#good person and an ally while they’re still sacrificing dream for stuff that isn’t near comparison is just fucking crazy to me

[drusic]

apparently everyone is allowed to change and grow as a person except for dream. 👍👍

[bemused-writer]

VNC Chapter 43 Analysis

Wow, for chapter designed to segue between one arc to the next, this one sure had a lot packed into it! The political intrigue is through the roof and our main characters take a backseat while we finally get to see Dominique and her family once more. Before that, though, a few last thoughts on Gévaudan. We learned both Chloé's and Jean-Jacques's names and they, indeed, suit them well. Chloé's was "Canorus," or "she who plays with snow crystals." She'd isolated herself in a snowy castle and she played the piano to exert her power, which has white keys. It also implies a more lighthearted nature to Chloé than we really got to see, which seems accurate to me. Jean-Jacques's is "Aprix" or "he who nestles close to the last snows." His is especially overt in its meaning: he loves the snow (Chloé) and stays close to her side. Jean-Jacques is also the easiest vampire to cure we've seen to date and the reason is simple: he only gave his name to Naenia to protect Chloé. If he doesn't need to do so to protect her, then why bother?

He will now protect her as himself, his true self, without any outside help. I can't help but wonder how soon he will have to live up to that promise. We also finally get something of an update on Johann and Dante.

Okay, so we already knew these two were hired by Marquis Machina, we just didn't know what it was they were looking for. Turns out, the whole reason they were there was for Chloé's alteration device. This actually makes perfect sense: it contains information and that's precisely what dhampirs collect. Furthermore, it seems information is what Marquis Machina is most interested in as well, so things are adding up nicely.

Unfortunately, (or thankfully?) Marquis Machina doesn't get whatever information this device has because of the chasseurs and Ruthven. I think it's safe to say at this point that there are certain members of the Church that are allied with Ruthven. Furthermore, they are almost certainly trying to reignite a war between humans and vampires.

Having these two groups working together is nothing short of a disaster because it's a very effective team up and no one even suspects what's going on, save for possibly Marquis Machina who is familiar with both Ruthven and Chloé, but I'll talk a bit more about that in a bit. Also, I think we now know why Astolfo was sent to Gévaudan:

Now this is just sinister. Astolfo was purposefully sent because they know he has no restraint. They know he's angry, looking for purpose, and they're manipulating those emotions into something beneficial for them. It also means they know Roland is questioning the Church; they had to make sure he was sufficiently distracted in order to get what they came for. And who was in charge of all this? None other than Gano, the mysterious chasseur that was supposed to come as backup a couple chapters ago. I guess now we know what the holdup was about.

There is not a lot of love lost here, is there? Olivier is looking at Gano with overt mistrust and disdain. Roland has his relaxed grin firmly in place, but I think we know enough about him at this point not to blindly believe it: he knows there's something up with Gano and he knows that whatever happened in Carcassonne shouldn't have taken that long. I think we now have a physical representation of why Olivier is so worried about Roland's behavior. He knows people like Gano are aware of his treasonous thoughts and he knows Roland is in danger. I think it's also safe to say that Olivier isn't a big fan of a lot of people in the Church, which fits in with the leeway he's given Roland and his extreme opinions (in the Church's eyes at least). As for this Gano...

That is one of the most suspicious individuals I've ever seen. 8D My goodness, Mochizuki isn't doing much to give him the benefit of the doubt, is she? XD He's all but leering at them; he knows something they don't. No wonder Olivier looks so irritated. I wouldn't be surprised if Gano is an extremely powerful chasseur. All the more reason for Roland to be careful in his investigation of things. Another major thing before we jump into the de Sade drama:

I KNEW IT. I KNEW IT, BUT I CAN'T BELIEVE IT, I-- *ahem* So, Murr is a shady cat. :D Either Teacher is the cat or, more likely, he's watching everything through the cat, which is still pretty disturbing. Think about it: Noé has been put through the wringer repeatedly, and Teacher hasn't lifted a finger to help him. Noé was nearly killed by Ruthven on two separate occasions, nearly died in the catacombs, lost a limb most recently, and I'm sure it's only going to get worse. The only time Teacher offered any help was when Noé was asleep and even then he wasn't so much helping as he was listening to Noé's troubles, no doubt because he was curious what Noé would do. It's Louis all over again, just with some adjustments for Noé's personality. Anyway, that wraps up the Gévaudan arc pretty neatly. I doubt this is the last we'll see of Chloé and Jean-Jacques, though. You don't spend this much time developing two characters simply to drop them by the wayside for the next arc. I have two guesses on how this could go: Chloé and Jean-Jacques will show up later in the series to support Noé or to offer some knowledge on Ruthven. Alternatively, they will be sacrificed in the near future to prevent that information from getting out. Either way, for the moment, Vanitas and Noé are allowed to bask in their victory and feel as if they've accomplished something, which they have, but there is so much manipulation in this series I'm feeling uncertain about how long they'll get to enjoy it. And at long last, we get to see Dominique again! None of our questions about Misha are answered, though, and if anything, I'm more worried about what happened to her than ever. She thinks all of that was a dream? What did he do to her?

