Touhou ~ The Shinigami's Rowing Her Boat as Usual - Ch. 6

[MangaDex]

 

[Duribu]

A cute series! Happy end too, and even some Kasen. A+ all around.

 

[gouder]

Komachi = based and redpilled
Old hag = cringe and bluepilled

 

[luminary]

Nice! Really hope this artist will do more stuff.

 

[pavel94]

Lovely little series. Hopefully Azuma Aya will continue writing similar works in the future. There's something about her art that makes her works so easy to enjoy. Can's exactly pinpoint what exactly it is, but I honestly like her art the most of all the artist who had drawn Touhou, even though my mind tells me that Moe and Mizutaki have better art.

 

[Calvados]

@pavel94 If I had to guess, it's because Azuma Aya is really good at capturing the spirit of Touhou. She can capture all the serious, comedic, and charming parts in her art. Whenever I read her works, even the independent doujins, it always feels like she really understands what makes the world and characters resonate with so many people.

 

[justforthelulz]

Komachi is my spirit animal.

 

[Tahuantinsuyo]

Simple yet so touching, what a great read! The ghost at the end was the little girl's, right?

 

[Cloy552]

This was a really good one.

 

[skilodracus]

Oh man, this was a great story. Cute, straightforward, though I did think it would go on for a bit longer.

 

[charkan]

This work is approved by Zun, so it's canon I think.

 

[MoonlightwolfchanX]

Very cute final chapter. I really enjoyed the art, hopefully we get more stuff from this artist at some point.

 

[Swifft]

@charkan It literally is not and that's why every single chapter of this, and every series on the website it's hosted on aside from the Satori manga, begins with this alert explaining things:

Spoiler

https://wp.touhougarakuta.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/shinigami_1_0001.jpg
https://touhougarakuta.com/index_comic/shinigami/

本誌に掲載さわている漫画は幻想郷を幻視できる漫画家たちが自らの魂を振り絞って生み出したものであり内容についてはあくまでも、各浸画家に任されているものです。
そのため、 ZUN 氏の見解とは異なるネタ、 パロディ、 その他成分がふんだんに含まれていますがこれら Strange な Creation もありえたかもしれない作品の形としてお楽しみいただければ幸いです。
編集部ょり

The comics published in this magazine have been created by manga artists who can see the illusions of Gensokyo, squeezing their souls, and the content is left to each engraver.
Therefore, it contains a lot of material, parody, and other ingredients that are different from ZUN's view, but I hope that you can enjoy these Strange Creations as a possible form of work.
Editorial department

 

[Swifft]

I kind of enjoyed it but Komachi was so dramatically out of character it sort of killed things for me. She does care about people, but she also "cares about death". Death isn't something she fears; death is something she coaxes people into and is very comfortable with. She believes in death. She wants people to die, as they should. It's not psychopathic, she just knows that life goes on, ends, and life begins anew. She has literally canonically coaxed a child across the river, telling them to accept that they've departed, and regarding the child with no surprise because she sees this sort of thing constantly (people refusing to move on, children or adults, young or old: death. She is used to people dying; dealing with it is her job). Having her desperately care about saving people, or cherishing life MORE than death makes no real sense. She despises immortals, cherishes passing on, and honestly barely has a dramatic bone in her body. She's very relaxed, and has only ever gotten upset in canon over, you guessed it, people tampering with the cycle of life and death. The most she's done in an effort to "save" people has been delivering general warnings to be safe, and her reasoning was that less people dead means less work for her.

I can tell that Azuma really likes Komachi, but I feel like she gave Komachi an idealized character and personality that runs counter to her almost unnerving otherworldly nature in canon. This is Death, after all.

 

[WakasagiIsTheBest]

I think we can all agree that Komachi is cute and a good girl.

 

[Grimmycoffee]

@pavel94 They're fluffy.

@Swifft Where is that came from? I don't think I remember much about Komachi in canon

Well, that was a fine ride! I wonder if this artist will draw more

 

[Swifft]

@Grimmycoffee
Scarlet Weather Rhapsody, in which she calmly tells others how their afterlives will be, gets mad at Tenshi for messing with souls, and in her ending meets a dead child at the Sanzu River who doesn't want to let go of life; tells the kid that they should.

She gave out death forecasts in Alternative Facts in Eastern Utopia.

 

[DeadintheWater]

@Swifft She does also tell the kid to take as much time as they need. Which is, I think, where this depiction of Komachi is coming from. However, it is also noted in that ending that her tendency to do things like that is not good, and lead to Tenshi doing more damage than she could have if Komachi were moving souls over more rapidly. I can't remember why she was letting the kid take time, I think it was because either judgment or crossing the Sanzu is more difficult if you have attachments to life. So, she does care about humans, but in a very different, and as you said, otherworldly way.

Her comments during that route was also about what kind of ghost they would be, not what kind of afterlife they would get. Based on what we've seen so far, there is just Hell (including the beast realm), reincarnation, or the Netherworld. Nirvana is a huge unknown outside of removing souls from the cycle of life and death.

 

[Swifft]

@DeadintheWater >Her comments during that route was also about what kind of ghost they would be, not what kind of afterlife
I consider that the same thing. She was describing what their literal after-lives (their dead states) would be like

I've never said she doesn't care about humans. Obviously she does, and Reimu even considers her a friend as said in VFiS, but I don't see any reason she'd be bothered by death when she intrinsically understands its value and handles it daily.

 

[DeadintheWater]

@Swifft I didn't phrase that well. I wasn't disagreeing, I was stating that I can see how Azuma got to the depiction of Komachi's character from that same ending which shows that it is wrong.

>I consider that the same thing. She was describing what their literal after-lives (their dead states) would be like
I didn't think of it that way.