ruin their lives. However, in Jerk In Sheep's Clothing, the one time Henri attempts to harass and humiliate one of her friends in public, Marinette is horrified and chews him out for it, saying she does not hold a grudge at the friend and Henri has no right to try to hurt them on her behalf. After that, Henri does all his bullying behind her back.
    • The story also points out how Adrien was unaware of Lila's worst actions when he told Marinette to take the high road. Marinette never told him how she stole the book or how Lila threatened her.
    • Adrien's friendship with Chloé is also deconstructed. Marinette reveals to Chat Noir that she didn't tell Adrien that Lila threatened her because she honestly thought Adrien wouldn't really care, given how he regularly defends Chloé despite how she constantly bullies others, especially Marinette.
  • Juleka vs. the Forces of the Universe:
    • The Shipper on Deck is torn asunder through the character of Alya, as well as other supporters of the Adrienette and Ladynoir ships. It's made clear that Alya has stopped caring about what her 'bestie' actually wants, pushing her towards Adrien despite her growing discomfort around him. She constantly blames Marinette for her own Zany Schemes failing, insulting her and encouraging their friends to treat Marinette like she's incompetent and incapable of achieving anything on her own. Similarly, despite knowing that Ladybug doesn't want a romantic relationship with her partner, she ships Ladynoir and happily misrepresents their relationship through Manipulative Editing and posting pictures without context.
      • Notably, the trope is also reconstructed through Juleka. Unlike Alya and other shippers of Adrienette and Ladynoir, Juleka actually cares about Marinette as a person rather than a prize. While she wants to help her hook up with Luka, Juleka has enough self-awareness to question her own motivations; what ultimately drives her is seeing that Marinette is truly happy and comfortable around Luka, and that Marinette herself is interested in potentially pursuing a relationship with him.
    • The fic also criticizes the way that the Love Square is kept static, maintaining the status quo by keeping them locked in the same position. Marinette is not allowed to succeed in any of her efforts to get closer to Adrien, while he remains oblivious to her crush, pursuing Ladybug as Chat Noir over her objections. Once she becomes aware of this dynamic, Juleka immediately recognizes how unhealthy it is, and the unfortunate implications that Adrien will only care about Marinette if he learns that she's Ladybug.

    K-Z 
  • Karma's a Bitch: A number of salt fic tropes, particularly found in The Karma of Lies get targeted here:
    • Marinette automatically having the moral high ground because she's right about Lila. The very first chapter points out that while there's nothing proving Lila's claims true, Marinette hasn't shown any tangible proof that she's lying, either. In addition, Marinette's heated accusations make her seem less than credible to the outside observer, making it easy for Lila to act like she's the one being treated unfairly and dismiss her accusations as jealousy. Marinette's friends even point out in their interviews with the police that this isn't the first time Marinette has jumped to conclusions and held grudges against people over misunderstandings, so it was easy for them to accept the idea that it was happening again with Lila.
    • Marinette's classmates being depicted as irredeemable, ungrateful jerks or loyal, die-hard allies with no in-between. Here, they aren't blind idiots or irredeemable jerks, nor are they firmly on one side or the other. While they don't believe Lila is lying, they still see Marinette as a good friend and enjoy spending time with her, putting in the work to balance their friendships with the two girls and spend time with both of them despite their inability to get along. As for why they believe Lila, it's discussed that a huge part of the problem is adults they trust, like Ms. Bustier, failing to do their jobs and giving Lila special treatment she doesn't deserve. This directly reinforces the lies she's getting that special treatment for and makes it more believable when she makes similar claims later. And since they've already had to accept the reality of a supervillain using butterflies that possess people to attack teenagers for magic jewelry, Marinette's classmates have naturally developed some Willing Suspension of Disbelief regarding other far-fetched ideas.
    • The idea that Adrien is selfish enough to knowingly let Marinette suffer for his personal convenience. It's pointed out that his advice to Marinette to "take the high road" does benefit her by making it harder for Lila to target her, even if it's not a good long-term solution to the problem. He also makes the valid point that Lila got akumatized even when he privately confronted her and nicely asked her to stop lying, which left him worried that she'd do something far worse if she was actually exposed (and she later proves this fear well-founded). Emphasis is also placed on the fact that he thought Lila was just telling harmless celebrity lies when he gave that advice; once he learns about how she threatened Marinette, he immediately takes it back and gets on board with outing Lila as a liar.
