#Ōgai Mori

[kyouka-supremacy]

Please I need to know how Mori made a slitted throat look like a natural death. Please

[sskk-manifesto]

This ought to be in the 20 most homoerotic lines in bsd

[yah1dka]

i hate the person who made "mori sexually abused dazai as a child" headcannon popular with my whole soul.

[leaderofthemafia]

Dazai doesn't look like he enjoys being restrained. Especially not with leather when he's stuck to a weird reclining chair and has a wire mesh muzzle on his face.

@gnawingonribs

*Mori stands, his tall frame casting a shadow over Dazai. He fixes him with a piercing gaze.*

It is for your own sake, Dazai… and, well, for my own too.

[aishiteru-kenshin]

Meiji Tokyo Renka | 明治東亰恋伽 | Ōgai & Mei

[yah1dka]

i know this is a skk take, but i immediately imagined mori holding a syringe in his hand and trying to give dazai some kind of vaccination, and dazai biting that same hand and hanging on to it just by holding on with his teeth

random new mafia member: mori-san, with all respect. what the hell is happening?

dazai: mhmh mmm hmhmg

mori: that's not what i called you for, ignore him. just don't come close, he would bite

dazai: mhm.. *spitting out mori's hand* i am not biting some...

mori: catch him.

chuuya: hi koyo

kouyo: i expected more formal greetings, lad.

kouyo: ...

kouyo: why is your sleeve wet?

chuuya: one stupid fish tried to ate my hand

dazai, being on the completely different floor: why am i having the feeling that someone talks about me.

Can we all agree that teen Dazai bites? I don't know why, but teen Dazai just looks like he would bite people. Specifically Chuuya.

[bsd-bibliophile]

Generally those who wear a mask of stoicism as they pass through life want something from others. The mask is worn to gain something and no sacrifice is spared to obtain it. Setsuzō, however, wanted nothing. He just wanted to conceal his inner self.

Mori Ōgai, “The Ashes of Destruction” from Youth and Other Stories

[amythedemisimp]

Bungou Stray Dogs Wan!

Chapter 161 (English translation)

Translation, cleaning, type-setting by: @amythedemisimp (me)

Chapter illustrated by: KanaiNeco

Raws: here

Sorry if it looks a bit rushed, I did this quickly because I wanted to translate it and show it to everyone as soon as possible -- Fyodor is finally appearing in a Wan chapter as one of the main characters!!! I'm so happy!!!

[ladyrashelougai]

[Ōugai is probably a person who believes in skin care, he prefers to keep his appearance young and beautiful, and this is what makes him look even more like a single mother than a powerful man; But Yukichi?! I think he's more like the person who screams when Ōugai tries to force him to use a green tea mask on his skin.]

[wonder-and-wildflowers]

I know I've already reblogged this but I was thinking about it again so I'm coming back to it to add more.

Bare with me cause this is a half-baked concept that I haven't had time to find evidence for. Literally thought of it 2 seconds ago and now I'm running with it.

Also, for the sake of not having to constantly repeat myself:

01) Og Elise is Elise pre-Yosano leaving. 02) Y-Elise is Elise after Yosano has left. 03) D-Elise is Elise after Dazai leaves.

I think the idea of Mori's regret shaping Elise is very interesting, not only in what it tells us about his character, but also in what it tells us about the characters in proximity to who he's projecting onto her.

For comparisons sake, we can look back at how Mori treated Og Elise during the time that he had Yosano with him. My interpretation of it is sort of like how we would talk to Siri on our phones. He would give her an order, and she would comply. It was mechanical, robotic, and devoid of any sort of interpersonal connection.

I don't think she even really call him by name in this era (could be wrong don't hold me to that part).

However, as the original poster states, when Yosano leaves, we get to see Og Elise's behavior shift to mirror Mori's interpretation of what he believed Yosano would have done. This is evident in both the way he behaves towards her, and the way that Y-Elise begins to refer to him in a more familiar terms.

Unfortunately, we don't seem to have any characters (at least that I can remember) who knew and felt kinship towards Yosano during her time with Mori that were there to bare witness or react to the shift from Og Elise to Y-Elise.

When we see executives, the black lizards, and soukoku in the same vicinity as Y-Elise, theres rarely any real interaction with or acknowledgement of her. We don't even really have official art of Y-Elise interacting with people in the PM.

But then think of the shift in Y-Elise after Dazai has left. How much official art have you seen with D-Elise, not only with Mori, but also with characters such as Chuuya.

The bsd wiki page literally states "--she enjoys making them take her shopping or putting their hair up in different hairstyles, antics that even prominent members like Hirotsu and Chūya tolerate"

While we don't get to see a whole lot of Elise's interactions with others, theres a distinct shift in the way that people in the PM that knew Dazai regard her when she resembled Yosano, of whom we can assume they'd never met, verses when she resembles Dazai, of whom we regularly get to see characters in the PM think of with some varying degree of fondness.

