07x16 - Farewell, Reaper

[bunniefuu]

Asa: Yaemon...

Sign: The Reaper's Request: Please watch this program in a bright room and at a safe distance from your TV.

Asa: You will die with me here.

Asa: Yaemon!

Yae: Too slow.

Yae: My sword has long reached

Yae: your head.

Kag: Gin-chan!

Shin: Gin-san!

Gin: Asaemon!

Yae: Asaemon,

Yae: neither this man nor the previous head

Yae: deserved to be protected by you.

Yae: "Innocent"?

Yae: Shall I tell you what sin that criminal the previous head let escape committed?

Kag: Gin-chan!

Yae: He's a sinner who k*lled your biological father.

Yae: Will I take his head first,

Yae: or will you take mine first?

Yae: Shall we see who's quicker on the draw?

Yae: Or, perhaps, will you take his head yourself?

Yae: That way, you can avenge your real father.

Yae: Ten years ago, your father, a Joi rebel, was k*lled in the Joi w*r,

Yae: and thus orphaned, you were adopted by the previous head.

Yae: That is what you were told, yes?

Yae: But that is not the truth.

Yae: your father survived the w*r, just like this man.

Yae: But once the Hitotsubashi began wiping out the survivors after the w*r,

Yae: he tried to ensure his own safety

Yae: by betraying his former comrades

Yae: and leaking their, and even their families', whereabouts

Yae: to aid the Hitotsubashi with their purge.

Yae: But, once he'd served his purpose,

Yae: he was fated to be k*lled himself.

F: P-Please!

F: Spare my life!

F: I know!

F: You can have my daughter as proof of my loyalty!

F: After all, she's just a leech some whore gave birth to and abandoned before the w*r!

Gin: Greetings.

Gin: Who am I, you ask?

Gin: Indeed, I am this idiot's daughter.

Gin: I don't recall ever fighting you Hitotsubashi,

Gin: but you can have this scum's and my, the White Yaksha's, head.

Gin: In return,

Gin: don't go after the others anymore.

Gin: But the former Yaemon let him live

Gin: and took your father's head.

Gin: Perhaps it was out of guilt that he adopted you.

Gin: Either way, the previous head and this man

Gin: are people you were meant to exact revenge upon.

Gin: There's only one head that needs to be taken here.

Gin: You don't want to send innocent heads rolling, now do you?

Gin: Asaemon,

Gin: remove his head.

Kag: Asaemon...

Asa: Please tell me just one thing...

Yae: Would you be kind enough to make me human again

Yae: with your sword?

Asa: Did he always intend to die by my hand?

Gin: Beats me.

Gin: But I'm pretty sure he was glad it turned out that way.

Gin: Just like me.

Asa: Say,

Asa: why have you been locked up here?

Asa: Did you do something bad?

Gin: Yeah.

Gin: I've done loads of things that'd make you piss your pants,

Gin: so I gotta lose my head.

Asa: Really?

Gin: Yeah.

Gin: Get lost. You're annoying me, you damn pipsqueak.

Asa: But the executioner was saying you weren't really a bad guy.

Asa: That all you did was protect a poor little girl.

Asa: But now you... It's so sad.

Asa: Oh, I know!

Asa: One day, when I become a great executioner,

Asa: I'll take your head for you.

Gin: Seriously?

Asa: Yep!

Asa: I'll cut it nice and good so it doesn't hurt!

Asa: I'll send you to heaven in peace!

Asa: So promise me.

Asa: Until I become a great executioner,

Asa: you can't die, okay?

Gin: That so?

Gin: In peace, huh?

Gin: Sounds good.

Gin: Okay, I promise.

Gin: Send me off in peace, okay?

Asa: Sure.

Asa: I won't mess up this time.

Asa: Never again!

Yae: Asaemon,

Yae: please don't think badly of me.

Yae: The Soul Cleansing technique is almost instantaneous.

Yae: The only way to fend it off

Yae: is by having it point elsewhere

Yae: and attacking its blind spot immediately after it's been ex*cuted.

Yae: Did you really think you, a criminal's child, had any right to punish sins?

Shin: Gin-san!

Shin: Asaemon-san!

Asa: You're right.

Asa: The only way to overcome the Soul Cleansing technique

Asa: is by attacking its blind spot!

Asa: Like I said already,

Asa: never again will I let

Asa: the heads of the people who saved me

Asa: fall to the ground!

Asa: Wh-What is this?

Asa: Who could've done such a thing?

Yae: Father...

Yae: I finally did it. I pulled off the Soul Cleansing technique.

Yae: Now I'm sure to be the next Yaemon, aren't I?

Yae: It'll get there.

