BLADE OF THE FUCKING IMMORTAL.
I CAN'T EVEN
Okay so I previously wrote about Blade of the Immortal and how fucking awesome it was and how it was pretty much one of the best series I've ever read. So, feeling nostalgic, I checked if it updated only to find that it had already finished?! I was freaking out because when I left off, Anotsu and Habaki were having their showdown in the port, and Manji, after being saved by Rin's moment of awesome, defeated one of the Six Demons. Makie was absolutely owning everyone when Giichi showed up. So how will they resolve a story that was so complex and intense?
As it turns out, by absolutely ripping out your heart and drowning it in your tears.
Makie owns Giichi by faking her illness, but when Hyakurin shows up Giichi pleads for the sake of her unborn child. Makie acknowledges them and lets them go while she goes to join Anotsu. Ryo shows up and tries to warn her father about the smell of gunpowder, showing she has more foresight than anyone before Hanabusa's subordinates unleash a round of shots. A round of shots which fatally wounds Makie, who is walking towards Anotsu, and Ryo who is protecting her father.
Anotsu remembers the moment when he asks her to stay with him, when they were children and Makie tells him to become stronger than her because she doesn't want to be stronger than a man even when they're grown up. He tells her now that he still isn't stronger and she replies that it means she still has a reason to stay. She then tells him to watch her, and he doesn't take his eyes off her as she, having been fatally wounded by bullets around, vaults onto the snowbank where the snipers where and fluidly and flawlessly defeats them all. But for her who was wandering and running away, without a reason to live or die, she finally found herself. So is the end of her story.
Anotsu, carrying Makie's body, finds Hanabusa tied up by Taito. Habaki is there, but refuses to kill Hanabusa because bringing his daughter to the battlefield was his own mistake. Anotsu however has no such qualms and it's fucking awesome right then because Hanabusa is begging for Habaki to save him but Habaki just says oh sorry I'm blind what can I do? (You deserved it you dick.)
With that out of the way, Habaki and Anotsu go to an empty field to finish their fight. Habaki is genuinely blinded, but prepares for Anotsu's attack with an iai and Anotsu himself notes that Habaki seems sharper than ever. Habaki tries to listen for Anotsu's footfalls as he attacks but mistakes one for the sound of an axe hitting the ground. That mistake is fatal. His life paints a picture of regret. So is the end of his story.
It turns out that the axe was Manji returning Anotsu's axe to him. He says that Rin asked him to take her to see Anotsu because he 'isn't going to die where [she] can't see him'. But Rin already fell asleep leaving Manji and Anotsu to fight which comes to a conclusion by Manji taking off one of Anotsu's arms. He leaves him alive and eventually one of Anotsu's ships come to pick him up and as he's boarding he's telling Manji about how eventually he'll come back and stuff but Manji's just like fuck you don't mess with Rin anymore. But before he gets onto the ship, he turns and sees something coming towards him and on the next page we see Rin stabbing him with a dagger. And this scene, the expressions, the everything I'm telling you I lost it. And I haven't stopped crying since. A dying Anotsu wonders if all of their struggles, all their fighting changed anything at all, and Manji tells him that he'll never forget. But so is the end of his story.
We cut to a bit of a time skip, a year into the future. We see Hyakurin cutting off her hair and laying it before Shinriji's grave. We see Taito now farming. He reminisces about the last words of the man he cut down, who wished to see the rebirth of the world of the sword and admits he was only with the Itto Ryu because he liked Anotsu. So he followed him to the end, but only to see him off because he wouldn't have gone on the ship with him. 'Besides, it isn't across the sea. Ren's grave I mean.' With that, so is the end of his story.
Then we see Rin walking away from Sori's house after Renzou refusing to see her again. Renzou says despite all her warnings about the path of revenge to him, she still killed Anotsu in the end. He comes to his own decision, that he would try to make a living off painting and show her that this is the right path to take. So is the end of his story.
We get one last look at Isaku and Doa, who are farming now as well. Doa calls out to Isaku after a water taxi drifts past, showing Ozuhan in the boat. I think they are happy. So is the end of their story.
Rin meets up with Hyakurin and they take a walk, talking about the future. Rin says she's going on a pilgrimage, then working to pay back the money Sori lent her. On their walk, they see Manji in the distance, walking away. Hyakurin tells her that Rin could ask him to be her bodyguard again, but Rin refuses, apparently thinking she shouldn't be by his side anymore. They turn away, and keep walking. Rin tells Hyakurin to have a healthy baby but she tells her that Rin is just a child, that children don't have to worry about anyone, that they should just want and wish and make trouble for those around them. Hearing that, Rin stops and cries. And so is the end of her story.
But it isn't the end of the story. Time skips forward to imperial Japan, and a police officer tries to stop a man carrying a sword. That man turns out to be Manji. He sees the old lady to first sent him on his journey, and she sees him burying his weapons, literally. As he's telling the old woman about recent events, the name of the 'Itto-ryu' passes his lips for the first time in ninety years. It seems that someone in the Itto-ryu once asked him to do something, but he can't quite remember what it is.
The old woman has a job for him, and a tiny girl is introduced to him as the granddaughter of an old acquaintance of his. Because of a succession fight over the dojo that his acquaintance started, the old woman asks him to be a bodyguard for this girl. She carries the old drawing of him that started everything, and gives him an old wood carving, having been told to do so by her mother. But the carving isn't her mother's, but her mother's mother. It is very very old, and on it are two designs. One of them is an original design meaning 'there will be a reunion', and the other is of a black and white swastika surrounded by flames. Taking her hand, Manji remembers the name of that person, and they leave Edo together. So is the beginning their story.
Because that's how life is, a neverending story. There is no real end or beginning. Characters may enter and leave, but it never really ends. As long as there are people and as long as we are alive.
