To explain simply, while thinking about Touka’s pregnancy this afternoon, I realized something I hadn’t noticed before:
See, the reason Touka’s body has the risk to mistakenly recognize the baby as nutrients and absorb it is because, as a ghoul, she feeds on RC cells and…
humans have a low rate of RC cells
=> human meat is edible! (and tasty :D)
ghouls have a high rate of RC cells
=> ghoul meat is edible! (but disgusting, ew :/)
which means that human, ghoul and hybrid babies (like Touka’s) have RC cells too!
..But then in that case (which is what I realized today), how comes that only a hybrid baby has the risk to be mistaken as nutrients by its ghoul mama when a ghoul baby also has RC cells? In other words, why is Touka’s body possibly going to recognize her baby’s RC cells as food when her own RC cells in Hikari’s womb weren’t?
Hi Anon and well, logically that’s what you’d think with what I said above, isn’t it? 🙂 However, since I’m pretty sure that Sensei won’t kill that baby, if somehow I’m correct (big big if there), then there must be a catch somewhere.
I do have a theory to answer you, the problem is that…
Itori possibly losing her own hybrid babies in the past is not 100% helping me.
See, initially with what I explained above, I was considering the following: Touka aside, the common point toall the previous hybrid pregnancies in the story is that the mothers always were humans. Eto’s ghoul parent was Yoshimura…
and for the sunlit garden, the father of every child in there (be it “half human” like Arima, or ghoul like Rize) is from the pure Washuu bloodline who are, as we learnt recently, kakuja ghouls from birth.
However, now we have Touka who is the ghoul parent of her hybrid baby, which makes her case pretty unique so far in the story (Itori aside). Touka who, as a ghoul, is supposed to be eating a lot of RC cells both for her sake and her baby’s, but who also has higher RC cells rates than a human mama, as well as a kakuhou to regulate these high rates.
In other words, her own RC cells needs (and body rates) are different from a human mama carrying a hybrid. That’s why her case is interesting, because the maternal environment that she provides to her hybrid baby is different from what Arima’s mom provided to fetus!Arima, or what Ukina provided to fetus!Eto.
=> so my theory is that the maternal environment during the pregnancy plays a part into the development of the kakuhou for hybrid fetuses.
In the first place, kakuhou development is correlated to high RC cells rates, which is the difference between humans and ghouls as @mawjaw explained here; that’s also why ghouls can develop multiple kakuhou in order to regulate their high RC cells rates, when one kakuhou on its own is overwhelmed.
Anyway, so far in the story, we got numerous examples that a hybrid baby carried by a human mama has more chances to be born as a half human (no kakuhou) than a OEG (kakuhou), and it’s interesting because the human mama herself has low RC cells rates and thus no kakuhou in the first place.
So in Touka’s case, the fact she’s a ghoul means that she needs to eat a lot of RC cells, that she has higher RC cells body rates and a kakuhou, which may just favorize the kakuhou development for her hybrid baby.
In other words, a maternal environment
exposing the hybrid baby
to more RC cells because the mama is a ghoul (or in Ukina’s case, because she ate a loooot of human meat) might just positively influence the development of the baby’s kakuhou (in order for baby to regulate all the RC cells reaching it).
And if Touka’s baby develops a kakuhou, then my theory above that it will protect the baby from being seen as food by Touka’s body works too. 😀
In conclusion, about hybrid pregnancies:
mama = human = no kakuhou
maternal environment = low RC cells rates
=> “half human” baby (no kakuhou) more probable than OEG baby (kakuhou), because no need for baby to regulate RC cells while in the womb => Arima.
unless mama eats a lot of human meat and increases the RC cells rates in the maternal environment => that’d be Ukina & Eto.
