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Chinese scanlations.
English translations.
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Best color page of Nirai Kanai hen or best color page of Nirai Kanai hen? I love the composition and the colors here.
Fye looks really nice with his hair loose. I already hear all of your heartbeats. Why doesn’t Fye look nice?
So despite the big mess Syaoran caused using the “cursed” bunny rabbit keychain, he was still able to restore half of the souls from the other Nirai Kanai thanks to his strong wish.
It’s nice to see that the fourth item that Watanuki collected was used, it kind of gives a full cycle feeling to it, although the cage was returned because it’s a “special” cage. And it really is, it looks like the “shiritori” cage, the cage with the CLOVER birds that can be only be seen in the moonlight, the cage that came from the suspicious shop with suspicious bat-winged decoration that looks like Fei Wang’s. Of course, it might be just a similar cage since it was given by the old lady from XXXHOLiC Rei #3 in Watanuki’s dream… I don’t know, I’m confused. But that reminds me that we still haven’t learned what is up with that suspicious looking shop.
I wonder if the cage will play more roles in the future…
Judging by Watanuki and Syaoran’s conversation, it looks like Syaoran will keep looking for the clone? Isn’t he learning anything from Watanuki? Those kids, seriously! xD Will this be the thing CLAMP will cling on to to keep drawing XXXHOLiC and Tsubasa? Use that egg already Doumeki and shed some light in those two’s heads…
Fuuma arriving in the end is the randomest thing ever and yet not? CLAMP have been hinting about this for at least two title pages. It’s so funny when he jokes that he almost didn’t have time to hang out in a resort (what a big fat LIAR!). Fuuma’s not-so-random arrival is CLAMP saying “hang in there, there’s more to come”. Well played, CLAMP, well played.
So this was Nirai Kanai hen. It looked more like a new arc of “RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE” than a stand-alone work. I don’t know what CLAMP are doing here with creating these new arcs and then restarting the volumes all back again from volume 1. Are we ending up having a bunch of “WoRLD CHRoNiCLE” volume 1s? What’s the point? This can be excused if there is going to be big gaps between each arc, but if they are planning on starting a new arc in 2016 still, it’s just very pointless doing all this “final chapter!!” fuss and then “new arc!!!” and then “final chapter!!” again.
That is why I am hoping that it’s gonna take them another few years to work on a new “WoRLD CHRoNiCLE” arc, so that they can work again on some of their unfinished projects (which they have plenty to pick from) and then work on Tsubasa again, from time to time.
But right now, XXXHOLiC Rei is still going, we’ll see how that goes. Is volume 4 going to be the final one? I certainly hope that it won’t take as many breaks now that Nirai Kanai hen is over.
54 thoughts on “Tsubasa – WoRLD CHRoNiCLE – Nirai Kanai hen – Chapitre 19 (Updated)”
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Chibi Yuuto's CHRoNiCLEs 
It does look like there will be a continuation after this. It also looks like Watanuki plans on taking a more proactive role in granting his wish than he did in the original xxxHolic series – which to me suggests Syaoran’s journey has the side-effect of changing the future we saw of Watanuki in the original ending.
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CLAMP is leaving the door wide open for a continuation, indeed. I’m curious to learn about Watanuki and Syaoran’s conversation.
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ahhh it seems like a nice chapter. the gang is back together again. and it seems to be an open end? to be continued soon hopefully?? and not wait another 5 years. will we be alive to see it finish i wonder? ^^
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Yes, CLAMP left the ending wide open for a continuation ^^ Please don’t hate me but I wouldn’t mind seeing a continuation in another 5 (or more) years.
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I can’t hate you for saying that since there is so many works unfinished. May CLAMP leave Tsubasa rest for a long time and (we all hope) Drug & Drop and GATE7 continues. Just when GATE7 got really good, was put on hiatus T.T
have we lost our hopes on X? what do you say, Yuuto-san?
KAMI
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I haven’t lost hope for X. The day that I lose my hope for X is the day that I lose my hope for CLAMP as a whole and this website will be closed. I strongly believe that they will finish it. When? I don’t know but it will be finished.
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you wanna make me cry or something? Gee, you’re a great Fan, just like me. The day CLAMP finish their activities as a Team, I think it will be the saddest day ever. A big hug for you Yuuto. As always, entering at your website it is such a pleasure! =)
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Glad to know there are long-time supporters like you still around =)
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I’m glad Syaoran will tell them about what happened.
One thing I’m not sure about when reading this, though, is Syaoran and Watanuki conversation about Yuuko part. Watanuki mentioned that when in the dream searching for those stuff for the princess, the Yuuko he saw was not Yuuko. At first I thought it’s not the same as what he said in the recent ch. of xxxHOLiC Rei (he told Doumeki “she was definitely Yuuko”). Then I’m thinking both are different: the one in recent ch. of xxxHOLiC Rei was just him becoming unconscious after seeing both Syaorans about to fight each other, and the dream when searching for Syaoran was different time… I’m not so sure, though.
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Sorry, correction.
> I’m glad Syaoran will tell them about what happened.
I’m glad Syaoran will tell them about what happened (so the rest of them don’t feel left out).
