- Der Tod, from Elisabeth.
- Well, he is frequently accompanied by "angels of death" and if he`s the king he does not necessarily have to follow his own rules. Maybe some of the rules were the result of his romance with Elisabeth.
- You made me think. What if really, the Death Note IS the Yaoi Note?! Think about it. Ryuk was carrying the real Death Note all the time, and while Light was writing all those names in his book, Ryuk could just look over his shoulder and write those names into the real Death Note, making it seem like Light was doing all those killings. However, in reality, the book that Ryuk gave Light is the Yaoi Note, which has the powers to make Light a magnetic to all yaoi pairings! You had Matsuda, whose admiration for Light is veeerrrry dubious; Mikami who worships Kira in more ways than we suspect; and who can forget L? This says it all. Also, this power extends to us viewers, so that we have no choice but to find yaoi in EVERY context, and search for subtext that is not even there to prove that Light and L are cannon dammit! Yes, the Yaoi Note should be feared.
Regarding to the theory above, who is to say that Ryuk didn't drop a fake notebook? Think about it. Ryuk, who is incredibly bored, drops an ordinary notebook, gives a high school student a pep talk, and he thinkks he's a God that has the power to kill anyone... When he doesn't have anything at all. Talk about Dramatic Irony!
- So what was the impossible thing MJ was supposed to do? Become a victim of black-on-black crime?
- "Murdered by a Cute Beatle." Though it's starting to look like that entry read, "MJ: dies of anesthetic overdose."
- Recent news says that MJ's death is a homicide. The police are just catching on.
- "Murdered by a Cute Beatle." Though it's starting to look like that entry read, "MJ: dies of anesthetic overdose."
- Note the unusual airplane-related circumstances around the latter's death... a more successful experiment?
- A lot of the recent deaths have been centered around California - and, more specifically, Los Angeles. As well, at least two have been killed by heart attacks (Billy Mays and MJ). And Los Angeles is significant because that's where Another Note took place. As well, there's been a trend of a celebrity dying every 1-3 days now. Gentlemen (and ladies), we may be onto something.
- Steve McNair died today, as predicted.
- Exactly as planned...tomorrow another famous person shall die. Justice is Kira! Another has died.
- I was given this Deathnote by a man who looked suspiciously like Light, so that makes sense. My shinigami says hi
- This just in: Ted Kennedy has died. Kira strikes again!
- Two days later, DJ AM is dead!! OMG Kira's at it again!
- Kira's on a Hollywood Rampage! Patrick Swayze dead at 57!
- Oral Roberts is dead too, as of 12/14/09!
- Kira only kills criminals, and this matches up.
Michael Jackson: suspected of being a pedophile.Ted Kennedy: politician, and there's that Chappaquiddick incident.Heath Ledger: did too good an impression of being evil in The Dark Knight.Billy Mays: Damn, he's loud.DJ AM: you saw how he died, right?Patrick Swayze: Corrupting millions of teenage girls with his Dirty Dancing? - This... More evidence! "Shame on you, Raito-kun"
- Alternately, Zac Effron is the new Kira, who kills not for justice, but to slowly and steadily cleanse Hollywood of anyone and anything competing with him and his teeny-bopper revolution. That fiend!
- In another few days, another shall die, the name written in my note book.
- Tracing your IP now... wait, this feels like a heart attack coming on. Candlejack! Come kidnap me and hit enter before I
- Brittany Murphy has died at age 32 after suffering a heart attack in her Los Angeles home. Make of that what you will.
- Now J.D. Salinger is dead! Am I the only one whose getting the felling that Kira is a Moral Guardian?
- He can't have killed J.D. Salinger. [[Kira died the same time Salinger died. (Timezone makes Japan a day ahead.)
