(2) There’s this quote at the end of chapter 98:“Those who seek peace have no choice but to fight others who seek the same for themselves” What’s your take on the Cycle of Violence between the mainland Eldians and the Walldiens?
First of all, I’m glad my ramblings about Willy Tybur were helpful! 😀
Secondly, this post contains my thoughts on the general cycle of violence portrayed in this story, but as to your specific questions about the mainland vs the wall Eldians… Tbh, to me they’re locked in that same dilemma, in that they are both the victim and the perpetrator and both can reasonably argue that they didn’t start the fighting.
The mainlanders were left behind by those who migrated to the walls, this is true. We don’t know what the selection process was or if there really was one beyond “well, some of these folks are getting abandoned here” (sort of how some people later ended up being sent out on the Wall Maria retaking expedition and then, oh well, how sad, they’re all dead now). Dina Fritz says her part of the royal family chose to linger on the mainland, so we know at least someone had a choice. But this seems like a special case, and Willy Tybur certainly made it sound like the First King (Carl Fritz CXLV, whatever) + the Tyburs he plotted with didn’t make any special provisions for the Eldians left behind.
They got thrown on the mercy of their erstwhile enemies, and today’s mainland Eldians are a product of systematic abuse and brainwashing by the Marleyans. Resistance was punished, and severely–as we can see from the grim example of Grisha’s rebellion and, well, the pre-existing practice of taking political dissenters out to Paradis and turning them into titans. Finding any kind of a way to live with the Marleyans was the mainland Eldians’ sole means of survival, and while it would be great if they didn’t end up being Marley’s weapons, you can totally see how they got there.
So: genuine grievances, these people definitely have. They got screwed over by just about everybody.
But while we can definitely say it was the will of the First King to bugger off to Paradis and leave a part of the population behind, we don’t know that the Eldians going behind the walls knew what was going to happen–either to them, or to the people they parted with. We know they were mindwiped pretty much the moment they got inside the walls, and spent the following hundred years in complete ignorance of anything that had happened. This… doesn’t scream enthusiastic consent. And even if the initial emigrants knew what they were agreeing to, their children and grandchildren (so, the people living within the walls today) certainly didn’t, and were perfectly innocent of those old crimes. Until the SC’s discoveries, they’d thought they were literally the last remnants of humanity in the titan-infested universe.
But this is, like, only one dimension to Paradis, right? Because, in addition to Eldians going behind the walls, there were also a bunch of others.
The majority race we now know to be Eldians. The minority bloodlines include the Ackermans, the East Sea Clan and a few other families–essentially, the nobles ruling Paradis prior to the SC’s coup. We were told that the Ackermans and the East Sea Clan were Not Cool with the First King’s new policies of mindwiping everyone into walled bliss, and thus became the enemies of the regime pretty much immediately. We saw what that meant: they were hunted down, and in order to save themselves at least somewhat they chose to forget everything they’d known about Paradis’ history and not pass down this knowledge to children. So the Ackermans and the East Sea Clan weren’t mindwiped like the others, but in the end they wound up about as knowledgeable as your average Walldian.
Not so the other minority bloodlines, who were totally okay with the new regime. They were clearly in it for a cushy existence, and they didn’t seem to care who had to get mindwiped or abandoned to the enemy for that to happen. These nobles ruled Paradis from on high, and it cannot be said that they liked or respected the Eldians very much at all.
Anti-Eldian sentiment was built into the power structure of Paradis–the Eldians there just didn’t know it, because they didn’t even know they were Eldians. They didn’t know different races existed anymore. And anyone who questioned the official story and threatened to disturb the status quo was ruthlessly dealt with, as the Ackermans and Erwin Smith’s dad could tell us.
So you have this, like, very deliberate parallel between the Walldians and the mainland Eldians, as of the start of the story. It’s only apparent in retrospect, but Eldians in both places were ruled over people who hated them; were subject to manipulation and brainwashing, albeit of different flavours; and in both places, there was an Eldian at the very top of the power pyramid who made this system a reality, and whose current attitude to all this was aggressive and deliberate noninterference. In both places, rebellion was punished by torture and death; both made active use of child soldiers and, frankly, didn’t give much of a damn if lots of Eldian blood was spilled.