Everything seems to be in order. Her bedroom is clean, there's no sign of struggle, she isn't missing anything... It makes everything that much more alarming. How long has she been sleeping? What happened after she met Misha? Quite a bit of time has passed, so that seems to indicate, to me, that if she's still dreaming about Misha, something bad happened that she can't remember. There seem to be a lot of memory issues in this series. After all, if you can't remember something, you can't very well exercise your will over a situation, can you? Dominique is desperate to get outside, but she's immediately confronted by her sister, Veronica.

There's a familiarity between these two that shows they were probably raised together, but there isn't any closeness, which means they weren't raised to have especially strong bonds with one another. It's an interesting dynamic and feels both sinister and aristocratic. Now, Veronica says she's covered in blood because she was having an intimate moment with Marquis Machina. However, I feel the need to point out, there's no reason we should believe her. We didn't see the marquis anywhere, after all. However, she has information on the senate meeting that she could only have gotten from someone in the senate, so there's probably some truth to what she's saying. Personally, I find this a curious change of attitude for Veronica. I thought she was a bit of a misandrist if I'm completely honest. This is the woman who said, "What is a human doing here? Not only that, but a man. What a stench. The stink of humans is so strong I think my nose may drop off." I suppose her biggest issue was that he was a human (so, she's a xenophobe and/or racist), but his being a man didn't seem to help. Still, people who are bigoted often get together with the very people they have issues with. In that regard, Veronica and Vanitas are kind of similar. 8D Vanitas definitely has misogynistic tendencies and he's trying to have a relationship with a woman. Likewise, Veronica may have issues with men, but she's having a fling with one. All right, then. It is true that she and the marquis interacted with one another in volume two:

It's extremely subtle, but the fact she didn't just go ballistic on the marquis when he didn't handle the problem could indicate a certain fondness for the guy. Anyway, the important bit for now is Dominique's reaction to this revelation: she seems a whole lot like Noé all of a sudden. Dominique: Marquis Machina got you all bloody, Veronica? Why...? This is kind of odd for Dominique. She normally seems way more worldly than this, not to mention way more on top of things. This seems more like the Dominique we saw in flashbacks, and I suppose that makes sense. She just woke from a nightmare, she's feeling disoriented, and her sister is messing with her. Not a great time of things. Furthermore, her sister says this:

"You're as dull as ever, child." This is in direct reference to Dominique being uncomfortable hearing about Veronica's sexual conquests. This strongly implies Dominique isn't having her own sexual conquests, despite her being so flirtatious in previous chapters. Put that together with Veronica referring to Noé and Jeanne as Dominique's "favorites" and I think it's safe to say that at the moment, Dominique is harboring unrequited romantic feelings for both of these individuals and Veronica find the whole thing contemptible. As an aside, this means Dominique and Vanitas are kind of similar, too. 8D In fact, both of them are having more luck with Jeanne than they are with Noé. Jeanne seemed quite taken with Dominique and their dance going so far as to keep pursuing her afterwards, and she has become much more fond of Vanitas. Meanwhile, Vanitas's almost-pursuit of Noé at the beginning of the series* has gotten exactly nowhere, much like Dominique's. I'm not sure what that says, exactly, except that Jeanne might be more romantically inclined than Noé. Or, perhaps, Noé is even more oblivious than Jeanne to this stuff. Still, both Vanitas and Dominique are very close to Noé, so maybe it's a matter of time. Anyway, we then get into the political spectrum of things, and this is no doubt what a lot of the next arc will be dealing with. We're introduced to several senate members, and none of them seem trustworthy.

From right-to-left we have: Lord Bellator (the Fuming), Unnamed Lord (the Nervous), Lord Paldence (the Sly), Lord Ruthven (the Liar), Antoine (probably a lord? I'll call him "the Diplomat" and in this instance that's not necessarily a good thing), and Master Luca (heir to the throne AKA "the Prince"). I think it's interesting that in the overhead shot, we're shown there are eight senate members, but in this closeup we're only shown five, not counting Luca. We know Marquis Machina was there (though notably his face wasn't shown), that raises the number to six. That means there were two members there we still know nothing about, not to mention The Nervous, who was never given a name. It seems Bellator and Ruthven are not each other's biggest fans. In fact, most of the meeting that we are shown is of these two going at each other's throats.