- Hey, it's just all apart of Kira's plan. He wanted to cleanse the world of evil by killing current criminals to stop them from corrupting others to have them repeat the cycle. In his mind, it's hollywood that's making evil look cool so people want to go over to the Dark Side. How many times have you seen the All Girls Want Bad Boys and Draco in Leather Pants tropes put into effect, and even been abused by fandumb? It's all cause of hollywood, so Kira is solving it by eliminating celebrities.
- Andrew Koenig has died from suicide, and Corey Haim has died of a drug overdose. Celebrity Kira has apparently just discovered that he can control people with the note. And so his vendetta against The '80s continues...
- Ronnie James Dio - stomach cancer. Wow, I know, all the others, but HIM?
- And now Brittany Murphy's husband has also died of a heart attack from "natural causes". At age 39. Clearly he got too close to uncovering the truth.
- Kira strikes again. Probably cause of his assault record.
- The Golden Girls, except for Betty White, have all passed away now. http://www.popeater.com/2010/06/03/rue-mcclanahan-dead What does Kira have against old women? It's understandable for Bea Arthur (the abortion controversy on Maude), but the other two? Seriously?
- Kira is a high school student in Massachusetts. Here's my proof: http://intimateviolencedeathnews.blogspot.com/2010/06/fitchburg-ma-fitchburg-teacher-dies.html
- Randy and Evi Quaid, currently facing trial over vandalism charges, recently fled to Canada to escape a "celebrity death list" conspiracy that's already claimed Heath Ledger and David Carradine, and they fear may be after them now. Celebrity Kira's reputation continues to spread...
- And I don't belive no one mentioned it, Leslie Neilson died a month or so ago. DAMN YOU CELEBRITY KIRA! SPARE THE COMEDIANS! TAKE STEPHENIE MEYER INSTEAD!
- Wait, Bin Laden is dead? GOD BLESS YOU CELEBRITY KIR- Oh wait? Shot in a military operation, that's either a good cover or not related to Celebrity Kira.
- *Death Note reads* "Osama bin Laden Headshot"
- Isn't it a bit strange that the pictures of bin Laden's death haven't been released? Maybe the truth is they found him dead when they got there, and they can't let the truth get out about the real cause of death...
- Wait, Bin Laden is dead? GOD BLESS YOU CELEBRITY KIR- Oh wait? Shot in a military operation, that's either a good cover or not related to Celebrity Kira.
- Kira strikes again to Amy Winehouse.
- Kira strikes again, this time to Steve Jobs.
- Are we sure it was Kira and not Ryuk? He thought he was getting an apple, not an Apple...
- Kira strikes yet again, except now it's Whitney Houston. The cause of death as of this posting is 'unknown'. He's getting better at this.
- Not exactly a celebrity death, but the Las Vegas incident as well. The guy had no kind of criminal record or anything else that would indicate he could pull this off...and it happened anyway.
- Kira...how could you!? Stan Lee, Stephen Hillenburg, and the GOOD President Bush all in one month!? Earlier, he had gotten to Carrie Fisher, Alan Young, and June Foray, amongst others.
- Kira you monster! Cameron Boyce was going to be a mega star, he finally finished filming Descendants 3 and he was set to leave Disney Channel so he could finally be in better projects. Fans wanted to see him in better projects ever sense the first Descendants movie! Yes the other two Descendants movies sucked. But you shouldn’t have taken it out on him!
- As if 2020 hasn’t sucked enough you had to take Naya Rivera away from us, she was the best part of Glee. The only thing she did wrong was say some bi-phobic dialogue, none of which are her opinions on bi people she was forced to say all of it because of the writers. She like most people on the show, under 40 is an ally for all LGBT+ people.
- This must be true for the series to make sense. Otherwise, what happens if someone accepts the Shinigami eye deal in order to kill someone who was about to kill them?
- The Death Note can screw with life spans all it wants. Obviously, if you make the eye deal, you're planning on getting the Death Note. The closest things to this situation in the story were the Naomi Misora incident and Higuchi trying to kill Matsuda; in both cases, they had enough time before their death sentences to act.