(In terms of actual governmental policies, the main difference between Paradis-run-by-nobles vs Marley is that one was isolationist, and the other imperialist. It’s worth noting that both of these goals were achieved through the subjugation and brainwashing of the Eldians under their rule, so we’re back to the original point.)
So: Eldians in both places have a lot of grievances, and you could definitely claim that the mainlanders have had it worse, but this is a question of degrees. All Eldians living today get a shitty deal because of something that happened before they were born. And in an ideal world they’d, like, jointly rise up and cast off their chains and help each other march into a happier future and forge peace with other nations. However, too much shit has gone down to allow for this to happen easily, even between Eldians on different sides of the wall.
One major thing that went down was Marley’s attack on Paradis, which, in their typical fashion, was made through the use of their Eldian warriors. RBA breaking down Wall Maria resulted in thousands and thousands of deaths and a major paradigm shift in Paradis. From the point of view of the Walldians–who at that point had no knowledge of, well, anything outside their walls–this was the first act in what would later become war between Paradis and Marley. From their perspective, especially at the time, they were not the ones to cast the first stone. But for the warriors… well, we saw what it was like from their POV.
Hence, to my mind: everyone can claim a grievance, and everyone will be right, and this doesn’t help anything. There are no clear-cut heroes or villains here.
(And I do think it’s interesting and very deliberate on Isayama’s part that the current Paradis government is no longer composed of the Eldian-hating nobles. No, the people leading the charge against Marley–and kinda, by association, against the mainland Eldians–are their fellow Eldians who for so long had been denied all knowledge and only got the knowledge together with the realization that, if they wanted peace, they had to prepare for war. Because Marley would be coming for them sooner or later. And so we’re back to the cycle of violence in which everyone is to some degree innocent, but also up to their elbows in blood. Just like Isayama likes it.)
And this ended up being so much longer than I expected, omg. Apparently, I had Thoughts on this ^^
Friendly reminder that Ciel is the same height as Nicki Minaj.
but she’s slicker than the guy with the thing on his eye
I’ve been on this godforsaken site for a long time and of all the things I’ve seen, Ciel Phantomhive and Nicki Minaj being compared is one of the strangest
Hi Anon! I’d consider it a crack theory more than a theory, but it’s something I always kept in some part of my mind yeah, because…
Kaneki and Mutsuki parallel each other and, well, we know what happened to Mutsuki’s family…
Also, Sensei revealed rather late that Kaneki had an abusive mom and I always thought there could be a plot-relevant reason for that, especially since “Rize” is the one who gave us the first hint for that truth in ch62:
so I’d find it fitting that her calling him a murderer right now would also be in reference to what possibly happened with his mom, if he had a hand (whether it was an accident or not) in how she died.
Besides, there is something Kaneki never solved about his mother. I always thought that he’d maybe finally mention her to someone (like Touka) once he’d feel safe enough to address the subject of his abusive childhood but he never did. So, as @hidewari proposed [x], maybe we still haven’t seen him properly addressing the topic of his mother because he feels guilty about what he did to her, especially considering…
that he seems to be smiling in this memory. Also…
:///
Finally, this is just me but what does “dying from overwork” even means? Was it a cardiac arrest? Or did she fall down the stairs because she was too tired? “Overworking” is not specific enough for me not to think Sensei might have something else to add on this topic.
That being said, the reason I’m considering it as a crack theory is that nothing forces Sensei to go that far in Kaneki’s parallels with Mutsuki. These two characters parallel each other a lot already, so Sensei can choose to make it even bigger or not, it won’t change much for anyone besides Kaneki and his personal issues about his mother.
The second thing is that, unlike Mutsuki, for now I think the most likely version of this crack theory is that, if Kaneki played a part in how his mother died, then it was an accident. Like, maybe he tried to push her away when she was beating him and she fell down the stairs, or any similar event leading to no one doubting his version that she died from overworking herself. Of course, the not-an-accident version of this crack theory can be considered too since, overall, nothing is certain.
