Yukio cares a lot about perception and keeps a distance because of that
Even while his twin is going on a journey of realizing he sabotaged his own past ability to have friends and is welcoming the new opportunity to make them (he'll fuck that up but figure it out eventually,) Yukio will not allow himself to go on a similar journey until much, much later.
Welcome to part three of my Critically Reading Yukio analysis. Part one here, and part two here. I intended to pause on this series for a moment to focus on my girl Izumo, but I'm actively watching the Yukio analysis and discussions deteriorating before my eyes so he got priority for now, but expect that Izumo analysis soon.
In this part of my analysis we will focus some on Yukio's interaction with his peers and how the way he carries himself relates to that. This, like the other parts, will be a start to a study we will want to keep up through the entirety of his story. I talked last time about Yukio's role of responsibility with Rin and others, and that is directly applicable to this section, because Yukio? Has so much responsibility.
Also, apologies but we're going back to chapter 5. I will get to the double digit chapters, and maybe even triple digit. (Dare we dream?)
I want to point out this moment after the students have taken their exwire certification exam, which they think is a practice exam. Izumo, Paku, and Shiemi have gone to the bath where big dramatics are about to happen and Shima is talking about going to spy on them.
Now aside from the incorrectly translated 'Renzou' there (it's supposed to be Shima as always, sorry), this is one of the first panels where the students acknowledge that their teacher is in fact a student and honestly, younger than most of them. Renzou, Ryuuji, and Izumo are all older by a few months.
Renzou is the only student that will point out Yukio is a student on more than one occasion. Some of you are probably inclined to point out Shiemi, but she very much treats him as a teacher and mentor and someone to put on a pedestal, and I still intend to come back to them in their own post so hold that thought.
Renzou offers a companionship branch (granted on perving but it is Renzou) and Yukio firmly rebuffs it. He does not engage in such things and cannot allow himself to be too familiar with them. One, they are his students and propriety is something Yukio sticks with. Two, he is trying to keep a rather large secret and Rin is not being much help on the secret keeping end.
Yukio has not, as far as we're aware, had real friendships. We know he became popular as a kid/teenager at some point, but his early and formative years were spent being heavily bullied. That he not only could see demons and the terrors that go bump in the night, but that humans treated him cruelly too.
He became popular, but we do not hear that he had friends. How could he when he had a secret full time job at age thirteen and pulled good enough grades to be the top student of his grade in True Cross?
Yukio separates himself from them over and over again and you'll see that all through the chapters in little touches and big moments.
Here's another example from chapter 7 (the chapter where Neuhaus tries to kill Rin and they fight on the roof and Yukio breaks the summoning circle) where the new exwires have been bought a meal for their victory.
Yukio is shown to be standing outside and away from them. He gets called in by one of them and joins the group, or so we think until a few panels later when we see
He only sort of joined them. Now it is possible he's sitting with a few of the students, likely Takara and Yamada if anyone, but however it happens, he's still not sitting with the group in this shot. Even Mephisto is more connected to them. He is facing away and at his own table watching them, but never joining.
He is excluded from his fellow exorcists by necessity, always treated a bit strangely because he is so much younger and he was Shirou's protégé, and eventually he's outed as the other son of Satan and that furthers the gap between him and his coworkers. He excludes himself from the exwires and other students his age because he can't be like them. He has to be their teacher and leader and he has far more going on in his mind and life than thinking about the girls taking baths. He has been given a very lonely and isolating path to walk.
Made worse, I will once again say, by Mephisto.
Moving forward, I want to touch on this moment from chapter 8 before I hit Kuro:
Yukio gets a lot of flack for, well, everything, but this one bugs me in particular. Yukio tells Rin not to fight a certain way because HE KNOWS MORE THAN RIN. If Rin relies more on the demon part of himself without doing anything to try and control/restrain that part of himself he will be controlled by it. He is essentially turning the demon tap all the way on without any idea yet of how the handle works and what the size/strength of the spray will be. He needs to do this slowly or it will lead to problems, and it does. Rin gets taken over by his demon half later on in this story and it almost goes very poorly for the exwires. It is only Mephisto and the Paladin that stop it from happening.
