#for nyappytown

[herstrayskies]

Blue Exorcist Commission for my friend @nyappytown ! Thanks again! 💙

#blue exorcist #ao no exorcist #manga #anime #manga coloring #manga edit #manga colorist #rin okumura #Shiro Fujimoto #commission #for nanna #for nyappytown #herstrayskies

[eerna]

Kazuma and Hiiro really be waving 'em death flags huh! It's not a competition, you stupid children!!! "throws them both over a shoulder and carries out of the narrative" But honestly, I too am more worried about Hiiro. Kazuma's flags are a little too on the nose, but Hiiro's... That heart-wrenching smile of hers... Also you are not having a full 100ch experience, if you don't know about latest nyappytown's Kuraha-Yukine theory. Check it out, and welcome fear in!

Yeah, Kazuma's death would legit feel cheap if it happened- what, he suddenly became normal again after dozens of chapters of spiralling and being horrible, and NOW he gets hit with his dying blow???? Hiiro, on the other hand, had a slow journey to getting better, and then falling off the wagon bit by bit, and HER death would make total narrative sense, and I am SCARED, MY DUDES!!!! And yes I am familiar with the theory but I don't think it's possible. Call me a naysayer but the idea that a man who was capable of murdering his own child (in a way that even out of context makes people horrified!!!) turned into a funny grandpa character just doesn't sit well with me.

#eernask #eernanon #eernask talk noragami

[kanotototori]

Language envy oficially exists, because I'm DYING to know what was said in these raws!!! Like!! The only people we are missing this chapter are Kofuku, Ebisu and Take! (And Kaya will probably make her debut with them! Can you belive they might already know something about Kaya?) The endgame is so near! Hiiro hugging Father with *that* smile broke me though. Also Kazumaaaa... And: nyappytown has a chilling theory that Kuraha might or might not have been Yukine's father, and it's driving me crazy

Luckily, the translations are already out on @fast-moon's blog so check them out if you haven't!!

This chapter was SO MUCH. I don't even know where to start, my brain is empty, only the:

"You're important to me"

"Come back to me"

"You were my prayer, Yaboku"

"Haven't I literally gone to hell and back a thousand times for you...?"

"I love you, Father"

I have so many thoughts but I need a few to process LOL. (But I agree that the reintroduction of Take and Ebisu into the story means Kaya debut FINALLY. Hopefully soon!!)

Also, yes, @nyappytown's Kuraha theory is excellent - and I feel like it's closer and closer to becoming canon than ever, with how Kuraha appeared with Bishamon this chapter... I can't wait to see what happens.

#asks #noragami #noragami spoilers

[kofubisha]

oh my GOD i was almost late but here is your @noragamisecretsanta gift @nyappytown!! i hope you like this ficlet <333

please send to good homes

Your name is Sekki. You are bright and sharp, nearly a slice of moonlight yourself. You have no memory of yourself. The first emotion you feel is gratitude.

You had been unhappy before; you didn’t know why, except that it had been such intolerable suffering that you could hardly imagine an existence outside of it. You are grateful that you no longer have to.

But you are different now. Sekki. A blade. You know you were unhappy once, but it already seems so distant, like it happened to someone else entirely. Someone else bore that suffering, and you arrived on the other side, clean and perfect.

Shortly you understand that all this must be because you are dead. It doesn’t bother you. It seems, even to your shadowy consciousness, that you had been anticipating death for quite some time.

: : :

“You like cats, huh?”

Yato asks this when he has to yank you bodily away from a battered flyer advertising six kittens: please send us to good homes!

You jerk your elbow out of his grip and mumble an affirmative.

“Why not a fish? Fish are cheap. And easy to replace.”

Yato has been making clumsily disguised efforts to echolocate a holiday gift idea for his shinki. Having been thoroughly shamed by Hiyori for not knowing more of your interests, he’s been becoming progressively more desperate as the days pass. Which, really, is enough of a gift on its own.

“Cats and fish aren’t historically a great combination,” you point out. Yato appears to struggle with this.

“I was thinking…just…a fish…”

He trails off at the innocent sparkle of hope in your eyes, which is entirely and unabashedly manufactured. If Hiyori were here, she might be able to sniff out your insincerity, but Yato has become hilariously susceptible to it.