    • The "Saltinette" characterization. Marinette does have some shades of it at first, being upset that her friends don't believe her and Adrien isn't doing anything but rethinks her attitude after Zoe points out that they have some valid reasons for acting as they are and expecting them to simply take her word is unfair. It's also shown that she's not somehow better at spotting liars than the rest of her classmates, with Tikki pointing out that Marinette also believed Lila at first and only caught on because Lila made a claim Marinette knew couldn't be true. When Zoe starts manipulating the class, Marinette plays right into her hands without ever suspecting her involvement.
  • The Karma of Lies:
    • The concept of Protagonist-Centered Morality is tackled through Adrien, who sincerely believes that this is how the world works thanks to seeing it in his favorite media series. So far as he's concerned, he's obviously a good guy; therefore, everything he does is automatically right by default. This makes him a self-centered Entitled Bastard who expects to have his Happy Ending handed to him on a silver platter because he 'deserves' it simply by virtue of being him. Despite being repeatedly warned that this isn't how things work, he clings to this delusion to the bitter end, unwilling to change his ways once his Karma Houdini Warranty runs out and continuing to try and ram things down the road he wants, to his own detriment.
    • Karma Houdini Warranty is deconstructed through how various characters deal with theirs expiring. Some, like Lila, have actually prepared to deal with things going wrong and are able to shield themselves from the full karmic backlash. Others, like Chloé and Juleka, recognize their mistakes and are able to mitigate the effects through sincerely repenting and accepting their respective punishments. Then there are cases like Adrien and Alya, who are in complete denial and ultimately make things worse for themselves.
    • World-Healing Wave is also deconstructed. Adrien views his partner's Miraculous Cure as a magical Reset Button that ensures their battles don't have any long-term consequences. For Marinette, meanwhile, it's a heavy burden to bear, as evidenced when she has to make a call that could lead to casualties — knowing that the victims will be brought Back from the Dead if she wins does not make that any easier on her.
    • The idea that Adrien is a Sheltered Aristocrat who simply doesn't know any better is skewered. Ladybug repeatedly rejects his advances, making clear that she's not interested in a Relationship Upgrade, only for him to blithely ignore every protest and insist that they're meant to be Because Destiny Says So. Plagg also constantly warns him about the impact of his actions/inactions, only to be repeatedly brushed off, showing that it's more of a willful ignorance on his part. What's more, his being Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense bites him in the butt when he lets Lila see him accessing his family's emergency funds account, passwords and all.
    • The series also picks apart the idea that someone has to forgive those who have wronged them and help them out. Marinette was constantly pressured to Turn the Other Cheek when dealing with Chloé, Lila, and other issues; her attempts to follow this advice just led to her being taken advantage of while those who hurt her never learned anything. Things only improve when she puts her foot down and cuts them out of her life, finding friends who don't take advantage of her... and the only ones she forgives are the ones who actually make an effort to change their ways.
  • LadyBugOut takes a sledgehammer to Adrien/Chat Noir acting entitled to Ladybug's love. He's repeatedly called out for ignoring her feelings whenever they don't perfectly align with his own goals, and when it becomes painfully clear that he's convinced himself that they're meant to be together because they were chosen to bear a paired set of Miraculous? Master Fu strips him of the ring.
    • Alya's tendency to justify everything she does as Going for the Big Scoop also gets picked apart when her classmates question her taking a photo of Ladybug and Chat kissing and posting it without context. Her defense amounts to claiming that Ladybug being a public figure makes her a celebrity, and celebrities don't deserve any privacy. This leads to Ladybug starting her own blog and addressing the matter personally, causing the Ladyblog's popularity to take a serious hit.
  • Leave for Mendeleiev:
    • The concept of Relationship Upgrades is picked apart through Adrien, who takes for granted the notion that he and Ladybug are meant to be together... and thusly doesn't bother building any kind of bond up with her. Even when she tells him outright that "Love takes time and work, and those that want to put in the work are the ones that will last," he dismisses her by declaring it's a good thing they're already connected. Naturally, she doesn't end up with him; instead, she gets together with Aurore, having built up a deep connection with them over time.
  • Lila's claims to be a friend of Ladybug and claims that the miraculous cure fixed her tinnitus come back to bite her in Lie-abilities when an unstable man tries to force her to contact Ladybug at gunpoint so Ladybug will save his injured relative.