TL;DR I’m not sure, but that’s kinda why I cannot wait for Monday’s chapter. It’s alwas been a cracky possibility to me but frankly I was kinda scared to mention it earlier this week, just in case it’d cost me a few angry anons in the askbox. That’s why I was really happy to see that apparently other bloggers were thinking the same thing. 🙂 But best to keep it as cracky for now. :3
We’ll see on Monday. Thanks for passing by and have a nice weekend. :))
Okay so, I realized that I might as well share with all the people who enjoy this series my relatively short knowledge of what’s going on starting from vol 7, since it’s not translated yet and I don’t know when it’s going to be.
Of course, spoilers for the anime currently airing, even if I doubt we’ll go until there, but it’s always better that you catch up with everything first before you take a look below, especially since a lot of things happen.
Warning: I’m not fluent in Japanese, not at all & far from it actually, so all of what I’m about to say is supposed to be taken with a huge grain of salt. I have rather limited knowledge buuuuut taking my time, Koiame proves to generally be easier to read than what I’m accustomed to.
…Still, take everything with a huge grain of salt, you’re warned, don’t come crying if somehow I most likely got something wrong. :)))
/! I really hesitated to post this, because I’m not sure I could convey what I understood very properly and I know people are usually not really forgiving, so please do not ask for more details than what’s written below: if I didn’t describe more of some events, it’s because I wasn’t particularly confident about what I read.
/!
/!
Feel free to correct me if you notice that I misunderstood something and you read it differently. I’ll update what’s under the link and tag you.
Volume 7 (ch49-56)
vol7 was entirely translated by Roseliascans and vol 8 will apparently follow shortly so go read the translated chapters!
Volume 8 (ch57-64)
It turns out that, ever since realizing his feelings for her, Kondo is losing sleep and mostly, he starts avoiding Akira as much as he can.
At some point he searches on the internet “how to get rid of insomnia” but Kase shows up right at this moment. He tries to “help” (I mean, it’s Kase) by telling him that maybe he should try herbal tea or sweet sake.
Then he says that the best thing to do first would surely be to get rid of “why” Kondo started being insomniac, so Kase (who, again, is 200% aware of Akira’s feelings for their boss) “jokingly” asks if he’s insomniac because he’s in love. Kondo gets super flustered so I think Kase found out what he wanted to know.
Still Kondo tries what Kase told him and he drinks herbal tea + sweet sake before going to bed, but there is no avoiding dreaming about Akira until his alarm clock wakes him up.
Then he meets with Chihiro, who’s rambling about stuff and who gets pretty annoyed the few times Kondo seems to stare at his phone instead of listening to him, so Chihiro takes Kondo’s phone and sees that he’s trying to write a message to “Tachibana Akira”.
Initially Kondo tries to pretend that “Akira” is a male coworker’s name but Chihiro is quite convinced that “Akira” is a girl (and well, he’s right). Kondo admits nothing though, but Chihiro is pretty excited for him.
In ch58, the kouhai girls from the end of vol7 tell Haruka that they went to where Akira works, so Haruka decides to go there.
Meanwhile Yui and Akira are having lunch before going back to work: Akira tells Yui about how bothered she was by her kouhai showing up, and I believe Yui understands because her school doesn’t allow students to have part-time job. She also adds something about how she wouldn’t want her friends at school (I suppose) to know about Yoshizawa (so again, I think she agrees with Akira).
Going back to work, Akira and Haruka meet at the restaurant. Haruka tells Akira “please come back to the track & field club” because she feels she’s growing
too much
apart from Akira. In the end though, she doesn’t eat anything and leaves while Akira is stunned. Kondo sees Haruka leaving and realizes she’s the girl who helped him pick up Yuuto’s shoes.
Not sure I understood ch59 that well, because it seemed to be mostly built with metaphores initially coming from Kondou’s little storage issue with the restaurant’s computer. xD
So anyway, Kondo is still avoiding Akira, but Yuuto shows up and Akira ends up watching over him and giving him advice as he practices running. Kondo insists that she doesn’t have to force herself (since he knows she’s got slight issues on the subject and fears it might be too stressful) but she does it anyway and they both watch over Yuuto running around.
Akira says Yuuto is fast and that since he’s still a growing kid, he can become even faster if he practices properly. Then Kondo basically compares his son to a computer and the main gist of the whole scene (from the way I understood it) is that kids are “like computer” with huge data storage capacity, because they can learn & experience a lot as long as they’re hard workers.