Rin does not know what he's playing with when he's just going ham on the flames and injuries.
But more on that later.
Yukio is seldom not willing to explain something to Rin. The problem is that Rin doesn't want the lengthy explanations from Yukio that Yukio likes to give. He wants a quick and interesting yes or a no that feels more like a yes later, and he doesn't really want any 'no' from Yukio who he doesn't see as an authority because he still sees his brother as smaller and weaker even if he shouldn't. Now Yukio probably could use a less condescending tone, but honestly he's not being that condescending and I think the guy is permitted some annoyance at Rin. Neither of them want to be stuck in this situation and the horrible heat is amplifying everyone's sour mood.
Rin gets mad and growly and tells Yukio to shut up because he saved Yukio and Yukio isn't Father Fujimoto. Rin is referencing the incident with Neuhaus on the roof and grossly simplifying it. While it could be argued that Yukio was aided by Rin, it is not apparent that Yukio was at all saved by Rin. In fact, it was Yukio that got rid of the demon and saved Rin.
However Rin is right, Yukio is not Father Fujimoto.
Rin does not know that Yukio has basically been raised to replace Father Fujimoto. Yukio does know that and it simply adds to his own complicated feelings about their entire situation.
There fight escalates through Shiemi to this:
Yukio getting mocked. Now it's friendly sibling banter at a glance, but we know that Yukio has been bullied and made fun. He is trying very hard to have a serious conversation and Rin will just not have a serious conversation with him and strikes out, sends Yukio's glasses soaring, destroys them, and then laughs at that fact.
Yukio is still on that babysitting duty and it's moments like this that make it seem more like actual baby sitting.
I can feel people getting tense and wanting to interject that I'm being harsh to Rin and mischaracterizing him and he's just goofing or what does it matter when Yukio is so bossy and mean anyway?
Take a breath, hold on, and remember that the vast majority of aoex fandom text is lauding Rin and tearing Yukio apart. This is a Yukio centric study so I'm not going into Rin's emotions and drives as deeply as I'm trying to cover Yukio.
I love Rin and I also find the way the glasses landed hilarious. Kato has a fantastic sense of humor that lines up with my own far more often than not. However, as a sibling who has had her own items destroyed by siblings who just found it funny, I also see this so clearly from Yukio's side. Especially with the fact that he carries himself in a way that makes it seem he doesn't feel safe to express any emotions over this and doesn't get a chance to properly express his mounting frustration before he's being called to the job he shouldn't be stuck with.
He is not permitted to be upset. Rin quite literally just yelled at him, but Yukio yelling back gets him ganged up on. Yukio does not allow himself to express his real emotions and fights them down so that when they do come out, they come out in a snap that's usually intense because they're so far from his usual even demeanor or perfected customer service smile. A "This isn't funny!" from any of the other characters wouldn't be shocking, but with Yukio it is because he never lets himself show that much anger or frustration. Even in chapter two when he was leveling the gun at Rin he did so with an even expression and voice. It was not an emotional thing for him. It was a testing thing.
No one represses an emotion as quickly and efficiently as this 15 year old.
Yukio was bullied from childhood and even his own twin calls him a cry baby, though from what we see, Yukio hasn't cried since he was a child pulled into Exorcism work by Shirou. He has spent more years not crying, but will never lose the conception of wimpy cry baby in Rin's eyes, and it is Yukio's deepest fear that he will always be that. Rin does not realize that is one of Yukio's biggest fears and would certainly not constantly push and poke and deliberately prod that very tender spot if he did. He's an idiot, but he is very rarely a purposefully cruel idiot.
