#smtv

miyazu who does try to help a little by tending to sahori's wounds also seems ignorant to what's truly going on, as if she's struggling to conceptualize or unwilling to acknowledge the bullying. most of the kids who do take note of it seem like they don't really know what to do, but perhaps they fear for themselves more than they care about sahori, and they would rather not get involved. you could maybe say this was the case for dazai as well, who expressed wanting to help, but ultimately was discouraged out of it by his own lack of self-esteem. he calls himself 'just some nobody' and admits defeat immediately so he doesn't even try, which was an odd excuse to me. he's certainly not confident in his own abilities, but i also got the sense that he made note of his own 'status' within the school's 'hierarchy' to tell himself that there's no way he could stop the bullies because he didn't have the influence to convince anyone that they were wrong and to stand up against them. so more likely, he would just be outcasted and bullied along with sahori, was probably the scenario he was afraid of. this goes back to my old thread on dazai, his parallels with sahori and the way he saw himself in her i think. i do want to note that MC does not help her either, at least not until it's too late, so idk make of that what you will.

their school does have this oppressive top-down structure to it where the students all seem very caught up in status. they talk about 'famous students', 'school big names', 'no name losers', etc which honestly made me laugh lmao. their bonds with each other seem rather shallow, and they seem willing to backstab each other as necessary, the way sahori's bullies tried to do when confronted by lahmu. none of this is at all unrealistic, especially given the emphasis on jouin being an exceedingly prestigious school. the students are told they're like the cream of the crop, they have their egos inflated and convinced they're better than everyone else. and their vapidness and lack of any true identities, values, beliefs means they have nothing else but their egos and insecurities.

and all of this is very ironic because the idea is jouin is likely a sanctuary/prison of sorts for Knowledge bearers. they're gathered up and kept both under watch and protection in the school by bethel. the fact that they Should be these idk bright pillars of Knowledge who possess the true wills of former gods and shit, and yet they've become so hollowed out of any substance or identity is very ironic. i don't know if you can maybe say it's intentional on the angels' or God's or whoever's part, but it almost feels as if the school is designed to 'destroy their spirit' and trap them within the illusion so that there's even less chance of them reuniting with their demon counterparts to become nahobinos.

either way, hayao certainly talked as if he knew of yuzuru all this time, but he never made any move to actually meet him. there's like really a lot of diff possibilities as to why this may be and it's hard to narrow it down lol. some form of protection? he didn't want to potentially exert influence over yuzuru and mislead him or something knowing he had his Knowledge? or was it more like some fear on hayao's own part, he didn't want to meet a reflection of himself? knowing this guy it's probably some complicated mix of both these possibilities at least tbh 🧍.

the feeling i get as well though is that even in CoC, i think he was trying to allow yuzuru his own autonomy to choose what it is he wanted to do at any given time. he didn't involve yuzuru in this mess, but he also didn't go out of his way to prevent him from getting involved in this mess. he probably knew to some extent that yuzuru got involved because he wanted to help protect tokyo or whatever so he didn't stop him if that was his will. this is sorta what he tells miyazu in CoV too but i think it also applied in CoC. that's probably why he stopped to ask yuzuru for his input all the damn time in CoC (all while never extending the same courtesy to us 🙄). they were probably still misled due to a combination of reasons including the fact that they never sorted out their own issues to understand better what it was they really wanted (such as yuzuru saying in CoV that he thought he wanted to protect tokyo, but he was really just doing it for miyazu until she told him to think about protecting others like her too), yuzuru still being a highschooler figuring shit out himself so he wasn't exactly particularly good at leading the way (and hayao is too much of a damn mess to do any of that either), but ALSO the fact that none of the other nahobino pairs really had any guiding figures unlike with aoshu, which is maybe part of the difference as well that set them apart. the goddess was specifically on their side lmao, but they also had some guidance from a number of other charas like idk goko and sophia i guess.

anyways it was just kind of notable that hayao seemed to have gone out of his way to avoid meeting both MC and yuzuru all this time, but it feels like his reasons are different for yuzuru. i guess he met tao probably around when she was born literally just as the result of the investigation into wtf happened to ammy so that was inevitable. i've always wondered what sort of relationship they had given he very likely resented her the same way he resented aoshu. but he couldn't avoid her the same way he avoided MC this whole time.

