Tsubaoi

"A fated encounter, the cards said. It really was. Everything changed after I met Tsubaki..."

- Aoi in "Gorgeous Dance -Knight-" Card Episode

Tsubaoi is the femslash ship between Tsubaki Aoyagi and Aoi Miyake from the D4DJ fandom.

Canon
The relationship between the two is technically a central theme not only of their unit's story quest, but in fact the very essence of RONDO itself. In particular, all of their songs with multiple vocalists are officially performed as a vocal duet of Tsubaki and Aoi, even though Hiiro often sings the backing vocal line. According to EMSS, the official lyric provider for RONDO, [Re]termination and Black Lotus is also united by the common idea that Tsubaki and Aoi are different sides of the same coin.

The most important source of content for their ship is the 2020 Valentine's Event, which was also the first such event in the game at all. In the RONDO Valentine's event, Tsubaki is shown wanting to give Aoi chocolates for Valentines Day, however she did not want to make it average. Tsubaki decides to tail Aoi one day, in order to notice something special and personalize Aoi's chocolates. However, Tsubaki ended up feeling more doubtful, due to Aoi's popularity and her inability to go anywhere without getting noticed by fans. In the end, Tsubaki ended up making the chocolates anyway, with the help and consultation of Hiiro, reassuring her that Aoi would be happy with any kind of chocolate she receives from Tsubaki. When Valentines Day finally came, it was no surprise that Aoi received many chocolates from fans. Tsubaki again felt discouraged but eventually got the courage to meet with Aoi alone that night in order to give her the chocolates. Nervous, Tsubaki finally took the plunge and gave Aoi her chocolates. To her surprise, Aoi also gave her chocolates in return. The two exchange the gifts while flustered.

It should also be noted that while the English translation still retains the necessary ambiguity for shipping, their original Japanese lines sounded a little more intimate, such as when Aoi asks Tsubaki to consider her a "romantic". Another example is when Tsubaki mentions sharing the umbrella with Aoi. This scenario has a more romantic connotation in Japanese - a divided umbrella is often used for intimate or outright romantic scenes between characters.

After the Valentine's event, Aoi and Tsubaki also got an area conversation for White Day where they give each other gifts in return for the chocolates. Tsubaki got Aoi gloves while Aoi got Tsubaki a muffler. Both of them end up blushing upon receiving the present.

It should also be noted that Aoi has directly called Tsubaki a very special person to her several times, repeatedly emphasizing how important it is for her to receive gifts and recognition from Tsubaki. For example, during her birthday event, Aoi was sincerely happy that Tsubaki was the first person to wish her a happy birthday. In a few other stories, she also cites that her first meeting with Tsubaki at the church was a fateful one. Whether these feelings are romantic in nature is up for the audience to decide.

Fanon
Tsubaoi quickly became the most popular ship in the franchise, both due to more or less confirmed attraction from Tsubaki, and due to Aoi's status as one of the most popular characters in the game. This was also helped particularly by the fact that many RONDO-related events or side content is, in a way, devoted to the interaction of the two. In this regard, due to the huge popularity of the ship and the frequent teasing of the game developers, many people can agree that canonicity of one of or both the character's feelings are either implied or explicitly stated in one form or another. Tsubaoi is often shipped alongside Nagihiiro.

While the game itself is mostly trying to be ambiguous about it, there are a few exceptions as when the creators chose to unambiguously depict Tsubaki's attempts to make Valentine chocolates for the Aoi Valentine Event as romantic, and several episodes of Petit Mix actually confirmed the crush on her part. Aoi's second birthday illustration from the franchise's official illustrator also explicitly shows Tsubaki angrily looking at the other girls' enthusiastic reactions to Aoi's ikemen looks, depicting her jealousy.

Tsubaki's sexuality is still unknown, but she is widely considered to be sapphic/queer because of her canon feelings towards Aoi and how she never shows even the slightest problems with the fact that she is another girl, the only thing preventing her from pursuing Aoi being her shyness and lack of social experience.

Some Tsubaoi shippers are disappointed that Donuts has not shown much progress in terms of feelings on Aoi's side, and how the only thing that is stopping the ship from being canon is Aoi not confessing to Tsubaki.

This ship also causes some controversy among people who ship other pairings or aren't interested in D4DJ shipping at all, since a public expression of doubt about this ship often leads to various conflicts or even attacks. For example, the D4DJ fandom wiki even closed comments on both girls' pages due to the fact that people were constantly arguing over the ship with each other.

It is currently the most written ship in the D4DJ Groovy Mix tag, and 2nd most written ship in the D4DJ First Mix tag on AO3.

Fandom

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Trivia

 * Tsubaki and Aoi were the only characters to mention each other during the limited 2021 Valentine's menu lines (instead of just the player, just like every other character).
 * When Tsunko (Aoi's seiyuu) was asked to comment on one of her unit's performances on Photon Maiden TV, it was Rihona Kato's (Tsubaki's seiyuu) performance of Gunjou no Flor Seca, the song for RONDO's Valentine's event.
 * Due to Aoi's refusal to speak of her life goal with a smile during the RONDO introduction video, fans have often joked that her goal would marry Tsubaki.
 * In a menu dialogue, Tsubaki says that she has taken cooking lessons from Hiiro in order to "make a certain person happy" while blushing. Earlier in one of the events, it was confirmed that this person is Aoi.
 * In one of Aoi's menu lines, she ponders which shirt to wear before asking Tsubaki for her opinion.
 * During RONDO's D4DJ D4 FES. -Party Time- concert, one of the set lists was titled "Tsubaki x Aoi Setlist" and included the songs Movement, unravel, Calendula, [Re]termination and Onaji Hoshi.
 * In Saki's "Night Sky Glory" card Episode, Saki and Ibuki spot Tsubaki's tanzaku slip which has two things written on it - "I want to get better at singing," and "I hope you realize them." which was written on the back and crossed out. Although the Japanese writing can be ambiguous, based on prior context and clues of RONDO's story, it is heavily implied she means that she wishes Aoi would realize her feelings for her.
 * In Marika's "The Joy of Vowing Love" card Episode, Aoi becomes very flustered and chokes on her coffee after Marika tells her to imagine herself in a tuxedo and a "blushing Tsubaki in a wedding dress next to her".
 * In episode four of the Haruna & Aoi centric event story “My Prince,” while Tsubaki and Haruna are conversing, Tsubaki mentions that she likes every side of Aoi. She begins to follow with, “Not just like, but lo-“ with her sentence being cut off when Aoi returns to the two.
 * They have a height difference of 15 cm, Tsubaki being 155 cm and Aoi being 170 cm tall.