Of course this leads Akira to wonder if adults can’t do this kind of things too (learning/experiencing new things) and what she was apparently implying by this as well as her staring and moving closer to him was enough to fluster Kondo a lot.
Frankly I don’t know if what she wanted to address was if he’d ever have feelings for her (since he hasn’t confessed yet when she did a while ago) or if she was more or less trying to go for a kiss, but either way, nothing happened except Kondo being extremely flustered.
Anyway, next chapter has Kondo avoiding Akira just like always and wearing a scarf when she’s knitting one for him, so she gets pretty annoyed by all of it and ends up confronting him about his current behavior. He apologizes for not realizing he was avoiding her (lmao) but she’s still pretty jealous about the scarf even if he doesn’t know that.
Nothing particularly important happens afterwards: Akira and Haruka want to go Christmas shopping but first, they go to pick up Sho-chan (who’s in the year below high school), which gives Akira an opportunity to check on Mizuki’s running performances. Of course the girl feels pressured, but Shota shows up and they leave quickly.
In another chapter, Yuuto gets in an accident because he was running in the street and a student on a bike hit him but it turns out he’s okay, he just sprained his ankle.
Yui and Akira meet up for more Christmas shopping when Yui tells Akira that she wants to confess and gives the scarf to Yoshizawa before Christmas. She has Akira’s full support of course and they go to buy new hair pins.
When Yui doesn’t look, Akira also buys the hair tonic that Kondo uses because she likes the smell and it reminds her of him, which results the following days in everyone thinking that she’s the manager at first when nope. xD Kubo even tells her not to wear too much perfume in general since they’re working in a restaurant (and I guess different smells mixing isn’t good for the food)
Anyway the rest of the volume is focusing on Yui and Yoshizawa which is super cute. I think their little date starts because Yui wants to thank him for always allowing her to cut his hair and because he introduced her to his grandmother who gave Yui advice for knitting.
So they meet up and go ice-skating (Yoshizawa is so cute, saying stuff like ‘I’ll teach you’ and he also thinks Yui’s hairdo suits her) and stuff happens before Yui decides to be brave and confess, with the scarf to offer, but…
he apologizes before running away… ;_; Poor Yui… Meanwhile Akira is waiting for Yui’s report about how it went but she hasn’t received any message yet. Turns out Akira is also waiting for someone and this person is…
Volume 9 (ch65-73)
…Haruka. They’re going to Kyoto with Tomoe, Akira’s aunt on her mom’s side, because Haruka is participating in a race. Akira’s aunt is reading “Waves by the window” and Akira asks her to lend it to her since she remembers that it was written by a friend of Kondo.
They meet Mizuki again, who’s originally from Kyoto (and who’s visiting her old school?)
While in the bath, they discuss why Akira is knitting that scarf but they end up staying too long and get dizzy. xD Akira sends a text to Kondo, wishing him a merry Christmas and explaining that she’s in Kyoto but Kondo cannot open the image that she sent.
I don’t really remember exactly what Akira and her aunt speak about while Haruka is running, but I think it’s something about how “growing up and things changing are painful” and Akira is wondering if that feeling ever changes over time (could be 100% wrong though).
Meanwhile Yui finds some resolve again thanks to her sister who reminds her about her dream to become a beautician and how that involves always smiling even when things are painful. So Yui cuts her hair short :))
Going back to work, she also tells Akira that things didn’t work as she expected with Yoshizawa but that she still wants to become a beautician and she seems happy enough with just that.
In the following chapter, Akira realizes that both Haruka and Yui are moving forward in comparison to her, so she feels pretty bummed out about feeling left behind. Going to the restaurant, Kondo greets her, asking about Kyoto, and Akira, in need of comfort, imagines herself hugging him, but it’s not really happening.
Anyway, she gives Kondo a bookmark that she bought as a souvenir from Kyoto for him and he shares a story about a bird nest there used to be above the restaurant but that Kubo took down.
This leads to him thinking about her injury and he says something about how it’s okay if a bird doesn’t fly away because it’s happy to stay at its usual place. But if the reason it doesn’t fly is because it gave up then it’s bound to eternally look up at the sky. So “girl, plz go back to running” should be the message here. xD
Back home, Kondo looks at the bookmark again and ends up writing during the whole night. The next day, he looks pretty tired as he leaves for a meeting at the main office, which is precisely when Chihiro comes to the restaurant.