> Then I’m thinking both are different
Then I’m thinking both probably happen differently
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Yes, the Yuuko wearing the butterfly kimono is the one we know. The Yuuko from XXXHOLiC Rei is the “dream version” that is different from the Yuuko we know 😉
I think it’s easier if you consider the kimono xD
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> The Yuuko from XXXHOLiC Rei is the “dream version” that is different from the Yuuko we know
Wait… then that’s even more “not match up”. I thought Watanuki told Doumeki after the dream after being unconscious “is definitely Yuuko”.
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Because the Yuuko he saw in the dream was the butterfly kimono Yuuko, the Yuuko we all love.
That Yuuko from the first 3 volumes of “Rei” is a different Yuuko.
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Ah, I see.
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“Please don’t hate me but I wouldn’t mind seeing a continuation in another 5 (or more) years.”
haha! no way! to be honest i didnt like this arc at all, i only liked the last 3 chapters. and trc confused the hell out of me. its only by re-reading it for the 3rd time last year im understanding it… (and thanks to your website too!) i love all the characters though, and the potential it has with the loose ends, and there are a few extra characters i wanna see more of like seishiro, kujaku, vampire twins and clow reed. by the way who else thinks watanuki is a younger clow reed. i only came to this theory the other day. with all the messing around with time loops it is so possible.
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by the way who else thinks watanuki is a younger clow reed. i only came to this theory the other day. with all the messing around with time loops it is so possible.
Sorry to butt in, but I’ve read that theory a few times, and to be honest I have no idea how it could be possible? Both within the narrative and outside of it (as in, “How in the world could Nanase Ohkawa think this is good writing?”). I’m so sick of it, in fact, that I’m going to waste the next 15 minutes explaining to you why it’s silly. Let’s take a look at the story so far:
1) Watanuki can’t leave the shop, so he can’t travel through time. He also can’t get older, but even if he could, there’s no way a guy who’s physically 17 – 18 years old could bulk up enough to be as large as Clow Reed as a fully-grown adult. (CCS concept art says Clow was about 190 cm tall, or 6’2″ – 6’3″, and he was head and shoulders above Yuuko. Watanuki’s about as tall as she is.)
2) BTW, the two Sakuras repaired the universe at the end of TRC, so Watanuki can’t take advantage of holes in space-time, either.
3) At the end of xxxHOLiC Rou, Watanuki finally manages to catch up to Yuuko in a dream after using Clow’s magic circle. TRC!Syaoran, Xing Huo, CCS!Sakura, Yue, and just about anyone with some kind of magical relation to Clow can use that circle. It took Watanuki a hundred years to be able to use it, and Yuuko’s ghost/dream image still overpowered his magic, so how can he ever become the strongest magician in the world?
4) Other than Yuuko, Watanuki and Clow’s personal stories share nothing in common. Nothing about Watanuki’s background (his troubles with spirits, his relationships with Doumeki and Himawari, etc.) sheds light on Clow’s character, and nothing about Clow’s life and death (the creation of a new form of magic, the birth of Kero/Yue/the Clow Cards) serves as a satisfying or even logical conclusion to Watanuki’s narrative. Unless you assume Yuuko is the most important aspect of both of their stories, the two characters are non-sequiturs to each other.
5) Clow has a clearly established origin: we know that his father was English while his mother was a Chinese woman of the Li family, and he was born hundreds of years prior to the events of CCS. Watanuki has a clearly established origin, too: he was created to fill in the void left in space-time by Tsubasa, so he effectively is Tsubasa. His father is Chinese, and his mother is Japanese. How are these two backgrounds reconcilable?
6) The only character who ever commented on Watanuki’s physical resemblance to Clow was Fei Wang Reed, whose observations about other people always turned out wrong. Note that Yuuko had zero comment or reaction when FWR said that Watanuki looked like a young Clow.
7) The glasses Watanuki finds in Yuuko’s shop can’t be Clow’s actual glasses, since Clow still had his glasses on in Clow Country and at the time of his “death” in his house. Also, Watanuki’s glasses have arms, while Clow wore pince-nez.
8) Finally: Watanuki’s entire narrative arc in xxxHOLiC revolves around him becoming his own person, not just an echo of Tsubasa. What kind of message would it send if, after 22+ volumes and over ten years of serialization, Watanuki was revealed to be…the prequel for a minor character from another comic series?
You know what I personally think CLAMP is getting at with the relationship between Clow and Watanuki? It hit met when I saw the recap page from the first volume of TWC. Watanuki and Yuuko are pictured right next to each other, and the resemblance between the two was so striking that, if you stuck lipstick, a wig, and a pair of cantaloupes on Watanuki, they’d look like twins. It honestly seems like Watanuki is supposed to be a representation of what Yuuko and Clow’s child would have been. It explains so much more about the story: why both Clow and Yuuko’s magic circles were in the eyeglasses box for Watanuki, why Clow had a hand in making Watanuki look the way he did, why Yuuko was so invested in Watanuki’s survival, etc. Yuuko’s humorous jabs at Clow in the first two volumes of the series are funnier and more poignant in hindsight if Clow is Watanuki’s “father” than if he’s actually Watanuki himself. Heck, even as early as the third volume, Yuuko remarks that both she and Clow knew that Watanuki was going to turn out to be a good kid, which suggests that the two of them planned for his future together.