  • lies of attrition: This one deconstructs Ladybug's tendency to keep others Locked Out of the Loop. While the rule on knowing each other's identities is understandable and important, her tendency to keep everyone out of the loop on literally everything does more harm than good, and results is some very detrimental Poor Communication Kills. And the whole conflict of this fic could've been avoided if she'd just talked to Chat Noir.
  • Lies We Tell (Ourselves): Another one that deconstructs Salt Fics by reminding the readers that the characters don't have the whole picture due to lacking the audience's privileged point of view, and building on that, giving the characters logical explanations for the way they act.
    • In many salt fics, Adrien is shown as a spineless Extreme Doormat because of his "taking the high road" approach to Lila's lies; here, it's shown that Adrien thought that Lila lied to make herself look more interesting and her lies weren't harming anybody. When he sees that she's trying to manipulate Nino in order to get him to work as a DJ for her parties for free while setting him up for a big disappointment, Adrien was ready to intervene, though in the end, he didn't need to. The story also reminds the readers that in "Chameleon", Adrien tried to convince Lila to stop lying, which resulted in her being Akumatized and going after him (meaning that from his point of view, he was protecting Marinette from the same thing happening to her) and that he isn't aware of Lila's threat to Marinette in the bathroom at the end of the episode.
    • Alya, the other biggest victim of the Salt Fics, is often portrayed as Lila's Beta Bitch who is willing to happily throw Marinette under the bus and treats every word of Lila as gospel, and refuses to admit the truth about Lila even when presented with undeniable evidence of her falsehoods; here, it's shown that Alya trusts Lila so much because she believes to be Ladybug's bestie, and Ladybug would never befriend a bad person. When Nino points out that Lila might be lying about being Ladybug's BFF, Alya counters it by saying that Lila knows about certain events of Heroes' Day that wouldn't be able to know if she wasn't close with Ladybug (of course, Lila knows of these events because she was allied with Hawk Moth and took part in them, but Alya can't be blamed for not thinking this). So it's not a case of "Alya throwing her alleged best friend under the bus for the sake of a new girl" but "Alya is placed between a rock and a hard place when she's forced to choose between her best friend and somebody very close to her idol".
    • Many Salt Fics portray Marinette's classmates as Gullible Lemmings for not instantly believing her about Lila being a manipulative liar, or in some cases, dismissing her warnings due to Marinette being jealous of Lila because she also has her eyes on Adrien. The fic smashed both situations with a sledgehammer, and shows that Marinette herself is far from flawless:
      • While Nino eventually agreed with Marinette, he explains that the reason why he didn't believe her immediately is that Marinette doesn't have a perfect record herself regarding judge of character, since she used to dislike Adrien due to a bad first impression born out of a misunderstanding, and even told Nino not to befriend Adrien.
      • As Alya points out, Marinette has a history of letting jealousy get the best of her when it comes to other girls who may like Adrien, with Kagami as a prime example, pointing out how Marinette never bothers to hide how much she dislikes Kagami for that very reason.
  • Long Con:
    • As a Recursive Fanfiction for the high road, this work criticizes both the "high road" approach as well as Marinette's employment of Bothering by the Book. While her malicious compliance does force her classmates to realize that Lila is manipulating them, it also means that she's stuck catering to Lila's every whim in the meantime, which takes its toll on her. She's also deeply discomforted in seeing how much her classmates are suffering in the meantime, finding no catharsis in their struggles, and repeatedly debates with herself whether or not she should continue with her plan.
    • Marinette's attraction to Adrien is also picked apart, as she realizes that her classmates see her as a Flat Character whose personality is completely defined by her crush on him. On top of this, she recognizes that she was Loving a Shadow, ultimately deciding to give up on him entirely.
    • Ms. Bustier's preference for passive-aggressively pressuring her "good" students to Easily Forgive their bullies and tormentors while refusing to punish said bullies means that Lila isn't concerned about being exposed. When the class finally confronts her, she points out that their teacher will punish them instead of her, and she'll get coddled in the same way as Chloé.
  • Miraculous: The Phoenix Rises takes the original cartoon, which is extremely upbeat, clean, and idealistic, and hits it with about every Capepunk trope in the book, from Celebrity Superhero, to It Sucks to Be the Chosen One, the Superhero Paradox, all wrapped up in a hefty dose of cynicism.
