Archive

Flowers of Light

Written and drawn by @chachacharlieco

Japanese has a variety of pronouns, and which one you use depends on your age, gender, and even who you’re with. And looking at the Japanese lyrics for Chikai, the theme song for Kingdom Hearts 3, I noticed the pronouns switch between verses.

I decided to take a closer look, and not only do the pronouns switch, the language style also switches back and forth between masculine and feminine speech styles along with the pronoun changes.

I think what we have going on here is a dialogue between a man and a woman, so of course I wanted to do a more thorough analysis.

Buckle in because this is going to be a long one, and yes, while it is just my speculation, I do think this song might very well be about Sora and Kairi.

運命なんて知らない けどこの際 存在を認めざるを得ない

I don’t know much about fate But now I have to admit it’s real

Notes: Much like in “Hikari,” the theme of fate is brought up again. In “Hikari” the speaker says to forget about fate, but here the speaker has come to accept that it’s real – there’s no more avoiding it. Also, it’s interesting to note how Xigbar mentions a similar concept, destiny, to Sora in one of the KH3 trailers:

JP: たどり着いた時、お前は自分の宿命を知ることならだろう。

EN: And at the end, you’ll finally realize what destiny has in store for you.

So from the sounds of it Sora has a destiny/fate he has to come to terms with in KH3, and right from the beginning Chikai also weaves this motif into its lyrics.

本当にこんな私でもいいの ねえいいの あんまり期待させないでほしいよ

Is someone like me really good enough? Hey, am I good enough? I don’t want you to expect too much from me

Notes: A lot to unpack here – first of all, whoever is speaking in this verse uses feminine sounding language. No is used at the ends of sentences in casual speech to indicate questions, but it’s also a characteristic of feminine speech used for emotional emphasis - either could be happening here, not completely sure.

But perhaps most telling of all is that the speaker uses the pronoun watashi to refer to themselves. Watashi is technically a gender-neutral pronoun, but it is the default pronoun for women, as guys have two more common options for referring to themselves – boku and ore. And combined with the casual speech of these verses, it sounds feminine. It’s also the pronoun Kairi uses to refer to herself.

And not only that – the no sentence enders is a characteristic Kairi incorporates into her speech. Hmmm…

Then the lyrics to Oath are translated…

Now seeing the lyrics that were on the exact same page that they were on:

“The light illuminates from the opened door. From now on I always want to be by your side. All my other options are long gone.”…

From now on I always want to be by your side?

All my other options are long gone?