Anyway like I said this is very half-baked lmfao feel free to correct me or add to it.

Mori Ogai and Regret

Mori in the BSD Manga and Light Novels prides himself in always finding the optimal solution, in pushing his own feelings aside to accomplish the optimal goal for any given situation.

He is a man of logic and carefully wielded cruelty.

We see countless examples of the way he handles things and in the end achieves the best possible solution to his problems.

Killing the old Boss and having Dazai as his witness

Dazai pointing out that he himself is a possible danger to the initial plan

Chuuya remaining a loyal part of the Port Mafia

Driving Dazai away

Getting the Skilled Buisness Permit

The Great War and Yosano

There were all instances where we saw Mori put aside his own emotions and morality to achieve a greater goal. He wielded cruelty, facts and logic as weapons to achieve the in his mind most logical and optimal solution.

But Mori is human. And Humans can not completely disregard and turn off their emotions, no matter how hard they try.

Mori himself says that he has no regrets during the Guild Arc.

But does this like the face of a man void of regrets?

Or this?

In this instance Dazai is choosing the words that will invoke the feeling of Regret in Mori to push him towards choosing a truce with the ADA.

Dazai is aware that Mori has regrets.

But so is Hirotsu.

His inclusion in any conversations Dazai and Mori have regarding the old Boss tells us, as the reader, that Hirotsu knows the full picture.

He isn't just aware that Mori killed the old Boss like other people, but also of Mori's goal from that act.

Hirotsu even goes as far as to tell Mori that Dazai understands why Mori did what he did, implies that Dazai would also understand other actions Mori takes to reach the optimal solution.

But this also shows us something different.

Mori needs reminders.

After Mori killed the old PM Boss Dazai became a constant reminder of why he did what he did. It was inevitable that Dazai would forever remind Mori of the act itself and the initial reasoning behind it, since Dazai was present and Dazai helped him plan it.

Once Dazai left the Mafia Hirotsu transformed into a reminder of it all. In some way Kouyou is also a reminder of what he did and why he did it.

But why these two?

They were there during the reign of the old Boss.

But how does Mori remember the regrets of another part of his past? How does he remind himself of a time where he miscalculated, where he should have taken the emotions of the people he regarded as tools into account?

How is Mori reminded of the mistakes and regrets of the Great War, of Yosano?

Elise.

Elise is Mori's ability, Vita Sexualis. A humanoid puppet to control as he wishes.

But also to shape as he wishes.

During the Great War Elise is nothing more than a robotic being wearing a human skin, void of emotions, thoughts and autonomy.

Mori has always made Elise take the form of a younger girl.

While it is speculated in the fandom that this could be linked to his Lolicon, I believe otherwise.

Elise is for one inspired by the Novel The Dancing Girl from the real life author. But since she is Mori's ability in BSD she will be influenced by his subconcious.

Elise shows us that Mori, even in his twenties, wanted an apprentice. He wanted to impart his knowledge on someone else but until he found Yosano he did not have someone to do this with.

(Im Beast Elise takes the form of a women. Mori already has children to take care of and bestow his knowledge upton, he doesn't need her to fill thie role. But he does need another caretaker, so that is what Elise becomes)

Yosano herself says in the Manga that she respected Mori as a doctor.

Choosing a young and mallable girl as his apprentice did make her easier to manipulate, to create an army that can not die. But young people are also sponges for knowledge.

And here we come to his regret.

Mori does regret how he handled the situation with Yosano.

He liked that strong willed and opinionated young girl he drafted, and he broke her.

We do not see much of Elise until Dark Era, so we can not tell how long it took for Elise to display Yosanos personality after Yosano was redcued by Fukuzawa and Ranpo.

In this official Art we see Yosanos shadow in Elise, a clear indication of teh fact that Mori's impression of Yosano was bleeding into Elise. But we also see her still wearing pigtails.

Her hair and general clothing tells us that this is between loosing Yosano and Dark Era. With time, Elise will resemble Yosano more.

(The bow resembles the butterfly hairpin of Yosano.)

In this scene Mori tries to convince Elise to try on a new dress.

She refuses and clearly displays Yosano's personality in thsi interaction. From the way Mori handles it this isn't knew.

Their dynamic had already shifted into something more like Yosano and Mori instead of the Ability and Mori.

But her hair is different from the last picture.

Elise now has open and wavy hair. Does this remind you of someone?

(For a boy Dazai has always worn his hair longer than traditional seen as boyish, which in turn let's his ends curl and wave more noticable)

But why would Elise take on appearance markers of Dazai?

Simple.

Because there is something Mori regrets.

He only openly mentiones it in Beast but since Beast is a mirror of Canon, that shows us how different choices will change the same people, we can assume this are also the feelings of Canon!Mori.

Mori regrets not being able to really help Dazai.

And his regret will only get deeper as he makes another choice for an optimal solution.

Driving Dazai away and getting Oda killed fulfilled many positives for Mori, what he reached was the optimal solution. He just had to lose his right hand man.

