In Warhammer 40,000, you kill psychics. In From the New World, psychics kill you. In Warhammer 40,000, the vast Imperium needs the daily sacrifice of thousands of psykers every day to power the Astronomicon which acts as a psychic beacon to send its starships throughout the Imperium via warp. Though disciplined psykers are used for various functions in the Imperium, they are generally feared by Imperial citizens due to their connection to the Ruinous Powers of Chaos. Thus, psykers that are too weak-willed to control themselves are often sacrificed to power the Astronomicon.
In the New World, psychics manage to conquer modern human civilization and eventually turn their descendants into animals by combining their genes with naked mole rats so they wouldn't be even considered human anymore. What the psychics would do to normal people, it's the same thing normal people would do to them. They would try to dominate each other and do horrible things to each other as well.
- Pretty much confirmed in episode 18. Though so far it doesn't seem like specific hatred against humans, but simply lust for power and acknowledgement that humans would never let him be as powerful as he would desire.
- Fully confirmed as of Episode 25. He didn't lead the rebellion for power or from ambition, but out of a desire for his people to be free and unthreatened by humans.
- Maria will become The Dreaded Akki: Hoo boy, one could see Maria losing it if something horrible happens to Mamoru.
- Shun read about the Gouma early in the series and look what became of him. Maria read of the Akki. Signs aren't looking good.
- Jossed. Tomiko confirms that the bones Yakomaru laid out were in fact those of Maria and Mamoru. She and Mamoru are thus Killed Off for Real.
- Maria will crank a Face–Heel Turn on Kamisu 66: I think she has enough restraint to not become an Akki. Having something bad happen to Mamoru (especially if the village finds out where they are), however, could affect her view of the world.
- Nope. How can she cause havoc if she's already dead (as proven by Tomiko)?
- Maria will die...: And Mamoru becomes The Dreaded Akki. What a twist!
- Again... Nooope. As Tomiko proves, he's kicked the bucket, he's shuffled off the mortal coil, rung down the curtain and joined the choir invisible. He is an ex-Mamoru.
- Maria will not become an Akki, but her child will: Now that's what I call a simultaneously horrifying, saddening, and shocking surprise.
- Allow me to explain myself for a minute or two. Episode 15 reveals that Squealer has been doing his research on human history. He will realize that the "gods" are actually restrained by their Power Limiter. In other words, Maria's and Mamoru's PK powers are restricted. However, since they fled Kamisu 66 and the boundaries, any children they have will have unlimited power, thus giving Squealer a weapon to use against other colonies and (potentially) human settlements. If the fate of the Bakenezumi queens are anything to go by, a nasty surprise could be in store for Maria...
- Jesus Christ... CONFIRMED IN EPISODE 21. Poor Maria...
- Furthermore, episode 16 emphasises how deeply the society of Kamisu 66 is built on the fear of children. This was also the theme in AKIRA where the society was in danger of falling apart from the clash of generations.
- I disagree. The psychic powers in here are notably different than how they are in Akira (for one thing, it doesn't appear that pills are needed to keep their power under control), to say nothing of how malevolent psychics can get in general. I think From The New World is likely the universe that comes into existence as a result of Tetsuo's defeat, because the 'power level' of this setting could easily contain someone like Tetsuo without a problem...as well as partially explain their penchant for devastation.
- Given the numerous death flags surrounding the characters and Squealer's growing ambitions, we'll probably see vast destruction in this final story arc. With the exception of Saki and Satoru, I really don't see how the series is going to end well for the rest of the cast.
- Saki and Satoru live, and they even get married. and have a child. However, every other named character bites the bullet by Episode 25, so it's Confirmed.
Shun turning into a karmic demon may have been an unfortunate occurance for Tomiko (she might have wanted to use him in other ways), but once Mamoru starts to buckle under the strain two years later, she has her chance. She lets the Education Committee plan to get rid of him, then saves him from death (we know she has the final control over the cats), but this makes him afraid enough that he doesn't want to stay around the settlement. Maria deciding to go with him is an added bonus. The bones provide a nice cover story for them — Tomiko knows they're still alive, but lies about the DNA and dental testing, so that (if questioned) she can say they are dead for sure. She also starts grooming Saki, using flattery and guidance to get the most leadership-minded member of their group on her side.
