#Golden Kamuy Ramblings and Theories

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 314 “Grand finale”

Last chapter and WARNING again.

If you only want to hear praises for “Golden Kamuy”, the ban button for either the tag ‘Golden Kamuy Ramblings and Theories’ or myself (I’ll suggest the latter) is the right choice to make my posts disappear from your dashboard.

With a fair warning given, let’s move on.

I guess I should focus on the color cover which shows Sugimoto and Asirpa together. No Shiraishi this time. The cover is in soothing shades of blue (which fits since it’s the last chapter and everything is calm and contrast with the cover of Weekly Young Jump in which there’s just the face of Sugimoto smiling on a red background) on a white background, with Asirpa linked to Sugimoto’s arm. I wonder if Asirpa extending her fist is meant to be an invitation for the reader to bump it. It’s a nice color cover.

So, after chap 313 ended in a cliffhanger with a seriously wounded Sugimoto who was also pinned on the locomotive ended in the bay, we’ve reached the final chapter…

…which is temporally placed 6 MONTHS LATER, in Tokyo and that opens with Asirpa, apparently alone, buying dried persimmons.

The next page a woman informs us a terrifying looking man is standing in front of Umeko’s store and asks her if she should go call Umeko’s husband… so yeah, Umeko ultimately married that widower.

And who can be the terrifying looking man if not Sugimoto? And of course it’s him, complete with a new scar on his cheek and smell of blood and death, only this time Umeko isn’t fooled because she has already gotten her eye surgery and she can see it’s him.

How did Sugimoto survive the cliffhanger of the previous chapter? Evidently it wasn’t important enough to show it because it won’t be explained through all the final chapter. We had our hints Shiraishi might have fished him (and the cap Sugimoto lost when he ended up in the water) up. Of course he had plenty of fatal wounds (a stab in his intestine, a sword through his lugs which needed to be pulled out to unpin him from the locomotive which would have done further damage (not considering the one Sugimoto did to himself when he threw Asirpa), a consistent loss of blood and plenty of water that should have ended in his lugs when he apparently lost consciousness as he fell into the water. But it’s Sugimoto, the immortal, he survived to a bullet in his head! Yeah, but that time he was saved by Ienaga, a master class surgeon with experience.

But whatever, I’ll assume this time they’ll met with Meiji era Tenma Kenzo (Tenma is the genius surgeon with a heart of gold from the manga “Monster”) who packed up Sugimoto for free and didn’t report him to the army/police whatever nor tried to eat him up for immortality.

And it’s possible, really but… it’s deflating. When a chapter ends with a cliffhanger and you worry for a week you want the solution to it to be worth your worry, not to handwave them by completely ignoring how the situation managed to be resolved as if the final chapter has just been cut and we jumped straight to the epilogue.

Someone has suggested me that opening this chapter in this way was meant to lull the readers into the idea Sugimoto died and then surprise the reader with how he survived which… is not a bad idea per se… only the ‘suspense’ lasts for a single page… so it’s not really something you have the time to worry and then feel sad about.

When I saw Asirpa I merely thought Sugimoto was around and her somber expression was because she feared he would remain in Tokyo and they would part ways, I actually expected Sugimoto to be in the next page and join her, I didn’t really have the time to realize that she was wandering alone in those two panels and worry about where’s Sugimoto and when the following page basically let me figure Sugimoto wasn’t with her because he was with Umeko, well, this killed any chance I had to worry about Sugimoto’s survival.

Sure, although this chapter is longer than usual (22 vs the usual 18 plus the color page and a special page with Noda’s last words), it’s still not 60 pages like the first chapter was. So there clearly was no time to put in how Sugimoto survives, nor to keep the suspense of his survival for long so Noda had to do with what he had.

Will this chapter be expanded in the volume version, either by playing longer on how Sugimoto died or by explaining how he was saved?

At this point I’ve no idea.

Vol 30 & 31 (Noda made clear he wants to end the story at Vol 31) need to contain 24 chapters. They could split them evenly so it’s 12 each which is more than usual as usual they contain 10… and through the chapters I noticed plenty of things that would have been better to expand.

So chances he can expand everything are running short and, very likely, he’ll have to choose between plenty of things and, at this point, I don’t feel like guessing what he might judge important to expand and what not. I’ll just wait for the volumes.

Anyway, back to the story.

So, who follows me by a long time knows that among my long standing predictions/expectations for the end there was Sugimoto going back to his hometown and meeting Umeko again so yes, I’m satisfied this is happening. The fact that Umeko ALREADY got her eyes fixed and even remarried could have been an interesting point to ponder because it proves Sugimoto didn’t need to go through all that because what he did was of no use to her.

Sugimoto’s motive to take part to that bloody gold hunt was to repay Toraji by taking care of his wife by providing her the means to cure her eyes… and to have a second chance with Umeko.

Only, once the gold hunt is over it turns out Umeko has another husband and doesn’t need his gold because she already got eye surgery.

In short the gold hunt was a bad idea, he could have either come back home sooner and try to get her and support her or just go on with his life as someone else was there taking care of Umeko.

The wounds, the pain he suffered, the kills, were unnecessary, Umeko didn’t need his gold, she needed someone to be there for her and this one wasn’t him.

This would be interesting to ponder over but… nope. We’ll dig on this in a moment so for now let’s leave it as that.

So Sugimoto just hands Umeko the gold because that was what Toraji told him to do, tells Toratarou, Toraji’s son who finally, FINALLY got a name, that his father was a real hero and then leaves. He doesn’t ask Umeko how she is, he doesn’t reconnect with her and she doesn’t reconnect with him either, she doesn’t ask how he has been nor she does try to stop him because why should she? He just came to drop something and then left.

It overall feels very perfunctory on both sides.

Somehow Umeko stopped mattering for Sugi and he stopped mattering for her. They might still call each other ‘Saichi-chan’ and ‘Ume-chan’ but they’re little more than strangers and don’t try to go back to being friends. They just let go of each other without really inquiring.

Sure is, when Umeko got to see all that gold… well, she should have gone to him, if only to thank him in a bit more heartfelt manner. I mean, it’s not everyday someone gives you a bag filled with gold dust and Sugimoto clearly didn’t look like he would manage to appear in Forbes' annual list of the world's billionaires so getting all that gold should have cost him and giving up on it should have cost on him as well. I mean his coat even look worse for wear than usual and he’s been wearing those same clothes for years by now so it’s clear he’s not an eccentric billionaire effortlessly giving out bags of gold to his old friend’s wife.

I think he’ll deserve a more heartfelt thank you and an ‘are you sure?’ and ‘do you have a place to stay tonight? You might tell me about Toraji a little as well…’ but… no.

Umeko’s role in the story ends with her watching the gold. If she considered chasing after him to thank him… well, that’s something up to everyone’s speculation, the story won’t tell.

So… the long awaited meeting between Umeko and Sugimoto doesn’t really feel that meaningful in the end, he just hands her the gold and leaves with no regrets. As for Umeko, I guess we’re meant to assume she has moved on long ago… and I’m glad she did, really… but this way she seems not just someone who moved on but someone who’s way too cold with a guy who was your childhood friend, went to war and came home with a bag of gold for you. Whatever, maybe it’s just lack of space and lack of readers’ interest in Umeko. The anime even cut her out completely so maybe Noda felt it would benefit the story to further erase her. I don’t know.

Sugimoto, all happy, joins back with Asirpa… and Shiraishi, as he’s there too.

Shiraishi points out how sneaky it was from Sugimoto to fill his pockets with gold, taking his share in advance without telling anyone… but this isn’t presented like something bad, no, Shiraishi praises him because thanks to that Sugimoto could concentrate on Asirpa and the land deed back in Hakodate.

“Golden Kamuy” isn’t a manga about teaching you to keep a moral behavior and Sugimoto still helped Asirpa with the land deed even though he got what he wanted… but I guess I’m still hung up on how chap 302 tried to present Sugimoto as noble because he was helping Asirpa even if that meant giving up on the gold (something on which chap 311 played as well) to then reveal he filled his pockets with it already to then say ‘ah but that wasn’t bad because it helped him to focus’.

I mean, I get the gold was meant to be a surprise so Noda couldn’t have him reveal he took it secretly but Hijikata could have just praised him for being willing TO RISK HIS LIFE for Asirpa, not his share of gold. That’s noble and praiseworthy enough, why focusing on the gold instead?

Whatever, maybe it’s just me.

We move to Asirpa who insists the answer she arrived at is that the ‘golden kamuy’ isn’t needed to protect the Ainu and since she has been chosen as the ruler of all the Ainu she got to decide that.

Ops, no she wasn’t and I never liked how no one, not even Kirawus or Ariko, pointed out Asirpa had no right to decide for all the Ainu what to do with the gold that belonged to them all and not just to her.

I mean, Kirawus joined the gold hunt because his village was suffering as they had not enough food (due to locusts eating their food) so he needed money and he had to work first as a seasonal worker and then for Hijikata instead than pursuing an Ainu lifestyle and other people from his village and from other villages might be in the same situation. One would expect he would point out how gold, distributed equally in all the villages, could help them overcome such problems… or buy medicines or things like that because sadly this world requires you to have money but… nope.

The most we get is that Sugimoto tells her he’s fine with her thinking so but, to him, the ‘golden kamuy’ isn’t necessarily bad but changes purpose according to who is using it so he believes the ‘golden kamuy’ will be good for Umeko and ‘Toraji’s son’. Then points out how it was actually part of the ‘golden kamuy’ what was used to buy the land deed. And yeah, he’s right.

Among other things, Asirpa could have used it to buy more land or benefits or things that were of use to the Ainu or even bribe officials in the government so as to smooth things over and get more benefits for the Ainu. But no, she has decided the Ainu don’t need the ‘golden kamuy’ and so they don’t get it nor they get a say about her decision because at her young age and with her newfound knowledge of minority problems she has been ignoring up until then, she’s the right person to decide FOR ALL THE AINU.

Sure, Asirpa is an Ainu so it’s better if she’s the one who decides for them than, let’s say, Hijikata or Tsurumi or Sugimoto but still, she’s a child who has barely started tackling adult problems and this chapter will prove her view of the gold expressed in chap 311 was completely wrong. She claimed if Sugimoto and Shiraishi were to get a huge sum of gold the killing would continue and they would be unhappy. Sugimoto gets his share of gold and is happy and, spoiler, Shiraishi will get all the rest and, supposedly, will be happy as well. Because they’re the right people to use it apparently and wouldn’t be hit by the curse but the Ainu? Nope, according to Asirpa they aren’t the right people to manage all that gold.

Whatever.

The discussion though is cut short because a flashback start, showing us that one month earlier Asirpa and Co were already in Tokyo to met Enomoto Takeaki. They used Hijikata’s sword, which apparently Shiraishi fished up as well as Sugimoto and Sugimoto’s cap as a way to persuade him to meet them.

If you’re wondering why Asirpa doesn’t have her headband on, it’s explained in chap 87 how Ainu are supposed to remove it when visiting people (yeah, she really didn’t do it often in the story but maybe it depends by how important is the people hosting them?).

Anyway Enomoto is super supportive of their cause and volunteers to help them and recommend them to people who’ll help them so, great.

We move to Sugimoto eating a dried persimmon, apparently for the first time, even though we just learnt they were in Tokyo by a month. But who knows, maybe season of dried persimmons just started and those were the first ones available.

Asirpa, despite having matured so much, seeing him eat them still think they’ll change him radically and asks him if he feels different now.

Sugimoto says nope but he believes it’s fine if he doesn’t change because he gave his all to fulfill his duty so he’s pretty satisfied with himself as he is. Evidently he believes doing his duty by giving Umeko the gold she didn’t need any more, cured his PTSD and his guilt for killing people and doesn’t worry anymore about having VIP seats for hell.

I mean, the whole point of the discussion Sugimoto had with Asirpa in chap 100 was about how Sugimoto had maladaptive coping methods to deal with his guilt for having killed people on the battleground, how he rebuilt himself to survive and how he couldn’t go back to being his old self.

And the whole speech he had with Asirpa in chap 206 reinforced the idea killing people pushes you in a psychological hell.

And then we had in chap 310 Ogata who, once his maladaptive coping methods break, couldn’t face his own feelings of guilt and killed himself so as to remark how terrible all this can get.

It was pretty heavy issues that the golden hunt wasn’t meant to solve as Sugimoto murdered plenty of people during it and this should have made him even worse and it was making him even worse as he was getting much more prone than he started at killing people to the point he wanted Ogata to come back solely to kill him and attempted to murder Boutarou when the latter surrendered and could have revealed info about Asirpa’s survival, which was what Sugimoto himself predicted would happen in chap 123, he would risk stopping being able to make distinctions between good guys and bad guys and just kill and relish on it without justice on his side and to make matter worse, once he got the gold for which he shed so much blood and was hurt so badly and risked dying so many times, it turned out Umeko didn’t need it.

It was all for nothing.

But no, Sugimoto is satisfied with how he fulfilled his duty so it’s all solved.

I’m… glad for him but this feels more like a magical hand wave of his problems than as a resolution.

Asirpa looks at him with an expression that’s a bit troubled so Shiraishi goes straight to the core of the problem and asks Sugimoto if he’s going to remain in Tokyo.

Asirpa immediately worries because we know she has a HUGE crush on Sugimoto and doesn’t want to part from him and even considered not solving the code so he would remain with her and she would be his human shield so he would be dependent on her.

Sugimoto goes and mention how the fried shrimp he hate at the imperial hotel was tasty and this sadden Asirpa as she doesn’t know that thing is WELL ABOVE Sugimoto’s financial possibilities. Sugimoto informs her of the matter and says all the food he ate with her was equally tasty… he doesn’t say how it was also cheap since Asirpa provided it for free. but since he directly compares it not with the dried persimmons which he could afford but with the expensive fried shrimp of the imperial hotel this feels implied, which cheapens the fact he says he finally has found a place in which he can be happy.

I mean, I’m pretty sure this is meant to be funny or cute or something but it makes it sound it as if he found a place in which he could be happy just because he has found a place in which he can eat good food for free. He could have said it better if he had said the company made the food taste great, but whatever, maybe we’re meant to assume he’s being shy or something.

Asirpa is touched and blushes and shed tears because this means her love interest will remain with her and Sugimoto confirms this by telling her ‘let’s go back home, Asirpa’ clearly implying they’re going to cohabit in Hokkaido.

Asirpa is overjoyed but then they realize they lost sight of Shiraishi.

Asirpa, who always had a poor opinion of him, thinks he’s pooping in the streets of Tokyo but, in truth, Shiraishi has left without telling them because he doesn’t like tearful goodbyes and, clearly, doesn’t feel part of their own little family… which, as I had remarked many times, has never fully included him.

We move to a summary of what happened to the minor characters.

Kantarou managed to fulfill his dream to become a ranch owner even without the gold.

Nagakura went back to his life and to dream of Hijikata, whose body was never found like in real life history.

Tanigaki went back to Ani and had 15 children with Inkarmat and that’s how Tanigaki’s arc ended.

I mean, it was supposed to be a big deal for him to go back to Ani, since he couldn’t do it for most of the time, he just couldn’t confront with his father and brother and admit he was wrong when he left and tell them the truth about his sister’s death but no, he got a wife and just did it and whatever problem he previously had before about being too ashamed to go back home was hand waved. Maybe if he had married sooner he would have managed to avoid the whole thing.

Kadokura, Kirawus and Mansur went to America 10 years later and starred in a western that became a cult classic. Kadokura never got a backstory or his full name revealed in the story but whatever. Kirawus had no problems leaving the Ainu into Asirpa’s care while Mansur, who was basically a non-character as all we knew about him was he had great aim when using a cannon and was Sofia’s man, decided his days as a revolutionary/partisan were over.

I… don’t know how to feel about all this. I’m glad they’re all alive but… somehow it feels random?

We also learn that Vasily Pavlichenko became a famous Russian artist who refused to part with a painting of a dead lynx near train tracks until he died.

So yeah, another character who was really underdeveloped survived and met a great ending as, although he deserted to kill Ogata and couldn’t do it, he ultimately wasn’t killed and managed to fulfill his dream of becoming an artist. The lynx near the train tracks seem to imply he found Ogata’s body, confirming, in case someone assumed Ogata could survive after blasting his brain off, that Ogata was really dead. That or Vasily finished him off for good.

Again, this leaves me pretty cold. As Vasily wasn’t developed he moved from a character I saw potential in and was really curious about to a character I had 0 investment on because it was more a mob character than anything else and the whole painting of a dead lynx didn’t really impress me much.

@sandflow suggested he might just be a stand in for the readers. A part of them obsessed on wanting Ogata dead, a part of them obsessed drawing fanart of him, a part of them just obsessed on him. Considering how he’s not developed it can be. I’ll leave up to others to speculate if this was a good or a poor representation of the fans.

Either way for me this poor guy ended up on being a non-character so I’ve hard time caring for him and his ending, whatever he was meant to represent.

Meanwhile in Hakodate bay Tsukishima is desperately searching for Tsurumi’s body because he went into this believing Tsurumi would make good use of the land deed and the gold and doesn’t know what to do of his life without him.

People talk about Tsukishima’s redemption but, truth is, Tsukishima hasn’t changed in the slightest. He doesn’t regret murdering his father over nothing nor he regret what he did under Tsurumi, just that it didn’t work and that if Tsurumi is dead he won’t be able to continue working (=murdering) for Tsurumi’s goal. The only thing that’s different in Tsukishima is that now he also has a codependent relationship with Koito along with the codependent relationship he had with Tsurumi.

As for Koito… he didn’t redeem himself either. Even when he realized Tsurumi was using them he continued following him, claiming he would have issues with him solely if Tsurumi’s plan were to fail. He let the soldiers be slaughtered in Goryokaku and on the train, and worried solely about saving Tsukishima at the price of risking to sacrifice Tsurumi and his plan (Tsurumi had the land deed).

Neither Koito nor Tsukishima truly confronted with Tsurumi or denied him and his methods.

Ultimately all they got was salvation and absolution, as they survived and, afterward, thrived, not redemption. I was super invested in their arcs but this resolution… doesn’t quite feel as earned.

Anyway Koito remarks that it is their duty as soldiers to defend their nation even without the Ainu land deed and the gold even if Tsurumi isn’t there and… ah, yeah, Tsurumi in chap 270 painted their rebellion as a noble act for the protection of Japan, I forgot.

We moved from chap 31 which had him wanting to create a military government in which his soldier won’t waste their lives as a pencil-pushing officers sitting meaningless at their desk but stand tall as his elite guard and offer salvation to their relatives and to the people of Hokkaido in form of jobs in his weapon factory (and opium fields) to chap 270 in which he claimed his goal is for JAPAN to flourish by protecting it from Russia’s southward advancement… by taking personal possession of Hokkaido, developing it and then conquering the whole Manchuria (inner and outer) so that Vladivostok too would become Japanese.

Tsurumi’s oh so noble goal to conquer other nations for Japan’s benefit was stopped before he could start on the conquering part  so Tsukishima and Koito has to CONTINUE DEFENDING THE NATION.

Hopefully this won’t mean they believe Japan has to go in full imperialistic mode and… and who am I kidding WW2 is not that far from this point in history.

Koito goes on claiming they will be tried as rebels by the government so they have the important duty to defend all those poor men who stuck with Tsurumi… not for the elite guard job, no that was retconned, they did it for the noble protection of Japan. Tsukishima wonders if they have a chance at winning, to which Koito remarks in order to do so, it’s essential he has someone exceptional as Tsukishima acting like his right-hand man.

Should they be punished? Hell, yeah, they were rebels, they acted independently from Central, wasted lives, bombed a prisons murdering inmates and guards, killed officers who weren’t agreeing with Tsurumi (Hanazawa, Wada) or blackmailed them (Yodogawa), or manipulated them into helping him (Koito senior), took personal possession of military weapons, cannoned Goryokaku and the land near Hakodate, used military fund to secretly buy weapons from Mister Thomas and planned to take possession of Hokkaido and start a war of invasion to take possession of Manchuria, just to give you a short overview of their best actions.

Their actions weren’t even moved by an attempt to criticize Central’s way to use soldiers as cannon fodder since that’s exactly what they had used the men attacking Goryokaku for or how they carried a war of aggression in the Russo Japanese war since they also want to carry a war of aggression. Their complain to Central is not on what he does, it’s that it’s not good enough at what it does so he couldn’t get reparation from Russia.

Japan should have just stripped them of their ranks and, in Koito’s case, of their titles and sent some of them to jail so that order would be reestablished. This would have served as an example to the Kwantung Army who would have maybe thought twice before going against Central, carrying out the assassination of the Manchurian Wardlord Zhang Zuolin, the Mukden incident and the subsequent invasion of Manchuria.

But since we know that those facts have to happen and that the insubordination of the Kwantung Army was rewarded rather than punished, it comes as no surprise that this won’t happen.

Actually Koito, like the classic elite rich boy he is, won’t even lose his rank and will rise to become the final commander of the 7th division. Not like Tsurumi who had his promotion stunted because, allegedly, his horse kicked a kid that got too close to it, killing him.

Tsukishima, Tsurumi’s right hand and Wada’s murderer (among other things) will continue serving Koito as his devoted (and codependent) right-hand man.

There’s no mention of the soldiers’ fate but, I bet, they faced no repercussion either even though when Japan rewarded the Kwantung Army it was because the latter took possession of Manchukuo. It’s not like the 7th accomplished anything beyond wasting men and resources. They didn’t even manage to retrieve the land deed.

We’ve no info about survivors among Sofia’s men besides Mansur. Evidently the 7th slaughtered them all. Because they’re good, patriotic boys and it was all Sofia’s men’s fault.

Back to Asirpa we go and to how she decided SHE will keep their culture from vanishing by passing it down to the new Ainu and, in order to do so she’ll go back to Karafuto and meet other minority ethnic groups beyond Karafuto. Because she won’t have her hands full with just saving Ainu culture and because travelling back then didn’t take months.

But okay, I appreciate her efforts and her dedication to her goal, I just wish she wasn’t just ‘I’ll do it’ but tried to work with other Ainu on this. Instead we’re told she’s the one who spent her whole life continuing to negotiate with the government. Ariko didn’t come back to help her in this as he’s not even mentioned in the epilogue and we know Kirawus went in America.

Overall, in a way, the Ainu as a whole are one of the big absents from a story about their gold and their cultural salvation. Everything is entrusted to Asirpa, there’s no mention of other Ainu helping her or deciding on their lives along her. Kirawus, as far as we know, is the only Ainu who had a small role in the fight at Goryokaku. To ensure the Ainu could use that land deed we saw plenty of Wajin and Russians die, but Ainu hardly had a role in all that.

Sure, this is a story about Wajin for Wajin and it wouldn’t have looked good if the 7th has slaughtered not Russians but Ainu but still it’s kind of sad.

Anyway supposedly part of the land covered in the land deed (not even all!) was converted in national or quasi-national parks so this allowed the Kamuy to survive so it’s all well what ends well… so it’s kind of sad to think that same land was converted in national or quasi-national parks even in our world without the land deed. I mean, I get Noda might have tried to return the story to the real trails of history but when you know the truth, it means having the land deed basically changed nothing for the Ainu. With it or without it, they got EXACTLY THE SAME RESULT. And this is sad.

The story moves to three years later.

Asirpa has grown up and is still with Sugimoto as she wanted. There’s no mention of Sugimoto having gotten a wife for himself or Asirpa liking someone else that’s not Sugimoto. They has captured squirrels and they’re going to bring them to Huci, so they supposedly live together with her and Sakamoto and O-gin’s kid who never got a name (same as Osoma’s mother).

Huci’s prediction she would never see Asirpa again didn’t come to pass but who cares, no one probably remembers it, even Asirpa has stopped worrying about it post Abashiri.

Osoma informs them that a letter came for them and it turns out it’s from Shiraishi. The letter is completely blank  but inside the envelope there’s a gold coin depicting king Shiraishi Yoshitake I. We’re told Shiraishi basically stole all the gold and used it to fulfill what was Boutarou’s dream. From the Burmese writing on the coin we can assume Shiraishi is now the king of an island in Burma.

And hey, I’m delighted for Shiraishi, he’s one of my absolutely fave but… but that was the Ainu gold. Okay, Asirpa, a kid, said they didn’t need it but again, Asirpa wasn’t the exclusive owner and she was a kid at the time. What if growing up she were to realize that wasn’t such a bright idea?

But the story doesn’t criticize at all the fact Shiraishi didn’t consider this and just accepted Asirpa gave up on the ownership of the gold, no, we’re meant to assume Asirpa did the right choice giving up on all the gold so that Shiraishi could use it for himself, same as Sugimoto used the one he took for Umeko. Because the ‘golden kamuy’ is bad only depending on who is using it and what is his purpose.

So for the Ainu to want to use it is bad.

When they wanted to buy weapons the ship sunk. When they buy the land deed, the people they bought it from lost the war so they apparently couldn’t claim their prize nor tried to do so later and one of them did. When Wilk’s group also considered using it to form their own nation they slaughtered each other. Because for them to use it to try to free their land was bad and, as far as Asirpa is involved, it would never be good to them so better not to use it.

But for Shiraishi to use it to buy his own kingdom or for Sugimoto to use it to repay his debt to Toraji and make Umeko rich… well, that’s all right.

