#back cracks

Part I: “In the end...” (Ch. 32)

Ray is Emma’s “counterpart”. They seem different at first: Ray is more logical and meticulous while Emma looks at the big picture and does things based on her feelings, but they’re both really two sides of the same coin. They’re both logical (Emma showed her pragmatic side when she debated with Norman and presented a counter-proposal to his plan) and they both operate on their feelings (Ray cared deeply for Norman and Emma so he wanted them to live, and Emma cared for everyone so she wanted everyone to live).

They both also care for their family in the same way. When Ray was faced with the notion that he can live (or that he should live), he did his best to become the sibling he had never allowed himself to be. There’s a caring, almost motherly nature to him in the way he handles the kids, in the way he frets over Norman and Emma, and in the way he supports everyone silently.

Emma is the same: she’s a lot more loud and open about it, but they’re both very caring towards their siblings. Unlike Ray, however, she’s certainly a great deal more idealistic and ambitious.

Ray and Emma are similar because they are warm and tender, and they’re both very family-oriented. They do things for the sake of their family, putting their loved ones first and themselves last.

Their familial love manifests itself similarly, and while they do have their individual, defining traits, they are the same at their core.

Hence, they are parallel: heading in the same direction in terms of how they think and feel, but going about it in different ways.

An example would be from the final chapters of the Jailbreak Arc, where Ray explicitly points out that: “In the end, [they] were thinking the same thing.” (Ch. 32)

they might be thinking the same way but ray’s the lil shit who goes off and says he’ll burn himself to achieve their goal

Part II: “Fate—has split our paths” (Ch.128)

Norman is essentially Emma’s “foil”. He has contrasting traits that serve to highlight Emma’s own. Take the famous “sun and moon” depiction for example: it is the night that lets you know the day exists, and vice versa. A more nuanced interpretation of this is that Norman, as the “moon”, operates on borrowed light.

Firstly, he is neither idealistic nor ambitious—in contrast with Emma, who most definitely is. He does not wish for extravagant or impossible things; despite, or perhaps because of, his intelligence, he only wants the simple things: to see the world, and to stay with Emma and Ray.

He does not actively set idyllic goals for himself, he only seeks to apply his mind in the present rather than consider abstract/seemingly unreachable concepts (I want to ride a giraffe!). He never even considered having their entire family escape until Emma brought it up. It is here that we see him operating on ‘borrowed light’; his actions in the Jailbreak Arc are made to directly achieve what Emma wants.

He and Emma get along and complement each other very well (more on this later), though they are fundamentally not the same.

Thus, Norman and Emma might share the same ideals (a world where they’re all free), but they aim towards different goals. Emma essentially wanted co-existence (at the same time, not necessarily at the same place), while Norman determined that the best route was to eliminate the demons altogether.

This in contrast with Emma and Ray’s dynamic, where they share similar goals, but different methods.

To further define this difference, it is Emma and Ray who can come to the same conclusion independently, with them working separately and finding out they thought the same way in the end (of course, with the absence of a conflicting variable—‘will we bring everyone or not’, that entire spiel).

Meanwhile, Emma and Norman only reach the same conclusion when they’re working dependently (this more so in Norman’s case, wherein he’s usually striving to achieve what Emma wants).

This illustrates itself clearly when Norman and Emma are working independently throughout the next few arcs of the manga, and eventually find that they both reached different conclusions about the same matter.

Case in point, this difference makes itself one of the center conflicts in 3 arcs (King of Paradise through the Imperial Capital Battle Arc). They even get an inside cover.

Hence, they are perpendicular: heading in different directions, and intersecting once (clashing).

It is through this consolidation of views that TPN manages to bring forth a (hypothetical) moral conflict to the forefront of its story through its characters—quite like a physical, mental, and emotional debate, wherein the protagonists each present one aspect of the moral conflict and work to achieve a balanced and unanimous outcome.

In other words, they complement each other magnificently in their opposition. Emma hopes for the impossible, while Norman works within the realm of possibility. Emma reaches for the sky, while Norman is rooted to the ground.