ANYWAYS, so it is very fascinating then that ne-no-kuni seems to embody all of life, death, rebirth and eternity. AND that it's a land directly connected to susanoo, which then associates these themes with him as well. strictly speaking, within the myths it seems very vague as to where this realm actually is. it's simply referred to as the place to where susanoo was banished by izanagi, so maybe it can be seen as several different possible locations that are just simply neither takamagahara (heaven) nor ashihara-no-nakatsukuni (earth). so i guess the idea then is that ne-no-kuni must be either a subterranean underworld possibly equivalent to yomi (especially with its association to susanoo's mother, izanami), and/or it's an otherworld beyond both heaven and earth, possibly transcending this material reality. note that takamagahara may be more akin to an 'earthly heaven' representing like the sky or something rather than a transcendent realm. nirai kanai of the ryukyuan religion is a land lying beyond the sea or on the seabed, from which all things in the material world originate and return to, it sounds like. note the similarities in nirai kanai and ne-no-kuni both being named as a land of 'roots' or 'origins'.

anyways, a realm beyond the earth and heavens…that starts to sound familiar. that's where lucifer awaited us right? so a transcendent realm beyond our material reality. it's not to say that lucifer himself was in ne-no-kuni necessarily, his realm seemed more associated with outer space, which is i guess also a 'realm beyond the earth and heavens'. but i guess given the similarities between these different transcendent realms, maybe it's just hinting at that higher dimension of sorts the dead gods ascended to, of which susanoo is also closely connected to.

i'm honestly still trying to figure out what to make of lucifer's 'death' & defeat at our hands at the end of the game and what exactly it means for him and us. lucifer who must have defeated the Creator without becoming nahobino, who consumed the Creator's Knowledge and presumably not even his own. also note he does say 'consume' i believe, not 'fuse' or something? this is just a tangent but i guess 'consumption' of Knowledge is indeed a thing in contrast to whatever fusion aoshu had going on lmao. lucifer who told us we'll be free from the mandala system, and yet what does that even represent allegorically? especially if the cycle of life and death and all that isn't necessarily something we strictly want to escape from entirely. lucifer who transcended but still needed to be slain by us anyways, what did that symbolize? was his 'death' there necessary for his own liberation, or ours? or both? anyways idk i guess maybe i'll think about all this another time lol. maybe it has something to do with the genealogical themes and ancestor worship, putting to rest the old gods/ancestors who transcend to an eternity of their own as they watch over the world that now belongs to the new gens in the new world shaped by them. the old gods who have gone through the cycle already and gained their enlightenment can now transcend to an eternity beyond it…lucifer just spares us the necessity of the same grueling cycle with the consumption of his Knowledge, maybe that's what it is? idk i just thought the themes and lore surrounding ne-no-kuni was neat. uh. perhaps this too is like umineko actually 🧍

Edit for further thoughts:

i guess the mandala system is probably just representative of like…samsara basically, cycle of reincarnation and all that. the 'goal' is to eventually break free of the cycle but i think the existence of the cycle itself isn't inherently 'bad'. you essentially get as many tries as needed to try again until you get it 'right', i guess. it kinda sucks but there's a very forgiving aspect to it in that there's always a 'way out' in contrast to concepts of like, eternal damnation and hell and all.

additionally, i think the cycle is only 'broken' for us specifically with lucifer's defeat. i don't remember his exact dialogue anymore but i recall him saying something like 'your world will now surely be everlasting' or something. i don't think this means that the like…objective reality, the world as a whole will be 'everlasting' and unchanging or something. society itself will not remain in stasis and i think there will still be the rise and fall of different societies across time. i think it means something like our 'individual' world, considering each individual person can be a 'world' of their own, will no longer be subject to that cycle because we have been freed from it and understood our true will. we've reached enlightenment so we can now live a true, fulfilling life or whatever and at the end of it, we'll ascend to that same eternal realm to be freed from the cycle of rebirth. but i think there's still value in going back to the earthly realm and living out our lives fully in a brand new world or something, especially with the emphasis on the nahobino being part of the new gen who haven't truly gotten to live yet. it's possible as well then to interpret all this as…in the new world, everyone who died 'prematurely' without achieving enlightenment will now be able to live again fully, in line with their true wills, until they reach the end and attain eternity too. maybe that's also what's meant by each new world being freed from the mandala system with lucifer's defeat, i guess it could apply to everyone within the new world as well. but the world itself and society i think will continue to progress and change cyclically.