In the end, what this really reminds me of is when Ohkawa tried to pull a fast one on the readership by implying that Tsubasa’s parents were the CCS! versions of Sakura and Syaoran. If you thought about it critically, it didn’t make any sense. But the plot had become so convoluted by that time, most fans assumed that it was just another wacky plot twist, LOL, so the actual truth behind Tsubasa’s parents — which did make sense — was a major revelation. It’s basically the same thing here: throw out enough hints about Clow and Watanuki’s resemblance to each other that the fans assume Watanuki is a younger version of Clow (which makes no sense), then get them in the heart by revealing that Clow and Yuuko are Watanuki’s real parents (which does make sense!).
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I’m with you for the ‘Watanuki and Clow Reed are different people’: CLAMP made it quite clear that Watanuki and Syaoran were the ‘same person’ + Yuuko and CR knew each other in the past (and as you said, the time/space is not messed up anymore, so we can’t use the argument that he will eventually end up centuries in the past…) + CR’s origins are indeed quite established, hi mother’s family are still here (the Li), no info about the english side but not relevant in the story, and he clearly became the King of Clow one way or another at some point of his long life, before dividing his soul in 2…
About Watanuki’s appearance, it was clearly said in the manga that both his face and name were fake, fabricated by Sakura and Syaoran.
BUT! The “Watanuki is Yuuko’s and Clow’s child” doesn’t really convince me to be sincere…
Their relationship started as master-slave, than teacher-student, than something close to a mix of friendship and, as you said, even as family; but by the end, even while not clearly saying “I love you” (which CLAMP’s characters close to never do, ever! Unless it’s the last 5 pages of the series ^^;), his feelings toward her seem to lean toward something romantic in my eyes, she is his ‘important person’, someone he will wait for forever inside that store even while knowing the probability of her returning is close to null…
As for ” Watanuki is a good kid, didn’t we both think that? Clow…”, I also didn’t interpret it the same way as you do: what I understood from that, if that both she and Clow foresaw the events that were happening and will happen even further in the future, like they did for so many other things in CCS, TRC and Holic worlds, and prepared everything in advance for these events.
Furthermore, repeatedly, Yuuko talked about SxS as Watanuki’s parents as much as they are Syaoran’s, and there was the whole thing about the fortune teller telling him that his parents has safely crossed to the other side, but more than a 100 chapters later, she went back on her words and said she was wrong about it, which Yuuko confirmed saying SxS were in another world and waiting to be reunited again, once day, with their children.
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Talking theory with Cutesherry, yesss!
His feelings toward her seem to lean toward something romantic in my eyes, she is his ‘important person’, someone he will wait for forever inside that store even while knowing the probability of her returning is close to null…
Yuuko is definitely Watanuki’s “most important person,” but I think it would be an interesting twist if it turned out be that his most valuable relationship was with a parental figure instead of a lover! CLAMP has done the “I’ll wait forever for you” trope several times over their career, from RG Veda to Shirahime-sho to Cardcaptor Sakura to Wish, and each time it’s centered on a romantic relationship. Watanuki’s unusual in that the one kind of connection he seems to have craved the most over the series is to his parents. He not only asks after their departed spirits, but he risks his life in order to reach out to a mother figure (the story arc with the ghost woman in Vol. 6), and he cries out in anguish when he finally sees Sakura and Syaoran in a dream, even though he doesn’t remember their names or their faces. They’re very important to him, and it’s clear that he has an emotional void in his life. Having Watanuki’s most important person be his “mother” and not his love interest would actually make sense in this case. (It fits in with his expressions of grief following her death, too — he wraps himself up in her clothing and tries to fill her shoes as much as possible, because he’s afraid that he’s going to forget about her. Your mileage may vary, but to me that comes across more like a child grieving for his mother than a man grieving for his wife.)
Furthermore, repeatedly, Yuuko talked about SxS as Watanuki’s parents as much as they are Syaoran’s, and there was the whole thing about the fortune teller telling him that his parents has safely crossed to the other side, but more than a 100 chapters later, she went back on her words and said she was wrong about it, which Yuuko confirmed saying SxS were in another world and waiting to be reunited again, once day, with their children.
Sakura and Syaoran really are Watanuki’s parents, and they clearly want to be reunited with him along with Tsubasa. But Watanuki’s relationship with them is complicated, because we don’t know how much he remembers them (and how many of those memories come from experiences Tsubasa had, not Watanuki himself). I think of it like this: when Tsubasa left a gap in space-time, Yuuko and Clow took advantage of the fact that the child who would have to fill in the gap would need a different face and the potential for a different identity, and so substituted the image of their own child. The kid looks like Yuuko and Clow’s child, but due to taking Tsubasa’s place in the world, Sakura and Syaoran are his parents. There are a few reasons why Yuuko and Clow would do that — maybe Watanuki’s an expression of what could have been, maybe he was once their actual child who died young, maybe Yuuko died in childbirth. (For what it’s worth, one of the most emotionally powerful moments for Watanuki in Rou is when he protects the soul of an unborn child.) By giving him up to Sakura and Syaoran, Yuuko gave him a chance at life, and — much later — a chance at reuniting with his parents and having a loving family long after both she and Clow had passed on.
Anyway, that’s all just a guess on my part. I think it’s a good explanation for why Watanuki has emphasized physical and spiritual connections to both Clow and Yuuko.
