Souya’s calm place vs Kiriyama’s pitch black room [Part 3]
Warnings: // Spoilers until chapter 160 // Long post divided in parts // I consider Souya’s hearing loss as something symbolic, not a real sick
Structure of the analysis: (divided in different posts, so these are the links)
What is Souya’s calm place and Kiriyama’s pitch black room.
Analyze/theorize how they end in their rooms.
Add comment: the storm and the clam place
Theorize why I think Kiriyama could end in a calm place and how he could go from the black room to the calm place.
Go from the ‘pitch black room’ to the ‘calm place’
Well, I have to start saying the same thing as I said earlier: Souya could be consider beyond the storm but he is only there because he has a method (hearing loss) to elude it. Even if most people consider him the finish line (the final boss), he is still knowing parts of the shogi he didn’t know earlier (example: against Dobashi). In other words, even if someone beats Souya, that person will be still in the storm because shogi is deeper than the actual meijin (Souya don’t know everything about shogi). In my opinion, there is another question (is possible for someone in the manga to get to know everything about the shogi? Quick answer: no, it is impossible. It’s unreal, and we know Chica Umino likes to give to his story a sense of reality).
The real questions: can Kiriyama go from the ‘black room’ to the ‘calm place’? Yes. Is the ‘calm place’ the finish line’? No. Can Kiriyama become someone like Souya? Yes, in another reality or if the things start to go really badly in his personal life.
First question: can Kiriyama go from the ‘black room’ to the ‘calm place’? As I said like three times, yes. We saw it when he was against Souya, he felt it. But the thing is, how Souya goes to the ‘calm place’? Is a consequence of his hearing loss or is because of his calm demeanor? If it’s because of the first one (as it seems, because after Kiriyama entered in Souya’s calm place during the match, Kiriyama only could hear the pieces), Rei will have to live a life only dedicated to shogi. As I said at the beginning of the post, I used the theorize all of this with the idea that Chica Umino uses the concept of hearing loss as a method to illustrate the life only dedicated to shogi. If I’m correct and the only way to entered in a ‘calm place’ like Souya’s is dedicated only to shogi, the author shout to us telling us that living only for the work is bad: the teacher Hayashida told it to Kiriyama when he tried to explain him the ‘black room’.
“No matter what happens, do not let that onirigi leave your hand!” Hayashida uses the onigiri as a metaphor of the relationship Kiriyama has with the sisters. Basically, he is saying: “Do not sacrifice what you have with the sisters if that means being better in shogi”. The teacher knows Kiriyama has been looking for a place where he feels okay, and even if Kiriyama doesn’t realize, he has one now, so he can’t throw it away now because he will be in the starting point again.
On the other hand, if Souya’s calm place is because of his calm demeanor, Kiriyama can reach it in the future. He is a calm person too, and he has demonstrated that he can maintain the cold head even against troublesome opponents.
Is the ‘calm place’ the finish line’? As I said earlier, no. The calm place is a state of the mind and if I’m correct, Souya has the ‘calm place’ because of his hearing loss, after all, he’s still in the storm (I don’t want to extend more than I did, so check before, I talked about it).
Can Kiriyama become someone like Souya? Yes. In the bad and in the good sense. Throughout of the manga, the characters have told us how similar Kiriyama and Souya are (example: the reason why Shimada invited Kiriyama to his study group is because Rei and Souya have a similar way of thinking during the matches). That’s because I think Kiriyama can become a really good player in the future (even a player better than Souya because he will not make the same mistakes than him if Kiriyama doesn’t “let that onigiri”). That’s is the good sense for me. In the bad sense: if Kiriyama “leaves that onigiri” he will only have the shogi again and he could “lose his hearing loss” and become someone like Souya.