and the mandala system itself is not entirely destroyed on an even higher scale across all timelines and multiverses or something. but i think the 'goal' isn't to destroy the system but to like…idek help everyone achieve enlightenment to be free from the system instead. the system i think is just a tool that allows us to reach enlightenment, though through a much longer and more grueling process than the ideal liberation a nahobino could offer. here in the REAL WORLD we don't have such a thing really so having a system like that might be better than eternal damnation or something 🤷. i think it's just a process of progressive learning. it's either that or you return to the womb and never be born, which is also the other option represented in smtv i think, though perhaps overall less ideal.

and considering all this, i guess it's notable especially then that neutral route is the only ending where we never fight lucifer at all, so i guess the implication is uh. nobody is freed lol, not even us. we figure nothing out at all. i would argue all the CoC endings are too far from ideal for enlightenment and liberation to make sense as a result but i dunno. i think both neutral routes especially though we don't actually attain liberation at all. even in true neutral where we defeat lucifer i don't think we actually achieve enlightenment and liberation from the cycle. the MC who has given up the chance to live again also doesn't seem to ascend to that paradisiacal eternity For The Free And Enlightened or whatever and instead remains in the world itself, albeit not actually living within it. i do still wonder what it means that we see two different MCs at the end of true neutral so maybe i'll get back to that another time 🧍.

i guess in a way it's like an ending where you don't actually reach the 'journey's end' that's marked by an eventual transcendence to eternity. it's possible lucifer's defeat in itself isn't enough to guarantee our liberation and there needs to be further efforts from us as well. which could mean something similar for the other far from ideal endings. i guess it's apt thematically that lucifer isn't the one who saves us, it still has to be our own will that saves us, he merely gives us the chance to do so. true neutral does feel very much like an 'inner' world of MC's that we're looking at instead, where we've returned to the familiarity of his previous life right before everything (literally) went to hell lmao. and that life was illusory and empty.

i guess maybe you could potentially break down 'the steps to the ultimate goal of enlightenment and liberation' as:

find and understand your true will through the trials and tribulations of daat

attain the freedom to live and learn how to live through overcoming fear of death

?? achieve awareness of the cycle (through lucifer's defeat)

put all this together in the new world and fully live out a fulfilling life

??? profit. die at the end of life and ascend to eternity

yuzuru expresses doubts over getting not just dazai, but also MC involved in this whole mess, thus endangering the both of them. and then he expresses regret and shame at not having been stronger and more capable. this is pretty in line with what we know of tsuku's true feelings, but the details here are somewhat interesting too.

if dazai represented the ordinary citizen of japan, the populace tsuku is meant to protect, as his duty as an amatsu and protofiend, then MC seems to represent susanoo. i think these represent the two major responsibilities he now has to shoulder: his duty to protect japan and its people, and his responsibility as an older brother.

the former was previously a responsibility mostly shouldered by amaterasu, thus shielding tsuku from most of the weight of it as he acted as support to her. the latter was a responsiblity he likely neglected and wasn't even truly aware of all this time, because he could never understand responsibility until now. maybe it wasn't until the weight of the first responsibility settled fully on him that he began to recognize the concept of responsibility, and only then was he able to realize how he had utterly failed in his responsibility to susa as well. so now he's consumed by guilt and shame, but also confronted repeatedly with a dilemma where he can no longer uphold either responsibility because the world is doomed. he's pitted with the choice of either sacrificing susa to protect japan, or sacrificing japan to protect his brother. ultimately, this world can't be saved so the more he tries to make up for his past failures, the more sacrifices he has to make as well in a desperate attempt to keep things from falling apart entirely. i guess his goal of restoring the old world accomplishes several things that are ideal for him:

it returns him to a sheltered state free from all of this adversity, with reclaiming his power and reviving his sister.

it allows him to make amends to susa this time.

it allows him to make amends to japan and its people.

so no more guilt, no more shame, no more humiliation. no more fear or adversity or any of that either.

the additional angle that's kinda interesting is that the three protofiends were created with specific roles to fulfill as their very purpose of being. did tsuku still regret sending susa and the aogamis to their doom anyways knowing that was their very purpose and responsibility? it feels like again that dilemma where he has to question the conflict between their duties and the necessity of conforming to these roles they were given VS protecting susa as his little brother. his two main responsibilites being pitted against each other again. it's actually important this conflict occurs to prompt questioning so you can understand for yourself the purpose of these things and how they should be balanced out. i think it's also actually the same dilemma amaterasu likely struggled with herself, upholding their established order and their roles within it that they were bound to, even knowing it was harming her brothers.