(Of course, in a absolute worst-case scenario, Nanase Ohkawa could go in both directions and have Yuuko simultaneously be Watanuki’s mother figure and his romantic interest. щ(ಥДಥщ) She did say that the end of Rou was meant to have the readers think about what makes them happy, and xxxHOLiC has consistently featured themes questioning the limits of social judgement, so, uh…)
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Talking theory with Cutesherry, yesss!
My feelings exactly 😀
It is actually quite complicated to talk about xxxholic series: it has been on-going, and being serializes on and off, since 2003, that’s a long time! So unless we have the will to continuously refresh our memories, remembering it all is hard, especially since the themes of the series themselves are not simple, too many things are shrouded in mystery, left unsaid or incomplete for volumes before it’s resolved and explained, plus the events which are crossover with Tsubasa’s universe…
I was actually going to start addressing point by point the things you posted, but then I realized one important thing: the way the both of us see Watanuki is different: from your post, you seem to be thinking that Watanuki had another identity before being converted later on to “another Syaoran” because of the irregularities in Logic/Time/Space, and said identity could be Clow’s and Yuuko’s child.
But my personal understanding of his existence from what I read in the manga, is that he exists to begin with in order to fill the gap left by Syaoran after he was imprisoned by Fei-Wang Reed as payment for turning back Time in order to save princess Sakura’s life. He then became SxS son and filled all of the relationships Syaoran would have made if he had stayed and lived in his own world. And I believe this is confirmed by what happened afterwards: when Space/Time/Logic were reverted back to their normal states, he didn’t “turn back” to being whoever it is he was (your theory: Yuuko’s child), but became an irregular existence that should not be here, and had to pay a price to keep on living, by staying inside the store for a century while waiting for Yuuko’s return.
About Watanuki’s memories of his past and his parents: before xxxholic story started, he gave them away as payment to Yuuko as a price to find Fei-Wang and help Syaoran. So his “first time” in the store was actually his 2d time there, and Yuuko, obviously, already knew him not only because she foresaw it, but because she actually met him in person and listened to his wish.
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The way the both of us see Watanuki is different: from your post, you seem to be thinking that Watanuki had another identity before being converted later on to “another Syaoran” because of the irregularities in Logic/Time/Space, and said identity could be Clow’s and Yuuko’s child.
Sort of, yeah. I don’t think Watanuki physically existed prior to being put into Tsubasa’s place, but that the spiritual concept for the boy who would become Kimihiro Watanuki did. Sakura and Syaoran didn’t insist on him having a different name and a different face just to keep him safe from FWR, but to give him a chance at existing on his own once space-time was repaired. It was an affirmation of the fact that, despite being made to adopt the identity of another person, Watanuki was valuable to his parents and wasn’t be thrown away after he had fulfilled the purpose for his creation. He ends up becoming an aberration in space-time due to the circumstances of his creation, but he’s still his own person. If anything, that makes his existence even more bizarre — he’s Kimihiro Watanuki squeezed into the space that ought to be Tsubasa Li’s.
RE: Watanuki’s memories: What I’m unsure about is whether or not Watanuki had any interactions with Sakura and Syaoran on his own. Watanuki is retconned into Tsubasa’s timeline when he’s about seven years old, and Tsubasa’s life prior to that is rewritten with Watanuki in his place, right? But since Sakura and Syaoran sealed themselves away, Watanuki is orphaned as soon as he’s written into the world. So wouldn’t the memories Watanuki gave away of his parents be the same as what Tsubasa remembers of his parents, since all of his experiences with them were drawn from Tsubasa’s life? (It would be great if CLAMP devoted some time to exploring Watanuki’s actual life leading up to his first meeting with Yuuko, because right now it feels like that part got hastily thrown in at the last minute.)
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*”Watanuki was valuable to his parents and wasn’t to be thrown away after he had fulfilled the purpose for his creation.”
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RE: Watanuki’s memories: What I’m unsure about is whether or not Watanuki had any interactions with Sakura and Syaoran on his own. Watanuki is retconned into Tsubasa’s timeline when he’s about seven years old, and Tsubasa’s life prior to that is rewritten with Watanuki in his place, right? But since Sakura and Syaoran sealed themselves away, Watanuki is orphaned as soon as he’s written into the world. So wouldn’t the memories Watanuki gave away of his parents be the same as what Tsubasa remembers of his parents, since all of his experiences with them were drawn from Tsubasa’s life? (It would be great if CLAMP devoted some time to exploring Watanuki’s actual life leading up to his first meeting with Yuuko, because right now it feels like that part got hastily thrown in at the last minute.)
Watanuki’s relationship with SxS is definitely one of the most unclear things in the whole manga, and at this point of the story, I don’t think there is any hope to get anymore information about it from CLAMP…
Nonetheless, if SxS actually changed his face and name and wished him well, there couldn’t have been no interactions between them: they must necessarily have met him to do that. Meaning that the version of history with Syaoran was erased when he left that world and was imprisoned by FWR, and rewritten with Watanuki in his stead “for real” since his birth until he turned 7 years old, when SxS vanished and Watanuki became orphaned at this point.