Of course Chihiro asks if the manager is here, since he knows it’s Kondo’s working place. He also checks out Yui’s and Kubo’s names on their uniform and thinks that “maybe ‘Tachibana Akira’ was a guy then”… He also thinks that he or she should be around Kubo’s age. Meanwhile Kubo thinks that she saw him somewhere before.
Chihiro ends up asking Yui about if there is someone working here called “Tachibana Akira-kun” and Yui is confused because yes, there is Akira, but obviously the customer is looking for a boy since he used “kun” so she answers “nope”. Meanwhile Kubo remembers him as being a famous writer who appeared on TV.
Just as Chihiro leaves the restaurant, Akira shows up and, between the ‘Tachibana’ name on her uniform and Yui saying “Akira-chan”, Chihiro realizes that she is the person he was looking for.
Obviously it’s super funny because he gets all like “wait, no way, it can’t be” and in disbelief, he asks how old she is (she’s 17). xDD
Then Chihiro goes to a party at his office and his editor introduces him to a very talented young writer who’s one of Chihiro’s biggest fans but also 17 years old (I think his name is Machida Sui, but it’s not his real name).
When Kondo comes back at the restaurant, everyone tells him about Chihiro passing by and they realize that the two are friends. Then again, it’s super funny because Kondo says that they went to the same university and Kase is super shocked to realize that the manager went to the university in the first place (since he’s a uni student too). He even grabs Yoshizawa and tell him to think carefully about what he wants to do in life xDD
Kondo also realizes that if Chihiro came to the restaurant that means he must know now who Akira is and well, the perspective kinda frightens him.
Cute chapter follows with Yuuto making a yarn phone and wanting to try his new game with Akira. First he says ‘poop’ and she’s not happy xD but she ends up asking him when his father’s birthday is, since January is coming but Yuuto doesn’t know. Then she asks if he knows whether it’s in the first or second half of the month but Kondo takes the phone instead and answers that his birthday is on January 5th.
He asks her in return when her birthday is and she answers June 21st which leads to him saying that she is born during the rainy season. They play with the yarn phone again a few other times after that day, but apparently Akira feels lonely.
Back to Chihiro who keeps wondering what’s up with these 17 years old youngsters lately xDD And right after that, he receives an invitation from Machida and they meet up in a restaurant. Turns out Machida’s real first name is “Akira” too (but he’s a guy).
The gist of their discussion is that it draws a comparison between Chihiro who’s 45 and who only ever focused on writing, while Machida is 17, already a talented writer but he wants to do many other things in life besides just writing.
Chihiro says he envies him, but Machida says that he finds Chihiro’s devotion to writing to be beautiful. Chihiro ends up saying “let’s be friends”. :)) He visits Kondo afterwards and he ends up saying something about how these youngsters have enough power to move a dull heart and Chihiro feels motivated.
The end of the chapter shows that Akira is reading a document that her doctor gave her about starting full rehabilitation in order to run again and the next one is a flashback to a year ago, when she was still running. Slightly later in the volume, it’s said that her doctor thinks that, if she does everything properly, she’ll be able to run again around next spring (as in a year, not in 3 months but again, I could have misunderstood).
End of the volume is coming and bad news come with it, because Yui-chan is quitting. ;_; It’s not that she wants to, it’s because her school asked her to. Yui apologizes to Akira but strangely enough, it’s Yoshizawa who is more stunned than everybody else.
On Kase’s side, I believe he still has this crush on his “sister” but things take a bad turn for him too, because while chiding her the usual way one evening, she ends up saying that she’s such a useless sister anyway that she will stop coming to his place. And obviously that puts him in a super bad mood at work.
Finally, it’s the end of the year and the staff decides to hold a party both to celebrate it and also Yui’s departure, but Kase is as bitter as ever and when the countdown for the new year starts, he ends up throwing her way something like “are you really quitting because you can’t get a boyfriend?” (or an equivalent), which gets Yoshizawa to yell “oi” but Akira is the one who ends up punching him in the face, lol.
