Advance is probably the most nonsensical technique we've gotten elaboration on up until this point in terms of martial arts. Even Setsuna's wacky spins of death are at least vaguely supposed to be working off muscle power applied in a hyper specific way. How do Ohma and the Kure beat their hearts faster though? How is that a consciously controllable action you can do? Its the closest the series comes to brushing with chi where almost everything else is justified as just moving around bodies.
Our current tier list of silliness by my reckoning:
Advance/Removal
Literally Everything Hanafusa Does
Nikaido's Hypnosis Clap Thing
Rakshasa's Palm
Niko Style: Indestructible
Niko Style: Redirection
Razor Edge
Advance is probably the most nonsensical technique we've gotten elaboration on up until this point in terms of martial arts. Even Setsuna's wacky spins of death are at least vaguely supposed to be working off muscle power applied in a hyper specific way. How do Ohma and the Kure beat their hearts faster though? How is that a consciously controllable action you can do? Its the closest the series comes to brushing with chi where almost everything else is justified as just moving around bodies.
Our current tier list of silliness by my reckoning:
Advance/Removal
Literally Everything Hanafusa Does
Nikaido's Hypnosis Clap Thing
Rakshasa's Palm
Niko Style: Indestructible
Niko Style: Redirection
Razor Edge
I mean it's just biofeedback exaggerated to extremes, similar to most of the enhanced reality stuff in the series. Your heart rate isn't a total black box, you can kinda fuck with it, just obviously not to these extremes. And the Advance is basically just having a body that's naturally able to endure putting out more force than usual combined with some self hypnosis. It absolutely isn't realistic, but I'd say it's more sensible than pinch grip letting you act like your fingers are bladed weapons.
I assumed you put Advance and Removal on top because Hanafusa's nonsense doesn't count as martial arts. But no, apparently you genuinely think every mad scientist trick Hanafusa has is more plausible than conscious hysteric strength on steroids.
For the record, my implausibility ranking for those things would be:
What I love about Advance is that, like. Okay so we have a pseudoscientific explanation for how it works. We have the actual on-screen depiction of it providing literal super strength and super speed and a berserk state of mind.
At no point, in any of this, is there any attempt to explain how triggering the Advance causes a steam explosion powerful enough to blast a way a bunch of sand.
It's not like Ohma is jumping here. Or even physically moving in any way. He literally just pushes the 'mental trigger' of the Advance while lying prone on the ground, and his Power Up Aura kicks in and conceals him in a massive blast of light and plume of sand/dust before he begins to slowly pull himself up.
Of everything else in Kengan Ashura this may be the small detail that most purely exists for no other reason than the Rule of Cool.
If we are just pointing out magic, Cosme's last fight would certainly count. Like, dude was pushing his broken ribs into his internal organs in alphabetical order or whatever, and then it was time for peak lifetime athletic performance.
Of course none of this applies to Kuroki's Devil Lance, which is clearly the most realistic and grounded of techniques. We question not the Bearded God.
If we are just pointing out magic, Cosme's last fight would certainly count. Like, dude was pushing his broken ribs into his internal organs in alphabetical order or whatever, and then it was time for peak lifetime athletic performance.
At no point, in any of this, is there any attempt to explain how triggering the Advance causes a steam explosion powerful enough to blast a way a bunch of sand.
Please pay attention, theres no sand in the arena its just concrete, steam explosions occur because steam is at a high pressure, Advance raises blood pressure.
Putting these all together its clear that that isn't a steam explosion, its a blood explosion. Ohma is going to die and Rian is too busy processing body horror that Hamafusa would have a hard time coming up with to fight back. Its all clearly laid out.
Advance doesn't actually increase physical capabilities people are just too horrified by watching a human turn into a short horned lizard.
So it just feels like Ohma gets so much faster and more powerful. View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE_fZNZjJcQ
Worlds greatest intimidation technique.