(Light Novel Dark Era)

This is not the behavior of a man not regretting driving away the boy he cared about for 4 years to this point.

To this day Mori leaves Dazai's spot as executive open. He invited Dazai back into the Mafia.

And when we see Elise after Dark Era she has changed once again.

But this time it is not her appearance that changed, it is her attitude.

Elise displays a very much Dazai-like attitude when talking to Mori.

Where Yosano - and until the end of Dark Era Elise - were strong in their oppinion but polite and steadfast in their refusal, Dazai was bargaining. Dazai more often than not wanted something in exchange for doing something he deemed unpleasant/bothersome/boring.

During the recent timeline Elise also does this.

She doesn't just refuse things, she makes deals.

And she doesn't lie during negotiations, just like Dazai.

In the end Elise changes to be more like the people Mori feels a form of regret over. Elise is a constant reminder of his Regrets and Mistakes.

To support this, here are Asagiris words about Mori from the BSD Exhibition:

“He who fell out of the optimal solution”

Mori Ougai’s belief as the boss is described in the novel “Dark Era” and “Dazai, Chuuya, Fifteen”. That is “The boss stands on top of the organization, and at the same time, be the slave of all.” For the sake of the organization, the boss must always take the “logical optimal solution.” That is the duty of the boss.

There is an unspoken additional point to it. “Therefore, no matter how much your heart aches, you have to ignore your personal feelings.” We can catch a glimpse of that in this scene. [the ADA-PM alliance meeting]

Mori’s expressions after “Burnt it.” and “Like what you did to your predecessor”, gave us a glimpse of his true feelings that were made sacrifices for the sake of the “logical optimal solution”.

[Translation by @popopretty here on Tumblr]

A true optimal solution would leave Mori with no regrets. But whenever Elise changes and reminds him of regrets he feels, it is also a reminder of the time he did not truly reach an optimal solution.

[kyouka-supremacy]

I know I've talked about this plenty already but I literally can't take off my mind how despite being objectively horrible towards her, Akutagawa praising Kyouka is such a frequent, heartbreaking occurrence. Like THE ISSUE with bsd's generational trauma is that every mentor trains their student according to how they'd treat themselves. Mori repeatedly says he sees himself in Dazai; he allowed Oda to be killed because he didn't think it would have effected Dazai that much, but that's only because it wouldn't have effected Mori that much in his place, because it was just the most rational thing to do; but of course it wasn't the same for Dazai, who was left utterly destroyed by Oda's death. Dazai never offered Akutagawa the validation for his life he so desperately needs because for Dazai that sentiment is just incomprehensible– how could the suicidal maniac understand the need to be allowed to live, when living is so fundamentally meaningless for him? And Akutagawa constantly praised Kyouka– constantly, but that's never been something Kyouka, quite confident by her own nature, ever needed; she needed to be loved, cherished, protected, overall to be treated like a child, but Akutagawa never gave her that, because - again differently from Kyouka, who had a relatively normal early childhood and would know what being loved is like - he himself was never a child.

[sskk-manifesto]

I really like how Mori/Fukuzawa being opposites as juxtaposition of modern/traditional, West/East in this episode is reproduced by showing Mori playing chess and Fukuzawa playing Go.

[yah1dka]

i'm so tired of this, listen

fandom loves to say that dazai had always hated mori, even in the mafia, and make his teen self act with fear towards mafia boss. but i don't feel that this is right, so now i would try to make some explanations

have you seen any of this pictures? "poor dazai's completely traumatized after seeing mori killing previous boss" except that's the scene before this event:

dazai tied to the table after suicide attempt, no light in the eyes and probably still wants to kill himself. do you get what i mean? people often act like mori was the one who broke him, when in reality yes, he added little more trauma but this wasn't fundamental (i want to see his backstory really bad)

usually it comes in a parallel with kyoka's and akutagawa's dull eyes and guess what? they're also not traumatized by mentor in this pictures yet, life just gave them enough to look like that before even meeting akutagawa/dazai

but also

here's dazai before mori said he knows someone exactly like him

that's after

mori wipes away this conversation and they loose their light again, but then, when mori finally responds with "myself, of course" light is regained

so, dazai is not uncomfortable to be compared to mori, at least not at 15. even more, i assume: he's feeling validated after hearing that mori may be experiencing same things as him. or this look could mean that boy heard something unexpected, but anyways i don't see him being scared of this or disgusted. his main beef with mori really starts after odasaku's death, before they share some weird form of bond, but not hatred.

you can say something if i'm wrong or made a mistake but not be rude<3

love you, bye!

[kyouka-supremacy]

bsd anthology 5 - kanade

[muttakutagawa]

"care to explain yourself, dazai?"

"not especially, no."

[aishiteru-kenshin]

Meiji Tokyo Renka | Daisuke Namikawa | Hidden In My Heart (Ōgai Mori Edition)