  • Miraculous: Tales of Scarlet Beetle & Ikati Black:
    • In canon, no one really bats an eye at Sabrina's lopsided, toxic friendship with Chloé. Here, everyone's concerned about Sabrina to some extent, it's mentioned that there've been attempts in the past to separate them, and Alya makes it her personal mission to help Sabrina get out from under the blonde girl's thumb.
    • A more positive version of this trope occurs regarding the Fandom-Specific Plot of Marinette being childhood friends with Nino and Kim. While most fics include this but keep the canon status quo (usually by stating that they drifted apart), here it has positive long-term effects: being friends with the gung-ho Kim has made Marinette more assertive towards others (especially Chloé) than she originally was in canon, while being friends with the sweet Marinette has made Kim kinder and friendlier towards his classmates and others (which directly leads to him getting chosen to wield the Ladybug here).
  • A New Leaf:
    • Adrien's continued friendship with Chloé gets deconstructed. For a long time, Marinette excused it as him being Chloé's Only Friend, but that idea comes crashing down when she sees him hanging out with Lila; unaware of why he was doing it (it was part of a deal to have her undo Marinette's expulsion), she comes to the conclusion that Adrien deliberately favors bullies over their victims.
    • The idea of Marinette being at all morally superior to her peers because she sees through Lila's lies is heavily deconstructed through a "The Reason You Suck" Speech directed at her by Alya. For all that Marinette complains about how Alya never checked her sources, Alya points out that Marinette has never given her concrete proof that Lila was lying; for that matter, Ladybug hasn't said anything on the matter, either, even though it's been months since the video where Lila claims they're best friends was posted. For all that Marinette claimed Lila was a terrible person, it was Marinette that always attacked first — the rest of the class doesn't know enough about Lila to draw any sort of conclusion about her, so for all they know Marinette is claiming that a perfectly nice girl is secretly a terrible person for no reason, further damaging her credibility. Alya also cites Marinette's actions against Kagami as a reason not to trust her judgement on Lila, since for all she knows Marinette is just acting out of jealousy towards another girl getting close to Adrien again. Overall, Marinette is left so shaken by the revelation that she immediately makes plans to become a better person — which, unfortunately, includes her deciding to give up being Ladybug.
      • The above speech also leads to a deconstruction of the Secret Identity trope. Part of the reason Alya's trust in Marinette has eroded is because of her constant disappearances during akuma attacks — and whenever Alya checks on her afterwards, she figures out that Marinette was lying about where she was.
    • The idea that directly exposing Lila is the best way to take her down is also deconstructed. As noted above, all trying to publicly expose Lila did was make Marinette look like an awful person — but after she decides to be genuinely nice to Lila, her actions (baking her croissants that account for her supposed allergies, letting her have Adrien, etc.) indirectly start revealing Lila's true nature to the class because Lila genuinely can't comprehend that Marinette is being no-strings-attached nice to her.
  • Open My Eyes effectively tears apart the notion that Adrien would be better off believing that his father was a hero instead of the villain he'd been fighting for years on several levels:
    • Despite being told that his father heroically gave his life to defeat Monarch, Adrien cannot stop thinking about how cold and controlling the man had been towards him his entire life. Unfortunately, because he believes that his father sacrificed his life to save the world, he feels that he does not have the right to resent him, so he maintains a front of loving and admiring his father while being deeply conflicted about it on the inside.
    • It is also shown that the deception has deeply affected his self confidence on both sides of the mask. As Chat Noir, he admits to Ladybug that he believes that Gabriel was a better hero than him for defeating Monarch while he was absent from the final battle. As Adrien, he keeps trying different activities at school in hopes of finding something he’s good enough at to be able to live up to his father’s supposed genius, only to grow increasingly frustrated and despondent when he fails to become an instant expert at any of them.
    • As anyone could have guessed, Lila (here operating under the alias Cerise) proves that she would absolutely use her knowledge of Monarch’s true identity to sabotage Ladybug, doing so by using the Butterfly Miraculous to send messages to both her and Chat Noir, taunting them over the secrets Ladybug is keeping from her partner. This forces her to tell Chat Noir the truth, breaking his trust in her and driving a wedge between the two of them, just as their new enemy had planned.