Red or white, I chalk that battle aura up to artistic license, like when fighters are drawn twice as tall as the referees or face punches cause their necks to turn 270 degrees or something.
But, in my opinion, it's a very silly artistic choice to make when trying to convince people that your hero's power up is something grounded and not literally Super Saiyan..
Red or white, I chalk that battle aura up to artistic license, like when fighters are drawn twice as tall as the referees or face punches cause their necks to turn 270 degrees or something.
But, in my opinion, it's a very silly artistic choice to make when trying to convince people that your hero's power up is something grounded and not literally Super Saiyan..
Honestly, the Advance is more like the Kaio-ken than super saiyan. Temporary boost, can be pushed to arbitrary levels, turns you red, comically damaging to the body, forced to use it by his opponent to accomplish anything...
Oh wow, Raian really is Saiyan Saga Vegeta if Toriyama thought Vegeta was the coolest.
Really, Kengan is all over the place. You have characters who would be entirely plausible in real life as major competitors in this kind of event (Okubo, Kaolan, Cosmo), characters who are clearly rooted in reality but either have a less effective martial arts background or are exaggerated to some degree (Kuroki, Sekibayashi, Saw Paing), characters who have a terrible background for this kind of event but could still sort of exist (Julius, Hatsumi, Karo), characters who are centered around blatantly superhuman abilities (Rihito, Muteba, Bando), and characters where the martial art they practice doesn't exist and trying to recreate their fighting style would probably literally kill you (Raian, Hanafusa, Kiryu).
Honestly, the Advance is more like the Kaio-ken than super saiyan. Temporary boost, can be pushed to arbitrary levels, turns you red, comically damaging to the body, forced to use it by his opponent to accomplish anything...
"Fun" fact! You know that one time in Z where Vegeta works out a Super Saiyan form that is just super muscly and strong but turned out to be very useless to fight Cell with? Yeah that happens in Omega. There's a guy who does that there to fight Wakatsuki and then he dies at the end of the fight.
One of his techniques included throwing his blood at Wakatsuki like they were bullets just to mess with him. Because his blood pressure was that strong due to the Advance.
There's a guy who does that there to fight Wakatsuki and then he dies at the end of the fight.
One of his techniques included throwing his blood at Wakatsuki like they were bullets just to mess with him. Because his blood pressure was that strong due to the Advance.
(Okay, before we begin, just gonna drop a note here of a new form of notation I'm gonna use. I'm sick of not having a convenient way to refer to which match I mean, and don't want to just count onwards from 16, so in future I'm going to use the round number and match number in sequence to refer to matches. So, for example, Wakatsuki vs Murobochi is 1-5. And Cosmo vs Akoya is 2-1. Is that clear? Okay, brilliant.
Let the show begin.)
The arena is filled with the echoing impact of bone on meat, meat on stone, and the reverberations of unyielding force.
Kengan Asura, for all that its fight scenes are all 1v1s in a bare arena of flat concrete, has pretty consistently managed an absolutely shocking level of variety in its matches. And Match 2-2 is no exception. Previous rounds weren't without their displays of absurd physicality, and in plenty of cases fighters were pretty fast, but only one fight of the first round leant real hard into the speedster angle. And that was a one-sided domination. This is, at least going by the front page, a pretty even match between two ridiculously fast men. The ground around them is filled with plumes of dust as they zip back and forth, trading blows the audience couldn't hope to perceive.
And by god, each of these gross, veiny men is giving as good as they're getting.
Down in the Kure Quarters, confusion is spreading. There's the obvious kind, Kure Reiichi is baffled that Raian isn't using the Kure techniques. I guess given he's already let the Removal Cat out of the bag, it's fair to ask why he isn't going the whole way, but you'd think Reiichi would know Raian better than that. Raian doesn't enjoy fighting, he enjoys one-sided domination. Or…usually he does. See, Hollis notes that exact fact, and points out that Raian is actually having fun. He is, possibly for the first time, actually enjoying a fight.
