#and we get to see awkward Hyakkimaru flirting in one scene (the same way he does in every version calling her pretty totally bluntly)

[runawaycarouselhorse]

... you know, because of Tezuka's very round-looking art style, I always imagined Dororo in present time as being 8-9... she's probably closer to 11 or 12, since she talks about her parents' demises as happening sometime between ages 5-10. (She doesn't know exactly.)

.......... Hyakkimaru's only 14-15 over the course of the story (not the reboot, he's 16 there). These two have. Only about a 2-3 year age difference?! Dororo is SHORT... or Hyakkimaru just got very tall, very fast... well, teenage boys do have big growth spurts, but.

I always imagined the age gap was bigger, but I guess that's why they're paired up in so many adaptations when they're older (with some hints while they're younger)--aside from Dororo's jealous anger in the manga when Hyakkimaru talks about a village girl being pretty or something, PFFT.

(Give or take a year or two, given the time period, and the traditional way of calculating ages in Japan [counting the 9 months in the womb, a baby is considered a year old, lunar calendars--the Hijri calendar does this too--also often consider a child older once the new year begins, rather than chronologically when they complete a full year and reach their next birthday...])

"The traditional Japanese system of age reckoning, or kazoedoshi (数え年, lit. "counted years"), which incremented one's age on New Year's Day, was rendered obsolete by law in 1902 when Japan officially adopted the modern age system, known in Japanese as man nenrei (満年齢)."