    • Marinette’s willingness to keep secrets from Adrien just to spare his feelings is similarly picked apart. When she confronts Chat Noir as Ladybug over him cataclyming Gabriel's memorial statue, she tries to defend her decisions by claiming that learning that his father was Monarch would destroy Adrien, and she refused to let that happen on account of her love for him, subsequently revealing her secret identity. Unfortunately, Chat declares that Gabriel was his father and that he had the right to know what really happened to him, revealing himself to be Adrien and effectively tearing Marinette’s argument apart. To make matters worse, now Adrien knows that his own girlfriend has been keeping secrets about his family from him, further damaging their relationship. Ultimately, all Marinette’s efforts to shield Adrien from the truth did was create more problems in the long run.
    • Even hiding his true nature as a sentibeing created by the Peacock Miraculous from him proves to be a disastrous mistake. When Adrien punches a metal window pane out of rage and frustration, he accidentally damages the rings containing his amok, putting him in a painful near-death state and would have ultimately killed him if Nathalie hadn’t had the rings repaired. Later, after stealing the Peacock Miraculous to interrogate Duusu, he discovers the amoks in his and Felix’s rings and naturally assumes that his cousin had secretly created two new sentimonsters. Felix is forced to use Adrien’s rings to make him return the brooch before he snaps them both out of existence, leading to Adrien making yet another shocking discovery under less than ideal circumstances.
    • On a more lighthearted note, the story also deconstructs the idea that Adrien simply cannot handle the truth. He spends most of the fic is a very bad mental state, as would just about anyone in his position. However, the constant love and support of his friends and family sees him through it all, and by the end he is in a much better place than he was even before he learned the truth. Granted it helps that the only time the new butterfly villain tries to akumatize him is when he’s surrounded by heroes ready to stop it, but it is nonetheless shown that a proper and sincere support system is far more effective than some pretty lies.
  • (pockets full of) Stones deconstructs Adrien's "just a friend" statement regarding Marinette by pushing it to the Logical Extreme: that is, Adrien is Aromantic Asexual and thus cares for her in a platonic manner. He even comes to realize that the love he had for Ladybug is just a higher form of friendship rather than romantic as he initially mistook it for.
    • It also deconstructs his classmates' attempt to set him up with Marinette. While they are well-meaning, their constant dismissal of Adrien's claim and trying to get him to love Marinette romantically gets on his nerves. It eventually gets too much and he snaps, outing himself as AroAce just to get them to stop.
  • As the title implies, Salt Trope Parody Oneshots parodies and deconstructs the usual tropes seen in salt fics. In particular, it deconstructs the concept of Marinette "getting back" at Adrien and the other classmates for believing Lila's lies, showing just how much of a petty, spiteful, and ultimately foolish person Marinette would have to be to act like that.
  • Schedule deconstructs Marinette's Stalker with a Crush tendencies and completely averts Stalking Is Funny if It Is Female After Male. Adrien is not only creeped out that Marinette got so much information on his daily life and the excessive posters of himself plastered over her wall, but also hurt someone he trusted and considered a friend would violate his privacy and treat him like a commodity. He then becomes paranoid that Marinette is stalking him everywhere and has gotten panic attacks over it. It's to the point where he can't even be in the same room as her.
  • The author Storygirl000 has written several fics deconstructing typical salt fic tropes.
    • Power Trip deconstructs the common "Marinette loses her class representative spot to Lila, who turns out to be a Sketchy Successor" plot. The author's note at the beginning points out that, assuming Lila's done things like this previously, she should have a working knowledge of how her position works; as such, she manages to successfully set up fundraisers and get the class a trip to Disneyland Paris for their end-of-the-year field trip. Consequently, her fall comes about not because she ended up failing at her own plans, but because Marinette's own trip plans turned out to be more spectacular overall.
    • Funhouse Mirror deconstructs Ron the Death Eater by having Alya meet her salt fic counterpart after being exposed to an akuma's powers. Naturally, she's horrified at the fact that her alternate self is a gullible, spiteful harpy of a person, and the fic ends with her telling her friends to smack some sense into her if she ever acts like that.
    • Underestimation presents a familiar scenario — Lila pulling a Wounded Gazelle Gambit to frame Marinette — and has the class think it out rationally; between the fact that Marinette is a Nice Girl and the fact that they live in a world where anyone can be easily framed by a villain's powers, they conclude that Lila merely mistook her "attacker" for Marinette, and she's forced to begrudgingly agree.
    • Similar to Funhouse Mirror, Kill the Lights deconstructs the Ron the Death Eater trope by having the class deal with shadow archetypes in the form of students from a class Lila transferred to, each one representing how they're commonly characterized in salt fic.
