#I have such a hard time characterizing toji for some reason but here you go

[ryukatters]

def gojo, but also toji and maybe y’all are like competing assassins who run into eachother sometimes

⟡ word count: ~700

⟡ a/n: your brain is so big

⟡ Based on this ask

Your target is right ahead of you.

Just a few more feet, the two of you will be away from any wandering eyes and security cameras— and you’ll be in the clear to take him out with a single blow.

It’s an older gentleman— a local politician, you’ve been told, with connections to the black market. Made a few people working underground unhappy with some new laws passed. So you’ve been ordered to execute him.

You get jobs like this all the time. You don’t necessarily like what you do, but you don’t necessarily hate it either. It’s something that brings food to the table, allows you a roof over your head. Despite your unconventional career, it’s actually pretty stable, given your high success rate and gracious recommendations from satisfied clients.

Stable, as long as you’re the one actually doing the killing.

You blink once and suddenly your politician has a bullet going straight through his skull.

“You’ve gotta be faster than that, sweetheart.”

The politician’s body hits the floor with a dull thud. You hardly pay attention because all you hear is the rush of blood in your eardrums and all you can see is that annoying smirk on that stupid face of his.

Damn him.

You stomp towards Toji angrily, pointing an accusing finger into his (well-built) chest, “That was my target, you freak!”

“Was it? Well that’s too bad. Looks like you’ll have to pick up another job elsewhere,” he sneers. “Think you could make a pretty penny with those tits of yours.” He stares down at them pointedly. You feel your cheeks burn from humiliation.

“Oh fuck off, Fushiguro.”

“I’d much rather fuck you.”

Toji Fushiguro: a quick, money hungry, infamous assassin. Or, as you often call him— a pain in the ass. Your ass specifically, since he seems to have a tendency to sabotage all of your missions.

He’d argue that he simply has a penchant for pretty things, and you’re a high he has yet to come down from.

“You’re deplorable,” you spit, arms crossing over your chest. “A waste of space. Are you really so broke that you feel the need to steal someone else’s kill? Maybe you’re the one that needs to pick up a gig at the local strip club.”

Your words do nothing— they bounce off him as if he were a wall of solid steel. He might as well be. Nothing could ever penetrate Toji, physically and emotionally.

“So everyone can see the scratches you leave on my back?” He sneers, taking a step closer. He smells like sweat and cheap cologne. It’s intoxicating. “Dunno why you’re pretendin’ to hate me s’much with the way you’re creamin’ on my cock all the time.”

“Maybe because that’s the only redeeming quality you have,” you bite back. Toji merely chuckles, as if the venom spewing from your lips lacks virulence. And maybe it does.

“You’re pretty spunky today, baby. You know how much it turns me on when you put up a fight.”

You let out a growl, swinging your arm to punch him, but he’s gone from your sight before you even get the chance to land a blow. That’s the second time you’ve missed tonight.

He appears behind you before you can react.

Toji presses a kiss to the nape of your neck, relishing in the way you suppress a shiver as he leans down to his whisper in your ear, “Gotta be faster than that, sweetheart.”

You hate him. You remind yourself that every single time you see him.

“Bring that attitude with you tonight and see where that gets you,” he murmurs, allowing himself a rough nip at your jugular— a little taste of the inevitable. “You know where to find me.”

The words ring in your mind, each syllable being burned into your hippocampus with every passing second. You make quick work of delivering the corpse to your handler before you’re off to find a certain assassin.

Toji Fushiguro would ruin your life. Yet for some reason, you can’t find it in you to push him away when he calls.

[helloarchivist]

2-24 even for Shanks 💕

Oh my goodness, thank you bby!! Y'all are gonna hear about Shanks today lmfao. Most of this is gonna be under a readmore bc I've never been able to be succinct but here we goooooo!

2. Favorite canon thing about this character?

I love how careful he is about when and how he flexes all that power he has. It was meant to be very on the nose when we were introduced to him via Luffy in the very beginning of the series, but like. His little episode on Whitebeard's ship seemed like he had conqueror's haki out of control, but it was a very purposeful flex, if for nothing else than to show that he took approaching another Yonko seriously. Or the way he chose to handle Greenbull at the end of Wano. Sure it was hard to the new folks on his crew to handle exposure so suddenly, but he sent that like 50 miles out from the ship and hit that jerk in the heart with it. And never even raised his voice about it. Idk I think his restraint and how it manifests is a really interesting part of his characterization.

