Line #38 WMG/WitchHunter


1	[[AC: Manhwa/WitchHunter]]
2
3	First thing first, beware spoilers.
4
5	!Plot
6
7	[[WMG: Lee lied in chapter 52.]]
8	He hasn't [[spoiler:actually killed Xing]] and he knows exactly what Yue has been up to until today; he's simply bluffing and deliberately pushing Yue's BerserkButton to get him to fight all-out [[strike:[[BloodKnight because Lee's just that crazy]]]] because if he won against Yue in other circumstances, he would forever wonder if Yue didn't maybe just let him win and forever think that [[AlwaysSomeoneBetter Yue was actually better than him until the end]]. His destroying the palace shows this war is not so much about him getting to be the Emperor than just getting revenge on and besting Yue.
9	(I may have thought about this a bit too much.)
10	** As of chapter 56... [[spoiler: the part about killing Xing at least is '''confirmed to be a lie'''.]]
11	** The part about wondering whether or not Yue is better than him seems to be true.
12
13	[[WMG: Ryu Hwan is from Bairong.]]
14	So far, all characters with Korean-type names (Eun Ryu, Eun Won, [[SpellMyNameWithAnS Visul/Bi Seol]], etc, have been from this country (with the exception of Vi Hyung Ran), with everyone else having completely different names. The clothes and architectural style seen in his flashback in volume 11 look Bairong-ish, and for that matter, the guy looks like Eun Ryu.
15	* [[EpilepticTrees Alternately]], in the same flashback, look at the magic sigil... The triangle in a circle? ''that's Prithvi, the Doberg family emblem.'' And then a little later in the same volume, Tarras also uses a similar-looking magic circle, that looks completely different from the one Tasha used in volume 1 to summon Xing. So... maybe the combination of badass + ButtMonkey status is inherited from Tarras?
16	** Prithvi is a spirit with a massive cult, Dobergs are just high priests of that cult.
17
18	[[WMG: Sorella is a balancing force for exceptionally powerful witches]]
19	This is a bit of a stretch, but as implied by South during her chat with East, except for East, none of the other Great Witches has a Supporter. However, in place of a Supporter, South has a Sorella named Poene, who acts differently from her. So based on this, I speculate that while most witches have Supporters, they do so to complement their power, thus allowing them to reach their full potential. However, for the Great Witches who are already way too powerful, they seem to have no need for a Supporter. However, what if a Supporter is not just a complementary force but also a power stabilizer? Look at South, who is very powerful and [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity is clearly very unhinged]]. So they somehow create for themselves (or have their power create for them) these Sorellas, which act as a counterbalance, both in power and in other aspects such as personality.
20
21	[[WMG: Varette is related to Edea Florence, specifically being her ''Sorella''.]]
22	Okay, this guess takes a few things into consideration:
23	* Edea Florence is Tasha's mentor, and as the White Witch, is one of the most powerful witches ever to exist.
24	* Varette is a powerful and ruthless witch who controls shadows.
25	* Tasha regularly dreams about a much more amiable, if quieter, Varette.
26	* Instead of a supporter, a very powerful witch may instead have a ''Sorella'', who is something of a second personality. In South's case, her Sorella, Poene, has a distinct personality on her own.
27	Speculation time:
28	* Poene is a partial opposite of South: Calm and not so trigger-happy. This may mean that Sorellas are different from their 'parent' witches in an opposite kind of way. Now compare Edea and Varette: Edea is the so-called White Witch, while Varette uses darkness. Quite an opposite.
29	* Halloween was given by Edea to Tasha, and he values Halloween dearly for being a gift. This implies that Tasha values everything Edea has or gave to him as priceless and that he somehow dream of a kinder Varette suggests Varette served Edea in some way.
30	* There's the term golden contract, which binds an individual, going so far as giving said bound individual a FakeMemories to allow them to serve their master better. There is a possibility that Varette served North under this golden contract, which somehow explains why Varette in reality is far different from Varette in Tasha's dream.
31	So, to round up the speculation: Varette is Edea's Sorella.
32
33	* Looking at the situation surrounding Etwal, East's Sorella, seems like the theory of Varette being Edea's Sorella is about to get tossed. See below for updated speculations.
34
35	[[WMG: Varette is Etwal.]]
36	She's actually East's Sorella, just brainwashed by North and takes a new name/identity as Varette. North, South and other witches attack East, during the attack it is revealed that the person everyone thought was East was actually Etwal, East's Sorella, and gets captured in the end by North. She also looked almost identical to Varette right off the bat.
37	* This also helps explain why Tasha occasionally dreams of a friendly Varette. What truly happens is that [[spoiler:because Tasha is West's reincarnation, that Tasha's dreaming of Varette is actually West reminiscing about East, or rather, Etwal.]]