for tsuku who's maybe never previously questioned any of that and just followed what they were expected to do within their roles, believing in that rigid conformity and the inherent righteousness and authority of the system, in a very lawful neutral way, coming to now regret not protecting susa from his own duty of fighting and dying for japan…maybe that's growth. tsuku is gradually finally maturing, but unfortunately his circumstances are extremely difficult and fucked up so he's also easily misled. for someone who likely never questioned the necessity of forcing susa to conform and submit to his delegated role by any means necessary, the fact that he regrets doing exactly that now and not protecting susa instead probably really opened the floodgates of guilt and horror at finally realizing just how poorly he's treated his brother all this time. that's massive amounts of guilt and shame and responsibility that now weighs tsuku down, so i guess that's why he can't think straight anymore lmao. and then the irony is of course that to try and make up for it all, he has to repeat the Exact Same Thing with mistreating aogami the same way by forcing him to conform to an identity he no longer identifies with. i also just think it's interesting to examine the themes of like…how maybe you can't truly understand love and you can't truly love another person until you can overcome your own immaturity & selfishness. until then you only have like, a seed of love (Not To Be Cliche) that can't grow and mature unless you do.

oh also, i was thinking the weirdass abrupt shift in CoV from the shinjuku stuff to We Gotta Go To Egypt To Save Miyazu Right Now!!! was maybe because hayao didn't want yuzuru to repeat his same mistake of failing to protect a younger sibling in the course of trying to uphold some duty and then regretting it. maybe in a way it was also his way of vicariously making amends for his own mistake, he had to prove he wouldn't make the same mistake again. i think the irony then in what followed was that both hayao and yuzuru are not the type to then understand the additional complexity of Their Younger Sibling Did Indeed Possess Their Own Will And Autonomy. and that perhaps they didn't need to be protected at all by that point. susa likely also made the decision to sacrifice himself by his own volition in the end, but tsuku was so caught up in his own guilt and regrets that he ALSO failed to give susa, and then later aoshu, their own autonomy. there's just kinda like. a lot going on lol.

the dialogue from this NPC has some interesting implications but idk what to really make of it because it's vague and the specific wording could always be just translation things and all.

but the most notable takeaways for me were:

the other aogamis DID change over time, that implies they are indeed dynamic beings which suggests they were not wholly robotic even without the influence of their Knowledge.

the wording is confusing, but they seem to suggest that our aogami has remained largely unchanged unlike the others, due to being in a dormant state in daat this whole time. he was 'frozen in stasis' perhaps unlike the others, and thus he's not quite the same as the type-0. i don't know if this means he's never been quite the same as the type-0 even on creation 18yrs ago, or if he's no longer the same as the type-0 after it had undergone changes during the time our aogami was dormant.

it sounds like our aogami was 'sealed away' pretty early on and very soon after his creation, so there was little time for him to undergo any change. while the other aogamis were operational for long enough to undergo change over time. exactly when it is then that the aogamis died out, idk lol. perhaps our aogami was the first one that was 'lost' and the others gradually died out in the 18yrs that followed. it's also notable as well that in present time, bethel jp has once more returned to a state where they've depleted their forces, and now desperately have to rely on civilians to help, but abdiel and HQ haven't made the move to absorb them entirely as was originally planned before the creation of the aogamis. the reason for that, idk either, abdiel is also known for being pretty wishy washy and indecisive afterall lol. but i guess it's possible that if the aogamis only very recently fully died out, bethel HQ just hasn't moved in yet to absorb JP. and then the nahobino comes along and restores some 'power' to JP.

tao's quote here is again subject to specific wording and translation things, but the way it's worded, 'this is the one', almost sounds like she's saying THIS specific aogami (ours) was the one that was lost in this case, a long time ago. and if this is the case then…she also seems to somehow be able to recognize him specifically.

