the vinsmoke sibs all being numbered is old news to everyone, ik, but i haven’t seen anyone pointing out reiju’s number specifically. she’s “zero daughter.” this makes sense when you consider the quints are numbered 1 to 4 already, but like. consider. reiju is the oldest by three years.
can u imagine that. not just being a number, but being zero. from the moment you are born, you’re the prototype. fine, but not good enough. created only to be improved upon. the eldest but not the first. the stumbling start to a sprinting marathon where innocents are rungs on a latter. a twisted game where you and your siblings are guns and you are worth no more than the bandwidth of your magazine.
the inferior trial of a greater product from the moment you’re born. and eventually, the final touches are complete. your brothers are born. you learn to play the game: to keep yourself safe, to keep your father loving you because one wrong move and you’re nothing. your brothers are not human, you learn— they’re the perfect soldiers. cruel and monstrous and empty. they disgust you, but you keep playing along because you have to.
yet as you learn to smile when the runt among them crumbles, to laugh when he cries— when you’re killing innocents right alongside them for the sake of your father’s army, years down the line— you find you’re no better than them. your empathy, your emotions, do not justify your sin.
because those emotions are what led you here in the first place. the need to be loved, to be safe, it’s present in all children. sanji couldn’t keep up but you. you had what it took, didn’t you? you played the part to perfection until the mask was fused to your skin.
the eldest daughter. the prototype that kept pace with the final product. a silent smile with cyanide behind her lips.
poison pink. zero. all you are, all you’ll ever be.
it’s too late for anything else.