      • Ms. Bonaparte is a counterpart to Ms. Bustier, and she horrifies the other teacher with her willingness to let her students get away with their bullying (and let Lila specifically manipulate them and herself). For bonus points, seeing how her counterpart behaves leads to Bustier having a My God, What Have I Done? moment over how she treats her own class and seeking to rectify that.
      • Vin is Alya's counterpart, running a tabloid-like news site about Ladybug and Chat Noir, taking Lila's word at face value, and being stubborn enough to refuse any criticism or attempts to get him to see the truth. Alya's quick to dismiss his articles as nothing more than lie-driven clickbait.
      • Zero is Alix's counterpart (and Kim's, though they never meet), being the student that's quickest to resort to physically bullying anyone (e.g. tripping Alix and Nathaniel) who supposedly harmed Lila and insisting it's "justice".
      • Newton is Rose's counterpart, being Lila's victim when she pulls the salt fic-typical Fake Charity scam. Word of God also compares him to Max, claiming to be a genius yet being dumb enough to fall for Lila's claims (e.g. refusing to listen to Rose when she points out Prince Ali doesn't support this supposed charity).
      • Finally, Trixie is Adrien's counterpart, being the only one who knows Lila is lying but refusing to expose her for risk of akumatization and dismissing her lies as "harmless". When Adrien points out that his friends are getting harmed by them, she simply tells him that they're used to the pain (being Hawk Moth's most frequent victims), so it doesn't matter.
    • here's to never-ending circles takes a critical look at Depending on the Writer and Alternative Character Interpretation by throwing Chloé (a character frequently subjected to both) into a situation where she's made to play a new role every week (ranging from being her Spoiled Brat canon self to being Marinette's best friend in a Salt Fic-like scenario), with the implication that she'll be forced to anyways if she refuses. She's also fully aware of every loop, and occasionally uses loops where she's meant to be an antagonist to vent her frustrations about not having a consistent role or being able to control her own fate.
  • Telling Lies? No, Mama deconstructs many of the common tropes seen in salt fics.
    • The class gangs up on Marinette when Lila accuses her of assaulting her, like in many salt fics before. However, instead of passing this over as them just being jerks, it is explained that they do this because Lila deliberately played the victim to make them defensive.
    • In most salt fics, Alya is the first to pounce on Marinette when Lila accuses her of something bad. However, in this story, when Lila claims Marinette attacked her, Alya is instead the first one to come to Marinette's defense and try to prove her innocence.
    • Many salt fics have Adrien as a Dirty Coward, who sits back and watches Marinette be tormented by Lila and blames her for everything horrible that happens to her because she didn’t take his "high road" advice. In this story, however, Adrien is quick to come to Marinette's defense when Lila tries to defame her and even begins to doubt his own advice to her.
  • Two Letters:
    • Deconstructs Marinette's status as The Reliable One. After shouldering the burden of Ladybug for over two years, Marinette grows resentful over how she appears to be the only one taking the threat posed by Hawk Moth seriously, frustrated by the apparent ingratitude of the citizens she's worked so hard to protect. This builds to the point that she decides to retire, and it's later revealed that she's come to associate the very idea of helping anyone besides herself with suffering thanks to the resultant Sanity Slippage.
    • The fic also questions why nobody else in Paris seems to be setting up any kind of countermeasures against Hawk Moth, whether in the form of trying to hunt the terrorist down or providing programs to help deal with or prevent akumatizations. The lack of any such efforts only further convinces Marinette that Paris is relying too heavily upon her to 'magically fix everything', to the point where she fears people are deliberately getting akumatized without considering the dangers of dealing with Hawk Moth.
    • Several cliches common to the "Saltinette" genre of accusation fics get targeted for deconstruction:
      • While Luka supports Marinette, he doesn't completely agree with or condone all of her bitterness. For instance, he feels like she might be judging her parents too harshly, and that she's not acknowledging how difficult it is to resist akumatization. He also admits that the glee she shows at the misfortune of those who wronged her in the past isn't ideal, even while still sympathizing with her and reassuring her that she's not a bad person.
      • In many salt fics, Marinette becomes furious at her friends for believing Lila's lies. Here, though, while Marinette is still very angry at some people like Alya, she makes it clear that — given her constant life-or-death battles against akumas — she really couldn't care less about something as trivial as people believing Lila's lies about having tinnitus or knowing celebrities. Instead, when she's angry at people, it's due to their akumatizations or their actions as Miraculous users.