4. If you could put this character in any other media, be it a book, a movie, anything, what would you put them in?

it's probably on my mind bc of Bernard Hill's recent passing, but I think Shanks would do so well and have a grand old time being elusive and mysterious in Lord of the Rings lmfao. He's got that Aragorn quality of could be in his 20s could be in his 40s who knows, he and Gandalf would probably get a kick out of each other, he'd fucking love the hobbits I am telling you this. (he also, I am very afraid, has that Aragorn quality of 'doomed by the narrative just not quite yet,' but we'll see.)

6. What's something you have in common with this character?

this is hard, I think he's a much more complex and interesting person than I am for the most part, but like. I think it's safe to say he'd mostly rather diffuse a situation than have it become serious when the latter is avoidable, and I am that way too. If the situation is already serious and requires a throw down response that's a different matter, but if we can avoid a serious fight in favor of a little tussle and some drinks, that'd be the way he'd go, and I agree.

8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

take this one with a grain of salt bc I mostly try not to yuck anyone's yum or argue about differing headcanons, but I really do not fucking like the like. scumbag/villain!Shanks thing that seems to have a semi-popular following. some of that is personal bias, as I think he is a warm, good person who is doing his best, but it also kind of feels like a betrayal of the narrative for him. which I realize is funny coming from the "everything is made up including the source material" guy but here we are. there was a period a few months ago where people were basically just writing him as OP Toji and it made me want to pull all my hair out.

10. Could you be best friends with this character?

absolutely, I adore him, I think he's right about a lot of things, our ethics tend to line up where it matters, I think he's funny and would be fun to be around, he listens well and is a warm and compassionate person. I really like him and we'd get along really well I think. (mostly probably through the lens of my OC bc I'm not like. terribly convinced of my actual in person IRL likeability but in theory, absolutely yes.)

12. What's a headcanon you have for this character?

I've written about it a little before, but I think the reason he let Buggy go without telling him what Roger talked to him about after the execution wasn't because he didn't want Buggy with him anymore or didn't believe he had what it took to complete that mission, but so that Buggy would have a chance to forge his own way and have his own life. Doing what Roger asked necessitated Shanks--who was widely regarded as having the potential to be the next big legend--to drop out of the running almost entirely. He picked up his crew, he made a name for himself, he became the youngest person (at the time) to gain the title of Yonko, but he also spent a decent amount of time having to like. Lay low on beaches and dick around in the East Blue and play balance keeper and chess master until the man Roger was waiting for appeared. There are more spoilery additions to this that I'll leave out for now but yeah. I think he knew Buggy had all that same potential, and wanted to give him an opportunity to strike out on his own adventure without living in that shadow or carrying their mentor's ghost around.

14. Assign a fashion aesthetic to this character.

oh take this one with a grain of salt too idk that I know any of the terms correctly lmfao but he's very like. when I picture boho in my mind that seems very him. a lot of linens a lot of light flowy breathable clothes. It's pirate!Boho obviously but like. The man is out there wearing birkenstocks as we speak js.

16. What's your least favorite ship for this character?

same standard issue disclaimer as the fandom stuff I don't like, this isn't to yuck anyone's yum, follow your bliss what people ship isn't my business, these are just the ones I personally do not like. shankslu is at the forefront, but I don't really do shanksbenn either?? a LOT of captains and first mates in this series read that way to me but those two don't for me.

18. How about a relationship they have in canon with another character that you admire?

I actually really enjoy his dynamic with Marco. There are some interesting pieces of shared history there but overall the like. Friendly ribbing, amiable hanging out and willingness to cooperate between two of my faves is always very nice to see. c:

20. Which other character is the ideal best friend for this character, the amount of screentime they share doesn't matter?

oh please I think he'd think Sabo was a ton of fun. I know there's an age difference there that makes peership a little different than between the other mid-40s dudes he usually hangs out with, but think about it. Two very powerful people who are carrying the weight of part of this new era on their shoulders, who have a habit of just sort of fucking off out of the narrative and doing things as they please within their own personal parameters, who will just get up and obliterate a guy when that's what the situation calls for? Funny, weird, intelligent guys that love Luffy, believe in him, and want whats best for him? Even if they weren't besties, I think there's a lot of fun overlap for general friendship there.

