alt title(s): Ceres Celestial Legend
Ayashi no Ceres (
Ceres, Celestial Legend in English), by
Yuu Watase, draws on ancient Japanese myth and mixes it with a cynical modern perspective to produce a dark yet compelling tale of a young girl caught up in supernatural events beyond her control or understanding. It starts with twins Aya and Aki Mikage being driven to their grandfather's house on their 16th birthday. On arrival, they are made to view a family relic; the mummified hand of the clan's founder. Wounds appear on Aki; when Aya asks why no-one is helping him, her grandfather orders her death.
During her escape, Aya meets Tooya, a mysterious amnesiac in the hire of her family who helps her. She is then taken in by her friend Yuuhi, his older sister Suzumi and their strange housekeeper Q.
As the series progresses, it is revealed that Aya's family is descended from a "celestial maiden," Ceres, who was trapped on earth and forced to marry a mortal. Aya is the reincarnation of Ceres, who occasionally takes over Aya's body and is willing to take revenge for all the misfortune she went through. Aki is the reincarnation of Ceres' husband from her former life, Shiso Mikage, who over the years has gone...
somewhat insane. Whilst Aya and Ceres cohabit, Aki is totally taken over by his ancestor, who now is on the hunt for Ceres. The rest of the family are trying to create their own army of celestial maidens, through various scientific methods.
Ayashi no Ceres is very violent, and features several characters with varying form of insanity: the Ancestor; Aya and Aki's mother tries to kill Aya; a girl commits suicide as a part of her plans; there is borderline incest as the ancestor in Aki's body tries to have his way with Ceres in Aya's body
and Aya's cousin Kagami, a
Mad Scientist, threatens to rape her. All in all, not recommended for the easily shocked.
This series provides examples of;
- Ancient Conspiracy
- Badass Longcoat
- Big Fancy House (Yuuhi and Suzumi's house, The Thing That Goes Doink included)
- Bifauxnen (Shuro Tsukasa, raised as a man out of fear of her powers manifesting)
- Brother Sister Incest (Played completely seriously and creepily)
- Dangerous Sixteenth Birthday (Poor Aya must die when she turns sixteen, since at that age her powers will awaken)
- Demoted To Extra (Poor Shuro barely gets to appear in the anime)
- Dramatic Wind (Quite a lot)
- Driven To Suicide (Suzumi attempted this in the past following the death of her husband and her subsequent miscarriage, but was stopped by her brother in law Yuuhi. Later, in a much more malicious case, Aya's cousin and fellow tennyo Miori kills herself in a very gruesome manner, purposefully traumatising Aya as revenge for her mother's death, caused by Ceres.)
- Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas (Kagami's only Pet The Dog moment comes when he's shown visiting his insane, delirious mother)
- Expy (Tooya inherited the looks, the fighting skills, and initial stoicism of his cousin Tamahome.)
- Eye Scream (Wei Fei-Li gets one eye sliced by Tooya's dagger in his first appearance. Perhaps even more wince-inducing is the scene near the end of the manga where, ironically enough, Tooya restores Wei's damaged eye.)
- Falling Into His Arms (Sort of)
- Fan Preferred Couple (Many people consider Yuuhi to be a better match for Aya than Tooya, though she actually does sort of end up with him. Not on-screen, but considering Tooya is dying already...)
- Fighting From The Inside
- Gonk (Mrs. Q/Kyu)
- Groupie Brigade (Manga only)
- Hard Cut Flashback
- Heroic BSOD (Aya gets this a lot)
- Hidden Eyes
- High Pressure Blood
- Hot For Student (Yuki Urakawa and her teacher)
- Ill Girl: Yuki Urakawa. Shouta, Chidori's brother, is a male example.
- Important Hair Cut (Aya gets one of these when she gets depressed over the idea of Tooya leaving her for Miori.)
- Joshikousei
- Katsuyuki Konishi (Tooya, one of his first popular roles along with Maxima from The King Of Fighters)
- Ki Attacks (or something close...)
- Kissing Cousins (Played darkly with Kagami and Aya, and in a more positive (albeit tragic) light with Shuro and Kei)
- Love Makes You Evil (and HOW)
- Mac Guffin Girl ( Tooya is a male version)
- My Death Is Just The Beginning (Miori's suicide, which is her Take That to Aya since her beloved mother was killed in the rampage of the beginning.)
- Mysterious Protector (Tooya)
- Narm ( Tooya's "death scene" in the anime was so ridiculously exaggerated that This Troper ended up laughing out loud)
- Nothing Up My Sleeve (Quite literally, as Tooya's dagger isn't really in his sleeve...)
- Occidental Otaku (Alec, an anime/games fanboy from Scotland)
- Offing The Offspring (several failed attempts in the series, as well some successful ones pre-series)
- Older Than They Look (Chidori is actually a high schooler, but looks like a pre-teen girl when not using her powers)
- The Ojou (Aya)
- Ordinary High School Student (Aya and Aki, until the beginning of the series)
- Parental Abandonment (Aya is actually set up for death by her parents to stop Aya's awakening as a Maiden. Logically, it fails big time: the father is killed and the mother is comatose. Chidori lost her parents in a bus crash in her backstory. Miori is driven pretty much insane with grief when Ceres kills her mother)
- Reincarnation (Kinda sorta, in a weird way)
- Shapeshifting Lover (the myth of the ten'nyo has elements of this)
- Shojo
- Shut Up Kiss
- Sliding Scale Of Idealism Versus Cynicism (Significantly on the cynical side, at least by Watase's standards)
- The Stoic (Tooya, though he softens up over time)
- Swirling Dust
- Tall Dark And Bishoujo (Ceres, Shuro)
- Taking The Bullet (Aya's father does this for her early on. Much later, Chidori does the same for Yuuhi. Both cases are fatal.)
- And while no actual bullets are involved, Gladys sacrificing herself to save Ceres when the Progenitor tries to rip her heart out near the end of the manga involves pretty much the same idea.
- Well Done Son Guy (Kagami's backstory)
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity ( Shiso Mikage wanted to not be a burden on his powerful ten'nyo wife Ceres, so he asked her to give him some of her powers. When he had them, he went completely MAD and killed one of their kids, which prompted Ceres to go Mama Bear and kill him
- Woman Scorned (Ceres again)
- Yandere (Miori, who goes mad after losing her mom. Shiso mixes this and With Great Power Comes Great Insanity.)
- Yumi Kakazu (Aya)
