Ura Baito: Toubou Kinshi - Ch. 226 - "After-Work" ①

[Enchiladas_de_Mole]

On another note
I wish for Yume and Nago to be happy
A big trend for lovecraftian inspired stories is that knowledge is forbidden and hidden away due to its effect on the psyche of someone, ending usually in their death
I.E: if they ask you to do something, don't make questions!
Work, get money and live your life to the fullest while getting drunk!
To survive the horrors, drinks as much as possible!

 

[Enchiladas_de_Mole]

Finally
I love this manga
Really, I have invested 2 years and a half following it
I love the art, the stories, the characters...
But, I have to be that guy...
I would much have preferred that our protagonists remained as simple people instead of special abominations (yeah, I know, the mangaka from the very beginning established that Yume would be special, and the plot twist of Nago not remembering anything correctly was pretty good too, making for an interesting conclusion in the story...)
But I wish they remained as normal as possible
Living their dreams, ignoring the mess that their world truly is (just like real life woah!)
Anybody agrees?

 

[Hikineet]

Thanks for the chapter.

 

[fennec]

We're inching towards the end more and more... I'm really going to miss this series when it's gone ;_;

 

[zawarudo]

Soil is my favorite thriller in any media full stop and I will have to say that weirdly enough, a lot of Ura Baito's gray activity would not fall into the foreign bodies category. A lot of the gray I remember actually seemed to be following and upholding some kind of law, code, or order which would be the complete antithesis of Soil's foreign bodies from the path to the curse-breaking temple, the last Kuroiwa job, and hell even that god-like guy who resets things to right wrongs in the timeline (who we found out later has been MIA for a while). The only one I can remember that I can 100% say fits the bill is the quantum residue of that actor that kills anyone who tries to observe it.

The way I understand it, foreign bodies include anything that should not normally exist in reality, but if for some reason too many of them gather in one spot, then the connection between reality and irreality becomes stronger and stronger that eventually the border will break, making it much easier for irreality to spill over into reality. It is implied throughout the manga that even manmade objects intentionally built to be "out of this world" can count as a foreign body. Certain acts that are so bizarre you think it's "unbelievable" also count, I think. As more and more foreign bodies gather/happen in one place, they in turn invite even more foreign bodies until the boundary between reality and irreality breaks. However, once reality becomes folded too far into itself, it rubberbands violently, kicking out all foreign bodies and snapping everything back to normal or at least something approaching that state. I am looking at it from this angle. I am not sure which chapter, but in the Ura Baito universe, I think it was mentioned grays can't just "invade" our world willy nilly - like you said, there are "conditions" that have to be fulfilled for a gray phenomenon to take place. This is the root of my belief that the power of grays in the Ura Baito universe is directly correlated with how you perceive them and whether you comprehend them.

In my older comment above I referred to Daidai's condition as the inability to comprehend, or even perhaps an active refusal to comprehend. Since Daidai does not acknowledge a gray as something that is abnormal, they in turn seem to have absolutely no real power over her. What made me think of Soil is this aspect; I'm not saying that grays are identical to foreign bodies. In Soil, everyone thought the Suzushiros were real people (basically everyone refuses to see them as foreign bodies), and so they continued inviting more foreign bodies into the town, and so on. So, the act of observation and comprehension do not really come into play with foreign bodies; however, there are still quite describable rules; including how the infestation even started in the first place. There was a "patient zero" in Soil, which the very last page confirms to be Ms. Kosaka (and her actions).

What if there is also a "patient zero" in the Ura Baito universe?

 

[capricieux]

Otoh, wasn't it implied that the detective sister knew about Yume's past/abilities?

 

[ProHajikelist]

So basically Daidai is the anti-Yume: by having an absolutely empty cranium and never attempting to "understand anything" (the opposite of omniscience), she becomes impervious to any and all danger especially gray-related ones without having to even make an effort to avoid them. There is a fascinating implication here. Since Yume no longer has omniscience, she cannot just "know" that a gray job will have some Lovecraftian being messing around, so she readily accepts the jobs. But once on-site, the remnants of her power activates and she can perceive them faintly, narrowly avoiding the full brunt of the gray's influence each time and surviving. What this means IMO is that a gray's influence on you is mainly related to the act of observing it and understanding what it is.