22. If you're a fic reader, what's something you like in fics when it comes to this character? Something you don't like?

something I like: when people recognize that all that soft puppy silly goofy guy exterior, while sincerely part of him, is something that he makes the decision to externalize every day, and is sat atop a deep well of like. sadness and responsibility. there are a lot of people doing a very good job making him a romantic dopey nightmare man without sacrificing that silliness or his intelligence and sense of personal responsibility.

something I don't like: when people start a fic with the disclaimer "Shanks is in here but I hate him lol so he's a lil ooc 🤭🤪" and then he's like. not only ooc but just someone's ex boyfriend or doflamingo or just off-screen doing heinous shit for no reason. Writing a character you hate: can be fun and compelling! I fucking hate Doflamingo, for example, but as a narrative device, as a villain? bar none one of the best and most interesting. Writing a character you hate with the intention of doing a shit job because you hate them? dumb, annoying, and a waste of everyone's time. why include someone you don't want to write about lmfao just pick a different character and be done.

24. What other character from another fandom of yours that reminds you of them?

i'm drawing a blank, I'm going to be real with you. Like, I can think of a ton of mentor characters, but they don't really remind me of him. I can think of a bunch of like. guardian of the new era characters, that still don't super remind me of him. I think again i've got LOTR on the brain rn but the like. Fellowship of the Ring Aragorn is the closest I'm coming up with and even that's mostly in terms of like. the gentle mentorship of the hobbits, the offbeat sense of humor, and that dedication to a responsibility that he might have been scared to face. IDK. Shanks is a pretty unique guy to me. I'm sure I'm gonna sit bolt upright at 3 AM with a list of 20 people that fit the bill but rn it simply isn't clicking lmfao.

And there we have it!!! My (mostly) comprehensive analysis of Shanks, for you my dear friend. Thank you so much for asking!!!

[igixri]

destroy...everything, big sister

this is a meta/recap post about the (affectionately dubbed) kill zenin arc (chp 138 + 148-152) of jjk, written mostly because I wanted to type it all up to make sense of to myself: maki and mai’s characterization in this arc, the motivations of their mother, and the death of zenin naoya.

also because im sick of searching for the same 20 images every day to post about them so im gonna put them all in one post for easy chronological reference ^_^ this arc destroyed my life i literally can’t stop thinking about them

although perfect preparation arc starts proper on chapter 148, I think that chp 138 is the true beginning, especially because that means that the arc begins with maki and mai’s mother:

or, well, not really. even though she’s a part of this conversation, she isn’t shown speaking or even opening her mouth at all. it’s kind of hard to tell who’s speaking when because of this, but naoya seems to be the one that’s asking the question “is she dead? that girl mai” and maki’s mom is the one that’s responding with “worry about the head of the clan...” etc. This is kind of interesting, because the panelling almost tricks you into thinking at first that maki’s mom is the one asking “is she dead?”, but naoya having the last word on the second page (and also the fact that he starts going on about the two cousins right after this) most likely means that he’s the one who’s actually asking. during this, her very first appearance in the series, we have no idea who she is, and we don’t learn until much later on. but knowing what we know now, which is that this woman is mai and maki’s mother, it’s a callous bait and switch; she’s not even the one that’s asking about mai, and she’s the one saying that “the one who’s dying is maki”, without even a tremor in her face to indicate that this upsets her at all.

going back to read this section after seeing what happens to her makes you think about what her real feelings were on this predicament. one of her daughters is about to be killed and the other one might already be dead, what could possibly be going through her mind at that moment?

again, we see that maki’s mom has nothing to say, even though naoya says basically the most inflammatory things imaginable. we start the arc knowing nothing, not about who this woman is or how she feels, or why she is enduring these words from naoya instead of speaking out against it. it’s the perfect introduction to the conservative nature of clans in the jujutsu world: misogyny, incest, apathy, and arrogance all at once.

