Apparently while Ciel was in Weston College his piercing holes closed up, and Sebastian had to re-pierce them after they got home. I’ve always thought Ciel’s pierced ears were adorable, but this adds a whole new level to the cute.
This is too cute. I couldn’t resist taking a stab at translating it.
Sebastian: Since it has been a long time since the piercings were used, the holes closed up. Cheer up, it happens. Ciel: EEEp SFX: *click* Sebastian: Relax and give ones like this a try. Painful things hurt; take it like a man!
I could be totally off on that last part. I think the kanji is
潔い, and jisho.org says that can mean “manly.” If anyone can offer a more correct translation, please do!
@akumadeenglish ? Could you possibly check this person’s ttanslarion?
Hi Anon! And no problem, I had tagged it with the voice actor’s name Ishida Akira (he’s Zura actually :3), even if it’s initially a post by @akumadeenglish. 🙂
“Survivor’s guilt is a mental condition that occurs when a person believes they have done something wrong by surviving a traumatic event when others did not.” [x]
And that’s all you need to know why “Earl Ciel Phantomhive” came to be born while our!Ciel’s true identity died with his brother: survivor’s guilt made our!Ciel believe that his brother died in his stead, his brother whom he saw as the strongest for a long time and who wanted the power to protect the two of them.
So he acquired more power than anyone else through contracting Sebastian and that’s how “Ciel Phantomhive” could be reborn even after he died in his little brother’s stead.
Hi Anon! Well, first of all, Ciel was not particularly honest with himself in ch95, in my opinion…
That being said, I definitely think he wasn’t lying when he said…
…for two reasons:
the contract is a mean to a revenge he is exacting for himself but it’s also something our!Ciel sees as a punishment
the more we see of this flashback, the more I have the feeling that “Earl Ciel Phantomhive” represents a fusion between the twins, so for “himself” would actually mean “for real!Ciel + for our!Ciel”.
About #2, I think it might make more sense if you read @thedarkestcrow‘s take on why our!Ciel took his brother’s identity first, because for now I think that it’s precisely what our!Ciel initially intended to do: he was the spare/extra to their father’s heir, he thought his brother had died “in his stead”, he gained a power stronger than everyone else (Seb), so he tried to keep his brother “alive”.
However, the problem with this decision is that you cannot erase your own identity that easily.
Our!Ciel tried to become his brother, because of survivor’s guilt, because he wanted to keep the image of his strong brother living…
but our!Ciel’s true self was still there too. In the first place, stealing his brother’s identity was mostly a deception for himself and not for other people, so that he would manage to be strong for the two of them, but…
if he built the Funtom company, which was our!Ciel’s personal dream as a child if you remember, it must have been for himself and not for his brother.
our!Ciel is terrified to be happy because he’s supposed to be acting as his brother’s spare (since that’s how he sees himself + survivor’s guilt), so caring about Lizzie and Soma (for example) as much as he does with his own feelings and not because he’s supposed to be his brother is another contradiction to his decision to live as his brother’s spare, out of guilt.
In other words, what Soma explained in ch126 isour!Ciel being inwardly conflicted between how he decided to live 4 years ago (as his brother’s spare) and what he, as himself, a person separate and different from his brother, felt ever since.
In my opinion, that’s the reason why we could see two “Ciels” during his PTSD episode of the GW arc.
The two Ciels do represent himself and his brother but in fact, both are a part of who he currently is, both are what makes “Earl Ciel Phantomhive” and that’s why I’m convinced that Yana will never give her main character any other identity besides “Earl Ciel Phantomhive” for as long as he lives.
So when he found his resolve in ch95 and said that it was all “just for himself”, well, yes it’s true, but himself = both twins now, he just hasn’t realized that yet.
I hope it answers your question? Have a nice day Anon. 🙂
Hi! Okay so, I’m not sure of what exactly you’re asking, since you’re wondering about relevance but at the same time all your examples about Touka are relevant to explain her character, but anyway I’ll try to expand.
First of all, maybe it’s a question of word choice, but as an “individual” your only role is to exist and live your life to me, so I’ll personally speak about Touka’s characterization instead:
You were wondering about why Touka fights even though all she wants is a peaceful life? Well, what good is your “peaceful life” if there is no one by your side?
So the reason Touka fights is not because she believes in coexistence and thinks that her peaceful life will come along with it. On the contrary, she sees her own species in a more negative light than humans, going as far as to not even see herself as someone who would ever be “beautiful” because “she’s a ghoul”.
No, the reason Touka fights is because she can’t just live while losing things and people. Not anymore. Initially, this philosophy was one she probably tried to live by between TG and :Re after Yomo told her to run away from the 20th ward:
But after Kaneki/Haise came back, this philosophy began to shatter. She went to help Tsukiyama’s escape during the Roze arc, she went with Ayato to save Hina in Cochlea and now…
She’s most likely going to save her husband.
