Yeah, Undertaker’s views on how to ‘help’ someone seem kinda twisted. And right now it’s hard to see how any of what he’s doing right now is going to do any good to our Ciel. However, I still think that Undertaker’s goal is to actually help our Ciel to survive.
The biggest threat to our Ciel’s life in the long run is definitely Sebastian. The contract bounds our Ciel to him and as soon as it’s completed Sebastian will eat his soul. Even if our Ciel gives up on his revenge that would end his life as we’ve learnt in the Green Witch arc. Sebastian surely won’t give up on his price willingly. And it never really seemed like our Ciel regretted the choice he made back then. He accepts that he’ll die by Sebastian’s hands and he’s okay with that after he achieved his revenge. Maybe he even thinks that’s what he deserves after being the survivor while his brother had to die. He clearly feels very guilty (which I think is the main reason why he even took his brother’s identity). And he accepted that Sebastian would take his soul quite quickly.
So it’s already quite difficult to save our Ciel from Sebastian because of Sebastian. But our Ciel doesn’t even want to be saved so that makes things even more complicated.
Now this is the situation Undertaker is confronted with. He knew at least two generations of Phantomhives before the twins. And from what we’ve seen about him carrying Claudia’s mourning locket and him crying over Vincent’s death it’s obvious that he’s quite close to them. He cares about them even to a point of obsession. And that includes the twins – both twins.
Undertaker lost Claudia, he failed to protect Vincent and then both twins were abducted and tortured – one of them died and the other one sold his soul to a demon. I suppose UT blamed himself much for all of that. So he may now try to do anything in his power to save who he can still save. However, in order to save our Ciel from Sebastian he has to make our Ciel actually want to be saved. And maybe that’s the big plan behind all his actions. Our Ciel needs to confront his lies and his guilt in order for him to process all of it. Only if he sees that he deserves to live, that he doesn’t need to blame himself for what happened and that others still love him for who he is he may allow himself to live on. And then he might actually accept help in order to get free from Sebastian.
So maybe letting our Ciel face his guilt in the form of his dead brother and exposing his lies to everyone is UT’s way of starting that process of acceptance for our Ciel. It’s a very drastic and painful way but maybe UT sees no other way.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s horrible what our Ciel has to go through right now but I think it might lead to important character development for him which could be the start of a change in the contract with Sebastian. And maybe that’s what Undertaker is aiming at. I’m quite certain that in UT’s weird and obsessive way he actually really wants to save our Ciel in order to keep the Phantomhives alive (maybe in order to uphold a promise he once made to Claudia or even to himself to protect her descendants and to make up for earlier failures).
There aren’t two ways to go about it: UT doesn’t want to lose more Phantomhives (ch140), he’s even ready to go as far as to bring some of them back from the dead. So, indeed, being confronted to a young boy who went through so much that he thinks he actually deserves to die and have his soul eaten by a demon…
…what is he supposed to do? If he doesn’t up his game (both towards Seb and Victoria, imo), Ciel is lost.
I agree with you @thedarkestcrow, it doesn’t mean he chose the best way to do this (especially not with what the twin did to Soma and Agni, when Soma was slowly getting closer to Ciel, or even how sad the whole arc made Lizzie), and this decision of his may be the result of having lost many Phantomhives, but then again, who has a better idea to offer?
Clearly not Tanaka, despite being another character who’s probably well aware of the past of the P family and even possibly of Ciel’s contract to Seb (and maybe that’s even why he’s still at the P manor in ch145, because he’s the same as UT when it comes to wanting to save what’s left of this family).
The only possible alternative I can see to UT’s rather drastic ideas is Frances (who’s also someone who knows about Claudia and who has a way imo to know about Seb and the contract), mostly because she’s been conveniently absent lately and there are reasons to vouch for her being eventually the one to foil UT on this (I swear I won’t do this on your post tho), but nothing is certain rn.
Thank you for writing this, friend ❤ It was amazing! And sorry that I ended up slightly rambling. The point is we can call UT out for a lot of his bullshit, I love doing that personally, but thinking that saving our!Ciel is not a part of his goals is probably missing the point of most of his character throughout the story.