mama = ghoul = kakuhou
maternal environment = high RC cells rates
OEG baby (kakuhou) more probable than “half human” baby (no kakuhou) because there is a possible need for baby to regulate RC cells while in the womb
OEG baby’s kakuhou will then provide protection against being seen as food by the ghoul mama’s body
That’s the theory. However, as I was saying, Itori might be failing me here, because TG ch34 seems to imply that she might have lost her own hybrid baby/babies, meaning that it’s probably quite complicated for hybrid pregnancies to succeed at all. So I don’t know
¯_(ツ)_/¯
maybe hybrid pregnancies will fail more often than regular pregnancies in general (which would mean that Itori is right when she says that the chance of successful pregnancy in itself is extremely slim)
but when they’re successful, the baby’s nature as a half human or OEG is strongly correlated to its mama’s nature, because kakuhou development is also
mediated
by maternal environment.
I really think Sensei won’t kill off that baby, so there must be a way for Touka to make her pregnancy viable and I’m just rambling around with all my ideas. :3
Still I hope it made sense, thanks for reading Anon and have a nice weekend. 🙂
Anon-chan, for everyone’s sake I’ll make this extremely simple. :)) If Touka’s baby can be born then, according to the theory above, it means that:
it will most likely be a OEG
it will most likely be heatlhy/okay and Touka & Kaneki will be happy parents!
Here are the two possibilities for Touka’s baby in my opinion, considering what I said above (please keep in mind it’s just a theory and I could be totally wrong):
In terms of probability though, I guess it depends on if you’re taking Itori’s words seriously or not. She said that chances for a successful hybrid pregnancy are slim and frankly, I don’t think she’s lying.
Besides, in a human mama’s case, both half human and OEG babies can be born, it’s just that she’s more likely to have a half human baby than a OEG. Whereas in Touka’s case, in this theory it seems the only way for her baby to survive in her womb is if it’s a OEG, which is what Itori probably meant when she said that chances of success were slim.
I’m sorry it sounds so hella complicated, but I hope this sums things
Sorry for the delay in response @midnight-in-town; life’s been super busy!
My current theory isn’t far from what I’d been speculating prior to these chapters, but slightly tweaked with the latest information.
Yes, while I believe she’s not necessarily Shemihaza incarnate, she is most certainly the next host. I 100% think she was raised in the alternate dimension or that the experiments continued after Section 13 was “destroyed.” Just because the Sol and Azazel chose to crystalise doesn’t mean they vowed to never come back, and with the fate of the world in the balance, they will.
Mephisto knew this day was coming, so he would have prepared, and I’m sure he has some way to communicate with them as his true essence is the same as theirs: ephemeral. Even if he doesn’t and Shemihaza is unconscious to it all, Shiemi was most assuredly conceived to counter-act Rin and Yukio’s arrivals, as I and @flower-of-assiah have stated in our own theories.
However, as I sit here thinking about it, Takara is older than the other Esquires, isn’t he? Which would mean he was conceived (as Armumahel’s newest vessel) prior to Satan impregnating Yuri. So that leads me to believe Mephisto knew Satan would eventually come after Yuri, just not exactly when and started having vessels be born (in a more secret lab or a portion unknown to Lucifer) for the Sol, as well. Ergo, Nemu Takara was a “successful” experiment prior to Shiemi, but perhaps done too rapidly.
With how Shiemi has lost memories, and Nemu is… Nemu, my theory is that she has been possessed by Shemihaza
(and Nemu, by Armumahel)
this entire time – a traumatic event that blocked out all of her young memories when it happened at a young age – however, Shemihaza has remained dormant (like a seed) and has slowly awakened after Shiemi received her temptaint in the garden (something similar to the eyedrops had been given to her to make the dormancy occur along with Shemihaza being okay with staying inactive). It would explain the massive increase in power over a short time, the bodily damage, and why Amaimon is terrified.
Nemu seems to be a case of true possession, or the trauma of being possessed destroyed his mind, so another demon is acting as guardian over a dormant (sleeping) Armumahel for the time being. I’d imagine they learned a lesson from when he was possessed and found a way for it to harm Shiemi even less. Lost memories beats a thoroughly broken brain any day of the week.