Without another word, he gets out his phone and starts furiously tweeting. You roll your eyes, heading to the crosswalk without him.

You do not see him lingering to take a picture of the flyer. After the two of you arrive at Kofuku’s, you do not hear him on the phone in the other room.

: : :

When you are slain by the war god, you live again. You become blessed.

It is now, in the moment between one existence and the next, that you feel it again: that gratitude. You sense again some divine mercy that let you be free of the utter loneliness that accompanies dying. You had been saved by it. And now you will protect it in turn.

You are Sekki again. You are twin arcs of brilliance in the hands of your wielder, and you rend the night as one.

: : :

You wake up earlier than usual because someone is screaming downstairs. It’s only when you’re halfway into the room that you realize it isn’t due to an emergency.

“So cute, where did you get it?!”

“Shut up, Kofuku—!”

You walk in on Yato, drenched with rain and doubled over in the doorway, holding something approximately the size of a spitball very close to his chest.

“Hi,” you say.

“Hi,” they both say.

“Everything…good?”

“Yeah!” Yato grins, stuffing the thing in his hands into an inner pocket of his tracksuit. There’s a distressed, reedy little noise, which Kofuku tries to cover up with a coughing fit. She stops coughing when you glare at her, and flees into the kitchen, where Daikoku and Hiyori are making something that smells pervasively of onions.

“What’s that?” you ask accusingly.

“Probably lunch.” Yato is looking at the kitchen with longing, and his stomach audibly rumbles.

His jacket squirms. You lunge.

The thing in Yato’s pocket reaches for you just as you reach for it. Five tiny daggers sink into your wrist, and you yank your hand away, howling. Something white and orange is still attached to it, and you now see it is an animal.

A kitten.

“She did that to me too,” Yato observes, not offering to help.

Hiyori’s head pokes through the door from the kitchen. “There’s a lot of shouting out here,” she begins reprovingly, before her eyes go wide.

“Yato, you didn’t…?”

“I did,” says Yato, looking very righteous and benevolent indeed.

“That thing’s going to live here, isn’t it?” calls Daikoku from the kitchen, resigned. “We have to pay for its fancy food and litter? I hope you’re telling Yukine to thank us.”

“He’s thanking me,” retorts Yato, “because I deserve it for finding the evil little thing in the first place.”

Your hand is definitely bleeding, but the pain is forgotten. You are holding a small, shaking creature that clings to your palm for dear life. The kitten blinks in the too-bright room; its teeth are tiny and very white. You cradle it against your chest, letting it burrow into the front of your jacket, seeking warmth.

: : :

You never dream of desolation: of a cold apartment or its miserable occupants. You never dream of a mother who smiles at you, vacantly, before disappearing. You never dream of a sister who promises you the sun, then leaves you in the snow. You never dream of unsent letters, empty bottles, locked doors.

: : :

You take the kitten to the upstairs room, where she slinks under the furniture and will not be coaxed out for the entire day. As it gets late, you leave two saucers out for her—one full of water, the other of broth—and go to sleep.

You wake up much later, and find her curled against you, and after a few moments you dare to reach out a finger. It’s so unbelievably small; her skull is barely the size of a walnut. You think she must have been the smallest of her litter. Undernourished, perhaps. Maybe she was overlooked by the mother.

The thought of this is so much more heartbreaking than you were prepared for that it shocks a sob from you. It’s barely audible, it doesn’t even wake the tiny animal tucked up against your sternum, so close to the irregularities of your breathing.

As you drift off to sleep again, you hear the door slide open, the creaking of boards under bare feet. Yato brings the smell of Daikoku’s cheap beer with him into the room, and your nose wrinkles. It isn’t uncommon for Yato to drink himself asleep at the table, then haul himself up to bed hours later smelling like a bar closet.

Rather than collapsing onto his futon immediately, Yato rustles across the room to check on you. You feign sleep—quite convincingly, since you were nearly there in earnest. You don’t see his expression. There is something in his face as he watches the two of you: both orphaned, both much smaller than you ought to be.

After several moments, he shuffles to the other side of the room and lies down on his own mat.

He doesn’t turn the light out. He never does.

