Worse than evil itself, or, basically, let’s talk about Tsukishima Hajime

So you’re probably wondering if I’ve finally lost my mind. How can Tsukishima, the ‘Dainanashidan no ryōshin’ (第七師団の良心 “Conscience of the 7th” or, more literally, “Good heart of the 7th”), by many considered a good person and by, I think, everyone, considered at least one of the less evil people in the 7th, be worse than evil?

Well, whoever said I was talking about him when I said ‘worse than evil’?

But let’s go in order and start with…

A PREMISE

In chap 227 Tsurumi explained to Takeda how he had found the motivating force that could push a man to bring out all his aggressiveness and murder people without any hesitation.

Said force, according to Tsurumi, is ‘love’ and, as he said so, behind him we can see the images of Ogata, Koito, Usami and Tsukishima with the implication Tsurumi used ‘love’ to turn them into killing machines.

Skipping how Tsurumi is overlooking tons of relevant issues at play in those 4 guys, how do you use something normally considered a positive emotion like ‘love’, to turn someone into something as terrible as a murderer?

Well, it’s clear you can’t use ‘pure, selfless love’ to get this result, you’ve to use some ‘corrupted version’ of it.

And this caused me to remember something.

According to Dante Alighieri ‘capital vices are perverse or corrupt versions of LOVE for something or for another person’.

In fact Luxuria (lust), Gula (gluttony), and Avaritia (greed) are all excessive or disordered love of good things; Acedia (sloth) is a deficiency of love; Ira (wrath), Invidia (envy), and Superbia (pride) are perverted love for oneself which ends up being directed toward other’s harm.

This pushed me to think ‘can it be to depict how Tsurumi used love to manipulate his men, Noda also took inspiration by the capital vices?’

After all Noda joked on the idea Tsurumi represented the devil and, of course, a devil tempts you to sin through your vices.

While possible, there’s of course no proof, and it doesn’t help that the interpretation of what are capital vices has changed over the centuries, but still I had fun pairing each of them to a character in Golden Kamuy that was tempted by Tsurumi since, although they indulged in more than one vice (the most common one being ‘Ira’ [“wrath”]), it was always a different vice what caused their downfall.

But what are capital vices, some of you might ask?

You probably better know them with the name of ‘7 deadly sins’, although this is an improper name.

The capital vices (from the Latin ‘capitalis’, which is a derivate from ‘caput’= “head”/”top” and ‘vĭtĭum’= “lack”, “defect”, but also a “deviated or crooked habit, off the right path”) aren’t exactly deadly sins, they’re mostly wrong behaviours or habits which CAUSE people end up breaking the rules set by God and therefore committing sins… like murder for example.

In short Tsurumi, by tempting people to indulge into wrong behaviours or habits, could effectively lead them to commit murder.

Yeah, yeah, I know some of those ‘capital vices’ doesn’t seem to fit with GK characters, but the trick here is you’re probably thinking at the ‘7 deadly sins’ as portrayed in media. In truth they’re a lot more complex and underwent various transformations so they aren’t as clean cut as you might have been lead to believe.

It’s also worth to point out that no, Noda didn’t pick up 7 characters and made the personification of ‘capital vices’ as you see often in many media. He just made 7 human people, like you and me and, like any human in the world, and then had them indulge in one of the ‘capital vices’ in such a way this lead them to the worst outcome possible, their ‘fall from grace’. Or, if you prefer, to ruin their own lives.

If I’ll manage to, I’ll discuss all 7 of them in future posts but, for now, I’d like to focus on just one character and let you wonder about the other 6.

So, here ends the premise and back to Tsukishima we go, and to the vice that caused his downfall, a vice that by many (to name some Plato, Leonardo Da Vinci, Voltaire, Einstain, Martin Luther King, Jr) is defined with words that imply that’s ‘worse than evil itself’, Acedia.

What’s Acedia, some of you might wonder?

Well, many of you probably know it by the name of ‘sloth’ but sloth doesn’t quite do it justice as it seems to merely imply laziness when actually the vice of Acedia is much more.

ACEDIA

From Greek ἀκηδία, ἀ- “lack of” -κηδία “care”, Acedia is a state of not caring or not being concerned with one’s position or condition in the world, with what’s happening to you and/or to others… and because you ‘don’t care’ you can end up on ‘doing nothing’ and, from here, the idea that it’s connected to ‘sloth’, ‘laziness’…

It doesn’t seem really that big of a deal, does it? It doesn’t seem one would do harm by indulging in Acedia. After all one ‘would do nothing’ so how can a person who’s doing nothing, being doing something ‘worse than evil itself’?

Well, many people much better than me at discussing and explaining this, from Plato to Martin Luther King, had been doing their best to point out how if good people ‘don’t care’, if good people ‘do nothing’ against evil, they actually are empowering it, supporting it, strengthening it, allowing it to thrive, sometimes they even end up disguising it as something good because if good people don’t fight against something… well, that something has to be good, hasn’t it? It has to be normal, it has to be right for it to exist, isn’t that it? Shouldn’t we all indulge in it, after all?

But to better get things into perspective let’s dig into Tsukishima Hajime and how amazing Noda’s portray of him was.

“But well… that’s fine with me. Getting furious about the fact that I’m being used? My life never had that much value in the first place.” [Chap 210]

Now you might think I’m going to talk about chap 210, right? But no, I’m going to talk about something different, how we got to know Tsukishima and how Noda hinted that his worst vice was Acedia.

PART 1 INTRODUCTION: THE NAMELESS MINION

There’s a trend that’s common for almost all the victims of their own vices. Although they don’t immediately get their back story to be told, we, almost always, get a hint to what the vice that caused their downfall could be really early on, if not at their first apparition, short after it.

Acedia though, is a rather complicate vice (yeah, I HAD to start from something complicate… -_-) so Noda went with a really peculiar way to hint at how this is Tsukishima’s vice and why it’s such a human vice we all could end up committing it.

So now… do you remember how Noda introduced Tsukishima, whom he defined ‘the conscience of the 7th ’ (第七師団の良心 “Dainana shidan no ryōshin”) in the presentation of the characters included in Vol 9?

When he went with Tsurumi and Nikaidō to Yubari’s cemetery in Vol 8 chap 70?

No, Tsukishima appeared much, much earlier, in vol 2 and showed up more than once afterward. If you didn’t notice him, that’s because Noda presented him as if he were merely a nameless minion, the classical minion you can find in many stories, someone who blindly obeys him and murders for his boss without questions, in short ‘someone who doesn’t care’ and is just following orders because ultimately it’s just a mere ‘plot device’, not a person with his own personality, identity and will. A nameless minion doesn’t need a reason to do what he does and, therefore, doesn’t need to care if he does good or evil, a perfect personification of Acedia.

And what Noda wants us to be the first thing we see the nameless minion we’ll later know as Tsukishima doing?

Drawing his unsuspecting superior officer, Captain Wada, outside, in an isolated area, and then shoot him in the head as per Tsurumi’s orders [Chap 13].

Q22: Who shot Wada? This question keeps me awake at night.

Noda: It was Tsukishima. [Q&A section with Noda Satoru, translation courtesy of @piduai]

Not really how you would expect ‘good person’ to be introduced, as murder is definitely something no talking cricket, pardon, ‘conscience supposed to guide us’ would be expected to commit, don’t you agree?

Why that scene doesn’t really make an impression to the point we hardly associate it with Tsukishima?

After all we all remember how Ogata shoot in the head prisoner number 1 or how Vasily attempted to do the same with that poor Orok man.

Why this shooting in the head didn’t impress us much?

Well, for start we can blame the circumstances in which it takes place.

At the time Tsurumi seemed a rightful person defending the rights of the veterans and Wada an ugly jerk who was jumping against a man due to the disfiguring wound he received during the war… even though if we pay attention to Wada’s words, Wada was actually worrying for his men, demanding to know why 4 were missing and one was in critical conditions (as well as how Tsurumi was secretly stealing weapons and ammunitions from Asahikawa), men whose well being Tsurumi was responsible.

Noda plays with our feelings, tricks us into thinking that since Wada looks like a rude jerk and Tsurumi seems righteous, it was ‘okay’ to murder him in cool blood or, at least, not so wrong as it could be to kill… someone else.

I doubt there are fans who mourn Wada or do a consistent effort to remember him.

We can discuss if it was right or not to murder Kiro or even Mishima but Wada? Who will ever care about him?

Yet, in the GK world, Wada is a person, he might be a loving father with a precious family. For us, he’s just a minor, mean character who happens to get shot by… someone under Tsurumi.

Nothing really worth remembering, let’s move on as we don’t really care about this or about why that soldier pushed the trigger, for us he’s just a nameless minion just following orders.

We don’t expect him to care about his own actions, nor we really hold him accountable.

He’s a minion, minions do what they’re told to do without caring if it’s right or wrong, they aren’t supposed to stop and say ‘no, wait, this is bad’.

And, just to remark the concept that Tsukishima is merely a minion just following orders we see Tsukishima witnessing without blinking other questionable activities.

We meet Tsukishima again in Vol 4 chap 31.

According to Noda, THIS is the moment in which he decided to elevate Tsukishima from the random mob character that shoot Wada to regular character.

Q2: Initially, Tsukishima was a mob character. When did you decide to elevate him to regular status?