The volume ends on January 1st, it’s snowing instead of raining, Kase got punched, Yui is leaving, Yoshizawa is confused, Kondo is still writing and Akira goes to visit him with the scarf she knitted and a letter.
Chapters 74-78
Akira shows up just at the moment Kondo decides to take a break from writing and a bath. She leaves the scarf and letter in front of his door and goes home when he doesn’t answer. He checks his phone after his bath and that’s how he notices she came by (her text says: “happy new year, will we meet again from now on?”)
so he kinda runs after her with the scarf and when he catches up with her he says he’s glad to see her. Akira wishes him a happy birthday slightly in advance and the scarf is her present for this occasion.
They go back to his house afterwards, but he has to clean up a little before she can get in.
I’m not sure exactly of how it’s supposed to be worded but Kondo wonders about “meeting again” and IDK if it is that he has a strange feeling about why she said that in her text, or if it’s his own feeling. Sorry, this is confusing, but I wonder if Akira’s text doesn’t have something to do with that letter he has yet to read (maybe she’s quitting too?).
Anyway, at the beginning of ch75, Akira is relieved because she realizes that the reason Kondo was slightly different lately is because he’s writing again whenever he’s not working.
They chat a little while he makes her coffee (and doesn’t forget her sugar) and he says that the snow outside really makes him feel as if they’re alone in the world. Then, watching her happy expression for the sugar, he thinks to himself that, because it’s such a quiet day with the snow falling outside, he feels as if he’s going to say words that he wouldn’t/can’t say usually.
ch76 is Kondo imagining what it would be like if he was a high school student as the same time as Akira and he seems to think that he wouldn’t have any contact with Akira in high school (or rather, he’d notice her when she wouldn’t).
Somehow (from the way I understood it) it’s as if the fact that they’re 28 years apart makes them closer than if they had met while both being 17, at least from Kondo’s point of view. I think that he is possibly confused about what he wants to do about his feelings for her.
in ch77, it’s Akira who imagines what it would be like if Kondo was 17 and a classmate (something about 17 y/o Kondo wanting to do an interview for the school’s newspaper about Akira’s results in track & field). All in all, it comes down to the fact that Akira eventually doesn’t mind when it’s raining in that fantasy world because, even if she cannot go to the track & field club on raining days, she can still go to the library and meet with him.
ch78 is focusing more on the scarf: Kondo is surprised at her gift but also very impressed that she knitted it by herself. Akira confirms she did it by herself several times and she shows her cute jealous side towards his other scarf, pushing it away and, frankly, it’s adorable.
I think at some point Kondo asks about why she punched Kase during the New Year’s party and Akira says something like “I couldn’t forgive him” (surely because of what he said to Yui). That makes him laugh.
Aaaand the chapter ends with Kondo thinking namely about the scarf and while staring at Akira, he feels as if he can’t breath.
The editor’s line implies that he’s staring and is completely taken by Akira.
I don’t know what’s the usual update schedule (once or twice a month?) but anyway, that’s it for now. Again, please take with a grain of salt.
TBH I really wonder about the content of Akira’s letter, it seems very plot relevant. And I wonder if Kondo might not finally give in, at least about his feelings in one of the following chapters. …At the same time, I feel like there could be a bittersweet development lurking due to him being still bothered by the huge age gap, soooo we’ll see!
FINAL POINT, kinda unrelated, but please do not ever refer to this series as ‘shoujo’ or ‘josei’. It’s ‘seinen’, meaning that it supposedly targets a more adult public than the other terms (yes, the slice of life genre in seinen does exist). Thank you!
I’ve seen people toying with the idea of Kaneki being responsible for his mother’s death (similar to what happened with Mutsuki’s family) for a while now, and that has me thinking.
Rize accused Kaneki of being a murderer at the end of this chapter, and Kaneki mentioned specifically how he had to eat humans in order to save those he cares about. That makes me think that the focus of the next chapter will be the human lives that Kaneki’s taken, which means that we will potentially have some focus on the Oggai and maybe Hide. But, if these theories about Kaneki killing his mother are true, then I feel like that would be a massive revelation at such a significant turning point in Kaneki’s development, especially considering that it would have been the first human death Kaneki would have been responsible for. It could easily be pulled off the same way that Kaneki’s abuse at the hands of his mother was and the way that the deaths of Mutsuki’s family were (especially considering the fact that Kaneki and Mutsuki have been paralleled frequently in the past) wherein, Kaneki had been suppressing the memory entirely and instead blaming his mother’s death on overwork as a way of dealing with the guilt.
