Pascalslilpunk - Antler

: ̗̀➛ALICE IN BORDERLAND

SHUNTARO CHISHIYA ———————————————————

about Chishiya, since the show watered him down ;p he actually was kind of heartless and never understood the concept of life and wasn't interested in it either. so if you're mad at someone for saying "awful" things he would have do, you're probably the one mischaracterizing him In his backstory (manga-based only), we learn that he was born into a family with no love and affection. his parents never showed interest in him; they only cared about work—actually, that much—that even if they didn't love each other anymore, they pretended to be happy so the hospital where the father worked—his father was the hospital head—wouldn't get into any scandals. chishiya basically grows up in a family with no feelings, and since he never got to know them, he still doesn't know them to this day. he wanted to check if he could feel anything by starting to work in his father's hospital as a student. he wanted to know if he could feel compassion toward any of the patients and if that would help him find an interest in life; guess what, it didn’t help, then he kind of gave up on himself and looking for any sense in life or finding a good in himself

but there was one thing that interested him since he was a child: it was the Mona Lisa painting. we see him looking at it, stating that he couldn't look away and that "everyone wants to be seen for who they are"; it is a reference to his history in various ways. first, the painting, in one of its meanings, is a visual representation of happiness. looking at what he said, it could be interpreted as him referring to his family, who are actually just pretenders and are "painted" happy. the second meaning refers to him, as he always felt different from others and viewed emotional people as stupid. because of that, other people couldn't understand him; he reminded himself of the painting when he tells arisu he just wanted someone to understand him. he said the Mona Lisa, in one theory, has been said to be Da Vinci himself dressed as a woman—which refers to people actually not knowing Da Vinci, just as people do not actually know and understand him.

in Borderland, his first game was 6 of Diamonds - a blackjack. there we could see how intelligent and observant he actually is. he never gambled before and was not only able to pick up the rules through observation but also invented a mathematical card counting method to decide how to bet. other players there couldn’t understand how a young man like him could act so calm and unbothered, but he simply had no concept of living and didn't care if he died or not. from the beginning, he only "helped" others when he saw they might be useful—that's why he helped Karube and gave him information about the beach since he was with Arisu, who he became interested in.

on the beach, he paired with Kuina, but they weren’t friends, as the show depicts; he had from the beginning planned to use her to steal the cards by himself when they were about to steal them together. he needed her to get closer to Arisu—to use him for his plan—he didn't care what was going to happen to them(arisu & usagi). kuina even asked him if he really didn't feel sorry at all, but of course, he doesn’t feel anything. Kuina later in the series even said she hates him just as much as she hates niragi 10 of hearts: after the start of the game, he leaves Kuina behind and is trying to kill Niragi; he says he's pissing him off since Niragi reminds him how awful he also is. both of them don’t care about other lives, killing and betraying them. Chishiya really hated niragi. he knew there was something wrong with him, but he couldn’t change and gave it up already in his backstory. he wants niragi dead so he won’t have to face the thought of how evil he actually is. also, when he learns Arisu is alive, he doesn’t try to solve the game; he knows Arisu will do it and that he doesn’t need to interfere. especially when it’s a heart game, he may be pretty good at them, but he doesn’t really like them since he isn’t good with emotions and never really understood other people's minds.

King of diamonds: there, as usual, Chishiya couldn't care less about his life and gives Kuzuryu the option to kill him. as i said, he never had the concept of life and was only in the borderlands looking for something interesting, like, for example, his beloved Mona Lisa painting. unexpectedly, Kuzuryu decides to sacrifice himself for Chishiya, which actually makes him wonder—how do people decide to sacrifice for others? Why do they do that? He contemplates the concept of empathy. Kuzuryu's sacrifice was like a breaking point for Chishiya because, before, Arisu's will to help others interested him, but what Kuzuryu did for him made him actually think about changing.

Arisu and Niragi: when the shooting started, because of what i wrote above and Arisu's speech before Usagi appears, he decides to take Usagi's bullet. He wants to do something nice in return, something out of character—as he said. he wanted to know how it feels to help others, to do something for someone instead of for himself. he then expressed thoughts about the Mona Lisa, stating he only wanted someone to understand him, and it happened to be Arisu and Niragi. He was glad to meet them and told Arisu his existence was just to show how empty humans can be—“I understand,” he responded. he came to the conclusion that he probably never wanted to learn about others and/or emotions because he was too jealous of them to think of it, viewing them as stupid instead. summarizing all his character: he was selfish, lacking humanity, and disinterested in life. so why, after all, did he decide to go back to the real world and survived the shooting? because of Arisu, Usagi, and Kuzuryu, he finally found a reason to live - to slowly change and try to understand what is humanity - i think that moment - him finding a reason to live - was the most beautiful part of his character. they were his new Mona Lisa, making him interested and causing him to think just like the painting did before; it was what he searched for in the borderland.

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pascalslilpunk

4 months ago