AKA, in version 2 (twisted version): Watanuki was truly born as “Syaoran” in both appearance and name, but SxS were obviously aware it wasn’t normal, they still remembered their “first son” and knew everything that would be happening from this point on. He was “the same as Syaoran” but still different, as you said on your post they indeed wanted him to have his own personality/existence after the whole battle with FWR was done for, and so they raised him as “Watanuki” after changing his outward appearance with magic and giving him a new name.
The thing that makes me even more sure that he must have lived with SxS and known them, is his clear understanding and knowledge of what is happening around him: he went to Yuuko’s shop on his own two feet to ask her for FWR whereabouts and to help Syaoran in exchange for his memories, he was a teenager and he pretty much knew everything about his past, about what/who he is, and even about what was to come in the future by paying in advance for a wish that would help Syaoran later on : how could he have known all this without being told by SxS?
The other thing is his attachment to his parents: would he really feel so strongly about people he “didn’t know”?
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One thing…Watanuki AGES, he is in fact getting older, but because he is in a halted time he physically grows very little in a long time, he says he will eventually grow old and die ’cause no-one lives forever but it will take him many, MANY centuries.
Also I think the whole Tsubasa/xxxHOLIC plots are made so Watanuki doesn’t become Clow or Fei Wang Reed and the cycle stops
EX:
clow wished for life>fei waang>yuuko lives>tsubasa(Syaoran) travels to clow country> the clones> Watanuki>Yuuko dies>watanuki now clow wishes for yuuko to be alive>fei wang reed.
Now there’s one thing you need to think about, it will take many years for Watanuki to have Clows power, Doumeki’s descendants have the egg, if any of them uses it on watanuki when he’s as powerful as Clow, and if the theories about the egg are somewhat right -taking his memories, giving him memories or freeing him from the store (although we alredy know Watanuki can create projections of himself into reality via dreams and ‘leave’ the store as seen in the Yaobikuni’s/ crimson Pearl arc)- then there’s a chance he can ‘become’ ‘Clow’ or Fei waang Reed in the future IF the egg serves those purposes and then the cycle will once again begin.
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I don’t think the ending of a chapter could have been anymore open that that, seriously ^^;
I suspect, like most people, that the announcement in volume 3 will be about the next arc, but then it also means that the series won’t be starting up again until next fall in the best case scenario = a minimum of a 6 months break.
I’m sure the fans hopes that it means CLAMP will work on their other titles instead, but there is a sad possibility they might actually do nothing at all…well, we will at least have CCS no matter what , let’s not despair 😉
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All this time between the final chapter and the tankoubon release is suspicious. It doesn’t take that long to record and audio drama and the script is technically already written.
It all looks very suspicious…..
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Thanks for posting as always, Chibiyuuto. I’m sorry I left an essay on your blog, ahahaha.
The big gap between now and July is making me wonder whether or not Rei is going to get a more consistent update schedule to tie up its independent plot lines and get ready for whatever new world the Tsubasa gang will go to. (The Kinugawa onsen “research trip” seems like a theme that’s more suited to Gate 7 than TWC, since it’s close to Edo Wonderland Nikko Edomura, so maybe we could get Gate 7 back…?!)
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That’s an interesting bit of information you got there (about Edo Wonderland Nikko Edomura). I didn’t know about it and although they didn’t mention anything about visiting that park on Twitter, I so hope their trip to Kinugawa Onsen was for GATE 7.
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You know, I’m still confused what the cursed bunny charms did. Is it that full of cursed spirits from their original owners that it helped Tsubasa break free from Utaki and corrupt the place? Is that what happened?
It’s a huge relief to know papa Syaoran was able to escape before he could “die”, though. Although agaim, it’s all because time in Utaki stopped at one point. I know the time stop thing was mentioned in a very recent chapter. But if it wasn’t for text expositions, I literally would not have noticed.
I still adore trc/twc series, but a weakness I continue to see from CLAMP is how action scenes are drawn so chaotic, that it’s hard to notice things that are going on.
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You know, I’m still confused what the cursed bunny charms did. Is it that full of cursed spirits from their original owners that it helped Tsubasa break free from Utaki and corrupt the place? Is that what happened?
I’m not sure if there is a logic explanation behind it at all… I think you summed up pretty nicely: it was infected with “evil energy” =P
As far as CLAMP’s action scenes being chaotic, I think they have always been like that. Just take a look at their catalog and there are plenty of them. For me, I like them the way they are =)
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Waterflamescans just uploaded their complete scanslations for Ch. 18, which, after rereading it plus previous chapters, helped me make sense of what went on in Utaki! XD
The core of Utaki is already frozen in time, but it allows Syaoran and Tsubasa to move freely still. When Utaki insists that Syaoran has to be thoroughly defeated (killed off) for Tsubasa to use the power of the yuta, Tsu basically went “fuck no”, and the power of his will MANIFESTS so that literally any thing inside is frozen. Except Tsu, because he’s so angry and determined, and then those cursed bunny things taint Utaki so he can get out.
A flood naturally helps him escape. And so, because Tsu’s strong “take that!” will manage to stop the time on Syaoran, Syaoran is still “alive” as he says in Ch. 19
Wow!
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But that version of the clone is not the real one… I mean, there’s a reason why we’ve seen it in the other Nirai Kanai, because only dead people are there. I don’t think he is still living. It’s natural for Syaoran to think that because he has seen the clone moving and apparently living, but that wasn’t the real clone (I think). It’s like Watanuki was trying to explain how the Yuuko he saw in the first three volumes of Rei wasn’t the real Yuuko.