This is actually kind of a fun character note? Especially once we move to the next page and get some of Raian's internal monologue, which clarifies that yeah! He is! Raian's actually having fun. Which would be neat to me on its own, if slightly questionable for the fight's direction, if not for two important factors. One, Raian's actual thoughts are that if he uses a Kure Technique, it'll be over too soon. Two, given what we heard last chapter, he's pretty much kind of winning. The removal was designed for his family, it unleashes their true strength rather than pushing them beyond their limits. Even just matching Ohma blow for blow is basically winning the exchange, since Ohma is literally killing himself to keep up. At this point the fight is, essentially, a more grounded riff on Goku vs Vegeta in very early Dragonball Z. The cocky, arrogant prince sandbagging out of sheer ego against the hero doing serious damage to himself just to not immediately lose. With the crucial difference that Raian's ego is, in this moment, contributing to his joy rather than fury.
Anyway, Raian screams at Ohma, demanding to know if that's all he has, as internally he demands to be allowed to keep enjoying this. More and more. And then things go from bad to worse.
As absolutely sick as this panel is (I love trailing eye-flames, I love them so much) it's a dire omen. Hanafusa cuts in immediately after, for a single panel, with his face set in stoney, utterly mirthless concern. The memory confusion has set in. It could already be too late for Ohma.
Not that it even occurs to Ohma himself, he's completely immersed in the fight. Grin an ugly rictus, he crouches down into a tackle of insane speed, catching hold of both Raian's legs. He doesn't knock the Kure over though, for all they skid across the arena with the force of it, and he gets thrown off. No sooner does he hit the floor though, than he's back on his feet. Ohma's face a mirror image of Raian's, eyes lit with unnatural vigour, as each spits blood and euphoria.
The next couple of pages are a fun little technique of contrast. Set to black backgrounds, the first is a series of individual panels highlighting a single moment, a single strike getting parried in meticulous detail. Two fists crashing together. A low kick hitting a raised shin. The two men closing in on each other. One page for these three moments, distinct and frozen in time, slows down the pace for a page and highlights the precision of the individual pages.
And then this.
This panel is essentially just an incoherent mess of impact effects and speed lines, without even more than the vaguest suggestion of human outlines in the mess of noise. And yet, it reads perfectly clearly as close combat of truly biblical speeds, essentially thanks to a still-motion version of the Kuleshov Effect! Which, for those unaware, is basically a principle of filmmaking that notes that more Meaning is created in the intersection of two shots than any one shot can create on its own. And here it is being employed basically to sell insane speed in this dumb fight manga. Aren't the nuts and bolts of art fun?
Incidentally, the slow page also gives us a really clear view of the fucked up skin these guys have, and it's actually relatively easy to tell Removal and the Advance apart, like that. Even without seeing faces it's easy to tell who's limb is whose.
The camera pulls back a bit then, to give us a better view of the running battle as Hanafusa sees it, and settle us into his perspective for a few panels as he makes a grim proclamation. It's time to make a decision, Yamashita. Continue the fight or not? Or, well, that's what he would say. He's actually cut off by the realisation that Yamashita is no longer even there. He's fled down the corridor, phone out, trying desperately to get in contact with his son. Possibly hoping to warn him about the Kure, so he can make some kind of escape. And the thing is? It's not out of fear Ohma will lose. No, he's specifically calling so that, with Kenzo out of the line of fire, he can throw in the towel for Ohma safely. He wants to save the lives of both young men.
Unfortunately, noone's going to pick up. The Kure have already gotten inside Kenzo's room, smashed it to bits, and have Kenzo on the floor. Pinned, with a blade ready to make good on their threat. Only kept safe, ish, by the fact the match hasn't actually ended yet.