38
39	[[WMG: The reason North needs Tasha is to resurrect West.]]
40	So now that we know [[spoiler: Tasha is West's reincarnation,]] maybe that's how North intends to use him if she gets him. Going along a bit with the theory above, and considering something mentioned in an earlier chapter, maybe North needs Varette and Tasha to bring back west. By sacrificing them, or something like that.
41	* Going by some suppositions about the soul, since [[spoiler:Tasha is West,]] North likely has devised a plan to [[spoiler:revert Tasha into West.]] This troper supposes that North intends to implant FakeMemories into the resurrected West in order to get her to willingly cooperate with her plans. Alternatively, while North intends to "resurrect" West in the sense that she won't allow her ''personality'' to surface, and North will instead manipulate her into allying with her. In fact, as a bonus, see the next WMG.
42
43	[[WMG: [[LukeIAmYourFather North is Tasha's biological mother.]]]]
44	Since we know that Tasha's adopted, and he originally had black hair, a case can be made that North created Tasha from [[spoiler:West's soul]] and herself, taking into account that Witches can't give birth. These are the main reasons North has invested so much into Tasha, going so far as to [[spoiler:have Neptis watch over him and manipulate his family for a decade]]. This way, she can play this card to further manipulate Tasha, by saying she's been watching over him from the shadows (technically true). Most compatible if North intends to [[spoiler:turn Tasha into a version of West that lacks her human-favoring personality]].
45
46	Alternatively, she did this not necessarily to manipulate Tasha with a LukeIAmYourFather scenario, but because of some twisted desire to [[spoiler:''re-educate'' West, who she sees as having "strayed" from the path of Witches.]] For example, if she were to [[spoiler:revert Tasha to an amnesiac version of West, she could take her in as an apprentice and show her how a "proper" Witch should be. She turns her greatest obstacle into her greatest tool, and as a bonus, gets to satisfy the maternal urges every Witch supplants with an apprentice with what can arguably be said is her ''actual'' child.]]
47
48	[[WMG: Edea Florence is related to West]]
49	Tasha and Ryuhwan have practically the same fighting style, and we have been told that they inherit those combat tricks from Edea Florence. However, we also know that Ryuhwan is also an apprentice of West. Now consider a few things:
50	* Edea Florence is defined by the color white.
51	* West also appears to wear white.
52	* When using Moirai's Confinement, Tasha's power manifests, among other things, as magical snowflakes.
53	* As East notes, West's power can manifest as snow.
54	Taking into account that [[spoiler:Tasha is a reincarnated West]], some guesses can be drawn:
55	* Despite having two masters, Ryuhwan's fighting style remains the same as Tasha's, no matter how much better he is. This means that Edea and West most likely teach the same things.
56	* Edea may have taken Tasha in under her wing because she knows West, [[spoiler:and thus trained Tasha not simply to increase his powers, but make him strong enough to prepare when he eventually finds out who he truly is.]]
57	Heck, it may be that Edea is West's Sorella; we know that while a Sorella may behave differently from her main witch (we know Poene acts differently than South, for one), she likely possesses the same type of spells/powers as her main witch, as Etwal and East can attest.
58	** While I won't argue that Edea most likely has a link to West, I doubt that Edea is West's Sorella in the same vein that Poene is South's Sorella. North rather heavily implies that a Sorella will die if their partner dies, so seeing as West ''was'' killed, Edea should have died too if she was West's Sorella. This troper believes Edea could have been an apprentice of West, which is how she knows of the Mana Guns or shared a similarly close relationship. Given their similar appearances, and a precedent for a similar case of misdirection with the Bairong Triplets, this troper wouldn't find it far-fetched at all if it turned out that Edea Florence and West were twin sisters. Although taking into account the WMG below, which postulates that Varete is West's Sorella and may have been revived as a result of [[spoiler:West being reincarnated]], it is possible to argue the same for "Edea is West's Sorella".
59
60	[[WMG: Varete is West's Sorella.]]
61	If Varete is West's Sorella, then she should have died when West was killed. This is consistent with the fact that Varete was apparently killed in a joint attack by North and South--presumably when they took down West. Even if Varete was not present for that battle, if she was really West's Sorella then North and South would indeed have killed her by proxy. This neatly explains several other interesting facts. Namely:
62	* Since [[spoiler:West is Ryuwhan's master]], this explains how [[spoiler:Ryuwhan]] would know Varete, and how they would come to the conclusion that Varete being alive is proof that so was their master.
63	* Varete being apparently revived by North would presumably not be possible without reviving her partner, which is why others state that [[spoiler:Ryuwhan's master]] is NotQuiteDead, but not quite her normal self either--[[spoiler:because she's currently existing as Tasha Godspell, and thus, not quite herself.]]