Noda: In volume 4, when they were negotiating with the English arms dealer. I realized that there is a need of a character who will do Tsurumi’s dirty work for him and serve as a right hand man. [Q&A corner from the DVD bundle of the 17th volume of Golden Kamuy, translation courtesy of @piduai]

He’s with Tsurumi as they’re buying weapons for their own rebellion, Noda subtly trying to tell us he’s not just a minion but a character, by placing him in the center of the first panel, by having him speak in place of Tsurumi, and speak in a quite clever manner. Tsukishima complains about the guns, a foreigner, Mister Thomas (likely GK version of Thomas Blake Glover, a Scottish trader who made a fortune selling Ships and Arms in Japan), is trying to sell them, pointing out how they’re old models and, when Thomas explains with what they’re paying him, this is all they can get from him, Tsukishima assures him once they’ll get what they’re after they’ll get money.

If you buy the narrative introduced by Tanigaki of Tsurumi being in a rebellion for the well being of his men, the one who looks like a jerk is again Thomas, the foreigner who thinks only at money and it’s okay in selling weapons and funding wars for it. But if you pay close attention Tsurumi too, despite personally knowing the horrors of war plans to profit by it, selling the weapons he’ll plan to produce to Thomas. They’re the same.

Tsurumi plans to use the Ainu gold and the weapons to rebel against Japan’s central government, conquer Hokkaido, establish a military dictatorship of which he’ll be the leader and then profit from a weapon factory they’ll build so they will profit from war. Yeah, you know, the thing they complain the government forced them to fight without rewarding them properly and for which they lost so much.

After discovering its horror they aren’t starting a ‘peace movement’, no, they want to profit from it, Tsurumi mimicking Hitler as he explains his plan to his men.

Noda could have let solely Tsurumi interact with Thomas (like the anime does), yet he shows Tsukishima being there, proving he’s actively involved in Tsurumi’s plan. Tsukishima too knows first-hand how war is terrible, yet he’s okay supporting a plan which is basically based on profiting from it.

And again, although Tsurumi’s goal is terrible and Noda clearly thinks so as well or he wouldn’t have Tsurumi move as Hitler, Noda tricks us into thinking that’s not so bad because Tsurumi is presented as someone righteous, someone who, differently from his superior officers, faced the horrors of war, someone who gets the approbation of Tanigaki, who claims Tsurumi’s quest is more morally acceptable than Sugimoto and even Sugimoto seems to consider helping him out.

And Tsukishima, who should know how terrible Tsurumi’s goal is, is there supporting it, speaking up in a manner that benefits Tsurumi’s interests. He’s not merely a doll, he’s an active participant. He doesn’t care what Tsurumi’s goal will cause, he’s supporting him.

Tsukishima has also a minor role in chap chap 34.

He’s with Tsurumi when the poor people of Otaru hope the 7th division will protect them from the commotion and Tsurumi’s first and foremost worry is to check if the guy they had killed is a tattooed criminal.

The division that’s supposed to defend people is actually there for their boss’ interests. Tsukishima sees this and… it doesn’t affect him (which is in stark contrast with how, much, much later, the fact Tsurumi didn’t care about Koito being hurt will affect Tsukishima… although he then won’t act on it).

And we go on.

In chap 46 vol 5 Tsukishima is there as Tsurumi cuts Nikaidō’s ear.

The scene is interesting because, as Tsurumi questions Nikaidō, we see some men of the 7th are uncomfortable with what’s going on, with witnessing someone who used to be among them being tortured in such a sick way… but Tsukishima isn’t shown among the men who look uncomfortable.

It was a good moment to show Tsukishima is not okay with what his boss is doing… after all it’s pretty gruesome and nowadays it would be clearly labelled as torture, as something horrible… but Tsukishima isn’t shown.

Noda wanted us to know he’s there… but not that he’s against what Tsurumi is doing.

The ‘conscience of the 7th’ is saying nothing, doing nothing about what’s being done. The ‘conscience of the 7th’ doesn’t care to stop Tsurumi.

And now the story is ready to introduce Tsukishima as a character, to move him from the role of random minion with no will of his own and who therefore is a perfect representation of ‘Acedia’ as a background character is not meant to care, to a fleshed out character, a fleshed out character who supposedly CARES.

As a move it’s brilliant, not only because it plays on the fact we, as readers, tend not to expect background minion characters to have feelings, but also because it’s often what you do in real life.

We know that soldiers are actually a huge number of PEOPLE, but not only they’re trained to blindly obey and not care but we also tend to see them as… a mass, a single entity of opponents, the enemy, not as people.

Sugimoto himself decides to see the whole of the Russian army as ‘soulless bad guys’.

And now Noda instead picks one of those apparently soulless creatures and… shows us he’s human.

He makes sure Tsukishima stops, in our eyes, to be the personification of ‘Acedia’ to become a full fleshed human who indulges in such vice and for his own specific reasons.

There’s always a reason why men do things in this story, they aren’t meant to be just stereotypes or personification.

So, without further ado let’s go meet…

PART 2 THE PERSON BEHIND THE MINION: SERGEANT TSUKISHIMA

It’s in chap 70 that Tsukishima makes the big jump from someone who existed apparently only as a nameless minion to a character with a name and a characterization.

Noda will develop him, his story, his character in a way that makes him likable, lovable. Tsukishima is a fan favourite after all, it’s no coincidence he got the 3rd place in the Golden Kamuy All-stars voting pool.

Noda clearly signals us in chap 70 how Tsukishima’s moment to shine has come.

In fact, in the first panel of that chapter that shows the 7th division’s actions, we’ve Tsurumi, a big presence in the panel, and then Tsukishima, a little smaller than him, still a background character but one that’s clearly transitioning from background character to a regular one and we can see that the first thing Tsurumi will say in that panel are Tsukishima’s name and ranking before giving him his orders.

Tsukishima is not the only soldier there, there’s also Nikaidō, who’s also meant to do the same Tsukishima will do, don’t take his eyes off the grave, yet, by having Tsurumi give his order specifically to Tsukishima, Noda introduces him to us, he subtly tells us it’s Tsukishima’s time to climb on the stage… even if all Tsukishima says at first is a “yes” (はい ‘Hai’), a mere word of obedience.

And yet it’s clear this guy is not just another random minion.

Tsukishima is not another “First Class Private” like Nikaidō, like Tanigaki, like Sugimoto. He’s not even a “Superior Private” like Ogata or a “Corporal” like Tamai.

Tsukishima is a “Sergeant”, as far as we know the only Sergeant under Tsurumi and, for a long time, Tsukishima will remain the known highest ranking soldier after Tsurumi in Tsurumi’s army.

Sure, in chap 98 Koito will show up, but Koito, despite his higher rank, is clearly not an authority in the 7th division, he’s just a boy fresh from academy who merely has a rank higher than Tsukishima just because he’s the son of a officer who sent him to the Army Academy.

(I’m not considering Kikuta because he shows up too much later on, in chap 191, when many of us weren’t expecting other soldiers from the 7th division would be introduced)

Anyway it’s Sergeant Tsukishima, who’s older, competent, trusted and, we learn in an extra page in Vol 9, is considered the ‘Dainanashidan no ryōshin’ (第七師団の良心 “Conscience of the 7th” or, more literally “Good heart of the 7th”) who’s the higher authority after Tsurumi in Tsurumi’s division, the one the soldiers look at.

For Tsukishima is basically a 180° turn, he moved in a blink from random minion many of us didn’t even care to remember existed, to basically Tsurumi’s second in command and most trusted man.

Noda hints at it immediately.

We can clearly see how, although Tsukishima is lower in rank compared to Tsurumi, they are good at working together. Tsukishima questions, Tsukishima warns Tsurumi something is happening, Tsukishima and Tsurumi react at the exactly same time and in the same way when Nikaidō makes a small noise.

And then Tsukishima takes charge.

Tsurumi tells Tsukishima (and Nikaidō) to go after Edogai and Tsukishima orders Nikaidō not to kill Edogai.

It’s a 4 pages scene, it’s apparently nothing big and yet, through small details, Noda has pushed Tsukishima on stage, from this moment on we won’t be able anymore to dismiss him as a mere minion, a background character, because Noda will flash him out more and more, to the point that many think it’s NOW Tsukishima entered in the story, and miss his previous introduction, thinking that one wasn’t Tsukishima, just a random guy, when they actually are one and the same.

Why those 4 pages are important as well as all the following Tsukishima-building?

Because Noda is not trying to create a personification of Acedia but a human indulging in it.

In order to do so Tsukishima can’t be a powerless pawn or someone who doesn’t realize he’s doing wrong as we could have assumed he was in the previous volumes. He has to realize that wrong is being done, he has to have the moral sense to acknowledge it as wrong, he has to have the power to stand up against it (not necessarily to defeat it) and decide he doesn’t care to stand up to it, that he won’t make the effort.

And Noda will paint Tsukishima exactly in this way.

Tsukishima is a person who can tell right from wrong, who has a moral sense, who could try to fight it… and yet he doesn’t.

Of course Noda gives him reasons, everyone in this story has reasons for what he does, which doesn’t mean reasons are necessarily good enough to right wrong actions, just that people didn’t merely act for the evulz or for great justice, but for more realistic, personal motives. We’ll talk of Tsukishima’s reasons later though, as it’s only later that Noda will introduce them to us.

For now let’s focus on how Noda will flesh Tsukishima in the Vol 8/14.

In fact, in order to flash out characters, Noda often shows us their struggle in pursuing their goal.