Thanks for your addition, @midnight-in-town. I was actually searching for that post where Yana implied that UT wasn’t a villain but I couldn’t find it so I left it out. But that’s exactly it! UT’s ways are surely not ‘nice’. What he’s doing to our Ciel is cruel at the moment. But he may see no other chance anymore.
The point is that in those nearly four years that the contract exists nothing much has changed regarding Ciel’s view on the contract. It’s obvious that Undertaker kept an eye on him. Maybe at first he thought that reminding him of the importance of one’s soul and giving him time would change our Ciel’s view on his future and on the contract but apparently it didn’t. In the meantime our Ciel could get closer and closer to his revenge and therefore to the end of the contract. I wouldn’t even be that surprised if UT tried to prevent Ciel from getting closer to the truth about his parents’ murder (by distracting him with his Bizarre Dolls or by hiding evidence) so that the contract wouldn’t end too quickly before UT has the chance to do something about it.
Maybe somehow UT even knows what happened in Germany and fears how quickly Ciel’s life could end. That may have shown him that preventing Ciel from getting his revenge may not even be enough because Sebastian could eat his soul as soon as Ciel gives up on his revenge.
So UT may now have seen the necessity to act, however cruel the methods may seem now.
Ohh and one last thing @thedarkestcrow: I think you’re also right because we know that during the campania arc UT checked Seb’s cinematic record about how he and Ciel met and that included how the contract was made, so…
he must have seen this too (ch138).
Of course he was already going through the process of bringing the twin back ever since he had rescued his body, but still, maybe that convinced him that seeing his brother again could be one way to help save Ciel from the contract.
In fact, the more we’re seeing of UT in this arc, the more I think that he really doesn’t want to lose more Phantomhives but that bringing back the dead Phantomhives could be something he’s justifying as not being (only) for himself, but also for Ciel (Vincent and real!Ciel), Frances (Vincent and Claudia), maybe even her children (real!Ciel => Lizzie), etc.
It’s just that our!Ciel is the one with the most precarious situation at the moment, so maybe he even hurried with the twin and brought him back first for that reason (since Vincent can’t be brought back anyway).
Does anyone else just feel the malevolence emanating from Real!Ciel? I’ve felt that way since Chapter 129 but the spoilers have really brought that out again. I can feel the darkness dancing underneath his beautiful eyes and tantalizing smile like an eternal temptation to finally see who he is under the mask.
When I read this chapter it hit me what a terrifying villain R!Ciel is, even more so than Undertaker since his sanity/maturity is unclear and yet everyone is about to treat him like a fully sane/mature Earl, and he will wield a lot of power.
But then it hit me… that’s probably how all of our past antagonists have felt about O!Ciel. There’s just something unnerving about a child being so impishly confident in carrying out deeds that no child should even be comfortable knowing about. Through R!Ciel we are again seeing Phantomhive cruelty… except this time, we’re not on his side.
Ooh that’s such a good point. What makes it even worse is that unlike Our!Ciel, we don’t know what limits, if any, that Real!Ciel has on his ruthlessness. It’s like staring into an abyss.
Hear me out, because Ciel and his servants can’t go back to the Phantomhive mansion (real!Ciel is there), they can’t go live at the Midford mansion (not after the latest development), the townhouse in London was attacked + it’s not exactly a good hideout, Soma is at Sieglinde’s and I doubt that Ciel wants to involve them more.
So where are they going to go and mostly how are they going to counterattack (Frances’ advice: it’s always easier when your opponent makes the first move)?
I made a small post before on which readers left a lot of cool ideas, like going to Lau’s opium den (@isammy7936 and @frederickabberline) or asking Diedrich for help (@my-lady-no-further) and, while I love those ideas (let’s get more people involved), there are other characters from this arc who also need to stop the undead twin + UT duo…
so I’d say a team-up with them first would make more sense for now, at least if we ever hope to see this arc move closer to its end. xD
Grell can’t face UT on their own after all, since UT won against Grell + Ronald + Seb during the Campania arc, which is probably why Grell and Othello ended up leaving as soon as Ciel and Seb were arrested by Scotland Yard.