- Jossed. Misa's lifespan was mentioned to be almost up on the day she was to be killed; it was extended when Jealous killed the man that was going to kill Misa.
- You can also interpret the line this way. Most murders are killing without realizing they are participating in a kind of fate in the Death Note universe. Beyond Birthday is free of this. He was like Vriska in [[Homestuck]] in that he was killing people that were going to die soon anyways and wanted to be the one who did it. Or more simply, replace the victims with horses. Average murders see a horse and have no idea if it is ill or going to live for years. They could be robbing years of life. Birthday knows the horse is lame and that the vet is on the way already to put it out of its misery. Why feel so bad over a few minutes or hours?
- That would sort of fit with Rem's remark about Shinigami "evolving/degenerating" so much that they do not need food.
- Well, any meaning they had is lost now, 'cause Tsugumi Ohba forgot.
- The big hole in your theory is that it's impossible to make someone live longer with the Death Note.
- This isn't strictly true; Gelus extended Misa's life beyond its destined end (and sacrificed himself in the process) by using his death note to kill her murderer, the agent of her death. Rem also protected Misa by the same means: using the notebook to eliminate the human who threatened her.
- Rem specifically states that when Gelus saved Misa's life, his lifespan was added to her own. This means that even though her lifespan had come to its natural end, Gelus' unnatural actions caused her to gain a new lifespan, which was equal to his own (which he didn't need anymore).
"By manipulating the death of a human that has influence over another human's life, that human's original life span can sometimes be lengthened. If a god of death intentionally does the above manipulation to effectively lengthen a human's life span, the god of death will die, but even if a human does the same, the human will not die."
- This isn't strictly true; Gelus extended Misa's life beyond its destined end (and sacrificed himself in the process) by using his death note to kill her murderer, the agent of her death. Rem also protected Misa by the same means: using the notebook to eliminate the human who threatened her.
- The number is not necessarily some sort of countdown. Even the creator said it was based on a "complex mathematical formula" which he "forgot." There is no reason for the number to get LOWER as a person approaches their death. There is no reason to assume it ever changes at ALL. Maybe it's a date as represented by the Shinigami calendar. It could be something like DAY / 12 x MONTH x YEAR + HOUR / MINUTE x 44.
- Maybe it's an obscure branch of Death God math? Since people can't see the Death Gods without the Note, maybe the Death Gods are higher-dimensional beings? (Let's say fourth.) That would explain the general bizarreness of their appearances and outlooks; people's minds can only comprehend the first three dimensions. There's a whole new Ryuk out there! Since the Death Gods would be able to grasp fourth-dimensional mathematics, they could have invented something even more powerful than calculus to figure out when people are gonna drop?
- The number represents how long the person would live naturally if left alone by the Shinigami.
- Which still means the numbers are meaningless. Light killed off many murderers, many would have killed again. They couldn't, their future victims lived, thus changing the future.
- Not necessarily. It's possible, probable even that when you die is when you die. If you were supposed to be murdered and can't you'll die of a heart attack.
- I thought this was why the "can't kill for love" or whatever rule existed. The numbers are accurate barring interference from a Death Note. Any individual death may change other numbers. So a Shinigami is going to alter the numbers like crazy as they feed. There are just specific rules against abusing their life span changing powers intentionally.
- Which still means the numbers are meaningless. Light killed off many murderers, many would have killed again. They couldn't, their future victims lived, thus changing the future.
- This is why Ryuk killed Light when he was mortally wounded.
- But Light wasn't yet dead when Ryuk wrote his name.
- Pretty sure Ryuk was just doing it for the Lulz.
- Isn't a human being's lifespan their natural lifespan, with the death caused by an accident, disease, or other act of god, and not being murdered or harmed with the Death Note?
- Another Note is vague on this point. On the one hand, Mello says that B knew the day his father would be murdered because of his shinigami eyes. On the other hand, Mello also says that the reason B had such an easy time killing his victims compared to other murderers was because they were going to die anyway.