We’ve Sugimoto fighting hard to get the money to cure Umeko, Asirpa who’s travelling to discover the truth about her father, Hijikata who wants the gold to resurrect the republic of Ezo, Kiroranke who wants to help the Ainu, Tanigaki who busies himself in a quest to bring Asirpa back, Nikaidō who wants revenge and even in Ogata’s case, although we don’t know exactly what he wants, we see how he struggles to get it.

In Tsukishima’s case though, this doesn’t happen. Tsukishima seems to not have a personal goal, he’s just there obeying Tsurumi’s orders, but he doesn’t seem in adoration of Tsurumi like Koito or Usami, nor someone who long for an improvement in his position.

What Vol 1/7 established remains, Tsukishima is a mere executor of Tsurumi’s orders and, ironically, we’ll see him facing again situations similar to the ones he faced in the previous volumes.

So… what Noda shows us in this new group of volumes in regards to Tsukishima?

He actually shows us how Tsukishima relates with other characters.

Through it, he establishes that Tsukishima is not evil, that he can differentiate between right and wrong, that he can care for others… but also gives us many hints Tsukishima’s vice is Acedia.

Let’s start with the first relevant interaction, the one between Tsukishima and Ogata.

Although the start of vol 8 places Tsukishima with Tsurumi, Nikaidō and Edogai, the first interaction ‘s meant to make an impression in the portrayal of Tsukishima is the one with Ogata.

In fact, remember what Tsukishima does in chap 71?

As Tsurumi talks with Edogai, Tsukishima is hiding in a house, ready to snipe Edogai should things go wrong, Nikaidō playing the role of his spotter…

…the same way Nikaidō played the role of Ogata’s spotter when the latter wanted to shoot Tanigaki.

Tsukishima explains things to Nikaidō, same as Ogata, and Nikaidō, same as he had done with Ogata, suggests killing the target immediately (remember how Nikaidō said they should have killed Tanigaki in Huci’s house?).

All this is to subtly prepare us to the scene in which Tsukishima and Ogata will clash, to push us to compare them in our mind.

Through a not reliable narrator, Tanigaki, Noda has previously painted a negative view of Ogata and a positive view of Tsurumi and his goal.

Tsurumi, according to Tanigaki, is a noble man who’s pursuing his own goal to improve the life of the people in the 7th, who were mistreated by central.

Ogata, always according to Tanigaki, is a despicable person for betraying such a noble man and, from the way Tanigaki talks about him, Ogata’s betrayal doesn’t come to him as a surprise, implying Ogata lacked moral qualities (back then we didn’t know yet of the whole Yamaneko business so we could assume Tanigaki has something more valid to hold against Ogata than the fact the army assume Ogata’s mother was a swindler and he would merely inherit that trait from her).

So, when the narrative pushes us to compare Tsukishima and Ogata, they seem to act as foils of each other, with Ogata’s betrayal causing us to see in a better light Tsukishima, who instead is so very loyal to Tsurumi… and this comes out as even more marked when Ogata and Tsukishima clash.

Tsukishima is fast at painting Ogata as despicable for shooting Maeyama, a war buddy, and for betraying Tsurumi, claiming he’s doing it for personal gain, that he’s selling them to his master, the despicable central command, to rise through ranks.

(Actually the idea Ogata is doing this out of ambition is merely Tsukishima’s speculation but, as the story gave us no reason for Ogata’s betrayal and Tsukishima seems to know him, it’s easy for a reader to buy Tsukishima’s words.)

The fact that Tsukishima considers turning against companions and betraying them for personal ambition as despicable, tells us Tsukishima can differentiate right from wrong, he’s not someone who jut blindly do what he’s told with no opinion on what’s going on, he’s angry with Ogata because, according to him, Ogata is doing something morally wrong, not just because he’s ‘an enemy’ and the enemy is wrong a priori.

It’s through Tsukishima scolding Ogata for his behavior it’s easy for us to swallow what we’ll learn in vol 9, that Tsukishima is considered the ‘Dainanashidan no ryōshin’ (第七師団の良心 “Conscience of the 7th” or, more literally “Good heart of the 7th”).

So… where’s the vice of Acedia in all this, when Tsukishima is ‘fighting evil’?

It’s in the fact that Tsukishima is basically doing exactly the thing he’s blaming Ogata of doing.

Tsukishima serves a master, a master who’s fast to sacrifice people for his purposes and Tsukishima knows, Tsukishima has killed people for Tsurumi, including Wada, who probably also took part to war with them, including Hanazawa, who surely was in the war with them, and even plotted to kill Yuusaku, who was clearly not to blame for his father’s poor leadership, Tsukishima is aware they’re betraying central command for their own gain, to rise to the ranks of elite guards of Hokkaido’s new military dictator.

It would be actually very obvious how Tsukishima is in the wrong as well, if Noda didn’t use a narrative gimmick that’s actually rather common in mystery novels.

He uses the readers’ expectations, that the reasoning coming from a supposedly unreliable character has to be wrong, to influence us.

Because it’s Ogata the one who points out how the 7th is also a group of rebels (and therefore of people who’re betraying the state to rise in power willing to go to those who previously were their companions) the whole accusation doesn’t seem valid. Like Tsukishima will say to Koito much, much later, many readers end up thinking Ogata is trying to confuse and mislead them, that the 7th is righteous and he’s just slandering them.

In order for Tsukishima not to indulge in Acedia, since he knows such behavior is wrong, he should oppose to Tsurumi, he shouldn’t support him or, at least, try to bring him to reason or, at the bare minimum, to tame his behavior.

Tsukishima doesn’t.

For his own reasons not only he turns a blind eye to the wrong things Tsurumi is doing but he supports him in them. Even though he knows they’re wrong and he feels no enjoyment in all that nor any personal gain.

Interesting enough the comparison with Ogata won’t end with vol 14 but will also be a recurring element later, as we’ll learn they both had a despicable father, a similar past of bullying, are in Tsurumi’s close entourage, are involved in Koito’s kidnapping and in a Tanigaki’s hunting… but for now this can suffice.

And now we move to the relations Tsukishima had with Edogai and Koito.

Those two are in a way pretty similar as persons as not only they share the same age but they’re very emotional and completely and utterly captivated by Tsurumi who’s actually only using them.

Tsukishima acts with them in a similar manner.

On the surface he keeps his distance from them, acting cold and emotionless (and even clapping his hands with both of them to encourage them to go faster (remember chap 176?)…

…probably thinking they’re a nuisance, but in truth he’s fond of them and would like to protect them. Tsukishima won’t shrug off Edogai’s death, even many chapters later it will still weight on him… so again, where’s the Acedia in all this?

In the fact he knows they’re young men with psychological troubles being manipulated for wrong purposes and placed into dangerous situation by someone who lies at them and yet he does nothing to stop him.

And to remark better how Tsukishima actually had a big part in the fate of those two young men Noda rests on Tsukishima’s shoulders the failure to protect Edogai, as if to foreshadow how much later Tsukishima will fail to protect Koito (who’ll be stabbed by Sugimoto, although he’ll manage to survive).

Let’s look a moment at how things went.

Tsurumi left Tsukishima (and Maeyama) there as a protection to Edogai. As Tsukishima is a sergeant, he’s probably in charge of deciding things and insure Edogai will be kept safe.

Tsukishima however decides to leave Maeyama alone to guard Edogai to have a bath… offering Ogata the perfect moment to attack because not only Maeyama is now alone and therefore easy to deal with but Ogata is AWARE TSUKISHIMA WOULD HAVE A LONG BATH EVEN IN SUCH A SITUATION and even manages to render unusable the rifle Tsukishima has left in Edogai’s house (remember the many times Ogata said rifles shouldn’t be left unguarded?).

And why Tsukishima took the habit to take long bath?

Q26: It was stated that Tsukishima takes long baths, but how long, exactly? Do you have any bath time trivia about him?

Noda: Bath time allowance was more lax when working with Tsurumi in Otaru than with the 7th Division in Asahikawa so he probably developed a habit of taking rather long baths, but there’s also the fact that Ogata hates soaking in the bath so for him, Tsukishima’s baths seemed to take forever. [Q & A section with Noda Satoru translation always courtesy of @piduai]

And it’s also worth to point out Ogata is merely the faster to track Edogai down.

Sugimoto’s group was also searching him and Ogata is there on Hijikata’s orders, meaning it’s not just Ogata who was after Edogai but Hijikata’s group.

And, although they won’t manage to be involved, it was also possible for other convicts to come and hunt Edogai, who kept in his home a tattooed skin so Edogai shouldn’t have been left unguarded.

Ogata is the fastest but he’s only the first of a list of people aiming to get his hands on Edogai… and Tsukishima left him guarded by only one man. And why?

Noda (because it’s Noda who’s creating the situation) has him leave Edogai for a bath and that’s not all, Noda establishes Tsukishima loves to have long baths.

Noda could have Tsukishima leave Edogai for whatever reason he wanted, he could have Tsurumi call him, he could have Tsukishima go check on something relevant in a rush but instead he has Tsukishima leave to indulge in a personal pleasure. It’s a carelessness Edogai will pay with his life and part of the reason why Tsukishima feels responsible for his death.

Sure it might seem Tsukishima manages to turn tables with Ogata, and in a way he did, as Tsukishima is capable and tenacious, but most of what plays in Tsukishima’s favor is mere luck. Because Tsukishima forgot his wallet, he came back earlier, catching Ogata completely on surprise, the man Tsukishima has ignored when coming back, actually gave him a hint on how to track Edogai, in the mines they manage to leave behind both Sugimoto and Ogata due to luck, and, due to luck, while Edogai will end up crushed by rocks, Tsukishima will remain perfectly safe and will even manage to find a way out of the mines.

