>> A solution to this particular problem is now easy: Replace
>> `NotoSerifCJK-VF.otf.ttc` with the fully equivalent (but slightly
>> larger) file `NotoSerifCJK-VF.ttf.ttc`, which can be found here:
>> https://github.com/notofonts/noto-cjk/blob/main/Serif/Variable/OTC/NotoSerifCJK-VF.ttf.ttc
>
> I don't want to touch a file provided by a distro package.
OK. Then I suggest to manually filter out this font in a local
FontConfig configuration file. For example, append the following to
file `~/.fonts.conf` (or `~/.config/fontconfig/fonts.conf`) right
before the closing `</fontconfig>` tag:
```xml
<selectfont>
<rejectfont>
<glob>/usr/share/fonts/google-noto-serif-cjk-vf-fonts/NotoSerifCJK-VF.ttc</glob>
</rejectfont>
</selectfont>
```
If the file doesn't exist, create it with the following contents
instead:
```xml
<?xml version="1.0"?><!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
<fontconfig>
<selectfont>
<rejectfont>
<glob>/usr/share/fonts/google-noto-serif-cjk-vf-fonts/NotoSerifCJK-VF.ttc</glob>
</rejectfont>
</selectfont>
</fontconfig>
```
Werner