Seeing as Seb & Ciel probably want the same as Othello & Grell though, either side could easily vouch for an alliance in order to stop UT’s BD project and the twin’s plan. Besides, at least the Shinigamis know the twin is undead and they have no reason to support his return.
The second point that’s making me think this idea could be the next development is…
what Othello said the first time he met Ciel: “you have a familiar face”.
Considering that Othello didn’t comment anymore about this upon seeing the twins together a few chapters ago, I am thinking it never was about real!Ciel at all, but rather possibly about another Phantomhive he met 50 years ago (the last time he came to the human world), which is to say Claudia Phantomhive, one of our main mysteries.
The twins do look like Vincent a lot and Sensei said that Vincent took a lot after Claudia, so Othello could have been reminded of Claudia when he saw Ciel (50 years ago she’d have been ~10 y/o and he’s almost 14).
Furthermore, if we’re assuming that Othello couldn’t remember who Ciel reminded him of exactly in ch125, after meeting with UT and seeing the twins with him, there is a good chance his memory was jogged (maybe that was even the whole point of making the Shinigamis show up at the manor despite them not doing anything before leaving).
And why it might be important is because one way to get to UT could be through confronting him about his link to Claudia…
especially since he seems rather sensitive on the subject [x][x] and she could be one objective of his BD project (remember how he cried about Vincent, ch105?).
Anyway, no matter if this what happens or not (if Claudia gets mentioned or not, I mean I’d looove that but let’s not hope too much), Othello just sharing stuff about UT from 50 years ago could be useful to Ciel (since UT has an emotional connection to the Phantomhive family) and, in return, I guess Ciel could lend Sebastian to the Shinigamis to try and take UT down.
Besides, don’t we know that the Shinigamis are understaffed? xD
So I’m all for Will as reinforcement (especially since Will was investigating about UT in Germany), but somehow I can see this happening during the final part of the arc (to take UT away, he’s done enough), just not right now.
IDK but considering that Shinigamis are everywhere in Kuro’s arcs, it’s interesting that we never had a temporary common front before between them and Ciel & Seb (it didn’t even happen in the Campania arc because Seb was fighting against Grell and Ronald too).
It certainly happened in the anime (with Grell too), so for the ones who are fond of parallels with the anime, this could be an opportunity to see it in the manga. 🙂
Side note: we don’t know if Alexis and real!Ciel talked about “the truth” yet, but I’m also still vouching for more investigation by Edward who might hopefully remember about Weston and the undead students & vice principal.
I love how people are joking that our!Ciel is The One Who Shall Not Be Named, when in reality
Claudia
is.
Because okay sure we know her name, unlike our!Ciel’s, but damn if we ever find out about anything else when it comes to her in the plot.
She’s looming behind the truth of a big part of the main plot, or at least that’s the impression Sensei is giving me (oh yeah I’ll bet you anything that she’s very significant), but no real mention yet about anything besides her name.
sensei when
our!Ciel we know everything about and we have followed but don’t know his name.
Claudia, we know her name but almost nothing else.
There are so many other characters that I want to know more about, like Francis, Undertaker, the Shinigami’s, Meyrin and Baldo. I want to know what makes them who they are!!!
Since Mey is Chinese, I’m guessing her arc will also be related to whatever Lau & Ran Mao’s arc we’ll be getting? Just guessing though.
As for the recurring Shinigamis, like Grell and the others, there is no guarantee but I’m guessing that when we learn about how the organization works exactly (and what’s up with those superiors), we might find out about some elements of their past.
Finally, for Frances, UT, Tanaka, Claudia and even Vincent I’m guessing this will be more or less addressed through the same discussions/answer moments and since this is main plot material, it can’t be helped that Sensei is taking her time.
I mean, we have Othello who made a comment that might be implying he met Claudia when she was a little girl 50 years ago + Othello knew UT as a Shinigami, so I think he’ll be doing the honors at some point during this arc, maybe giving Ciel a few answers, which will hopefully lead him to ask for more to anyone who might be aware of what UT did after his desertion.
