Headscratchers / Destiny of the Shrine Maiden

Destiny of the Shrine Maiden

• Why does Chikane start that love-speech addressed at Himeko during their fight, when she wants Himeko to actually kill her? It's way counter-productive.
  • See Love Makes You Crazy
  • She knew she wasn't going to survive regardless of what happened. Didn't want to die with things unsaid.
  • Chikane may also be trying to purposefully invoke Yandere/Psycho Lesbian.
  • Or she thinks it's going to make Himeko hate her. Enough to want to kill her. This troper got the impression she was keeping it for the end because she thinks it's worse than everything she's done so far...
  • Perhaps she wants to make Himeko feel betrayed. Keep in mind that Chikane and Himeko spent a pleasant evening together at the end of Episode 10, before Chikake sliced open Himeko's top and threatened to kill her.
• When does this series take place? They keep on being reincarnated, and the reincarnations all seem present time except for the previous one shown in Kannazuki. They must each take at least 14 years after each other.
• Were Chikane and Himeko reincarnated again at the ending of the anime?
• Chikane. Himeko. The rape. I'm sorry but what the fuck?
  • Two reasons. One: Chikane wanted Himeko to hate her, so that she wouldn't feel any remorse for killing her. Two: in the manga version, the rape took place in the cave where they were trying to summon Ame no Murakumo. Himeko was a virgin, and when she...bled...it served as a catalyst to summon it. In the anime, due to the changed location and how the summoning of Ame no Murakumo changes function, it's much more just the first reason and wanting to keep the event in the anime too.
  • Also, in the manga, Himeko was originally meant to be the sacrifice, because she was the orphan that "no one would shed tears for" instead of Chikane who was the daughter of a prominent family. When Himeko was soiled, she lost her rites as a miko, and therefore, no longer viable to be sacrificed.
• Exactly, who are the good guys and who are the bad guys? The anime and manga are quite ambiguous. No side is you traditional Hero or Villian. Each side can be said to be the Anti-Hero and/or Anti-Villain. The Orochi kind of resemble the Gnostic sect known as the Ophites. Or is this Values Dissonance because the show is based on tradition Japanese/Shinto mythology and Order Versus Chaos is the original them moslty? Okay explaining in full: The world is threatened with destruction by the Orochi, and is trying to be saved by the Mikos.
• Is there a political meaning? Destroying the world could be a metaphor for revolution and saving the world, maintaining the status quo. Status Quo Is God, Values Dissonance, and Order Versus Chaos are all part of the theory. The show basically teaches the Aesop that the status quo must be maintained at any cost, even Human Sacrifice.

---