The clones were reincarnated so Syaoran would have to go to that China-looking world in order to meet him. Right? xD
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Nope. It was the real clone. The difference between Watanuki and Tsubasa is the Yuuko he saw in Rei was from a dream while the place where Tsubasa and Syaoran were wasn’t a dream.
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Yes, but the Utaki is known for having *dead* people so why would it mean that the clone is alive?
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Remember when the Utaki said Syaoran doesn’t belong there? Which means he really was just sent there because of Tsubasa’s wish but technically he never really died, just disappeared. Even princess Tsubasa said Sakura’s and Syaoran’s souls are still living. So I guess he is still waiting somewhere else.
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I see… Yeah, maybe you are right 🙂
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I could be wrong, but I think the bunny charm corrupted the Utaki because objects from the outside Nirai Kanai are not supposed to enter the interior Nirai Kanai. Kujaku was supposed to take all of the items they brought from the outside, not just the good fortune coins, but since Kujaku is Kujaku, he only accepted an equal payment and let them continue on with the other items so he could watch the events that unfold afterwards.
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Hey, I actually like this theory and it makes a lot of sense! Thanks for bringing that up, that will be my version 🙂
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you know how the girls put their feelings into the dolls, and the bunny broke in the neck meaning the girl died, well the bunny is now a representation for the Utaki, when the bunny head oppened so did the utaki. I think it’s used as voodo. Everything outside the Utaki just went in, and I think it also let the princesses fill it with water
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aw i love how much they have become like a close knit family over the years. like 5 brothers! (including mokona and watanuki of course!!) 🙂
“Sorry to butt in, but I’ve read that theory a few times”
oh i see… i had no idea. i never really read the theories when it first came out. and i only started re-reading holic and trc last year and discovered this website and peoples comments helped me to understand this complex manga more. so i didnt know others had said that… but awesome 15 minute essay! actually, i do get where your coming from with the whole watanuki being yuuko and clow reeds kid thing. i thought that first time round in the earlier volumes, but then dropped that theory when syaoran got involved. i still think he’s spiritually connected to them though. ^^ sorry, late to comment on your essay. but yeah, i enjoyed reading them both. 🙂 open discussions are fun.
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That’s okay. I think fans started seriously considering the “Watanuki=Clow” theory around the time TRC revealed Clow’s wish for Yuuko to live, which was a really hectic and confusing time for the fandom. Some Chinese fans who were scanning the magazines started spreading fake spoilers and everything, so each chapter release met an explosion of bizarre speculation.
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speaking of the items watanuki gave….with the cage, wasnt that the one in an early chapter of holic where on a full moon two shadow birds appear inside it? if hana thinks its precious to them, maybe itl help bring sakura and syaoran back? maybe those two shadow birds represented mama sakura and daddy syaoran?
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That’s a really good observation, and it would be awesome if CLAMP brought the cage back that way! It would be a neat callback to the time when Sakura and Syaoran were “caged” in the inter-dimensional tube together.
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Yes it is the same cage or at least a look-alike, since that one was given from the old lady from Watanuki’s dream.
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tbh honest I am done with the whole clone situation, I am tired of Watanuki sacrificing himself for them over and over again ang getting no reciprocation, I don’t see them trying to help him with the whole Yuuko situation he’s been in for so long.
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“It would be great if CLAMP devoted some time to exploring Watanuki’s actual life leading up to his first meeting with Yuuko, because right now it feels like that part got hastily thrown in at the last minute.)”
yes!! i completely agree. im excited at the idea actually. i think watanuki’s childhood before yuuko has got so much potential for a whole arc or short manga prequel. i think it could be fantastic if they do this. but on the other hand he is yet to get his memories back which are sealed in the blue ear ring mokona wears, so maybe we will see flash backs of his childhood life via this.
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Things I will never understand about all the TRC+TWC+CCS+xxxHolic+Gate7+etc.etc. (aka: Help, plz ;__; ):
1. xxxHolic Row ending-> we see Watanuki meeting “kimoned” Yuuko (which means is Yuuko, really Yuuko), cage opening, bird flying, yay he’s free etc. and after that he says – even more than – 100 years have passed. So that’s the end. Does it mean that whatever we are reading into xxxHolic Rei happening currently is supposed to be BEFORE that chapter and any supposition about who’s the Yuuko in Rei is pointless since we know they will meet into that dream with the cage, the bird etc.? So in Nirai Kanai/Rei when Watanuki says to Syaoran that he knows what waiting for Yuuko means for him does he mean he finally got the fact he must wait for his price to be payed and for that dream? (and we all know also he doesn’t know anything about the famous mysterious egg in Doumeki’s descendants hands…)…
2. Prices comparison-> it seems like Watanuki was left by Yuuko with all instructions: “my existence is paradoxal hence to not interfere with the outside normal existential plane and pay my price I’m gonna stay in the shop for at least 100 years not moving out except for all it’s in my power to grant wishes, stopping my personal time to not grow older, watching people around me instead living a normal life, chatting with Tsubasa & gang time to time via Mokona and with Sakura-hime via dreams….” which is pretty sad in a way and leaves all open to different parallel stories and arcs to dream about ok. But Tsubasa-Syaoran? Is his personal time stopped too? How long has he to wait for the price being payed? Why he doesn’t know it while Watanuki knows it? Is it the same amount of time that Watanuki has to wait for besides the fact time flows differently in every world so Watanuki’s 100 years could be Tsubasa-Syaoran’s 10 years?… And even so: did CLAMP think bout the real fact that just because time flows differently in different worlds there is the big, big risk that the time Syaoran lives could be different by the time that Sakura lives while waiting in Clow country and there could be a future gap like <>? Same for Kurogane in Nihon and all people waiting for him in Nihon? Or is it like all their times are attuned together, that is the time flows the same for Sakura hime in Clow, Syaoran and the gang travelling around across worlds, and Nihon world people (which is quite weird…)…?
