"See you at the gathering of witches"--a trending topic on social media, but what does it mean? Check out the drawings!! [Recent Buzzwords]

"See you at the gathering of witches" (魔女集会で会いましょう) is a hashtag that emerged on a certain social media in February 2018. The tag is used by people to upload illustrations of a particular theme.

#魔女集会で会いましょう

by 黒烏龍

"See you at the gathering of witches" Overview

An author named "九頭さん" uploaded the hashtag on his social media on February 8, 2018.

The original tweet talks about using the hashtag when posting a free-style illustration of "A witch who picks up a boy and raises him until he grows taller than herself and into a (rough, vulgar, and tough) man who loves and protects her with all his might." The illustration, however, does not have to include the parts in the parentheses.

The hashtag has woken up various kinds of fetish and disposition in people and in the blink of an eye, the hashtag has spread like wildfire with people posting not only illustrations, but also short stories and manga based on the hashtag.

Many of the postings are divided into these two plots:
・The 'Before' scene in which the witch comes across the child
・The 'After' scene in which the child has all grown up and what happens after that
pixiv Encyclopedia

Why "See you at the gathering of witches" is a popular tag even on pixiv?

One plausible explanation is because this hashtag is largely interpreted as the following 'before-after' format:

・The 'Before' scene in which the witch comes across the child
・The 'After' scene in which the child has all grown up and what happens after that

Based on this format, the creator is free to design the characters (i.e. the witch and the child) as well as the storyline as they see fit. This hashtag grants so much freedom to the creator and there is practically no limit as to how many variations people can cook up. That is probably why it appeals to many of pixiv's users who like the process of creating literary and artworks.

Some postings depict the combination which the original tweet described, that is of "a witch whose outward appearance is that of a young woman and a man with a nice body build". But it is actually much more diverse when explored. For instance, some works feature the witch as a lolita-grandma (i.e. she looks like a young girl, but is actually much, much older) whereas some others replace the child with a half-human or an animal. In addition, the 'After' plot is developed in different ways by the creators and many of the works show the creators' personal take on the plot. You can encounter these wonderful postings using pixiv's Search feature.