It’s not a solid theory by any means, but it would certainly be an interesting idea to play around with and potentially open up some doors for major development and perhaps some revelations about Kaneki’s character and his motives (i.e. perhaps it could be used as one underlying reason that he was so opposed to killing humans but not so much ghouls).
Yeah, it’s interesting! Saiko and Ayato seem like such opposite characters in so many ways: he’s intense, he’s angry, etc. Saiko is flippant and loving.
So Saiko is also a foil of Hinami, like Mutsuki is, in that both Hinami and Saiko are classified by kindness and love for others; however, Hinami suffers for that kindness and Saiko does not.
Probably this is part of Saiko’s human privilege. We’re first asked to compare them when Sasaki is getting wrecked by Takizawa. Saiko and Hinami both are horrified. Saiko is the one who could easily intervene given what we know of her kagune prowess, but she does not. She just watches. Hinami, despite knowing this was probably not going to end well for her–and it did not–and knowing Kaneki might be gone forever–chooses to intervene anyways. Also, during this Ayato in contrast is desperate to save Hinami but is told to return would be suicide. But he tries.
Saiko and Ayato therefore contrast with each other. Saiko loves people and saves them, but Ayato and Hinami are proactive in saving their loved ones, whereas Saiko is reactive. When we get further Hinami and Ayato development, it’d probably be during a Saiko focus, so we might get some interactions/them provoking Saiko to act more.
Hey guys, remember how Tanaka said that it was hard to differentiate the twins (and our!Ciel even said that Rachel and Vincent were mistaken at times too)? Well, in that case maybe Tanaka realized which twin had come back home 4 years ago…
…when our!Ciel built the Funtom corporation, since it was his idea for a future career when he was 8/9?
(don’t mind me I’m just trying to make sense of things we still didn’t get an answer for :))
Let’s unpack this scene, where Sebastian explains how Agni acquires superhuman strength (ch 18 pg 23).
I checked the Japanese to see whether Sebastian really said, “Something we could never obtain…” because sometimes fan translations are imprecise, and this “we” is critical to the interpretation.
The original is “私達には持い得ない.” I totally agree with the fan translation on this one. Not only is “私達” (watashitachi) definitely “we,” but it’s bolded in the original. We are most entitled to play with “we.”
So who is this “we”?! Is Sebastian referring to the people in the room? To all demons? To himself and Ciel?
There is no right answer; that ambiguity is part of the joke, which is why get this panel of sly Sebastian looking all slyly at Ciel. Soma and Lau are in the room at this point, but only Ciel and the reader know about Sebastian’s true condition.
Soma and Lau must think Sebastian means that Agni is incomparably pious, and therefore
incomparably
powerful.
Sebastian holds his hand over his chest suggesting his “we” refers to all demons. Surely demons cannot achieve a power granted by love and faith in god. Demons oughtn’t love a god who cast them out of heaven. They needn’t have faith in one either.
But what about Ciel? You’d think that since Ciel has proof positive of the existence of religious figures, he’d have an easy time believing in a god.
But what would be the point? Ciel’s fate is sealed. He has turned his back on the light and charged into the abyss. Even if he could find love and belief in a god, forgiveness and redemption is beyond Ciel’s reach.
“The price to cross the river has already been paid.” Ciel will be crossing the river.
No wonder Ciel’s expression says, “Rub it in, why don’t you…”
So, this got a little more interesting, now that chapter 136 has come out.
(Chapter 136 pg 27)
I retract what I said about Ciel having an easy time believing in God, for one thing.
We know now that part of (our) Ciel’s initial contact with Sebastian hinges on the fact that Ciel “spits upon God” (ch 136 pg 34).
It’s so fucking brutal of Sebastian to explain how the pious can gain great power, knowing that Ciel renounced God in the course of gaining great power. It’s like he’s saying, “Yes, there is a God, and you could have drawn power from Him, but you’re stuck with me instead.”
midnight-in-town 