I really, really love Shiraishi, I’m very happy he got his kingdom and his place and his family and I’m glad Sugimoto could repay his debt and I’m happy Asirpa lived doing what she believed in (sort of, she also believed killing was wrong but then changed her mind but then never managed to kill someone because the only one person she tried to kill killed himself off) and I get this is a story about Wajin for Wajin (at the end of the book Noda says this is Sugimoto’s story, cutting Asirpa from the equation) but still…

Whatever.

So that’s the end and the other great absent from this story is Central, which had been looming into the distance as some sort of ‘big bad’ but never quite joined the actions and of which we only got some glimpses (Okuda, the fact both Kikuta and Ogata worked for it and that it should supposedly have come in Hokkaido after Kikuta’s death or that it should have supposedly punished the 7th but, probably didn’t and anyway Koito and Tsukishima faced no repercussions).

Not that I really cared about having Central in the story but… it still felt a waste to just have it loom in the distance but NEVER do anything. But whatever.

In the end this chapter, more than a final chapter, feels like an epilogue, giving us information about what happened after the end of the story.

It tried to end the story on a happy/hopeful mood while bringing it back into real history, with the surviving characters all getting what they wanted, hand waving whatever plagued them through the story and things going back to how they were in real history but that’s mostly all that there is to it.

There are no deep points to ponder or strong emotional bits, it relies on how we’ll be emotional on our own because it’s time to say goodbye to the characters, which is always sad and emotional per se.

That is unless you consider the part in which Asirpa learn Sugimoto now believed the place in which he can be happy, his home is with Asirpa. But since this strongly and suspiciously smells like a SugiRipa ending (although it’s vague enough you can tell yourself it’s not) and I think everyone knows I feared and LOATHED the idea the story could end up with a SugiRipa ending, the whole bit just didn’t work for me… but maybe it’s just me and I’ve probably annoyed you enough with my grievance about “Golden Kamuy”.

Thank you to everyone who remained with me till now and enjoyed my ramblings and theories, put up with my complains and contributed in making my experience in the fandom good.

Thank you also to all the people I didn’t indirectly interact with but that still contributed to the fandom and to my enjoyment of the story by making translations, scanlations, subs, sharing material and so on.

It was a long travel with plenty of great parts and I’m sad I couldn’t enjoy it all at its fullest till the end but I hope you had and that your experience was greater than mine.

Said all this, I’ll still be around for a while, probably make a post about my GK experience as a whole and then still be around to see how the volumes and the anime series will turn out but likely won’t be as active as I were in the past. I’ve some unfinished meta also but I don’t know if I’ll ever go about finishing them so I’m not promising anything.

So yeah, if you’re bugged by me, I remember banning this blog is the right solution as it’ll keep on existing for still a while longer.

Anyway, still thank you to you all for the great experience.

[plan-3-tmars]

just finished reading dungeon meshi (I will never recover) so take some sleepy thistle panels I collected

[etovest]

Ovest | 21+ | they | Real life human being

This is a blog I made for my general ramblings, mainly used for archiving purposes and soliloquies. If you're a minor you're free to interact with the posts but please take note that this is an 18+ blog, if you still decide to follow please consider your own well being.

General warning for body horror/gore/blood applies to this blog. I will tag trigger warnings as [tw], if something reminds me of something else I'll use the tag [adjacent]. My writing is going to be [my fiction]. The tag [archived post] refers to my old sideblog that is now inactive. Everything else is pretty unconsequential. If you want anything specific tagged just ask!

My interests are many and fleeting, thus it'd be a bit useless to list them all, but I'm very keen on red valley podcast, disco elysium, golden kamuy, one piece, dragon ball and frolicking in the fields. I like the middle ages and hole theory, my favourite animals are cows and basking sharks and my favourite food is pasta asciutta.

Feel free to stick around!

🔗 AO3 Twitter

TERFs and cops fuck off, OK BYE.

[chibivesicle]

Golden Kamuy chapters 216 & 217: bear bum humor falls short, the cat came back and more bears!

I am posting another combined chapter meta as work is still quite busy for me - this is just a really bad time of the year for me with so many meetings on top of normal things. 

Chapter 216 starts with the group in a stand off with a white bear.  Throughout the chapter the language describing the bear will shift between a white bear or polar bear, done on purpose by the EHS scans team as to indicate the group isn’t sure about what the bear is.  It likely is not a polar bear and I’m a bit disappointed, but that’s okay.

Shiraishi has already removed his soaking wet clothing and wrapped himself in one of the white cloths/sheets they stole from the ship.  He’s traveled with this group long enough to know what to do.   However, his naked bum is a sign of things to come in the chapter.  . . .

@goldenkamuyhunting​ has already written an excellent summary of this chapter here: https://goldenkamuyhunting.tumblr.com/post/188470521878/ramblings-and-crazy-theory-time-about-gk-chap-216

I agree with many aspects of the summary - the summary reveals a lot of the the mental states of the group as well as how they try to determine their actions towards the bear.

I won’t dwell on 216 a lot.  Asirpa quickly tries to determine if the white bear is one that failed to hibernate . . . Sugimoto of course takes charge and says that he’ll take care of the bear while Asirpa grumbles in the background that she’s out of arrows.  Since she used all of her arrows during their escape (why did she do this?  It seems to be a very poor decision be without any arrows?) she can’t take care of the bear.  I think Asirpa’s lack of arrows demonstrate that Asirpa made an impulsive decision when she escaped and it goes against her normal rational approach to things.

What that she then shifts to what she thinks about the value of the white bear’s fur.  And all of a sudden she shifts to figuring out how to get that expensive fur.  She looks unusual as she says this, her eyes are similar to when she pulled the arrow on Shiraishi and she’s got tons of stress lines under her eyes as she sweats.

The shocked look on Sugimoto’s face indicates to us as a reader that the way she said this and Sugimoto is so shocked that his eyes are white as well!  I really wish we could hear her say this line. . . .

Shiraishi then asks very excitedly how much money is is worth?  Sugimoto tries to calm him down so that he has even a chance of shooting the bear with his poor rifle skills.  Asirpa estimates that the bear pelt would be worth at least 12x more than 4 yen (= 60 kg of rice!).  So, yes, this would ease their obvious cash flow problem upon escaping from Tsurumi who had been bankrolling them via Koito.

Vasily prepares to shoot the bear, but the group has to stop him - of course Sugimoto tries to tell him to shot the bear by speaking to him only in Japanese with a lot of sound effects, sadly and not surprisingly Vasily doesn’t get a damn thing that Sugimoto is saying and he has to physically bully him to stop.

All of this shows that Vasily isn’t going to be a key member of their group - yes, he helped them escape b/c he knows Shiraishi and Asirpa are a key to finding Ogata.  Now that they have separated from Tsukishima and Tsurumi, the only other known Russian speaker is Ogata and that really puts them at a disadvantage when Ogata will re-appear.

This entire situation then becomes this awkward comedy of almost errors on ice as Asirpa and Sugimoto argue with each other how to kill the bear. . . . Shiraishi remains as the voice of reason.  Sugimoto stopped Vasily a known sniper can’t shoot the bear, and then Asirpa negates all of the ideas that Sugimoto thought.  I really think this is just a lot of rambling that takes up too many pages.

Shiraishi is more concerned about them getting out of this dangerous situation as poor Vasily is stuck in the background just watching the argument of Asirpa and Sugimoto.  This then ends in the idea that Sugimoto should just randomly shoot at it (something that Vasily could have already done . . . . likely much better than Sugimoto).

By sheer luck Sugimoto gets tossed over the bear on the unstable ice and gets set up for a very interesting view as Shiraishi, ignores Asirpa and Sugimoto and he tells Vasily to shoot the bear.

This inspires Sugimoto to recall the previous two times that bear bums had been violated, both with Boss, stabbing a bear in the ass as well as Anehata sexually violating a bear (that lead to his death, not the bears).

With this particular aim, Sugimoto luckily hits the heart directly killing the bear and it slumps down on to the ice as Sugimoto now aggravates all of his gunshot wounds.  The bear then drifts away on a piece of ice and all of their waffling has resulted in losing the bear because they were so concerned about how to kill it without damaging it.  Shiraishi looks disappointed as he provides the commentary as the bear is lost.  Vasily luckily notices some Ainu and they meet up with them to get a boat ride to the land. 

The Ainu man then explains that there was a white brown bear club that was going to be sent off by the kotan but that the Japanese government heard about it and then took it from them.  This is a very loaded yet small exchange.

This shows how the government is slowly preventing the members of the kotan from their own cultural practices - the kotan thought that this white bear was a great gift from the kamuy - which the government then steals from them and thus invalidating their own essence.  Thankfully, Asirpa lets go of the bear and realizes they need time to rest and recover - Sugimoto is wounded and Shiraishi almost got hypothermia [again]. . . . it finally ends with Asirpa relieved and excited to be back to Hokkaido!  

She’s happy to be home and she’s back home knowing much more than she knew when she left.

I think that this shows that Asirpa is truly happy to be back and she’s in this moment able to just enjoy the moment - something that neither Shiraishi nor Sugimoto can do in their current states.

The chapter then ends, finally giving us an update on the status of Koito.  He’s alive!  But Koito looks pretty rough as he tells his father that he’s pathetic . . . his father glances around before he looks at him softly and tells him that he’s glad that he’s alive.  It then ends with Tsukishima blankly standing nearby.

Koito looks terrible, he’s feeling sad and pathetic, he’s got lines under his eyes and his down turned mouth indicates that he really is feeling like he has failed.  His father doesn’t want to look too concerned or fatherly - hence he glances around nervously before he lets Koito see his concern. 

Tsukishima is looking blankly out towards the ocean on the ship - is he concerned about what he will say to Tsurumi?  Is he glad to see that Koito’s father has talked to him?  Is he tired of everything?  Has Tsukishima proven that he’s more loyal to Koito than to Tsurumi? Fast chapter 216 summary.

The dynamics of the Sugimoto-Asirpa team are still awkward and Vasily really doesn’t belong with them. . .

I think they got greedy and were hit with karma - on the ice they should have just had Vasily kill the bear and then they could have moved on - but their delay showed how they are still not united as a re-united team.  Shiraishi gets ignored yet tries to make an executive call with Vasily while Asirpa and Sugimoto argue about how to kill the bear. 

Overall, it served them right losing the bear - Sugimoto was already wounded and Shiraishi was also at risk.  They stopped worrying about their own safety and they almost got in a worse situation. 

I know that Asirpa was trying to think strategically by getting the bear but they were already in rough shape. It is showing that Asirpa trying to take a leadership role isn’t ready just yet - I will always argue that she’s a natural leader and she will become a great leader - when she’s an adult.  Right now though, she needs an adult leader to mentor her.  When Shiraishi is the voice of reason it means that their group is in trouble. .  . Chapter 217 - MOAR BEARS!!! But before more bears - let’s talk about the cat.  The cat that came back.  Before the title page we get a real time event of Ogata doing some information gathering.  Due to his positive Grandma vibes, he’s easily able to talk with the inn keeper who was hosting Asirpa and Co with Koito and Tsukishima.

He’s able to easily determine that Asirpa was able to escape from the 27th and Tsurumi AND that she likely made it to Hokkaido.  Ogata is almost beaming as he smiles (since Ogata really isn’t a character who would beam with happiness).  This shows that when he needs to be, he can pretty easily get information and not arouse others.  This is similar to when he was solo in Barato, he went to the barber shop and got the intel on Hijikata that he needed as well as into on the gang situation. So with that information, Ogata sets off to return to Hokkaido.  With a sob story of course!  With his visible injuries and a new uniform he tries to beg his way onto the ferry.  He offers some dried cod to barter for his fare.  Even though we all know Ogata is a TERRIBLE liar (aka back with his meltdown on ice) when it comes to story telling he succeeds.  The officer for the ferry believes him that his elderly parents are in Hokkaido and he needs to go back and see them.

Now a general rule of thumb concept in pop culture (or maybe just in general) is that a more successful lie contains some truth.  Perhaps, he succeeds b/c their is some truth - maybe his grandparents are still alive? 

Thanks to Sei Kobiyama, those of us who are not native Japanese speakers also got some insight into Ogata’s offering of cod.  That in slang, “dried cod” = “terrible actor” so even Noda is admitting that Ogata really shouldn’t dream of a future acting career after the gold hunt.

Whatever it was that gave Ogata the magic touch to get onto the ferry, he manages it and the chapter title page finally appears with him basking in his cat greatness. Any cat owner would immediately recognize this pose - it is the “I am a cat and watch me as I survey my domain from a perch.”

As a cat owner, I get to witness this on a daily basis and it is perfect as he has that subtle smile as he re-enters the quest for the gold. Really, this has proven that the cat has come back and it means he’s going to shake things up.  Now that he’s behind everyone else, I predict he’ll do some intel to gather information before he gets involved - Ogata is never rash or hasty.  Oh, I’m so excited! [understatement] I really hope he and Vasily chat before Vasily pounces er jumps on him for more sniper cat playtime. But back to more bears!  The chapter then shifts to a young man fleeing from a brown bear active in the winter.  He runs into a tree branch and scrapes his forehead before the bear overtakes him and appears to begin to chew on his shoulder/neck area.

The bear is clearly chewing on him as we see some blood on its mouth as well as on the scarf.  The panel then zooms in on a small wooden carved case with a walking bear on it.  Again, thanks to Sei Kobiyama, this item is identified as an inro or a pill case and the image on it is tied to an owner . . .

The chapter then shows that Asirpa and Sugimoto are with the Ainu man they met off of the drift ice, hunting for bears that are still hibernating in their dens.  The Ainu man looks similar to Asirpa’s uncle Makkanakuru . . . I wonder if he is a relation to her?

Interestingly, Asirpa and the yet to be named Ainu man are both wearing the vine snowshoes yet Sugimoto is not.  Sugimoto was thrilled to wear them before when he was out hunting with Asirpa - why is he no longer using them?  The snow is at least mid-calf deep if not more.  Is Sugimoto less inclined to use Ainu practices after what happened on Karafuto?

In direct contrast to the white bear last chapter, they set up the triangle head trap and they easily kill the bear.  Sugimoto doesn’t even need to raise his rifle, the man does the single shot for them.  This entire chapter seems to be showing how to do a bear hunt properly and how to treat the bear.  They make the newsar kamuy stick to keep the bear company before they can retrieve the body the next day.

As Asirpa explains things, she has returned to her role as our resident Ainu expert.  This is a complete contrast with her behavior last chapter wanting the pelt of the white bear, yet trying to hunt it without respect for it as this bear is treated.  Will they be in trouble for the way that they treated the white bear?  It drifted away on the ice and it did not get a newsar kamuy to accompany it.  Is Asirpa back to normal b/c she has an older nispa present to guide her without her realizing it?

As Sugimoto and Asirpa return to the kotan, he remarks on how the cise visually tells them that they are back in Hokkaido.  He’s smiling as he says this - in contrast Asirpa is not.  She looks serious as she walks along and when she finally speaks, her facial expression is not one of happiness or joy.

Asirpa seems less sure to be back in Hokkaido.  She was thrilled when they were on the boat last chapter, but now she looks quiet and contemplative.  I think she realizes that her hasty escape seemed almost unreal and now that they have settling into routine for some time it has become more real again.  She is likely worried about her extended family and the impact of the 27th could be on them.  It also is bringing her back to the place were she lost her father after finding him as well as her mother, whom she now knows what she looked like from the film.  Returning home less naive and more mature shows on her face in this panel. The next page reveals that they are staying with the same man and what appears to be his mother and wife perhaps.  What is striking is the distance between their group and the Ainu family.  Previously, when Asirpa has other Japanese with her in their group as well as Kiro and Inkarmat they were physically much closer to their Ainu guests.  Think at Kiro’s home, or with Kirawus when they were celebrating as well as before Abashiri with the salmon feast.  Now there is a great distance - Sugimoto isn’t being friendly with the Ainu man, Asirpa is working on making more poison arrows and Shiraishi is leering over at the woman breastfeeding the bear.

Furthermore, Vasily is way back in the corner not even interacting with anyone.  They also are not sitting around the hearth with everyone else - they are off in the corner.  This is completely different behavior for both Asirpa and Sugimoto who was always keen to be friendly with Ainu before.

Their conversation then reveals that they are talking about how they will get the gold with zero skins.  This may indicate why they are chatting as a small group versus so openly.  Asirpa confirms that they will have to steal the skins back from both groups and Sugimoto’s plan is to make sure they grab them from both groups.  He doesn’t know how he’ll do it, but he wants the two groups to meet and in the confusion, steal the skins.  A risky idea if I’d say so . . . Sugimoto’s long term plans have a tendency to not actually work out that well.  Shiraishi even highlights that it is a difficult plan.  I know he is the escape king, but I have a new nickname for him - the voice of reason.  When Asirpa and Sugimoto get emotionally wound up by each other, he’s the one to try to point out the obvious issues with their plans.

Shiraishi is then the one to ask the man if there is any way to make some fast cash.  Interestingly, Shiraishi address him as nispa, so I interpret this to mean that he’s saying “mister” in a respectful yet somewhat casual way - really typical Shiraishi.  This is also the first time that I can recall Shiraishi referring to an Ainu man as nispa - this likely is a part of Shiraishi coping and still coming to terms with Kiro’s death and he feels at least some level of connectivity with the Ainu and other native peoples more than he did at the beginning.

The man does not look at Shiraishi as he replies, but it is clear that when Shiraishi used nispa, it got his attention enough that he felt that he owed him a reply to his question.  He immediately mentions that there is a wen kamuy that is a problem in another kotan. 

Shiraishi isn’t too keen on making more money through killing bears, in part this is a method that he doesn’t contribute to so he may be looking for a way for him to contribute to their travel funds.  However, when he was traveling with Asirpa, Ogata and Kiro, he frequently pitched in the post hunting efforts. The man goes on to state that the bear has killed 5 people and all of them were panning for gold dust in a river.  This all of a sudden gets Sugimoto’s attention, his eyes have a slight sparkle in them as he inquires about it with a surprised expression.

The man continues to state that people want to collect gold dust but the wen kamuy is keeping them away from the river - it seems that perhaps this wen kamuy is linked to preventing people from doing more harm to the river . . . Sugimoto then covers his face as he states that he wonders about a river that still has gold dust and that he was never ever to find it.  He’s instinctively covering his face as his remark is connected to Umeko and his quest to get money for her and how he is still uncomfortable with really speaking about this to others.

We don’t get to see the man’s facial expression - he tells them about a rumor that a man made 50 yen in one day and that if they wanted to make money they should do that and avoid the wen kamuy.  . . based on their white colored eyes the boys are shocked at this rumor.

Of course this means they are going to head to were the wen kamuy is.

There is then a man collecting firewood who almost falls off of a small cliff -

The man screams for help and it reveals a group of men panning for gold in the river.  They all appear to be ethnically Japanese and we learn that his name is Heita.  A man who looks like Ogata’s long lost cousin yells his name and runs off to try to help him.

It looks like perhaps his father and a son are near him in the water.  Heita’s relation to these other men is still unclear. The big reveal is that Asirpa and Sugimoto are able to save him - and that he is the man who was attacked by the bear in the beginning.  He still has the scar on his forehead but clearly no bear chomp marks on the neck.

It then focuses on the small wooden case with the bear carrying a fish (not to scale) and walking upright like a human.  The tagline even says “he died, but he’s not dead!!!” What does this even mean? Are these Japanese gold scavengers unaware of the danger of the wen kamuy?  Are they subjected to the wrath of it?  Is that his actual case or was it procured from someone else?  Is it supposed to protect him from bears?

Time for some observations from these two bear themed chapters.

Chapter 216 is pretty much an example of what not to do when in danger of being killed by a white bear.  Don’t argue and try to one up each other on the ice floe when Vasily could have shot the bear and they could have called it a day.  This complete comedy of errors results in them losing the bear as Sugimoto violates the bear to kill it without damaging the pelt.  There needs to be a reminder that Shiraishi was right from the get go.  Deal with the bear and move on.  Instead, Sugimoto hurts himself more and Asirpa seemed to snap out of her desire to have the white bears fur at any cost.

Chapter 217 has Sugimoto and Asirpa accompanying the unnamed Ainu man and they successfully manage to kill a brown bear and give it proper treatment.  I’m really stuck on Sugimoto not wearing snowshoes - is he now less likely to adopt Ainu customs and practices after realizing that Asirpa wants to fight for her people? This Ainu man seems more distant but still helpful.  We don’t know his name either - names are so important in GK.  Noda withholds names on purpose . . . I’d say that Shiraishi and Asirpa have a better chance of becoming closer or more trusting of him but Sugimoto is keeping his distance.  Is this a result of Kiro’s betrayal? There is a wen kamuy on the loose and it is associated with those who pan for gold in the river.  The kotan wants it killed because it is a danger but could it be more than that?  Is it acting out the wrath of the gods on those who pollute the river in the search for gold?  I think there is more to this story, something about how the Ainu man lures them into to going after the gold and the wen kamuy. I’m suspicious of his information . . . I think the Ainu man wants them to leave and go there on purpose. There is Heita the man attacked by a bear who isn’t dead.  My crazy hypothesis is that he had a salmon or something like that on him.  I’m totally being crazy but why not?  The bear on the case has a salmon. Ogata time!  I have to put this famous short cartoon from the NFB first. 

This is sometimes how I feel Ogata is perceived by other members of the GK cast - mainly Sugimoto but also by Tsurumi.

What Ogata’s brief few pages are showing that he’s back in the game, and he’s excited to know that Tsurumi doesn’t have Asirpa and that things will get interesting in Hokkaido.  So he’s slowly following them cautiously determining what has happened.

Chapter 203 had this interesting page with the lynx crossing the path/road through the forest on Karafuto.  It looks like the lynx crossed ahead of them since there are no dogsled trails in the snow.  I could see Ogata eventually getting ahead on them and intercepting them.  The lynx is looking back at the viewer . . .

I am curious to see how this page is shown in the tankoban.  If it is redrawn so the lynx is behind dogsled track marks that would imply he’s now following them. If Ogata manages to get to their group before anyone else - I’m curious to see what happens when Ogata talks to him.  It is more than likely that when Ogata wounded Vasily he may have questioned him .  . . Or if Ogata didn’t let Vasily know he can speak Russian will he use that to his advantage against Sugimoto?  I could see him using that as an advantage against Tsurumi as well.  If the two snipers teamed up and Ogata can communicate with him - that is going to be an interesting combination.  That is as long as Vasily doesn’t want his stupid cat rematch.  Again, Vasya, you lost. Lastly, let’s not forget that Koito is at a low point but he’s alive.  I’m hoping that this will be the start of a turning point for Koito in the quest for the gold and his blind devotion to Tsurumi.  That will get interesting and where is Tsukishima going to fall?  Tsurumi or will he align with Koito?

[midnight-in-town]

Hi! I just wanted to know how you rank all the stories you read these days. What story you talk about is your favourite, what is your second favourite, etc

Hello Anon! Sooo, I’m not sure I understood your question so please tell me if that’s not what you had in mind?

When it comes to on-going series I like to blog (more or less) about, my faves are as follow:

Ao no Exorcist

I already answered someone who asked me for reasons to give the series a try and, lately, it’s without a doubt my absolute fave, because we’re focusing on the main plot and there are so many answers, so many possible plot twists, so much angst that I wake up eager for more every day.

No kidding, the fact we didn’t have a chapter this month really had me downcast.

Anyway, the pace is consistent, the writing is top notch, I love the cast, what else can I ask for? xD

Berserk

What I wrote for AnE multiplied by 20, since this series is possibly the best story I ever read. It’s just that I have less excitement for it daily, because we don’t get chapters that frequently. 

It’s not a criticism, as I understand why Sensei’s schedule is the way it is and, most importantly, within the story the pacing is great which is all that matters. 

Anyway, whenever a chapter is close by, it definitely makes me super excited and I’m always looking forward to it, because Sensei never disappointed so far. 

Shingeki no kyojin

Yeah, maybe it’s an unpopular opinion (?) but I totally dig the current arc and unfathomable!Eren, while Sensei is giving us answers about Zeke, so I can’t get enough of it. xD

Add to this that the anime is airing about the most tragic arc of the series and you’ve got why I’m overwhelmed by feels for this series lately. 

Kuroshitsuji

Okay so. Actually it’s hard to explain, because if any other series had the same pacing issues as Kuro has had lately, I would have let go of it a while ago already.

However, for some reasons, I can’t let this series out of my mind, no matter how dreadful the pacing issues are and that’s why I’m still blogging about it.

Not gonna lie, I’m not looking forward to the chapters as much as I used to lately and I constantly fear plot convenience, but I still love to discuss the series and write theories. :)

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens

The fandom is, like, super small xD but IloveitIloveitIloveit. So many feels and I love the unexpected developments.

Gangsta.

Same as for Berserk: unfortunately, Sensei cannot give us chapters frequently but considering how much I love the story and its characters, I’m just happy with whatever we get. 

I’d love more worldbuilding, but one of the latest chapters kinda answered why it was hard to figure things out about the plot’s circumstances, so I think I’ll just be here, enjoying the crazy ride. xD

Golden Kamuy

Well, I think this series is incredible and Sensei is a great author who knows his stuff. But: 

=> I gotta admit that lately I noticed some pacing issues (most likely related to the fact that, from two main sides until the Abashiri arc, we evolved into several groups of characters working on different goals, so we have to switch POV often). It doesn’t impede my enjoyment though.

