Haha, I’m teasing, anon. This is a great observation. And timely because I actually recently had this exact discussion with a friend of mine. There is indeed some foreshadowing in the manga that the Quinx will be the ones to kill Kaneki. I hadn’t even thought of the Mutsuki panel, but you’re right about the Urie as a knight imagery, and knights typically oppose dragons. There’s also this:
Should Kaneki truly be Dragon and turn into a monster, I could see it happening. That would certainly make Kaneki a tragedy, though, though again, a fundamental part of Kaneki’s character is that he has so little agency because he doesn’t want to have it. He’s a tool for Eto and Arima to groom into the OEK and for Furuta to (maybe) groom into Dragon. Should his personal life end tragically, I would imagine Goat would still create a better world against the odds because that fits with the Fool’s Journey.
The question is how that works with where the Quinx are now. Saiko adores her Maman, and Mutsuki loves his Sensei, and Urie just teamed up with Hide, Kaneki’s BFF. Yes, Mutsuki’s love is twisted, but I really don’t think he wants to kill Kaneki (I think he was lying to Aura there). Should Kaneki turn into Dragon, that could definitely help wreck Mutsuki’s obsession over him, which would be a good thing, but I question whether that would be enough for Mutsuki to want to kill him.
But yes, you’re right: there’s been some foreshadowing in that direction. It’s looking like Shirazu isn’t Dragon, but should Ishida suddenly surprise us, that would also fit, as there’s this panel that seems to indicate the Quinx may have to kill him at the end:
But overall, it’s looking like Dragon will be Kaneki, and given the original purpose of the Quinx… yeah. There’s also the fact that if Kaneki’s personal life is to be a tragedy, it’s interesting that the Quinx, who share fundamental flaws with Kaneki and all kind of represent part of him might be the ones to end him. I hope this isn’t how it goes, personally, but yes, there’s been some foreshadowing that this could be where it heads. A lot depends on what happens next chapter though! (*prays for no third series*)
Initially I thought the narrative over the last 40 or so chapters was a mind fuck, with all the confusing messages that were impossible to decipher. However when I was recently reminded of one minuscule detail I was immediately given the feeling of several pieces falling into place, and everything started making a lot more sense.
Specifically, it was when Furuta mentions the letter “V”. Most people immediately theorized that Furuta was either referring to the origin of the kagune itself, or that Furuta was simply trolling (which he does a lot of). However I don’t think it was either of these things. First of all, we already know what the letter “V” stands for, it means Victory.
Onee-chan.
“Find happiness.” …I can’t really say that. It’s really easy to become unhappy, and it’s very difficult to become happy at all.
So live.
“Live.” That’s the only thing I can say to you. Even if it feels like the pain is going to make your heart burst, even if your cheeks become stiff from the sorrow, live.
Ohh, they knew each other when they were in the Sunlit Garden. Judging by her memory of him as she was dying and the light novel story Tension, those were halcyon days for both of them (Tension will break your heart btw).
The light novels stress Arima’s gentleness with her, which left her obsessively pining for his love and attention as an adult. She’s admitted to jealously vying for his praise (”that’s why I’m trying even harder than my best, more than Koori and Haise"), has a quinque fashioned to be an exact replica of Nurakami (”T-Human”, a play on the name), and it says she “wants Arima’s IXA” in her bio (hoho).
Hairu’s also blatantly overlooked Ui’s passes at her to go show Arima gifts he’s given her, gets easily distracted when he’s around, and has stopped working to play games with him on multiple occasions :’)
In a nutshell, she idolizes him (and he’s probably too much of an airhead to actually see it).
She says “I saw the Reaper, he was very beautiful”. I’m still banking on this foreshadowing her revival and only being able to remember him in the Garden before dying.
It’s all super cute and fun for the time being imo, but I think it underscores something dark that we’ll see in the near future. For one thing, kindness shouldn’t trigger that much obsession for a child unless it was something they usually didn’t receive much of. For another, even in the most innocent sense, Hairu truly did love Arima a lot, which is not going to bode well for Ui nor Kaneki if she’s brought back and finds out that he’s dead.
hamliet 