#scarfwrites #noragami #noragamisecretsanta2021 #nyappytown #noragami fanfiction

[gsunny6]

It’s Sunny’s officially bbs screenshot masterpiece

@nyappytown @macey-wacey @straysatan

#bbs spoilers #kh spoilers #kh bbs #kh bbs spoilers #kingdom hearts

[ara-mitama]

The poem from Noragami chapter 95

As many have already figured out, the poem Takemikazuchi recited in Noragami chapter 95 was composed by Kakinomoto Hitomaro. This particular poem is taken from the Waka anthology Kokin Wakashu. I decided to dive a bit deep into the poem.

The following parts are taken from my Noragami chapter 95 thoughts, feel free to give it a read whenever you can!

Here’s the verse in Japanese;

Honobono to Akashi no ura no Asagiri ni Shimagakureyuku Fune o shi zo omou

If we go deeper, there are multiple ways to interpret this poem. The Kokin Wakashu classifies this as a travel poem. However, the content of the poem varies widely in tone based on different understandings.

According to multiple instances listed in Hitomaro: Poet as God, this poem definitely has undertones of lament despite being a travel poem on the outside. It was written to commemorate the death of either Emperor Mommu or Prince Takechi. Meaning, the mist, island and boat in the poem are not to be taken in a literal sense.

The Kokin Wakashu Kanjo Kuden interprets the morning mist here as the mist that separates. What if this mist signifies the boundary between the near and far shore?

The poem is supposed to convey how it is impossible to escape death, even for an imperial ruler. Using a subtle play on the word “island” (shima), which could also mean four devils, Hitomaro specifies the four sufferings of birth, old age, illness, and death through which a person has to pass. The boat here signifies the sovereign, but from the POV of Noragami, it could be referring to the journey of a person through all these four sufferings before crossing over to the other side.

It fit in perfectly with the scenario at hand in Noragami chapter 95, so kudos to Adachitoka for including it. But beyond that, I am still undecided on what kind of importance/role this poem would have in Father’s past, other than being tied to the Tamatsuki poem with hints to the island’s location. It is possible that this waka was composed (548 – 710) and compiled (905-920) roughly in the same period as Father was alive (read this post here), explaining why it was used in tandem with the clue.

Could the undertones of lament be suggesting that this poem was used by Father in memory of the woman with pockmarks on her face? Could the interpretation of the poem in any way allude to Father’s beliefs? 

Now, here’s another comparison & translation of the poem, wherein the poem is broken up into four units. I won’t go into the details, but read the translations at the bottom (colors are brilliant one). Does that in anyway remind you of Father? If yes, then we are on the same boat (to Tamatsuki!!)

Or, is the underlying idea of inescapable death somehow related to the God’s greatest secret, which is apparently something to be careful of, on Tamatsuki.

Suzuki Harunobu, a Japanese designer of woodblock print in the Edo period, designed his own interpretation of Hitomaro’s verse. In it he alludes to the poem by depicting a young woman looking out a window toward the distant boats, lost in thought. A tinfoil assumption would be that Adachitoka took this reference, and it is again somehow connected to the woman with pockmarks.

@kanotototori​ @nyappytown​ I’d like to hear what you have to say about this!!

#noragami spoilers #noragami chapter 95 #yato #yatogami #ebisu #takemikazuchi #kiun #Kakinomoto Hitomaro #adachitoka #waka #japanese poetry #what am i even doing here

[thedeliverygod]

@nyappytown Lolol with the new update they ask to come over to your house and they want to see all your rooms so you just go into the rooms and they follow you

[trashahime]

So in three pictures Yashahime twitter used for some contest, a common theme was toy models or miniature representations of something. There's also the merch where the characters are sitting with mini versions of the twins, Takechiyo and Kirara.

And on a tangent, for my Takechiyo is InuKag's illusioned son theory, I think another purpose of that merch was to put Moroha in a similar situation as the twins where she is holding her "sibling".

Anyway, "miniatures"...

It makes me wonder that if Yashahime is an illusion, maybe it's taking place in a mini world like Tokajin's in the Inuyasha episodes with the human faced fruit. Another Yashahime connection is that arc also involves a corrupted Sage.