=> We also had some weird fandom conflicts happening after one character died and, not gonna lie, it did bother me because Sensei was unfairly called out, so I kinda took my distance and that’s why I blog less about it, even if I still love it.    

Gintama 

This final arc has been a mess, but in a good way, so it’s fine. xD 

I’d rather have it that way actually, with Sensei taking all the time he needs to finish it properly (for this reason, everything post time skip made the final arc way more enjoyable), because a rushed ending can ruin good chunks of a story and I wouldn’t want that, considering how great this series is.

I feel kinda on edge though, because I know that, no matter how it ends, some parts of the fandom will be angry and I’m not here to browse through conflicts. 

Akatsuki no Yona 

L o v e d the current arc. Great story, great developments, etc. 

Not enough theory content for my tastes, but ya know, that’s not the most important considering everything else that has been happening lately. xD

Black Lagoon

Clearly Sensei is not super motivated anymore to finish it, but hey, I still love what this series is about, its crazy characters and all the arcs till now. 

Still hoping we’ll have more content soon, though. *sigh*

Vinland Saga 

The current arc was kinda longish and a bit predictable on some parts (I mean, ain’t no way Sensei is going to butcher Thorfinn’s character development), but it’s still an amazing series. :) 

I’d blog more about it, but the fandom is super small, so it’s not like I have a lot of people to interact with, haha.

The anime is coming up this summer though, so maybe this will change!

Chihayafuru

Oh boy. Errn I don’t want to start rambling, especially if you don’t know the story, but it feels as if it’s not at its best lately. :/ 

I don’t know exactly if this rather gloomy feeling within the story is on purpose by Sensei or not(it might be though), but all I can say is that I’m hoping that Sensei knows what she’s doing. 

Lately though, seeing some developments, I have this fear that maybe she won’t be able to finish what she spent years on building, but here’s to hoping she’ll 100% prove me wrong. 

Other series I keep up with, mostly from afar: Gokushufudou, Chainsawman, Witch Hat Atelier, Yotsubato…….. 

There are probably others but I can’t remember right now. xD I like all of them!

Sorry Anon, maybe it’s not what you wanted, but that’s how I understood your question. :) Have a nice weekend!

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 308 “Both alike”

So it’s again time to say goodbye to someone… or not?

In case you don’t know, the quote is from the real Hijikata Toshizou… but I think the spirit of the fictional one will also live on in the hearts of all of those who loved him.

But, as usual, I’m running ahead so again, back on the runaway train to hell we go.

After a quick summary of where’s who...

...we go back to how Hijikata, thinking he’s slashing down enemies, is actually cutting down the bear’s face. He doesn’t kill it but the bear still is smart enough to understand the wisest choice against this old man with an antique sword is to run away as fast as his legs can carry him.

However, in doing so, the bear pauses a moment to bit Shiraishi’s head in a not fatal way because… humor.

Okay, who knows me also knows I’m not really fond of this running gag, especially in this case because the gag feels out of place with Ushiyama lying on the ground and Hijikata with his skull split (not mentioning the bear’s bite should have done serious harm and instead it’s just handled as a light napping).

But whatever, maybe it’s just me and everyone else loves a gag here to tone down the drama, besides, credits when it’s due, Noda uses it as an excuse for Shiraishi to notice that Tsurumi, who evidently walked OH SO SLOWLY after receiving the quiver from Tsukishima, has FINALLY walked through the whole train car and is now jumping on the 2nd car.

Why he took so long and what he was doing in the meantime is up to everyone’s speculation.

Okay, he probably wasn’t really doing anything, this is just a request of suspension of disbelief on Noda’s part for the sake of the plot… so… whatever.

I guess I’ll put it here because it’s a place as good as any other.

This whole runaway train to hell arc has alternated A LOT between asking us to suspend our disbelief when the characters were doing something cool (like Ushiyama disposing of a car filled with men of the 7th or grabbing a hand grenade seconds before it would hit him) or ‘funny’ (Shiraishi being bitten by the bear and remaining relatively unharmed) or time related (characters walking oh so slowly or oh so very fast so they’re in the right position when it’s more convenient for the plot) and realistic consequences of wounds for the main characters (like, yeah, death, loss of limbs, loss of consciousness), after an arc which actually relied a lot on realistic war (fort Goryokaku was all about people realistically dying out of consequences for attacks with very little space for the rule of cool).

Now… both the rule of cool and realism are something that can be very enjoyable in a story and make it great, the rule of cool adding it an epic feeling and a sense of amazement while realism adding drama and inner reflection.

The scene of Tsukishima being fine after having been slammed left and right and having a hand grenade tossed above his head is no better or worse than the scene of him being all of sudden unable to move his arm due to… what? Another hand grenade? Ushiyama tossing him away? I’m not really sure, probably it’ll get fixed in the volume.

But I personally have problems when I’m asked to believe, for example how, one moment, Tsukishima is the Tsukinator, and therefore has a titanium skeleton and the next he’s just a mere human and his bones can break.

Mind you, it’s not that I don’t understand why Noda is doing it. Characters have to die but, before doing so, he’s trying to give them a moment of pure coolness. I get this, but still it leaves me upside down.

It’s my personal flaw and you might not share it but this part of me is going to come up in this meta so consider yourself warned.

Anyway, back with the story.

Tsurumi opens the quiver, pulls out the arrows (which might turn useful later for our main characters as they fall on the roof and, likely remain there) and the land deed, which he scans briefly.

Then, while Ogata is turned on the opposite direction, tells Ogata to use him as bait and snipe Sugimoto and the others, who will be climbing up there.

We don’t get Ogata’s reply, if he agrees or if he comes up with another plan, or if he tosses Tsurumi off the train since now he has the land deed. Everything is possible.

Anyway, honestly, since Ogata is turned away from him, I would expect Tsurumi to pocket the land deed and then hand him the quiver, use Ogata to get rid of Sugimoto and then get rid of Ogata, because I trust Tsurumi the same way I’ll trust a hungry shark not to eat me if I were to swim right in front of him, as in, not even a single bit and I REALLY HOPE Ogata remembers he used not to trust Tsurumi as well and hadn’t been completely retconned into someone who swallows all Tsurumi says hook line and sinker.

Really, it’s bad enough he’s giving Tsurumi his back.

Meanwhile the bear has run back into the 2nd car in which the valiant 7th division soldiers are still alive but can neither scare/stop/kill the bear and mostly just try to escape from it because not everyone can be Hijikata Toshizou and scare a bear off with a katana.

I’ll be honest and admit I was hoping the bear had done a short work of all the remaining soldiers in the 2nd car (and of the soldiers in the 1st car as well) but no, he has spared quite a bunch.

Why? Plot reasons.

So the surviving soldiers, since the bear has left them alone, thinks they can now go attack Sugimoto, probably hoping the bear has done a short work of him and they won’t have much to do, and find themselves facing Hijikata.

At this point though, the soldiers have remembered that HEY, THEY HAVE RIFLES IN THEIR HANDS AND KNOW HOW TO USE THEM so they start shooting at Hijikata, who could handle just fine having his skull split in two but, after a couple of shoots, he’s starting to feel a little worn out.

Okay, no, I get the split skull is also not helping, never mention the previous wounds and so on (previous wounds that previously didn’t so much as slow him down or make him feel faint) but this is again another abrupt moving from the rule of cool to realism and, as said before, I don’t take them well.

Besides since up until now the soldiers hardly shoot, we could have done without them shooting at Hijikata and have him merely falling on his knees after making the bear escape.

Instead Noda wanted them to be there and shoot him so that Sugimoto moves past Hijikata and the latter has fallen on his knee, and Hijikata, looking at him, sees his younger self ahead of himself and then realizes the one he’s seeing is actually Sugimoto who’s now the one slaughtering the soldiers.

So, in the middle of the massacre, Hijikata calls Sugimoto back to entrust him his sword, claiming it’ll be of use to him, the soldiers (there were quite a bunch alive in the 2nd car) conveniently disappearing/stopping to shoot/going back/whatever so that Sugimoto can go take Hijikata’s sword without being riddled with bullets. And yeah, for this to work we’re back at suspending our disbelief and accept the soldiers wouldn’t conveniently attack in a clue moment.

Whatever. Back to the plot.

Now Sugimoto was a judo guy, not so much a kendo one as far as we know, but I wouldn’t be surprised if, as Hijikata said, the sword would be useful to him just the same (and hey, maybe since we’re at it, with a little use of the rule of cool he can use it even better than Hijikata to slice Tsurumi to bits), though, hopefully, Sugimoto wouldn’t use it merely as an object he throws at people or that slams on people’s head like one would do with a wand while the sword is still in its scabbard. But well, I wouldn’t be surprised if he were to do it either.

Anyway Hijikata tells Sugimoto they’re alike, they’re two men who are willing to give their life for what’s right, so he’ll pass on Sugimoto the debt he has to repay in hope the gold and the land deed will save the Japanese and the Ainu.

I guess Hijikata is discounting the time he used Sugimoto as a bait in Abashiri and the time he tried to kill Sugimoto in Sapporo as unimportant.

Sugimoto (evidently agreeing Hijikata’s past betrayals were unimportant and that he wasn’t distrusting of him and interested to kill him until Asirpa forced him to partner with him in Sapporo) accepts the sword and walks away...

...since, apparently, no more soldiers are coming even though in the 2nd car there were supposedly still a bunch alive… but I guess they decided that between the bear and Sugimoto this was a good time like any other to take a break from duty and… I don’t know, do a crossword puzzle?

Really, the damn bear left so many of them alive, why they aren’t attacking?

Or did Hijikata and Sugimoto managed to murder them all while we weren’t looking? I don’t know.

Whatever.

Said all this, yes, it was a running theme how they were similar, and I know some fans even theorized they could be related so yes, what Hijikata is saying makes sense from the story’s perspective, this arc even lampshaded it HARD when Hijikata said Sugimoto follows the Bushido.

On a personal note I feel Sugimoto and Hijikata were more morally gray characters when the story started and now they’re painted a tad too white for how they’ve been through the story but whatever, it might be just me… or it’s just that we’re at the end and Noda thinks the final fight will work better if we forget that it’s dark grey versus light grey and think it’s pitch black versus shining white.

Anyway, as Sugimoto walk away, we can see Asirpa deeply upset at the idea Hijikata too is going to die and, again, liquefying.

I wonder if the whole liquefying thing is symbolizes the tears she can’t shed and that she’s keeping bottled inside herself as, from when it started with Ariko’s supposed death and the discovery Boutarou died to, she still has to cry, which is pretty unhealthy.

It’s true though that Asirpa never cried for her losses through the story. In Abashiri she only quickly shed some tears for her father (and Sugimoto) being shoot but, when Ogata joined them, although she seemed to scream and fall...

...but her eyes were dry and the same applied to when she saw Kiroranke dying, though, back then, she didn’t liquefy.

...not when he died nor later on as Shiraishi buried him under the ice.

She has cried when remembering her father’s words and when meeting Sugimoto again… but not when losing Kiro.

So the liquefying might symbolize this, a pain she keeps bottled inside herself and that now needs to come out.

Or it might represent her losing parts of herself.

From when she has escaped from Tsurumi she has kept on seeing people she knew dying left and right, which is traumatic, so maybe Asirpa is losing herself. We’ll see.

Meanwhile Nagakura and Kantarou get on the train and find Tsukishima and Koito being conveniently unconscious.

Really, Tsukishima, how far were you thinking to go in such state? But okay, up until moments ago you were into the Tsukinator mode so maybe you assumed you won’t run out of battery if you were to join Tsurumi.

Whatever, Nagakura reaches for Hijikata while Kantarou checks on Ushiyama, claming he doesn’t believe it. There’s no mourning for Ushiyama and I wonder if the ‘I don’t believe it’ might refer to him being still alive because yes, I’m still in denial for Ushiyama’s death.

Call me a fool, I don’t really care.

Anyway Hijikata entrusts his regrets to Nagakura, who this time has managed to reach him and be at his side as Hijikata, slowly, dies.

Hijikata claims although they had lived in interesting times, he was hoping he finally would live in even more interesting times and that the springtime of his life was only just beginning… because yeah, Hijikata totally doesn’t know his own age and possibly feel even younger than Sugimoto and it’s such a shame he’s dying...

And in a way this old man is an example to us all because he lived his life always looking toward the future and living it to the fullest. He didn’t stop thinking ‘I’m old, I’ve done my share, let’s pass the ball to someone else’, no, he continued fighting for what he believed, for Japan and to repay his debt.

Hijikata finds a shame that his life has to end now, but he’s smiling as he says so, leaning against his old friend and this tells us he clearly never meant to die in a glorious last battle as Nagakura feared.

No, Hijikata really wanted to keep on living, to keep on going, to keep on running for Japan.

So maybe it’s Nagakura the one who longs for death… which worries me as Nagakura is the last person on the wrong side of the road of survival so yeah, I don’t expect him to survive till the end but I’d like a break from all those deaths.

Still, Hijikata dies and Nagakura and Kantarou mourn him and, with them, us fans.

It’s the death of a great character who was with us from the start and I’m sorry about it. I get that the idea is that this ‘golden kamuy’ they chased after is cursed, possessed by some sort of evil spirit and leading people to death as Makkanakkuru said in Vol 2 but… it’s still sad to see beloved characters after beloved characters to abruptly lose their plot armors and leave us.

The scene though, switches and, although Tsurumi said he would work as a bait for Sugimoto, it’s Ogata who’s all alone on the roof of the 2nd car (which was confirmed also by a scene shown during Hijikata’s death in which Ogata was on the roof and Tsurumi was nowhere to be seen).

Well, all alone but not for long, as the soldiers of the 7th divisions in the second car who yes, are still alive (and no, the thing doesn’t please me at all) are, instead than attacking Sugimoto, busy to somehow encouraging the bear to climb up the roof. How they persuaded him to do so instead than run inside the 1st car is up to anyone’s speculation.

Ogata, worried the bear would reach him, shoots him in the head, which, of course, does to the bear minimal harm. So, only now he remembers how Asirpa told him bears had thick skulls and that he shouldn’t aim for the head...

...which really, was something I wanted him to remember so bad that I’m glad he finally does. Too bad it apparently served nothing so the fact he remembered didn’t really feel as useful.

In fact it’s kind of too late, because, before he could shoot  the bear, Sugimoto stabs him from behind (while Ogata is holding the rifle in the wrong way so I take Noda will have to redraw this scene or mirror the image… but more likely he’ll redraw it).

While the bayonet apparently went through Ogata, there’s actually only minimal loss of blood involved so it’s possible Ogata only got his arm stabbed. Of course Sugimoto might aim to merely push Ogata in the bear’s warm embrace instead than personally murder him so he didn’t really aim at giving him a fatal wound.

Tsuurmi, who was meant to play bait for Sugimoto, is, OF COURSE, nowhere to be seen.

I wouldn’t be surprised if he escaped with the land deed and left his men, the bear, Ogata and Sugimoto’s group free to murder each other while he reaches a safe shelter with the land deed.

Sugimoto instead, has just proved he’s the Speedy Gonzales of “Golden Kamuy” because while it took hours for Tsurumi to cross a car, Sugimoto could climb up to the roof and cross a car the moment Ogata turned his eyes away from the direction he was coming from.

On a personal note, unless Noda is going to speed run through a lot of explanation or just cut it all, I don’t think Ogata is going to die in the next chapter. There are too many loose threads still tied to Ogata, and the wound he got from Sugimoto doesn’t seem serious (though, of course, this is always a matter of plot armor, if Ogata dropped his own, he can easily get killed by a paper cut, if he is still holding it instead Sugimoto can’t murder him not even if he were to walk over him with a steamroller).

Anyway we’ll have to wait for the next chapter but, sure thing is, I strongly doubt Ogata is going to die for such wound as the one Sugimoto gave him. If Noda wants to kill him, he’ll need to have Sugimoto inflict something more substantial.

Now… people know I like Ogata as a character so of course I’m going to be sad if he dies… but I’m not sure I managed to drive home the fact I like him as a character because he’s interesting.

So if his time has come I can accept him to die… but not him to become uninteresting.

Ogata has been with us from chap 4. It’s before Shiraishi and Tsurumi were introduced.

He was involved in many plot points that were left hanging and caused a lot of people to bang their head trying to figure out things about him. If all this is going to turn into loose threads and all we will have is chap 304 or something else along the line of chap 304 (which was a goddamn mess by the way because it seemed to retcon scenes from the manga for no real reason) I’m honestly not going to like it.

Yeah, I know some will prefer if Ogata is a random bad guy for the sake of being a bad guy and that Noda can’t make everyone happy but handing a character like this feels such a goddamn waste!

Though yeah, I saw Noda tossing away Vasily and Sofia so it can happen. I just absolutely don’t want to believe Noda, who previously took so much care in developing Ogata, will handle him the way he handled Vasily, someone he should have killed long ago but kept around for only God knows why.

So, really, I hope Ogata will return on being interesting, making sense with the previous scenes in which he was involved and be given a satisfying conclusion to his arc. I’m fine if he dies afterward, okay, no, fine is a big word, I’ll be distraught but I’ll cope as long as his story will make sense. If it’s another chap 304, just call me out.

Anyway, that’s it, that’s the end for this chapter, let’s stay tuned and see you in the next!

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 313 “Last stop”

I thought after giving a warning for two chapters it wasn’t necessary to keep them up but someone proved me wrong so we start with the WARNING again.

If you only want to hear praises for “Golden Kamuy”, the ban button for either the tag ‘Golden Kamuy Ramblings and Theories’ or myself (I’ll suggest the latter) is the right choice to make my posts disappear from your dashboard.

With a fair warning given, let’s move on.

So we’re almost at the end of the story.

Sugimoto’s strike, as it was easy to predict, cuts away the enamel piece protecting Tsurumi’s forehead as well as the rope of Asirpa’s quiver and part of Tsurumi’s chest.

Asirpa, realizing this will cause the quiver to fall, runs to grab it. However there’s another thing that fall from Tsurumi’s now cut jacket, which are Fina and Olga’s fingerbones.

Now, I’ll do a little jump back at chap 309. In it Tsurumi talks about his plan to join the Kwantung garrison and use the land deed as a bargaining chip. He then touches his chest and says in Manchuria he will build up his strength once more.

The visual put a big emphasis on this by leaving the spot Tsurumi touches white, in contrast to his uniform, as if shining. Back then most of us assumed this meant Tsurumi put the land deed inside his jacket and that it was in the spot he was touching. But what was there wasn’t the land deed, it was Fina and Olga’s bones because when Tsurumi thinks at Manchuria he likely includes in it the Outer Manchuria which included Vladivostok, where his wife and daughter’s bodies rest and of which he planned to take possession.

I personally like a lot this subtle reference to them, to how he includes them in his ambitions, in his plan to rebuild his strength.

Back to 313 we go.

Tsurumi too realizes the quiver is falling but he also notes the bones falling.

He has a moment in which he could decide for which ones to reach out and save, if the quiver with the land deed that would support his ambitions or his wife and child’s finger bones which, he said, were the only and last prove of their existence.

Tsurumi decides to go for the quiver, and we could assume breaking his enamel protector was Noda’s way to tell us this is Tsurumi’s ugly side but actually, the full extent of his wounds remain covered and it’s only when Tsurumi, once grabbed the quiver, turns toward the falling bones, evidently hoping against hope he could retrieve them too and is forced to see them falling and being shattered by the wheels of the train we fully see the extent of his wounds and it’s not his ugly side what we’re seeing but his scarred, wounded side, as his expression is one of pain and loss as he watches those bones shatter and there’s something like light in his eyes, and white lines on the bottom part as if to represent tears.

Now we move to an action scene that I like to believe Noda will expand better in the volume version because it’s a tad too jumpy in the visual, as if it were missing panels. Of course the idea might be also to do so as to give an impression of rushed actions. I don’t know, we’ll see in the volume.

Anyway it turns out Asirpa has pulled out her knife and now she’s cutting the rope Tsurumi is holding, freeing the quiver from his grasp but then… she’s falling off the train.

Sugimoto jumps to grab her but… Tsurumi is already standing and slams him on the ground and steals Hijikata’s katana, which he then uses to impale Sugimoto, the tip of it embedding into the train, all of this under Asirpa’s desperate gaze.

Tsurumi, in full Shinigami mode, fluid starting to drip from his forehead, looking at Asirpa, claims that ‘Everyone that you love will be killed by the Golden Kamuy. You’re responsible for all of this… Wilk!!’

Evidently, if Ogata saw Yuusaku in Asirpa, Tsurumi instead sees Wilk in her and continues in his maladaptive behavior of pushing on him the blame of everything, refusing to take responsibility for anything.

But it turns out when Sugimoto jumped toward Asirpa he managed to grab her hand and, using all his strength, he manages to toss her above her head (and above Tsurumi’s as well) and toward the horse on which Tanigaki and Shiraishi are, his last words for her being ‘he’s Sugimoto the immortal’ with a gentle smile, though his eyes look pretty fatigued.

Tanigaki and Shiraishi grabs Asirpa while the locomotive crashes through the stop of Hakodate station. Tsurumi would like to jump off But Sugimoto manages to grab his hand, the one that’s holding a gun, and, before Tsurumi could use it to shoot at Sugimoto, turn it toward Tsurumi and then pull him close and make him shoot himself.

Tsurumi, now above him, is drawn with his eyes completely black, sclera included and slams his teeth close.

It’s a visual reminder of the promise Tsurumi made to Sugimoto long ago, in reference to his own nickname as Shinigami and Sugimoto’s nickname as immortal. In fact in the Japanese myth Shinigami snuffs the candles representing the life of mortals, and this cause them to die. Since Sugimoto is however immortal Tsurumi told him “Even if your life’s candle is an immortal flame that can never be blown out… all I have to do is bite the candle down to nothing!” and, as he said so, he repeatedly clamped his teeth close as if to imply he’s biting something.

So basically Tsurumi is reminding him of how he’ll kill him.

Meanwhile the locomotive falls into Hakodate bay, dragging them with itself. Sugimoto, for once, loses his hat in the impact, and I’ve no idea if Noda is considering this or not but, since Sugimoto’s right cheek basically doesn’t exist any longer, for him it’s likely not enough to keep his mouth shut to avoid water to enter in it so he’s at an even faster risk of drowning, especially considering the sword is holding him against the locomotive.

Outside Shiraishi, Asirpa and Tanigaki look at the scene worriedly, Shiraishi with a bump on his head and Tanigaki with his left side pretty wounded, which, I guess, is the result of grabbing Asirpa as she fell.

Shiraishi though, is already removing his clothes, ready to jump in the water to save Sugimoto...

...and, in fact, in the last panel, we can see only two dots on the ground and then there’s a third that’s moving toward the water which, I bet, is Shiraishi.

There’s to wonder if this time Sugimoto will want to accept the ‘kiss of life’ or will refuse it like he did when he fought with Boutarou…

...and if it’ll serve something, exactly due to Sugimoto’s damaged cheek (though maybe this time, kissing his cheek might be the right solution to the problem...).

Of course they need to remove the sword to pull him away from the train… but I don’t know how much good this will do to him as the sword might be stopping the blood to fill his lug and drown him in his own blood instead than water.

But whatever, he’s Sugimoto the immortal, so maybe he can survive to this too... or not. Honestly I wouldn’t be surprised either way.

Now… many stories start with a thesis that they prove or deny.

We can say that “Golden Kamuy” thesis was if Sugimoto really had VIP seats for the train to hell.

He undoubtedly had VIP seats for hell.

Now the question is... will he be saved because the good he did outweight the lives he took? Or will punishment come anyway as the title of the next chapter seems to imply (314 as Kamuycentral found out can be read in Japanese as ‘Saichi dies’)?

We can only wait and see.

Now, in case someone missed it, I overall enjoyed this chapter. The jumps in the actions can be blamed to the short number of pages and easily fixed in the volume or be a wanted choice so as to give a sense of things moving fast. Tsurumi was undoubtedly well handled, Noda humanized him in having him regret briefly the loss of those bones but, at the same time, kept him grounded in his maladaptive copying mechanisms, blaming Wilk for everything refusing to see his own faults, refusing to see how his focus on his own selfish goals lead him to his own loss. In the moment he could have saved the bones, he chose the land deed, he chose his own ambitions, he chose himself. So is now, so was in the past in which it was him who accepted Wilk’s group as students, it was his spy work that lead the police to his house, it was him handing them weapons that lead Wilk’s group to answer the fire so effectively and all this combined lead to Fina and Olga’s death.

Wilk wouldn’t have been there if he hadn’t accepted him as a student, Wilk wouldn’t have fired around if his spy work hadn’t drawn the police to his house while they were there, Wilk wouldn’t have managed to get out of the house if Kiro hadn’t covered him with the machine gun Tsurumi provided them.

But Tsurumi can’t accept the part he had in his own tragedy and has to keep on blaming Wilk while, at the same time, he continued to make the same mistakes and losing the people around him due to them.

At the same time, I’m a bit sad that Tsurumi’s past prior to his life as Hasegawa wasn’t explored. What about his disgraced original family? Of course Noda might not have felt the need to develop it because their story might be the same as the story of tons of families and therefore very familiar to Japanese people and my need to have it cleared up might simply be born by how I’m not Japanese and therefore unfamiliar to it.

Another matter I’m not really happy with was how the huge arc for Asirpa to decide to kill someone and go to hell with Sugimoto ended up in nothing. Ultimately my problem isn’t that Asirpa didn’t kill anyone but that she didn’t even try to kill Tsurumi despite Tsurumi being a clear threat to her and Sugimoto. And yeah, I knew we would end up like this, that Noda wouldn’t have let her become a murderer but in the end it’s not that she resolved not to kill him, it’s just… it didn’t happen she did so much as try.