These people, besides UT himself (in case he may not feel like talking, as we saw in ch141), are most likely Tanaka and Frances, that is at least what seems to be making the most sense (considering they also both knew Claudia) and anyway they are fishy too, at least as far as the current narrative goes.
=> Tanaka because he joined the Phantomhive family when Claudia was the Watchdog so he is bound to know quite a lot about her death and some circumstances behind Vincent’s death too…
So it’s not like Sensei can avoid to eventually answer all of this. TBH though, I just wish the pacing wasn’t so… slow.
I mean, I get building the plot and wanting to focus each volume around certain developments but :// well, this is killing me. 3 years on this arc and we still don’t know how the blood transfusions came to be, how real!Ciel is so perfectly undead and if UT is truly alone behind the sect. Amongst other things.
The hopes I have is that once we get past the chess game between the twins, we will find out about the Phantomhive family, Claudia and UT, but until we’re there, 20 pages/a month is haaaard because it’s making the wait so much longer.
I can’t blame Yana though: since Claudia was made to be so mysterious ever since volume 8, giving answers about her is very probably giving out big big hints towards the main plot and the target of Ciel’s revenge (to us and to Ciel himself), so she gotta build it up as much as she finds it necessary.
I love this because Claudia #1 master confirmed yay! but also because “I have served this family for two generations so I don’t really care who is the head of the family amongst you fighting siblings, I’m just here to keep an eye over all of you and watch the fort”.
I love this because it’s like “you’re all Phantomhives as regards me”, by UT in ch131 and the two men are definitely foiling each other. They have been here since Claudia’s time and she could very well be the reason they decided they’d stay for the following generations.
So not only do I truly wonder what kind of an awesome woman she was (but that’s not new), but I guess neither Tanaka nor UT will be the ones who will put an end to this chess game between the twins because they’re not on either side.
hey i just gotta add quickly that
UT and Tanaka both knew that our!Ciel was lying about his identity,
they both know stuff about the P family that they’ve been more or less not telling our!Ciel
they both knew Claudia and Vincent
and they seem to care about both twins (unless the rcmt is a thing and Tanaka is just pretending)
The last character who could be fitting the exact same criteria (with a remaining question mark on the first) has been missing for a while but her children and her husband are (supposedly) coming home with “the truth”.
Unlike Tanaka and UT though, I wonder if Frances might really stay a neutral party?
First of all, there is Lizzie’s sorrow that might motivate her to do something/anything, especially if she already knew about our!Ciel lying and feels bad about not telling her daughter, which led to the current arc in a way.
Secondly, considering the comic relief around her character, I’d say her not getting along with UT could be a real thing and in that case she has no reason to go along with whatever plan he supports/be as neutral as he and Tanaka are?
As a follow up to this post about what the family lineage might be.
I definitely spoke about this before, when ch108 came out and for an old analysis I did of Frances’ character, but it’s been over two years since then and lately I was wondering once more…
…if what awoke within Ciel during the arc in Germany, allowing him to see the Shinigamis, was activated only from time to time or became permanent.
Thus here’s a reminder of the parallel between Frances and Ciel both staring at Seb’s face for no particular reason (Ciel more than Frances, since he literally said it was nothing when Frances called Seb names afterwards), when they both share the Phantomhive lineage.
I can’t be sure whether it was made on purpose or not (I do agree it sounds super random though), but I personally always took that part (above) from ch108 as a possible hint that the lineage thing somehow activated in ch103 and is now permanent, meaning that Ciel’s eyes can see things that he couldn’t before:
like shinigamis even when they’re supposedly hiding themselves from humans
and possibly even through Seb’s human disguise as well.
TL;DR what runs for generations in the Phantomhive family may be the ability to spot either just Shinigamis or supernatural beings in general, and:
No but seriously though, Bravat aside (no matter if he can really see through Seb’s disguise despite being a human), what if…
that’s more or less how Frances sees Seb, thanks to the Phantomhive lineage???
Hence why she’d not only criticize his hair (even if she doesn’t like bangs on everybody so it’s not really a hint) but also his face, when humans in general will describe him as good looking?
Maybe the lineage only allows Phantomhives to notice Shinigamis or maybe it allows more than that? Mayyyyybeeee?
