#rabbitblogger

[bunnymedley]

oh salad is yummy actually #rabbitblogger

oki i bought some overpriced salads n stuff so im gonna convince myself im just being an authentic rabbit

[yamayuandadu]

What's the deal with ibaraki kasen? Is there any way you can summarize all her intricacies for someone who doesn't know anything about taoism or obscure religious history? (And what's with ibaraki douji....?)

I'll answer your questions in the opposite order, I hope that's alright. Ibaraki Douji arguably holds the title of the second most famous oni, thanks to being a part of the tale about the unquestionable #1, Shuten Douji. According to the most famous version, both of them resided in a fortress on Mt. Oe, engaging in assorted acts of villany (kidnappings, murder, cannibalism, the usual stuff), as one would expect from oni. The core narrative itself does not discuss Ibaraki in much detail in most versions, though in many this specific oni is the sole survivor of the extermination of evil undertaken by a band of heroic warriors. Ibaraki is also singled out as a particularly prominent underling of Shuten, different from the four underlings from which the Touhou concept of „four devas of the mountain” is derived. As the rest of the reply contains some WaHH etc. spoilers, I’ll put it under a read more.

However, various supplementary legends delve deeper into the history of Ibaraki. While they vary from each other, most of them mention that Watanabe no Tsuna, one of the participants of the oni extermination, cut off Ibaraki's arm – the circumstances of that aren't always clear, though it's usually assumed to be a separate event from the fight in the mountains itself, usually happening some time later. There are versions where it predates the battle, though, and Ibaraki and Watanabe no Tsuna are established enemies by then already. The overwhelming majority – if not all – such stories mention Ibaraki taking a female, human form to retrive the arm – usually the form of an elder relative of Watanabe's; this lead to the theory that Ibaraki was a female oni, but historical descriptions do not necessarily support this notion. Yokai.com is not wrong about most depictions of Ibaraki being technically female, but as far as I can tell most of them depict the human disguise and not the oni. Also, Sekien's “oni of Rashomon,” identified as Ibaraki, is male, for instance. This brings us to the last important core part of the legend of Ibaraki – the conflation with the oni of Rashomon, originally seemingly a different, unrelated entity. The oni of Rashomon is a character from a legend about the famous Heian era poet, wannabe geologist and court official Miyako no Yoshika. Supposedly, one of his poems was co-written by a supernatural entity inhabiting the Rashomon gate – later identified with Ibaraki, who is depicted as the inhabitant of Rashmon in some versions of the aforementioned arm loss tale. This is arguably the most unique and remarkable feature of this oni – rather than just an extension of Shuten Doji's legend, Ibaraki gains an identity of his own as not only a fearsome and vengeful monster, but also a conisseur of poetry.  The aforementioned poem was quoted by Kasen in the beginning of Wild and Horned Hermit. Kasen is introduced as a hermit (sennin/xianren), which at first glance doesn't match anything present in any Ibaraki stories. However, a sound argument can be made that it's an indirect derivative of the Miyako no Yoshika versions – while the creature he conversed with is not portrayed as hermit-like, Yoshika was famous in part due to his keen interest in hermits, and believed that they inhabit the peak of Mt. Fuji. The goal of such hermits was to obtain supernatural abilities via rigorous exercise and ascend in the hierarchy of beings, transcending the limitations of human body. The methods used for that vary between texts. Kasen pretty clearly denies her nature as an oni for most of the duration of the manga, which in theory goes against established oni folklore – in the very legend discussed above, Shuten Douji says that an oni never lies and never impersonates someone else (this specific aspect of his character is pretty prominent in Suika’s characterisation in Touhou too!). However, an argument can be made that this is simply taking the character of the irl Ibaraki to the logical extreme – an oni who hides as a human and presumably enjoys poetry as much, if not more, as slaughter is almost by definition denying the oni nature, like Kasen does by presenting herself as a hermit. Despite the taoist elements of her character, Kasen is, in the end, first and foremost just a sum of various elements which already existed in established oni folklore. As a final side note, it's worth mentioning that the concept of oni embracing religion is relatively widespread in folklore – the shugendo patriarch En no Gyoja had oni disciples according to some legends, and nenbutsu no oni (usually translated as “oni converted to buddhism” in english) is a common art motif.

[crimson-chains]

HI I SAW SOME ART OF NOVA AND I ALREADY LOVE HIM SO MUCH

EHEHEHE

HE IS VERY GOOD!!! I am happy you like the art of him, I love creating cool demons!

[purple-striped-aesthetics]

@rabbitblogger requested:

Tails doll pls? Sorry if you're swamped.

[pastelog]

Fall moodboord for Elliott @rabbitblogger

- Moon

[jasonjddean]

Rabbitkin board with gold/lonely/moon influences

@rabbitblogger