Also, I have seen some possible call-outs to the Journey to the West in the show. The human faced fruit is based on the Peaches of Immortality. @nyappytown I know you especially have been exploring this connection.

#inuyasha #hanyo no yashahime #yashahime

[herstrayskies]

Your header right now is hot fire my love

🥺 Thank you my dear 💙 sometimes I find myself watching it over and over. It's so mesmerizing and the scene it comes from is close to my heart.

#i wanted a simple but pretty scene from 86 and then there it was 🥺 #nanna out here spreading kind words #nyappytown #nanna #asks #86

[kanotototori]

So, let’s talk Father and Yato in Chapter 102-1

Not a formal chapter thoughts post because I haven’t done meta in a few months and I am very very very rusty and this might be kind of incomprehensible and also this might be a hot take so.

This is just one perspective from a Father Enjoyer and Theorist, etc etc. More under the cut.

Dated: September 6, 2022

First off: I don't think any question that is asked in Noragami goes unanswered.

In the case of this chapter, there is one central question at play in this scene: Yato, in his inner monologue, asking "Why would [Father] be crying?"

This question is posed at both the present day situation AND the flashback we see here, between Father and a young Yato.

Before I go on, I think it's important to establish that Yato has a warped perception of how Father feels about him (for a good reason, obviously, definitely not faulting him for that). The fight between Father and Yato this arc has done a lot to further flesh out the dynamic between Father and Yato. And even though this moment is a pretty small one, it illustrates the disconnect perfectly, both in dialogue and with the visual of Father and Yato’s clash: 

"Why are you hurting Yukine?! If you hate me that much, then come after me directly!", aka, Yato for the first time explicitly vocalizes the thought that Father hates him.

To which Father responds in confusion: "Huh? Well, yeah, you're a pain in the ass, but you're still my son." Whatever Yato thinks Father thinks of him is not how Father actually feels about him - he doesn’t hate him, but says that even though Yato is a pain in the ass, he’s still his son. This notion is multiplied tenfold and put on crack in the conclusion of this fight in the latest chapters.

There's also a small moment in the Heaven arc that reinforces that a bit further, in which Hiyori relays to him that Father told her it's "Yaboku that needed saving", to which Yato responds "the old man is meddling again."

Foregoing the fact that Yato falsely assumes that Father set up Bishamon and was involved in sending the Heavenly Guard after her (when it's very clear from earlier scenes that he didn't, Bishamon took that risk in order to defeat him herself), this is the arc where Father proceeds to purposefully put himself in the spotlight of a fight with Heaven in order to bait Bishamon into fighting him instead, so that attention may be drawn away from Yato. It is very explicitly stated that this is what Father's aim here was - he was doing this to save Yato, as he told Hiyori when she confronted him.

For someone as meticulous as Father, this was a hasty move that almost got him killed.

Even in Chapter 100, when Father explicitly says that he let Yato do all of those things because he's *important* to him, Yato's response to that was "you let me do whatever you wanted so I'd always come running back to you, you knew that's why I was so scared of you."

It's not that it's not true necessarily - because it absolutely is true, that was the main underlying purpose of Father being so "permissive" with him -  but it's more about perspective: this is, fundamentally, how Yato sees Father and his actions, more importantly the motivations behind his actions. Again, he isn’t wrong per se, but there’s more to this story that Yato obviously doesn’t see (and who can blame him?).

And even by Yato's own admission in Chapter 49, he doesn't know much about Father because he didn't want to think about it... because he was scared of him. Understandably so. This fear permeates their relationship, and how Yato sees Father.

So with this in mind, we once again return to the question: "Why would [Father] be crying?"

Yato doesn't understand why Father is crying because that action does not fit within his understanding of Father and his actions, because the Father that Yato thinks he knows wouldn't do that. And that's where it gets interesting with this flashback.

@nyappytown​ brought up an interesting point about how this might have been a memory that Yato repressed to protect himself. And why would he need to do that? Because it's not something that fits within his understanding of Father, and the implications of this interaction might be more than Yato was capable of taking previously.