also making a note of naoya’s words here, “any woman who can’t walk three steps behind a man should get stabbed in the back and die,” for obvious reasons. this is the kind of line where you read it and you’re like, ok so that’s totally gonna be how he dies, right

some more interesting notes for this chapter:

naoya namedropping toji with such confidence here. like, the black sheep of the zenin clan? is who you’re stanning? toji should be someone that zenin naoya hates, someone so pathetic as to not have a cursed technique and to have abandoned the clan and the family. yet naoya loves sucking his dick. we’ll elaborate on this later

putting this here because when i first read it i thought it was a fucking joke. like at this point i know that it’s because gojo basically had custody over megumi, who wouldve been guaranteed heir because he inherited the ten shadows technique. glad i could get that cleared up (for myself)

and then the rest of the chapter finishes of with yuki tsukumo(!) and choso and yuuji talking. when this arc starts, you barely have any of the puzzle pieces. you’re dropped right in the thick of the zenin succession, and you’ll get to learn the backstories/motivations of characters out of chronological order. pretty standard way to build suspense as far as manga writing goes, but i feel like since naoya and naobito’s cursed techniques rely on timing, fucking with the order of events makes them hit harder.

we return to the zenin plotline at chapter 148, after naoya and choso’s fight (i feel like i don’t have to talk about it that much, it’s pretty obvious the parallels being drawn there with choso’s singleminded devotion to his siblings vs naoya’s “fuck family, as long as im sitting on top” attitude) and yuuji&co’s meeting with tengen. again here is a toji stannie moment

of course, naoya loses this fight, and has to be bailed out by yuta

pathetic bitch

anyways, chapter 148: starting with a cover image of mai and maki twisted up together in the womb. we’ll come back to twins and their relevance in japanese/jujutsu society later, but for now let me just say that when i saw this panel first i hadnt read jjk yet and i was like WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON IN THIS MANGA LOL...now every time i think about this image i get dangerously close to tears. what shonen manga does to a mf

here’s the first words that we see maki’s mother say to someone directly. i’d like to note that at this point, she knows that entering the cursed warehouse is a trap for maki that will lead to her death. she starts off with a polite tone, 

but then she snaps. close up of the mouth and everything -- we see that the woman that has stayed so silent when her own daughters were being badmouthed and mistreated by her family can only raise her voice to add onto the abuse. again her motivations are unclear--we’ll spend the whole arc wondering what the difference is between what she says and what she thinks--but these words seem to imply that she’s given up. it can be extrapolated from maki and mai’s treatment in the family that their mother must’ve also been on the receiving end of this abuse. after all, she was probably groomed to grow up into this role, and been told that her only role in the clan was to produce a strong heir as to make her husband proud. on some level, she probably knows that the clan is in the wrong, but in this moment she lashes out at maki anyways. she chooses to blame maki for not following the rules than the people who made the rules unfair to begin with because maki is someone she can control, or at least somewho who she thinks that she should be able to control.

not to mention! this is the reveal where we as the reader find out that she’s maki and mai’s mother, which lets us go back and recontextualize those earlier scenes. it’s a good buildup.

here’s where we start delving more into mai and maki’s relationship. to recap, their interactions as of this chapter have only been during the tournament arc, where they had their chance to hash out their differences but didn’t really resolve anything in the end.

what this chapter (42, for reference) told us was that mai was just straight up lying during the entire tournament arc. she can repeat over and over again that she hates maki, but it’s painfully clear that she loves her and misses her. this is what mai wants to tell maki: 

the abuses of the zenin clan, the misogyny and being looked down upon by their own parents and the rest of their family, all of that mai could’ve endured, if only maki hadn’t left her. in this respect, she’s following a similar path to her mother: just keep your mouth shut and live a “normal life”, ignoring the fact that normal in this situation would be rejecting her freedom and autonomy. mai believed in the promise that the maki that held her hand and led her across the bridge made to her: that no matter how difficult the road ahead, she wouldn’t be left behind.

the goodwill event ends with mai being unable to get through to maki, and she even shamefully loses the fight on top of it all. she’s left behind by maki yet again, and that’s where we leave her until chp 148.

on the other side, maki:

when maki chose to leave the zenin clan, she also chose to leave mai behind. she chose to flee her abusive household and cut ties entirely, and this meant that she couldn’t take her sister with her either. i believe that maki saw this as her way of protecting mai; she is the one with the heavenly restriction and the lack of cursed energy, she’ll bear the repercussions of leaving while mai stays “safe” at home and has a “normal” life. 

