I finished reading ajin about a week ago now and man, that manga, i don't think saying that its the best manga I've ever read on all counts is enough. There's just so much that is so well executed.
That being said the amnesia bit realy threw me for a loop and my general feelings about it when i read that chapter was: huh? Like is that what's happening? Thats where the story is going? A single chapter where Kei has amnesia in the last 10 of the story? And then i remembered that when stories are well written you can actually ask those questions and get meaningful answers so here we i guess
Fundamentally, at its core, the amnesia thing brings a very interesting question to the story and its characters. If you took out all of the memories, from the incident that started the adventure to where they are now in the story from your character, what changed? Outside of literal experience and knowledge learned, in what way did the core of their person evolve.
Kei, from the moment he decides to actually be a part of the narrative and to involve himself in the plot, as in defeating Sato, doesn't realy have anything holding him back. Nothing besides failure and the loss of his opportunities to get what he wants. Its only until the Sato's arrival in Forge tower and the success of his mission that Kei is actually faced with a new hurdle to avoid at all cost, hurdle that doesn't have anything to do with his mission, a problem that only exists because he thinks of it as one.
Decapitation and the regeneration of a new head is from the moment its introduced is something that is framed, by Kei and a few other characters as a form of death for an Ajin. But up until Forge tower it was mostly an hypothetical that Kei viewed as an aberration. It can't happen because he reasoned that it meant dying despite still resuscitating. He protects Nakano from potentially getting beheaded but he himself does not let it get in the way more than getting sedated of incapacitated does. And then Sato enters, and he concludes that what Kei needs to finally grow into the adversary that Sato sees in him, he needs to get decapitated, he needs to get past that fear of death that he believes is what's keeping him from being a truly formidable opponent. And that right there is the first time, since he decided that this story needed to end with him winning, that Kei lets a fear outsider to his mission take control. He still succeeds at what he attempts to do, but for a short while it isn't motivated by his objectives, he runs from Sato because there is something that he fears more than failure and defeat.
So, after the truck, after the experiments, after his time with grandma, after deciding that Sato needed to be gone, after Forge tower, after giving up and getting mocked by his mother for being an idiot, after deciding to fight no matter what, after the plan with Sato's arm and the hole, after the flood, after saving Kaito, what is Kei Nagai?
And i think that, that specific question, is what makes the final confrontation with Sato so great. Its what makes the amnesia not only make sense in the narrative but also for his character. When this grown and changed Kei loses everything, all his knowledge, even to the point of forgetting that he is an ajin, he is able to do the thing he could have never done before and couldn't have done just a few weeks before even in Forge tower, he kills himself. Ok bear with me for a second, i know that this all sounds very edgy but death for him is only metaphorical, its a question of philosophy, its Theseus's head if you may. To the Kei that know that he is an ajin losing his head is the only "death" but for a Kei that doesn't know death is whatever kills him. So to do what he does when faced with the uncertainty of what he is means that he finally grew past that hurdle, that fear of dying, as metaphorical as it may be. Killing the Kei that doesn't know to come back as a Kei that does is as much of a death as losing his head is. And that's what makes the amnesia so great, it shows us why is Kei ready to finally beat Sato, why we know that this time this is it, why this is where the story ends
Sato finally got his ultimate opponent in the end. He got Kei to get past the fear without getting the satisfaction of doing it himself, and as a reward, in his big final showdown he gets beaten in the way that it was always going to happen against Kei. He gets outsmarted and incapacitated in the least satisfying way for him and a way that take into consideration just how weak Kei is compared to him. Its not fun, it doesn't last enough time for him to realise what happened, but it exactly how Kei does things, no theatrics, no amusement to be gained, just the clearest path to the best outcome.
Anyway that felt very pretentious but Ajin is just this good so be prepared for more posts that are way too long and way too wordy
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