      • The Reveal in the final chapter makes it clear that this story is meant to be a "Saltinette" fic played for horror rather than catharsis. As a result of the above-mentioned pressure on her, Marinette snapped and chose to retire while also punishing the entirety of Paris for, in her mind, pushing her this far — which she achieved by gifting the Ladybug Miraculous to Lila Rossi (subjecting Paris to the whims of a far less moral Ladybug who can ruin anyone's reputation with ease), removing the other Miraculouses from the playing field (including keeping the Cat for herself and outright destroying the Rabbit Miraculous), and leaving a letter for her post-amnesia self that essentially claims she was a flawless victim to justify it all. And she's become a Yandere for Luka in the process, so much so that she plans on using the Wish granted by the Ladybug and Cat Miraculouses to destroy the world and replace it with one where he's her perfect, loving boyfriend forever if anything were to come between them.
  • Unsatisfied deconstructs various aspects of the series:
    • Numb has Marinette deal with the pressure to become an Ideal Heroine and never allow herself any moments of weakness by turning to a drug that acts as an emotional suppressant, turning her into an Emotionless Girl who no longer cares about anything other than doing her job as Ladybug. While Tikki tries to prevent her from resorting to such extreme measures, Marinette recalls the kwami lecturing her about needing to be perfect.
    • Self-Destruct shows the downsides of Alya's laser focus on Going for the Big Scoop. Despite being warned that an armed robber is out and about, she still goes out trying to film footage for the Ladyblog, runs into the thief, and gets attacked when he sees that she's recording.
    • Breakup deconstructs Adrien's insistence on trying to "keep the peace" by going along with things he doesn't want to by exploring a scenario where he starts dating Marinette not because he's interested, but because he doesn't want to lose her friendship. Which inevitably happens anyway once she overhears him admitting to Nino that he still thinks of her as "just a friend" and is only continuing the charade to keep her happy.
    • Fight spotlights Alya's tendency to drag others into her Zany Schemes by deconstructing "The Puppeteer 2". Marinette isn't happy about Alya making her ditch a babysitting gig to drag her to the museum, and is even less happy to learn that Alya dumped Manon off on Nino, ruining his plans to spend the afternoon hanging out with Adrien. That last part is especially galling, since she realizes that Alya intended to "coincidentally" bump into Adrien there as part of another plan to force the two of them together.
    • Finally, Duress picks apart the idea of Adrien using Chat Noir as a way to circumvent his father's rules, as well as his tendency to casually lie about his relationship with Ladybug, when he crashes one of Kitty Section's concerts. His presence attracts Hawk Moth's attention, resulting in an akuma; Ladybug is deeply unimpressed with his Skewed Priorities, as well as how he claimed she was going to be showing up as his "plus one."
  • Watch Me Burn targets Adrien and Mariette's relationship in Chat Blanc and the love square in general, pointing out how Adrien only became interested in a relationship with Marinette after learning that she was Ladybug. Thus, his "love" for Marinette is really just an extension of his obsession with her alter ego. It's also pointed out how selfish it was for him to become a Secret Secret-Keeper rather than admitting he'd learned her identity, showing how it gives him a position of power in their relationship that encourages his existing disrespect for Ladybug's feelings. Between this and Marinette's Gibberish of Love making her struggle to enforce boundaries, the relationship quickly turns abusive, with Adrien leveraging his knowledge to make Marinette miserable in both of her identities while silently laughing at her discomfort and anticipating her mortification when she learns that Chat Noir's escalating sexual harassment was really coming from her "loving" boyfriend all along.
    • The World-Healing Wave is also deconstructed; since Ladybug can repair the damage after every fight, Chat Noir sees no problem with harassing Ladybug during battles rather than focusing on the akuma, shrugging off the harm that's caused in the meantime as unimportant because Ladybug will fix everything in the end and it will be like it never happened. By contrast, the responsiblity of using Miraculous Cure takes a severe emotional toll on Ladybug, who often faces situations where she doesn't have time to save everyone and has to choose who to rescue, knowing those she can't help will have to live with the memory of what happened after she fixes the physical damage. It's also pointed out that, given how destructive many akuma are, Paris is deeply dependent on Ladybug's Miraculous Cure, to the point where Chat is able to effectively take the entire city hostage by stealing Ladybug's yo-yo while a particularly destructive akuma is on a rampage.