Tsukishima’s failure in saving Edogai is important.

It’s not that Tsukishima didn’t want to save Edogai, it’s not that he was completely disinterested about him… it’s just he didn’t give to it his all, he didn’t care enough, and this contrast with the behavior of two other characters.

For start we’ve Edogai.

Edogai’s goal is to give the skins to Tsurumi. When he finds Maeyama dead and realizes he could be about to be the next, despite the fact he’s not a soldier, he doesn’t know how to defend himself and that he’s deadly scared, he FIRST OF ALL grabs the skins then hurriedly comes up with a successful plan to hide himself and, equally successfully escape from the house.

Later, when he and Tsukishima are on the cart, even though this exposes him to the possibility of being shoot, Edogai contributes by throwing coal to his chasers and, ultimately, when he finds himself trapped and with his legs crushed facing the realistic possibility to die burned alive (he’ll actually be killed by the gas), he doesn’t beg Tsukishima to try to save him but, in order to make sure Tsukishima too won’t end up trapped, passes the skins to him begging him to carry them to Tsurumi along with the way to recognize fake skins from real ones. Edogai did all he could, gave all he could for his goal, died with a smile for his goal…

…and Tsukishima will do as Edogai requested, not even giving a try to see if Edogai could be saved…

…while in that mine there’s another man who instead gives his all to save another person, Sugimoto.

Shiraishi isn’t trapped by rocks like Edogai, but unconscious, possibly due to gas inhalation and might not survive. Actually, as Sugimoto doesn’t even check if he’s still alive, he might as well be dead. There’s so much gas where Sugi is that, differently from Ogata and Tsukishima, Sugimoto himself can’t muster the strength to stand. There’s plenty of dead rats and, as Sugimoto keeps on crawling forward, there’s also plenty of dead men.

Saving Shiraishi in such a situation not only might be impossible but might cause Sugimoto’s downfall as well.

Yet Sugimoto had put Shiraishi on his shoulders and, crawling, drags him away. While part of Sugimoto’s actions are due to how ‘they’ll be all in troubles if Shiraishi dies’, Sugimoto does all that’s humanly possible to keep Shiraishi alive even at the risk of his own life and doesn’t give up, he even let Shiraishi breath fresh air prior to him doing that.

Sugimoto was also in a desperate situation yet he tried his hardest to make Shiraishi survive and he’s rewarded when Ushiyama saves them both.

Tsukishima decided not to even try to check and see if Edogai could be freed and therefore saved but the worst thing is that Edogai says Tsurumi is the only one who acknowledged him… Tsukishima didn’t even add he acknowledged him as well.

Now… Noda isn’t trying to portray Tsukishima as evil here.

He’s just showing us Tsukishima, differently from Sugimoto or Edogai, isn’t putting up his best efforts.

It’s another shape of Acedia, one we tend to excuse easily because it’s such a human thing to act like Tsukishima did, but it’s also a luxury someone in Tsukishima’s situation couldn’t indulge or the price will be the loss of a human life.

If you’re a decent person but, in face of someone manipulating someone else you decide to remain a passive spectator, if you let others feel alone, if in face of a possible danger, you don’t take all the measures to protect others, if you give up on people’s lives without really making sure there’s nothing else you can’t do, you’re gonna regret it.

And Tsukishima does… but still he doesn’t learn anything by what happened with Edogai, and therefore the same will repeat with Koito. Koito is clearly another youngster who’s completely manipulated by Tsurumi and is so infatuated of him he’ll do crazy things for him, same as Edogai, and can very easily end up meeting Edogai’s same fate as Tsukishima is unable to keep him safe.

The story though will dig more into the Tsukishima/Koito relation in the next arc so I prefer to discuss it in deep later. For now let’s just say this arc hints at how the Tsukishima/Koito relation is deeper than the Tsukishima/Edogai one and yet Tsukishima is still equally passive with Koito as he was with Edogai.

And, in a way, the same applies to his relationship with Nikaidō.

Tsukishima in chap 94 is fundamentally Nikaidō’s babysitter… and he clearly would want Nikaidō to get better…

…but there isn’t a single scene in which he faces Nikaidō and actively helps him to either overcome the pain for his loss or deal with the burning hate he feels for Sugimoto. He only tries to keep him from overdosing because the doctor said Nikaidō shouldn’t do it but it’s ultimately Tsurumi who distracts Nikaidō… by giving Nikaidō the means to pursue his toxic revenge so that Tsurumi can use him against Sugimoto.

There are three more relevant scenes in this part of the manga, scenes that basically prepare us to what we’ll learn about Tsukishima in the next part.

I won’t go in chronological order for them, sorry about it.

One is in chap 131, when the 7th attacks Abashiri.

Tsukishima should know what they’re doing is wrong. This time they aren’t trying to kill convicts, they’re attacking a prison and is guards. Some of them might have accepted bribes but they aren’t all spawns of evil. In a way this scene parallels the one in which Tsukishima killed Wada.

Tsukishima now questions Tsurumi on what he’ll tell to central command to cover up the incident, which is another scene that’s placed to remind us that Tsukishima can talk with Tsurumi, can ask for extra explanations and therefore could try to discuss things with him and influence him. Tsukishima probably realizes they’re going to do something big and his question might not be mere curiosity but a subtle way to hint there could be troubles if the go through it.

When Tsurumi explains his plan, which is basically to feed central command a huge lie, Tsukishima makes a logical yet naïve observation, that if a witness were to give testimony, Tsurumi’s report won’t hold. At this Tsurumi turns and asks “witnesses from the prison?” clearly hints there aren’t meant to be witnesses, which makes Tsukishima uncomfortable… but that’s all. He won’t discuss things.

Tsukishima is uncomfortable because he knows that they’ll have to slaughter everyone and this is wrong… but he doesn’t oppose in the slightest. He NEVER opposes to Tsurumi’s plans even if this means killing people who don’t deserve to be killed.

Do you think opposing to Tsurumi’s plans would be meaningless?

Think in comparison how Kikuta expressed disliking at the idea of murdering Asirpa’s grandmother. It’s up to debate if Tsurumi would have gone through with Usami’s plan but Kikuta voicing his disagreement surely helped Tsurumi to rule out that option and forced Usami to propose a tamer plan (chap 215).

And there’s also plenty of real life situations where attempting to influence someone positively could effectively push that person to ‘tame down’ the evil that person planned to do.

And so we move to the scene in chap 94, which mirrors the scene with Thomas as Tsukishima is dealing again with people profiting from war by selling weapons. This time though we get a piece of Tsukishima’s mind as, watching Tsurumi and Arisaka interact, Tsukishima reasons that ‘war means jobs for the people of Hokkaido so unless war keep happening they’ll lose their way of life’ and therefore he calls this ‘an addiction to war’.

This chapter is the chapter in which Nikaidō’s addition to morphine is brought up by the way, also drawing a parallel between his addition and the one Tsukishima is talking about, which is clearly also self destructive.

But the relevant part is that Tsukishima could realize what they’re doing is wrong, that, as Arisaka says, if they’ll start producing and selling weapons more people will die, that if they’ll start producing and selling opium more people will get addicted, his expression tell us he’s not enjoying this in the slightest. Yet he reasons this is okay because it’ll give jobs to the people of Hokkaido… which is probably also why he excuses the Abashiri attack, by telling them it’s a mean to get people to be better. Noda is subtly hinting and Tsukishima’s motive here… even if it will be better detailed later.

And there’s another thing Noda hints at here.

In chap 107 when they’re dealing with the son of O-gin and Sakamoto the idea their baby could grow up as a monster is tossed in randomly, that ballon superimposed with the image of Tsukishima…

…before Tsurumi suggests he could also grown up to become a hero.

This sentence is likely tied to Tsukishima’s past and to the fact Tsukishima sees the thing from the perspective of a son who grew up to be a ‘bad boy’ like his father… so, without further ado we move to the next part.

PART 3 THE CORE OF IT ALL: HAJIME

The trip to Karafuto is a splendid chance for Tsukishima to be removed by his usual environment and be in charge of his own life in the same way as he’s in charge of the expedition… in short it’s our chance to see Tsukishima be ‘free’ to be himself and, in fact, it’s during the trip to Karafuto that Noda presents us with ‘Hajime’ and why Tsukishima ended up becoming the person he’s now.

In fact one of Noda’s narrative tricks is he often tells us a character’s name when he reveals us that character’s core.

We learnt Tsurumi’s name when we were told his past as Hanazawa, we learnt Usami’s name when we were told about how his infatuation for Tsurumi caused him to become a murderer and we learn Tsukishima’s given name, Hajime, when we learn about his backstory and why he became the person he is.

But I’m running ahead.

At the start of the trip Tsukishima is still just the Tsukishima we know, only Noda gives his character an extra brush stroke.

We’ve learnt in the previous part Tsukishima is a sergeant, Tsurumi’s right hand man, basically the higher in rank after Tsurumi and Karafuto makes clear the fact Koito is actually higher in rank than him don’t count because Tsukishima is the one who’s meant to be in charge of all the decisions of the group and… and it’s a mess, the living proof Tsukishima might have been placed there as a ‘leader’ but fundamentally Tsukishima doesn’t really care about leading, be it organizing things, directing people or promoting group spirit to the point we realize Tsukishima is the one who’s meant to be in charge only when Tsukishima will tell us at the end of the stenka arc.

