volumes 1-22 of the manga were available for free temporarily to commemorate the 22nd anniversary of serialization, so i thought it might be nice to compile them and share
> HERE <
is the file with the raws which i got from here (you can also buy the rest of the volumes from the same place or other e-book stores like u-next, it's pretty simple but the sites are all in japanese ofc)
i had to manually compile the files into pdf so it's possible there are pages missing or out of order (i checked it and everything seems to be right but giving a warning just in case)
I was scrolling through the Korean wiki of the Natsuyu characters and I came across this in Matoba's profile. Korean wikis contain a lot more discourse and theories between fans in contrast to the English Fandom wikis which only state Canon information hahahahaha. The google translation is a bit wonky but what's your opinion on this?
hmmmmm ok i had to look up the webpage itself and see what chapter they're referencing for that "nuance that the head position is not passed down through lineage" turns out the little [6] citation mark there doesn't actually cite any chapter, but just more explanation about the dangerous nature of the exorcist profession and that spiritual power aren't guaranteed to be inherited from parent to child, etc. which i don't consider to be a valid supporting evidence to what they're saying about matoba clan inheritance system. as for seiji saying "the previous head", since the page doesn't specify what chapter that line is from, and i can't remember off the top of my head where seiji specifically said "the previous head", so i'll talk about instances i remember of seiji talking about other matoba clan heads:
-in a hand extended, seiji said "...or so the current clan head says": he uses the title because that gives weight to the opinion that the exorcism industry is on the decline, since it's the stance of the very person at the top of the industry, and it wouldn't land the same way if he said "my dad/relative says..."
-in miharu arc, "i'm disappointed in the matoba leader of that time": the miharu family died out before the last three pillar ceremony that welcomed lady white claw/shirotsume-no-kimi 40 years ago, and considering matoba's assumption that he will no longer be the clan head by the next ceremony in 30 years time (which yes as we all know seiji is passively suicidal but he's also a stone cold pragmatist and i've always read that line to be informed more by the history of exorcist being a dangerous profession and matoba clan heads being an even more hazardous job and so they tend to have rather short tenures) it would've been a matoba clan head from 2 generations (or more) ago that was in office and therefore not seiji's parent or someone from their generation.
↳if you or anyone reading this knows in what chapter seiji said "the previous head" please let me know in the reply and i'll look into it
afaik (again, off the top of my head), there is so far no concrete evidence to prove or disprove what they're saying here about matoba clan leader's position being a free for all to anyone in the entire clan. BUT, i'm more inclined to believe that while it's not impossible for the position to go to someone not directly related to the main matoba family, the children with direct lineage have precedence over those from other families in the clan. if none of the children of the entire matoba family in the next generation is deemed good enough (most likely in the sense that none of them have strong enough spiritual power + aren't skilled enough), then they might adopt a children from another family within the clan and name them heir.
in a world unbent, while seiji did only say "i'm here on the clan's orders", takuma then specifically criticized "matoba-san" for said order. seiji's phrasing insinuates that the order came from the leader, so takuma's words next would imply that said leader is seiji's parent or at least a relative.
↳ side note, the official translation of the manga said "my family told me to come" and "mr. matoba again", which on the surface supports my arguments, but it must be clarified that in jp seiji says "the clan (ichimon)", and "matoba-san" (which does not denote gender, hence why some ppl headcanon that the previous clan head was seiji's mother instead). just mentioning this for transparency.
chapter 123 also shows that the only children being considered for heir is the 2 matoba siblings. again, could be that the children from other families in the clan are significantly weaker in power, but a significant theme in auction arc is blood & inheritance (esp in the eyes of youkais) so i think the matoba siblings & discussions about them being heir candidates being brought up in this arc means something.
It was revealed in the Official Fanbook that Takashi has a complex about his feminine appearance from the late Reiko and consciously makes an effort to be more masculine by using manly language (Natsume uses "ore", the masculine version of "I" in Japanese, instead of "boku" or "watashi", which is more polite).
WAS IT. jghbsdg little gender dysphoria boy thats awesome
ok so natsume's bday got me in a mood to reread and i was doing just that, but this character in chapter 14 (natsume's and natori's first trip together to an inn) always caught my attention
i never really understood why the person at the inn reception was so detailed but i figured it's because midorikawa always liked drawing women (as she stated multiple times)
BUT THEN i got to matoba's introduction arc and....
...is this the same character?? i mean same hair, same mole, same lipstick, are we supposed to think it's the same person? that's a distinctive character design, right? i'm not crazy for thinking this is the same person, right?
that would be intriguing in and of itself, but this woman is not just some passerby this time, she's actually one of the matoba family's shiki or at least a yokai employed by them in some way as it is mentioned later in the same arc:
so let's say i'm right, why the hell was one of matoba's shiki at the inn natori invited natsume to?? well, in that arc natori was actually doing an exorcism job and he only tells natsume abt it later, so taking that into account, was the job from the matoba clan? (as we know, he does take those)
if that's the case then was the shiki sent there to "supervise" or something or is the inn one of matoba family's property?
there's another intriguing detail that got me thinking this was a matoba job:
natori is happily chatting away with the recepcionist by the end of the chapter
now, i always thought it was bc he was just doing his actor thing yk, sparkling, being friendly whatever but now it makes me think, was it bc he knew this person? if that's the case, then this being one of matoba's shiki he knows makes sense, and her being present for an exorcism requested by the family also makes sense
another thing that could corroborate this is, sensei says the seal on the pot was powerful and recent and natori says a powerful exorcist almost managed to seal the yokai but it fled to the inn (idt matoba would let a yokai escape so idt he was that exorcist, but this does sound like the kind of job the matobas would get tasked with, something difficult that not any exorcist could do)
also if i'm right abt this, then this woman is not the only matoba shiki natori knows
in nanase's intro chapter natori calls these two yokai by name, later in eastern forest arc and shiki natsume arc the tengu masked one is present:
so natori knows two matoba family's shiki by name (at least the tengu mask is confirmed to be one of their shiki) and, even tho they appear more than once, that information isn't given directly
all that to say, can i assume this woman character is the same case? a character with a somewhat distinctive character design we see more than once, and that we later learn is a matoba shiki?
if i'm right in this interpretation then, can i also assume the exorcism from chapter 14 was in fact a matoba job natori got or was asked to do?
going further, not only is natori familiar with the matoba family's shiki but he also seems to get along with one of them
was he around seiji and the matoba clan that much?