Not observing it/be outside of its immediate area of influence - you're basically immune
Observing it but not giving a shit because you don't understand it and hence don't know that it's dangerous - still immune and can even interact with them freely (Daidai is here)
Recognizing signs that it is there, and your instincts tell you it's deadly - the gray can kind of affect you but you can still take measures to evade it (Yume is here)
Fully observing it, realizing what it is and what it can do, which breaks your mind - you are dead, or at least go insane (most of the victims in this manga are here)

One job that immediately came to mind when I was reading your comment was the Supermarket job or Personal Delivery job. In relation to realizing it breaking your mind. Or one that's incredibly extreme, Cotton Glove Dropper.

Oh, and so many of the people trying to use it to their advantage for some reason or another while assuming they're above that influence. Like the security job with Mr. Oogurai outright eating the pages, and by extension the people using him for entertainment. Or the "God of Luck" from the Shrine Maiden job. They were okay with being perceived and in some ways, used, up to a point. I guess another one that can fit here is the Livestreamer? Kind of?

I do like your DaiDai observation, it just reminded me of how she won over an entire group of Gray at that swap meet or whatever it was.

Although I think a fourth category here exists, ones that are beyond understanding for human mind, but still interact with them to some degree anyway. Like the Janitor Job Gray or The Great One. While some surface level understanding is there, in the grander scheme, they never figure it out and them figuring it out or not doesn't change the Gray messing with them, if that makes sense?

 

[zawarudo]

One job that immediately came to mind when I was reading your comment was the Supermarket job or Personal Delivery job. In relation to realizing it breaking your mind. Or one that's incredibly extreme, Cotton Glove Dropper.

Oh, and so many of the people trying to use it to their advantage for some reason or another while assuming they're above that influence. Like the security job with Mr. Oogurai outright eating the pages, and by extension the people using him for entertainment. Or the "God of Luck" from the Shrine Maiden job. They were okay with being perceived and in some ways, used, up to a point. I guess another one that can fit here is the Livestreamer? Kind of?

I do like your DaiDai observation, it just reminded me of how she won over an entire group of Gray at that swap meet or whatever it was.

Although I think a fourth category here exists, ones that are beyond understanding for human mind, but still interact with them to some degree anyway. Like the Janitor Job Gray or The Great One. While some surface level understanding is there, in the grander scheme, they never figure it out and them figuring it out or not doesn't change the Gray messing with them, if that makes sense?

Really fascinating bit about the Beyond.

Reading your comment, I remembered a concept that is found in many cultures (including mine) regarding the occult: that our world is actually interlaced with the other world, but normally you wouldn't be able to see or interact with it and its residents. However, once your Third Eye is open, the two worlds basically become one and the same and you will be able to see, smell, hear, feel everything. Think Insight from Bloodborne or Umbral Lamp from Lords of the Fallen 2023 where locations basically have two faces to them. Come to think of it, this can also work well with the reality/irreality concept in Soil.

There might be something similar to this in the Ura Baito universe. What if the grays are actually everywhere in the other world, but they cannot just manifest anywhere in the normal world because they can only be around places where there are enough opened Third Eyes (i.e. gray job applicants)? The recent supermarket job is kind of like this with Yume and Hama eventually seeing the real supermarket after they successfully escaped, which is nothing close to what it looks like when the gray zone is fully active.

Going from this premise, Daidai would be an extreme example of someone whose Third Eye is always fully closed and Yume would be Ultimate Eye 9000 whose sensitivity got toned down because she never needed it, at least before her parents are murdered. There might also be levels to this - such as the super grays you mentioned being on the extreme end of the spectrum, who can just ignore whether humans are able to perceive them or not and do whatever they want.

Just last week I was watching the Fake Documentary Q channel and its most recent video (which is very, very creepy) also plays around with this concept, which most likely was the little thing on the back of my mind that drove me to think about all of this. Some of its other videos also allude to this two-realm thing. Word of warning to those who want to check the channel out: be prepared to lose lots and lots of sleep over the videos.