In fact, let’s look at what happens.

Tsukishima realizes only when they’re at Odomari about how Koito has carried with himself too much luggage (likely with the support of his father who had carried them there) and has to persuade him to leave it. It turns out in one of those trunks there are Cikapasi and Ryu. Tsukishima would like for them to be sent back home but, instead than setting his foot down, let Tanigaki (who’s another person who’s not suited for leadership) to handle the matter. Sugimoto sides on keeping Ryu and the result is that Cikapasi remains as well.

They start searching for info and Tsukishima realizes they’ve lost track of Koito, who, instead than searching Asirpa, is gone trying hurep wine. Tsukishima begs him not to wander. Koito will keep on wandering through most of the Karafuto arc.

Sugimoto, who couldn’t care less about Koito’s status as noble and higher in rank, tries starting a fight with him. The fight is interrupted only because a lady says she saw and Ainu girl and so Sugimoto runs after the girl, thinking she’s Asirpa. However when they try to ask info to a Russian the whole group discover Tsukishima is the only one who knows such language because they hadn’t worried about how some people could not talk Japanese and Tsukishima hadn’t informed them he could talk Russian. They resume chasing after the girl, lead by Tsukishima this time as he has learnt the Ainu girl might be in danger of being attacked by a bear of a dangerous animal.

Tsukishima seems more in his element when the bear appear… but then he can’t keep Koito away from the wolverine. Tsukishima is good enough at dealing with the wolverine to save Koito, but then SUGIMOTO orders Tanigaki to take care of the kids and Tsukishima decides to help the now wounded Koito leaving Sugimoto, whose ability to aim is nonexistent, to guard their backs from the wolverine. They escape on Enonoka’s grandfather’s sled and it’s Koito and Sugimoto who decide Tanigaki has to walk. Later it’ll be Koito who’ll decide they’ll hire Enonoka’s grandfather to take them around with his sled, which is the only reason why they will manage to reach Kiro’s group.

As they go in the village in which Kiro’s group went Tsukishima, despite knowing how to talk Russian, manages to get no info and Sugimoto argues with a Russian. This leads another Russian to steal one of their dog to force Sugimoto to take part to the stenka. Sugimoto would want the rest of the group to take part to it as well, they all disagree but then they let themselves to be roped in when the Russian call them weak.

Sugimoto notices Gansoku but says nothing to the others. Although Tsukishima notices something is up with Sugimoto and Gansoku, he asks nothing and does nothing.

The day after they argue with the Russian, Tsukishima only translates while Sugimoto and Koito threatens the man and ultimately it’s Sugimoto and not Tsukishima the one who will decide how they will behave even though no one, including Tsukishima, would want to agree with Sugi, who claims he has a brilliant plan he doesn’t share with anyone. When Sugimoto loses it while fighting with Gansoku, Tsukishima’s group chases Gansoku, save him from a wolverine and hide in a banya where Tsukishima loses completely control of the situation, in fact at a certain point he wonders ‘what the hell he’s doing’.

Gansoku and Sugimoto fight again, even Tanigaki realize they can’t let Sugimoto get more punches but Tsukishima does nothing and the day is saved by the ice breaking under them. Sugimoto says he doesn’t want to kill Gansoku and wants just a copy of his tattoo. At this point Tsukishima will agree with Sugimoto that Gansoku has to leave Karafuto and go to Russia.

The volume version adds a little extra.

When Gansoku will part ways with them, Tsukishima will tell him to study Russian like his life depended on it and that if he were to come back he would shoot him in the head.

After all this, in which the overall impression is that Sugimoto is the one in charge (and that their group is as disorganized and disunited as possible, with neither of them knowing or caring about what the other is capable to do), Koito questions Tsukishima about the decision to let Gansoku go… and it turns out it’s TSUKISHIMA who’s in charge of their group as Tsurumi has left all the decisions to Tsukishima, included the ones in regard to Sugimoto.

Through all the trip Tsukishima won’t be capable to make them work as an united group, nor will really lead them. Sugimoto will do all the ‘planning’ and they’ll merely follow him (even the idea to join the circus or to search for Svetlana are Sugimoto’s and he’s the one who carries the copy of Gansoku’s tattooed skin), Koito will keep on doing as he pleases and Tsukishima won’t know how to handle him (the only time he tries his plan backfires so bad it almost leads Sugimoto to be forced to do Harakiri) and Tsukishima clearly has no info on Karafuto in fact not only he didn’t know Yamada is a spy, but that Kiro’s most likely destination is Alexandrovskaya prison where Sofia is.

Tsurumi too should have been aware of this considering he knew who Kiro was and of his bond with Sofia and, honestly, considering Tsurumi had involved the Russian government to stop Kiro on the Russian border by shooting him and Ogata, I wonder if Tsurumi had put any faith in the Karafuto expedition or he merely wanted to get Koito and Sugimoto out of Hokkaido and if they were to get Asirpa in the process… well, that would be merely an added bonus.

But whatever, back to Tsukishima as a leader that doesn’t lead nor organize, it becomes obvious the problem isn’t just he doesn’t know how to lead but that he doesn’t care to do it. Tsukishima doesn’t try to organize things, to propose plans, to create a group spirit. He’s just there, asks people if they’ve seen Kiro or Asirpa, translates things from Russian and tries to keep Koito out of troubles.

Tsukishima clearly has no wish to lead… but he has a duty to do so, which he’s neglecting.

Acedia again.

It’s possible Noda is actually planning to put this side of Tsukishima in comparison with Koito’s leadership abilities. Koito at the moment is clearly inexperienced and unable to lead despite wishing to. By the time chap 231 will come around though, Koito will reveal himself much more capable to handle Tsukishima and leadership than Tsukishima, who’s older and more experienced than him, ever was. That’s because Koito will put all himself in this while Tsukishima is hardly making an attempt.

But anyway let’s go back to chap 149. After Tsukishima says Tsurumi left all the decisions to him, including what to do with Sugi himself, claiming he won’t show any mercy and kill him if Sugi were to lose control again… because if Sugimoto is unable to keep himself under control he’ll eventually will pass the point of no return.

Now… in this chapter Tsukishima seems aloof and cold toward both Gansoku and Sugimoto, promising them death if they misbehave. We might think/hope he’s just acting tsundere, but the problem is we’ll discover Tsukishima is completely prepared to go through with his threat if he has to.

In chap 212 Tsukishima will shoot Sugimoto, and much later he will show he’s okay with shooting at Tanigaki when the latter wants to call himself out of Tsurumi’s army. Note that I’m not saying Tsukishima likes this, I think he much preferred to let people go, but in truth we should have known he would have no hesitation in put in place his threat if he had to, Noda had shown us he had no hesitation in killing Wada or the guards at Abashiri.

I’ve said Noda made some subtle parallels between Tsurumi and Hitler. Tsukishima is clearly meant to parallel the soldier who, in WW2 (or in other wars if you prefer) did all that was ordered to him, not because he enjoyed it or because he didn’t knew the order was wrong, but because he got that order and he would carry it on without really stopping and saying ‘no, I can’t do this, it’s immoral’.

And Acedia is the vice you’ve to indulge in, if you want to be capable to do this. Otherwise a person with a sense of moral and who’s not enjoying this at all wouldn’t be capable to turn his eyes away from this and do it anyway.

Anyway, after this bit, Noda decides he will present us with Tsukishima’s backstory and, with it, we get back to the parallel with Ogata I mentioned previously, as Tsukishima too has also been born in a troublesome household where the father is suspected to be a murderer and this reflects on his son as well. Tsukishima is considered a ‘bad boy’ and mistreated by the people around him.

We don’t know what happened to Tsukishima’s mother, we’ve no idea if Tsukishima’s father is really guilty of something and which is his relationship with Tsukishima but we know something… the young Tsukishima, differently from the present one, used to have a personal goal, he wanted to marry Igogusa, a girl he loved and whom loved him back.

He wasn’t an emotionless and passive person, he used to beat up whoever were to make fun of Igogusa, he planned to leave the island with Igogusa once he were back from the war and then he would marry her.

Then things took a wrong turn and Igogusa disappeared 10 days before he were back, with only her shoes being found on the shore hinting she might have committed suicide and tossed herself in the sea, possibly due to someone spreading the rumour Tsukishima died in war.

For a while Tsukishima remains active and desperately searches for her then… he gives up on finding her and focus on who spread the rumour of him dying, who turns out to be his father.

In a way very similar to how Usami will end up killing Tomoharu, Tsukishima explodes as well and kills his own father.

It’s entirely possible the thing was staged by Tsurumi.

Tsukishima was shown to be in jail in 1896. He was conscripted short before the start of the Sino-Japanese war (1894) and, since conscription lasted two years, he likely wasn’t allowed to come back home immediately after the end of the war but had to wait to end his conscription time.

Tsurumi on the other side was back in Niigata in 1895, bragging with Takeda he had found a way to help people to overcome their resistance to take a life and create perfect soldiers who will be willing to do any job, no matter how dirty… like Tsukishima will be willing to do later on.

It might be that Tsurumi, who had learnt to appreciate Tsukishima during the war but might have also known Tsukishima planned to leave the army and settle down, staged things so that Tsukishima would first commit parricide (which in Japan is considered a crime even more serious than here in the west) and then, when Tsurumi would save him, Tsukishima would have no other way but devote himself to the man.

