#he's like 'you should just burn it' (thereby killing all the youkai who are bound)

[coquelicoq]

[Image description: Two stills from an episode of the "Natsume's Book of Friends" anime and a panel from the manga. In the first image, Matoba looks back over his shoulder while saying to Nanase, "Since I don't see him, Natori probably went to seal it away." In the second, Nyanko-sensei is perched on Natori's shoulder and is headbutting him in the cheek and saying, "Look everybody, it's the exorcist Screw Up Natori!" The third is a manga panel in which Matoba is smirking slightly and saying, "You have to use what you can. I just want strong ayakashi so I can protect humans. If you worry yourself over being despised, or about the price, you can't be in this business." /end ID]

Rewatch: S3E7 Exorcist

🎯Summary Revenge, tears, and Matoba being a jerk.

🎯Canon Notes +this episode corresponds to all of manga volume 7 +paper with ink symbols can be used as binding charms +matoba needs a charm over his right eye, to protect it from being eaten +the matoba family curse is explained (long ago, an ancestor asked a youkai for help and promised away a right eye in return. he broke that promise, and now the youkai chases after every matoba head after, trying to claim that eye) +matoba already has an old wound over his eye +nyanko upgrades natori’s nickname from “that shady guy” to “the screw-up exorcist natori” +matoba fights using bow and arrows, and is also capable of using paper dolls as a tracker on people

🎯Comments

originally, natori is said from his first appearance to hate youkai. but right away in this episode, we get an extremely cute scene of natori carrying nyanko-sensei around on his shoulders (because he’s a stuffed animal, see?)

i also have a previous post that goes into more detail on the canon interactions between nyanko-sensei and natori. at the very least, from the amount of times they have encountered each other, nyanko-sensei is willing enough to hang around natori and also bicker with him, the way he might with natsume (“look everyone! it’s the screw-up exorcist natori! rahhh!”)

nyanko-sensei also asks about more info on matoba from natori, to which natori replies: “He’s the type who’s not afraid to use dangerous youkai for his own ends.”

nyanko-sensei asks if that was why natori had left behind his own shiki. natori denies that he was trying to protect his own shiki from matoba. with his own shiki, hiiragi clearly worries about natori, even if she claims she was not mad that natori didn’t take her with them so she could protect him.

and in an interesting twist, while the current natori is not entirely a jerk to youkai, he does understand the expectations that the exorcist community has. youkai are either servants or not, are either useful or to be banished.

while sympathetic to the woman who had lost her crow shiki, he says “In this line of work, the youkai we use are…[nothing but tools].”

matoba’s own view on youkai lines up with this sentiment that natori expresses.

“I just want to have strong youkai to protect people. If that means people hate me, or that I pay a price, that’s fine.” ���[Natsume, thinking] He’s an exorcist, but he’s very different from Natori-san.” “I can’t use that youkai. I’m leaving.” “If you don’t need a youkai, then don’t spend time on it. Blast it to nothingness.”

matoba is all ruthless efficiency, expediency. if a youkai or a person is not interesting to him, he abandons it immediately.

we don’t really get a full picture of what it means to matoba to protect people, but from his family’s curse, we get an inkling; for matoba, any interaction with youkai is a life-death situation, and each time, matoba will choose to protect himself (to protect the clan).

matoba seiji and his clan is powerful, yes, but it rests on a precipice, drawing entirely from a bargain based on fear, on bloodline, and half of his sight (which allows him to watch out for enemies, both youkai and human).

both matoba and natori are exorcists, and both of them are acquainted, at least. in issues of sight, both of them seem to struggle with skewed perceptions; natori and his fake glasses, which he thinks would help him see youkai better. matoba and the paper charm on his right eye, which protects him and blocks half his sight.

as for any relations between natori and the matoba clan, we are reminded again how nanase-san is familiar with natori’s personality, when he is hiding something, and how he would react in certain situations (“Natori? I only teased him a little and he came running. What a child.”)

matoba seiji also seems to know natori, at least is aware of natori’s abilities and personality as well.

one of matoba’s earliest comments to natsume, after natsume is trying to break a paper binding charm, is to mention natori’s name: “Interesting isn’t it? Normal people can’t see that paper. Ah, the Natori family knows more about that paper than I do. Ask them.”

when in the end, natori goes back into the cave to seal the youkai, matoba does not seem surprised (“Since I don’t see him, Natori probably went to seal it away.”) both are exorcists, yet both choose different paths of action in this episode.

and in the last scene, as natsume is wrestling with his understanding of the casual cruelty of the Matoba exorcists, natori sounds more resigned when he just tells natsume not to worry about it, that: “Some people are like that. That’s all it is.” 

was matoba always like that? is that all it is? natsume wants to protect friends both youkai and human; so what is it that matoba or natori hopes to protect?

Previous posts: S1E9 rewatch. S1E13. S2E3. S2E11. S2E12-13. S3E6. More exorcists meta can be read here.