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So that first half was less of a reaction/review than a chance for me to sort out the events of the last volume and my FEELINGS. As it is, I've stopped crying so hard I can't see the screen and now am just occasionally sniffing. I kept thinking, is this how it really ends? The fights, the feelings, the memories and all that time did it all come to this? It seemed so intense like nothing could ever be the same but that's how this series has always been.
People forget, and with time, everything comes to an end. The fights of the Itto-ryu, of the shogunate, of an immortal man and a young girl, they become lost to time. But it doesn't mean that it was for nothing. They live out their lives like fireworks, bursting and never slowing down and eventually fade away into the dark. But the time that they lived was brilliant and bright and even if it was for a split second it was enough to be carved in one's mind. Even if the meeting between an immortal man and a young girl was just a heartbeat in time, it doesn't make those time that they spent together meaningless. It doesn't make any of those meetings meaningless.
It started off as a simple, one way linear path to avenge her family. It started off as a simple, one way desire to create a revolution. But in his fight against Manji, Anotsu acknowledged it. 'There is no impurity in her desire for revenge. It should be sweet, and full as well.' So what changed? Feelings and meetings between people. If Rin had never started on her journey, she wouldn't have grown up, seen the world for what it is -not black and white, but gray.
'No impurities, is that right? As if you'd know a thing about it. Rather than being without impurity, she's filled with doubt...from the start to the end. Stumbling this way and that. She even spent her compassion on people she didn't need to have anything to do with in the end. Even though you should've been her enemy, her mind was disturbed by your words. Even though I'm supposed to be her bodyguard, she risked her life to save mine. Doing that sort of thing...didn't bring her one step closer to vengeance.'
And what a journey it was. It wasn't straightforward, like the plot to a shounen manga. It wasn't with a build up and climax and facing off against the big bad. She took side paths, stumbled along the way, and kept on going. And it wasn't for the sake of anything, but because that's what humans do. Life keeps on going. And along the way she met so many people, people who were greedy and corrupt, people who were cruel and unjust, people who were kind and loyal, people who were selfish and scared. She came to realize that people could be all of these things. That they could be cruel and still wish for peace, that they could be kind but still wish for war.
And when Anotsu turned, just before he board the boat, he saw death coming to him and he smiled. Because she kept her promise. And wasn't that what his wife had once said to him? That maybe, the woman he needed was someone who could watch him to the very end. And that's what Rin did. She made a promise to wait and watch to see where the Itto-ryu would go, but that at the very end, she would be the one to kill him. And I think in that, there was a kind of peace for him.
'That man and I, we were both crushed by a lot of things...and came to crush things ourselves. That's why, I could never allow that to carry over into the next era. Revenge, retribution, the revival of the sword. No matter how they made merry, I felt that I had to at least protect that. If I can, I want to finish this pilgrimage, and I want to have an open talk with Renzou and then...if, during that process, there's even one person who says 'I won't forgive you', then I will give that person my life. I want everything to end with that.
In a way, Rin and Anotsu were similar. It all started out so simple. But life is rarely that way. To end things like that, for both of them, is a kind of peace. Because they can't live forever, but they both met someone who could.
'To a completely free, peaceful world, there were fools...who clambered for the prosperity of the martial arts and the rebirth of the sword. By their swords...was anything changed...even the smallest thing? I wanted someone to verify that with their own eyes. In ten years...or even a century from now...that...is my final wish.'
'I...will never forget.'
But he did, because for all that he's immortal, Manji is still human. But it doesn't mean that their meeting was meaningless. Because ninety years later, you could see that the meeting changed something. Even if it was just one man, it stayed.
'That man, I can't remember his name or face anymore...I wonder how that bastard would feel...if he saw this era.'
And in the end, Rin saw Manji walking away. After everything they've been through, his wounds for her and her fights for him. After all that passed between them and all that they've said, he walked away and she saw him. This is what made me so very sad, because surely, for both of them, that time was everything. They gave each other their lives, so how could it have been so easy for them to separate? I thought they would be together forever. But there is not convenient magic cure, so they have to keep on walking.
'Killing people and protecting people are both atonement to that man..that's what a certain elder told me. Weeping people without any strength of their own, people who have had their loved ones snatched away and spend their sleepless nights in regret, people like that should be at that man's side...that's what I think. I am...no longer...'
So many things could've been different. If Rin hadn't met that old woman. If that old woman didn't point her in Manji's direction. If Rin hadn't looked like his sister. If he hadn't devoted his life to her.
But they did, and they were together and they travelled and oh the people the met and the things they saw. It started off so simple but it became something amazing. All these different people, all with their own motivations, their own emotions, that's what makes up life.
In the end, Rin saw Manji walking away, and she walked away too. I'm sure that in the end, they never saw each other again. I think, in the end none of them did. Whether it was Doa who she fought alongside, or even Hyakurin who told her it was okay to cry. But I'm sure that in the end, she never forgot. That's why I'm sure that even if they never saw each other again, she gave the carving to the man she loved and asked him to always carry it. That's why she took the carving that Doa had started for her, and carved her own story into it too.
This series was like that. It started with a meeting between an immortal man and a young girl who looked like his dead sister. But she carved her own place into his heart and they carved their story into the past, and everyone they met did the same. And even if those things are forgotten, even if they never met again it doesn't mean it didn't happen and it doesn't mean it meant nothing. For her, or for him or for everyone else. A million other things could've happened, but there was only one way it happened, and that's life. That's what made this series so amazing. It was about life in its entirety. It was about all the different ways that people could be, and all the different things that could happen and it never ever stops happening even twenty, thirty or a hundred years later and it'll never stop happening because that's people and that's life. It was about a meeting.
'But from the moment he met you...it was just certain that man would become your ally, after all.'
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