Noragami Aragoto Episode 5

 
The truth is finally out, and Bishamon has a moment to finally grieve properly. Bishamon was drawing a very thin line for her chances of survival when Yato deemed she reached the point of no return. It was Kazuma who ultimately saved her from being slashed down by Yato and successfully snapping her out of it by taking the hit himself. The so-called medicine Kugaha had created for her and Aiha only worked for a matter of time, and Kugaha deliberately set it up so that once he would no longer apply further prescriptions, the blight would spiral out of control. It had almost fully consumed Aiha, who somehow managed to reach Kuraha and then freed Kazuma and Hiyori from the cell. But for Bishamon on the other hand, it was an entirely different story. With Aiha’s blight spreading like rapid-fire, it struck Bishamon like a lightning bolt. To make matters worse, Bishamon was already so consumed by her rage and desire for revenge, she lost herself and gone mad like a wild beast. She couldn’t hear or she had chosen to ignore the cries of her equipped Regalias, all suffering from the blight shock cast upon their master. Her fall into the depth of despair only grew deeper as Kugaha began his massacre, killing off the regalia who have fallen victims to the Phantom he had brought inside.
I approached the massacred scenes very cautiously after seeing how gruesome Suzuha’s death was delivered. BONES however made the decision to tone it down a notch, and when I think back at the comparison of the way the manga had portrayed it, I believe BONES could have still made the tone of the massacred a tad darker without it being as bloody as Suzuha’s execution. They did include the sound effects of the phantom eating the fallen regalia, but other than that, with a neon green phantom that doesn’t look as nearly as threatening as the one in the manga. The way I see it, they decided to make it so it wasn’t too overwhelming to watch for more sensitive viewers like myself (I still covered my eyes though, I am so cautious about these things).
It was more or less confirmed that Kugaha in fact has a different name. He doesn’t consider Bishamon as his master because he hates who she is as oppose who she is described to have been. He prefers the version of Bishamon who stays true to her title, the God of War, not the “wannabe mother” who is so soft and kindhearted to take in countless of regalia and makes it so she has an enormous family. This is why not only he wanted to have her killed off to be reborn, but to also kill her children in the process. It is unfortunate that he did succeed, because many innocent regalia had died today by his hand. Kugaha however made two miscalculations. The first is with Aiha. She may have been jealousy of Tsuguha, but she drew the line she should not cross. Since she already had, she took it upon herself to do whatever she could to make things right. She informed Kuraha of the situation and then freed Kazuma and Hiyori, explaining the situation and revealing her crime. The second was Yukine and Hiyori. The two of them were important for different reasons because Yato was focused on trying to fend for himself and determine if Bishamon even had the chance to survive this ordeal. After jumping in front of Yato to block Bishamon’s death blow, Yukine proved to have been loyal and sincere  enough to have the ability to evolve into a blessed regalia. Being split into two, Yukine has now taken form as a dual blade. Evolving into this rare form does not only change the shape, but it enhances their abilities and strength as well. The only other blessed regalia we know of is Kazuma. So it taken Bishamon by storm to see Yato of all people have a blessed regalia.
Hiyori’s importance is to fill the gap Yukine couldn’t quite fill himself: Keeping Yato in-check.
Yato’s dream is to become a good God, to be know and thanked for doing good things- not the God of Calamity where he will unleash chaos and despair. But his old habits are hard to break. Nora still has a tight grasp on him, and it is because of that her words continue to echo in the back of his head. It was her words that had him almost kill Bishamon, but it was Hiyori who snapped him out of it and drew him back. Hiyori is not just someone who Yato cherishes for being remembered by, she is is his rock. But it isn’t just her alone of course, she and Yukine both keep him grounded. They are the ones who are helping Yato become the God he wants to be, overcome his past sins and reputation and build anew. Now days, in order to control Yato, you need him to be isolated from both Yukine and Hiyori, and this incident will prove a valuable lesson to those who want to control Yato.
At the end of the day, the question now lies whether or not Bishamon will have truly learned anything from this experience. Now that she knows of the truth and will no longer blame Yato for being the sole blame, how she will recover from this loss and experience will be an interesting one. In the past she had claimed she would never create a mass family again due to the pain she had to go through- and yet she ended up doing so and is almost experiencing the same tragedy all over again. But the biggest take away here is the stark comparison of how Yato and Yukine handle their problems compared to Bishamon. All these years, Bishamon kept her problems to herself, and so did her regalia. But because Yato and Yukine are always complaining about their problems out loud, they aren’t shouldering it on their own. Bishamon will hopefully learn from this and be more open to her regalia about her feels and hopefully, they too can do that in return.

A/N: I just realized this week I have been spelling and using the wrong the name entire time for Kugaha. I have been using Kureha when it’s supposed to be Kugaha. And on other hand, Kuraha is the lion guy- don’t hate him, he’s the good guy. I went back to my previous Noragami Aragoto entries and made the correction for every single one of them.