Yukio does not confide himself in anyone because it has never been safe to. He couldn't tell Rin most of what was really going on through the majority of their life because they couldn't risk the seal that was on Rin. Knowing too much and certainly knowing about demons would weaken the seal and an unsealed Rin is a Rin that would be killed by the Vatican. Shirou was someone Yukio couldn't bear to appear weak in front of, and Yukio has no other friends.
There's Shiemi, and he lets himself be more open to her than most people, but he also doesn't quite see her as she really is, and he's slow and tentative about being open with her because he doesn't want her to see the darker parts of him.
But I'll cover them later, I promise.
Focusing on chapter 8 again, I have to say that Rin is a damn menace on this mission. He follows Yukio, shoves himself into the mission while reminding Yukio that he broke his glasses, disregards Yukio's orders in front of others (something that continues to frustrate and upset Yukio visibly and something Rin does a lot, and Shura will as well when she shows up shortly.)
We find out that Shirou had a familiar and it was Kuro who is unquestionably the best boy and deserves cat treats and a warm sun beam to nap in, and who Yukio watched Shirou tame last time he went feral.
Shirou is brought up a lot in this chapter. Over and over by everyone in it. He is haunting this chapter particularly hard. He's been haunting the narrative since he died, but it gets especially cranked up here. The memory of him and the pressure of what he'd do and the way the knowledge of him, of who he really was separates the twin.
Yukio has a super secret package from Shirou, presumably a weapon, specifically for if Kuro loses it. Yukio does not know what this package is and can only assume it is a weapon because he knew Shirou as a warrior. As strong and brave and never afraid. He raised Yukio to fight and defend so of course Shirou would anticipate this and make a weapon to stop Kuro's rampaging.
(Also this is mark two on the tally of Shirou seeming to know he was going to die. Just saying. There's a lot of signs.)
Anyway, Yukio orders everyone away to use his presumed weapon. Rin disagrees with the attack and has been hearing Kuro this entire time but Yukio doesn't know that and Rin doesn't get how he's hearing it, and goes to confront Kuro himself. He literally uses his head and tells Kuro that he gets why Kuro is sad because he misses Shirou too, and Yukio:
Yukio remembers. He remembers Shirou saying almost the same thing to Kuro and sees himself further and further away from being the image of his father he so idolizes while Rin makes it look easy to be like that.
They decide that Kuro will now be Rin's familiar and a lot of people saw Rin take the headbutt from a cat sidhe without any kind of issue, so more stress on Yukio to keep Rin's secret underwraps.
By the way, this is the sort of thing I'm talking about when I say Rin does not work hard to keep his secret. Flame lapses aside, Rin just doesn't pause and think about how something he does will be perceived by anyone. He does not slow down to think. Yukio has to carry that load and Rin will not listen to him. To be fair, no one has taught Rin how to hide a secret. It's not something he's had to do, and Rin has spent most of his life avoiding people and interactions, so it's not something he's good at even without having to keep super strength under wraps.
Rin and Kuro will from here on be inseparable. Rin will have a small buddy at the worse moments and honestly, Kuro is fantastic and I adore the bond they both have. Rin needs and deserves that kind of friend.
Moving on now that Kuro has joined the party!
Chapter 9 starts with everyone getting an assignment to hunt a ghost. Rin embarrasses Yukio because he very obviously stares at Shiemi in all her not-in-a-kimono state. Small spat and everyone goes out and about on their stuff.
It's a dramatic chapter and once again shows that Rin is just not doing well on keeping the whole Satan son thing under wraps and that it is really just the benevolence of those that do know keeping it quiet that is keeping him safe at this moment. His secret will come out and it will almost certainly be a moment of their choosing, because Rin is also easy to manipulate.
Yukio reappears at the end of the chapter. After the roller coaster has been destroyed and Amaimon has returned Rin's sword and they have destroyed a good portion of the amusement park and come horrifyingly close to killing Shiemi.
