literature

Warp of the Feathered Robe

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Literature Text

Leitmotif: "Low of Solipsism" — Death Note Soundtrack

-:-

Kaguya Ōtsutsuki was a goddess. That was the indisputable truth. Had she not eaten the fruit of the God Tree for which she and her clan had waited for millennia? Had she not ascended to godhood and used her newfound power to quell the wars and silence any dissent?

How, then, could her raiment not fit her? Hagoromo, who had been woven of the holy threads of herself and Harafu*, the Ten-Headed and Ten–Tailed Beast of Mount Hōrai’s† God Tree, was to be like his namesake and be her legacy, draping over the world and snuffing out the evils of these pathetic moths.

But no. He had succumbed to their dust, showed them kindness and mercy. He even shared his God-given gift with them! She had tried, of course, tried to reopen his eyes to the mortals’ true nature, but to no avail.

“How can you tarnish yourself by walking among these moths? How can you tatter your divine gifts sharing them with beasts such as these? Forget you how below us they are in everything?! They’re nothing but brutes that stain the world with each other’s blood and breed like the vermin that they are!”

“Well, then, why don’t you
teach them how to better themselves instead of lording it over them?!”

Oh, how close she was to tearing out her horns…

How dare he deviate from her designs! How dare he! Raiment, celestial or not, did not form an opinion of its own, did not have an existence separate from its wearer! Without its wearer, it was merely a heap of fabric. Purposeless. Extraneous.

Nothing.

Nothing. That was what Hagoromo had been before she wove him on her loom…and that was what he would be when next they met. She wove him into being, and she could unweave him just as easily. He wasn’t irreplaceable; she and Harafu had intertwined once again, weaving Uimaru‡—a perfect, more fitting raiment.

And so, Princess Kaguya Ōtsutsuki, the Demon of Mount Hōrai euphemistically worshipped as the Rabbit Goddess, spirited away Uimaru, assembled her Five Fantastic Items§—the Stone Begging Bowl of the Buddha; the Jeweled Branch of the God Tree; the Dragon’s Pearl; the Robe of the Fire-Rat; the Swallow’s Cowrie—turned her steely gaze to the endless sea…

…and waited.
Thread | Weft

So.

When I learned about Kaguya Ōtsutsuki, I found myself admittedly fascinated with her backstory: eating the Forbidden (Chakra) Fruit, putting wars to a halt, unwittingly unleashing the Olympus Mon into the world, bringing the first Shinobi God into being; things like this make the mythology buff in me squee! Other than that, we don't know much about her, especially not about her personality, but I am led to believe that canonically, she just sat by quietly while her son traveled the world spreading the word of what was originally her ability.

But here's the thing: as my friend :iconizzymarrie: and I have discussed, gaining that kind of power would go to most people's heads, and I imagine that would be even more so if you were born into nobility as Kaguya was. And you know what they say about power and how it corrupts...

So, this. My pilot version of Kaguya. A misanthrope with a god(dess) complex. And the original Mommie Dearest. :iconkiralaughplz:

Kaguya's voice actor: Terri Brosius (SHODAN from the System Shock games [robotics not included!]) Who better than one of gaming's most famous god complexes? :D

Obligatory nerdy trivia:

*Harafu: The Japanese transliteration of prabhu, Sanskrit for "Surpassing", "Powerful", a title of various Hindu deities OR of prabhū, Sanskrit for "Origin(al/ate)". This is the name for the Ten-Headed and Ten-Tailed Kodama, the antecedent of the Headed and Tailed Beasts.

Also befitting the predecessor of the many and sundry Chakra Beasts, Harafu has elements of the Hakutaku. Originally called the bai ze in Chinese mythology, the hakutaku is most famous for telling the Yellow Emperor of the 11,520 forms of spirits in existence and how to subdue and harness them, all of which the Emperor had his subordinates record in a bestiary. With such an illustrious and knowledgeable mythos surrounding it, what better origin of such Olympus Mon?

Harafu also has elements of the Qilin, a creature foreshadowing the birth of a great leader, befitting his paternity of the God of Shinobi. Considering the misanthropy and narcissism of the Rabbit Goddess, a Kodama God is the better choice to help her weave holy cloth than a "pathetic moth". 

The Manticore is also part of the Kodama's makeup. The term "Kodama", in addition to "tree spirit", also means "echo". And what better to cause echoes than the trumpeting voice of the manticore?

Mount Hōrai as the God Tree's place of origin: In the folkloric story of Princess KaguyaThe Tale of the Bamboo Cutter—the princess sends her suitors to gather five impossible items. One of them is the Jeweled Branch of Mount Hōrai—the Japanization of the Chinese Penglaian immortal fairyland. Since the canonical (anime) location of the God Tree was the Land of Ancestors, I thought what if that was simply a name given in posterity to a land befitting a divine tree?

Uimaru: Recently, it has come to light that the God of Shinobi had a brother. Considering that here, Kaguya sees Hagoromo merely as a mantle of her legacy, one can be certain that she would've "woven" a second feathered robe as backup should the first became "stained". Thus, Uimaru, from "ui"the alternate pronunciation of the kanji for "hagoromo" [羽衣]and "maru" [丸], the boy name suffix meaning "perfect".

And yes, it is true that in a certain depiction, his name was Hamura—presumably alluding to the city in Tokyo—but in a context where a little brother was woven to be the superlative of his elder, it is more fitting that their names be nigh-identical. So "Uimaru" he will stay in this depiction. Of course, there may be an opportunity for this name to come up again...

§The Five Fantastic Items: In a certain context, the Celestial Maiden's Feathered Robe had his five Treasured Tools. Is it not fitting, then, that the Celestial Maiden herself have items based on objects actually pertaining to her namesake, as aforementioned above?

Edit: Changed the title. Looked up some weaving terms and discovered that a warp is a weaving term for the set of longitudinal threads in a loom.

Kaguya, Hagoromo, and [Second Son] Ōtsutsuki, the Shinju/God Tree, Land of Ancestors © Masashi Kishimoto
Harafu, Mount Hōrai = proto-Land of Ancestors, Kaguya's Five Fantastic Items, Uimaru (name) © me
© 2014 - 2024 UberChimerism
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PoodleJockey's avatar

Ooh, gives me goosebumps with this intro of Kaguya's backstory, goddess complex, and disapprovement of Hagoromo's compassionate dealing with the flawed humans.


Also thanks for linking The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter . I had no idea you were well versed in mythology. Have you studied this topic in depth?