3. Cursed bunny-> why Watanuki gave it to Syaoran in first place if it had to corrupt the Utaki risking to make him and his friends to not go out of there? I probably lost something in translation, ’cause only logic reason is that its purpose was to kinda attack Utaki’s power to let Syaoran not to kill C!Syaoran… is it? So it wasn’t Syaoran strong will overwhelming Utaki’s power in the end, but the head of a little cursed bunny?
4. (*cough* my dear and favourite character *cough*) Fai chose to not use his magic power during TRC first phases, but now he can use it as much as he wants so-> why he doesn’t use his magic to make Syaoran and Sakura communicate to each other directly without using Watanuki like a messenger?
5. Language translator-> we all know that one of Mokona’ skills is to automatically translate different worlds languages. What about Hana and Sakura meeting in dreams and talking to each other normally? One could explain saying they’re so powerful that they don’t need translators, and/or there’s no need of it in the world of dreams like “souls talk the same language”, maybe, perhaps… ok but then: how Tsubasa-Syaoran child was able to talk to Tsubasa-Sakura child when he went to Clow to meet her, is Clow country language the same language of the world where Tsubasa-Syaoran comes from (which is also the same world of Watanuki? is it?) ?
6. gate 7-> is Nirai Kanai arc the explanation and solution of Hana’s dream in Gate7, where a parallel Hana (the Nirai Kanai one) cryes for the people who don’t “come back”, solved by Tsubasa gang and particularly Syaoran godmode hidden power in Utaki?
7. CCS clear card arc-> after all this now I expect some elements of TRC/TWC are gonna be put into CCS clear card arc just to explain and connect that scene where CCS Sakura gave her -old by then – staff to adult C!Sakura: how did she know after all? who told her there was an adult version of herself needing something to use as price to pay for Tsubasa-Syaoran sake (plus “Language translator” issue, see point 5)?… And I really, really, really hope IT’S NOT THE CASE, I just would like that CLAMP keep CCS separated and parallel from Tsubasa saga, seriously. It would be too much a mess ;___;
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“gate 7-> is Nirai Kanai arc the explanation and solution of Hana’s dream in Gate7, where a parallel Hana (the Nirai Kanai one) cryes for the people who don’t “come back”, solved by Tsubasa gang and particularly Syaoran godmode hidden power in Utaki?”
this is how i thought of it too. hana had a dream where she met another version of herself, and in one of the later chapter the two guys- (cant remember their names) discover a problem with the “interior” which is where twc – nirai kanai picks up from. and ultimately resolves. but CLAMP still haven’t gone back to gate 7 to continue with the story.
i noticed a theme CLAMP seem to be using is someone appears in the story and is involved with magical happenings yet apparently has no aura. in gate 7 we have chikahito, in xxxholic we have zashiki lookalike, and in ccs clear card arc we have akiho, and her guardian.
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Yeah, I strongly hope Clamp will continue Gate7 I was loving it. ;___;
Asd, yes! I noticed the same! In Gate7 they say Chikahito is like Hana but in a different way, he’s the “non existence that clears out” (“clears out”-> “clear card”). I used this association when I saw Akiho the first time and no one seemed able to perceive her magic powers. Unless Clamp are plotting something different I still think that bout Akiho and her guardian (f.e. : another possibility could be the role that Momo-bunny has over her – like possession/master-and-puppet/magic transpose sort of – and/or Akiho could suffer for a form of personality issue like Chii/Freyja in Chobits where the cute Chii had no particular skills and when Freyja took control she was able to perform powerful stuff…). Mmmm dunno but I’d like more if Clamp deepen this new not perceivable magic subject: we would have more answers also about Zashiki lookalike and Chikahito in the same time. It also would open a door to the existence of people with magic powers, even high level, in Clamp multi-verse, but not perceptible by other mages and witches…
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1. That’s how I understand it, xxxHOLiC Rei is somewhere between the chapters of xxxHOLiC Rou. which will leave Watanuki as Ohkawa’s trump card for the rest of her career. As for the dream with Yuuko and the cage, it was Yuuko’s dream.She’s the one who made it on chapter 170, the very last of tankoubon 14, when she was talking with Haruka. So whatever happen to Yuuko’s soul after this, it would have no influence on the dream.
2. For Xiaolang, he needs to find his other self and Sakura’s, things will get clearer when they meet. I don’t think his time is stopped, but since both Sakura and he are magic user, they will live much longer than the average human. Fay is already centuries old. Sakura and Xiaolang will probably stabilize in their 20s, regardless of how many years they will have lived through when they’ll meet again.