Again, this has nothing to do with coexistence. She doesn’t want to save “the one eyed king, so that he’ll stop rampaging through Tokyo and kill humans”, rather she wants to save her husband because she loves him and because
…she’s building a family with him.
And I spoke about this before, even if it’s not really the subject here, but Kaneki is exactly the same. The OEK role was initially given to him by Eto and Arima, and the only reason he accepted was because at the time he had nothing else to focus on in order to keep on living. It’s different now, because of his love for Touka and yearning for a future with her, which is the main reason he ended up going berserk recently:
So you could call that “selfishness” if you want, but looking at the whole story, Touka and Kaneki are characters who could be summed up (in my opinion) by “I was selfless for a long time and I really tried to help everyone else, but now fuck it I come first”.
That’s why deep down neither actually give a single care about the current conflict. Or well, they do, because ending it means their friends not dying anymore and that Kaneki will stop being a leading figure, but ultimately it’s about themselves, not about making the world a better place (they might eventually come to that though, for their child’s sake, but it’s not the case right now).
Back to Touka, one of her biggest issues to solve in my opinion before she get to live a peaceful life would be finally accepting that ghouls aren’t inferior to humans, which is something she doesn’t see right now but which might change…
through finding out what happened to Arata, since his fate is one more proof that the CCG, a human organization, did terrible things too
through meeting again with Yoriko, who now knows about Touka being a ghoul and who still sees her as a precious friend anyway
through giving birth to her baby, which would help her with seeing herself in a different light.
Finally, if we were to speak more generally of Touka’s relevance in the story (since it seemed to be your original question), then I think the one mistake not to make on the subject (and that unfortunately more than a few readers do) would be to define her character based on the romance between her and Kaneki.
In fact, both Touka and Kaneki, even if they were described to be a set, are not solely defined by the mutual love they share. They exist as two different individuals and falling in love with each other is but one part of their respective characterization.
Anyway, so if I were to give an image to explain Touka’s relevance from my point of view, I’d describe her as everyone’s pillar of strength. Example: to be quite honest, even as a huge fan of hers, I was almost convinced that Tsukiyama would be the one leading ghouls during that common front with the CCG, but guess what…
I was wrong. And it’s extremely interesting because, as I was saying above, Touka isn’t and doesn’t want to be a leader.
She isn’t even vouching for this common front because it’s important for the ghouls’ rebellion and for coexistence, nope, and yet she’s the current leader figure after Kaneki went Dragon, which speaks a lot about how many characters look up to and respect her because of what she represents and did for them.
Even Yomo, who used to be like a mentor figure and who was the one who told her that “they could only live while losing things”, apparently left that philosophy aside too, probably because seeing Touka and Kaneki falling in love and wanting to build a future for themselves changed his mind.
So Touka’s relevance as a character has always been like a huge light shoved in the readers’ face throughout the whole story in my opinion, which is why I’m baffled whenever I read people saying “she isn’t doing anything” or “she’s just Kaneki’s love interest”.
In fact, that’s the contrast with Hide’s own relevance as a character to the story (since people who shit on Touka generally love his character). He’s as relevant as she is, but it’s for different reasons and it’s also not expressed similarly in the story because of his strong shady game, which is why both their dynamic with Kaneki are interesting.
In other words, Touka and Hide are both relevant, but for Touka it’s written in an almost blinding way while Hide shines too, but it’s as if it comes from behind the stage TG’s story takes place on.
There, it was long, sorry for rambling. Anyway, I don’t know if this helps? You seemed to be wondering about Touka’s relevance as a character, so I hope I could at least answer this, if that’s what you meant.
Hey Anon! Well, I don’t know exactly in what order the dark stuff we have left will be coming but here is what we can be expecting for January and maybe February, if one chapter is not enough to cover it all…
And afterwards we’ll get another chapter focusing on…
As you can see and as I told someone yesterday, literally most of what will be shown during the flashback of that one month is nothing “new”.
It’s just Yana is now drawing in full details what she spent years foreshadowing. We had hints that they were raped (ch135 :/), hit, starved, branded. We know that real!Ciel will end up stabbed and that our!Ciel will go as far as to open his stomach to get the ring back. And we know that’s when the contract happens.
Nothing will be really new and Yana probably told us all of this in advance so that we could prepare ourselves for when she’d draw it.
I hope that’s what you wanted to know? Have a nice day Anon. 🙂
Well Anon, the translated version gives an “answer” to your question…
…they who worship the devil must be evil themselves. So yeah, insane, definitely.
Actually, Ciel’s panic attack at Kelvin’s house is more in relation to the day of the sacrifice, with the altar and the lambs, and his brother stabbed in the stomach, but it’s part of the same horrific ensemble.