- Maybe B's victims were going to die anyway because B was going to kill them. B just didn't realize this.
- Considering the fact that Gelus saved Misa from her predetermined death by killing her murderer, a human's lifespan takes into account murder as well. So, the Death Note would seem to be the only thing that can interrupt a lifespan since that's what it was intended to do.
- Another Note is vague on this point. On the one hand, Mello says that B knew the day his father would be murdered because of his shinigami eyes. On the other hand, Mello also says that the reason B had such an easy time killing his victims compared to other murderers was because they were going to die anyway.
- Isn't it obvious? Shinigami can interact directly with the physical world (Ryuk confirms this at one point by mentioning that if he ate an apple, it would disappear visibly even though he is invisible), so the rule deals with them deciding, for whatever reason, to do things like "making someone compact".
- The odds of this happening are about of one against 60 million for each death, assuming a mortality rate of 0.878% per year equal for everyone (criminals have a higher mortality rate, though) and a precision of one minute (it's closer to one second). The total number of deaths is unknown, so we can't get the chance of the whole story happening.
- The theory is true nonetheless. You simply cannot argue with chance here. If you propose a causal connection between the book and the deaths, then you have to present a theory of the exact nature of this connection that would not only have to be able to be tested empirically, but would also have to be better than any theory of those deaths that does not propose such a connection. But the thing is: You cannot. All of the deaths are already completely determined by natural causes, and there is no visible connection between those deaths.
- How Unscientific!. You don't just throw away several years of data on an assumption that a trillions-to-one chance happened. The Death Note clearly just operates using undiscovered, but still scientifically testable, mechanisms. Attribute it to Sufficiently Advanced Aliens if you want.
- Alternately, the Death Note has no inherent power, but Light is psychic. He's not causing all of those deaths, merely predicting them.
- ...Or Light and the other Kiras had THE POWER all along and the notebook is merely a Magic Feather.
- The multiverse theory states that there is are infinite number of universes with infinite number of rules. In that case, there would be two 'identical' universes, one where the Deathnote causes the deaths, and the other where the exact same events happen, but by random chance.
- Alternatively still, the Death-notes themselves give their users urges to write in them right before the person in question is killed, either to bring about the death of victims the note itself has targeted, or merely to present the illusion of having power.
- Death Notes are issued on a one-to-one basis (barring bribes, as seen in the Extra Chapter). Killing a human without using a Death Note is considered an Extreme-level crime whose punishment is concluded with the death of the offending Shinigami.
- Strict timetables are set for the possession of human Death Note users and recovery of Death Notes that have been relinquished from the human realm. But there is no timeline for the retrieval of a Death Note owned by a killed Shinigami - while the rules recommend returning it to the Shinigami King, the common practice is "Finders, Keepers."
- In the manga, it says that all humans go to nothingness, not just the Death Note users.
- There is a theory that Shinigami aren't really reapers but predators which kill humans without knowledge of their after-death fate. Given that I assume that Ryuk is some sort of... atheist.
- That does weaken the theory somewhat...still, is there any evidence that shinigami aren't what becomes of humans who use Death Notes?
- Ryuk isn't the most trustworthy source for information. He's deceived Light in the past; there's no reason to think he wasn't deceiving him then.
- Possibly, there are two nothingnesses: Purgatory for normal humans, and the Shinigami Realm for Death Note owners.
- I don't think you understand the concept of "nothingness".
- I actually figured that Mu was actually a place called "Nothingness", because the first letter is capitalized just as any place name is. If it were simply "nothingness" as in Cessation of Existence, there would be no need to capitalize it.
- Maybe you only become a Shinigami if you have used the Deathnote and have the right kind of personality for it. If Light did indeed become a Shinigami, then it would be due to his past experience with it and the fact he has no qualms with using it. Raye Penbar, on the other hand, wouldn't become a Shinigami because he didn't know what he was doing. He doesn't seem like the kind of person who would willfully use the Deathnote.