On the other side it might be Tsurumi just took advantage of the situation.

We don’t know… but what we know is that Tsukishima ended up in this mess again for a lack of care.

Note that his start into indulging in the vice of Acedia has a psychological explanation, because it becomes Tsukishima’s maladaptive defence mechanism.

Tsukishima had reached Sado already plagued with fear because Igogusa stopped replying to his letters. When he learns she might have killed herself believing him to be dead, in the beginning he searched for her frantically, feeling chills run down his spine each time he were to see egogusa washed up on the beach.

It’s clearly a situation of great tension and pain and you can last in such psychological situation only up to a certain point. Then you either stop or risk to go insane.

Tsukishima decides to stop thinking about finding Igogusa and focuses himself on punishing his father, whom he views as responsible of her death because this explosion of blind violence in which he didn’t care to find out why his father did so or the consequences of his own actions if he were to murder the man is a way to release the emotions that had been bubbling up inside him.

And then Tsukishima is trapped in this situation.

His own violent actions solved nothing and might have been not even aimed to the right target (as Tsukishima doesn’t know why his father did what he did and what truly happened to Igogusa it can even be he punished an ‘innocent’) but by keeping on ‘not thinking’, on ‘not caring’ and telling himself he’d done the right thing because he avenged her, he avoids feeling the emotional turmoil and pain he felt when he desperately searched Igogusa.

We see that although Tsukishima ends in jail and is sentenced to dead he believed he is in peace with himself. Without Igogusa he has nothing so not even dying seems bad to him.

And then Tsurumi comes ‘to rescue’.

We don’t know the truth about Igogusa and, what’s more, Noda showed us nothing that could confirm or deny Tsurumi’s theory. We see him wandering in the city, looking at a cliff, probably the same near which they found Igogusa’s shoes and then sniffling what I think is egoneri.

He’s not shown talking with anyone, nor he’s shown going to Tokyo where Igogusa and her parents supposedly were. But the fact we don’t know it’s not the problem, the problem is Tsukishima doesn’t know.

Tsurumi uses exactly the fact that Tsukishima didn’t care to find out the truth from his father to hand him a story, a story in which Igogusa is still alive, a story that makes Tsukishima regret he’s about to die. And then Tsurumi find a way to get him out of jail… and, even if Tsukishima doesn’t admit it, deep down he probably let himself be saved because deep down he hopes to see Igogusa again. It’s something he doesn’t admit but that he likely nursed in his heart along with Igogusa’s hair.

So Tsukishima doesn’t question things any further and learns Russian as Tsurumi wants and becomes basically his right-hand man, clearly letting Tsurumi lead his life without questioning things further. Without caring to question them.

We know because in another flashback we’ll learn he’ll do what Tsurumi says even if this means taking part to Koito’s kidnapping.

Tsukishima will be okay with kidnapping a young boy of 16, a Japanese boy son of a rear admiral, a boy who hadn’t committed any crime, so that Tsurumi will be able to make the admiral feel indebted to him and manipulate him into using the torpedo division for Tsurumi’s purposes, clearly hinting at how Tsurumi could have been planning already his rebellion.

And the thing is even more remarked when it’ll turn out among the kidnappers it’s Ogata and not Tsukishima as everyone seemed to expect, the one who was left in charge to take care of Koito and felt pity for him, offering him emotional support, rubbing his back when the boy is at the phone with his father… the story again placing a comparison between Ogata and Tsukishima who instead keep distance.

It’s probably not that he truly doesn’t care, it’s more than Tsukishima wills himself not to care.

The ‘death’ of Igogusa likely taught him the lesson if he keeps his distance and doesn’t care he doesn’t suffer and he doesn’t get himself in troubles. This is probably what he meant when he told Sugimoto to control himself, to do like him and remain cold and distant. Not care.

But there’s to wonder if something took a wrong turn because later, during the Russo-Japanese war, Tsurumi felt the need to, as Tsukishima put in, ‘tear open his old wounds and then pour affection into a place in Tsukishima that has already wilted away’.

Maybe Tsurumi has discovered Tsukishima plans to go in Tokyo to finally get a glimpse of Igogusa.

Or maybe it was merely because something else that’s tied to Acedia is depression. In the past forms of depression that caused a state of nor caring were mistaken for people indulging in the vice of Acedia. Noda might be playing a little with this.

All that ‘not caring’ and keeping distance might have ended up making Tsukishima too irresponsive. Tsurumi needs a man who’s willing to do any act but not one who’s just a doll that blindly obey. Hard to say.

It’s also possible once Tsurumi has told Tsukishima about the Ainu plan Tsukishima had called himself out. After all, even though he’s not visiting Igogusa, he can still tell him one day he can drop by. If Hokkaido becomes a military dictatorship Tsukishima will likely not be welcome in Tokyo.

Or maybe something happened we still don’t know yet. After all Tsukishima was in the infirmary when he was told the new story so something could have happened. Was he also in a bombed trench, same as Kikuta and Ariko and, although he survived, the thing shocked him? Who knows?

Anyway Tsurumi decides to fed Tsukishima a new tale… again taking advantage of how Tsukishima had never cared to discover the truth. At this point this isn’t just in regard to how he hadn’t asked the truth to his father but also to how he hadn’t checked on Igogusa through all the years.

She was taken away from her city and married with a trick to another man she barely knew taking advantage of her grief for Tsukishima’s death and Tsukishima… didn’t check on her. He’s not jailed anymore, I’m not saying he has to go there to sweep her away but… he could have made sure she was well cared for, that she wasn’t just drowning in depression for his death.

Instead he decided to just disappear from her life without even checking if her life was going well, merely assuming it was.

The new tale get quite a reaction from Tsukishima.

Igogusa is the wound Tsukishima will talk about, a wound that it’s actually far from closed. Tsukishima merely thinks it is because he seals it behind walls of rather insincere ‘I don’t care’ but, as soon as the new tale shatters the previous story Tsurumi told him, Tsukishima likely felt all the pain and the desperation he had felt in those days long ago, those rushing emotions feeling Tsukishima as soon as that soldier pokes at that unhealed wound and Tsukishima attempts to fix the problem the same as he has done in the past.

He attacks someone, namely Tsurumi.

I’m pretty sure Tsurumi expected this and, for him, it’s probably the ultimate test for Tsukishima. If even in such a situation Tsukishima can control himself and not murder him without making questions as he had done with his father… well, this is the proof Tsukishima would stay loyal to Tsurumi no matter what Tsurumi does.

And Tsukishima controls himself.

Tsukishima is furious but, although he punches Tsurumi, he then stops himself and asks for Tsurumi’s reasons.

And Tsurumi takes advantage of it to basks Tsukishima in his ‘love’. Tsukishima, who really got little love in his life, falls hook, line and sinker for Tsurumi’s act.

Now, to be honest I think that Tsurumi cared for him in some measure… but that he cared much more for the pawn Tsukishima could become or he wouldn’t have put him through this test.

Anyway Tsukishima breaks, torn between his love for Igogusa and the love Tsurumi gave him and even goes as far as to try to protect Tsurumi with his own body when they’re attacked.

In a way the wounds they receive are symbolic.

Tsurumi will have his face disfigured, so that when he wears his metal plate it resembles a skull. He’s death incarnate, a Shinigami in look as well, a punishment for sacrificing on the altar of his own goal Tsukishima too, a friend, a good man, someone than from life ad really little and who cared for him.

Tsukishima’s wound is on his torso, what’s coming out is probably blood and not intestines or he’ll die there but Japanese men did commit Harakiri by cutting their stomach to show their intestines were clean, sinless. Tsukishima, in that moment, metaphorically dies for and with Tsurumi, his master.

And yes, in a way Tsukishima dies, or better Hajime dies.

Because Tsukishima will discover the new story Tsurumi will feed him is all a lie, an elaborate act, so he knows he can’t even trust the previous, he can’t trust this man who DELIBERATELY sets up things so that e can tell him elaborate lies so that he can use him for his Ainu plan.

Still, despite knowing this, Tsukishima still keeps on following Tsurumi.

Tsurumi had made clear he needs men ready to do terrible things for his plan and yet Tsukishima sides with him. Tsukishima knows among the terrible things they’ll there will be to kill Hanazawa so that Central will turn against the 7th and Tsurumi will be able to use the discontentment which will follow for his rebellion.

Tsukishima still sides with him.

It’s meaningful how the volume version shows that Tsukishima, once back to Otaru, will drop Igogusa’s hair in the sea in another attempt to let her go, to stop caring, to stop feeling pain.

He doesn’t believe he can have her back and Tsurumi, despite tricking him, is the only other person who showed him love and care. It’s fake, a lie, Tsukishima knows it but he has nothing else.

To Koito who will later prod and prod, Tsukishima will say that there’s nothing wrong in following such plan if people following Tsurumi are saved along the way. Tsukishima dresses it up as a giant, noble thing, they’re saved.

It actually takes only a little of thinking to realize they’re not.

Tsukishima himself is far from being saved, he’s a broken man with no hope who wants to see what Tsurumi will do till the end as if hoping the result will justify his own actions, will turn right all he did wrong.

Remember?

Acedia is the vice that pushes you to not care about evil being done by you or by the others.

Tsukishima is not a cold jerk though so this is his excuse to ‘not care’, to indulge in such vice, that people is saved in the end, but it’s such an implausible lie Tsukishima is pushed ‘not to care’ further. Tsukishima turns his eyes away from understanding what the soldiers Tsurumi should supposedly save really need.