We get this moment.
We get Yukio running and visibly upset as he should be. This was obviously Rin's doing what with the flame damage and how much strength would be required for this. He doesn't know Amaimon was here at this point.
Yukio comes running up and Yamada, the hoodie wearing team work refusing student that has been hanging out in the background is standing their and holding the bag that Kurikara is in. Yamada is standing there, holding the secret of Rin's flames and his heart, and Yamada speaks.
(Also, apparently 'Yamada' is the Japanese equivalent of John/Jane Doe. Gotta love how low effort that was on Shura's part xD )
Yamada speaks and Yukio immediately knows who Yamada actually is. Whatever Yukio's history with her, it's enough of a history that Yukio recognizes Shura Kirigakure's voice without seeing her face or signature clothing style.
The chapter ends with her saying who she is. The next chapter Rin is getting dragged to the Tokyo headquarters and Yukio is silent for most of it until they're in the building and Shura is saying she will have to report Rin and wants to interrogate him. Mephisto has shown up as well, and it's when Shura starts to walk away to interrogate Rin that Yukio breaks his cooperative silence.
And now I'm gonna skip to chapter 15 before I explain this, because damn it, there is just not enough analysis on the relationship between Shura and Yukio and how messy it is. Shura is such a complicated character and that complication shines with Yukio in so many ways. They bring out the most interesting and sharpest edges of each other and were both rivals for Shirou's attention and neither one has any of their Shirou baggage at all resolved and they can't work together because they can't take the other seriously and they both care about each other and man, the complexities amplify every time they're in a scene together.
I want to focus on this moment in chapter 15. Chapter 15 is at the start of the Kyoto/Impure King arc and is right after the trial and right before they all leave to Kyoto.
During that moment we see Rin getting his new training to burn candles and try to burn specific ones. Shura tells Yukio she wants to spar while Rin is doing that, and it's made apparent it's something they used to do. She uses her sword and he uses his guns, and they both see who can destroy more of the targets in the time limit.
Yukio says no and Shura orders him to do it, and makes it clear that if he loses she expects him to buy him dinner.
This is yet another example of someone who refuses to see that Yukio has grown and changed from who he was, and there's a tremendous power imbalance in this situation. Shura loves to treat Yukio like a kid brother, but she has authority over him and a lot of years on him, and she uses both to try and manipulate him into doing what she wants.
That's a core piece of who she is and absolutely from how she was raised, but I'll probably expand on that later. It's enough to see that she often pushes and manipulates and ridicules Yukio into doing things her way and makes fun of him when he's trying to be serious.
Chapter 15 goes into a flashback after she orders him to join her in the spar. It shows us a scene from when Yukio was in training to be an exorcist, likely around 10ish though I'm not certain of the exact age, and Shura, who is more than ten years his senior, beats him. Unsurprisingly. Because he's ten.
Shirou sees it and sees Shura laughing and mocking Yukio and calling him names and leaving the room, and we get this moment of reflection from Yukio about why he hates Shura. (And a bit of wisdom from Shirou.)
Yukio, understandably, hates looking stupid. He hates that she's immensely talented and acts like everything is a joke because it makes him and being serious look dumb because if someone who isn't taking it at all seriously can beat him, then what chance does he have when he's giving it his all?
(Also the size of that gun in his tiny hands kills me. Take the gun away from the child. I know why you did this Shirou but it kills me and it's awful. ;-; )
Once again we see the problem of perception on Yukio. Of the way he is seen and mocked and how he continues to hate that. He does not want to be seen as weak and stupid, and two of the most important people in his life at this point both see him as weak and stupid, or at least give him the opinion that they see him that way. Rin would probably say he doesn't think Yukio is weak, and Shura would certainly say she doesn't think he's stupid, but that's the way they make him feel and it is a problem as it pushes him to keep showing that he is not those things.