There's a few key elements here:

(a) Father openly admitting that he knows Yato hates him

(b) Expressing the belief that it's essentially inevitable due to the nature of parent-child relationships, and how it’ll be the same no matter where you go (Father once again projecting his trauma)

(c) The crying, which is out of character for Father + "You're tired, aren't you, Yaboku? So am I..." (rare moment of vulnerability)

(d) Father being... well, being a parent (asking Yato what he wants to eat, telling him a story like a parent would, it’s a very parent-child interaction)

Like I said in the beginning, Adachitoka doesn't ask a question and leave it unanswered. The connecting point between this moment 1000+ years ago between Father and a young Yato and THIS moment is:

  "Why would he be crying?" 

Yato has not found an answer to that question in those 1000+ years.

But I believe he finally realizes the answer to it with Father's response here.

"But it'll be all right. Even if you fell into the Underworld, I'll come save you. Because I'm your lifeline, after all."

You can even see the change of expression between a few pages ago - clearly fearful, furrowed eyebrows - to this page, where his expression shifts to surprise, brows slightly upturned.

The "but it'll be all right" is actually on the bottom of the previous page, and it creates a very interesting continuity between the two pages: on the previous page, Father talks about how Yato as a child was so terrified of Father's stories about the Underworld that he would wet himself, then we have Father’s reassurance of "it'll be alright", because "even if you fell into the Underworld, I'll come save you."

May I perhaps be so bold as to suggest that this is where Yato realized that the answer to his question is this: it's because Yato's existence is precious to Father. So much so that he's saying "I would literally go to h/ell to preserve it, because I am your lifeline, and you are important to me." With how Yato saw Father all of his life, this conclusion was not possible. But if he understands that now...

Yato has had issues with valuing his own life this entire arc, basically throwing it away for the sake of the greater good - going as far as to say that it would be better for him to reincarnate - while the people around him (mainly, Yukine and Hiyori) mourn the possibility of losing THIS Yato. Yato hasn't quite realized the value of his life, THIS life, yet (ironically, the thing that he taught Ebisu in the Yomi arc).

I must again mention @PeevesV2 and her big brain cuz I am still very much thinking about the connection she made between Iwami's lesson to Ebisu ("never again sacrifice yourself, your precious life, for another") (oh hey look at that moon in that panel, just like the moon over Yato and Father in the flashback) and Father-Yato a while ago.

And like, Father HAS shown genuine anger at the thought of Yato reincarnating. It can be a little hard to catch but in Chapter 93, it's not "I told everything to Amaterasu" or Yato basically saying "I'm gonna off you" that had Father seething, but "that'll be the end... for me."

And we know that because Father directly responds to that with "do you hear, that, Hagusa? Yaboku is thinking about reincarnating." And ends the chapter with "Hagusa is pissed off TOO." (about the thought of Yato reincarnating)

Obviously idk how anyone else feels about this but imo, Father being the one who helps Yato really get it in his head that his existence right now is not disposable, is precious and important and shouldn't be thrown away, is a really great step towards the conclusion of both their arcs. It doesn't brush off the horrible abuse Yato endured at Father's hands but neither does it trivialize Father's own experiences and how that all fed into this inter-generational cycle of violence, nor his complicated feelings towards Yato. 

Just two deeply broken, hurt people finally being able to see eye to eye for the first time in their lives. So yeah, I do kinda hope this is the path Adachitoka ends up taking.

Sorry for this being messy, I haven't written analysis in ages LOL Anyway yeah I’m in so much pain right now

Addendum that I forgot to fit into the main thing: If that flashback was indeed a repressed memory for Yato, it's no wonder cuz... which one is worse: believing that your father hates you and that's why he treats you the way he does or knowing that he loves you... and still puts you through all that? Much to think about.

#noragami #yato #fujisaki kouto #my meta

[herstrayskies]

O fools, and slow of heart to believe.

#this one goes out to nanna aka nyappytown for fueling this idea #i came across this painting of jesus and a lamb at work and was like ohhh bisha and kuraha #and nanna was like #what about father and wolf #and i was like my god youre right #anyways i love pushing myself to do different charcters lately and this was a challenge but also fun #noragami #noragami father #father #fujisaki kouto #ayakashi #ayakashi wolf #stray god #original art #herstrayskies #strayskies art #jesusaki

[herstrayskies]

Noragami Chapters 38 & 86

Requested by my friend @nyappytown !