  • Weight Off Your Shoulder:
    • According to the series bible, every episode features Marinette "making a mistake and learning a lesson"... even if she wasn't actually responsible for what happened. Due to always being treated as The Scapegoat, Marinette has developed a Guilt Complex, automatically blaming herself for everything — to the point that she gives up her Guardianship and her memories and passes the Earrings to a successor after Alya and her Girl Posse barge into her room and invade her privacy in "Gang of Secrets", assuming that the fault falls upon her for having secrets to hide. She also assumes that she must have been an utter failure as a hero, refusing to give herself any credit for any of her hard work.
    • The idea that Marinette is the only character who needs to learn anything is heavily criticized through Adrien and Future!Alix. Future!Alix reveals that as Bunnyx, she has seen several Bad Futures; what she refuses to acknowledge is that a common thread in these timelines is Adrien's failure to develop. Either he pulls a Face–Heel Turn when he rejects the reality that his father is a supervillain, or he develops a toxic All Take and No Give relationship with Marinette, expecting her to put all the effort into making their marriage work. Future Alix insists that he can't be expected to change, ignoring the fact that Adrien actually does go through positive Character Development in this work as a result of what's changed.
    • Adrien's Skewed Priorities as Chat Noir are attributed to him naively assuming that The Good Guys Always Win, meaning that he takes their eventual victory as a given and sees nothing wrong with goofing off and harassing "his lady" for dates. Once it finally hits him that no, their successes aren't guaranteed, he's horrified with himself.
    • Adrien's tendency to defend Chloé's actions also gets deconstructed. Since Adrien has known her since they were kids, he recalls her as a fellow Lonely Rich Kid who just wanted her mother's attention. This leaves him convinced that he's the only one who really knows her, leading him to lecture her victims about how they should be more mindful of her feelings. After her Karma Houdini Warranty runs out, his stubborn defense of her only serves to irritate Marinette and his peers... and eventually, he realizes he was the one blinding himself to aspects of her character he didn't want to acknowledge.
    • Future!Alix deconstructs the concept of Because Destiny Says So alongside You Can't Fight Fate. She treats the events of Canon as a given, set completely in stone, and tells Marinette to "suck it up" because things will get better eventually without any sympathy for what she's going through now. After she accidentally reveals that things will be getting far WORSE when Shadow Moth gets his hands on the Miracle Box, she continues to insist that they have to let everything play out because "that's just the way things are," deriding and insulting Marinette's desire to prevent tragedy. It's also implied that ultimately, Future!Alix just wants everything to stay the same so that she gets to become Bunnyx, contrasting Marinette's willingness to give up her status as Ladybug and the Guardian for the greater good.
    • Future!Alix is also used to deconstruct Shipper on Deck. One of her justifications for attempting to force the timeline "back on track" is that, according to her, Marinette and Adrien eventually ended up together. Turns out that she's lying: the Awful Truth is that the canonical timeline is the current end result of her attempts to force the two together, twisting events around without the slightest care to the other side effects of her meddling.
  • What Goes Around Comes Around:
    • Shipper on Deck is picked apart through Alya's efforts to push Marinette towards Adrien despite knowing that her bestie's currently dating Luka. Alya dismisses him as an 'obvious' Romantic Runner-Up, calling him a temporary consolation prize that she fully expects Marinette to dump once she has a chance at Adrien. Her efforts only serve to strain her friendships with both Marinette and Juleka, as neither takes kindly to her insisting that Luka is 'nothing special'.
      • Alya also doubles down upon learning who Ladybug and Chat Noir are; in her mind, this means that two of her invoked OTPs can be 'canonized' at once. Her behavior makes clear that she cares more about that than what Marinette actually wants. Tellingly, she only backs off after learning about Adrien's Betrayal by Inaction; Marinette's thoughts on the matter simply don't factor in at all.
      • The concept is also Played for Horror through the Agrestes, who develop Villain Respect for Marinette and are keen to welcome her into the family... whether she wants to join or not. To this end, one of their plans for the Wish they intend to make on the combined Earrings and Ring is to merge Adrien and Felix into their 'ideal son', with Marinette ensorcelled into loving him. Adrien is quite understandably horrified when he learns about this.
  • The Wolves in the Woods:

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