No one in this manga will be as successful as breaking Yukio of his cool as Shura will be.
We will explore the rest of chapter 15 later because it is a Yukio gold mine.
Back to the moment where Yukio finally speaks up in chapter 10. At this point we see him begging to be taken in Rin's place. He knows much better than Rin what is likely waiting on an official interrogation, and chances are he's been carefully versed by Shirou on what to say.
But also, this is his brother and he wants to protect Rin. Everything he's done up to this point has been in an effort to contain and protect Rin and he will continue to work to protect Rin.
Remember the end of chapter two. Shirou brought Yukio into all this madness by asking him if he wanted to get strong and protect Rin, and Yukio steps fully into whatever game he believes Mephisto is playing, knowing he is stepping into a game and that Mephisto is manipulating everything. He does so willingly to continue to protect Rin. It is undeniably his expressed goal. Say what you want of Yukio, he works hard to keep Rin safe from Rin's own self destructive actions and he works hard to keep the secret and shield Rin from the Vatican and this.
Shura dismisses Yukio and his growth. She takes Rin away and leaves Yukio there with Mephisto.
We do not see him again that chapter.
The next time Yukio pops up is in chapter 11 when he's shown sleeping as Rin slips out to go to the roof with Kuro.
Or Rin thinks he is asleep.
This is a tremendously tiny moment that Kato gives us and is easy to skip over as just a funny little ha ha, but it tells us more about Yukio. He's fully aware of what Rin is doing and like always, he is watching. He is aware of Rin slipping out and hears Rin talking about him. Rin is not pulling something over on him.
He is smart and observant. He is a step ahead of Rin. (Probably several.)
We then skip to the next morning and the exwires having some sort of training camp coming up. Will it be a real one this time since their last training was a fake training and actually a test?
Methinks not, lol.
The exwires gather at the bottom of the stairs near the True Cross Midway Station and we see Yukio with what I call his customer service smile.
This smile is ALWAYS a lie. If Yukio is wearing it he is frustrated and pretending not to be. In this moment Shura is almost certainly the reason for the fake smile.
He leads them into the forest for their mission, and it's like mid July in the middle of the day in Japan in Tokyo and it would be so damn hot and humid out there. This is just the nastiest sort of mission to send the students out on. If you do not live in a humid place then know that there is no relief unless you're in the ac. Shade does not help much because the humidity carries the heat and it is an exhausting kind of heat. You should not be going on a hike like this in high humidity. Especially not with those kind of packs and not in a heavy coat.
Yukio's careful façade cracks a lot on this mission. He is starting to show himself and his breaking cool to the students more and more despite trying not to. While Rin is getting lazier about his secret and struggling with figuring his powers out, Yukio's carefully gathered control of himself is starting to fray.
His response will be to double down in the next arc.
A few notable examples of this fraying are:
(Kato fucking kills me with the exwires all :o at Yukio's outburst in that last scene. I laugh every time.)
Hot, stressed, dealing with a person who irritates him more than anyone else, watching as the one person he really considers something like a friend goes more for his brother, Yukio is fighting a hard battle to remain always composed and smiling. This forest is not only a trial for Rin.
None of this is ever only a trial for Rin.
Yukio forces his façade back in place and continues his explanation of the mission.
The last shot we get of Yukio in that chapter is with the customer service smile firmly back in place. The façade cracked but he shoved it back in place. He's pleasant and in control again, not giving the appearance of being emotional, weak, or a cry baby.
The very next close up we get of Yukio is in chapter 12, and needless to say
That smile died again.
I'm going to end part three here with this strip. Yukio visibly loosing his cool and exhausted with Rin while Shura laughs in the background. Yukio saying audibly "I can't hide his power much longer."
This was never just a trial for Rin.
As always, you can see more of my aoex meta by looking at my tag #raven ramble and I'll post another part to this series and hopefully Izumo's analysis soon (๑•̀ㅂ•́)ง✧
