(this isn’t a great meta, but it’s some ramblings i put together; the students are back and I’m drained but I loved this chapter and so wanted to talk about it!)

So the title of chapter 78 of Noragami is fittingly called “Want.” And in this chapter we see the three main ships this story is aiming for (Yatori, Kazubisha, Yukinora) all receiving focus. What everyone in this series wants is intimate connection with people, but this chapter highlights that there is no connection without pain, without breaking rules, and without risk.

Yukinora

Like Nora said last chapter, all she’s ever wanted is to be wanted. To have a family, but Father doesn’t love her–he uses her–and Yato doesn’t trust her.

She says it’s silly of them to behave like the living, but that’s what she does want. She wants to return to pretending to be an ordinary living family with Father and Yato, complete with cooking for each other and playing house with Yato. This want has driven her to extreme lengths to try to get it back, and it isn’t solely because of Father’s manipulation. It’s because she really, truly wants this as well.

When Nora tries to leave, Yukine tells her not to head into a situation that would be risky (talking to Ebisu). He puts on a bit of an overly enthusiastic act, but instead of annoying Nora, she seems to understand that he truly does care, and she give the first genuine smile we’ve seen from her in the series and agrees to eat with him, i.e. connects with him.

Nora and Yukine are both shinkis, and they’re both dead and want to be alive. Yukine’s developed so much from his starting place though: he is content with being dead, so long as he has people he loves around. He wants to show Nora the same kind of love and acceptance that Yato and Hiyori showed him, as it is what Nora’s been craving but has never had. But Yukine’s taking a risk in talking to Nora because she hasn’t exactly been trustworthy in the past, and it isn’t even entirely up to her since Father’s always been controlling her.

As for whether this is a trick or not, I don’t know (I think Father’s up to something but I don’t know if Nora is in on it; it’s more interesting to me if she isn’t) but I don’t think Nora’s smile here is faked, and I don’t think her misery is faked either. This is what she wants; it’s been obvious in her arc since the beginning. When Father will inevitably ask her to betray Yukine (even if he’s thrown her away, I’d bet anything he’ll do that at some point), she’ll have to choose between someone who gives her what she really wants, and the family of three she’s been desperately trying to get back. If she really wants to connect with Yukine, she’ll have to let go of trying to get back the past (with Father and Yato). Notice how the three acorns (family of three, as a friend pointed out to me last night) are behind her right now while she and Yukine (in a yin/yang design, no less) face the light.

In other words while Yukine is currently having the most positive development, he’s not out of the woods and obviously neither is Nora. Loving Nora and wanting to help her is good, but it comes with risks that he may not fully comprehend just yet.

Kazubisha

Kazuma is currently behaving pretty much just like Nora used to. It’s not a coincidence that he’s asking Yato to become a nora this chapter, something he previously stated he’d never do.

Kazuma’s always been a foil to Nora. Right now, he’s lashing out at Hiyori because he doesn’t want to feel alone. For him, he wants Hiyori to feel how he feels–being in love with someone whom he can’t believe loves him back–for Nora throughout… most of the story so far she’s been trying to get Yato to return and does so for the same reason she gets so many names: because she also doesn’t want to feel alone.

Kazuma, you loser. I love you. Get help.

He talks about pretending to be a family, and how the pretending isn’t enough. He wants everything, really, with Bisha, because he loves her. He wants a full committed relationship, a family they cannot have because she’s a goddess and he’s dead. The question for Kazuma is if he’s willing to take what he can have with Bisha, who does respect and care about him despite Kazuma not fully realizing it. Because to do that he’d have to get over himself.

The problem for Kazuma is that he idolizes Bishamon too much, refusing to truly see her and how she sees him because she’s a goddess and he feels extremely unworthy (hence the glasses: they’re symbolic. That’s why he takes them off when he starts to confess to Yato).

Yato and Kazuma are both currently paralleling each other too, in that they’re avoiding their love interests ostensibly to protect them, but also because neither of them feel worthy of them.

Yatori

Well, we finally had acknowledgement that Hiyori has feelings for Yato.

(it’s yin/yang toooo it even looks like the shape)^^

Kazuma seems to believe forcing Hiyori to face her feelings will sow the same sense of unworthiness and guilt in Hiyori, but I’m not sure it will work out that way. We’ll see. But currently Yato is the one being an edgelord and unable to face her, because Father is clearly going to go after her again in his quest to retain Yato. But avoiding her is only hurting her.

Either way, whether he’s with her or not, Hiyori gets hurt. The question is whether he’d rather be hurt with her, or hurt her by leaving her alone.

And Hiyori herself stays in denial because it’s easier for her that way, but now she can’t stay in denial anymore. (She’s risking her life and her family to find Yato.) Thanks for that, Kazuma, I guess? (Not.)

That’s where Kazuma is almost certainly wrong, and again this goes back to his idolization and his principles. Yato does care for Hiyori, and Bisha cares for him (okay he’s a shinki but a shinki is a dead human). Hiyori is able to see that (she tells him Bisha would want him home with her), but Kazuma cannot currently.

Daikoku/Kofuku

The opening of this chapter is super interesting in light of Kazuma’s statement and further proves that he’s really, really wrong, and his issues have to do with himself and his own self-hatred and not with some fact.

We know that a shinki and a goddess (of poverty, no less, who causes misfortunes wherever she goes) have the relationship of a married couple. It’s no coincidence that the chapter opens with them being domestic.

But we also know Kofuku and Daikoku’s relationship hasn’t come without pain. They can’t have kids because of what they are, and their attempt to adopt a child shinki hurt them both deeply. But they love each other and stay together, and Kofuku wants him to care for her if she reincarnates. In this way we know that Kazuma’s declarations are flat-out wrong.

What’s holding Kazuma back from a relationship with Bisha is himself. Same as it’s Yato for being with Hiyori. Yukinora seems to be doing the best currently, but we all know the shoe named Father is going to drop eventually since he was spying on them last chapter. It’s not what they are or what the people they love are, but rather their fears about themselves, and the chains those fears lash around them (cough, Father for Nora, cough). It’s fear keeping them from pursuing what they want and/or seeing what they truly want.