3. I need to reread Nirai Kanai and Rei, I can’t remember the details.
4. Mokona has to feel important to remind happy. XD
More seriously, I would like to see him use more magic, but maybe Ohkawa is too used to him not use any.
5. Xiaolang Jr. is clone!Sakura and clone!Xiaolang’s son, so of course he speak the language of Clow Country, plus his parents knew he would go there, so of course they though him. Plus clone!Sakura’s father is Clow Read, the same who create Mokona and worked with Yuuko, the futur boss of Watanuki. He would have make sure Sakura knew the language so she could teach Watanuki. As for the dream between Sakura and Hana, or princess Tomoyo and president Tomoyo, I would guess, indeed, the dream world translate the though directly. That or yumemi are thaught the Mokona translator spell as basic traning. ^^;
6. I would guess so.
7. I would guess there will be more and more connections. In the first series, Sakura was confined to the sandbox Clow Read made for her. But now that she have grown more powerful, she’ll meet other wizards, not always friendly. Plus, there are fishy stuff in Tsubasa, both Xiaolang have the same magic circle as ccs!Xiaolang. Definitely the Lee family’s magic… why? or how?
Also, I would like to see ccs!Tomoyo meet princess Tomoyo in a dream, just for the sake of it. XD
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“3. Cursed bunny-> why Watanuki gave it to Syaoran in first place if it had to corrupt the Utaki risking to make him and his friends to not go out of there? I probably lost something in translation, ’cause only logic reason is that its purpose was to kinda attack Utaki’s power to let Syaoran not to kill C!Syaoran… is it? So it wasn’t Syaoran strong will overwhelming Utaki’s power in the end, but the head of a little cursed bunny?”
mmm… yeah i got a little lost on this too. first time i read it i thought it was the bunny, then second time round i thought oh no wait its syaorans strong will again. (he’s gotta be careful how and when he uses that strong will of his!!) but now i think it was a combo of the two. syaorans will power combined with that cursed object= explosion!
i was confused by what nirai kanai meant for them in overall development in the first place. like does syaoran jr apparently have god like powers which would make sense since he was from from a paradox- in a way he is the creator/ parent of his own parents via his choice and fei wong reed. and we know papa syaoran was still alive at the end…
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– born from a paradox
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Ah ok, :O yeah so that explains also why Kujaku cares so much to say that (Watanuki) was so accurate giving those tools :O
Thank You very much 😀
Yesh at the very first chapters I had the hope that was the right place for them to finally find C!Syaoran but totally broke when Hana explained that she was able to foresee only things for Nirai Kanai citizens… there I had the confirmation that whatever was happening, underworld, up world, dead and alive people, was anyway limited to Nirai Kanai world, not including foreigners. It’s like a spiritual loop that had a bug and Syaoran fixed it as external element
And only he could just ’cause he already was on the edge of life and death dimensions and his own existence is paradoxal, yes.
I just see a little contradiction between the reason why he chose that price to pay and the fact he always manages to solve other people problems wherever he goes, unless doing so is making Universe getting used to his presence by baby steps lol.
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“That or yumemi are thaught the Mokona translator spell as basic traning.”
XD .. lolol that’s fun to think.
*nods Yeah I’d like a lot an interaction between ccs!Tomoyo and princess Tomoyo too 😀 but that would mean inserting too many trc stuff into ccs then… I still would prefer they keep them separated ;___;
(Dunno how it could happen tho, princess Tomoyo gave her foresight as price to Yuuko, but maybe she can still cross dreams? )
Well in trc it’s supposed that daddy Syaoran was anyway a descendant of that dimension Lee’s family, I’d guess whatever is the world one was born into, if that’s the magic they have then that’s the magic they show (maybe, just a guess o.o ), so I never thought about a real big influence between Ccs and Trc except the dream where Ccs!Sakura gave her wand to mommy Sakura (and there seemed like it was the 1st time they ever met).
Thank You very much for explanations, now I can see a light at the end of the tunnel 😉
Just still worried ’bout Kurociccio who could get too old when he will be back in Nihon ;___; unless Fai makes some spell on his age ;___;
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Kurogane would be in danger to grow old before he could make it back, but I guess Fay and Xiaolang will find a way. Or he’ll exchange something with Watanuki.
Tomoyo gave her foresight, but ccs Clear Card isn’t up to the first Tsubasa ending yet. Sakura still has her star staff, so princess Tomoyo would still have her foresight. It’s hard to keep track “when” ccscc is regarding the more recent series, like xxxholic, Tsubasa, “Gouhou Drug & Drop”, Kobato or Gate 7…
As for the Xiaolang, the problem is Senior is the clone of Junior and Junior is the son of Senior. Someone most have started this loop at some point, but who? How? Is ccs!Xiaolang the source? Hence why they have the Lee family’s magic circle? We still don’t know what was Xiaolang’s job in Hong Kong, maybe it’s linked to it, since Tsubasa RC started a few years after the end of CCS. Ohkawa could have planned this all as she ended the series. Which doesn’t mean CCS and TRC will be too heavily linked, the Xiaolang part could come up in a later Tsubasa World Chronicle story.
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