Still, this is a fairly crack theory. Plausible, but there are too many holes that I can’t account for as of yet.
I’ve seen some criticism of the Survey Corps for not allowing Eren any contact with Zeke. Even now, rather than reuniting the brothers as promised, they are secluding Zeke in the woods. It seems unfair to some. I’ve seen others point to it as a possible reason for Eren’s rage.
The thing to remember is that Eren and Zeke don’t need to be in their titan forms to make Founding Titan Magic. Eren first activated the power while human by fist bumping mindless titan Dina. Even now in his human form he unlocks memories by holding hands with Royal Human Historia.
When Eren touches Historia, the power transfer goes both ways. She’s affected as well. It unlocks her memories. So it’s possible that the moment Zeke and Eren make physical contact on Paradis, Zeke will have similar abilities awakened within him. He can already create, command and control titans. He may only need a tiny power boost to increase those abilities. Eren’s touch could provide that. It’s possible that Zeke and Eren might need to simply shake hands or brush shoulders to set off the rumbling if one of them desires it. So I don’t blame the Survey Corps for their caution.
This is a theory blog for many fandoms and this will now include Black Lagoon lmao. No kidding, I love this series and the characters are amazingly written in a very raw and realistic way so y’all should give it a try.
Anyway moving on: the thing is, I’m worried about the climax of this arc which supposedly is for next month for two/three reasons.
First of all, apparently the bad dudes sent after Feng were a group of 4 “brothers” and we only saw three of them.
So either it means that the 4th brother will avenge the others next, or that he’s a character we already know but who left the group a while ago.
Since Dutch was said to be a liar about being a war veteran in the previous arc, it’d be interesting to have a little more info on him and that’s why I like the idea of him being that 4th brother who left the others behind a while ago, so that we ever get a chance to learn his backstory.
However, in case that 4th brother is really an enemy, he could go after Feng in the next chapter while they’re watching Revy’s show. Revy even has her guns on her, so this could mean a fight to truly end the arc.
Second thing, Black Lagoon’s arcs tend not to end
well more than often than they do: the mass-murdering fucked up kids, the arc in Japan and Yukio’s suicide, Garcia and Fabiola ending up despising Rock…
…to the point our MC had enough of trying to make things end the best way they could at the beginning of this arc (and him eventually helping Feng was mostly because she reminded him of himself in how similar their situation leading them to Roanapur were).
The interesting part is that bad endings always drive Revy and Rock closer when they happen, because Revy is dead set on trying to have Rock remain as “innocent” as possible, his act of The Good Guy being important to her who only knows violence and blood.
That’s why she’s the one who went after Feng in the first place, telling her about Rock’s circumstances…
…in hope it’d motivate him to try once more for this arc.
So I don’t know what outcome we’re going with for this arc, but it should be the one leading to even more proximity between Rock and Revy, since it’s kinda one of the main points of the narrative in the first place.
If this arc ends badly, it could have the same effect as the other arcs, because Revy will try even harder to make Rock stick to his Good Guy act. At the same time, Feng dying could depress Rock even more and Revy could blame herself so…
¯_(ツ)_/¯
And if this arc ends well, since this time Revy is the one responsible for making Feng Rock’s problem, he could be a little happier to have been useful, which in return would please Revy, which is why I’m not excluding that Feng will survive.
However and this is my last point, there is a death flag because Feng kinda possibly totally jinxed herself, not once but twice: at the beginning of this arc and in the newest chapter…
And for real, the fandom is more alive on Reddit than here, but this above legit
was everyone’s reaction to her kissing Rock for the second time. xDD
It’s not even a ship war thing, because no one can really doubt that Revy and Rock will end up closer than anyone else in this series, their dynamic being one of the biggest focus of the narrative:
And Feng herself is 100% conscious of Rock kinda being Revy’s territory, not that our main girl tries to hide it very well
(between punching Eda for joking about getting Rock into her bed, turning onto freaking Balalaika when she held Rock at gunpoint, or threatening Jane when she implied she’d make Rock join an orgy, you get it).