- Maybe only humans that use Death Notes to try to become God become Shinigami? Shinigami die by falling in love with a human, right? So if they were only humans that had used a Death Note, perhaps by accident, like Raye Penber or Light in the pilot, this wouldn't make sense.
- Or maybe when a deathnote-user dies and becomes a shinigami, they forget about everything 'except' the deathnote, sort of the opposite of when they discard a deathnote.
- Only Death Note owners become shinigami, not just Death Note users. Therefore, since Raye Penber never owned a Death Note, he's not a shinigami.
- The Shinigami not knowing about the Death Note is put down as a "too cool for school" attitude. They can get a rulebook any time they want; they're just too lazy.
- Before Rem and Gelus' deaths, there had always been 13 shinigami. Afterwards, there were only 11. When Light starts using the Death Note, he is put in the running for becoming a new shinigami. After he loses his memories, he's still the next choice until Higuchi (the business man?) starts using the Death Note. When Light regains his memories, he kills Higuchi and, in theory, beats him in the 'game.' Light could have become Gelus' replacement because of that or because he had a higher body count. Misa is supposed to have commited suicide around the end of the series, after Light's death. She would have become Rem's replacement (the replacement female shinigami). If she didn't, Mikami could have, since he also had a higher body count than both her and Hiuchi. He could have been Rem's replacement, since he wasn't as used by Light as Misa was.
- Then, you could think that the 'nothingness' that humans go to IS the Shinigami Realm, as in, the Shinigami Realm IS nothingness. That would explain the barren look. Or, as someone else said, there could be two nothingnesses: Purgatory and the Shinigami Realm. Evryone who didn't manage to beat the 'game' or other 'competition' to become new shinigami could have gone to Purgatory instead, save for Mello, who probably never used his notebook.
- In the manga, Ryuk specifically states that you go to mu when he says you go to nothingness. Mu is not Purgatory. Mu is an eastern concept for which the closest description I could give for it is "null". It means less than zero. Less than gone. Less than nonexistant. Going to mu means you become null; you simply cease to be.
- I figured that Mu was a place called Nothingness, since the first letter is capitalized like a place name in the Death Note rule card in the middle of an episode. Not sure if it's in all lowercase in the manga though.
- Then, you could think that the 'nothingness' that humans go to IS the Shinigami Realm, as in, the Shinigami Realm IS nothingness. That would explain the barren look. Or, as someone else said, there could be two nothingnesses: Purgatory and the Shinigami Realm. Evryone who didn't manage to beat the 'game' or other 'competition' to become new shinigami could have gone to Purgatory instead, save for Mello, who probably never used his notebook.
- Also, that shinigami that spoke with Ryuk in that one special episode mentioned earlier also threw Ryuk an apple in the same way Light used to, and wears some kind of weird tie and suit getup, which could have been some kind of skewed version of what Light wore in life. There's a picture somewhere on a Death Note wiki.
- The clothing thing would also make sense, since the other shinigami have human characteristics to their attire. One wears an Indian chief's headdress (the book can be dropped for anyone to pick up and use in any time period); another is covered in gold and wears a crown like a rich and greedy king might have. But, that also brings into question that fat slug-looking one that likes bananas from the extra Death note chapter and the other shinigami that's covered in eyes, though they could have been a fat or gluttinous woman and a voyeur.
- Rem was a pharaoh, or some other high-ranking egyptian, who used the note to gain power.
- Maybe Rem was Hatesphut?
- This being true, Ryuk is actually Light from the future after he becomes a shinigami. He gave the Death Note to his former human self, establishing a stable time loop. Think about it. They're both sadistic, manipulative liars. That's why Ryuk is constantly amused and having a good time. He knows how it turns out.
- Ryuk likes being amused. Light likes to take control of things and reach his goals for himself. It is still possible for his personality to become twisted in such way after experiencing eternal boredom, but this could apply to every character then.