Ruthven's comment here makes it pretty obvious that vampires live for a ridiculously long amount of time, but even vampires agree that acting like you can do whatever you want because of a conversation from a century ago is kind of pushing it. It also implies that the people on the senate have been on the senate for a ridiculously long amount of time. In other words, they are set in their ways; there's been no new fresh blood. The political side to vampiric society is probably insanely outdated compared to humanity's and that's saying something for a series taking place in the 19th century--it's not just that certain families stay in power for years and years; literally the exact same people maintain that power. No change. No advances. They are stuck. Anyway. Dominique doesn't want Jeanne to be executed, understandably, and she reveals this weakness to Veronica.

Veronica berates her for trying to drag the family name through the mud; apparently, no one likes a bourreau. But what I find interesting is that Dominique says "Father's territory." Um... what? So, they live in this giant mansion and the father has his own territory? What about the mother? Do they mean territory as in he invaded and took over some spot or do they mean he just really needs his space? Either way, this is further evidence that this family is not very close; they are some kind of political enterprise. I really feel bad for Dominique, though. She's kind of out of it, but she immediately goes to Jeanne's rescue. Gotta admire that. Anyway, Antoine finally shows up and all of that is taken care of.

Antoine's sudden appearance is jarring, to say the least. Also, his fangs are out. Now, who was hanging out in the hallway with blood on her? Veronica. Who just showed up with his fangs bared? Antoine. Who seems incredibly shady? Both of them. There's probably nothing to this, but if there's going to be some kind of bizarre, incestuous affair going on, I wouldn't be shocked to discover it was with the de Sades. Regardless of potential crack theories, Antoine gives us even more information on what happened at the senate meeting. This makes it pretty clear to me that Antoine is kind of the head of the house. Why didn't their father go? Apparently because he has an entire territory to himself, I don't know. Thus, the responsibility falls to Antoine. Luckily for the de Sade family, he seems remarkably good at this job. He easily maneuvered Bellator into doing what he wanted and got the senate to cool down as well.

Even Veronica is impressed. He says he just wanted to move on from the topic, and I almost believe him, but there's no doubt he benefited from the whole thing as well. But he continues on, and it raises some questions.

What does he mean by "comrades?" It could be the other senate members, but Dominique thinks she shouldn't be hearing about this, which she didn't say previously. It makes me think that the de Sades are involved in something a little more nefarious than mere politics. If they're aligned with Ruthven, then I suppose it's the Church and they want a war. If not, then I have no idea; there are quite a few possibilities there. Perhaps loyalists to the queen? Either way, he isn't sure the queen's reappearance is a good thing, understandably, too. It would change the power dynamics for certain. We then get to see Marquis Machina speak with Ruthven, and, boy, are there some layers in that conversation.

In other words, Machina knows something was afoot, and he's letting Ruthven know he knows he had something to do with it. It also means that literally every single person involved in the Gévaudan incident was a pawn.

Ahh, now this raises the question: who is the chess master? At first, it's easy to think it's Ruthven. But now we see that Machina was manipulating quite a few things: the dhampirs, Noé, and Vanitas. A section of the chasseurs were squarely in Ruthven's control, however, so what we're seeing here is a power struggle between Ruthven and Machina. Who knows which of them will win that particular battle? For the moment, Ruthven is ahead simply because he got the device from Gévaudan, but who knows how long he'll be able to keep the edge.

I'm almost certain Machina is referring to Ruthven here. He's certainly been causing a lot of trouble in secret. On the other hand, "lion" has noble associations, so it could be Luca's rise to power. He beared his fangs at this meeting and saved Jeanne. Perhaps Machina is curious to see whether he can maintain the throne. Ruthven is still the more likely choice judging by the panel that follows:

Machina knows Ruthven is teetering on the edge, and he wants to see the man fall. This next arc is going to be something. There are so many threads in this introductory chapter alone that I think it's safe to say we're in for a wild ride. After all that, we get a brief glimpse of Noé and Vanitas back at the hotel.

We have a bit of a time skip; they've been back in Paris for ten days, and Noé is only now growing concerned that Vanitas has been sleeping solidly for all of them. Um, Noé, you probably should have checked after the first day.... We can also see that Noé is wearing a brace and that it looks like they're trying to reattach his hand. I am ... so curious about whether that works. Just let me know, Mochizuki, please.... Noé also gets to see Vanitas's sleeping face at long last! XD

What even, Vanitas. XD I can't tell if he's actually sick or if he's completely drained from how emotionally vulnerable he was for the entire Gévaudan arc. He was literally worrying about Noé for the entire arc, then he was worrying about his promise to Jeanne, then he was panicking about how fond Jeanne was of him suddenly and his own reaction to it. Yeah, I don't think he was prepared for literally anything in that arc. XD Guess we'll see how that continues later this month! I really need to see it.... *I've talked about that in previous installments, so I opted not to bog things down further by getting into it here, but if it seems unclear feel free to ask about it. :)