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loquatenjoyer69 · 9 months ago

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Matoba and Burden and Desire

I originally watched/read Natsuyuu back in fall of 2022, and then a few months ago, literally out of nowhere, my brain was like “Hey, remember that loquat story Matoba told in that one arc? It felt like there was something there, let’s go reread that,” which I did, and have been in hexorcists hell about ever since.

(pictured: a sane person’s reaction to reading natsuyuu)

And really, that’s it. The loquat story feels like there’s something there, but I couldn’t quite figure out what was going on. But after my close rereading of that arc, I think I’ve at least come to one coherent conclusion about it, even if it’s perhaps the most basic one: I think the loquats are an allegory for the greater themes of burden/desire in this arc. The following is my attempt to lay out my thoughts, but unfortunately I have never been known for my conciseness or my ability to organize my thoughts, so be forewarned. This will be rambly and include a few tangents/too much detail.

The story of the Miharu family is a story of a family that was once respected, had a relationship/contract with powerful ayakashi, and eventually fell into ruin, leaving behind their contracts. The ayakashi, the mihashira, still come to uphold their part of the agreement without fail, but the family is gone. So who comes in their place to maintain the contract? The Matobas, and in the present day, the current head of the Matoba clan is Matoba Seiji. In order to maintain this deal with a group of powerful youkai, which neither he nor his family actually made, Matoba has to come and perform the welcoming ritual to avoid incurring the wrath of the mihashira.

Matoba is a character marked by burden, I think. Though he is the head of the most powerful exorcist clan, and therefore one might expect that he can pretty much do what he wants, I don’t actually think he has much personal freedom. The only son of the main family, he was probably marked as the heir from birth (if not, he would have had to be once his sister left but I still need to read 120+ so I don’t know exactly what the deal with her is). The clan’s interests are his interests. He can’t do anything that might hurt the reputation of or endanger the clan, and he is obligated to do things that benefit the clan. Matoba is Matoba.

In chapter 25, in his debut arc, he tells Natsume 「使えるものは使わないと。人を守る為に、強い妖が欲しいと思っているだけですよ。その為には恨まれたり代償を払うことを気にしていたら、この家業はやっていけませんしね」

"One should make use of useful things. I just want ayakashi in order to protect people. If I was worried about being hated or suffering consequences, I could not carry on the family business,"

(this is actually one of those annoying instances of a Japanese sentence that’s more dense than would sound good in English. Matoba seems to be explaining his personal worldview/thoughts here with 思っている even though in English you’d never say “I just feel like/think I want strong ayakashi…” He’s explaining that this is the way he thinks, I think lol).

Matoba doesn’t get the privilege of having a good reputation among humans or ayakashi, since we learn in special chapter 17 that no good ayakashi will make deals with the Matobas because of their famous broken promise. Matoba Seiji not only inherits the burden of monthly eye-stealing visits, he also can’t make contracts with ayakashi and takes on all the distrust that’s built up over generations from both humans and ayakashi.

And now Matoba is taking on the debts of a dead branch family to avoid possibly endangering his own.

In the locked room, when Matoba is goading Natori into breaking them out, he says 「どうです？あなたには解くことができますか名取。無理ならばすべて私が片付けてさしあげましょうか？」

"Well, can you do it, Natori? If you can’t, shall I take care of everything for you?"

I’m unsure how much of this is Matoba teasing Natori (as he seems to like doing in the Homura arc) about how he’s not as powerful/skilled as Matoba, and how much is him simply making an offer because he’s Matoba and he’s The One Who Takes Care Of Everything. I think either way, there is at least a good amount of the latter going on here.

In special chapter 17, Matoba shows up at Natori’s house and helps him exorcise the ayakashi that’s been haunting him. After Natori wakes up, he tries to offer to help Matoba in some way. I think he felt uncomfortable being the only one being helped, and wanted to find something he could offer Matoba, even though Matoba seems to have everything he needs. Natori offers to listen to his problems, and Matoba smiles (of course) and says he’s fine. Even teenage Matoba is like “You’re not the one who helps me, I’m the one who helps you.” Though this chapter is from Natori’s perspective, so Natori believes Matoba was just using him to get an ayakashi, I’m not sure that’s true. I don’t know for sure what Matoba’s motives were, but I don’t believe teenage Natori is an unbiased observer of him lol.