But why go to all this trouble? Think of what her motivation might be. She's over 200 years old, and has seen humanity continue to decline over all this time. She also knows the destructive power of ogres and demons, and knows that an ever-increasingly repressed society will eventually collapse on itself. ("A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.") How to make the society stronger? Triumph over an adversary. What adversary? The queerats.
She therefore has allowed queerat society to develop by leaps and bounds under Squealer without pushing back at all. For what it's worth, I find it entirely possible that she allowed them to have the false Minoshiro so that they could develop technologically. When hostilities inevitably break out with the humans, however, she leads the human society in condemning the queerats as despicable, so that they won't wonder what's going on and instead throw themselves into the fight. But all this isn't enough: a concentration of trained cantus-users is still likely to be able to defeat any number of non-cantus users.
Solution: get some cantus-users on the queerat side. More specifically, Maria and Mamoru.
I think that right now, with Tomiko's tacit blessing, Maria and Mamoru are being held captive by the Robber Fly queerats and forced to use their cantus to aid them. Maybe they are brainwashed. Maybe they are working on pain of torture. Maybe they've gone full-scale into madness and become ogres or demons, but with queerats closely minding them. In any case, this would explain whose cantus skills could have caused the genocide of the Giant Hornets without any other humans noticing.
Tomiko's plan is for the humans to free themselves from their former restraints and wipe out the queerats. Then, with independent thinker-turned-leader Saki at the helm, they will recover their glory days of unrestrained cantus use. Will she pull it through? Is this just some loony WMG theory? Only time will tell...
- Errr...Jossed, as far as we all know. She had no known ties to the queerats, died in the attack, and impressed on Saki that it's extremely important to never ever let Akki or Gouma develop in human society. Plus several elements were individually Jossed.
- ....Girl. From some reason Tomiko stating that most of the Akki were boys with the exception of two stayed with me. And, if the akki turns out to be Maria's child, a Strong Family Resemblance wouldn't be amiss especially if it would cause conflict with Saki who might end up having to kill the akki. This could also explain why we haven't seen the akki yet, the big reveal would be more horrifying that way.
- Jossed. He's a boy. What IS confirmed however is that the Akki is Maria's child. Given that he has his mother's eye and hair color, it's going to be painful for Saki to take him out...
- It's a girl, after all! Though he was a boy in the original novel, they made her a girl for the anime.
- Episode 22 establishes that he led a mission there years before Saki's team goes there, but he never actually says what he was looking for there. its entirely possible that his reason for going there in the first place was to find this weapon, and his reasons for going with Saki's team is because he thinks a team of 3 "gods" has a much higher chance of finding it then his soldiers did.
- Confirmed
- I strongly support this theory. I doubt Akki would be impartial to who they chose to murder. Moreover, the child's expressions and laughter as he's brutally killing the villagers seem more reminiscent to a child at play rather than K's malevolent, purposeful, absolutely euphoric smirks. I'm not saying that either isn't creepy as all hell, but I think I see a difference. I do have one glaring question, however: if the child identified itself as a Bakenezumi, then wouldn't the Death Feedback have activated when he murdered Kiroumaru's troops?
- That is precisely the reason why it seems likely that the Akki sees itself as a Bakenezumi.Kiroumaru mentioned that his troops fought to the death with their claws after the Akki disarmed them,which showed that the Akki did not kill them.If the Akki could kill Bakenezumi,Yakomaru would have made him kill them all instead of just disarming them and risk losing his troops.
- Confirmed in episode 25.
- This is hardly necessary. We see many ingenious ways that the Bakenezumi use to kill people by the hundreds during their attack on Kamisu 66. Simple surprise attack when they were asleep or poison in their food would have done the job without any complications. Maria and Mamoru were a couple of naïve teenagers who weren't even expecting an attack from the completely servile and subservient creatures, after all.
- Besides needing their actual bones to make the humans believe that Maria and Mamoru were really dead. Squealer probably suspected that queerat bones wouldn't hold up under serious scrutiny, so he opted to get his one fiend out of the two of them and then disposed of them to cover his tracks.
- Not explicitly Jossed or confirmed by the end of the series, but both Shun and Tomiko speculate on the group's mental resilience and the unconscious mind. Slightly implied that he only became a Karma Demon in the first place because he knew the purpose of the Sacred Barrier, so it didn't work anymore.