Ogata didn’t need to kill his father, he needed his father to show him some care.

Tanigaki doesn’t need to stay in a militaristic Hokkaido, he needs to work up his guts and go back home in Ani.

Nikaidō doesn’t need to pursue Sugimoto, he needs to let go of his rage and just mourn his brother properly before letting go of him.

Koito doesn’t need to worship a man who’s actually only using him and his father.

Usami doesn’t need to have his feelings used to turn him into a killer.

And Tsukishima himself doesn’t need to do horrible things for a person who’s using him through lies.

Lies save no one. But Tsukishima doesn’t want to see this and doesn’t want anyone else to see this either.

Instead than accepting that Tanigaki didn’t feel saved by staying with Tsurumi he tries to kill him when Tanigaki attempts to desert again.

Tsukishima doesn’t want to think, doesn’t want to care because caring hurt and so this turned him into a puppet. The fear of that terrible pain that pushes him to attempt to close his own soul behind walls so that he can not care and not feel pain.

And Tsukishima doesn’t care BIG TIME because actually he doesn’t even care for Tsurumi’s true target, going so far as saying Tsurumi might not even have one.

Tsukishima is not evil… but he’s letting evil be done, he’s excusing evil, he’s doing evil, telling himself something good will come out of it… merely because this keeps his pain away and keeps him together.

But now let’s go ahead a little and open a special parenthesis for Svetlana… as in a way she’s strongly tied to our Hajime.

Tsukishima was clearly impressed by the pain their parents felt because he likely associated it to the pain he felt when he had no idea what had happened to Igogusa… but despite this he didn’t want to get involved. He didn’t want to act or care. It’s Sugimoto who involves them with the Svetlana thing even if actually Sugimoto is not that deeply involved as Sugimoto too should have passed in front of Svetlana but, same as Koito and Tanigaki, he was so focused on his goal he didn’t notice her.

Tsukishima, who’s clearly the least interested in the mission and is taking part to it merely out of duty (Tanigaki wants to murder Kiro and Koito sees it as a way to prove himself in Tsurumi’s eyes and to get a fight with Ogata whom he dislikes) notices her instead but, although he recognized her, he wanted to adopt his usual stance of ‘not caring’. However the Svetlana issue taps subtly into the Igogusa issue. He can’t let it go so he decides she has to go back home, assuming she left for selfish reasons. As she refuses Tsukishima, or better Hajime, jumps on her claiming she’s being cruel to them. He’s clearly furious but in a way he’s not really talking to Svetlana about her parents but about what he felt when he had no idea if Igogusa was alive or dead.

And Svetlana turns the tables, showing him she’s actually not so far from him. She doesn’t want to go face them because she ended in jail… which is probably part of what’s holding Tsukishima back from going to Igogusa. And that’s not the only thing they had in common. Svetlana wants to leave Karafuto, same as Tsukishima who wanted to leave Sado. Svetlana is poorly developed, actually she might exist solely for Tsukishima’s benefit, but in a way she forces Tsukishima to face himself again, his desperation for not knowing what had been of Igogusa but also how he is acting, being afraid to face someone due to having been in jail. Igogusa could be in the same situation as Svetlana’s parents, wondering if Hajime is really dead or just mourning him and yet… he’s not going back nor contacting her with a letter.

Hajime knows he should, it’s what he tells Svetlana to do… but he doesn’t and merely keeps being Sergeant Tsukishima, Tsurumi’s right hand man.

So this is Hajime, the core of Tsukishima, a man who in the past cared but got broken and to mend that pain decided to not care.

But that’s obviously not the end of the analysis of this complex character and his story.

We’ve discussed what Tsukishima Hajime is.

The last thing I’m gonna dig in is if Tsukishima can find salvation by dropping the vice that damns him, or if ultimately he’ll end up being lost to it.

PART 4 CONCLUSION: DAMNATION OR SALVATION?

At this point Noda did something interesting with Tsukishima, he subtly intersected Tsukishima’s story with the lives of two other characters, Koito and Tanigaki.

Now yes, Koito and Tanigaki couldn’t be more different, but they both become relevant for Tsukishima’s story.

We know Tsukishima views himself as Koito’s babysitter. In the circus arc we see Tsukishima also tries to take care of Tanigaki. It’s easy to guess Tsukishima feels a sense of responsibility for the men under him.

Yet he fails them.

Let’s, for example, look at the circus arc.

Tanigaki first.

We start tame. When Chōkichi stole Sugimoto’s bag, Tsukishima could have shoot in the air to attract Tanigaki’s attention and also get his help instead it doesn’t occur Tsukishima to involve him.

When Tsukishima sees Tanigaki crying, his way to support him is just to tell him to bear it because if it leads them to find Asirpa it’s a good reason to go through with it. From Tsukishima’s point of view it makes sense, as he’s bearing everything Tsurumi put him through for a supposed noble cause.

Tsukishima tried to push on Tanigaki his ‘acedia’. He told him ‘not to care’ about the frustration he felt and just swallow it and do what he had to do, which is what Tsukishima normally does.

It’s ironic how panels are structured so that Tsukishima looks in the opposite way to the crying Tanigaki panel. Tsukishima in the story is looking at Tanigaki… but the same doesn’t happen in how this page is structured, and it makes sense, because he’s not really looking at Tanigaki.

He completely misses the point of Tanigaki’s desperation as he cries because he feels a burden, because Tanigaki is caring for the job and would like to do it better and can’t, not because he feels frustrated for what he has to do or because he’s been scolded. Ultimately it’s Beniko who motivates Tanigaki, not telling him not to care but by giving him trust, appreciation and importance, just by telling him she’s glad she’ll dance with him and implying she counts on him for their performance to be a success.

It’s subtle but this it itself points out the flaw of Tsukishima’s mind setting.

Just ‘not caring’ can’t really help motivating people and this is something Tsukishima will have to face as well.

Koito now.

When Chōkichi stole Sugimoto’s bag with the skin in, the best thing to do was doing the same Tsurumi did during the Lighting Bandit arc and entrust the chase to Koito. Tsukishima instead just propose they’ll separate, which doesn’t help at all but also hints at how Tsukishima wasn’t placing his trust in Koito’s ability to keep up with Chōkichi.

When they join the circus Tsukishima realizes Koito and Sugimoto are again arguing.

Koito clearly hadn’t understood the point of Sugimoto’s (rather terrible) plan, to get Sugimoto famous enough the newspaper will talk about him so that Asirpa will be able to read about him being in Karafuto. While the plan will predictably turn out to be a fail as not only there will be a typo in the newspaper but the newspaper will never end up being read by Asirpa who’s actually much farther from them, Tsukishima, who hadn’t opposed to Sugimoto’s plan, doesn’t immediately try to help Koito realize the point of it and cooperate with the plan.

(Actually the circus arc in chap 156 has an interesting panel that shows how everyone is sweating attempting to do his part… except Tsukishima, who’s apparently not putting effort in the whole thing.)

No, before acting, Tsukishima wait for the day of the big show, when the show is ongoing and Koito has already started impressing people.

Only then Tsukishima decides to act with a plan that was… terrible to put it mildly.

He decides to ‘get his hands dirty’ and agitate Koito by showing him a photo of Tsurumi, believing this would make him fail his performance.

As he said to Tanigaki, this would be a small price to pay to find Asirpa. What he doesn’t mention and Koito possibly doesn’t realize is that an agitated Koito who were to fail such a risky performance could end up hurting himself but whatever, same as with Tanigaki, Tsukishima’s plan proves he understood nothing of Koito who, not only despite being agitated remaining an amazing acrobat, but completely mistook who played him that trick and tried to get retaliation in the worst way, by tampering with Sugimoto’s show and risking to get Sugimoto killed.

Tsukishima could have decided instead to speak with Koito, to make him understand Sugimoto’s plan. Koito proved later on he’s not dumb, and anyway, since it was Tsukishima who was in charge of all the decision as per Tsurumi’s orders, Tsukishima could have used that card to make Koito play along, implying Tsurumi would scold him if Sugimoto’s plan were to fail, something Koito absolutely wants to avoid.

Instead he decides to go for ‘emotional manipulation’ so as not to confront Koito, basically following Tsurumi’s example.

All this remarks two things:

– first of all Tsukishima doesn’t really know Koito despite spending a lot of time with him. He doesn’t understand his strength nor he truly understands what moves him. That’s not because Tsukishima is dense but because he’s keeping at distance. He’s not really looking at Koito and seeing him for who he is.

– the second thing is that Tsukishima overall avoid confrontation. Acedia again, even when he’s supposed to care. Koito isn’t dumb and trust him. Tsukishima could have talked to him, but through the Karafuto arc Tsukishima hardly does. We can say he’s reserved but Koito is young and needs a guide and that role was entrusted to sergeant Tsukishima, who’s supposed to help Second Lieutenant Koito as he makes his way into the army (as said in chap 101). Tsukishima at most gives Koito curt instructions ‘don’t get far’, ‘let’s go’, ‘don’t go’, but doesn’t really explain him things and doesn’t really enforce his authority (as he actually has little since Koito is still superior in ranking).

So… how this develop and why whose two are important for Tsukishima’s ‘growth’?

Well, because ultimately, both do what Tsukishima is not capable of doing, they both rebel… and Tsukishima is forced to confront with them.

