Blade of the Immortal 13

Hiroaki Samura – Dark Horse – 2004 – 26+ volumes

Wow.  I’ve been dying for the story to get back to Rin, and it does here.  She gains an unlikely ally.  An extraordinarily unlikely ally.  And I don’t even know that we can call this person an “ally,” per se, although the two of them seem to have reached an agreement.

It’s just… it’s very strange.  Is Blade of the Immortal about Rin’s quest for revenge?  Is it about morality?  Or maybe what people are forced to do under extreme circumstances?  The morality in circumstances, the morality in the actions of defense, or the morality in the action of revenge itself?  It doesn’t seem to examine the value of life very often, for as many people who have died, but it weighs heavily on Rin.  And for all the slaughter and bloodshed she’s seen, she’s faltered quite a number of times.  But she still forges on towards Anotsu.

And what of Anotsu?  We’ve seen the man in action many times at this point.  He has his sword school, very powerful now, because he felt the old sword schools were mired in tradition and pomposity.  To overthrow the existing system, he shed an immense amount of blood.  But it’s something he clearly felt strongly about, and what he’s done to get where he is today doesn’t seem to trouble him in the least.  He seems… almost decent, as far as these things go.  We see him take a wife, and treat her well.  He seems like a good guy.  I don’t have a good grasp of the politics against him, or what precisely happened to trigger his trouble in this volume (someone high up ordered a hit, basically), but all the same, he’s not put into any positions where morals are questioned.  He slaughters those who come after him.  There’s nothing wrong with that, right?  Self-defense?

And where does Manji fit in?  He wants to atone for his sins.  So he accompanies Rin as a bodyguard on his quest.  But Rin has shaken him, so where does that leave Manji?  I would think it would simply leave him a lifetime of kicking back as an immortal (with the occasional dodging of the law), but no.  He goes after Rin.  And stands by her even when she begs him to show mercy to those that probably don’t deserve it.

So this volume.  I don’t want to spoil anything.  Obviously it put me in a reflective mood, because certain things happen that throw a wrench in the whole works.  The very end of the volume makes me think that the story will take an entirely different direction as soon as one of the characters… well, inevitably expires.  At least it would seem that way.  So it makes you think what the series is really about.  Where is it going to go from here?

I need to read the next volume immediately.  This is great stuff.