i've felt like there's something unusual or special about our aogami in particular, especially given lucifer picked him out specifically to seal away. i don't know exactly what's special about him relative to the other aogamis, but i did wonder if there was some difference in design between our aogami and the others. it's possible he was the first one created? the original 'aogami' and maybe the original 'type-0'. but because he was lost so early on, maybe they created another type-0 to replace him, given the type-0 seems to be a rather important aogami model among the various types. that 'second' type-0 is perhaps the one we find in ueno, and perhaps it was still different from ours after changes over time but also possibly changes that were made on creation. i got this idea that maybe our aogami was a 'special' aogami hayao first created to possess unique traits the later aogamis were programmed without, maybe under orders for adjustments from the angels or something. so maybe our aogami was intended to be the 'closest' to susanoo, with the most likelihood of 'returning' to 'being susanoo'. while the later aogamis became increasingly less like susa and more like the pure tools of war bethel wanted them to be. this casts these bits of dialogue in a different light if the data received from our aogami specifically is just Different from the design data they had on the other aogamis.

ultimately it's all just wild speculation but i wondered if this piece of lore maybe applied ONLY to our aogami and not the others. maybe the other aogamis were indeed mass-produced purely for combat, as was bethel's intention. it's maybe our aogami only that possessed this more complex design. i think hayao would have motivations to do all this regardless, but it seems like a design the angels wouldn't be happy with tbh lol. so maybe that's what makes our aogami different, if subsequent aogamis were all designed to be more in line with 'protocol' and our aogami was just the first one hayao was fucking around with while the grief was especially fresh in some moment of weakness lmao. i think the whole vagueness with whether or not our aogami was indeed the type-0 was probably also simply intended to reflect his humanization and unique identity, he's no longer associated with any number allocation and is just 'aogami'. so it could just be as simple as that but it's less interesting lol.

a related thought i had was also…aogami's red and white(ish) color scheme always reminded me of amaterasu, and idk if that was intentional, but i was like what if he was intentionally designed that way as a callback to her lol. would hayao do that? like Yes. the design probably doesn't actually mean anything at all but He Would Do That so it's Possible. and…i don't think we actually see any of the other aogami husks' colors, given they've all lost their paint or something and are just purely silver. what if they had a different color scheme altogether…given the nahobino is mostly dark blue and black in contrast. what if our 'special' aogami was just designed specifically to callback to both of tsuku's siblings because he's the special aogami or something…what if the rest of the aogamis all had the same dark blue and black color scheme as the nahobino and we just can't tell lmao…this wild design speculation probably isn't true given yoibino's color scheme doesn't match the original nahobino tsuku's, though there could be various reasons for that too. but we don't know susa's original color scheme either so it's possible the nahobino's color scheme isn't the same.

also just wanted to say this quote is also really funny because she's straight up like yeah don't even bother asking him about this, aogami doesn't know shit!

imagining hayao just losing his 'special' aogami immediately and just being like man. did they really have to do that. did they really have to take my special aogami specifically. bitch.

Edit to add on further thoughts:

i've thought about what it means if our aogami is 'special' in that he was created in defiance of protocol and given complexity the other aogamis weren't allowed to have. they don't really specify exactly what it is our aogami and the type-0 have in common, but the easiest assumption is in their power. the game does seem to bring up the type-0 to suggest a connection between it to our aogami, but it also seems to cast doubt on whether or not our aogami is THE type-0 given we find the husk in ueno and all. i wondered what that meant, in what ways were they the same and in what ways were they different then? if our aogami both is and isn't the type-0.

maybe it isn't their power that they share in common, but their nature of being the 'closest' to susanoo. i think then regardless of the specific details of which aogami ours was, maybe it's just key that he was 'special' and created to be the closest to susanoo in some way or another. perhaps hayao took the risk of breaking protocol to make him this way as a final hope of bringing back susanoo again in some way or another. an un-typed, blank slate aogami possessing complexities and potential the other aogamis weren't allowed to have maybe made him the most likely to 'grow' back into susanoo. if he was the first aogami made, then he was created to be the closest in image to susanoo. if he was the last aogami made, then maybe he was whatever they could get away with under bethel's radar with the scraps of what was left of susanoo's power. regardless, he was probably 'special' in some way and the connection they tried to draw between him and type-0 suggested maybe they were the ones 'closest' to susanoo, in some way or another.

anyways, it would be thematically interesting if our aogami was created special as a final hope for hayao, only to have that snuffed out immediately with him being lost to the netherworld. and then the irony of him bringing back that hope on his return and really tipping hayao off the deep end of insanity.