- It's said that there aren't that many Shinigami left. (12 left.) they have to come from somewhere. Ryuk says a Shinigami dropping his note is an uncommon experience, then so is the creation of Shinigami.
- Death Note users become "proto-Shinigami"; this explains Light's flashing red eyes and his ability to run a marathon after being shot five times.
- Shinigami eyes cannot see the lifespans of Death Note owners because they "become hunters instead of prey."
- Also there's this when discussing the eye deal:
Ryuk: Don't worry Light, you're already a worthy Shinigami... - Both the manga's "several years later" one-shot and anime's "director's cut" special show the shinigami and their world a while after the events of the series. Light does not appear, and the shinigami openly discuss him in the past tense. There might be mention of something like this is an interview with the author, too, and it was rejected there as well.
- Unless you assume that IS Light talking to Ryuk and feeling nostalgic. It's a common framing device.
- The way Ryuk said "Light" in the end strongly suggests that Ryuk was talking to a Shinigami Light the whole time. This also explains why that shinigami cared about Ryuk's adventure — he could be Light with a fractured memory wanting to know the truth.
- This troper has seen Ryuk's final lines in Relight translated a couple of different interesting ways:
- Unless you assume that IS Light talking to Ryuk and feeling nostalgic. It's a common framing device.
- The biggest proof against this is Raye Penber. He used the Death Note, too; if humans who use Death Notes become Shinigami, then you'd think he would have just killed Light, especially since Light went after Naomi Misora.
- He only used a page of the Death Note. Just like with the memories, one must possess the entire note for it to count. As it stands, Raye only wrote the names in.
- It's logical to assume getting killed when you are human (or a Shinigami-inhabited human) ends the ownership of the Death Note you were using then, thus robbing Raye of his Death Note related memories, including those of Light killing him. Also, killing Light might be Shinigami-suicide, since it would have been done with the intention of saving the lives of thousands. Raye may not be willing to embrace what we could know in his Shinigami state to be oblivion.
- Another possibility — the lifespan was given to Light, not Raye; thus, Raye didn't become a Shinigami
- "Only a god of death that has passed on their Death Note to a human is able to kill the owner of the Death Note.", rule from How to Use: XXXIV. So the only shinigami that could've killed Light was Ryuk, even if Raye became shinigami (I don't think he did though, I think only owners of Death Note that were killed by "their" shinigami become shinigami), he couldn't kill Light.
- Alternatively, the pages are biodegradable (which makes sense, since they're already combustible) whenever they're outside the binding of the Death Note. Removed pages grow back up to the amount the Death Note was originally bound with.
- Since a Death Note can cause circulatory failure in humans without hearts (not necessarily The Heartless, but you get the idea) or with artificial hearts, it can make the impossible possible, and is thus Mwu La Flaaga. Or Kamina.
- And now they`re encouraging everyone to disseminate their names and faces in public...
- The last remaining one was destroyed after the conception of Christ, however, once the Bible Black finished beta testing.
- All but a single piece, where Shmi Skywalker's name has been written.
- So, writing a man's name...
- ...will get you this.
- Maybe he will just impregnate the next woman he has sex with - no matter which contraceptive they will use
- Or maybe we all go to Tales of MU when we die.
- I would rather say that Shinigami eyes and Eyes of Death Perception are counterparts, since one provides time and the other the cause of death. Assumieng they answer respectively questins "When" and "How" we can wonder wheather there are kinds of mystic eyes that provide answer to questions "Where" and "Why" a person would die.
- Even worse, it turns out "MU" actually stands for the Marvel Universe (A fate some would argue is even worse than an existence of nonexistence). And with so much disaster and no Death Note in existence there, any Death Note user is screwed.
- This troper thought that, from the capitalization, the above troper meant MU. Which this troper originally read as "Tales of Nothingness." It has no support whatsoever, though.
- Since when it mentions in the rules that they go to Mu (Nothingness), and the first letter is capitalized rather than not if it were just a word, I had assumed that Mu was simply a place called Nothingness, rather than a Cessation of Existence.
