This is my digital shrine dedicated to Shirogane from Monochrome Factor! Although I've never referred to myself as a yumejoshi before, i.e. someone who fantasizes about being in a relationship with fictional characters, my ever-growing love for him is similar to how those in that community feel, and I thought that creating this shrine would be an interesting way to indulge in the character that I love. I will say that the anime he's from honestly isn't that good, but it's kind of a "guilty pleasure" of mine, and I thought that Shirogane made it worth watching.

Who is Shirogane? A brief synopsis of the series he's from for a better understanding: A shift in balance between the human world and shadow world causes kokuchi, or shadow monsters, to threaten humanity. Akira Nikaido, the main protagonist who had been living a normal life, is turned into a shin, a being of the shadow world, by Shirogane in order to help restore the balance. The anime mostly follows a "monster of the week" structure with a range of characters in the main cast.

Shirogane is almost always wearing his hat, trenchcoat, and gloves, and he even wears cute earrings that are usually hidden by his long hair. He carries around a cane that can be used as a weapon with spiritual energy to fight off kokuchi and seal them away from the human world. He has a very outgoing personality— he uses a playful tone when he speaks and tends to tease others, and a common trait of his is how he acts surprised anytime someone acknowledges his appearance even though he's already aware that he's attractive. He's knowledgeable about the shadow world and what he's up against, but he'll put himself in danger to protect the people that he cares about. He initially isn't straightforward about who he actually is, making him quite mysterious.

How I discovered him I was immediately interested in Shirogane when I first saw his design a year or two ago. I didn't really know much about him, but he seems like a character I would have had a crush on if I discovered Monochrome Factor years sooner. I'm kind of picky about flamboyant characters, but I felt really charmed by him in the first episode. I originally continued the anime because it made me feel nostalgic— not just because of Shirogane having the qualities of a childhood crush, but Monochrome Factor feels like something you'd watch after first discovering anime, and even though it's not even that good, you enjoy it because you haven't watched any other series to compare it to. If that makes sense.

Why I love him My admiration for him turned into adoration just after watching the second episode, and my love for him has only grown over time. I've had favorite characters throughout the years, but I haven't really had a genuine "husbando" or "waifu" since my early anime days. I've definitely had strong obsessions over characters, but I always shipped them with other characters. I couldn't really find one that I could latch myself onto, and I was always awed by the yumejoshi community. I started to believe that selfshipping was something I left behind in my childhood, but I finally found a character that I can project myself onto and cherish. Shirogane is just about everything I could ever want in a character: Long hair, glasses (sometimes), long eyelashes + eyeliner (the lipstick is just a bonus), insightful, self-sacrificial, enjoys teasing others, a little strange in ways that I find endearing, etc. It could have just stopped there, but he's also a somewhat tragic character with a mysterious background, and there's an important part in the anime where someone from Shirogane's past called him out for his fake personality— Shirogane is capable of being cold and intimidating when he's not putting on an act for others, and I love those two drastically different sides of him.

For whatever reason, the anime adaptation added a lot of fanservice, and most of that involves Shirogane. There are some "shonen-ai" elements (fujobait) that weren't in the manga, and most of that just comes from Shirogane being overly flirty or unabashedly open about his own feelings. The new personality traits and additional scenes that were supposed to make people invested in the "pairing" (and in extension, the series) is what made me more attracted to Shirogane. It doesn't help that there are other scenes that include him having to remove his clothes to have an injury treated, or him being sick and needing to be taken care of, or him asking for his hand to be held after he had a nightmare, and blah blah blah. The anime makes me care about him a lot!

What kind of yumejoshi am I? I'll just say that I know Shirogane isn't real. I know he is just a fictional character made by some guy back in 2004. I know that I'm not actually in a relationship with him. But I still like him a lot, and that's as real as it gets! I'm not sure how to explain it exactly, I just don't find it difficult to create my own stories (either original or based off of something) and stuff. It's fun expanding on things that I enjoy and turning those ideas into something real through art and writing. I feel similar towards Shirogane, though I also started collecting merch of him so that he could be even more "tangible" + I just like surrounding myself with my interests in general.

I also "use" Shirogane as an outlet for things. I got back into arts and crafts because he has a fun design, and I want to get into other hobbies that would involve him in some way. I use him as a source of inspiration and motivation sometimes, though I don't really know what term to use— he's like a good-luck charm? A projection? A vessel? Something like that? I guess it's like that joke of "my favorite fictional character would/wouldn't want me to do XYZ" where you Do It For Them, with "it" being whatever you want or need to do and you dedicate it to something (or someone) to make it feel more special and/or important. As a more easy-to-understand example, I have one necklace that I sometimes only wear when I need to do something productive and only take it off when I get that something done so that my intentions are more clear. I coincidentally have a necklace with Shirogane on it as well, though I wear it all of the time becauseeee I don't know. It's just nice to have a physical reminder of something I enjoy, it's nice to reframe how I approach things in a way that makes me feel more connected with myself, it's nice playing pretend and making my life even more interesting. A weird hobby and worldview, maybe, but I find it really fun, and I'm sure that's how other people feel too when it comes to being dedicated to their interests.