maki believes that distancing herself from the family will protect mai and save herself. mai believes that staying together with protect maki and save herself.

where this leaves maki in the start of perfect preparation is still trying to progress down the path that she chose: get stronger, and then you can come back and destroy the clan and free mai. 

we think her arc is clear-cut like this, it’s a shonen after all. we’re excited to see the progression of maki growing stronger and triumphantly returning to beat everyone else and become the clan head.

but this never gets to happen because maki’s viewpoint is wrong. 

it’s not wrong in a way where you can blame her for choosing it, but it’s wrong in the way where her approach could never get her her happy ending: there’s no way that the zenins would accept her as the clan head no matter how strong she became, and there’s no way that mai would be completely satisfied with maki abandoning her for years, even if it was to save her in the end. now, all of this becomes frighteningly clear:

i’m not going to get that deep into the motivations of zenin ogi here, mostly because they’re pretty clear-cut:

he embodies the zenin clan tenets of tradition, abuse, and power. he can freely murder his own children because he believes that he’s in the right.

(you’ll forgive me for just straight up putting the next three pages in this post)

mai transports maki to her beach mind palace. it’s unclear how she does this, exactly--i think it’s her innate domain? she’s literally speedrunning her technique development rn. this is one of my favorite tropes of all time (parlay at the ocean mind palace!) and i literally cannot believe they did this with mai and maki i am screaming crying and throwing up

also i want to mention here that there are two toji references already -- the cursed spirit training room is probably the same one that he was thrown into as a child, and the last time there was a fight on a beach in jjk was when toji’s reanimated corpse was breaking into dagon’s domain.

mai’s line here, “i suspected this would happen someday”, means that she’s been planning this for a long time. her previous attitude was “lashing out because i want maki to return to the family”, but she always knew that this was fatalistic. just like maki was wrong, mai was also wrong. she knew that she could never get back the maki from her childhood, and continuing to chase after her, even becoming a jujutsu sorcerer for it, wouldn’t help. mai didn’t do anything wrong in the eyes of the zenin clan, she followed the rules and her cursed technique, although not powerful, was at least less of a stain on the reputation of the clan. yet she was slated to be killed anyways -- there was never any hope for her “normal life”, and she knew this, which is why she thought up this contingency plan. she accepts her death here so readily because of this, and it’s not cathartic or fulfilling in terms of her character arc at all. i was expecting to see maki and mai’s relationship develop over the course of the series, but this is cruelly subverted in a way that makes perfect sense for how jujutsu society and maki+mai’s attitudes towards life have been set up.

maki, of course, can’t accept this; she’s been running blindly towards the ending that she wanted for so long that she couldn’t have noticed her mistakes in doing so.

twins are seen as a bad omen in japanese culture, and a standard practice for many years was to kill one of the twins shortly after they were born, to “send back” the spirit so that it could return again.

what’s interesting here is that what mai’s saying is correct: the way that twins work in jjk apparently is that their cursed energy is treated as one. the conclusion that mai draws from this is that for maki to develop, mai is going to have to die. you, who probably doesn’t want mai to die, can envision another situation where maki and mai work together to overcome this cursed energy restriction, and their character arc progresses in that way. however...that isn’t...what happens...literally what do you mean the power of friendship is not gonna get us through this one...

however, her unwillingness and disinterest in progressing is not condemned, either. she gets to stick to her values to the very end, and she even gets to develop as a character as a result: instead of resenting maki for putting her in this position (something that her mother, whose mentality that she partially adopted, continues to do), she gives up her life on her own terms to give maki a chance at achieving her freedom.

what mai hands maki is a reed. the title of the arc, perfect preparation, or 葦を啣む, refers to the idiom “a goose holding reeds in its mouth”, which means to be well-prepared for something. geese crossing the ocean as they migrate will hold reeds in their mouth so that they can drop it into the water and land on it to take a break as they cross. maki has migrated home and mai is giving her the reed so that she can finish the journey. mai doesn’t need it anymore -- she’s never going back.