Even Rock himself doesn’t seem to question it when Feng half jokes that Revy could kill her for this, so basically the chances of Rock/Feng being a thing will never fly high and Feng seriously attempting it ever again would raise an even bigger death flag for certain, even if Revy is not the one to press the trigger.
I’m of the opinion that actually it would be fun to have Feng becoming Benny’s new girlfriend as she half joked there again, since no one likes Jane xD (and anyway, the woman herself is now in danger because of Feng getting revenge against her so maybe she won’t last long either), but that’s only if Feng manages to make it to the end.
TL;DR I like Feng and I don’t particularly want her to die, but the series has a history of making Rock disappointed about the way he handles the arcs, so Feng could be yet another example of that.
Maybe the whole point is to have Rock slowly being isolated from everyone but Revy (when his non-violent side used to make him the better interlocutor with everyone but her), especially since it was implied times and times again that Rock will probably never find a way to fit in Roanapur.
I mean sure, he’s got his place within the Lagoon company and he doesn’t want to go back to his previous life, but even his ways to handle what the 4 Big Bosses of the city can sometimes ask of him is starting to make Dutch, his boss, uncomfortable. And now he kinda indirectly targeted his colleague’s current girlfriend in the current arc so… oops.
On the other hand, Revy herself can currently only fit nowhere but in Roanapur, so I’d say Hiroe-sensei is building the narrative around the two of them slowly seeking an in-between.
…So I guess we’ll see next month whether or not Rock will finally be able to watch Revy’s S&M show, because it would be a shame for him to miss it just like during Shaitane Baidi’s arc. xD
At the end of chapter 142, the manor becomes filled with multiple people such as officers from Scotland Yard, Abberline, Edward, and Alexis. This puts a lot of pressure on our!Ciel as he is now ‘exposed’ as being a fraud.
However, our!Ciel is not the only one this affects. With all these witnesses, it’s much harder for Sebastian to fight to his fullest potential. If he was to go full demon, it would be nearly impossible to pull off his act as this perfect human butler. It would be clear he wasn’t human, and he’s the only one really restricted like this. Undertaker doesn’t have to necessarily hide his power or strength. This isn’t to say I think he wants to fight, but this setup does limit Sebastian a bit. He can still do a lot with everyone looking, but if he wants to continue to hide his true power from the masses, he’s at a disadvantage.
Woah…it’s like a nature documentary…three years in anti territory, with nothing but a notebook and a trusty camera…the anon files.
Well, not three years, but you get the gist. Yeah, the thing you have to understand about antis is that the vast majority of them are not actually acting rationally. Some are criticising the story based on objective criteria, sure, but those people I usually wouldn’t refer to as ‘anti’s anyway. The people I do refer to operate entirely off of feeling, and then try to mask it as logical with all kinds of wafer-thin theories they probably know deep down to be untrue anyway.
You can debunk them as much as you like (it’s pretty easy), but they won’t change their point of view and most importantly, they won’t stop coming out with utter trash – because you can’t argue with a feeling.
It’s not surprising if you feel as though you’re reading a different story because they’ll completely warp the canon facts to fit around their own narrative. For example, it’s totally crackpot now to even try to say that Touken is intended as a negative thing in the story. It’s so obviously meant to be positive, yet these people will still harp on with the same nonsensical points about Touka being a total monster for calling Kaneki her husband. It doesn’t matter if the logic has any leg to stand on, because, essentially, it’s just another means of communicating a feeling, and that feeling is that they don’t like Touken.
So if it’s just an emotional difference and not an objective one, there’s not really much you can do to win them over. Best you can do is try and stay out of all that hot hot drama.
Never trust anyone who says Gintama is a comedy. You’ll regret ever getting into it. Anyway, you should give Gintama a try, it’s a comedy and you won’t regret it.
midnight-in-town 