#noragami #Yato #yaboku #Hiyori Iki #iki hiyori #Nora #mizuchi #hiiro #shinki #for nanna #manga #manga cap #manga edit #manga coloring #my edit #my coloring #manga colorist #anime #nyappytown #herstrayskies

[kanotototori]

Chapter 97-1 Thoughts (Part 2)

(Continued from Part 1.)

A quick Nora aside: it was validating, in a way, to see Hiyori acknowledge that Nora and Father have a bond - and even she is confused about whether it is a master/servant bond or a parent/child bond. I'd say it's not completely one way or the other - Father's bond with Nora and Yato both crosses between the lines of "tool" and "family" in a lot of confusing and complex ways, and I think Father and Nora's bonding moments in this chapter showed that perfectly: Nora is both a child and a means to an end.

(Now I must bring up this extremely niche meme I made a while ago because yeah that pretty much sums up my entire thoughts on the debate of "what does Father really feel for Mizuchi and Yato?"

The answer: it's complicated.)

Next: finally, we got follow-up on Father saying that he did kill gods in the past, way back from Chapter 87 - which means this puts us pre-Yato timeline wise, Father's first foray into fucking shit up post-Pockmarks death (at least, I'm assuming).

I already said this on Twitter when the leaks dropped but Father's tattered outfit - the sleeveless koromo with the white kosode with the torn sleeves - puts this scene together with Yomi flashback and the below scene from 96-1 outfit-wise.

Also, I was looking at Father laughing here and kept getting the feeling it looked familiar. Well, I think I figured out the reason why: 

The "I'm so glad I took him to that fridge!" scene.

(Put down your pitchforks, I know.)

Though we can't see his face in 97, here he looks similarly ecstatic.

This page came immediately after Father talking about how Mizuchi doesn't hate Heaven but Hagusa split the Heavens, and how maybe now Father can go farther with him than he could with Yato and Mizuchi; if Father's recollection of his first time destroying a god with Chiki was the first time he realized he does have a fighting chance against gods (thus his delight), then the above page must have been a similar moment - less about laughing about Yukine's fate, but more about the fact that, for the first time in centuries after countless years of fruitless destruction, he has a fighting chance against Heaven.

Full circle. 

A really interesting remark that I'm not quite sure what to make of. The word for salvation that Father uses (救 sukui) is part of the word "savior" in the chapter title  (救主 sukuinushi) - is this the sort of liberation that Chiki's Liberation offers? Father has already stated that the beings resulting from the revealing of GGS are a person's karma, giving this power overt Buddhist overtones. 

@nyappytown​ and I talk about this quite a lot: the idea that souls have been trapped in the Far Shore and are prevented from moving on by the shinki system, an artificial roadblock in the natural cycle of reincarnation - in Chapter 81, Father even says that shinkis' disinterest in themselves stems from the way that they are "made".

Is "Liberation" the way in which a soul's karma is processed? Is "salvation" being released from an unnatural state of servitude, back into the cycle? Lots to think about. 

"Even though disaster and conflict are things Heaven can inflict on people."

I have a feeling this quote directly correlates to the scene we saw last chapter (96-1). We've got the disaster (fire) and we've got conflict (corpses, one of them looks like it's been tied to a post or a tree.)

The fact that we still haven't seen Pockmarks's lower half even though we've seen the exact same scene twice already is making me nervous. I am not ready for Adachitoka to drop that bomb on us. 

The fact that Hiyori and Nora had like, the exact same face to Yato/Father putting their neck on the line and going on a suicide mission is killing me. 

Here’s a few more.

"I'll protect you, so come hide with me!" / "Just forget about your father and come home! Don't you go anywhere!"

These two, man, I swear to god.

"Father has grown tired of life outside of the spotlight."

This feels like it's a direct follow up to the end page of Chapter 63: Ecstasy (above), in which Father prompts Bishamon to make herself a target to draw attention away from Yato and "create a shadow in which [they] will lurk."

And who exactly will burn bright until their body evaporates so that all of Heaven will look away from Yato (and his failure to kill Father)?!

GAHHHH. Adachitoka kills me. They are too good!!!!!