in my mind our aogami to hayao might've really been like the baby brother/only child left behind by dead brotherwife who he actually wanted to try and raise properly this time in order to make amends to susa who he mistreated all this time. in the hopes that our aogami will someday 'grow' back into susanoo with proper efforts and Love And Care TM so he can finally forgive hayao for everything. that's probably his idea of atonement. which is also Just Like Umineko Btw.

the nahobino shell is technically formed from the protofiend's body i guess, almost like protective armor for the MC. given it's TECHNICALLY the protofiends' bodies, they are probably able to shield MC in life or death situations by just straight up tossing him out lmao. i'm not gonna acknowledge the KO screens for this because uhhh they're kinda whatever. but i assume that's essentially what happened in CoV both with hayao at the end AND with aogami during tiamat's summoning. they both basically ejected MC from the fusion lmao in order to save him. so why wasn't that done in CoC with lahmu?

i speculated that maybe there was a momentary hesitation on aogami's part in CoC that led to the both of them suffering the lethal blow. they took the blow for tao very suddenly, but it feels like the slowness on aogami's part might imply a lack of resolve and/or fear in the face of his own death. i think before this point in the story, nobody had yet truly been confronted with the reality of death and the fear of it. aogami states he's never feared it before, but i think that was before he gained the desire to live. it's one thing to not fear death because you don't care to live, and another to be confronted with death when you DO want to live. the true fear then arises naturally as we are animals built with survival instincts, but i think that fear must be overcome if we want to attain the freedom to live as well.

the shinagawa arc in general is very much representative of a sort of 'end of childhood' thing, where you are to be confronted for the first time with true adversity, your own agency and complacency, and death. just as it happened with the kidnapped students, it also happened for aoshu i think. even in daat before this, i think they were shielded by the sense of safety of newfound power and did not have to truly confront their own death and powerlessness. the lahmu event probably symbolized to them the true realness of death, and that they were not as a powerful as they may have subconsciously believed they were. so maybe that momentary hesitation on aogami's part was representative of something like…his own reluctance to take action and confront his own agency, a lack of resolve for what it is he truly wanted to accomplish, maybe even a lack of understanding at this point for what it is he even wanted (to protect MC i guess lol), and also his own fears surrounding adversity and death. for both protofiends maybe it was these things that rendered them unable to protect the things they cared about. for hayao, he was far too immature and irresponsible to have been able to protect anything, which is why he was never able to until CoV. maybe it's not too different for aogami in CoC too.

you could maybe say hayao was also afraid of all these things, which is at least in part why he sought to return to a past where he was sheltered from all that AND to return to his original form where he had the Power to protect himself from death and adversity. maybe he was similarly afraid of his own death and 'being replaced by a new incarnation' like what happened to his siblings that he so resented. he was at least likely very afraid of the general concept of death and impermanence. and aogami too in CoC turned towards Power both to try and make up for his mistake AND to try and overcome his fears, because Power can protect them from the threat of death. but power is just kind of a comfortable trap and an illusion of safety that traps you within your own complacency, so maybe it was just a necessary rite of passage to face your own death and accept it so you can truly live. which probably explains why it is both protofiends had to 'die' in CoV. death in smtv is probably symbolic of liberation, transformation, transcendence and all that.

similarly, i think MC in CoV also had to make the decision to renew his own resolve to live after confronting near-death. even though going back into the fray and continuing to fight would likely mean confronting death again, he had to overcome that fear to prove his resolve to live. also something about lacking the resolve to live -> rejecting your own life -> rejecting aogami, who is representative of Life, afterall. maybe that was also what true neutral was? it's always felt kinda like an 'avoidant' ending to me, where ultimately MC rejects the freedom to live in order to retreat into a 'spiritual' realm purely as an uninvolved observer, because his brush with death left him too terrified to live, or something like that. so i do think the lahmu event in CoC was EXTREMELY impactful overall and whether or not aoshu are able to overcome their fear of it maybe determines what sort of ending they get.

in true neutral i had the idea MC 'rejects' aogami because of something to do with a fear he comes to associate with aogami, a fear of life because of a fear of death he couldn't overcome. and maybe in that timeline to some degree MC did regret taking aogami's hand and becoming involved in all this, which maybe leads to the dialogue options where he can express some of that resentment towards not really having had any real choice the first time they met. and then not having any real choice as to whether or not to become further involved, as hayao straight up told him he had no choice :^). this does seem like it would somewhat line up with the manyoshu quote from the very beginning, which maybe you could interpret as being afraid or indifferent towards life as we're ultimately all doomed to die.