Yae: My sword will get there first.

Yae: I've had my eyes fixed on his sword from closer than anyone else.

Yae: I've longed for his sword more ardently than anyone else.

Yae: It won't cut a thing.

Yae: Your sword is not capable of severing the sins of humans.

Yae: And yet, my sword...

Yae: As of this day,

Yae: I appoint Asaemon my successor as the Ikeda family head.

Nbnb: If you remain a prisoner of antiquated customs

Nbnb: that let outstanding talent go to waste,

Nbnb: your family is bound to die out someday.

Nbnb: You should just eliminate both Yaemons.

Nbnb: The one who will join me in carving a path to a new era with that sword

Nbnb: will be you, th.

Yae: My sword will reach him!

Gin: It's not gonna reach

Gin: anyone anymore.

Yae: I see.

Yae: By that time, my sword

Yae: was already long broken, huh?

G: F-Fire!

G: sh**t those fiends!

Oki: We're done here.

Oki: Feel free to carry on transporting your corpses or whatever.

Shin: Okita-san!

Kag: You bastard!

G: Don't let them leave alive!

Hij: Let's go!

Hij: The Mayonnaise Line is over there!

Shin: Over where?!

Oki: Boss, you should hurry up and run—

Shin: Gin-san, hurry—

Asa: H-Hang in there!

G: Don't let them escape!

Asa: Y-Yaemon?!

Yae: Hurry up and go.

Yae: Now that you've dragged me off the stage,

Yae: who's going to protect the Ikeda family?

Asa: Yaemon, you...

Yae: Let's protect the Ikeda family

Yae: and the things our father left behind

Yae: together, from the light and the shadows.

Yae: I was willing to k*ll my father

Yae: in order to protect the family of bakufu executioners he built.

Yae: And you were willing to k*ll me

Yae: in order to uphold his executioner's spirit.

Yae: But his sword...

Yae: We both loved his sword.

Yae: That is all.

Yae: Now go,

Yae: Ikeda Yaemon.

Nbnb: Good grief.

Nbnb: I never thought you'd relinquish the name

Nbnb: you k*lled your father to get your hands on.

Nbnb: I thought we vowed to carve open the path to a new era together.

Nbnb: What am I supposed to call you now?

Yae: Patricide,

Yae: serial k*ller,

Yae: or the fool who sullied the Hitotsubashi name.

Yae: Pick whichever you like.

Nbnb: Is that so?

Nbnb: Then...

Nbnb: how about "just a head"?

Nbnb: Yes...

Nbnb: That went pretty well for a first time.

Nbnb: Looks like I could act as the new government's executioner myself.

G: Surely you jest.

Nbnb: I'm not kidding.

Nbnb: That said, what I must behead is this antiquated country.

Nbnb: I, Hitotsubashi Nobunobu,

Nbnb: am without doubt this country's executioner.

G: My lord, what about the others?

Nbnb: Leave them be.

Nbnb: I'll grant his last wish.

Nbnb: All responsibility lay with him,

Nbnb: and sunk into the ocean along with his head.

G: But my lord!

G: Shigeshige's lapdogs...

Nb: They won't be able to do anything.

Nb: And thanks to them,

Nb: we got to see something amusing, did we not?

Nb: Don't you agree,

Nb: Takasugi-kun?

Nb: It wasn't my intention to steal your prey.

Nb: I heard there was an unusual corpse and had it transported,

Nb: but as it turned out, it was still alive...

Nb: That demon.

Tak: You won't be able to take

Tak: his head or mine.

Nb: We may have been bitter enemies in the past,

Nb: but I hold no resentment toward you people.

Nb: In fact, I find you fascinating.

Nb: You hold great power that yields not even to the nation,

Nb: be it as allies or enemies.

Tak: So long as you're taking on the bakufu,

Tak: I'm sure I'll stand by your side again.

Tak: But the moment you give up on that,

Tak: the one coming for your head

Tak: could be him

Tak: or me.

Tak: You never know.

Asa: I see.

Asa: So Yaemon...

Hij: We haven't found his body,

Hij: but it'd be safe to assume he was taken out by the Hitotsubashi.

Asa: No.

Asa: I was the one who k*lled him.

Asa: It may have been to protect the family,

Asa: but I took the former Yaemon's head,

Asa: and even his son's life.

Asa: Surely I have no right to call myself an Ikeda anymore.

Hij: You executioners might be fated to let your heads roll

Hij: in order to defend the Yaemon name.

Asa: In that case,

Asa: then I'm still one head short.

Asa: The bakufu executioner,

Asa: Ikeda Asaemon,

Asa: shall carry out her final duty.