But whatever, this is not a chapter about Asirpa, it’s a chapter about Tsurumi and, from this side, it’s a solid one.

Lastly two words about Sugimoto because I loved how not only he saved Asirpa but tried to comfort her by telling her he’s immortal. I’m pretty sure Sugimoto doesn’t want to die, but still he cared about her to the point he prioritized saving and reassuring her. Next chapter will be probably more centered about him so I’ll save the rest for the next chapter.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 311 “Asirpa’s choice”

The story continue and, I guess, I’ll keep the WARNING up.

No, I’m still not enthusiast of where the story is heading. If you only want to hear praises for the chapter, the ban button for either the tag or myself might be an option you’ll want to consider.

With a fair warning given, let’s move on.

We’ve left with Asirpa about to shoot Tsurumi. She doesn’t through because the story has already made clear they don’t like the idea of Asirpa killing people. It’s Tsurumi, who is standing on the tender, the one who manages to shoot in the main characters’ trio’s direction, but obviously misses.

Asirpa suggests for them to climb down and get in the first car which is conveniently completely empty of 7th division soldiers… as they had all either died or moved into the second car. By the way, the soldiers in the second car didn’t bother to remove the bear’s body and has no interest in pursuing Sugimoto, but are just busying themselves tending the wounded, which is a convenient thing because the bear conveniently covers up the visual showing Sugimoto, Asirpa and Shiraishi getting in the first car just in case some soldier might remember Sugimoto is the enemy and feel inclined to try to shoot him.

Really, why not to have the bear kill all the soldiers in the second car as well?

Oh yeah, maybe they need someone to pick up Koito and Tsukishima and bring them to the doctor so they can be cured since their role in this arc has probably ended. Whatever.

No one gives Sugimoto first aid and he assures anyway ‘it’s just a flesh wound’ because he’s the main character and plot protected, and Ogata likely missed his intestines when he stabbed him so no slow yet painful death for him… even if he seems to have troubles standing. But maybe he only has to recover for holding up and even raising around 400 kg of bear while dangling on a train car.

Talk about light training, Ushiyama would be proud.

At this point Asirpa, eyes still black, tells them… to leave a train on which 7th soldiers still are on board (and might remember Sugimoto is an enemy who killed many of them and come to get his skin) and hide in a safe place? Nope, they’ve to remain on the train but just wait her there because the Ainu land deed is her problem and she’ll just go get the quiver and be back because, really, where’s the problem?

Tsurumi is probably going to see Olga in her or slip and fall off the train so that, without too much troubles, Asirpa will keep her track record of being the only character who wasn’t so much as scratched by a human (the only time I can remember she got hurt was when the forest fell on her and Sugimoto).

At this point Shiraishi notices the train cars have been uncoupled by the extremely trustworthy Tsurumi who, instead than play bait for Ogata as he said he would in chap 308, has VERY OBVIOUSLY taken with himself the land deed and tried to save his skin, the hell faking his death and playing the role Ogata wanted him to play, leaving this new unsuspecting and childishly naïve character who looks like Ogata to play as bait for Sugimoto so, if he were to kill him, good, if he weren’t… well, he could just play dead since it’s not like he would have the land deed to hand to Central or Tsurumi stashed away in a secret place to back him up so I doubt Central would do so much as to raise him to corporal. Well, it’s not a problem that regards him anymore as he conveniently killed himself while our trio of main characters just watched.

Whatever.

On a positive note, escaping with the locomotive is not a bad plan, so kudos to Tsurumi. Maybe he won’t be hit by the idiot ball. One can only hope he’ll keep his brain till the end and give us a decent conclusion at least.

Back to Asirpa, she claims she has a LAST request to Sugimoto and Shiraishi, which feels like a HUGE death flag but will probably end up in nothing because Asirpa has the hugest plot armor ever to the point that if she were to die it would simply feel not surprising but just unbelievable as we had to suspend our disbelief in her never getting hurt for more than 31 volumes and it would be hard to turn it on.

Anyway Asirpa tells them she wants the well with the gold to stay buried.

That’s because she has finally figured out that what Ogata told her in vol 19 (chap 185 to be exact) was true, if one were to get his hands on the gold  things won’t end happily but the killing would go on. Took her 12 volumes to realize he didn’t lie on this… only the whole thing isn’t presented as her realizing he didn’t lie but as her coming up with this conclusion all on her own because, after the story has finally managed to get rid of Ogata, they aren’t going to bring him up again, not to show him among the group of the deceased nor because he actually realized way sooner this whole thing and warned Asirpa about it.

Really Noda, you should have killed him in vol 19 and save yourself the trouble to drag him on till here.

Whatever, Asirpa claims they’ve to break the Golden Kamuy’s curse.

Her eyes are still black, and surely, SURELY the fact that her eyes are still black, irises included, means something relevant, surely, to bring back the light in her eyes we’ll need something big…

No, nevermind, in the next page Noda is already starting to draw her irises a little lighter as she mentions on how, to pay for Umeko’s medical treatment, she’ll give Sugimoto the gold coin Wilk made, which is worth, according to her 10 yen so Sugimoto would only need 190 yen more to reach his goal, and volunteers to get bear bladders for him (assuming she manages to come back from her confrontation with Tsurumi) until they reach the 200 yen quota.

As for Shiraishi he can have the piece of hanpen that Asirpa stubbornly considered a piece of Ushiyama and kept on dragging around because, after so much drama, evidently we need to lighten the mood with some comedy and Asirpa’s completely black eyes don’t sit well with comedy, so let’s gradually lighten them.

Asirpa insists they shouldn’t go back as she doesn’t want to lose even the most important person to her.

Well, girl, congratulation for managing to make your love confession before the end of the story. I’m not sure Sugimoto got the message but, at least, this causes him to think back at… the photo of Toraji with his wife and child? Was Toraji your most important person Sugimoto? Or is the message that, when Toraji died, you felt you lost Umeko? Is she still your most important person, Sugimoto? It wasn’t retconned? I’ll appreciate it if it wasn’t retconned and you’ll go back to her and won’t end up paired up with Asirpa. Please, go back to Umeko, Sugimoto, I was displeased enough when the anime cut Umeko out of the story, I don’t want to believe the manga will do the same.

So we’ve next a comedic moment with Shiraishi who seems to think this is pretty dumb and then tells Sugimoto to tell Asirpa ‘okay, I understand’, which Sugimoto does because of course he’s going to give up on the gold because Asirpa asked him to do so, same as Shiraishi.

Actually, if only Asirpa has done so from the beginning, Sugimoto (and Shiraishi) would have kept out of this mess because they really couldn’t realize this was going to be bloody and live a safe, happy life in the last two years.

No, really, I was in the camp that predicted they would never get the gold, this was my expectation by quite a long time, but, to be honest, I expected it would be for some well constructed reason, or that characters would spend at least 5 minutes being torn at the idea of dropping their hope to get the gold, I mean, they knew they could die RIGHT FROM THE START, they saw people die RIGHT FROM THE START, Asirpa told Sugimoto it was a bad idea to hunt the gold RIGHT FROM THE START, Makanakkuru told them the gold was cursed RIGHT FROM THE START and still got into the gold hunt anyway and went through a lot so I expected they wouldn’t change their mind at the drop of a hat, that something relevant would need to happen, or that they all would come to realize the gold wasn’t worth it through some pondering, not that all that was needed was Asirpa finally coming to the same conclusion about what happens to who possess the gold Ogata spoke of in vol 19 and so shared her fear with Shiraishi and Sugi and they told her ‘yeah, sure’.

I mean, I would have NEVER expected that changing their mind would really be SO EASY… -_-

By the way, as Sugimoto says he’ll understand light seems slightly back in Asirpa’s eyes and okay, maybe for her this is important, or maybe for her black eyes meant loss of hope, I don’t really know, what I know is that Sugimoto grabs her like luggage, says goodbye to Shiraishi and jumps with her on the tender, telling her he won’t let her go alone because they’re partners and so mission accomplished, light on Asirpa’s eyes is restored and I don’t even know why I worried for Asirpa.

*sighs*

All right, I get for her it’s a big deal, but the black eyes too seemed a BIG deal and they get resolved so fast and in a scene that seems comedic that ultimately Asirpa’s black eyes merely seemed caused by childish and easily solvable worry. Something readers didn’t need to feel troubled about because OF COURSE Sugimoto won’t let her go alone, silly Asirpa, how could you think so?

Meanwhile the locomotive and the tender get farther and farther from the cars on which Shiraishi, Nagakura, Kantarou, a bunch of soldiers from the 7th as well as Koito and Tsukishima are.

This probably means they’re all going to survive and who knows, Koito might even replace Tsurumi with Tsukishima now loyally at his side because they did nothing wrong and, by fainting, they escaped the final fight… unless Nagakura will surprise us by decapitating them while they were unconscious or Kantarou will just shoot them in retaliation for causing Hijikata’s death.

But no, I expect them to live.

So this is probably the end of the arc of all those characters and, if we’ll see something more of them, it’ll be likely at the very end and/or in a flash forward and Koito’s big confrontation with Tsurumi was, ultimately, just asking him not to drag Tsukishima with himself because Tsukishima was at his limit and would die.

But hey, probably the noble Koito will restore the Wajin honor  and the 7th honor becoming a good commander because he openly said he would murder Tsurumi if his rebellion to Central and the stealing of the Ainu gold and land deed weren’t to bring benefits to the soldiers under them so he had to live.

Who knows, maybe he’ll even hire Ariko back without punishing him for risking his life in an attempt on saving a little Ainu girl who was being psychologically traumatized and threatened by Tsurumi under Koito and Tsukishima’s eyes, so as to prove he’s Ainu friendly now. Awesome.

Now, don’t take me wrong, I love Koito and Tsukishima, and I love even more Koito’s growth and how Tsukishima is so far gone he’s basically unable to grow and needs to be helped and how Koito is there for him… and I’ll be happy if they survive till the end… but I fear their ending will be a too convenient one, with everything they did being water under the bridge so as to raise them up as the good guys of the 7th.

And, at this point, I don’t even care anymore about the tiger curse because, unless they hallucinate a tiger or Kiro, if something bad were to happen to them it would feel so disconnected, it would be hard to tie them to it because I doubt they would regret killing poor Kiro like an animal due to them following Tsurumi’s orders. But whatever, people has started having abrupt pang of overwhelming guilt so who knows.

Meanwhile Tsurumi has finished all the bullets for his guns but fear not, he hasn’t been hit by the idiot ball yet so he was clever enough to steal the soldiers’ rifle and bring them with him in the locomotive.

Please Tsurumi, please, avoid being hit by the idiot ball with all your strength, please, I need you to stay IC till the end, to give me a sense that defeating you will be a little challenging at least!

Anyway, the fact that he had to collect rifles is likely why he took so long into reaching the locomotive (I mean he disappeared before Sugimoto were to find Ogata and his movements remained unknown through the Ogata/Sugimoto battle and Ogata’s whole breakdown).

Okay, to be honest, kudos to Tsurumi for trying but if he had been paid more attention to Ogata he would have known rifles aren’t really a problem for Sugimoto, as not even the best sniper of the story could bring him down with his rifle so really, they weren’t going to help Tsurumi in fact Sugimoto manages to reach him before he could do so much as shoot a second time.

But okay, Tsurumi is also a strong fighter, so when Sugimoto jumps on him, he can kick Sugimoto away, which was something Ogata would have had troubles doing. But Asirpa is there, about to shoot him, with plenty of light in her eyes because everyone can kill and if you do so for a reason you won’t be troubled by guilt… or so Ogata would say.

Whatever.

Of course Asirpa’s determination to murder Tsurumi so fast, matters nothing as Tsurumi hides before Asirpa could shoot (and as we have at least 9 more chapters to fill before Noda could end vol 32) and then… Tsurumi moves outside the locomotive.

Sugimoto claims he believes this is because Tsurumi is at disadvantage in a battle 2 against one, so he’s trying to lure them to a place where the footing is bad because it’s not like Tsurumi too can slip due to the footing being bad, no, he wears ninja shoes with maximum grip everywhere Tsurumi goes.

Anyway, as I said, there are 9 chapters to fill before the end of this volume, so Sugimoto and Asirpa decide they can give Tsurumi a break for a moment as they try to stop the train so they won’t crash in the last station.

Only… comedic mode is still on because the two of them know nothing of how trains work and basically do nothing to stop the train beyond looking around so, since Asirpa is surely the one who knows the most between the two (yeah, sure) Sugimoto puts Asirpa on the task of stopping the train (so she won’t have to risk dirtying her hands by shooting Tsurumi) while he goes chase Tsurumi because who knows which plan Tsurumi might have come up with to save HIS day.

The last page ends with a creepy Sugimoto standing above Tsurumi, ready to stop him as Kikuta has predicted he would.

And with this we end.

I’ve… not much else to say.

Things continue to go on without requiring too much effort from the characters involved so that it feels like there’s no point in worrying. Is it to lower our defenses and prepare the set for Tsurumi murdering Sugimoto and Asirpa so they can die together and go to hell together but then he’s too late to stop the locomotive or get off of it and dies on the crash? Who knows.

But I really, really need this final battle to be… well, not easy, not won because a sword break or because, by bad luck one of the characters get in the harm way and the other must do a heroic sacrifice or by an improvise attack of paralysing guilt or of hallucinations or by someone conveniently fainting in exaustion and blood loss, I need it something that was the result of a hard fight, be it physical or intellectual, a battle with both the parties involved, not one having a break up and the other munching popcorn as they watch, a battle with stakes and consequences. A battle whose victory will be EARNED by the victor, not just a lucky/unlucky happening.

Something that matters, in short, something I could worry and care about.

We’ll see what it’ll be though.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 306 “Suicide attack”

New chapter and it starts with... guess who?

Yeah, we start with the bear. Because what’s “Golden Kamuy” without one?

In fact the cover shows us how the bear is now entering in the first car, his blood still dirtying the locomotive.

I should probably praising the bear for not only surviving to the meeting with a train at full speed apparently with only some blood loss but also managing to get to the 1st car as the way isn’t exactly comfortable for someone the size of a bear but whatever. Anyway the bear after such meeting isn’t in a good mood and starts to slaughter the 7th division soldiers in a way that reminds me of the first “Golden Kamuy” chapters and of the unfortunate end of the so called ‘bear trio’ (Tamai, Noma, Okada).

Credits when it’s due Tamai Noma and Okada were much better than those guys because they ultimately managed to kill the bear (well, Okada wasn’t even killed by him but by a stray bullet shoot by Tamai so the credits go all to Tamai and Noma),with Noma giving it multiple stabs before the bear killed him and Tamai giving it multiple shoots before dying due to his own wounds.

Those 7th division soldiers prove again they’re sub standard by just getting killed by the bear, despite being many more than just Tamai and Noma, without really managing to affect the bear much.

Meanwhile, on his end, Sugimoto is starting to find hard to fight so many soldiers because FINALLY, someone told them they can attack together and don’t have to go one after the other. It took them time to get something so simple.

We don’t see what happens because the scene switches to Hijikata and Koito.

The bayonet gave Koito a big cut on his cheek. As for Hijikata, probably because he’s much more experienced than Sugimoto, he managed to block Koito’s strike without reporting any damage apparently by going down on his knee and holding his position there because if Tsukishima has a titanium skeleton, Hijikata’s muscles are made with steel and no matter how much Koito try to push his sword down, Hijikata doesn’t bulges… nor does Hijikata’s sword. So it’s Koito’s sword the one which breaks up.

Now…  I don’t really pretend to understand the scene well.

In theory, if Koito’s sword broke, it should be in the contact point with Hijikata’s sword.

This would allow it to continue its run and hit Hijikata (if he’s in the trajectory of the sword) albeit with much less force than before as Hijikata’s sword has interrupted its run and so the blow should have lost part of its original kinetic energy even if Koito kept on trying to press his sword down to the point it broke. Anyway, as Koito was putting pressure on the sword until it broke, it’s clear his strike wouldn’t stop abruptly but continue now that there’s no more obstacles in its run.

However if what remains of the sword isn’t in collision trajectory with Hijikata the blow should continue on its track missing him and Koito would have to try to strike again which would take him time. We’re talking about seconds here, but in a sword fight those seconds are all that matters (Just to give you an idea one can draw out a Katana and attack in 0.6 seconds). In his previous strike he also took advantage of how he jumped, something on which he couldn’t rely now.

However the attention moves away from Koito’s sword (so we don’t get if it’s in a collision course with Hijikata or not) and the 2 next panel focuses solely on Hijikata.

The first shows Hijikata smiling as if the breaking of the sword had put him at advantage, and then he moves and tries to attack as well…

...but all this is interrupted when Koito slams his sword inside Hijikata’s skull.

Now, it doesn’t seem Koito had the time to raise his arms again and strike again… which would mean the remaining of his sword was in a collision route with Hijikata’s head and Hijikata’s attempt at hitting him once his sword disengaged with Koito’s due to the latter breaking was just this, an attempt as he would have never been fast enough.

So, Hijikata’s smile was misleading for us readers. The breaking of Koito’s sword wasn’t an opening, merely the signal of him going to meet his end because now, his sword couldn’t stop Koito’s anymore and he could never be fast enough to hit him before the latter would.

Still the scene isn’t exactly that clear so I might have misunderstood it completely and maybe Koito actually managed to deliver another strike. Personally I prefer if Koito managed to surpass Hijikata in speed and deliver another strike because, otherwise, his victory is merely a matter of luck.

Anyway, with the sword now deep in his skull, Hijikata’s legs give out and he falls sit while his arms also lose strength and he seems to let go of his sword.

Having survived to the battle Koito doesn’t bother paying him any respect, just worries briefly for his throbbing wound and then leaves, now unarmed because he’s not picking up Hijikata’s sword or a soldier’s rifle or, at least, a bayonet.

So... is this the end for Hijikata?

Well, getting a sword into your skull isn’t usually something you’ll survive to tell but Noda only devotes a panel at Hijikata before moving on with the plot...

...and the idea he would just handle like this the death of one of the most important players in the story doesn’t really sit well with me, so in theory there should be more later on. I’ve absolutely no idea how long you can survive with your brain split in two but maybe he’ll manage to until Nagakura joins them or he’ll have a ‘final dream’ before he dies.

Something like that.

So… Noda shows us the train from above and… no one is on the roof.

Did he forgot Ogata and Tsurumi were meant to be there? Did they got inside the train? Off of it? We don’t know.

Tsukishima shows he has somewhat stolen Sugimoto’s plot armour and, despite the grenade exploding basically next to his head, managed to gain cyborg 009’s high speed and hide under the seat of the train so he basically got away with some scratches (while every other soldier seems dead now… ah, the benefits of plot armour when you’re the closest to the explosion and the only one who gets out of it alive!).

In the middle of this disaster area Shiraishi encourages Asirpa to crawl forward further. Really, I don’t get why they don’t stay put, wait for everyone to die and then stroll forward once the area is safe. Whatever.

Anyway our Tsukinator has come to believe if he’s a T-800 model, then Ushiyama is a T-1000 and therefore his plot armour is stronger than his own so he can’t beat him but hey, if he doesn’t stop Ushiyama what about poor, innocent First Lieutenant Tsurumi/Connor, who caused his men to first get massacred on Fort Goryokaku and now on this train?

He’ll end up in danger so the what about self destructing to drag down the T-1000… pardon, Ushiyama as well? After all there’s just a conveniently abandoned and completely undamaged by the explosion hand grenade lying there…

Tsukishima, really, stop being so devoted to a man you’re aware only lied to you and the others to manipulate you all. Damn it, you even remembered him JUST AFTER HE STAGED UP FOR A SOLDIER TO LIE TO YOU SO HE COULD TEAR OPEN YOUR WOUNDS, not even after he came to jail to save your skin, what’s wrong with you, Tsukishima, please, this is unhealthy as hell, don’t die for someone who tears your wounds open for his own sake! At least do like Koito and worry for your men, the soldiers under you, not for Tsurumi!

Okay, not that Tsukishima can hear me so he predictably acts the worst way possible, grabs a hand grenade, removes the pin and hops into Ushiyama’s arms planning to slam and therefore detonate the hand grenade from that position. Only Koito gets in right then (and he’s already halfway through the car and why no one heard him? Whatever, Koito is fast) and, credits when it’s due, although we didn’t see him doing so previously, he actually has grabbed a weapon so really, kudos to him and, since Koito is there and he doesn’t want to watch Tsukishima become a human puzzle he orders him not to do so and moves closer.

As Tsukishima also doesn’t want Koito to become a human puzzle he hesitates (note how his irises stop being white and return being black) in detonating the bomb, complaining Koito never listen to him and, honestly, I get Koito hadn’t listened to him in many situations in which he was telling him the right thing but this time it was a beyond idiotic decision so I kind of understand Koito on this one.

Kind of because we shouldn’t forget they’re still in the middle of a battle with Ushiyama and Tsukishima can’t just remain there, hugging Ushiyama for dear life while dangling a grenade over it and not just because he would tire off but because Ushiyama would do something… which he does as he tosses both him and Koito away.

At this Tsukishima decides to throw the hand grenade at Ushiyama but misses rather badly and the grenade gets past Ushiyama and… near the spot where Asirpa is.

Asirpa curls around the land deed, planning to protect it and… Ushiyama gets in between her and the hand grenade, taking most of the blast.

The scene switches to… Edo era? Kyoto? In the night a lone man is standing in the city… only no, it’s actually in the train and the lone man is Hijikata who’s being converted into young age by the same ‘program’ that turned young Youichirou, in Youichirou the manslayer arc.

So either this is going to be Hijikata’s ‘death dream’ or he’s going to hallucinate himself young as Youichirou did and see the train as the Kyoto of his youth. Hard to say but I like to think this means, despite his wound which was clearly fatal, we haven’t seen the end of Hijikata yet.

Now no, Hijikata is not Sugimoto and there’s no Ienaga around to sew his brain back together so I don’t think he’ll survive but, as mentioned before, when Noda kills off a character he’ll give him some more space. They either have what I call a death dream or manage to say some relevant final last words. Since Hijikata got none of that through the whole chapter, Noda must be saving it for the next chapter because, otherwise, this final page would be a tad too little for an important character like Hijikata.

As for Ushiyama… Ushiyama has a strong plot armour but he’s rather close to the hand grenade and, what’s worse, to Asirpa and Noda might not want to miss exposing that poor girl to some more additional trauma so as to shave off more than 10 years of her life all in a single train ride. I don’t want to believe Ushiyama will die, I want to hope he’ll survive somehow and Noda hadn’t changed his plans for him but sure thing things don’t look easy for him, especially with how in previous chapters he said he would enter into Ainu tales which was kind of a dead flag.

So I’ll cheer for Ushiyama to live because someone who was willing to give his life to save a child deserve to survive EVERYTHING. But well… we’ll see.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 295 “The two of them”

So this is the chapter in which we remind ourselves…

Yeah, that not all the siblings relations are like Abel and Cain. Some brothers just love each other. But let’s go with order.

We begin with a better depiction of the shot Nikaidou shoot against Sugimoto. Now we can clearly see that the bullets didn’t go through his left cheek and came out from his right one but just grazed his right cheek and ear.

I’ll say Sugimoto is goddamn lucky because if Nikaidou has shoot in the same moment in which he kicked his face they would have gone through him and, at the very best, Sugimoto would have had his tongue and teeth ripped to shreds. Instead he’ll just merely gain another scar on his face.

Anyway, despite having been hit, without losing a beat, Sugimoto uses the bayonet in his rifle to pin Nikaidou on the ground by his shoulder.

It’s not really going to stop Nikaidou though, who reminds Sugimoto of his grievance toward him.

Nikaidou will never forgive him for what he did to Youhei. Nikaidou’s plan is shaky and likely lies on the fact he’s confuse about his own identity, as he calls his own body parts Youhei’s body parts but basically, apparently, after he has killed Sugimoto, he plans to place on him his prosthesis and his own face and have him to play his role while he’ll become Youhei, replacing the body parts he has lost with the ones of Sugimoto.

I do wonder if Noda plans to better explain Nikaidou’s madness and problems with his own identity because Nikaidou reminds me of those twins who used to swap places and got so used to do so that their own identities blurred, which is why Kouhei wants to impersonate Youhei and give his own identity to Sugimoto (instead than just turning Sugimoto into Youhei).

Whatever, poor Nikaidou is so out of mind his identity problems might be simply the result of this.

Anyway Nikaidou makes clear what’s moving him now is the desperation for having lost his brother and the madness this caused.

Sugimoto has no sympathy for his loss, he never liked Nikaidou, whom he saw as an enemy right from the start (in fact it was Sugimoto the first to attack the other and Youhei who were there merely to question/arrest him), and he’s not going to start now, especially after the brothers in retaliation beat and tried to kill him. This is completely human and understandable.

I’m aware there’s plenty of readers who feel the same as Sugimoto as Nikaidou was often pitiful but never a likeable character and was even used as a comic relief.

Story-wise though, this is a pity.

Part of Sugimoto’s character’s drama was that he had to kill people during war, and in order to do so he dehumanized them, saw them as bad people who don’t have a human heart and therefore one doesn’t have to feel sorry for them (chap 100) because they would feel no pain when they died.

