I Miss Her Dearly

again & again

I hope Verlaine, Kouyou, and Mori are quarantining from the vampirism in Verlaine's depression hovel right now. I hope they're having the worst sleepover imaginable. If Mori uses Verlaine's electric kettle to boil fruit one more time, Verlaine is going to gut him like a fish. Kouyou and Verlaine ran out of slurs to call each other so Kouyou is making prolonged eye contact while systemically picking apart his rattan chair with her tantō. Verlaine has strangled Elise into dissipating four times.

Every time Chuuya calls to check on them, they act SO casual and unaffected. Verlaine is knitting Chuuya a hat from the hair Mori keeps stress shedding.

can't think of a haha funny caption for this because whenever i think about how they were both kids for more than a quarter of a second i suffer a brain hemorrhage

I'm usually on the camp of "Nezuko's mental age regression is a bad writing decision because it takes agency away from the sole female main character" - but after Tamayo's explanation that Nezuko traded consciousness for changing her biological makeup to co-exist peaceably with humans, I am forced to admit that as usual any writing decision in KnY I initially hate ends up lining up unexpectedly with the themes of the centrality of love.

The reason Nezuko is such a special demon is because Tanjirou's protection and guidance allowed her to become one.

Most demons focused on the day-to-day of feeding themselves, finding somewhere to rest, and fending off humans who wanted them dead. Nezuko is a rare demon who had the protection of someone else, so she could afford to sleep most of the time and change her biology. Only Nezuko could afford to trade so much of her consciousness away and to become so childlike, airheaded and defenceless because Tanjirou took care of the day-to-day for her. Unlike the other demons, she didn't have to always be on guard and live with an everyone-for-themselves mentality.

Nezuko was also able to not taste a single drop of blood because Tanjirou carried her away from their family's bodies (while trying to get her to a doctor) and was strong enough to hold her off until she got a grip. And only she lived past being discovered by a demon slayer, because Tanjirou defended her and she defended him. And when she did feel the urge to eat (Red Light District arc), Tanjirou was there to stop her.

Also very importantly, Nezuko's love for Tanjirou provided her a very strong motivation to stay in this sub-human state of consciousness for the long period necessary.

Most demons did not have a very strong reason to force themselves not to eat. Either they had no respect for humanity to begin with (Gyokko, Muzan, Spider Demon Ryu), or everyone they loved had died and they were subsequently in too much despair to put up a fight (Tamayo, a certain spoiler demon who was so suicidal that forgetting his loved ones ironically helped him live longer).

Meanwhile Nezuko really needed to return to being human, because her brother will not stop fighting demons otherwise. Regaining consciousness and convincing him to quit isn't an option for her because the demon slayers wouldn't let her live, and Tanjirou won't let her die. (And if he did, he would never recover from her death.) Like I don't know how much Nezuko thought this through, but Tanjirou's plan to shake information out of demons while trying to kill them is frankly terrible, while Nezuko's course of action to just change her biology was wildly successful lol. She had the better idea. Just as Tanjirou walked this long road for Nezuko, Nezuko did for Tanjirou.

Man, this is why I really love KnY. When the narrative said that nothing could break the bond between Tanjirou and Nezuko, when it said that love lets people exceed any reasonable expectation and achieve the impossible, they weren't just saying it. Everything has always been there, lying out in the open and waiting for us to realize it. Like, which other demon could spend so much time sleeping away so that they can change their biology. Only the little sister whose big bro is still alive and willing to take care of everything for her, and who herself loves him enough to achieve the impossible, of course.

Oh boy I thought people were over the Rayleigh-Zoro parallel being a 1 for 1 thing. But I see with this chapter they're not and now they're doing the same with Sanji and Gabán.

Rayleigh was a parallel to both Zoro and Sanji and Gaban's the same.

Rayleigh's a swordsman but he also uses his legs to fight while Gabán uses two axes (which ironically makes for 3 weapons + 1 pair of legs, it's probably just chance but who knows with Oda).

Rayleigh made fun of Zoro's stupidity the same way Sanji would, he's got a got a scar similar to Zoro's.

Rayleigh's a big drinker like Zoro and Gaban's very into love like Sanji.

Gaban's linked to Wano like Zoro and they both like to stir shit up.

Both Sanji-Zoro and Gabán-Rayleigh will not hesitate to argue against their captains if they feel like it's needed, so far Gabán and Zoro have only been shown to do it when they're particularly worried (both shown in chapter 1139), meanwhile Sanji and Rayleigh will scold Luffy-Roger for more mundane stuff as much as when they're worried.

So like outwardly Gabán-Sanji and Zoro-Rayleigh parallels are super obvious but in truth it's a mix because Luffy's crew is not just a copy of Roger's.

(also don't comment by saying that both Rayleigh and Zoro are 1st mate/Vice Captain as a parallel, Oda confirmed in vol. 102's SBS Zoro isn't, which we've been knew but apparently not everyone, anyway the idea of the Strawhats having a 1st mate is just weird when them not caring about hierarchy bc they're a family is so important)

the last line being "feel strongly / that's what you do when you want to experience the past" is so important to me genuinelyyyyyyy like. god. god. the dead authors manga for people who are bad at living. the lack of a solid time setting when it comes to bsd in a very deliberate way. the things that asagiri is always always saying about death as a transient state through bsd. fiction and emotion and death and the aftershocks that these dead authors and their literature leave across history.

Very hot today...

Okay, so Chuuya needs reading glasses but he decided to switch to contacts sometime after SB and usually only uses his glasses at home. Which is fine and works out great.

Except Chuuya needed to wear the vampire contacts at Meursault. And he didn’t bring glasses with him out of habit. He can’t read anything.

The red contacts already made it hard to see in general but he can’t read anything while wearing them (the only consolation he had was that he also couldn’t see Fyodor’s smug face when he thought he controlled him). Then afterward he’s shoving his face close to his phone and squinting to try to see if he’s gotten any news about Yokohama while trying to also text anyone he can to speed up their extraction.

Dazai, trying to hack computers to contact Ango: You know you can make the print bigger so it’s easier to read, right?

Chuuya, also a total grandpa when it comes to phones: I can what?

I like to think that chuuya secretly donates to animal shelters and never tells anyone. he'll be boasting about how tough of a mafioso he is one second and then quietly covering the medical bill for a one-eyed kitten the next. animals don’t lie. they don’t stab you in the back or expect things from you in return for their love. they’re just soft and small and trying their best, and it hits a part of him he doesn't want to look at too closely. he reads every “thank you to our anonymous donor” update email like it’s classified intel. someone at the shelter sent a picture of a puppy in a cast once and he stared at it for ten minutes straight. he would rather be shot point blank then explain to someone why the photo is saved and favorited in his phone though.

There is so much to break down here holy shit

First off, I like how Fukuzawa and Mori are the only one fully on different sides here, I think of all the generations of skk they are the ones who simply and truly hate eachother. Everything about them is antithetical, they represent the complete opposite values.

skk here is also interesting, look at chuuyas expression, he has his typical "I hate being here but i have no choice" look that he had as the king of sheep. And Dazai literally leaning over him is pretty spot on for how we see their partnership play out for most of their time in the mafia.

sskk being back to back here I think actually shows their trust in eachother now, Fyodor being a present threat and both of them wathcing eachothers back. There's also the fact that Atsushi is looking up while Akutagawa is looking straight ahead