And speaking off, we have a moment of mixed import. Ohma can see Raian's motions, the speed of his perception, his ability to process the things he see, has increased to the point he's not just predicting to trade blows. But can actually see what Raian is doing, and respond precisely. Unfortunately, the lettering of the thought is jumbled, some of it is backwards and its placement across the panel is off. Still, he's together enough to make use of the perception. In a beautifully drawn panel, Ohma ducks a blow and attacks in the same instant, snapping Raian's head back with a brutal elbow strike. He grins in satisfaction, even as the phantom from earlier returns to warn him it won't be enough. He still needs to draw deeper, pull forth more power. Ohma shouts, out loud mind you, at the hallucination to shut up.
And promptly eats a body shot so violent it takes up the whole page, the force visibly filling Ohma's chest like an exploding grenade. The only part of the page not consumed by the sheer violence of it is a little cut in from the phantom, basically saying I told you so.
There it is, there's the overweening ego that sits at the core of the character, and the flaw that stands proudest in the moments where he works. Convinced of his superiority, in his mind the fight ebbs and flows at his whim, the resistance of his foe but a spicy dusting of friction to make the game fun. But note the clouds of steam, the sound effects I'm pretty damn sure are panting. That's going to be important.
But then again, maybe not. Coughing an aerosol of blood, Ohma staggers and reels. He feels so…heavy. His body is beginning to fail him.
I was considering just describing these panels, since it's been so soon since the last screencap, but I just can't. Fucking look at this shit, god damn, what fucking awesomely grody and nasty imagery! The phantom peeling out of Ohma's flesh like a toxic layer of crude oil, the cracks and twitching spreading through Ohma's body. The last panel, where he's still such a slick, oily thing trailing sticky strands with a smile that's if anything even worse. His lips spreading so much further than his teeth, god fuck me it's unsettling.
And hey, oh boy, a sudden spike of intrigue and implication! We probably already figured this guy was important in Ohma's past, and not in a positive way, but this smells of motivation. What the fuck is the Tiger's Vessel? Why was Ohma considered such before? Why does this disqualify him? Ohma rages against the declaration, snarling incoherently. Bullshit, he thinks, the thought wavering in his mind. He can still-
Raian's hand takes him by the throat. He can't move fast enough to dodge it anymore, and we get a little bit of clarification. The Taboo Descendent isn't actually Raian's epithet. It refers to the clan as a whole. Within the clan, Kure Raian is known better as the Devil.
And the Devil destroys everything.
[Manic makes a wanking gesture with his hand]
This match has been growing on me, Kengan Asura, but don't push your fucking luck. You're still in for an extra long post-match roundup after this one exploring why Raian is such a fuckup.
God fucking damn the art goes hard here. Manic's only posted some of it but it's up there with 1-5 as some of the best work in the entire manga. If you haven't seen it for yourself you are sorely missing out.
It is somewhat hilarious that, somehow, this fight is essentially the process of Raian making a friend.
Anyhow, I'm gonna ignore the whole Tiger's Vessel thing, because Omega, and instead feel very thankful that we're finally here, in the spot where this fight starts getting interesting. I don't have many thoughts on this specific chapter that you haven't mentioned already (or that aren't better brought up later) so instead I'd like to point out how this fight has so far had basically the same construction as Cosmo vs Akoya, with the crucial difference that in place of Cosmo being tortured by Akoya, what we've had is Ohma basically killing himself to win. And yet the two feel very different, because Sandro is exceptional at pacing and weaving a the same three or four fight structurs into an entire manga's worth of great fights.
I'm going to briefly verge into massive, massive spoilers for the end of Kengan Ashura, open at your own risk:
Reading Kengan Ashura without being aware of Omega's existence was an experience. The whole concept of the Tiger's Vessel is brought up, teased as a mystery, some thoroughly inconclusive elements of answer are given without really explaining anything, and then Ohma fucking dies and the manga is over.
Welp, guess that ghost guy was right! Ohma wasn't 'the one' to be whatever the fuck that is! I suppose we'll never find out what a Worm or a Tiger's Vessel even is, because the story's over!
Honestly I kind of respected it. And learning that Omega 1) Exists and 2) Is bad kind of disappointed me, honestly.