Oka: Prisoner No. MI- ,

Oka: come on out.

Oka: You guys, too.

Oka: Sorry to keep you waiting.

Oka: It's time for your execution.

Shin: Okita-san, what's the meaning of this?

Oki: Did you think you'd get off scot-free after what you did?

Oki: Either you guys

Oki: or Asaemon?

Oki: It's proving difficult to build a prosecutable case on all this.

Oki: Firstly, the fact that the serial k*ller victims

Oki: were all criminals who were supposed to be beheaded is complicating matters.

Oki: It's become a question of whether it's even a punishable offense.

Oki: But most of all, the m*rder*r in question,

Oki: Ikeda Yaemon, has gone missing since then.

Oki: And while it's clear that

Oki: the Hitotsubashi were behind everything, including his involvement and disappearance,

Oki: we can't book them for it,

Oki: 'cause they haven't outwardly dirtied their own hands at all.

Oki: If we try to do it anyway,

Oki: they might end up bringing the hammer down on us.

Oki: So in order to resolve this hopeless situation once and for all,

Oki: we gotta have you guys take all the blame and die.

Shin: Why?!

Oki: To close the book on a scandal, you need a scapegoat.

Shin: We're more like sacrificial lambs here!

Oki: Your deaths won't be pointless.

Oki: This will put the issue of our spat with the Hitotsubashi to rest,

Oki: and I'll escape a pay cut—

Kag: That's pretty much pointless!

Kag: We're not toilet paper for you bastards to wipe your asses with!

Oki: Besides, if you and Asaemon all die,

Oki: surely the bakufu will refrain from wiping out the entire Ikeda family.

Gin: Hey. What's that supposed to mean?

Oki: Oh, you didn't know?

Oki: Apparently Asaemon took responsibility for this entire uproar

Oki: by committing su1c1de.

Oki: By offering the two Yaemons' heads and her own up as sacrifice,

Oki: she protected the family.

Oki: How far she's come, considering she couldn't even k*ll herself a few days ago.

Gin: Why...

Gin: Why didn't you stop her?!

Oki: Stop her?

Oki: Wake up and listen to yourself, would you?

Oki: Even when you first met her,

Oki: didn't she want to sever her head

Oki: along with the sins she'd committed?

Oki: And you chopped it off for her

Oki: with your pale executioner's sword.

Oki: You're the one who k*lled her, Boss.

Hij: Now, if we just take your heads, everything will be settled.

Hij: In the past, bakufu executioner Ikeda Yaemon let a certain criminal escape.

Hij: So taking that criminal's head

Hij: to make amends for it all

Hij: is bakufu executioner

Hij: Ikeda Yaemon's duty, too.

Shin: Asaemon-san...

Asa: ...is gone.

Asa: The Reaper no longer exists.

Asa: Didn't you help her commit su1c1de yourself?

Asa: Your sword reached her.

Asa: It was a pure swing that cleansed her soul without

Asa: letting her head fall to the ground.

Asa: You three are my precious executioners

Asa: who helped me remember the most important thing

Asa: and made me human again.

Asa: I shall waver no longer.

Asa: The woman before you is not a demon consumed by her sins,

Asa: nor a Reaper afraid to punish sins,

Asa: but a bakufu executioner,

Asa: the th Ikeda Yaemon.

Gin: You...

Oki: So, yeah.

Oki: We'll write Ikeda Asaemon off as having committed su1c1de.

Hij: We leave the rest to you, th.

Hij: Yaemon's sword needs no observers.

Hij: Should we ever run into some morons with heads still on their shoulders...

Oki: We can just consider them corpses with

Oki: their heads attached by one tiny bit of flesh, right?

Asa: Yes.

Asa: Yaemon's sword does not make mistakes.

Asa: There's no longer

Asa: a single criminal here

Asa: who must be punished.

Yae: When people sin and degenerate into demons,

Yae: the only beings capable of turning them human again

Yae: are humans.

Yae: That's why I have no right to cut you.

Yae: A demon has no right to cut a fellow demon.

Yae: You promised, did you not?

Asa: One day, when I become a great executioner,

Asa: I'll take your head for you.

Asa: So promise me.

Asa: Until I become a great executioner,

Asa: you can't die, okay?

Gin: Pops...

Gin: Think I've become a somewhat better person now?

Gin: Wait...

Gin: She took my damn nipple again!

: Farewell, Reaper

Title: A Phoenix Rises from the Ashes Over and Over

Mad: Next Episode: "A Phoenix Rises from the Ashes Over and Over."

text r: The next episode is a summer vacation special,

text l: where we'll run the traditional summer scary story.

text r: Make sure not to

text l: watch it alone...