Father feels like quite the static character - which he has been, for the most part, because his journey prior to the start of the series has already taken place! - but this...

This.

I believe we are seeing a character progression moment right now.

Because, like Father himself implied, he has been in the shadows the entire time. His line to Bishamon in 63 (above), his line to Mizuchi in Ch 50 about "what makes the man behind the curtain so cool is the fact that he works in the shadows."

Well, not anymore.

And finally, the panel I have been avoiding up until now: 

I admit that I've been following discussion about this panel quite closely and... ehhh. I don't know! Yesterday I was all up in the Discord server like, "am I going crazy? Am I supposed to be thinking Father is worse than Heaven because gods actually care about the Near Shore? Am I seeing a narrative setting up a discussion on systemic violence that's just not there???? Is my entire analysis of Father wrong??? What the hell is going on right now??"

So I guess this is more of a thought coming out of the chapter - and the takes I’ve been seeing floating around - rather than a chapter thought, per se:

What lens are people reading this story through? The answer to this for a lot of people seems to be "Child Abuse: The Manga" which is entirely FAIR because a lot of the manga concerns this, the main protagonist is so deeply affected by it that we, as readers cannot help but examine the manga through that lens of analysis. 

But it feels like that view also puts a weird binary on the narrative - "you are either a victim or you are a the perpetrator of violence, and the latter is the absolute evil" - when Noragami's power dynamics very often blur and cross the line between those two categories, between victim and perpetrator. 

If Noragami in its entirety was "(Child) Abuse: the Manga", where does that put major characters that haven't experienced abuse but are still incredibly important to the plot? Bishamon, Kazuma, Takemikazuchi, Ebisu...? Noragami is more of a "Cycle of Violence: the Manga" or "Trauma Fucks You Up: the Manga", in which the characters' relationship to "victim" vs. "perpetrator" is... complicated. 

Gods hold power over humans, yet humans are the reason why they can exist in the first place; a master holds power over a shinki, yet their shinki shape their existence and teach them right from wrong. I think we are absolutely supposed to feel sympathy for the plight of individuals gods (Kofuku, Bishamon, and now the Execution Squad gods) as victims but also acknowledge that they hold power over humans as well, and the harm that comes from their hand is not something that can be dismissed, ESPECIALLY when it comes about as a result of Heaven's ideology - considering that is the MAIN perpetrator of cycles violence in this series, directly or indirectly being the main catalyst for pretty much every event in the series, starting with whatever happened to Father.

My point is, I think Father should be understood in a similar way when it comes to the broader context of the story.

It was Father, after all, who made the comparison of humanity being like abused children, clinging to their parents (gods) - right on top of the page where Father sets the wolves on Yato, right after a page where we see a skeleton in the grass and Father holding Pockmarks's body. In a story that features abuse so heavily, I don't think Adachitoka would write these two pages for Father so lightly - the constant monologuing about abandonment/the concept of being saved/salvation, Father being human yet comparing gods to abusive parents...

Father (humanity) as the powerless victim, gods as the perpetrators; in the same breath, Yato (gods) as the powerless victim, Father (humanity) as the perpetrator. Father's role as the perpetrator of violence should absolutely not be forgotten, but neither should his role as a victim of Heaven's cycle of violence. What Father does out of anger absolutely makes the cycle go round, but the anger itself is a testament to pain that shouldn't be ignored, because it comes out something much bigger - and it's not as simple as "someone he loved died."

And with that, I will wrap things up! Until next time, folks.

#noragami #chapter thoughts

[gsunny6]

Repost of my Shitty Days Livechat screenshots tm

@nyappytown @straysatan

#kingdom hearts 2 spoilers #kindom hearts days spoilers #kingdom hearts days #kh 358/2 days #358/2 days spoilers

[gsunny6]

@nyappytown @straysatan @macey-wacey I can’t stop thinking about aqua terra ven dynamic vs hiyori yato Yukine dynamic help

#kingdom hearts #noragami #terqua #terraqua #yatori #ven #yukine sekki #terra #aqua #hiyori iki #yatogami

[thedeliverygod]

@nyappytown lol I’m fine with trailers but I’ve ignored their millions of Facebook posts and giant text dumps of info about the characters but yeah the demo is out since the anime ended today