It’s a mind setting many soldiers of many wars adopted, one the armies wildly encouraged them to have, but, of course, dehumanizing someone, albeit helpful in a war, is something fundamentally wrong. Sugimoto knows and that’s why he feels he has a VIP seat on the train to hell.

“Golden Kamuy” has brushed here and there Sugimoto’s problem and how it’s getting worse, for example in chapter 123 Sugimoto had a conversation with Toni in which he and Sugimoto argued if Toni has justice on his side or not. Sugimoto said they were just murderers, Toni countered they never killed anyone who wasn’t involved to which Sugimoto replied after a while they would stop being able to make the distinction (in short they would start killing innocent). At this Toni counters Sugimoto could understand it because there’s the stench of killer on him too.

And the thing comes up again in chap 261, in which Sugimoto tries to kill a Boutarou who’s actually surrendering (and therefore not threatening him) because he’s so angered he can’t stop, not even if Boutarou surrenders and if murdering him would make harder for them to find Asirpa.

In short Sugimoto was shown sinking, getting worse as he has predicted it would happen to Toni Anji.

But it’s difficult for many readers to catch this as, story-wise, the ones we see getting killed by Sugimoto are criminals, nameless Tsurumi’s minions or characters with whom many don’t really empathize much, like Nikaidou. It’s easy to excuse him with ‘he’s defending himself’ because that’s why he’s doing and because even if one of Tsurumi’s minions were to be the best person on Earth… well, we wouldn’t know, to us he’s just a minion and a threat to Sugimoto.

Readers had been trained by tons of stories to think nothing of when the hero kills an enemy nameless minion so the fact that Sugimoto might be indeed murdering poor, good people sent there by Tsurumi escapes us.

Sugimoto so far didn’t have yet a ‘Tsukishima shot an helpless Ariko’ moment so, even though he’s degenerating more and more, it’s hard to catch up. That’s why it’s a pity Nikaidou is not really someone likeable or easy to empathize with. If we’d felt bad for Nikaidou, we would have felt the emotion from both sides, for Sugimoto who has to survive, but also for Nikaidou who lost his brother.

It would have made for a more interesting fight because we wouldn’t have wanted anyone involved to die, and because we would have realized more the problem of Sugimoto getting worse. But we can’t have everything, I guess if this is a topic Noda wants to discuss Sugimoto will get later on his chance to kill/attempt to kill someone the fandom cares about. If not, it’ll just remain a topic Noda grazed at but never dug in deeply.

All right, let’s go back to the story.

As I said, Sugimoto has no empathy for Nikaidou and yells at him to shut up as this is a fight to death.

Then he pulls out his rifle and throw it to another mob soldier, killing him. Nikaidou tries to use his prosthetic leg to shoot at him but Sugimoto is by now deeply familiar with it and so he grabs it and uses it to shoot at the remaining soldier.

It’s worth to point out whose two soldiers instead didn’t attempt to shoot at Sugimoto, likely because they didn’t want to risk hitting Nikaidou (they yelled at him to get out of the way) so they somewhat cared about him, at least that much they didn’t want to risk hurting/killing him.

Back to the fight as Sugimoto grabs his rifle Nikaidou uses the chopsticks in his prosthetic hand to stab Sugimoto’s neck and cheek. It might go missed to the readers since it happened so long ago but there’s a veiled irony in this as this is a reference to Sugimoto and Nikaidou’s first meeting in which Tsurumi, who was also meeting Sugimoto for the first time, stabbed him with the dango skewers and, as a result, the Nikaidou brothers nicknamed him ‘dango boy’.

This time though, Nikaidou didn’t want to merely hurt him as Tsurumi did but kill him. Sugimoto though is a lucky one and of the chopsticks one hits his kin and sinks in his jaw and the other hits his neck but, likely, misses the carotid as Noda doesn’t really show blood coming out of it (and he will soon forget to draw it).

Nikaidou is not so lucky as Sugimoto stabs him through his abdomen. For the ones who still doesn’t know about this, this sort of stab is fatal (no way it has missed Nikaidou’s intestines), albeit it will kill you slowly and painfully. This too can be seen as a reference to their first meeting as, when Sugimoto killed Youhei, he later pretended Youhei has given him a fatal wound at his abdomen, when he actually was unhurt and merely used Youhei’s intestines which he stole from him to pretend Youhei managed to rip his own out.

Anyway now Nikaidou is as good as dead but we don’t learn what’s going to happen o him right now as we switch to Hakodate bay and to the sailors of the torpedos, who’re climbing on lifeboats.

One of them wonders about commander Koito and he’s told Koito senior said he would stay with the ship, acting like the classic captain who sinks with his ship.

I wonder if he ties himself to it or he clung to it until he lost consciousness because otherwise his body would end up floating back on the surface and could still be saved. Whatever, I guess the idea is he too is as good as dead.

We switch back to Koito Junior, who’s inspecting the place in which he was held captive (really, Tsurumi, it wasn’t a great idea to get him too to enter there, couldn’t you send him to inspect another building?) and discovers how the anpan which were there when he was held captive are still there, because no animal nor insect ate them as they knew they would be relevant for the plot in the future.

This causes Koito to sadly admit out loud how the Tsukisappu anpan person ended up telling sweet lies. Tsurumi hears him, the white of his eyes completely black, although his expression seems surprised.

Against Tsukishima’s will Koito FINALLY comes clear with Tsurumi.

He admits he and his father came there due to their own choice so they will accept the consequences for their decision. He goes on starting to say that if they will end up gaining nothing from this battle, in order to protect his men from central he… Koito doesn’t finish the sentence because he changes it, sweating he says he’ll do whatever he plans to do in order to protect his men from TSURUMI.

Likely, in the first sentence, Koito was merely thinking to shift all the blame to Tsurumi in the eyes of Central so that they would spare the men.

The through is nice, the idea behind it is that he doesn’t acknowledge how his men came there due to their own choices, same as him.

The correction comes better because it acknowledges not only that Tsurumi is more dangerous than Central, as even if they gain nothing he could still try to lead them to fight central and therefore to their death, but also possibly to his men, as he might be acknowledging they were manipulated by Tsurumi’s sweet lies.

He’s still deciding for them and thinking himself above of them… though being an officer and someone from the upper class he’s also responsible for them so I guess he can’t really see them as equal. But I think Koito is trying to do the right thing… albeit in a clumsy if not stupid way.

I mean he’s acting as he can impart judgment on Tsurumi. Unless he plans to sneak up on Tsurumi and kills him, if he doesn’t have the support of Tsurumi’s men they wouldn’t let him kill Tsurumi and he might have to fight them all. Tsurumi tells sweet lies? He has to prove it to be believed by them and Koito is nowhere near as popular and trusted  as Tsurumi but merely viewed as a spoiled brat.

He’ll need Tsukishima’s support but he hasn’t even told Tsukishima the truth about what happened in the church. He’s just confident Tsukishima will side with him when Tsukishima has strong ties with Tsurumi as well and has shown a desperate wish to believe in Tsurumi despite knowing he’s a liar.

So really, Koito, kudos for coming clear and for wanting to protect your men which are two HUGE steps forward, but you’re still acting overconfident and immature and I’m worried because the story is coming to an end and you might end up stumbling before you’ll manage to acquire the maturity and the necessarily ability to judge yourself correctly which are needed to deal with things as a leader.

(On a completely unrelated note I’ve been wondering for 2 years and a half if Ogata really gave Koito a stale anpan or a fresh one since Koito didn’t seem to notice his own anpan tastes terrible and should have given him a stomachache he didn’t seem to have… so really, Noda, I’d like to know)

Contrary to Tsukishima’s fear Tsurumi doesn’t immediately kill Koito nor order him to do the dirty job.

He calmly tells him to go on and kill him (if they gain nothing), claiming that from hell he won’t hear his name being dragged in the mud.

‘Dono yōna omei de tsurushi age rare yō tomo jigoku no soko ni ireba kikoendarou’

どのような汚名で吊し上げられようとも地獄の底にいれば聞こえんだろう

“No matter what infamy is hung on me, I can't hear it if I’m at the bottom of hell”

The way Tsurumi speaks, it seems as if he’s being unfairly accused. If he’s referring to how Central will unfairly accusing him or how it’s Koito who’s unfairly accusing him to be one who tells sweet lies and is a danger for his men that’s up to speculation. Ours and Koito’s.

Tsurumi goes on, switching from victimizing himself to praising Koito, claiming since he has become a splendid man Tsurumi can entrust things to him.

‘Rippa ni seichōshita Koito shōi ninara ato o makase rareru’

立派に成長した鯉登少尉になら後を任せられる

“Since you grew splendidly, Second Lieutenant Koito, I can leave it to you.”

Koito, who’s still sweating, is surprised by Tsurumi’s words, then lowers his gaze. Is he understanding the weight of them? Doubting himself? Doubting his decision? Koito is young and inexperienced, playing against a master. It’s not an easy game for him, even if it’s entirely possible Tsurumi would be fine with being killed by Koito if he were to fail. But I’m not sure if he would give up on his plan just because he would fail to seize the land deed and/or the gold in that battle.

He might think he could catch them later while Koito gave him a time limit.

We’ll see.

Koito moves to leave, telling Tsukishima to go with him.

Tsukishima prepares to do so when Tsurumi calls him back. There’s complete darkness behind Tsurumi and Tsurumi himself is pretty dark, the white of his eyes completely black again.

Tsurumi’s words are well through.

He tells Tsukishima he’s the only ally Tsurumi has left.

This basically places Koito in the enemy or at least adversary camp, as he’s not even considered a temporal ally or an ally Tsurumi can regain but what’s more, hits Tsukishima right where it hurts because Tsurumi is basically telling him he trusts Tsukishima to stay by his side as his ally (he’s not asking if he’s still his ally, he’s just stating he is) and continuing the pity party as Tsukishima is HIS ONLY ALLY. Koito senior, whom he doesn’t know just drowned and the other soldiers don’t count, he only has Tsukishima, Tsukishima who has no idea Tsurumi was aware they were eavesdropping in the church and thinks Tsurumi spoke about his projects from the bottom of his heart unaware to be overheard.

Now, it can be Tsurumi was being sincere back then but the fact he knew he was being overheard and kept silent about it, makes his words sound more like a mummery aimed at manipulating Tsukishima and Koito.

And Koito, as far as we know, didn’t reveal this HUGE detail to Tsukishima so Tsukishima can’t do an informed decision. He has to chose between a young, spoiled officer he babysat until then and the man who saved his life when he ended up in jail sentenced to death. The only ally he had back then. The one whose sweet lies saved him. The one who claimed he would save him and every other soldier in front of Asirpa, in a moment in which, as far as Tsukishima knew, he had no reason to lie.

The scales are not in favour of Koito… who once out of the building, turns toward it. We don’t know if Tsukishima followed him or remained behind, or if he followed him aiming to kill him on Tsurumi’s orders. We’ll discover probably next time as now we switch back to the fatally wounded Nikaidou and Sugimoto.

Nikaidou is still blaming Sugimoto for Youhei’s death, asking him how he dared to kill him and demanding Youhei back. Sugimoto rotates the rifle, so that the bayonet attacked to it and going through Nikaidou will further damage Nikaidou’s intestines, speeding up Nikaidou’s death as Nikaidou is clearly not going to give up so easily.

‘Kyōdai nakayoku jigoku de mattero’

兄弟��良く地獄で待ってろ

“You, siblings who’re close, wait in hell for me!”

Sugimoto is a fury and he has been for all the fight, his irises white as he verbally attack Nikaidou, though in his attack he also confirms how he’ll go in hell too.

Nikaidou though, is a determinate and stubborn fighter. He’ll kill Sugimoto no matter what and so he shows Sugimoto his closed fist. When he opens it, Sugimoto can see on his finger there’s the fuse of an explosive. Nikaidou grabs Sugimoto telling him to get blown up together. Coming out from the opening of his pants, placed as if it were a boner, there’s the explosive Nikaidou stole to the Russian guy.

Nihei would be proud of him if he were here to see Nikaidou, whose determination to kill Sugimoto is terrible and without boundaries as he’s willing to explode to kill Sugimoto.

But Sugimoto isn’t the sort who would panic and give up. He pushes Nikaidou forward and throws him, rifle and all, inside one of the holes in which the Russian partisans hid.

Now… the fact Nikaidou who was holding him, let go of him leaves me a little perplexes but whatever.

Anyway the explosive explodes, pushing upward the bayonet that ends up splitting Nikaidou’s body and head in two halves.

There’s something worth mentioning about Noda. He’s an author who doesn’t forget his characters’ wrongdoing but, at the same time, has compassion of them.

So far the majority of characters who died in this story, despite having physically gruesome deaths, ended up also having psychologically peaceful deaths. In death, they’re satisfied, in the last moments of their lives they aren’t left to be miserable.

Toraji, we discovered in chap 242 volume version, died saving a life and wondering if Umeko would believe him if he were to say he flung Sugimoto away.

Nihei died the way he wanted to die, in the wilderness, fighting a wolf, trying to help a son to go back to his family the way his son couldn’t return back home, Ryu next to him and fighting for him.

Henmi died of the brutal death he wanted to die, shining as he wanted.

Wakayama and Nakazawa died together, holding hands, Wakayama killing a bear to avenge Nakazawa in front of Nakazawa.

Edogai died believing Tsurumi accepted him and that he was doing something great by handing the fake skins to him.

Sakamoto and O-gin again died together.

Anehata died… getting close to the bear the way he wanted.

Inudou had his last fight with Hijikata.

Youichirou also had the death he wanted, aware of dying after a last fight.

Sekiya died thinking God existed and finally decided punishing him.

Fina died in her husband’s arms as he told her the truth about himself.

Kiroranke died knowing what he did had a purpose, Sofia was free and there was hope for the minorities.

Heita killed himself so as to stop his bear alter ego from killing.

Ienaga died to save Inkarmat so she could become perfect in place of her mother who lost that chance.

Usami died in Tsurumi’s arms being told what he wanted to hear.

Ueji died thinking he saddned his father one last time.

Boutarou died knowing he has saved Shiraishi, whom he deemed a friend and that Shiraishi would remember him.

Kikuta died believing Sugimoto would avenge him.

Toni in his death found the silence and calm he longed for.

Koito senior died with his ship as he wished.

Noda, despite not absolving them from his sins, still felt sympathy and sadness for their suffering and/or bad luck and, despite having them face the consequences of what they did (and therefore die often a painful death), in their final moment eased their psychological suffering, aware if they turned the way they were, it wasn’t just because they were born evil, but because something terribly painful derailed them from their path and turned them the way they became. It’s pity, not absolution. It’s bringing retribution for their own choices and wrong actions bereft of raging cruelly against them. It’s karma not sadistic revenge.

And so we can see Nikaidou too, despite dying a really gruesome death by being dismembered, still has his misery healed in death by believing he has met Youhei again, as when the two halves in which he was split look at each other, he see someone who’s the mirror image of himself and thinks he’s looking at Youhei, that Youhei is back and manages to hold his hand again... before being fully ripped to shred.

Mind you, I think it’s more likely that Kouhei hallucinated the whole thing than that he managed to see his other half, assume it was his brother and take his hand. But still the scene has its own poetry and reminds us how the Nikaidou brothers viewed themselves as the two halves of a whole as well as remarking the only salvation Nikaidou could hope for, required for him to die...

Again, it’s a pity the two brothers weren’t more likable because, narratively speaking, they are good characters with lot of potential… though terrible people. But even in how they were hard to be liked there’s a message. Their rage, their violence, made them alone in more way then one. No friends, one of them death, the other living longing for revenge until he died. And, outside of the story, not a wide fangroup.

Anger is an ugly, scary beast, after all, and when it’s mad rage it’s even worse.

And so Nikaidou, as I expected, says goodbye to us all, the final page being of Sugimoto as Nikaidou explodes behind him.

Sugimoto is creepy, his eyes shining, he has fought again like a Kishin and again he has killed but, although he has survived, he’s ironically in the dark while Nikaidou, or what remains of him, is in the light… the light of the explosion of course, but still light considering Nikaidou now is with his brother.

I wonder what will be of Sugimoto. I know he won’t die but will Noda deal with what he’s becoming or will he let this drop because Sugimoto is the main character? We’ll see.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 312 “Share”

So new chapter and, I guess, I’ll remind everyone of the WARNING.

If you only want to hear praises for the chapter, the ban button for either the tag or myself might be an option you’ll want to consider.

With a fair warning given, let’s move on.

Sugimoto shoots at Tsurumi and, predictably, misses him, then tells him the train is headed for hell and there are VIP seats on it. Tsurumi hears it and… remembers of how Kikuta called Sugimoto the Vagrant boy when they were escaping with Asirpa… and connects it to Kikuta’s prediction that the Vagrant boy is going to take him down.

We see two flashbacks, one of Kikuta saying ‘you’re the vagrant boy!?’ as he sees Sugimoto and the other about Kikuta telling Tsurumi ‘the Vagrant boy is gonna take him down’.

The visual seems to imply those two flashbacks are Tsurumi’s memories and that in that moment Tsurumi connected the dots and grew upset (he’s covered by a swirling shading and his eyes are completely black) as he mentions that Kikuta’s last words about a vagrant boy might refer to Sugimoto.

Now, okay, I get it’s possible Tsurumi overheard Kikuta and Sugimoto’s discussion despite the noise of the car’s engine and the wind blowing their voice away, but I think it’s a bit odd if he overheard that discussion that he connected the dots only now.

I would have preferred if the idea was he never heard Kikuta calling Sugimoto Vagrant boy on the car and that he connected the dots merely due to how Kikuta, after mentioning the Vagrant boy, talked about VIP seats same as Sugimoto.

I mean, if Tsurumi could overheard Kikuta and Sugimoto talking back then, he should have overheard Sugimoto calling Kikuta ‘Kikuta-san’, figured the two knew each other and connected the dots much sooner. He could have even assumed Sugimoto too was a man of Central!

But whatever, it’s not big and maybe Noda will improve it in the volume version.

Back to Sugimoto, he seems surprised, then, as Tsurumi comments about how ‘that miserable little spy said that the vagrant boy would take him down’, he grows angry, apparently on Kikuta’s behalf.

Okay, it’s no secret I love Kikuta, so of course I’m glad Sugimoto is upset on his behalf but… chap 279 had Sugimoto saying he wouldn’t hold back against Kikuta, as he apparently hadn’t realized the latter has tried to save his ass by pushing him off the car… and we know how Sugimoto feels against traitors, so he should be upset at Kikuta for being a spy…

Though it’s also worth to mention Sugimoto has never been 100% constant on this.

I mean, he didn’t hold against Tanigaki the fact he left the army and didn’t tattle them out to Tsurumi… but he kept on yammering about Ogata being untrustworthy because he left Tsurumi’s army and has an ambivalent relation with Hijikata (because the latter betrayed him at Abashiri), then tried to kill Boutarou because Boutarou too betrayed him but apologized to his corpse when he caused his corpse to fly out of the car… so okay, since Kikuta didn’t betray him and Sugimoto was fond of him, he probably was more than willing to forgive him for betraying his enemy, Tsurumi, and feel angry on his behalf for what Tsurumi did to him.

Anyway Sugimoto gets upset, Asirpa tells him to calm down but we’ll never know if Asirpa’s words calmed him down somehow or, in case they didn’t, if Sugimoto being angry was a problem.

In fact Sugimoto immediately throws himself at Tsurumi… which seems to hint he didn’t calm down however… there are no real negative consequences.

I mean, Tsurumi tries to shoot at him but, since he is clearly not as good as a sniper as Ogata, despite being close only hits Sugimoto’s arm and then the two engage in battle… or should I call it rifle-fight as they exchange blows using the rifles as if they were clubs?

Whatever, the battle starts and we aren’t asked anymore to care or notice if Sugimoto is angry or not as the two exchanges blow.

Tsurumi’s blow causes Sugimoto to lose his footing and almost slips off the locomotive, which gives Tsurumi a chance to kick away his rifle, and try to shoot him again. Too late though, because with impressive speed Sugimoto is already up and close enough he can grab Tsurumi’s rifle.

Tsurumi bites one of the limbs of Sugimoto’s cut cheek because Tsurumi showed us, right from when he chopped away Captain Wada’s finger, he likes to bite.

Sugimoto punches and kicks him away but Tsurumi, same as how Ogata did in chap 4, managed to remove the bolt of the rifle before Sugimoto could try to use it to shoot at him.

I should probably mention this chapter likes drawing parallels but… I’m not sure I find the one between Tsurumi and Ogata an interesting one.

Sure, Tsurumi maybe groomed Ogata, and I’m saying ‘maybe’ because, although there were hints he might have done it, this part of the story was never cleared up so we don’t know when Tsurumi and Ogata met and how Tsurumi influenced him beyond some vague parallels but… that’s all. Are we meant to assume Tsurumi taught Ogata this little trick?

Who knows?

The manga doesn’t tell and it could be a coincidence.

The reference to me feels merely like trying to capitalize on the memory of a character who was already killed off and, considering how it was killed off, I would have preferred if Tsurumi has merely managed to kick the rifle off Sugimoto’s hands without any reminder of how Ogata was prone to remove bolts from the rifles.

Anyway, with the rifle out of service, Sugimoto tosses it away and grabs Hijikata’s sword.

The scene however switches to Kantarou and Nagakura, the latter taking away Hijikata. Kantarou asks him what about the land deed and if he isn’t going to try to get revenge. Nagakura though couldn’t care less about the land deed. He was fighting there to protect Hijikata as he chased his dream, now that Hijikata is dead, he doesn’t care any longer and doesn’t want others to find his corpse and see him dead.

So maybe Nagakura wasn’t searching death on a battleground as Tsurumi suggested, just to return Hijikata’s favour, as Hijikata saved his life long ago by causing him to leave the battleground.

Honestly I won’t blame anyone who thinks Nagakura and Hijikata were more than friends, but whatever.

Kantarou notices the train is stopping and that’s due to Shiraishi turning the brakes and then running after the locomotive the same way he did on Karafuto when he run after Asirpa, Kiro and Ogata.

This is a parallel I appreciate more as it fits with Shiraishi, his growth and the fact he doesn’t want to leave his friends. Of course he probably wouldn’t reach them by foot but there’s no problem because, conveniently, Tanigaki survived and is coming to reach them riding on a horse.

No, really, Tsurumi’s aim sucks so bad. He was pretty close when he shoot a completely unaware Tanigaki in the back and didn’t manage to hit his spine? It actually seems he only grazed his side so he didn’t even hit his intestines! Honestly I hope I’m wrong, not because I want Tanigaki dead, but because Tsurumi’s lack of aim in this case seems ridicule.

Whatever.

I wonder if it’s worth to mention that the soldiers of the 7th which survived to the bear, not only don’t go check in the 1st car what’s going on, but don’t even bother to go to the 3rd car to check what’s going on so that Nagakura and Kantarou aren’t bothered by anyone.

I expect no one to care about Koito and Tsukishima either so those two will manage to survive till the end. Whatever, I didn’t expect them to die.

Back to Sugimoto and Tsurumi, while Sugimoto stands with his sword pulled out in front of Tsurumi (I wonder if Noda pictured describing this scene could feel as if readers were describing something more dirty than what is actually is), Tsurumi rhetorically asks if the gold was in Goryokaku.

Tsurumi points out if this weren’t the case it would mean Wilk made those gold coins to deceive the Ainu pretending they had military funds that actually didn’t exist so that he could push them to start an uprising. Asirpa sweats, Sugimoto’s gaze darken as he remembers the gold falling in his hands.

Tsurumi starts his patriotic speech. Japan lacks resources, to defend it they’ve to expand to Manchuria, Central would only hold them back so they need to use the land deed to keep Central at bay and yadda yadda and Sugimoto too fought Russia for Japan’s sake, didn’t he?

I wonder if this is meant to echo the first time Tsurumi and Sugimoto talked. Back then Tsurumi tried to win Sugimoto over by telling him Japan did nothing for him and he should help them to take over Hokkaido as a payback for how Japan used him. Now… he’s trying to tell him by helping him he would protect Japan?

How in the world Tsurumi came to believe Sugimoto might have something as vague as patriotic spirit? This is ‘great judge of characters and master manipulator Tsurumi’? I wonder if he managed to gain such a reputation merely because he used his Tsurumisexuality on young boys and traumatized soldiers and, in truth, he wasn’t such a big deal. I mean, I get he messed up during his first meeting with Sugimoto but that could be explained with him hardly knowing Sugimoto and expecting him to think the same as his soldiers but now, when Sugimoto has made clear more than once he just wanted the gold and protect Asirpa and has not a single ounce of patriotic bone in his body?

In fact Sugimoto points out he worked for the army because they fed him, which is a reference to the reason why Sugimoto enlisted, something we learnt in chap 278. I wonder if that flashback was always in the plans or it was created later but whatever, it’s not big deal.

Tsurumi changes method and tells Sugimoto to jump off the train. Tsurumi will forget about the gold (why bringing it up then?... Tsurumi you’re being a poor liar) because Central is pursuing him so he wouldn’t have time to bring it with himself (so Tsurumi has no more men to back him up? Where’s Central anyway? How would Sugimoto know this is the truth?) so the gold belongs to Sugimoto (who’ll only have to fight off the soldiers Tsurumi left at Goryokaku to get it… unless the few that tailed after Tsurumi and Koito were the only ones alive? This is pretty confusing, really but still Tsurumi controls Yodogawa so he can get reinforcements from Abashiri).