there’s a theory here that mai cursed maki with these last words, but i don’t know if i buy it. mai doesn’t seem like she has any regrets with her decision, with her and her sister regressing back to their child selves in her mind’s eye, the time when she was happiest. however, there is definitely the possibility that this was a curse, because well. love is the most twisted curse of them all...her final words to maki are “destroy everything”, and her final action is to create the weapon to let her do that. also! she finally calls maki big sister 🥺

and with the last of her energy, mai uses her cursed technique to create a sword for maki, then dies. this is, notably, very similar to toji fushiguro’s 500 million yen sword that he wields during hidden inventory, as if gege couldn’t hammer in the point enough. i do like the implication here though -- mai went and studied this on her own time to be able to do this for maki before she died. also, them lying in fetal position here...it hurts...

it’s a solid sendoff for mai, and a very shocking one. before this, there were sorcerer causalities during shibuya arc, so the fact that another one dies now is not entirely unprecendented. however, it hurts in that it was more “preventable” than the other two: mechamaru was a traitor and nanami had put his life on the line knowing the risks, but mai had been essentially kidnapped and brutalized while the camera wasn’t focusing on her. it’s unexpected, but it makes sense.

all of these panels have been talked about to death so i don’t think im saying anything new here, but i love talking about them so im going to do it anyways

maki continues to directly parallel toji here, something that she’s been doing from the beginning; she abandoned mai for a similar reason that toji abandoned megumi and tried to keep him away from jujutsu society. toji chose to leave the zenins entirely, but after mai dies and takes the “half” of the cursed energy that maki had left on earth, maki finally gets to use the power of the heavenly restriction to end the clan once and for all.

this is a #girlboss moment and a win for feminism but it is not a positive character development moment for maki. maki has essentially decided to spiral and has given up on her previous goal of becoming the head of the clan and making a space where she can protect people like mai. instead, she’s decided that she’ll end it all entirely, by murdering every last one of her family members, starting with her own father. only after mai dies does maki come to understand why mai wanted to “fall down the hole” with her, but she also now has to accept that this is an impossibility for her now.

this line kills me EVERY SINGLE TIME...mai really was her heart. maki understands this in the end, but like the ones that have come before her, the tradeoff for her newfound strength is the inability to protect someone she cared about.

now, finally, naoya’s obsession with toji fushiguro is elaborated upon. it seems that he had been impressed with toji from a young age, after having been impressed upon him by everyone in the clan that he was blessed, he was next in line to be the head, that the other family members were all inferior to him, those without cursed energy especially. naoya never once questions this structure, because it puts him at the top. his obsession with toji is seemingly contradictory to this, but it ends up highlighting the very real hypocrisy that can arise from such conservative and oppressive worldviews.

naoya holds his other relatives to the standards of toji, who he considers “true strength”. even though toji had no cursed energy, he was still a man, and one who could beat the other members of the zenin clan even without a technique of his own. toji is essentially who maki was striving to be since the beginning, someone strong enough to strike fear into the hearts of those that had looked down upon her, and someone who had left the clan to forge his own path without regrets. toji is allowed to be an exception in naoya’s eyes because although he left the clan, he didn’t question the structure to the point of wanting to destroy it, like maki does. toji abandoned the clan and everyone else who was suffering inside it, and that allows naoya to freely respect him regardless.

although he holds himself up to the same standards as gojo and toji, it’s clear from the fact that they’re facing away from him in the panel that he is nowhere near their level--

which, of course, leads to him being soundly beaten by maki seconds later. 

why does maki leave naoya alive before she leaves? this is the question that i wanted to answer by writing this post. maki had not been showing mercy before this (her heart was taken from her), and there’s no chance that she would extend mercy now, especially not to her awful cousin who beat her up, bullied her, and sexually objectified her and her sister. this leaves the conclusion that maki wanted naoya to die, but specifically at the hands of her mother, someone who has been traililng three feet behind naoya since the beginning of this arc.

maki goes to visit her mother, and she asks “why did you ask me to come back?” her mother doesn’t seem to understand this question, but maki is referring to the moment before she entered the weapons storage earlier. her mother knew that it would be a trap, and that her father was there, waiting to kill her and mai. maki knows painfully well the extent to which her own mother has been complicit in her and her sister’s abuse, and she asks this question now because she wants to know if her mother cared about her at all, in the end, even if she never spoke out to protect her. even so, it’s unforgivable -- she must’ve had a part in both capturing mai and luring maki to the weapons storage, and she did nothing to prevent the deaths of her children.

