Hi, since I can't stop thinking about Canto 9, I want to discuss Canto 9 in its retelling of the story of Hell Screen in its own way, and how it actually follow the core of the short story.
I will preface my analysis with that I know that characters have multiple roles, but for this specific discussion, roles I will use are - Ryōshū as Yoshihide, Rien as Lord of Horikawa, Araya as Yoshihide’s daughter and Ren as Yoshihide the Monkey. Since those line up best with the core of Hell Screen, if you disagree with those choices, you are free to write your own analysis.
Let start with the beginning of the story, we have the Lord of Horikawa, a man that by the view of the narrator is a man who is blessed, who is beloved by gods, that before he was born, a deity appeared in his mother's dream.
In Limbus we have Rien, a man who is a god’s proxy, a man to whom a god took a liking to.
Both are manipulative men who are essentially leaders of places they are in, men who are trying to look presentable, who hide from people what they are actually like, men who are hiding their evil.
They even have people who pretty much worship them, see no wrong in them, Lord has Narrator and Rien has Sora.
Then we have Yoshihide, and Yoshihide is rough, there is no facade, he is mean, he is unpleasant, he is unlikeable and he is hard to deal with, both in how he looks, but especially in his personality.
In Limbus we have Ryōshū, and even though she is beautiful, as the introduction introduces her “But with some creeds, you will have difficulty in even simply pretending to sympathize.” She is hard to deal with.
Then we have Yoshihide's daughter in the book and Araya in the game, both young girls (Yoshihide’s daughter is 15 and Araya isn't older than 10) who were given jobs by men in authority without their parents’ wishes (Yoshihide's daughter being a Lady-in-waiting and Araya being the Dihui Star).
Both girls are utterly miserable in the places they are stuck in and feel like they were utterly forgotten by everyone.
Then we have the monkey, a monkey who looks a bit similar to Yoshihide and that’s why he got this name, Yoshihide the Monkey is taking care of Yoshihide's daughter while Yoshihide is away, even helping her even when she is sick or in pain.
Then in Limbus we have Ren, a man who looks quite similar to Ryōshū and who cares about his master more than everything else in the world.
Then the plot shows us a scene of the Lord of Horikawa gifting a robe to Yoshihide’s daughter, acting like he just wants to help her without any ulterior motives, and so Rien in Limbus too, had this facade of kindness when it came to Araya.
Both Ryōshū’s and Yoshihide’s struggle centers around their daughters being stolen and abused by men in power (Lord of Horikawa, Rien) .
Yoshihide's daughter, a 15 year old was taken from her family without her family’s consent, and Araya was found by Rien when Ryōshū was away from the HOS, i.e, without Ryōshū’s consent either.
Both of them trying to do anything they can to free their daughters even though they are very much overpowered by antagonistic forces, and so they try to use only what was given to them but because of this, they can't protect their daughters, Yoshihide being busy with paintings, after finishing which, he asks to free his daughter and gets refused, and Ryōshū with being busy with Limbus since she believes this could mean she could save her daughter faster.
So they do what must be done, what they think would free their daughters.
But while they are trying to do it, their daughters suffer at the hands of the men who stole them.
Lord saw Yoshihide's daughter as a tool for his own pleasures while Yoshihide's daughter was utterly suffering under him, both concerned for the safety of her father and herself was suffering and crying where no one could see.
While Araya even though she didn't have to experience any advance like that, she was groomed by Rien into mimicking her own grandmother, down to making her talk and dress like Yoru, Yoru, a woman who was a victim of assault and wearing essentially what looks like a traditional Japanese wedding dress.
Both Yoshihide and Ryōshū are extremely masterful with the jobs they had, Yoshihide had talent to paint pictures that gave him the status of best painter of the land, while Ryōshū was a such masterful killer, she could split person in half using only the sheath of her sword.
Yoshihide had commissions he got, and Ryōshū had her Homework in HOS and in a way even HOS raid is her Homework too, since it was set up from the start by Rien.
Then in moment when they think they can finally finish what they are doing, when they think they can finally give them a future, in their drive to do it, they end up killing them, Yoshihide asks for a model to paint that he thinks will finally let him finish painting, but the model ends up being his own daughter, who he had no idea that she was in the carriage, since Lord said it was a sinful woman.
In Limbus Ryōshū didn't know that the woman she was attacking was her own daughter, she thought it's her mother, a sinful woman in her eyes who only hurt her, but it was her daughter in those robes all along.
Also, both Yoshihide the Monkey and Ren died as ones who they were helping and supported were killed
While both Lord of Horikawa and Rien were gloating about the finishing of painting, and Yoshihide and Ryōshū couldn't say anything as they were utterly consumed by their emotions as they saw their daughters die in front of them, first they reacted with rage, but then reached a state of kinda like, cursed enlightenment.
Yoshihide looked like he “possessed a strange, inhuman majesty that resembled the rage of the King of Beasts himself” and Ryōshū was reaching the state of Non-self.
But that enlightenment was only a sign of death.
As they both cannot live without their daughters, whom they deeply cherish and feel as if they failed to protect them, they both try to end their own lives and Ryōshū is stopped before there is nothing left of her but Yoshihide hangs himself in his own house.