So let’s me flash forward a bit.

Tanigaki has been teetering on the fine line between loyalty and rebellion for a long time as, although Tanigaki swears to himself he’s loyal to Tsurumi’s cause, when he left to hunt Retar he deserted and kept on doing so.

Koito for a long time never meant to rebel, he just always prioritized doing what pleased him or acting on impulse.

When we reach the end of the Karafuto arc… ironically all the chickens come home to roost.

Koito and Tanigaki didn’t mean to get to this point, to be honest but the plot developed so that this is the most logical conclusion.

In chap 210 we see that Koito has pieced together the hints Ogata gave him and has figured out Tsurumi (and Tsukishima and Ogata) were involved in his kidnapping. Differently from Tsukishima Ogata had known perfectly what to give Koito to have him move the way Ogata wanted. He bet everything on Koito having brain enough to figure out the whole plot just by giving him a couple of hints and then let him free to deal with them.

It’s sad in more than one way, for start because it shows Tsukishima could have done the same, could have let Koito reason out things by talking with him and giving him just a few hints and yet he never did, he never tried to have Koito reason things over.

And it becomes even more sad because, even in this circumstance Tsukishima will try to get Koito to ‘not think’.

In fact, before tattling everything out to his father and confront Tsurumi, Koito wants to discuss things with Tsukishima, because although Koito is confident he came to the right conclusion he wants Tsukishima to prove him wrong… or at least to come clear with him and give him a VALID reason for what he did… because Koito views Tsukishima as an older brother and admires Tsurumi and doesn’t want his reasoning to be true.

Tsukishima instead tries to wave everything off. He doesn’t really confront with Koito, he doesn’t really try to understand from where all this come. He insists Koito just doesn’t have to listen to Ogata…

…when he’s actually not listening to Koito or he’ll understand Koito’s theory is KOITO’S and Ogata had no really contributed to it, he just gave him a couple of topics to think about ‘Mantetsu’ and ‘barchonok’. He’s not making logic counterarguments, Tsukishima’s argumentum ad nomine is a lazy rhetorical strategy for when you’ve nothing intelligent to say against your opponent’s theory so you divert the attention on something unrelated.

By continuing to avoid confrontation with Koito, Tsukishima loses… in more than one way.

‘Acedia’ is the vice in which Tsukishima indulges the most… but Tsukishima is not the personification of it. In all his indulging in ‘not caring’ Tsukishima can’t help but care for Koito. It’s not a choice, it’s just how people works.

And so Tsukishima is forced to confront Koito to save him from being ‘erased’ by Tsurumi and he does so by revealing Koito the pathetic truth about himself, how he persuaded himself ‘not to care’ for Tsurumi’s lies, how he told himself they were ‘salvation’.

It’s interesting how, when Tsukishima says ‘the two of you were saved’ we can hardly see his pupils as they’re so lowered only the sclera seems to remain.

In a way it’s as if to say Tsukishima is turning away his gaze, he’s not seeing the truth as he says ‘the two of you were saved’. He’s trying to blind himself to it, as Tsurumi’s lies don’t save anyone but Tsukishima doesn’t want to see this.

Tsukishima comes out as a broken man, who had likely partly sunk into depression and Tsurumi, the man who defined himself as Tsukishima’s friend, seems to be the cause of his downfall, isn’t that right?

“Free will. It’s like butterfly wings: once touched, they never get off the ground. No, I only set the stage. You pull your own strings.” [The Devil’s Advocate]

Tsurumi undoubtedly set the stage.

Sadly it was Tsukishima who pulled his own strings and this was exactly due to his Acedia and continues to do so. Through the whole chapter he pushes himself to keep the status quo, he doesn’t want things to change, he wants Koito to validate his mind setting, his indulging into ‘Acedia’, if not by will, by force, by threatening him. This will save Koito.

Only it won’t because Koito ends up stabbed by Sugimoto and Tsurumi doesn’t even seem to care, and Tsukishima is left there to collect the pieces.

And then we move to Tanigaki, Tanigaki who, once left behind by Asirpa and Co who point out how he’s supposed to take care of Inkarmat, thinks he can decide to leave Tsurumi’s army and do as he pleases… and he’s forced to face that his desertion wouldn’t be tolerated any further, otherwise something bad might happen to Inkarmat and his unborn child. Tsukishima isn’t present here but he’ll be likely briefed later, because he and Koito ends up in the same hospital in which Inkarmat is, making Tsukishima acutely aware that, she and the baby could end up getting sacrificed should things go wrong with Tanigaki.

(On a sidenote Nikaidō is also here, forcing Tsukishima to see how Arisaka is experimenting his drugs on him. However, as it seems Nikaidō’s story arc is less tied to Tsukishima’s in terms of affecting him, I won’t dig on this too much… as Tsukishima, in Nikaidō’s case, has so far remained a silent spectator, unaffected by Nikaidō’s downfall…)

And so, the story goes on and Tanigaki’s arc and Koito’s arc converge with Tsukishima’s arc.

Tanigaki decides that he can’t escape responsibilities anymore and goes to save Inkarmat, which brings him into direct confrontation with Tsukishima. Tsukishima, adopting his mentality of ‘not caring’, tries his best to obey his orders and ignore the fact he’s about to sacrifice a family. Inkarmat placing in front of Tanigaki and telling him to shoot if THIS IS WHAT HIS SENSE OF JUSTICE TELLS HIM TO DO, symbolize just this.

This is not what Tsukishima’s sense of justice tells him to do, this is his Acedia speaking, his blind obedience at Tsurumi’s orders because it’s ‘easier’ not to care, not to think.

Things or better Ienaga happens and Koito is called to make the same choice Tsukishima had to do. There’s a personal risk for Koito here, as disobedience to Tsurumi’s orders could be taken as betrayal and he has been threatened by Tsukishima. Yet Koito decides to care and let them go.

Tanigaki continues to escape, Tsukishima could give up but instead pursue him. It seems a countersense that Tsukishima cares to capture Tanigaki when his vice is ‘not caring’ but actually he cares about capturing him so he could shut down the truth, so he doesn’t have to face one could rebel, that blindly following Tsurumi isn’t the right choice.

As I said, Tsukishima is not a personification, he’s a human, indulging in a vice to cope with trauma because this vice is a maladaptive behaviour which, he believes, will help him.

And in all this Koito arc intersects again with Tsukishima.

And while Tsukishima tries again not to talk things thought, Koito forces him to talk. To face that ‘not caring’, that just believing in lies will not save anyone. To face that he’s in pain, that it’s not too late.

Tsukishima crumbles… and to help him to stand up again Koito will also be there to give him strength when Tsukishima had none.

It’s what Beniko did to Tanigaki, what Tsukishima wasn’t able to make.

He forces Tsukishima to think at which could be Tsurumi’s goal… but Tsukishima isn’t really ready to ponder over this, he considers it could be all a huge lie and Tsurumi just… ‘doesn’t care’…

…then realizes that Tsurumi could actually care about something, the finger bones, but dismisses it.

Koito is curious but doesn’t push. He instead tries to motivate Tsukishima, to make him care.

He reminds him of the goal they should have ‘put their lives on the line and fight for the sake of their comrades’, but this time isn’t anymore by being blind, Koito wants to know if the cause they’re pursuing is right. Koito will care. He points out what Tsukishima was doing wasn’t healthy but accept Tsukshima might not be up for more so he offers to be Tsukishima’s strength, he tells Tsukishima he can just follow him…

…which is nice really… but is not a fix it all because it can end up in moving from following Tsurumi blindly to moving to follow Koito blindly so it can cause Tsukishima to slip in acedia again.

Koito is young, he’s absolutely not up to support another man out of this.

Yet, maybe because Tsukishima’s relation with Koito is different, maybe because Koito is honest with him or maybe because Tsukishima cares for Koito more than he has grown to care for Tsurumi, Tsukishima ends up on doing the most important thing needed to recover.

He starts to care on his own, not merely by relying on Koito.

Koito is the helping hand that pulled him up, but then it’s Tsukishima who made the steps.

We see it when, instead than blindly obeying to orders he let go of Asirpa and goes to save Koito. Because Koito, and not blindly obeying to his duty is priority now, simply because he cares more about Koito than to his mindless obedience.

And we see it again when he goes peeping Tsurumi’s conversation with Sofia and Asirpa.

He has thought Koito isn’t as strong as he painted himself to be when he heard him talking in a normal tone in front of Tsurumi. He thinks this means Koito is lacking faith in Tsurumi. Again his pupils are hardly visible, this time too high, and he’s clearly angry. Hard to say if his anger is moved by disappointment or by thinking Koito has lied to him.

The scene hadn’t been printed on the volume yet so it could end up changed in the final version. But still, this is Tsukishima evolving, Tsukishima caring, caring to discover Tsurumi’s motive, caring to discover if someone has lied to him or has failed his expectations.

This is no more the Tsukishima that ‘didn’t care’, that just would mindless doing his duty.

This is a Tsukishima who’s not constantly falling prey to his vice.

Tsukishima has evolved.

And maybe he can be saved, maybe his vice can be turned in the opposite virtue, ‘industria’ (“diligence”) and, instead than just passively follow, be the main character in his own life.

Or he can slip again because it’s so very difficult to escape from a vice that’s also a copying mechanism.

We can only wait and see if he’ll manage to continue through a positive path or he will fall. For now though, we can hope.

After Acedia, next in the 7 vices series we’ve IRA.