Tsurumi doesn’t bother talking about the land deed which he clearly doesn’t plan to return and Sugimoto and Asirpa don’t ask for it.

He gets a deep gaze from Sugimoto and Asirpa then Asirpa refuses Tsurumi’s proposition aiming at him and Sugimoto decides they’ll end it right there and now, preparing to strike him with the sword.

I guess after her first taste at attempted murder Asirpa has grown bloodthirsty since she’s again not trying to negotiate. I mean, I wouldn’t trust Tsurumi as far as I can toss Ushiyama so I get not trusting him over such unreliable words as the ones he said but… I get Sugimoto but Asirpa looks way too comfortable with this but, at the same time, this makes weird she waited so long before tossing her arrow at Tsurumi.

Well, no, actually not because I bet this is another attempt to keep Asirpa’s hands clean so she threaten Tsurumi and shows she’s ready to kill him but who’ll get to do the dirty work is Sugimoto. She’s not going to shoot him down and end the story.

Tsurumi smiles but he actually has hidden a gun in a spot near to the one in which he is and is trying to reach for it because he knew they would get to that situation and has hidden a gun in a strategic spot.

Actually the scene reminds me of a scene of “Andy and Norman”, the Italian transposition of “The Star-Spangled Girl” comedy written by Neil Simon but I’m pretty sure it’s just me.

But this surprising development is meant to face another surprising development.

Sugimoto claims such a deal mean nothing to him… because when the gold fell on him and filled his hands… he stuck said gold dust filled hands into his pockets, moving the gold into them so he already got his share and doesn’t need to go back to Goryokaku.

So, when in chap 302 Hijikata was under the impression Sugimoto forgot about his share of gold he was actually mistaken as Sugimoto has already taken it. And Asirpa clearly had no idea about it because in chap 311 she volunteered to work to get Sugimoto his share if he were to give up on the gold.

To sum it up, no, Sugimoto wasn’t as noble and selfless as those chapters painted him to be.

And this is great, this fits Sugimoto’s character because it brings him back to being a grey character, a human character, instead than a pure, noble white one with 0 self interest and plenty of sacrificial spirit… though it feels as if he acted quite like a jerk by filling his own pockets without even saying it to Asirpa, the legitimate owner of the gold.

I mean, I was pretty sure Sugimoto had gold on himself but I was thinking it had ended up in his pockets by accident, when it fell on him, not that he had collected it on purpose.

Whatever, it’s not a big deal… I prefer Sugimoto being a grey character, as I said it makes him more human.

However in a scene that mimics the one in chap 135 (I wonder in the volume version this pace will become a spread as well) we see Sugimoto having his hand filled with gold dust the way Hijikata filled his own hand with his own blood in the fight with Inudou. Then, as Tsurumi tries to use the gun against Sugimoto, Sugimoto tosses the gold dust in Tsurumi’s eyes before using his sword against Tsurumi.

We don’t see if Sugimoto hit something as the gold dust covers Tsurumi.

Now… I get the idea is this scene should be seen with a HUGE SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF, a suspension of disbelief which actually should be used for all the duel.

I mean Sugimoto and Tsurumi act like they weren’t on a train running madly because it’s unsupervised and isn’t pulling anymore any car. Not only they can sand on it without holding onto anything and fight with an overall perfect balance despite the shaking and the air running at them, not only their hair remain perfectly combed and Sugimoto’s cap doesn’t fly away (but Sugimoto’s cap never flies away no matter what unless it flying away is plot related so whatever) but, although Sugimoto is tossing the gold dust downwind, the wind didn’t push back it back in Sugimoto’s eyes but it managed to reach Tsurumi’s before the latter could shoot because Tsurumi is also slow at shooting.

Now, of course, we can speculate if the trick is due to the weight of the gold dust or the speed or whatever, but I think the real idea is we’re just supposed to shrug off if the whole thing is possible or not and suspend our disbelief in favor of applying the rule of cool.

And yeah, it’s cool and symbolic to have the gold blind Tsurumi so as to lead him to his death while Asirpa manages to continue to kill no one.

Personally I would find it interesting if the gold were to manage to blind Sugimoto as well but with his ‘heroic’ sacrifice of using the gold he ‘picked up without telling anyone’ (read: stole… and yeah, I know Asirpa would have given it to him had he asked but that’s the point, he didn’t ask) I guess Sugimoto redeemed himself (sort of, he still has another pocked filled with gold dust, unless it’s going to throw it too or his pocket has a hole) so he won’t get blinded by gold.

In a narration that clearly doesn’t care about realism but just with surprising its readers it works well.

(If we go back to Hijikata’s scene that too used the rule of cool in abundance as, if Hijikata had been losing enough blood he could collect so much in the palm of his hand in such a short time, he would have probably died of blood loss short later)

I’m not saying this as a complaint or as a praise, “Golden Kamuy” has been relying on rule of cool a lot right from the start so I’m not surprised it goes back on relying on it, personally I much prefer it because, at least, it means we’re not on ‘easy mode’ anymore and as I hated the easy mode, this is definitely an improvement.

In fact we have Sugimoto having to come up with a plan to defeat Tsurumi and implement it, it wasn’t just a bug that conveniently ended in Tsurumi’s eyes temporally blinding him so that Sugimoto could strike him with ease.

The fact we’ve dropped out of easy mode is a good thing, regardless of people loving or hating the rule of cool and I honestly think many of us would have less problems with the scene if it didn’t come after a series of disappointing chapters, though, of course, maybe it’s just me.

On the other side, sure, the fact that Sugimoto already has his pockets filled with gold makes his choice easier (Sugimoto didn’t really have to choose if to remain on the train and lose the gold or if to get the gold and leave the train) as the note at the bottom of the last page remarks so we aren’t in really hard mode for what regard character’s choice but whatever, at least we’re not in easy mode for the fight so I’ll take it as an improvement. Too bad it came SO LATE.

On another note… yes, I caught up on how “Golden Kamuy” wants to establish a parallel between Sugimoto and Hijikata… but I’m not really sure why, beyond that Hijikata was cool and rumored to have eaten mermaid meat which gave him longevity/immortality (it depends from the myth).

I mean, sure they could be both awesome warriors who wouldn’t hesitate to use underhand tricks but… Hijikata was in this mess because he was a patriot and believed this dream of his would help Japan, Sugimoto is in this mess because he wants to help the people he cares for (Umeko and Asirpa). I doubt there will be a big reveal in which we’ll discover Sugimoto is Hijikata’s grandchild/nephew, and while I get Hijikata is popular… well, it feels weird to me that the story seems to want to point to Sugimoto as the new Hijikata, not only by having Hijikata saying they both fight following the Bushidou but with scenes like the one in which Hijikata, before dying, sees himself in Sugimoto, in how Sugimoto is now carrying Hijikata’s sword and in how the visual is careful to draw a parallel between the Hijikata/Inudou fight and the Sugimoto/Tsurumi one.

Sugimoto is a character who’s cool enough even without him becoming the Hijikata of the new era. If this scene is meant to be similar to the ones in “Saint Seiya”, “Sailor Moon” or “Dragon Ball” in which the spirit of friends appear near to the hero in the final confrontation… I don’t know, I didn’t really feel the need for it because it’s not like Hijikata and Sugimoto had that deep emotional bond of friendship the over mentioned anime instead involved.

Tsurumi was just a common enemy but so was for Ogata, Kikuta, Wilk and so on.

So… I’m a bit confuse because even though the scene is cool… same as the Ogata parallel it feels more like an attempt to capitalize on another beloved, now dead, character, Hijikata than something with plot relevance. But maybe it’s just me.

Still two more chapters to the end.

Sugimoto and Asirpa will probably leave the train on Tanigaki’s horse.

Tsurumi, I think, will live a little longer, maybe Sugimoto’s blow only cut away the thing protecting his forehead giving us a full Tsurumi’s face reveal… or wounded him.

Yeah, it could have been fatal as well but I would expect Noda to dedicate a bit more time to Tsurumi’s death.

We’ll see, but I expect him to still be in the next chapter, even if wounded.

On another note... will the story even address Tsurumi’s grievance against Wilk and how HE coped with his own guilt for his wife and daughter’s death? Will he also shoot himself? Or will he continue to blame Wilk? Or we’ll skip this entirely? We’ll see...

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 302 “Mayhem on the train”

So welcome to the new year and to the very first new chapter of the year that helps us start 2022 with optimism.

Yeah, yeah, I was inspired by the “Final Destination” movie series but really, it felt fitting.

Anyway, let’s dig intot he chapter... though I should probably warn you this chapter makes HUGE use of the rule of cool to try to have you suspend your disbelief willingly (BTW The Rule Of Cool, according to tvtropes.org dictates that: “The limit of the Willing Suspension of Disbelief for a given element is directly proportional to its awesomeness.”).

Now I love cool things... but when I make meta my willing suspension of disbelief is nearly nonexistant so consider yourself warned because this is an extremely cool chapter filled with things so unlikely it might make your head spin. Realism and logic though are hardly as cool as fiction so... it really depends on what matters the most for you.

We start with Sugimoto thinking he can bring the situation to an endgame just by killing the final boss, Tsurumi. Well, maybe he’s thinking so because Hijikata told him so in Goryokaku (see chap 296).

Only this isn’t exactly a videogame and I’m not so sure the 7th division would just give up if Tsurumi were to be killed, I mean, his death would surely impact it but Koito and Tsukishima could still take charge…  though, of course, since this is a manga it would probably work same as a videogame so whatever, Sugimoto’s logic might even work… if it wasn’t for the fact Tsurumi isn’t going to wait for Sugimoto to come murdering him.

Maybe either because he’s genre savvy, because he’s a contributor to the Evil Overlord’s list or because he’s just that clever, Tsurumi doesn’t just stand there and wait for Sugimoto but climbs on the train’s roof and walk over it as that’s the safer and faster path.

Besides it’s not like Tsurumi is going to be bothered by the air rushing at him, lose his footing, fell from the train and on his death. He signed for more than 302 chapters, after all... though really, I don’t get why he doesn’t sprint toward the start of the wagon but merely walks.

Sure, it’s funnier but... shouldn’t he rush? Logic, where are you?

Anyway now, while Tsurumi is cleverly advancing unbothered by any obstacle, Sugimoto doesn’t think to join him on the roof and try to shoot him… which probably goes to Sugimoto’s credit as he’s not Ogata and wouldn’t hit a silo at 1 meter of distance unless the plot where to call for him to gain sudden shooting ability for plot reasons and clearly this wouldn’t be the case, so Sugimoto would only waste bullets if he were to try to shoot Tsurumi… not that bullets are useful for Sugi anyway but that’s it, Sugimoto evidently just decides to postpone his ‘let’s murder Tsurumi’ plan.

Whatever, the glorious soldiers of the 7th division who’re in the other wagon have heard that there has been ominous noises of commotion in the final wagon and so they have all put their bayonets on their rifles, a hint they didn’t believe their companions were just cheering on the incoming battle too loudly and… and are discretely trying to do what the Evil Overlord’s list advises not to do, instead than to attack the hero party en masse, they stand around waiting while the guys in the other wagon attack them.

Because if something ominous that pushed them to prepare and attach their bayonets on their rifles it’s happening in the other wagon… well, there’s no reason to rush help their companions.

Whatever, they finally decide to open the door and try to do something, only it’s predictably too pate as Ushiyama opens it for them… flattering them all against it.

Really, I don’t get why they had lost at Goryokaku when Ushiyama can single handedly dispose of so many men who don’t even think to hide behind the seats and, from there, shoot multiple times at him. No, much better wait there to be trashed away. So, while Ushiyama just pushes away more than a half of the soldiers, the one who were distant enough decide to bravely run away.

Then Ushiyama starts massacring the soldiers, making them fly left and right.

Hum... maybe the idea was that the competent soldiers of the 7th division all belonged to the first wave. Those who’re meant to be used for the second are the ones who’re actually in the story merely to be tossed away by Ushiyama.

Fine, okay there’s one soldier who has enough good sense to try to shoot Ushiyama but don’t worry, he’ll accomplish nothing because he is shoot first by Hijikata, who, despite all the blood he should have lost due to the wound on his back, is up to fight like a teenager because we all know he ate mermaid meat and the fact he looks old is merely a disguise to trick enemies.

Okay, more seriously I love how Ushiyama is trashing enemies, it’s a definitely cool scene, but it clashes with the seriousness and realism of Fort Goryokaku’s battle where Hijikata’s forces, which were much more numerous than currently, were crushingly defeated.

Yeah, back then the 7th had cannons and yeah, they remembered they could use rifles to shoot and a more open ground but still the contrast is a bit too much.

Anyway, Hijikata tells Asirpa that would be the perfect moment to jump off… only no, Asirpa realizes it’s not because as soon as she tries to leave the wagon she notices Tsukishima, still on his horse, running after the train, apparently waiting for her to jump off so he can catch her.

Shiraishi, still in the wagon, notices the incoming Koito who’s taking two soldiers with himself (for who has forgotten about it, Ogata shot the third soldier who was with him so as to steal his horse). Shiraishi is someone with great escaping experience and, while Asirpa is stalling, he immediately realizes they’ve no hope to escape by jumping off the train, grabs Asirpa and gets into the other wagon in which Ushiyama, Sugimoto and Hijikata are, because being in a wagon in which a fight is going on with them is better than being alone in a wagon in which Tsukishima, Koito and two other soldiers can enter. Bless Shiraishi.

Now you see why I said Tsurumi should have run?

Because he reaches the end of the wagon only now, when Asirpa and Shiraishi are already inside, which was what the plot needed but Tsurumi really shouldn’t make moves according to the story convenience but his own.

I mean, Idon’t really know what held him back, that wasn’t the moment to take a leisure walk on the roof, he had no reason not to run but whatever, from the top of the roof, COMPLETELY EXPOSED, he instructs Tsukishima to go to the lead car to get around them so that they can trap Asirpa in between them and steal her quiver.

And damn, Tsurumi seems to be losing more blood from his hand wound than Sugimoto or Hijikata from their various wounds. Okay that there are veins in the hand but damn it, he’s litterally leaving a trail, blood flowing out of him, to the point he might just end up dying of bloodloss if this keeps up.

Tsukishima obeys him, Sugimoto instead forgets that, when he’s involved, the bullets in his rifle are merely an added weight to his own weapon, and tries to shoot Tsurumi.

Predictably, he misses and Tsurumi jumps on the other wagon to resume his happy walk at a leisurely pace.

Hijikata insists that Sugimoto should jump off with Asirpa and escape in the forest or something… because surely it’s not like other soldiers in horses can reach them, never mention the Koito group being already there. Whatever, maybe he intend to wait for Koito’s group to also get aboard the train before having Sugimoto and Asirpa do their grand escape. At least I hope so.

Sugimoto thinks it’s better if he remains on the train and thin the number of Asirpa’s pursuers as this is the only way he can protect Asirpa’s land deed. Asirpa obviously hears it and is impressed and, I fear, this is going to become an additional burden on her already traumatized soul who, not so far ago, has decided to become a human shield for you and even murder for you.

Really, Sugimoto, I get the feeling but I think in that moment it was better for Asirpa if you were to play the jerk role and say you were going to risk your life for yourself. No need to say you’ll give your all for Asirpa while Asirpa is on earshoot.

Hijikata goes and stabs the dagger deeper by commenting it seems Sugimoto has forgotten about his share of the gold, to which Sugimoto remarks he’s not doing this for his sake and that he can’t help helping people as it’s something he inherited by his dad, and Hijikata corrects him saying this is Bushido...

and…. and… I get this speech sounds very nice and it’s meant to tie in with this discussion...

...but I actually have problems with it because it feels misleading (maybe it doesn’t feel as much misleading for the Japanese readers but I can’t really speak for them).

Anyway this bit paints both Sugimoto and Hijikata being in the gold hunt for selfless reasons, it’s Bushido, is sticking your neck out for others, they’re not interested in the gold, they aren’t doing this for their sake and yadda, yadda… which would be very nice if it didn’t make a mess with the information we previously were given.

Let’s start with Hijikata because he’s simpler.

Hijikata is not in this mess for the sake of the Ainu, he wants to turn Hokkaido into a buffer state for the sake of Japan… which can still be seen as ‘selfless’ since he’s still fighting for the sake of others, only he’s willing to sacrifice other people for his own goal (and I’m not talking just of people opposing to him, think at Hidoro’s men whom he slaughtered while they were thinking he was an ally or at Sugimoto, whom in Abashiri he used to create a diversion or at Ariko, whom he used to get the tattoed skin) and no one, neither the Japanese government nor some Ainu leader, asked him to do so. Hijikata claims he wants to give the Ainu a state also to repay Kimuspu for his help because if he has a debt with one Ainu it’s like he has a debt with the whole Ainu populace… but his plans for the nation he would create aren’t for an Ainu state in which Ainu could continue their lifestyle but for a multicultural state in which he would invite people from other states and pursue an economy based on coal mining.

As he fought for his goal, as far as we know, he didn’t really ask Ainu for their opinion on the matter, and in fact the Ainu support for his plan is basically inexistent, we don’t know how Ariko got dragged in but he was clearly manipulated and Kirawus was in it because he needed money and helped with the cannon because he was moved and inspired by ASIRPA, not by Hijikata. As for Asirpa she joined hands with his plan because… well, my poor kid wanted to help the Ainu but she didn’t really have a plan to do so and Hijikata’s plan to her didn’t seem bad… or at least it seemed better than Tsurumi’s.

Long story short, Hijikata’s ‘selfless’ goal is actually moved more by his own personal ambition to do something good for his country (Japan) and by his own personal ego as he thinks he knows better than others what’s better for them (hence Japan should just give up Hokkaido because Hijikata knows Japan need it as a buffer state and Ainu should just organize their state as he says because he knows better than them). Also, as Nagakura said, he probably wants an heroic death.

And hey, it’s okay Hijikata is moved by ego and personal ambitions as well as this makes him human and real… but now he’s presenting it as not the case. And again, okay if this was merely the narrative Hijikata wants to spin for himself, because there’s plenty of people who want to believe to be purely selfless when they’re not but if all the characters buy into it… well, I fear this will look like the narrative for which the story is now pushing. Hijikata was a grey character, not a white one, and it was cool and great because grey characters can still do a lot of good and they’re more real than white ones. I really hope the story isn’t trying to repaint him as white… because there would be not even progression in this, as he was grey then he whitened up, the fact that he had that talk about Bushido with Wilk before the gold hunt seems placed there to tell us he was white right from the start… when it’s more Hijikata only wished to be white but he was grey and remained grey.

And now we move to Sugimoto, because his case is more complicate. Sugimoto, right for the start, was in this mess for the gold. He wanted the gold but this doesn’t mean he wanted the gold SOLELY for his own sake. Surely, he wanted to be rich and he wanted to use the gold as a mean to come back home the way Tanigaki was told to use Retar’s skin as a mean to go back home… but ORIGINALLY, his plan was to get the gold for Umeko.

Even when he joined hands with Tsurumi and claimed doing it to protect Asirpa, he asked money for Umeko once they’ve gotten the gold...

...so no, Tsurumi didn’t immediately hand it to him, so Sugimoto never received it and therefore HE STILL NEEDS IT which is something he makes clear in chap 242.

Sugimoto’s share of the gold, isn’t SUGIMOTO’S ONLY, it’s actually the share he meant to give to Umeko. It was again a selfless and selfish goal, but it was a goal with selfless connotations. He wasn’t just doing it for himself, he was sticking out his neck for Umeko when pursuing the gold, and he wanted that gold he was disappointed when they found the land deed, which he had no idea existed. For a long time he didn’t want Asirpa to get involved, nor cared for the Ainu problems, thinking he could comfortably hand Hokkaido to Tsurumi.

So the fact he’s presented like someone who now doesn’t care anymore of how he needs the gold for Umeko and was doing all this solely for Asirpa’s sake seems to somehow clash with the narrative we’ve been feed till now. It would be different if Sugimoto has filled his pocket with the equivalent of 200 yen in gold and were to tell Hijikata ‘I never waned ALL that gold, just enough to help a person, so now I’m fine focusing on helping another person, Asirpa, reaching her own goal.’

Instead what he seems to say here is ‘I never cared about the gold in the first place or I would have given up long ago, I was here to help Asirpa’… which… isn’t the story I’ve been reading till now, especially since at the start Asirpa didn’t even want to be involved in this mess and it was Sugimoto who pushed her to join him by insisting she would avenge her father this way.

Of course it can be a matter of translation, maybe in Japanese Sugimoto’s answer is more nuanced, maybe he means to say in that moment he’s prioritizing Asirpa because that’s what the situation calls for, that he’s not giving up on the gold, just taking care of what’s more urgent, but really, this bit seems to attempt to paint him too as white when Sugimoto as well was grey… and the fact that everyone was grey was what really made “Golden Kamuy” cool.

They were all humans with their selfish and selfless motivations intertwining together and what made a difference was how far they were willing to go so that Tsurumi felt a really dark shade of grey because he was willing to do too many ominous things while Sugi felt a pale shade of grey because he was draw a line at many things.

Now that we are almost at the end of the story, this talk about Hijiakta and Sugimoto being white, having always been white feels as if there’s an attempt at robbing “Golden Kamuy” characters of their complexity, which is a pity. But, as I said, maybe it’s just a problem of translation… or something Noda will re-address later on, forcing them to face that one is only their own narrative. We’ll see.

Whatever, while Sugimoto puts some bullets in his rifle because this way it will be better balanced when he’ll swing it back and forth to stab and hit, Hijikata discharges his own (as he probably has no more bullets for it) and decides to use just his sword because for someone WHO CAN ACTUALLY SHOOT like him, recovering one of the rifles left behind by the 7th is for people who aren’t as cool as him and so it’s better if it’s Sugimoto who tries to do so.

Okay, so they’re in a small space and probably a katana works better than a rifle but still, since Hijikata was perfectly capable to fight with both, I would at least put one on my shoulders (Hijikata might not have anymore bullets for his rifle and the ones of the 7th can’t be recharged with a single hand like he does with his Winchester so, okay, maybe fighting with an Arisaka rifle might not be that functional but still...).

Whatever, Ushiyama ignores them and continue to trash soldier ahead of them (and hey, one of the soldiers impressively managed to stab Ushiyama’s arm! That’s quite the accomplishment since so far Ushiyama had remained unhurt as far as we know) so I don’t get how some soldiers managed to get in between Ushiyama and Sugimoto and Hijikata but well, maybe they hid under the floor, waited for Ushiyama to pass and then tried their luck with the apparently less dangerous Sugimoto and Hijikata. Really, I think they would have had better luck with Ushiyama and that’s saying it all.

Ushiyama though, stops in his track when, behind two soldiers appears him, THE TSUKINATOR.

Sure, his size isn’t quite the one of Schwarzenegger, but, in Tsukishima’s case, it’s not the size that makes the man, it’s the kicks that would make Hyuga Kojirou proud plus the fact that he is one of the 3 members of the 7th division who can think (and the only one who is still on Tsurumi’s side as Kikuta died and Ogata defected… and yes, I might count Koito in this too but Koito started thinking only recently and, from when he stared, he has mixed feelings on being on Tsurumi’s side so…). Unless Igogusa is involved. But whatever, I don’t think Ushiyama will bring her up so Tsukishima is safe on that side.

Meanwhile the conductors of the train have overheard the ominous noise coming from the passenger cars as well and wonder if it’s a train robbery and if they would do better to stop the train, though they’re almost at Hakodate, which, I guess, it’s the relevant info Noda wanted to deliver us though their discussion.

Anyway they don’t manage to do anything as Ogata, who has somehow reached the head of the train without being noticed by Koito despite Koito being ahead of him and on the same side of the train, shoot them both.

Whatever, there’s a forest around apparently, let’s assume trees hid Ogata until he reached the locomotive so Koito didn’t notice him.

Koito and Tsurumi seems to hear Ogata’s shoots...

...which likely means this time Ogata shoot the conductors instead than holding them at gunpoint and have them jump off the train or, even better, pretend to be still a soldier of the 7th with orders they had to follow, because those two were meant to realize he joined the ride.

Well, I like to think Koito surely realized so as he previously noticed someone shoot one of his men and might have gotten his horse. I’m not sure if Tsurumi is betting on Ogata to have joined them on the train, as he’s unaware of this detail and might think it’s someone else who’s an ally of Sugimoto but whatever.

As far as we know neither Sugimoto, Hijikata, Tsukishima, Ushiyama, Asirpa or Shiraishi heard Ogata’s shoots so I wonder if this really is meant to foreshadow how Ogata will interact with either Tsurumi or Koito first.

Whatever, Ogata, after patting his head either in self praise for his accomplishment or because, despite accomplishing it he got himself in a damn dangerous situation, is now standing on the locomotive and comments this one now is a runaway train headed straight for hell. So either something unpleasant is going to wait them at Hakodate or he expects not much people will get off of it alive. Awesome.

On a minor note kudos to Noda for remembering Ogata’s leg is wounded, and painting the blood on it. Sure he’s losing less than Tsurumi from his hand but it’s the thought that matter.

Also sure is that Ogata got himself a good spot.

My guess is he expects Sugimoto’s group (which by now is apparently in the third wagon) to try to reach the locomotive to control the train and maybe discharge the other wagons as they only slow the train down, and he’s planning to wait for them there. Sure, he might also try to get inside the train and try to reach Asirpa’s group from the front, taking advantage by how the soldiers on the train are likely converging toward Asirpa and so wouldn’t notice someone coming from the front but whatever, we’ll see.