 

[Sovyonok]

Really fascinating bit about the Beyond.

Reading your comment, I remembered a concept that is found in many cultures (including mine) regarding the occult: that our world is actually interlaced with the other world, but normally you wouldn't be able to see or interact with it and its residents. However, once your Third Eye is open, the two worlds basically become one and the same and you will be able to see, smell, hear, feel everything. Think Insight from Bloodborne or Umbral Lamp from Lords of the Fallen 2023 where locations basically have two faces to them. Come to think of it, this can also work well with the reality/irreality concept in Soil.

There might be something similar to this in the Ura Baito universe. What if the grays are actually everywhere in the other world, but they cannot just manifest anywhere in the normal world because they can only be around places where there are enough opened Third Eyes (i.e. gray job applicants)? The recent supermarket job is kind of like this with Yume and Hama eventually seeing the real supermarket after they successfully escaped, which is nothing close to what it looks like when the gray zone is fully active.

Going from this premise, Daidai would be an extreme example of someone whose Third Eye is always fully closed and Yume would be Ultimate Eye 9000 whose sensitivity got toned down because she never needed it, at least before her parents are murdered. There might also be levels to this - such as the super grays you mentioned being on the extreme end of the spectrum, who can just ignore whether humans are able to perceive them or not and do whatever they want.

Just last week I was watching the Fake Documentary Q channel and its most recent video (which is very, very creepy) also plays around with this concept, which most likely was the little thing on the back of my mind that drove me to think about all of this. Some of its other videos also allude to this two-realm thing. Word of warning to those who want to check the channel out: be prepared to lose lots and lots of sleep over the videos.

Good point about the worlds interlacing, that is the presence of other gray. I think the Observer job is a good example we saw as well, as all the, lets say undead, were focused on that plain and at the end start dropping in (introduction of Tokiko chapters). Tho i guess it varies from gray to gray on how much they overlap and on the "conditions" they need to fill/places they orbit. Park Caretaker was another fun example perhaps ? Whatever that big bug was, it was content on reaching out only in the park area and having it's own pocket to work in. Then we have Woodland Search chapters, where it seemed to be some ritualistic birth fulfillment and that green thing spreading out without a limit it seems. Fun to think about as a whole tho might be messy lol. Ofc we have Designer as well who might have acted as a dam this whole time (until recently where he stopped moving that is). Wasn't really going anywhere with this but fun to wreck my brain about it lol.

 

[ProHajikelist]

I was thinking something similar with chapters with colors involved. Like the forest search rescue, or the job on the boat where they were looking for God. As Kuroiwa mentioned, it's good that Yume and Hama didn't perceive it. Although, some think Hama could. And with these recent revelations, Yume most likely could before her parents' death.

Another thing I thought about with the Gray that kind of ties into the theory about needing gray job applicants is a lot of gray just mess with the world as they see fit but only in certain spaces. We have jobs going back to one of the very first ones with the black company that wouldn't even let you stop working until you die, to this most recent "final job" that took customers prior to the big reveal we see. One that I think about also in regards to this is the Shiro Azuma "thing" that they tailed for a while. It was fine with being perceived solely from the back, maybe the sides. The second you see it's face is when it got upset, and it only really walked in specific areas.

Some of the ones I mentioned before like Mr. Oogurai do make me wonder about this. Some Gray just kind of give a middle finger to any real rules, because they just do whatever they want, regardless of needing someone to activate it. And then others, that diner that would keep spawning every so often, filled with people killed long ago. It spawning again doesn't seem to be related to getting people to work there, BUT it does need people to circulate in. Or that one hotel with the cursed floor, it didn't seem to need to be gray workers, or even people to awaken to anything. It just needed enough seats until the ghost or whatever of that guy got what he wanted. I guess some of these would be more, "Super Grays" or something like that. Like how whatever that forest job was overrode everyone but Yume and Hama, the supermarket, that ghost thing from the school janitor job?