we aren’t explicitly shown that maki slit her mother’s throat, but it’s pretty clear that that’s what happened, given that her mother was begging for her life, and also the direction of the blood splatter (lol). destroy everything means everything, after all

after this, maki’s mother goes and deals the final blow to zenin naoya. i have to believe that this was maki’s intention in letting them both survive for long enough so that this could happen -- maybe a final chance at redemption for her mother? a sick acknowledgement that they were all in the hole together, and that if mai and maki were free now, she could be as well?

as this arc starts with maki and mai’s mother, so it gets to end with her. finally, we get to know her unvoiced true feelings: she dies happy that she gave birth to her daughters. she doesn’t have a change of heart, where she loves maki not because she destroyed the system that chained her, but simply because she was her daughter. her last action is one she makes out of her free will, ending the zenin clan completely.

[movedkagen]

hey so before i get to working on replies again i do want to analyze gojo  ( what’s new )  and discuss some aspects of his healing process.     tbh i could never properly analyze the stages of thinking that gojo underwent during geto’s defection and afterwards in one post,   but i ranted about it a bit on discord and I’m hoping to get it to make sense here.

what namely sparked this analysis was me finding two different translations of the same panel,   which is a flashback from when gojo approaches megumi and takes him in.     at one point, megumi asks if he’ll have to become a sorcerer  ( in order to keep tsumiki happy ), and gojo said yes,   but the translation is wildly different depending on which you read.

GIGANTIC  ANALYSIS  OF  GOJO’S  GRIEF  POST  STAR  VESSEL  ARC / GETO’S  DEFECTION  UNDER  THE  CUT.

the first is close to the gojo we've been seeing all throughout this past arc,   the gojo that doesn't really care for people weaker than him:   it continues to frame gojo as this unreachable glass sealing,   this limitless individual who believes only the strongest will survive.

however,   the second has a far  different  meaning,   and is closer to the gojo we met initially:

the second is close to the gojo we see now,   who is faithful and even  hopeful  in the next generation's ability to surpass him.      the second translation is also really important not just to how gojo in general is characterized,   but also in the way that i perceive gojo's healing process and what him seeking out megumi meant to his character.

in order to take that apart,   i first have to address how i view the famous kfc breakup scene:   i  don’t  think  it  was  the  moment  gojo  and  geto  realized  they  had  opposing  ideals.      i  think,   purely  because  geto  didn’t  clue  him  into  why  he  felt  the  way  he  did,   gojo  was  forced  to  get  ideals  of  his  own.

gojo was in ethical limbo after geto left.     geto was,   according to gege,   gojo's moral compass.   and geto just walked off a ledge that he himself pulled gojo back from just the year before.   in essence,   it's not an opposition of ideals at all,   because honestly,   at that point, gojo doesn't  have  any ideals of his own.      call it coping,   call it neurodivergency,   call it the fact that this is the only type of life he ever expected to live having come from a powerful sorcerer clan,   but gojo never seemed to  care  much about the purpose in his work or what it meant to himself or others.     it was just something he did because he had the ability to,    and because at that point in time it was simply what sorcerers like him  did.

there's a BIT of delinquency before the star vessel arc,   but it's more in him wanting to do things HIS way because he's been under his family's control all his life before coming to tokyo tech.   however,   at the end of the day,   gojo completes his jobs and his tasks without much second thought to it.     he doesn’t question why he does jobs,   and almost treats them like a game to show his own strength.     geto even tries to convince him there's purpose in what they do and gojo laughs it off and says that sort of philosophy is for the weak and that he thinks it’s a load of self - righteous  crap.

fast forward to when geto leaves.     he's been following either the school or geto's lead in terms of  intent  for years now and he's been comfortable that way.   so when geto leaves,   gojo can’t understand why.   he says things like "you can't" and "that's crazy talk" but he has no other reasoning to support that:

he just says it because what geto is doing is so  outside  of what the normal duties are,   which is why geto pretty easily argues against it and gojo has no rebuttal.   geto very easily turns that entire argument upside down,   and shakes gojo’s  entire  sense  of  self  with  a  single  counter:

and gojo can’t understand it.     he can’t argue it.     gojo is less arguing because he opposes his ideals and more arguing that he can't break away from the system because  he's  never  thought  to  himself.     it's like a child refusing to accept something simply because they don't understand it,    like if they deny it entirely then it isn't real and can't bother them.