The most clever thing Ogata can do is to wait for Sugimoto’s group to dispose of the soldiers, as he’s not that great at close combat and so he would be at disadvantage if he were to try to fight them.

They also probably need to leave the train before reaching Hakodate as Hakodate is the terminus of the railway and, if they don’t stop there, either the train learn to go on something else that’s not railway for a while before crashing against  a building or ending in the sea or they’ll have to stop at the station, do a lot of explaining and, possibly, meet some more soldiers.

Anyway we’ll see. I would like to see a meeting between Ogata and Koito or Ogata and Tsurumi more than one between Ogata and Asirpa but they’re all welcome as long as they turn out more than just a ‘let’s fight’.

That’s because I would appreciate some more explanations (and we had plenty of fights already so they’re starting to bore me, time for a change of pace) but maybe it’s just me. Anyway with this the chapter ends. We’ll see what will happen in the next chapter.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 292 “The naval battle of Hakodate bay”

New chapter on the series of…

Yeah, it’s always the art of war. But this time it’s more juicy than the previous so fasten your seatbelts and prepare for the ride!

The fight continues on the East entrance, where Sofia’s men valiantly kill off quite a bunch of men form the 7th who’re getting pushed back also due to how the bombing has stopped… but yeah, also because Sofia is there to motivate her men and personally toss hand grenades at Tsurumi’s men.

Go, Sofia, go!

But why has the bombing stopped?

Who remembers the previous chapters, remembers how, while Koito Heiji was bombing Goryokaku, Nagakura and Co started bombing his ships. At this point, instead than playing sitting duck for their fire, Heiji orders the two surviving destroyers to change their position. It’s too late though, as a third destroyer is hit and starts burning.

With only the destroyer on which he is working, Heiji, who likely has realized they’re facing someone with impressive aim and therefore are in a tight spot (just look at his close up above and at how Noda has darkened the shadow covering his eyes), orders to open fire on mount Hakodate, to the port side, where he believes the enemy is. The blow hits pretty close to where Nagakura and Co are, Kadokura considering they should escape now that Heiji is shooting back.

We aren’t immediately told what will happen as the scene switches to Ogata, wrapped in his cape with his hood up. As he holds his rifle with one hand and the binocular with the other we can assume he’s been checking on the situation with it. We can’t see where he is though, as all around him there’s only blackness so that we can’t even see on what he’s sitting. It doesn’t seem a tree branch as his legs aren’t dangling but not even a flat surface as his feet are a little lower than his backside.

Clearly Noda doesn’t want to let us know of his whereabout, if this is because he hadn’t decided them yet, because he still has to research on the area to draw Ogata’s position accurately or because Ogata’s position is meant to come as a surprise that’s up to speculation.

He shouldn’t be in Goryokaku since we saw he was in Hakodate when Nagakura went to talk with Tsurumi and I’ve no idea how would he have managed to get in unnoticed by both sides afterward.

Ogata wonders if Hijikata’s forces will manage to make it through the siege. He also shows he knows about the land deed and how the government wants to have it destroyed. He seems skeptical of his existence though. So it can be that Okuda himself wasn’t sure if the land deed existed or not and that Ogata’s mission was to ascertain if it existed and, in case it did, have it destroyed. Still, it’s weird this task was given to Ogata, because, although apparently Okuda wasn’t sure about the land deed’s existence, it’s a secret Okuda didn’t dare to talk with Kikuta, whom he trusted. It’s as if Ogata is trusted even more than Kikuta, despite, at the time, being very young, so young I’m not sure what he could have done to prove his loyalty more than Kikuta did.

Of course there’s also the possibility Ogata overheard Nagakura talking about the land deed or Nagakura told him himself.

In this case we don’t really know what was the task Okuda gave him. The same as Kikuta? Something different? Was he meant to light a rebellion in Tsurumi’s files should Tsurumi try to do something Central wouldn’t like so as to weaken Tsurumi’s power and when this failed Ogata found himself jobless as Central wouldn’t take him back since he failed? No idea.

Anyway, while Tsurumi considered the land deed could be either in Hijikata, Sugimoto or Asirpa’s hands, Ogata believes Asirpa to be the one who has it, which proves Tsurumi is good at analyzing people but ogata just knows that trio better and can correctly assess who had it.

It’s interesting that as he thinks to Asirpa she’s turned away from him... yet they’re connected somehow as his cape falls out the panel he’s in to slip slightly into Asirpa’s, above her image.

Asirpa was shown to currently be in some building so, unless Ogata is also hidden in that same building, which, as said before, would be difficult, it would be hard for him to see her (besides, if that were to be the case he would have seen her hiding the land deed). this likely means Asirpa’s face is meant to be in Ogata’s memory but, the interesting part is he’s remembering her turned away from him, almost as if she were giving her back to him. I wonder if this image is from a specific scene or this too is Ogata’s way to distance himself from her. It wouldn’t make sense for us readers to see her face shadowed same as Yuusaku, but to see her turned away from him still drives home the fact Ogata isn’t facing her, isn’t looking at her straight in the eyes.

Ogata lowers his head as he wonders if, should he shoot in the confusion of the battle, would someone pinpoint his location.

‘Kon'na sawagi no naka demo, ippatsu uteba jibun no ibasho o tokutei shite kurerudarou ka?’

こんな騒ぎの中でも、一発撃てば自分の居場所を特定してくれるだろうか？

“Even in the middle of such confusion, if I shot once, could one identify my whereabouts?”

While it’s question worth wondering, I wonder which would be exactly his plan.

Ogata is oddly specific as he talks of “once” (一発 ‘ippatsu’)

If Ogata were to shoot once from a distance he could, at most, kill one person as I’m not sure he can accomplish with humans the same feat he did with deer, killing two with one single blow especially since he likes to shoot them in the head but his rifle doesn’t exactly have a lot of firepower. We know this is also part of why Sugimoto managed to survive.

Of course Ogata might be actually thinking to shoot twice as, unless his location is really easy to spot once you know from which direction he’s shooting, if someone isn’t specifically looking in his direction, he would only get a general idea of the area in which he is. But, at this point, with a general idea of where Ogata is, the second shot would definitely reveal his position exactly, making him a sitting duck.

Still, okay, one or two shoots don’t change much because… what would they accomplish?

Let’s assume the goal is the land deed and Ogata wasn’t told to specifically kill someone.

Ogata might either aim to have the land deed destroyed or to snatch it so as to hand it to Central or personally destroy it. So he shoots and… what?

Whoever he kills, this won’t insure the destruction of the land deed.

If Asirpa dies, Sugimoto will grab it and bring it to the Ainu, or Hijikata will use it with the help of Kirawus or other Ainu. And if Sugimoto or Hijikata don’t manage to grab it once Asirpa is dead but it ends in Tsurumi’s hands, he’ll use it as well.

Basically maybe he only need to kill Tsurumi and maybe Tsukishima and Koito to stop the 7th from making use of the land deed… but in Hijikata’s faction case he’ll need to kill all the main members of it (Asirpa, Sugimoto, Shiraishi, Hijikata, Nagakura, Ushiyama, Toni, Kantarou, Kirawus, Kadokura, Sofia… and who might be aware of the land deed and willing to use it… and he doesn’t know if there are such people).

Sure, he can hope some of them will be killed in battle, aiming to shoot at the end of it, but… I don’t know.

We’ll see.

Anyway Ogata figures Vasily could recognize the sound of his Arisaka rifle (which he supposedly never heard before or heard at the brewery but didn’t recognize) among hundreds of Arisaka rifles and pinpoint his location the way he couldn’t do when they were at the brewery. Because Vasily is magical like that.

LOL, I’m not into ships but I still I can see this makes for some shipping material.

Okay, maybe it’s just the location they’re in are really easy to spot once you know in which area they are, and Vasily believes Asirpa is a perfect bait for Ogata so if she’s shoot accurately he can figure it’s Ogata doing it and from where he is shooting but whatever.

Anyway, we see Vasily is also seated somewhere, is background also completely blackened, him too holding binoculars as well as his rifle. Also Ogata is wearing again his fake eye but I love how Noda draws it so that while Ogata’s working eye can look at different directions, his fake eye only looks straight ahead. Amazing accuracy Noda sensei!

Back to Nagakura group we go. Heiji should have shoot again because Kadokura is now lying on the ground, the rock on which the deity was carved having flied very close to him but having missed his crotch area from few centimeters because Kadokura is just that lucky and I’m still waiting for his backstory.

Kirawus though pulls himself up and helps Mansur to get up as well. He wants to take down the last ship so, while Nagakura is on his knees coughing, Kirawus places Mansur in front of the cannon and charges it.

He remembers vividly the moment Asirpa found the land deed, he smiled as she did, his eyes shining as that land deed is a beautiful possibility for his people.

This gives him determination to pursue his goal and with this in his heart Kirawus, following Mansur’s instructions, positions the cannon and fires, hitting the front of Heiji’s ship.

Heiji, unperturbed, orders to return fire. They do, this time hitting the cannon and sending Kirawus and Mansur on the ground. I don’t know if they’re alive or dead as smoke covers half of  Kirawus.

Meanwhile the last destroyer begins to sink, Heiji, like a real captain, sinking with it calmly, his last thought to his son as the water has already reached his neck.

Sure, I guess he could try to swim as he seems unharmed, but he’s pretty far from the coast and, unless he finds something to hold on, it’s unlikely he can make it.

Heiji’s death would fits with the idea that the tiger’s curse would condemn him to a life of misfortune as he would lose his beloved father.

Still, I’m sad for him.

He was one of the few fathers in this story who loved his son and was willing to put everything aside for him.

Meanwhile as Heiji is sinking, Koito is cutting in two halves the head of a Russian soldier when he notices smoke coming from the seaside. As if sensing something he looks at it worriedly...

...but Tsukishima continues murdering Russians as if there’s no tomorrow, while Nikaidou notices Tsurumi, who has some blood either coming out from his head or falling on it which resembles a devil’s horns (because Tsurumi is back into his devil role here…), gives the signal they’ve taken over one of the bastions, probably at the south entrance since the group seems to be there.

As in answer to the signal the soldiers walks below a bridge, using it as a shield to get though, while the bastion who might have a chance at shooting at them is silent, likely being the bastion Tsurumi took over. Once back on land the soldiers run and try to get inside Goryokaku… only to meet up with the greatest danger ever, Sugimoto the immortal starting with stabbing the face of one of them and ready to make a mess of the remaining ones.

Likely those poor soldiers has just gone out of the frying pan and jumped straight into the fire as Sugimoto is a far worse danger than a bastion firing at them. The interesting part though is that Nikaidou should also be in the area and finally have his last fight with Sugimoto.

The poor guy is likely going to meet his death, unless he, Tsukishima, Koito and Tsurumi all gang up on Sugimoto. Though I doubt they can kill Sugi, the most they’ll do will be knocking him out. We’ll see.

Anyway that’s the end.

Two more words on Kirawus and on how I hope he won’t die but live on, though yes, it would also make sense for him to die while helping his people and with the hope they’ll live a better life thanks to his efforts if Noda aims to turn “Goldn Kamuy” into a new “Zanbot 3”.

When the land deed was found we didn’t see Kirawus’ reaction. I love how Noda now showed it. He was smiling and, although he was sweating a little, his eyes were shining so much they could rival with Asirpa’s. His reaction was quiet, no one seemed to pay him any mind, but it felt so fitting for him too to be delighted by the news of such a chance for his people to exist.

We’ve seen Kirawus always trying to do what’s best for his people, even going away to search for jobs so as to provide them food. When he joined Hijikata he didn’t seem to do it out of idealism, merely out of need because Hijikata could pay him, as if he didn’t truly believe anything could change… but here… it’s like hope in him has finally started burning and he just can’t give up. He won’t escape, not even when the situation is dire. He’ll quietly continue fighting for his people, fighting when Nagakura is on the ground coughing, and Kadokura had been knocked out and Mansur is wounded.

It’s Kirawus’ determination, it’s his dream of a better future for his people what truly sinks Heiji’s ship and it makes so much sense he’s him who fires the blow, it’s so perfect… and I don’t want him to die, I want him to live and collect the results of his efforts.

On the opposite side, since I doubt Noda is going to create a completely different realty in which things changed for the Ainu, this would mean in the end there would be nothing to collect and the land deed would end up lost or destroyed or whatever.

Hence killing off Kirawus while he’s hoping he fought for a better future would give him a ‘nice dead’… but really, even if nothing will change, I prefer for him to live and continue doing his best for his people. It feels like a more hopeful message than the idea that Kirawus died in hope but, at the end of the story it turns out his death was for nothing.

On the other side Kimuspu said how that treasure was actually a Wen Kamuy that killed everyone (chap 281) and it’s meaningful how the land deed ultimately was never used… so Noda might be trying to remark this.

Hope or not, they shouldn’t have never tried to put their trust in the Wen Kamuy as it would bring them nothing good. It’s already bringing people nothing good as they’re slaughtering each other on Goryokaku chasing a hope that might be as well erased by dead or by Central, letting them fight among themselces like Orcas and then becoming a loathsome creature that feed on their corpses as they sink on the bottom as in Tsurumi’s analogy of so long ago (Chap 41 & 130)? We’ll see.

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 297 “Escape from Goryokaku”

So we begin this chapter with some words of wisdom.

Yeah, as Tsurumi gets close you’ll better advance in a direction opposite to the one he’s coming from... as fast as you can. And now let’s start with the chapter.

Hum… I normally don’t care much about the line on the title pages as, in manga, they’re often not the work of the author but of the editor, and that’s why they often end up removed in the volume version but I’ll do an exception for this one.

“We have prevailed at 203 Meter Hill and the Siege of Port Arthur. We are the 7th Division, the strongest in the entire army!!”

Why I’ll make an exception for this one? Well, for start because it hints how the 7th division is winning. The other reason is something I’ll discuss at the end of this meta.

So, we’ve gotten to the point where only the north entrance is still standing, bravely protected by Sofia and her men. Sofia even shows she shares Sugimoto’s love for unconventional weapons by beating Japanese with the butt of the rifle when they get too close.

I wish she had something big to use but whatever.

Anyway, as the Japanese soldiers are forced to realize she’s no weak woman one of them try to stop her by throwing at her a grenade from behind. Sofia though is not just a fearsome fighter but also a beloved leader. Three of her men, in a desperate attempt to shield her place themselves between her and the grenade.

It works in the sense she’s unhurt although her men all die in a rather gruesome way. Sofia has no time to mourn them as she has to continue fighting though.

I guess this might trace a parallel with Hijikata, protected by Toni Anji.

It’s meaningful though how the blood trailing from Sofia’s cheecks resembles tears. She doesn’t have the time to cry for her men but it doesn’t mean she isn’t suffering.

Still, a side of me wish she hadn’t joined this battle, not in this way. Her original goal was to improve Russia. Instead now she’s following Kiroranke and Wilk’s plan and planning to immigrate in an Hokkaido they hadn’t conqueered yet from Japan, to build strenght there and then go back to Russia.

While the plan could make sense for Kiro or Wilk whose priority was to save minorities and their lifestyle and, once gotten this, they could stop, for her things are different as her aim isn’t a far eastern federation but the improvement of the whole Russia, overthrowing monarchy so that they’ll be able to modernize the country.

Creating a far eastern federation would take a lot of time and effort, it’s not something that can be done quickly. By the time they’ll accomplish it, they might be too old to go back to Russia and fight effectively for it and would have to hope in the new generations to do so.

However new generations born in Hokkaido would identify Hokkaido as their home country and not feel prone to fight for Russia.

So, basically, to fulfill Wilk and Kiro’s dreams (and likely help Asirpa of whom she’s protective) she’s neglecting her own and involving her own men who’re following her out of love in this mess, joining forces with Hijikata who’s basically using them as his army as he doesn’t really have one of his own.

So, while I’m glad to see Sofia in action and on the same side as Asirpa... the more this attack goes on and her and her men are merely used as cannon fodder to stop Tsurumi’s troops, the less I’m satisfied to see them all being used as disposable mob characters. But I’ll discuss of this later on.

Outside of Goryokaku common people is wondering what in the world is going on there. I can’t even suggest them to go call the police as the biggest authority in Hokkaido, the 7th division, is involved in the attack.

As they speculate a rider walks past them, it’s Nagakura, running to help Hijikata.

But, finally, this long battle might start to see its end.

A stable in the north side of the forth burst into flames, drawing everyone’s attention. It’s Shiraishi’s signal he and Asirpa are going to try to escape… but it’s also our clue that Hijikata’s forces are losing since Shiraishi sees as safer to leave the fort.

Sugimoto tells Hijikata they should retreat too, regroup and come back later. He belives since they got rid of a bunch of Tsurumi’s men, if they regroup they might still have a chance.

Hijikata seems doubtful. Honestly I am as well. Given time, Tsurumi can ask for reinforcements from Asahikawa. Hijikata’s group doesn’t have such luxury.

If they leave him the fort, the fort and, what’s more important, the gold are lost.

Sure, Tsurumi might have troubles finding the gold as he doesn’t know where it is, but Hijikata’s group wouldn’t be able to go there again and steal it from him without him not knowing. They should hope Tsurumi would believe the gold really didn’t exist in the first place and there was only the land deed and leave the fort.

Besides Hijikata wanted to defend the fort and either win or die trying so I’m not sure he’ll be okay retreating even if there would be a chance to reconqueer it and the gold.

Meanwhile Koito got smart enough to understand the fire might be a diversion for Sugimoto’s group to try to escape and warns his soldiers about it… though he believes they won’t manage to try and swim across the moat, so as not to risk damaging the land deed.

There’s someone who’s smarter than Koito though, Tsurumi, who, despite Tsukishima asking him if he wants to investigate the stables, from the fire likely guessed the situation and where Asirpa should be and started to run there.

Meanwhile Shiraishi is trying to escape on a horse, dressed as a 7th soldier, a large back on his back, telling to the soldiers who try to stop him he has a urgent message, so they should let him through. Shiraishi is good at this sort of things but, unluckily for him, Koito arrives right then and as he knows and recognizes him, he orders his soldiers to stop him, though warns them not to shoot him as he thinks Asirpa and the land deed are inside the bad Shiraishi is carrying.

On a personal note I think it’s nice Koito doesn’t want his soldiers to shoot a child. It shows he has a basic moral standing.

Shiraishi reaches the bridge but new soldiers come across it and Koito manages to cut the bag away from his back, causing it to dangle on the handrail of the bridge.

It seems all lost when Nagakura comes to rescue, easily getting rid of the men of the 7th because Nagakura is just that awesome.

Meanwhile the bag is about to slip into the moat.

I don’t know why Shiraishi doesn’t try to take advantage of Koito being busy with Nagakura to try and retrieve it. While we’re told the bag doesn’t contain Asirpa nor the land deed, the bag has in it the ropes Shiraishi plans to use to have Asirpa, who doesn’t really know how to swim well as she said she can swim only where she touches with her feet, swim across the moat, the land deed not really risking to get damaged as they had means to protect it.

Shiraishi though, gives up on retrieving the bag and thinks Asirpa should try swimming the moat on her own which… really doesn’t work well for me but whatever.

Meanwhile Asirpa, checking the situation with the binoculars, see that Toni Anji is dead. It’s a big blow for her, Noda tries to drive it home by showing as if her body is turning into water...

...a trick he used also when he showed Asirpa dealing with Ariko’s apparent death and Boutarou...

I really hope he’s not trying to drive my girl insane with all those shocks.

Meanwhile Shiraishi isn’t coming but someone else much more dangerous is, Tsurumi, who has just located Asirpa, is running toward her, forcing her to escape.

Back to the south entrance we can see that Nagakura is ready to face Koito in a battle I really want to see as they should both be awesome sword fighters, both specialized in a powerful fighting style.

Although I’m sure if one of the two will die, that one won’t be Koito, I’ll confess I’m gonna cheer for Nagakura. It’s interesting how Nagakura is calling Koito a ‘potato samurai’. Is he looking down on him or trying to get a rise from him? We’ll discover in the next chapter.

So now this is the point where I go back to the line at the beginning… which is that, in the end I get the feeling that, more than the 7th division winning against Hijikata’s forces, this battle is a reiteration of ‘the Japanese are stronger than the Russians’ (we had something like that when 4 Japanese beat up the Russians at the stenka… and then it turned out the strongest stenka fighter they had was actually a Japanese as well, Gansoku) and therefore it feels less that the 7th has gained the victory and more than the 7th had to win to show that Japanese are better than Russian to its Japanese audience.

But the story behind all this might be a little more complicate than that.

Noda likely always intended Hijikata’s forces to have a big, great battle against Tsurumi’s forces only… by the time we reached this chapter, Hijikata had no real forces to speak of, which would be a huge oversight on Hijikata’s part as he knew sooner or later he would have to fight the 7th… one that would make no sense but that might have come to be due to changes in the plot.

In fact if we jump far, far in the past, we started the story with Hijikata trying to recruit men. We’ve Ushiyama and Nagakura yes, but later we’ll see him with 8 men of his own, trying to recruit Shibukawa Zenjirou so as to get him and his whole crew to join them.

In short Hijikata knew he would have needed more men to do what he planned to do and it can entirely be that, in the original plans for the story, Hijikata was meant to recruit more and more men so as to have him too an army to oppose to Tsurumi or Central. Things with Shibukawa didn’t work out, because we were meant to see Hijikata in actions, but it’s entirely possible Hijikata was meant to incorporate in his ranks the whole Hidoro gang and, possibly Kusuda’s gang as well. In fact we see in Barato he will ultimately lead the Hidoro gang and both the Hidoro gang and the Kusuda gang will remain without a master.

As by this point we can see Hijikata is clearly meant to lose the battle here at Goryokaku in favour of a victory the 7th, it would have made sense an army composed by gang members who never fought in a real war and were motivated solely by greed and, possibly, a bit of hero worship for Hijikata, would lose.

Instead all he’ll recruit from the Hidoro gang are Kantarou and Kamezo, Ogata joining him on his own for his own purposes.

It’s not the only instance in which Hijikata doesn’t really collect men.

Hijikata will recruit Toni but he’ll only made use of his blind bandits gang at Noboribetsu, where it will be all murdered, Hijikata deploying Toni there for unclear reasons.

In his trip to Abashiri he’ll only recruit Kadokura, who was already on his side, not other convicts or guards who could now be enemies of the 7th as the latter tried to wipe them out.

He’ll recruit Kirawus out of luck, because the latter need money.

Youichirou will refuse to join him and prefer to die where he was.

He’ll recruit Ariko, also on shaky grounds (why Ariko? Who told him about Ariko’s father?) but apparently solely to steal the skins from Tsurumi and won’t try to have other Ainu, be them partisans or not, join his cause.

In short Hijikata acts like he never considers he would have to fight the whole of Tsurumi’s army sooner or later… but it can be in the original plan Hijikata was meant to be smarter than that, trying to collect men left and right as well, be they members from gangs, criminals, convicts, guards of Ainu. As said before, his forces wouldn’t be composed of elite soldiers but, at least, he would be able to count on a number of fighters to contrast Tsurumi.

Instead, hadn’t Sofia came to Hokkaido and decided to side with him, he might have risked attempting to defend Goryokaku against Tsurumi’s force with only Sugimoto, Shiraishi, Asirpa, Kirawus, Kadokura, Kantarou, Ushiyama, Toni and Nagakura. If we count him as well, a meager group 10 people, no matter how amazing they were, just couldn’t hold a candle against an army of more than 100 people. Defending Goryokaku in 10 would have been totally impossible.

So why painting Hijikata as this dumb or at least as this poorly organized?

Because handling Hijikata’s army would have been troublesome, story wise. We see how Noda even forgets for a while Toni’s men, showing only Toni in Hijikata’s ranks.

A huge number of mob characters tailing Hijikata or being at standby somewhere was likely unpractical to handle through the story. We see that from Barato come only Kantarou and Kamezo and Noda decided to kill Kamezo’s off pretty soon.

Hijikata’s smaller group, story wise is easier to handle and feel like a family. We know each member of the Hijikata squad, we love them and since they’re such a small number it’s the main characters we love who get to do the action, we don’t have mob characters trying to encircle Ostrog or capture Sekiya or things like that. While we read the story prior to this big fight, Hijikata’s small group of important characters feels perfect to narrate the story and enjoys the spotlight each time Hijikata moves. A huge group wouldn’t work equally as well.

What’s more the Ainu, which should have been one of the main parts in the conflict as the new republic of Ezo should have involved them and Asirpa was meant to be their leader and all the stuff, are actually completely cut out by it.

We only have 3 Ainu in Hijikata’s faction and their contribute to the battle is minimal.

Ariko remains behind, left for death but actually fine, Kirawus leaves Goryokaku to help with the cannon and enjoy his moment of glory helping sinking a destroyer and only gets some bruises and a broken leg, Asirpa is, as usual, not really involved in the battle.

It’s possible Noda considered including more Ainu in this conflict but then changed his mind because the battle would then shows us Wajin murdering Ainu all around, while Ainu try to murder Wajin back. And, ultimately, the 7th would win and kill them all or most of them. How would this feel to readers?

To see the 7th division, pride of Japan as it’s the strongest division of the Army, massacre Ainu?

How would this sentence feel if the ones murdered were Ainu?

“We have prevailed at 203 Meter Hill and the Siege of Port Arthur. We are the 7th Division, the strongest in the entire army!!”