((Imagine Frances’ reaction tho, if she had a way to know Seb was a demon from the first time she saw him: her brother’s family was thought to have been completely annihilated but it turned out that one of her nephews survived…..! Except that he came back with his soul chained to a demon. Poor Frances T_T))
Ahhhhhhhhh senseiiiiiii!! Okay so Bravat just confirmed that his “predictions” weren’t exactly his (most likely UT’s) but it seems he really does see through Seb’s human disguise to some extent!
So guess who else might be able to do the same thingggggg…!
rCiel: I’ve never fought with my brother before so I came back from the dead, stabbed his friend to death and left him there for him to find, carved ominous words into his wall, outed him for being a liar in front of our family, and sent him to jail. Just for the funsies. Just for the excitement.
I think that might have been possible had Vincent married anyone other than who he did. O!Ciel inherited his asthma and frail constitution from his mother, Rachel, who we saw in the “With Father” side-story as having been prone to illness. Madam Red also informed us that part of the reason she wanted to be a doctor was for Rachel, who was constantly sick or bedridden.
We have no indication that Vincent was ill or medically troubled as a child and we know Frances would simply not tolerate being ill (because let’s be honest, Frances Midford née Phantomhive is NOT dying from something so mundane as an ordinary infection) so whatever propensity O!Ciel has towards illness was given to him by Rachel.
So if R!Ciel took after Vincent and was a (presumably) normal, healthy kid while O!Ciel was more like his mother, it might actually lend credence to your theory that the “inhumanly strong” Phantomhive gene is maternal.
Because while R!Ciel was a healthy enough child, he was in no way exceptional like Frances or Elizabeth. It’s entirely possible they could’ve inherited this biological quirk from the OG Phantomhive countess, meaning Claudia – the most enigmatic figure in Kuro at the moment – might have also been a sword-wielding get-shit-done badass. (Hell, if we buy into the UT-was-in-love-with-Claudia theory then we at least know she could’ve kicked his ass if he tried pulling this let’s revive the dead shit during her tenure as Watchdog xD)
In summary, it’s possible that Claudia was the original Sword Queen but that this particular trait could only be passed down to the females of the Phantomhive line. Vincent did not inherit this genetically altered super-strength chromosome and was thus unable to pass it down to his sons, R!Ciel and O!Ciel. Erstwhile Frances did inherit it but was only able to pass it down to her daughter, Lizzy.
I mean, at this point it’s anyone’s guess but I’d just be happy to catch another glimpse of our Kuroshitsuji empress, Claudia xD
Crack theory: the Phantomhive lineage is at the origin of the Watchdog duty
Very old idea related to ch103 & the GW arc overall that I never took the time to write.
Based on the fact that Claudia was most likely Vincent’s predecessor, which is implying that, when no more male heir available, using a woman from the Phantomhive family as the Watchdog was apparently a better alternative than giving the job to another nobleman loyal to the royal family.
@frederickabberline previously made a post explaining under which circumstances noble women could inherit anything, so it isn’t strange that Claudia was able to get that title. Still, the Watchdog position implies keeping control over the underworld, solving weird cases and cleaning up after the royal family, so it’s not exactly a normal position.
To keep it within a family specifically (the Phantomhives) could be a matter of keeping the Watchdog’s identity a secret, but…
…clearly ch132 and Vincent explain that, if no more heir, the whole thing goes back to the crown who decides who they’ll give it to next. So it’s probably Victoria who decided to give it to Claudia in the first place, allowing her to inherit despite being a woman (we don’t know when) and…
it’s also the Queen who decided that a 10 year old boy from the same family would receive that position.
So, assuming that the royal family intends on keeping the Watchdog duty as tightly related to the P family as possible, the question is why? Well, my answer for now would be the lineage thing.
Granted that we don’t know exactly what that lineage is yet, why it apparently has to be activated, etc, but it seems to at least have to do with being able to see/sense/detect supernatural beings. So far:
Ciel managed to spot the Shinigamis in ch103 despite them being invisible to normal human eyes at the time
the German Shinigamis said that “it runs in the family” so we can assume that it spans more than just two generations (so it’s most likely unrelated to whoever Cedric K. Ros- is)
And I’m of the opinion that it could probably be seen as useful if the royal family were to know about (and believe) it.
