#ch 558

[reading-bleach]

Iba indeed never ran away and left Komamura's side after that. He immediately appeared the moment his captain had lost his immortal body and subsequently all his means to fight, to carry him up on his back and carry his will to defeat Yhwach.

What I found most precious is the words Iba said to him afterwards. He reassured him that he did nothing wrong. Words Komamura needed to hear because he basically lost everything and was regretting going down the path of revenge. Komamura is not able to speak but Iba understood what his captain might be feeling at that moment and knew what he should do.

Komamura and Iba have such a close captain - lieutenant relation that I don't think is talked about enough. Until recently I thought iba was his first name. Turns out it's Testsuzaemon and Komamura is on first name basis with him.

[plantyaoi]

knowing that himaruya hates the hetalia english dub is really funny because this is the same guy who loves south park

[every-temari]

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

Okay I really could be reading too hard into things on this one, but, listen. 

Luffy’s line is エースはおれの世界でたった一人の兄弟なんだぞ/ēsu wa ore no sekai de tatta hitori no kyoudai nanda zo! Basically, ‘Ace is the only brother I have in this world!’ 

The thing that stands out to me, here, is that he uses 兄弟/kyoudai to mean ‘brother.’ And he doesn’t, usually, when talking about Ace. Every other time he’s introduced Ace or talked about their relationship, he calls him his 兄ちゃん/nii-chan (a particularly informal and imo quite cute way of saying ‘older brother.’)

Kyoudai does also mean brother/sibling, but it’s like... a more general term? Like, in my experience, it’s almost always a plural, used for a group of more than one person. It’s a bigger statement, what Luffy is saying here, placing harder emphasis on Ace being the only one.

(Bonus point: the only time I’ve seen kyoudai used by them before in the story, actually, is here. In the little memory of when they became brothers.)

[everyjimbei]

It’s getting to be sad boy hours around here

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

Birth order is considerably more important in Japan than in America- it’s why ‘older brother’ and ‘younger brother’ are separate words. There’s a specific word for the eldest son of a family- 長男/chounan. In his goodbye letter, Sabo refers to himself and Ace as 長男二人/chounan futari (‘two eldest brothers’) and comments on how it’s a little silly to have two oldest sons in one family and only one younger brother.

[everyjimbei]

Luffy adores Jimbei, as he should

[everyjimbei]

I wonder how he knew that...?