I've put together a list of products, resources, and activities for anyone that wants to fully commit to their husbando/waifu. I found most of these online in various places, so I thought having everything in one place with additional information could be useful for someone.

Some things that you could do are probably obvious, but they also might not be a viable option for others. The biggest issue might be a character only having a few pieces of merch that are rare, expensive, or even impossible to obtain, or an even worse case of the character not having any merch at all. A lot of activities are really easy to do, yet I somehow didn't think about them until seeing discussions.

I'll add and reorganize things here from time to time.

For physical objects: (the hearts are dropboxes)

Buying merchandise second-hand

Extremely straight-forward, but I wanted to give some suggestions.

For merchandise sold in Japan, I prefer using proxy services to buy from Japanese stores/sellers over buying overcharged listings off of eBay/Amazon/etc (if they even get listed there). For second-hand items, I shop on mercari japan because of the selection, quality, and prices. I've discovered a lot of merch on here that I never knew existed!

I mostly use Neokyo as my proxy service of choice because I find it more convenient for me, but Buyee seems to be more beginner friendly + some Japanese stores incorporate Buyee on their ordering pages.

Custom merchandise

Etsy is probably the best place to find customizable products. The most common listings I see are ones where you can upload any image you want to be printed onto an item, and ones created by artists that make YCH (your character here) products.

Suggestions for what to put an image of your husbando/waifu on:

Acriworks and WaifuStation - acrylic stands

Candeehearts - customizable keychains

lockets

custom prints/posters/etc

Suggested artists on Etsy:

AquaZircon - YCH Kissing Couple Keychains/Stands + YCH Wedding Standee

KTcustomdolls - 20cm Plush Commission

PrinceNicolshop - Custom OB11 dolls

TopClayArts - Custom Nendoroids

Other:

StudioSteed - letter from your favorite character

Creating your own items

This is probably the cheaper and more accessible route, but it takes a lot of dedication!

This isn't every activity that exists, but I find most of these to be on the easier side.

Making fanart

Printing out images

Perler beads

Cross-stitching (plastic canvases)

Air dry/polymer clay

Felt plushies

Other

If a lot of these are inaccessible and/or you want things that are more subtle, you could get items that remind you of your favorite characters.

Matching/vaguely similar jewelry and accessories

Miniature figures of your character's favorite food/animal/etc. Miniature cakes are especially cute...

Perfumes/lotions that you think they would like or use

A journal to keep all of your headcanons and thoughts in one place

For digital objects:

Commissions

You can probably find artists who offer commissions everywhere, though I have a lot of fun browsing VGen since that site is dedicated to artists/commissions, and I like how everything is organized. If you're in a Discord server that has an art channel, you could probably find smaller artists that you could support. I've been working on my own wishlist for artists that I'd want to commission, and most of the people on that list are my friends.

Creating a shrine

Making your website is probably the most extreme and time-consuming. I probably wouldn't have made my shrines if I didn't have a main site to connect it to!

Waifu.ist - I was going to link this site, but I got multiple warnings about its security certificate expiring and I am not clicking risky links! Anyway, this is a site dedicated to making virtual shrines. A majority of the shrines on there are empty + it requires HTML.

Umm I don't know anything about Carrd/Rentry/whatever, but I'm sure you could make a simple shrine with templates if you really wanted to.

Making fanart

Editing pictures - I use LINE Camera

Creating your own gifs with PicMix and Ezgif

Making AMVs - Not for the faint of heart, but some apps (like CapCut) have templates

Marriage certificate generator

Picrew

Other virtual activities:

Recreating your character in a video game (i.e. The Sims, Stardew Valley (mods), Tomodachi Life, etc.)

Researching the source of your character for more information and ideas

Putting together a playlist/Pinterest board

Creating fanfics. It doesn't have to be crazy, and you don't have to be a talented writer! It could just be a short story based off of a headcanon or something.

Other

What if my character doesn't have a birthday?

I've seen some people come up with characters' birthdays by using astrology or something, though I don't really know how to do all of that.

Some people use the voice actor's birthday or an important date for the series, i.e. the release date, or when your character debuted in a chapter, or when a special event started.

You could use the date that you discovered or started obsessing over your character, though I prefer using those dates for anniversaries.

You don't have to put a lot of thought into it if you don't want to. It could just be a date that "feels right" to you!

My images

Gifts for me!

Clips collection

Illustrations

Manga panels