And, at the same time, how would it feel to see the Ainu fight and murder the Japanese?

So Noda likely cut them out from the battle as well but ultimately couldn’t cut the battle.

So enter Sofia’s men, Russians, mob characters and red shirts.

Noda hardly bothered to characterize them. Only Mansur did have a bit of characterization and the same goes for Sofia, but her role as well is reduced as she feels more someone working under Hijikata than someone equal to him and the battle taking place where she is ultimately holds little interest, if we forget how she decides to stay there despite the danger and how her men protected her in this chapter, nothing really relevant happened. That’s because ultimately they’re only there to get killed… and the fact they’re Russian is convenient, because their loss, their death, won’t really impact on the readers in any possible way.

The Russian lose against the Japanese. Even though they actually were presented like tough guys, nothing can stand against the mighty Japanese and, although the 7th division is actually fighting for the wrong side, as the empathy level for those poor Russian is kept as low as possible by them being mob characters, the 7th massacring them all feels less impactful than the 7th massacring those Japanese guards at Abashiri.

The downside though, especially for a foreigner reader like me who’s not supposed to feel pride in the strength of the 7th division, is that the battle lacks of emotional impact. It has started in chap 285 and it will likely drags on for some more chapters so we are at more than 12 chapters and still going, where the battle of Abashiri lasted 9/10 chapters but Abashiri, between the two felt a lot more intriguing because there were extremely few pages spent on fights between mob characters and the most of the story focused on fights between relevant characters (Hijikata/Inudou, Sugimoto/Nikaidou) or on plot.

Even the fight between mob characters has a purpose there, it shows Tsurumi’s men shooting at guards that are willing to surrender, or Tsurumi being a tad too excited at murdering people and, anyway, it’s kept pretty short, especially in the magazine version (the volume version expanded it a bit). Here instead we’ve pages of soldiers getting shoot from both sides for no other reason than showing the violence of the conflict… but as most of them are mob characters… well this doesn’t really make for emotional scenes… and the conclusion of the battle, I fear, is going to feel weak as well, probably only saved by some important character’s death, like Hijikata’s and Nagakura’s, because we aren’t really invested in those mob characters and the idea that hey, the 7th division is so cool and strong, might be appealing for a Japanese reader but for a not Japanese one, the 7th is no better than Sofia’s army, a huge bunch of mob characters with whom we don’t empathize because they’re just mob characters.

Minions.

Villains as for us it’s easier to buy into Hijikata’s and Sofia’s narrative than in Tsurumi’s.

All this to criticize Noda?

No, not really.

All this is the unavoidable conclusion to technical problems created when you’re writing a serialized work.

If you correct the plot along the way so that it’ll work better, you’ll end up on stumbling on logic errors, like Hijikata not getting himself an army. Noda rather cleverly tried to provide an easy fix by handing him Sofia’s army… but he evidently didn’t have time to make it so that the patch used to cover the problem wouldn’t be visible.

He couldn’t get rid of the Goryokaku battle as well as it’s clearly important. It’s not just that the gold and the land deed are here, it provides closure for Toni and Nikaidou and probably for Nagakura and Hijikata. And since we’re at around the end of the story it makes sense it’s presented as a bigger deal than Abashiri, with Noda devoting more time on it.

So, to sum it up, Noda remains a great writer… but now he’s forced to deal with the problems of an endgame in a serialized series that, likely, was changed along the way. He’s trying to fix things so that the story will still work… but of course it’s not possible to fix everything smoothly and elegantly.

At least that’s my huge speculation on why to me, and to other people I talked with, this Goryokaku battle just feels less impressive than the Abashiri one, even though they both are pretty similar, big battles including mob characters (the 7th) versus other mob characters (the convicts and the guards). It’s likely a problem that’s not going to last long, as the battle/massacre is about to come to its end and, hopefully, the changes it suffered won’t impact with the remaining plot, allowing us to reach the ending without further complication.

We’ll see. See you at the next chapter!

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 288 “A Pleasant Man”

So from a Watsonain perspective I’ve to praise Wilk as it turned out everything went...

yeah, just as he planned it... though Doylistically speaking let me be amazed by how Noda made this wonderful and intricate plot... but let’s start with order.

The story starts with a very useful timeline concerning the events that involved the gold.

There are little things I appreciate more than timelines so I’m extremely grateful to Noda for it.

We move back to the Russian consulate in 1902.

Irenka, one of the Ainu working with Wilk, correctly guesses the government which rules Hokkaido wouldn’t just give them the land, should they show up with the land deed.

Wilk suggests to ask Enomoto Takeaki for help at which the others correctly imply it would be a little hard for them to meet him.

As if this wasn’t difficult enough, Kimuspu informs them the Japanese government is AFTER THE LAND DEED and would steal it before they were to reach Enomoto, which is why they were forced to hide it there.

But then he suggests a Nispa might be able to help to get in touch with Enomoto.

We go back to 1869 and to a much younger Kimuspu, one that looks more like Cikapasi due to how the signs on his face are now more marked.

He explains they used to go to Goryokaku as they negotiated with Enomoto over buying the land, without even knowing the battle of Hakodate would escalate.

Early at the beginning of the story (chap 30) Hijikata lamented how their battle was hampered by the struggle to get funds...

...which seems to hint whatever agreement Enomoto managed to reach with the Ainu, was reached too late.

Anyway, while the others go take part to the negotiation Kimuspu is left behind to take care to give water to the horses and, as he does so he meets Hijikata… who basically behaves like a Sugimoto with a slightly different face...

Hijikata is curious of Kimuspu’s tattoo, he’ll help Kimuspu, is cheerful and modest, admitting all he’s good with are battles, horses and women. Okay, Sugimoto is popular with women but can’t understand them at all while Hijikata was supposedly better at this but whatever, Hijikata really feels like him to me… though I doubt they plan to have them be related.

Anyway Kimuspu doesn’t let him know why they’re there but clearly likes him and finds him a ‘Sawayakana otoko’ (爽やかな男 “pleasant/refreshing/invigorating/clear man”). Later he finds out he’s Hijikata, an Ezo republic commander.

Enomoto keeps the land deed as a secret. I wonder if, should he had won the war, he too would have tried getting it back.

Anyway the Ainu prepare the gold, though they don’t really trust Enomoto.

They’re being too slow though.

The government forces begin their all-out attack.

We’re at June 20 (lunar calendar May 11), 1869, and Hijikata, instead than being killed as history wants, is just nearly killed near the Ippongi Kanmon but manages to drag himself back despite the wounds...

...and is helped by Kimuspu, despite his comrades being against it. In order to give them a reason to care about Hijikata, Kimuspu reminds them he’s Enomoto’s comrades but it’s clear he’s not helping him just for that.

Kimuspu should have been a nice person, it fits he’s Cikapasi’s grandfather.

Anyway he brings Hijikata in one of the house left empty when its owners evacuated, so as not to let Hijikata be found by soldiers.

When Hijikata awakes, he’s reached by the news the Kaitenmaru was also destroyed by fire (always on June 20) and thinks they should protect the fortress Benten Daiba as Goryokaku  will surely fall due to the bombing of the ships, but Kimuspu tells him the day before, (June 24th) while he was unconscious, the fortress surrendered. This means we’re at the 25th. Goryokaku will surrender the 27th.

At this Hijikata likely understands they’ve no more hope to fight and asks Kimuspu to bring him to mount Hakodate, apparently to a statue of Kannon. Hijikata, dressed up as an Ainu to disguise himself, doesn’t manage to explain why he wanted to go there as the bombing on Goryokaku resumes and then they’re found by soldiers, who recognize Hijikata.

Kimuspu, gets in between them and Hijikata. He explains his action saying he was desperate because he figured the Ainu would lose the land of the republic of Ezo. Although he manages to push the rifle away from Hijikata, the soldier fires anyway and kills one of the Ain that were with Kimuspu.

At this Hijikata tells him to stop or they all would be killed and let the guards take him away. Kimuspu who had been pushed on the ground, stares at the dead Ainu in shock but he’s evidently released later on as it’s only Hijikata who’s carried away, apologizing to them and promising he won’t forget the debt he owns to them.

Kimuspu explains how, out of guilt for letting the soldiers take Hijikata, he couldn’t tell Enomoto how the latter survived. However, when he tries to find information on Hijikata’s fate no one wants to say he was caught or executed and, several years later he begins hearing rumors about Hijikata having been looked in a prison, an ex-warden even confirming this. So Kimuspu is sure Hijikata is alive.

Ratci adds in he also hears rumors about Hijikata being alive and helping to build the convict road.

Anyway they work up in their mind that Hijikata could get their message to Enomoto. How since he’s a prisoner those survival they’re basically hiding? Well, Oskeporo suggests they could pretend to be wardens and break him out. It’s worth to mention by then Hijikata was already in Abashiri so making him escape isn’t as easy as they make it out… but, on the other side, I do wonder if this was all part of Wilk’s plan. I mean, he and the other Ainu were hiding near to where there were those ‘prison lodges’ in which Inudou kept laborers confined… and, when the other Ainu die Wilk rushes there and have himself being arrested, asking to give Inudou the message he killed 7 Ainu and knows the location to the Ainu hidden gold.

I mean, at a first glance it seemed he did it merely to escape from Tsurumi… but maybe his goal was reaching Abashiri and getting into contact with Hijikata in the first place so as to use the whole incident with the Ainut o carry on his plan.

We see him repeating Hijikata’s name with a thoughtful expression after all…

...and then Kimuspu claims he knows a good spot to hide the gold, the good spot being the well. As they place the gold inside the well, one of them guarding the group in the distance, Kimuspu explains the last time they met Enomoto he saw the well being covered with dirt, so the Meiji government might not have noticed it existed. As a result the Ainu hid the gold there and starts planning an uprising among the Ainu.

So yes, they wanted to fight with weapons the Japanese government, not just use the land deed to have the land pacifically.

Wilk also thinks if Hijikata hadn’t forgotten his debt, he should repay the Ainu of the future. Honestly I think he should repay only Kimuspu… as Kimuspu’s Ainu friends back then helped him solely because he was Enomoto’s friend and they were making business with him but whatever, we know how Wilk is, for him the Ainu’s cause is the only one that matter… though from how he speaks he seems to link ‘Ainu of the future’ to Asirpa, whose name means woman of the future. So he basically is saying Hijikata should help his daughter.

The flashback ends here and the visual is pretty good because it moves from Wilk looking down in the well to Asirpa looking up from the well, as if to give the illusion she and Wilk could see each other… but the one looking down in the well this time is Hijikata, who likely means to repay his debt anyway.

And so that’s the story of how Hijikata and Wilk connected the whole horse kanji with a well whose existence only the two of them knew.

I’ll be honest, on one side I’m not overly fond of all this background exposition as it’s just that, exposition with little personal drama (I mean, Kimuspu was clearly grief stricken when the soldiers try to arrest Hijikata and, in effort to stop them, he inadvertently cause one of his friends to get killed… but this isn’t really explored… at most it’s exploited by Wilk) but, on the other side, I’m amazed by how Noda came up with such an intricate plot.

I mean, the meeting between Nopperabou and Hijikata seemed casual, they were merely two prisoners in the same prison… and Wilk trusting Hijikata to take care of Asirpa and carrying on all that plan seemed a risky bet based on circumstances but now it turns out Hijikata was ALWAYS part of the plan and the code was made keeping not only Asirpa but he too into consideration because Wilk clearly assumed Asirpa wouldn’t accomplish anything with the land deed without Hijikata’s support and the hideout of the gold is basically a jab at Hijikata’s moral sense so as to remind him Ainu (well, ONE Ainu) helped him so he should help them as well.

So while a side of me is ‘well, I don’t really care about this little sidestory per se as it’s just exposition and not emotionally engaging…’ the other side is ‘oh my this man actually planned all those plot details so damn carefully I’m amazed! I love him! This is just great writing!’

Oh well, I hope everyone else is enjoying how the story is revealing itself as much as I’m doing because, really, I’m having lot of fun! I love to see such a well thought plot! This is such a masterful work!

Anyway, see you all to the next chapter!

[goldenkamuyhunting]

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 296 “Bushido”

So we’ve a new chapter which will lead the group to deploy a pretty old strategy.

For who’s wondering the Leviathan is a demonic sea serpent noted in theology and mythology, often an embodiment of chaos. From the early 17th century has also been used to refer to overwhelmingly powerful people or things.

There’s plenty of variations of this way to say though as some mention a snake or, more generally, just a head (“Cut off the head, and the body will die”, “Cut off the head of the snake, the body dies”, “When the head of a snake is cut off, the rest of his body is an ordinary rope”...).

It’s also worth to mention this strategy wouldn’t work equally as well if Tsurumi were to deploy it as we’ve both Hijikata and Sofia in charge of his enemies (though Noda is really not using Sofia much) plus Sugimoto who’s not the sharpest pencil in the box but is a charismatic fighter so troops would still go fighting after him.

But whatever, I’m running ahead.

We start… with a flashback… which I think Noda will want to fix in the volume version because, although some important points are made… well, they aren’t made in a smooth, relevant and clear manner.

Anyway let’s look at it.

Wilk is tattoing Hijikata. Hijikata, old fox that he is, points out how, instead than going through all the troubles of doing things in such a roundabout way, he could just tell him where the gold is.

Now… this is not quite exact because it’s due to the fact they were tattooed prisoners carrying a map on their back that Tsurumi had his men ‘steal’ them from Inudou’s prison. Shiraishi couldn’t escape from Abashiri on his own which is why he joined Hijikata’s tattoed group so it’s not so easy to leave Abashiri, probably even if Hijikata could count on Kadokura’s support. So, well, they would still need to tattoo Hijikata and the others.

Of course Hijikata might be referring to the gold hunt.

Wilk could have given them fake tattoos and while Tsurumi chased after a fake map Hijikata could have snatched the gold. In this case yes, Wilk could have just tattooed them then told them the truth as Sugimoto said Wilk should have done when he met him, this is a fair question, but there’s a problem Sugimoto didn’t consider.

Wilk is apparently unsure if that guy he’s tattooing is the real Hijikata as not even Kadokura met him before. Now, okay, the government said Hijikata died, but Kimuspu told Wilk Hijikata lived and since neither Inudou nor Tsurumi know Wilk counted on Hijikata to deliver the land deed, they would have no reason to have Wilk met a fake Hijikata.

Siromakur apparently wasn’t even with them when they discussed about Hijikata so he can’t think he would have talked about him with Tsurumi.

So the whole ‘maybe you’re not Hijikata’ feels a tad weak to me because otherwise why should that guy claim to be Hijikata? But whatever, Wilk might have grown paranoid and, after all, there’s plenty of mad criminals in that prison so maybe assuming one of them could believe he’s Hijikata could make sense.

Whatever.

Hijikata retorts asking Wilk to prove he’s an Ainu… because?

Wilk explains about his eyes being blue due to his father being a polish man exiled in Karafuto… because this proves he’s an Ainu? Besides, didn’t they say in the past there were Ainu with blue eyes due to them being mixed with Russian blood?

Whatever, I just wish they had, at least, said Wilk’s father’s name. I hate not knowing characters’ names.

Hijikata is up to date with how the Polish, who live on what for him might be the other side of the world, kept on revolting against Russia. We know he’s used to read newspapers but I don’t know how much Japanese newspapers cared about Polish situation back then. Whatever, let’s assume he knows.

Hijikata, with this new info, assumes Wilk wanted to steal the Ainu gold from Hokkaido Ainu and use it to fight against Russia. He’s not so off track as this was basically Wilk’s original plan when he moves to Hokkaido. What Hijikata is missing is that Wilk wanted to fight for Russian minorities instead than Poland and that he would have had Hokkaido Ainu to join his eastern federation. The fact they might not be interested to join never dawned on him… until he had a daughter and decided the Hokkaido Ainu were better off on their own and it was the other minorities who could move in Hokkaido if they really wanted a place to stay.

I can’t help it, I think Wilk’s plan was bad from start to the end. Toni scolds them, claiming if they talk so loudly he can’t hear the sound of the warden’s footsteps, showing us Toni was already into the plan. I’m not sure though why Hijikata didn’t recruit him back then already into his own forces, beyond they needed to fight him for the blind bandit arc to take place.

Hijikata drops the whole ‘maybe you aren’t an Ainu’ or ‘maybe you want to steal the Ainu gold for the Polish’ and goes on saying they’ve a common goal, stopping Russia’s advance to south making Hokkaido into an independent, multi-ethnic country. Well, overall, this is not wrong.

It’s just that Hijikata wants the Ezo republic to be a buffer state so as to protect Japanese while Wilk wanted it to be a place for Ainu to live keeping their own culture so what they would make of Ezo republic is completely different.

We don’t know how Wilk planned to handle it, but we heard Hijikata would sustain it by investing into coal mining… which isn’t really something that would preserve the Ainu lifestyle, not mentioning I doubt Wilk wanted Hokkaido to exist as a protection for Japanese. Whatever, since their goal is similar on the surface and Wilk can’t escape anyway, Hijikata summarizes this forces Wilk to trust him no matter who he might be. Because, really, Hijikata, we needed you to start throwing us doubts on your identity at us at this point in the story.

Not that I’m gonna believe you’re actually your secret twin brother but whatever.

Wilk goes and tells us something we already knew, that if the guy he is tattooing isn’t Hijikata it would be a real problem as there’s something only Hijikata can do.

Actually there are two things only Hijikata can do, one is to bring the land deed to Enomoto, the other is to find the gold as he’s the only one who knows about the old well. But the visual tells us Wilk cares only about the land deed.

Hijikata asks explanations he doesn’t get as Wilk states he can’t be sure Hijikata will work for the sake of the Ainu.

Hijikata’s idea to reassure Wilk is to explain him he’ll continue to fight for the sake of JAPAN as Japan is an extension of the family he loves and of the hometown who raised him, claiming this includes Hokkaido Ainu as well.

I’m not quite as sure this is a solid reasoning because his plan is to basically use them to protect the rest of Japan but whatever. Hijikata is one who’s fine with sacrifice so maybe he really doesn’t see a problem here.

He then admits he’ll also do it because, on a personal level he owes a debt to the Ainu, more specifically to Kimuspu and his friends. This seals the deal for Wilk who DOESN’T TELL HIM THE PLACE IN WHICH THE GOLD OR THE LAND DEED ARE HIDDEN, just his daughter’s Japanese name and how Hijikata should meet her.

The next we see is another mini flashback, one in which Hijikata does Citatap with Cikapasi before they break into Abashiri. Here we can see that in that moment his gaze was actually focused on Asirpa, which he planned to bring to Nopperabou so as to get the information he wanted about the gold... and probably had already devised the plan to get Sugimoto out of the picture.

So okay, no, I don’t get how Wilk’s mind work.

He still doesn’t trust Hijikata so that he doesn’t give him the location of the gold or of the land deed, nor Asirpa’s Ainu’s name but gives him a way to track her which means if Hijikata wasn’t trustworthy now he has put his daughter in troubles too… and Asirpa can’t really vouch on him being Wilk until she met him so it’s not like she can confirm his identity… I think the idea is that Wilk wanted to push Hijikata to bring Asirpa to him, so it was very convenient for him that Asirpa had already decided to go see him and that the fake tattooed skins made the whole infiltration in Abashiri a plan that seemed easier than managing to recognize fake skins from real ones.

Anyway all this told us… that Wilk more or less believed Hijikata was who he said to be and therefore he trusted him enough to entrust to him his daughter… sort of as he didn’t quite give him her true name… but not the gold… which we… kind of already knew?

I’m not against flashback, I’m all for them but this is really no new info.

If anything the only thing we discovered was how Wilk learnt that Hijikata remembered Kimuspu and felt in debt with him… which yes, might have caused him to trust him a little more but the plan was already started anyway so… I don’t know?

On another, completely different note, this flashback reminded me of something relevant.

For the plan tied to the land deed to work they need Hijikata (or possibly Nagakura as he too likely had connection with Enomoto) to survive and bring the land deed to him. Only they’re likely both going to die in this fight… because if they could survive and join Enomoto they would likely lose their chance to die in battle here at Goryokaku… unless Enomoto is going to drop a visit.

Kadokura likely can’t work as a connection as, prior to Abashiri, he didn’t personally know Hijikata which makes me think he didn’t know Enomoto either so it would be hard for him to be received (though if we’ll make it a matter of luck Enomoto could just happen to stumble in front of Kadokura).

Ogata was probably sent there to keep the land deed away from Tsurumi’s hands. His grandfather was likely on the losing side of the Boshin war, fighting for the Shogun and might have fought for Enomoto as well. In a past ask I wondered if it was possible he’ll be the one who actually has the connections with Enomoto which are needed to use the land deed… but truth is we know really little of what’s behind Ogata so it’s hard to say anything about him… through this would explain why he had to remain a player up till now, he’s ultimately needed for the land deed to be put to use.

On the other side, using the land deed would change history so Noda might not wish for that.

So, either the land deed is going to turn completely useless or we need someone to manage to have the connections that’ll allow him to make it work.

We’ll see.

If I were to take a wild guess I would say so far Ogata’s interests lied in the land deed not being found by anyone, more than in putting it to use, but this is just me.

Ogata has been absent for so long Noda might be up at everything with him.

Back to the story we go… only what remains is just Hijikata defeating soldier after soldier in a rather awesome way.

However he also gets shoot, hit...

...stabbed and recognized...

...then Sugimoto comes to his aid and then they beat up more soldiers because together they’re an awesome duo (and in the past Noda had fun at making them pretty similar)...

...but then Sugimoto soon realizes they’re in a pinch.

Credits when it’s due, in truth Sugimoto, in the Japanese text, isn’t saying the whole 7th division soldiers are stronger compared to the Russian partisans, just that the soldiers OVER THERE are stronger.

‘Mukō no heitai no hō ga tsuyoi. Jōkyō wa kanari kibishī zo.’

向こうの兵隊のほうが強い. 状況はかなり厳しいぞ

“The soldiers over there are stronger. The situation is pretty tough!”

If they’re stronger compared to the Russians or compared to the ones they had previously fought (either because they’re fresher troops and therefore less tired or just because they’re just better, or just because it’s Sugimoto’s group who’s worn out and therefore perceives the soldiers as stronger) is up to speculation, but it’s clear that they’re presenting more troubles for everyone, from the Russian rebels to Hijikata and Sugimoto (who also gets shoot though, knowing him and his immortality, it’s probably just a flesh wound).

Hijikata, being the planner he is, tells Sugimoto he, being the best fighter they have but also one Hijikata wouldn’t mind doing without once the battle has ended (was the pre Abashiri flashback in this chapter placed here to remind us about how Hijikata isn’t actually a Sugimoto fan and wouldn’t mind to use him to hold back his enemies and, at the same time, get rid of him?), has to find Tsurumi and get rid of him because, if they get rid of him, his troops will lose their strenght.

Sugimoto points out Hijikata didn’t give him the easiest of the tasks but goes anyway.

Meanwhile Shiraishi makes the point of the situation. With the south and east entrance taken by the 7th all that still stands is the north entrance. Should it fall all the soldiers would come after them so they should run away now, in order to protect the land deed, meaning they’re also leaving behind the gold, unless Shiraishi managed to get some gold dust for himself, likely not much though as he doesn’t seem to have any bag, at best enough to fill his pockets… though honestly, Sugimoto pulled him up short after they found the gold because the bombing started so I’m not sure Shiraishi managed to collect any of the dust which had fallen on them.

On another side... I wonder if Asirpa will be willing to leave without Sugimoto again. In a way this attack parallel the Abashiri arc, which ended with Asirpa escaping with Shiraishi (and Kiro and Ogata) leaving Sugimoto, Tsurumi and Hijikata behind. Of course in that arc she believed Sugimoto to be dead, that’s why she let herself be carried away (that and also Kiro first and Shiraishi after picked her up and physically dragged her away).

It’ll be interesting to see if she will prioritize the land deed and her people or Sugimoto.

There’s also something else to take into consideration, which is Vasily. Previous chapters made clear Vasily was using Asirpa and Shiraishi as baits to draw Ogata out. Will he try again what he did in Shizuka and shoot either at Shiraishi or at Asirpa in hope this will force Ogata to act? Or is he aiming to use Sugimoto as bait this time so he’ll be the one who’ll shoot Sugimoto in the head this time? Or is he up to something completely different?

Really, Noda had kept him around, albeith not used him for all this time, I just want for him to finally do something plot relevant to start this goddamn sniper duel he so longs to have.

Anyway we’ll see.

And with this, the chapter ends.

So we had a flashback of 5 pages, 12 pages of fight and 1 page for Shiraishi to tell Asirpa the situation and that they’ll do better to escape.

As the flashback wasn’t very meaningful this, more than a chapter on the art of war, felt like a filler. Sure, I’ve to say showing Hijikata and Sugimoto fighting for 11 pages (opposed to the single page in which we see soldiers and Russian fight) made this 12 pages fight more interesting than the previous as we have emotional involvement for Hijikata and Sugimoto while the poor Russians and the poor soldiers feel just like mob characters to us, and this chapter also managed to deliver how their situation is getting more dire but still it feels like it used a lot of pages to say something that could be said in a lot less of them.

Is it due to the pacing? Does Noda need to get to a specific chapter number before having something happen? Or the next thing that’s going to happen needs a good amount of pages so the little that was needed from this chapter couldn’t be inserted in the following one?

We’ll see.