this is  also  why i think he made the motion to attack him;   he was never  going  to fight him,   it was more about doing whatever was possible / in his power to try and force geto to stay because he didn't want to accept he was leaving.   and if geto  had  stayed, gojo would have found a way to absolve him of his crimes because at the end of the day,   it  wasn't  that  he  was  opposed  to  geto's  mindset.      he  was  opposed  to  geto  leaving.

geto was the single person who  ever  made him think about his motives and stopped him from doing things he knew he was capable of.     with geto gone,    gojo is totally lost and he is not coping effectively.      he wouldn't empty out geto's room at all because that would mean he really left,   so he didn't. not for weeks, or months, or even a  year  after it happened.     he refused to do it and he threw a tantrum if anyone else tried to go near the room at all.     there was a surplus of rooms,   so that room was left alone almost like a grave for a long time.

during that intermediate period,   gojo wasn't even sure where he stood anymore.     he really questioned if he even  wanted  to be a sorcerer because if geto didn't do it anymore,   why  should  he?     he's never had compassion for non - shamans like geto did.     what was he doing it for at all,    then?    

gojo was at a crossroads where he was between being a weapon for the higher ups that he didn't even like to begin with or following someone he  did  care about and respect,   down a path that he knew to be wrong but realized he'd never once asked himself why.     

gojo was moody.     sometimes he'd be too reckless on jobs,   and other times he would rebel and outright refuse to go on missions because he was lashing out at the control he let them have over him.     he was a loose cannon and while he had yet to start actively being an enemy to the higher ups  ( at this time i hc he never really threatened them or demanded to know their every move ),   he was still powerful enough where they knew if they  couldn’t  get him under their control, they might lose everything  ------  and frankly, if geto  and  gojo defected,   they'd never be able to recover from that.   at that point if they had a way to kill him, i truly believe they would have and i'm sure there was at least an attempt,   which i have a separate headcanon for.

but healing has to start somewhere.     he clearly  does  have a shift in mentality where he  does  care about protecting those weaker than him,   and that's the first step.     it's gojo accepting he can't go geto's route because he doesn't hate the world like geto does.     he hates the people who oppress it.     the next step is accepting geto left,   which is hard.   after about 2 years he and shouko clean out geto's room and it's really hard on him,   it's a very emotional event and it's a very delayed acceptance that he is gone.

the final step in his decision to heal   ( heal being a strong word since the man never gets therapy and is clearly still traumatized )   is investigating those final words toji left him with,   that  "do what you want"  regarding his child.

i have said that i don't hc he went there to get megumi,   but he just went there to see him and see what the big deal was.      but then he found out about the deal and something compelled him to go and investigate,    and when he met megumi,    he didn't find toji's  "trump card"  or some secret weapon.     he found a child.     a child that was abandoned and destined to turn out like himself or geto or toji and he  very  impulsively decided to take him and tsumiki in and stop the deal entirely.

that  was the first time he opposed the higher ups for real.     that  was the first time he said  "i'm getting in the way of this and if you try and stop me i WILL attack you and kill you all"  and while he's an outsider with seemingly  nothing  to gain from that,   they have no choice but to let him because no one can stop him.    

that second translation of  "become strong enough to leave me behind"  speaks volumes about the way i perceive gojo's shift in perception over one of the hardest segments of his life ... how i view the process in which he went from not caring about the weak at all to becoming a man who "won't forgive anyone who takes another person's youth",    which would have happened to megumi and tsumiki if toji's deal went through.   

maybe he didn't understand protecting the weak out of a sense of nobility,   but protecting one's youth?     one's right to be happy?     he DOES get that.     and that is what guides him towards compassion.     it's a really good line in what i saw as the  "final step"  in him moving on from the events of the star vessel arc and moving towards becoming the person and teacher he is now, and of course his road there is neither linear nor perfect,   but this is his turning point.