Erii

I'm exhausted but I must tweak out over the latest chapter.

Editor's Notes First Page: ありし日の... [arishi hi no...] "Days long gone..." Last Page: 巨悪...!! [kyoaku...!!] "A monster...!!"

Uncle Soga Akemaru, Buyer of Bibs

Completely with you in your confusion, Chihiro.

Chihiro may be a bit skinny for his age right now (70 kilos, or a little over 153 Freedom Units), but he was kinda chonky as a baby apparently. 3860 grams is about 8.5 Freedom Units, which is definitely on the larger side for newborns in Japan as of 2020 (4000 grams is actually considered to be a case of macrosomia, or an infant being abnormally large at birth). Go ahead and HC that Chihiro gains weight easily when he's not running himself ragged if you want to. It's free and no one can stop you!

But yeah. Soga is quickly growing on me as both a character and a villain. Because in truth, he's not a villain in his own mind- he's a hero. And I'm kind of on board with him.

Ideals

I was struck by how much the art style has changed (largely for the better) since the first chapter here.

The "kind of" qualifier does a lot of heavy lifting there to be sure. For one thing, it's as close to true objectivity as it gets to say that "killing innocent people after their government and military surrendered is a bad thing, actually". It's actual factual heinous war crimes to kill surrendered soldiers, never mind non-combatants. Toss families with children into the mix and you've got the easiest case for execution ever. So no, I don't think Soga's really a hero that should be celebrated far and wide.

However, because of how his ideals are framed, I do believe that he believes he's a hero, and I won't contest him on it.

Hmm...

Soga Akemaru is just trying to protect the weak and defeat evil, always.

He also wasn't trying to break out for the nearly 20 years he was sitting there in Kamunabi HQ's basement. He felt like the world didn't need his brand of heroism any more, so he quit. It wasn't until he saw Yura's memories of losing the simple life he was happy to live that he roused himself. Clearly, he thinks, there are still many evils in this world for him to purge- the Sazanamis were just one of many powerful clans operating in the shadows, after all. The Kamunabi's not strong enough. So, he'll rise to the occasion instead.

He's the most extreme version of the ideals that Kunishige instilled into Chihiro. And that's the most dangerous thing about him, honestly... believing that he's completely justified and on the side of good. And with the right spin on his ideals, a hell of a lot of people would agree with him. Just downplay the scorched earth tactics and frame it all as "ensuring the safety of his beloved people" and bam, instant hero. Oh wait, isn't that basically what the Kamunabi already did?

So to see Kunishige so haunted in that flashback really says a lot about why he couldn't bring himself to tell Chihiro the truth yet. It's not at all a stretch to say that the probably made the monster that forced a government coverup of genocide. And why he was so careful with Chihiro to mention that they're responsible for the weapons they make. Every cut made, every dead body, that's on their shoulders too.

Hokazono could write a good horror manga with creepy imagery like this.

As far as how the fight's gonna go, stalemate by Soga needing to retreat away from Yura's consciousness is going to be my guess. But I won't put a single cent on that bet because this series is always doing the unexpected. The final clash between Chihiro and Soga's ideals is a ways off yet since Chihiro's latest power up wasn't enough to put him on Soga's level. Good thing he's got not-the-heroine-of-this-series to help him stay motivated!

HakuHiro Brainrot Section

"How is this chapter about HakuHiro", the average reader asks. "Isn't it just ship brainrot getting to you", they accuse. And they're kinda right. However.

Time to go and do a protecc

Assuming this wasn't just meant to reinforce how far off the deep end Soga is, then hooray! Protecting Hakuri is part of the main plot! Either way though, giving Chihiro a bit of a scare by mentioning that his friend is first up on the chopping block was certainly a choice. And thus we segue into Chihiro's verbal defence of Hakuri being cut off, telling us that Talk no Jutsu is completely ineffective here. Chihiro's gonna have to keep on stepping up his swordplay to become Hakuri's samurai.

And then there's this tidbit:

Sounds familiar to someone else's situation.

Assuming we ever get to see these characters have downtime outside of fights (lol; LMAO, even), there is exactly one character in the cast that can completely understand these complicated feelings. Hell he probably even needs help working through them himself.

Chihiro's put it out of mind for now since they've gotta do the talking with swords, but man, that could be a really potent point to follow up on if the author feels like it. I will absolutely stake one (1) slice of the super spicy artisan cheese I got as part of a Pollyanna gift that Chihiro's feelings are going to be more muddled than ever after this arc ends. He found clarity thanks to Iori and saved Samura with her and the Masumi's help, but it seems like he's going to lose the fight against his uncle.

And then there's the question: he picked up Enten from the ashes of his home and took on this crusade himself. Hakuri reinforced that he was the right person to do it, showed him how to put those messy feelings aside to focus on the here-and-now, how to kill your own family, and most recently gave Chihiro his motivation to become stronger. Next, will Chihiro revisit those ugly truths of being related to both Kunishige -a man who clearly had a regretful past- and the mass murderer who had to be locked away?

If so, that's where Hakuri can help again. He's the one who was raised to be a human trafficker and was completely on board with that until just a few months ago. And yet he's so completely reformed that Chihiro wants to keep him by his side and implicitly trusts him to do the right thing, even looking up to him in some respects. Need a shoulder to lean on to vent about killing family members you hate to be associated with because of how awful they are? A certain white-haired, blue-eyed guy is just a Shiba teleport away. He even has a personal storehouse he can register and teleport you to for maximum privacy.

It would also be nice to see Chihiro open up like that y'know. He's done a very good job of being stoic and pressing on in most circumstances, but the messy emotions will catch up at some point, right? Why yes, I am still hung up on the disappointment of chapter 60, thanks for asking. And he's got a friend who probably has similar complicated feelings of his own that he's working on when his life isn't in danger as well. Not hard to see where this is going, right?!

It'd just be nice to see two guys finally find true friendship they can rely on in the few non-action moments is all I'm saying. One of the best and most endearing thing about the relationship between Hakuri and Chihiro (romantic or not) is that they're each other's first friend ever. The guy that just gets the other on a non-verbal level. I hope it's not too much to see Chihiro finally allowing himself to be vulnerable on his own terms! And who better with than Hakuri, his first peer and friend!

Hello Ranpoe nation I have returned after not having drawn em in years (I missed them)