Now that we’ve laid all that out, let’s talk briefly about the Miharus, a once respected family who made a deal with ayakashi they didn’t understand, and fell into ruin. According to the ayakashi who wants to sabotage the ritual, there was a member of the Miharu family called Masakiyo. Masakiyo was stern for the most part, but there was someone he loved. However, he couldn’t be with that person because he couldn’t make them shoulder the burdens of his family business, but neither could he simply abandon his family. He had to stay with his family and let this person go. This was the only time this ayakashi saw Masakiyo cry. Then we get this panel:

(pictured: bench of I Hate My Life, credit to @joelletwo for that lol)

In his despair, Masakiyo wished there was no Miharu family. The ayakashi, feeling indebted to Masakiyo for letting it go during an exorcism, overhears him and decides that destroying the Miharu family will bring Masakiyo happiness. This is an unintended contract between the two of them. Masakiyo unwittingly causes an ayakashi to spend years (decades?) trying in vain to destroy his family in order to repay a perceived debt. This isn’t Masakiyo’s fault, really, it was just an unfortunate misunderstanding. The ayakashi didn’t understand that Masakiyo wanted it to be free and live the life he couldn’t. “You were almost exorcised because of human circumstances. You were saved on the whim of a human. What debt? You are free. Go wherever you want. Live however you want.”

After all the mihashira business is wrapped up, Matoba thanks Natori for his help, Natori says he probably couldn’t have gotten out of the room without Matoba, and Matoba laughs and says “Then we’re even this time.” Neither one is indebted to the other this time…they’re even. Then Natori says The Line:

「何かを継ぎ背負っていく…その真の重みは私などにははかり知れません。でも今はこう思うようにもなりました。重いものもひとりでなければと…」

"I don’t know the true weight of shouldering a burden you’ve inherited, but now I’ve come to think that even heavy things can be carried if you’re not alone,"

(this is another one of the aforementioned Dense Japanese Sentences, and I really prefer the fan TL version of this line but I’m translating it this way to try to convey all the stuff he’s saying). Natori once again reaches out to Matoba, trying to offer him maybe the only thing he can: support, listening to his problems, shouldering his burdens. This time, though, we don’t get a Matoba Smile and “I’m fine,” we get this:

(pictured: Matoba on the bench of I Hate My Life, or “Matoba Cow Beach” as I refer to this image in my head)

What is Matoba thinking here? I really don’t know. If I draw the obvious parallel with Masakiyo, I guess he’s contemplating his two…selves, as it were. His duty to his family vs his personal desire for companionship. And I do think Matoba wants companionship. I read his behavior in special chapter 15 as genuinely wanting to be friends with Natori. I think he was excited that there was someone else his age who was relatively powerful, and who wasn’t concerned with all the Matoba stuff. Hence his insistence on Natori calling him Seiji. He wanted to be close to Natori.

And finally, we can come back to the loquats. Natsume hears Matoba mocking the mihashira for continuing to protect the Miharu house even after the family has all died out, and thinks perhaps Matoba is envious of ayakashi who go to such great lengths to keep promises.

"Matoba-san, who keeps breaking promises, and doesn’t have anyone to make new ones with."

Matoba wonders how the welcoming ritual will go next time, but decides he won’t worry since he probably won’t even be the head of the clan at that time. Natsume offers him a loquat, saying cheer up, and Matoba does his Thing, saying “How odd, do I look upset?” and then tells The Story.

When Matoba was a teenager, he really wanted to try the loquats from Yorishima’s yard. One day, he was there with Natori, and Yorishima gave them both one. The loquat was delicious and sweet; Matoba felt that his “desire had been fulfilled,” but Natori got a sour one, and Matoba felt like Yorishima-san had wanted to give a loquat to Natori, and only given one to Matoba because he was there, so he thought “Ah there’s no winning even in such a small thing as this.” Matoba gets what he wants, but it wasn’t meant for him, and the one it was meant for is worse off, so did he really win? He was the only one who got to enjoy the delicious loquat. These are the unintended consequences, the burdens if you will, of desire.

Natsume speculates that the agreement with the mihashira began when someone had the wish to protect the Miharu family, and there was an ayakashi who happened to be there, much like the situation with Masakiyo and the sabotaging ayakashi. A simple and innocent wish accidentally creates a generations-long burden that Matoba eventually has to shoulder.

I think Matoba must be painfully aware of his power and influence, and that even his smallest actions could cause unintended consequences. I wonder if he sees the Miharu family as a warning of what could happen to his own family if he slips up… And it wasn’t just a mistake on the part of the Miharus, but a failure of the Matoba clan head of that time, whose responsibility it was to look out for the branch families. Matoba Seiji is not just responsible for the success of his own family, but protecting the branch families, and of course non-exorcists as well. I imagine he feels like he doesn’t have the time or room to act on any of his own personal desires, and his little loquat anecdote is evidence of that, to me. It’s bittersweet (lol). And Natori’s takeaway, meanwhile, is more casual as you might expect. When Natsume asks him if he likes loquats, he says he’s not sure because his first one wasn’t very good. To Natori, a loquat is something he might try again and like. To Matoba, it’s a reminder of what he can and can’t have.

#natsume yuujinchou #matoba seiji #really sorry this is so long and i'm sure i could cut it down. i am bad at that.#i hope i ended up saying something though lol #i want to try to write more thoughts about other stuff #hopefully if i do it more I'll get better #my meta

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