For now though, it’s hard to consider whether or not Victoria herself gave out hints that she might know about the lineage, because her absence of surprise towards Ciel’s report for the Weston arc could also be explained by John Brown most likely being supernatural and by her side, as many have guessed before.
The thing is, I find there is a possible analogy between the Watchdog’s duty
and Seb’s own situation as Ciel’s personal dog
Because Will basically said that a demon with a leash on (the contract & Seb’s own aesthetic) was better than free demons who would probably go around scavenging for souls that Shinigamis work hard to collect.
And it’s kinda the same if we’re considering that the Phantomhives are dogs to the royal family: putting a collar on them makes them less dangerous and more easy to keep under control (eventually hanging them with it if needs be, as UT pointed out), especially if what the royal family was originally interested in was how useful the Phantomhive lineage could be to them.
The other reason I came up with this theory is the Green Witch arc overall: again it’s just my opinion but, while the last part of the arc was really good, I have a few issues with the rest of it. I explained here why but, to sum up: compared to all the other arcs, the fake supernatural settings (werewolves, witch, curse/magic, etc) are rather unrelated to the true subplot (German army researching war weapons using a young genius), which is unusual and makes it too convenient as a result.
That being said, since I like to believe that Sensei does things for a reason, I’ve been thinking that maybe the fake supernatural settings of the GW arc are supposed to be relevant elsewhere in the story, kinda like how the murders at manor arc ended up being used as an introduction to the war suplot.
So initially, looking at what Sieglinde believed to be the truth, you get this story…
and let’s just say that this is a situation that could have easily been applied to the Phantomhive family, if anyone ever found out that they were “gifted”.
Again, we don’t know what the lineage is or where it comes from, but if Ciel’s ancestors ended up being hunted as heretics
at some point
because of it, then similarly to Sieglinde’s story, who knows if they didn’t agree to a pact with the royal family (the Watchdog duty), in exchange for their protection?
That pact gave the royal family the huge advantage to get their own little gifted dogs, generations after generations, and to use that special lineage indirectly for themselves…
…as long as they kept a tight leash on this family.
I’m aware it might appear a little far-fetched, especially when we don’t know what the lineage
really
is about yet, but that’s why it’s a crack theory.
To be honest though, I can’t help but also wonder about the timing of the lineage thing’s introduction by Sensei: ch103 is right during the final part of the GW arc after all, so it could be a coincidence or narratively meaningful because the settings of the arc do have some sort of link to that lineage stuff. :))
Let me know if anything is unclear! As always thanks for reading!!
I forgot to mention a few more details that might prove that the lineage is overall relevant to the main plot the other day. First…
…if the Phantomhive family is rumored to be gifted within occult circles, that could explain why this guy leading the cult from 4 years ago was so happy about having two of them as their lambs.
Think about it, if they believed in the occult to the point of thinking that summoning a demon was possible, then they might as well believe that there are some special humans out there.
Personally I don’t think that the twins having a special lineage influenced Seb’s summoning or anything, but maybe these people believed it might (amongst the many ways to justify their horrible actions towards the twins)?
Similarly, about the betrothal between Vincent’s heir and Elizabeth:
as far as we know, it happened when they were really young, probably at a time when no one knew for certain if Lizzie would even be as strong as her parents, so maybe it’s a consequence of the special lineage there again?
I mentioned it several times before, but for Frances to go along with the betrothal even though she knows how dangerous being a Phantomhive is, there must be a real reason to this decision. It could be just because she wanted to help her brother’s family, but Sensei generally goes deeper than that.
In any case, I doubt it’s a random narrative choice by Sensei to have Lizzie as the twins’ fiancée (not when Ed isn’t betrothed to anyone and neither were Frances and Vincent before they met Alexis and Rachel).
What’s clear is that neither Ciel nor Lizzie ever thought to ask why they were engaged so young (so they should ask someone at some point), but personally I do think it’s about more than just keeping the secret of the Watchdog’s identity within the family.
midnight-in-town 