64	* Varete apparently serving North out of her own free will, despite the latter being directly responsible for her death, can be easily explained if one assumes that Varete is doing it because North promised to resurrect West properly instead of [[spoiler:merely reincarnating her.]]
65	* And finally, the long-standing question of [[spoiler:Tasha's dreams of Varete]] are finally explained with this theory: [[spoiler:Tasha dreams of happy times as West with Varete as her Sorella, likely in what was West's castle. Sorella have ''very'' deep bonds. As the reincarnation of West, those feelings exist buried deep within him, and though he isn't aware of their significance, his soul clearly remembers Varete, which is why he longs to be with the person West likely cherished the most in her life.]]
66
67	[[WMG: The Great Witches have some basis on the Witches from Film/TheWizardOfOz.]]
68	Other than the cardinal ThemeNaming, the other reason for this is that, in the standard story of Oz, [[GoodWitchVersusBadWitch the North and South witches are "good", while the East and West witches are "wicked".]] Here, it's the reverse: [[BigBad North]] and [[AxCrazy South]] are "wicked", while [[TrueNeutral East]] and [[TheParagon West]] are "good". They were apparently able to coexist, if not in peace then in tolerance, for a ''[[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld long]]'' time before the war started, and it can be said the main reason [[CrapsackWorld why things are so bad right now]] is because the "wicked" witches have overpowered the "good" ones.
69
70	[[WMG: North and West [[WeUsedToBeFriends used to have a bond of some kind before the war started.]]]]
71	North is typically presented as calm, cool and always in control, often like she's got it all planned out. However, in the flashback to the last reunion of the Great Witches, [[NotSoStoic that attitude was nowhere to be seen.]] She was very heatedly arguing with West regarding the situation of [[WitchHunt the humans hunting witches]], as if personally offended that West disagreed with her. We know that North generally doesn't care what South thinks as long as her actions figure into her plans, and probably thinks the same of East. However, it seemed to be different with West--she states that she'll make her dream come true "even if she has to go through (West)". While it may be that she's prepared to fight with [[WorldsStrongestWoman the strongest person alive at the time]], it can also be that she's [[FightingYourFriend willing to fight a personally-important individual]] for the sake of her dream.
72
73	Perhaps they were simply good friends like East and West were. Perhaps they were [[PseudoRomanticFriendship a little closer.]] Perhaps ''[[LesYay a lot]]'' closer. Perhaps they were once master and disciple. Perhaps they didn't have any such connection, but had mutual respect for each other, perhaps due to some understanding between them. Regardless, the fact that West would staunchly disagree with and oppose North ''hurt her'', which eventually led to West being killed by North and South. This may even led some more credence to said fact: it may be that West was unable to bring herself to fight North without holding back, which got her killed.
74
75	Lastly, this may be either the primary motivation for, or part of the reason, that North's plan, as stated by East, is [[spoiler:to resurrect West]], as part of her final goal to end humanity. Maybe [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone out of guilt for what she did]], maybe [[ToxicFriendInfluence out of some desire to "rectify" West's "problem"]] (as stated by a previous [=WMG=]), maybe even due to an inability to let go, [[LoveMakesYouEvil for one reason]] or [[WasTooHardOnHer another.]] [[spoiler:And then there's reincarnating West as Tasha Godspell and simultaneously manipulating his life and having her minions looking out for him...]]
76
77	[[WMG: Neptis is North's Sorella.]]
78	Easy one. Neptis is practically joined at the hip with North, North is never seen with a hat whenever she and Neptis share a scene (and we saw Peone come out of South's hat). The only time we've seen North with her hat is also when Neptis wasn't onscreen. Neptis also seems to be the only person (aside from perhaps Varete) whom North trusts with her plans and with the duty of keeping them going steady. Neptis even says at one point that she "exists only for North", which is as good as a confirmation in hindsight.
79
80	As a bonus, using this [=WMG=] as a base, in accordance with any previous [=WMG=] that states that North is closely related to Tasha/[[spoiler:West]], this is the reason why Neptis is a compatible mana donor for Tasha; as North's Sorella, their mana is basically the same, and whether North is somehow related to Tasha or possessed a close bond with [[spoiler:West]], this allows Tasha to be receptive to Neptis', and thus North's, mana.
81
82	!Impossible crossovers
83
84	[[WMG: Witches gain their powers from the Witches of the ''Franchise/WhenTheyCry'' series.]]
85	The witches all wear elaborate clothes, summon "Supporters" (very powerful Furniture), and their expressions reminded me very much of Beato and Maria. The Witches of When They Cry probably are aware of this and are entertained, if they did not set up the whole thing from the start for kicks.

Context WMG / WitchHunter