- At first, it looks like these two rules of the Death Note contradict each other:
- Users of the Death Note can go to neither heaven nor hell
- All humans eventually die, and where they go is Mu - nothingness.
- This discrepancy is accounted for by the fact that Heaven and Hell are WITHIN Mu, thus making both true - to illustrate, think of Mu as a continent. On that continent, there could be different regions, and thus, "countries" residing in those regions. Heaven and Hell are those "countries" - however, there is more to Mu than just these two regions. In between these "countries" is Purgatory, and a fourth region is possibly the Shinigami realm - Death Note users would end up in the massive areas between those regions or "countries" - purgatory. What these areas are like is a different matter, but the human soul does not seize to exist - rather, there is always a place for it to go, whether it's heaven, hell, to become a Shinigami, or just purgatory in between.
- No, it's the German spelling.
- They can't be killed by human means, but seems like natural causes like starvation and stuff do affect them; it might not kill them, but causes plenty of pain and suffering.
- Using a death note = using crystal meth?
- MY PRECIOUSSSSS!!1111
- In the movieverse, that means only Takada became a shinigami. And maybe B. It's never outright stated whether the LABB case happened in movieverse or not.
- It's mentioned early on in the L movie
- And the L movie's canon?
- Only for the movieverse
- It's mentioned early on in the L movie
- Eyebeams that kill people and drain their life
- That's kind of a step down from killing any one in the world just by writing their name down in a notebook.
- This is not that far-fetched, since Ryuk DID write fake rules into his notebook, when Light asked him to to fool L. Rem said, that the Shinigami King didn't declare it forbidden..
- Ryuk probably didn't even know that there was a time limit until Light and/or the Yotsuba group figured it out. Early on when Light is testing to see what he can do with the Note, Ryuk admits internally to not knowing about some of the things that Light discovers.
- You need a special eraser to do it.
- I'm in
- Wasn't there a rule somewhere that said those who traded for the eyes had them "forever" unless you forfeit ownership of the notebook? So if you attempted option 3 wouldn't they just grow back?
- That's if they decide to forfeit, but consider this: B never had that option. He was born with shinigami eyes. Now, maybe he's just a one in a million baby, but if there are others out there like him, born with shinigami eyes, it's more likely that they'd do one of the above.
- Wasn't there a rule somewhere that said those who traded for the eyes had them "forever" unless you forfeit ownership of the notebook? So if you attempted option 3 wouldn't they just grow back?
- Maybe that's part of why the Kira investigation stalled for five years.
- In fanfic form (NSFW).
The Unnamed Shinigami is actually Kira, having been formed bit by bit each time someone was killed by Sidou's Note. Since a majority of the people killed were by Light, Kira looks like him more than anybody else. Or, possibly, Kira is completely Light's personality, but obviously doesn't remember anything about being human, which is the reason that Shinigami don't know their origins. But he knew enough to seek out Ryuk to at least learn something of his history.
I first thought of this when Light said something about human history changing every few hundred, or thousand years, when a Death Note makes its way into the Human World and is used by humans. This made me think that possibly all of the horrors of human history, like the plague, wars and such, are all caused by Death Notes. Possibly, Ryuk is the newest Shinigami, not being used to the boredom like all of the other Shinigami. He's the youngest because he was created as a result of the most recent mass-death of humans, which ever event that was.
- What about people who have had heart attacks and not died?
- They happen to all have been immune to the notebook. Dun-dun-dun?
Raye Penbar, Misa, Light, Higuchi, Soichiro and Mikami.
- You forgot Takada, as well as that one flunkie of Mello's who wrote a name in it during the hostage exchange for Sayu.
- Keeping in mind the Japanese roots of Death Note, the Shinigami King could also go by the name of Enma (AKA Yama, the Buddhist/Hindu god of death).
- This could point even more to the thing that the PJO universe is implying.