Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141
Tonikaku Kawaii Fly Me to the Moon 141
トニカクカワイイ 141

Spoiler Summary/Synopsis:

Yanagi-sensei teaches her class about the store of The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter. The story is about a couple who would be separated for good, and is about a thousand years old. In the story, Kaguya-hime gives the Emperor, whom she loved, a letter and the Elixir of Immortality before she returns to the moon. However, neither the Emperor nor old man who adopted Kaguya drank the potion, feeling that immortality was pointless if they could never see Kaguya again.

As such, the Emperor ordered Iwakasa to burn it at the top of Mount Suruga. The smoke from the fire is how the mountain’s name later changed to Fuji — the Immortal Mountain. After class, the girls in the class debate on whether it was right to burn the elixir. Kaguya believes not drinking the elixir was the right course of action and explains why.

At Nasa and Tsukasa’s residence, Tsukasa serves Nasa more rice. She expresses her happiness at having married Nasa since he understands her. Thus, marrying him was the best thing to happen to her. However, as Nasa looks at his wife, he recalls the day they met after he and she were hit by a truck. And yet a short time later, she was no longer a bloody mess.

Thoughts/Review:

The plot continues in Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141. Man, I’m sorta glad that my current work project has these “hurry up and wait” moments ’cause in those wait times, I’m able to keep pushing forward in the manga.

The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter

We’ve long known that the premise of this manga series was centered around the The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter story from Japanese mythology. Initially, there was a thought that Tsukasa was Kaguya, but then the real Kaguya-hime showed up in the manga. And apparently, her true identity is known to the girls Nasa teaches, based on their after class discussion of the Elixir of Immortality.

I’m fairly familiar with The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter. However, the name Iwakasa that was mentioned in Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141 was a new one to me. After doing some research, it appears Iwakasa is a character in the Touhou Project (video game) canon. The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter is part of the game’s canon, with some tweaks.

Touhou Project Version

In the Touhou Project story, Iwakasa is sent to Mount Fuji to burn the Elixir of Immortality. However, he’s met by Fujiwara no Mokou, the daughter of one of the princes whom Kaguya-hime had tasked with an impossible quest. The pair go to Mt. Fuji, only to be sent to another mountain, lest the potion cause the volcano to erupt.

Mokou ends up murdering Iwakasa and takes the potion out of a desire to try to get revenge on Kaguya-hime for the humiliation she caused Mokou’s father. After taking the potion, Mokou ends up regretting murdering Iwakasa and now has to deal with being an immortal. After hundreds of years, Mokou eventually takes the task of helping humans who get lost Bamboo Forest of the Lost.

Considering Hata-sensei’s love of games, and the longevity and popularity of Touhou Project, I think Hata-sensei is taking inspiration from the game’s version of The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter.

AstroNerdBoy’s Theory (Part 1)

If I’m correct and Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141 is “pulling” the Iwakasa character from the Touhou Project, than this is what I suspect.

Tsukasa is the Mokou character from Touhou Project. Nasa may or may not be the Iwakasa character in the story. Based on the events of chapter 120, I kind of suspect that Nasa is a reincarnation character who shows up over and over in Tsukasa’s life, but with no memory of his past lives with her.

That aside, if Tsukasa is Mokou, then it would explain why Tsukasa took the Elixir of Life to become immortal–she wants to avenge her father. Kaguya doesn’t actually end up returning to the moon in the Touhou version. So hundreds of years later when Mokou discovers this, it causes her to repeatedly battle Kaguya, who’s also immortal.

That could explain Tsukasa’s fight with Kaguya in chapter 130. Tsukasa seems to know Kaguya, and Kaguya plays coy with this notion. The Touhou version eventually had Mokou basically forgetting about Kaguya and dedicating her life to helping humans in need. And we know that Tsukasa spend time in the last few hundred years helping humans in need (assuming Nasa’s memory-dream was in fact a memory).

AstroNerdBoy’s Theory (Part 2)

So where does this lead us? Even assuming Hata-sensei is taking inspiration from the Touhou Project‘s version of The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, we have a time problem. The story may have been written as early as 871 A.D. Nasa’s memory dream, which features Tsukasa, is set in ~607 A.D., since the Houryuuji is a newly completed construction.

However, as Tonikaku Cawaii is a work of fiction, Hata-sensei can just state that while the story for The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter may have been written in the late 9th century, the actual events may have happened well prior to the 7th century, where Nasa’s memory dream was based. Thus, my theory is going to assume that.

Tsukasa takes the Elixir of Immortality. She kills the version of Nasa in the process, but then regrets that. She finds and battles Kaguya to avenge her father, but discovers Kaguya is also immortal, making the fight pointless. At some point, she becomes attached to Prince Shoutoku (Nasa reincarnated) as part of his staff, deciding to make his dream come true since he helped her in the past.

AstroNerdBoy’s Theory (Part 3)

As the many centuries pass, Tsukasa ends up helping humans in need. I think the little girl in the bombed out area from chapter 92 was Tokiko. I stated reasons in my chapter review, but basically, Tsukasa has always been 16 while the little girl in chapter 92 was clearly younger than 16 and the woman could have been 16.

That aside, Tsukasa took the young Tokiko in. However, as Tokiko aged and Tsukasa did not, it became necessary for Tokiko to pretend to be Tsukasa’s guardian. Some years later, Tsukasa finds and rescues Chitose, who’s apparently an orphan since she’s taken in by Tsukasa and Tokiko. While I believe Tsukasa cares about Tokiko and Chitose, there’s still a wall between Tsukasa and them.

However, when Tsukasa saves Nasa from death, she agrees to marry him if he’ll go out with her. As such, if Nasa keeps getting reincarnated, and Tsukasa recognizes him as such, then that could explain why she was willing to get so close to Nasa. Further, it would explain her words in Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141, where she’s so happy to have married Nasa.

Tsukasa may have come full circle with Nasa, especially if she murdered his first incarnation centuries ago. (Update: What am I thinking? Hata-sensei would never have Tsukasa murder anyone. 😅 I’m shifting my theory on this.) Now she can have forgiveness and finally find mortality again.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

How long has it been since a manga chapter inspired me to write so much? But that’s just the case with Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141. While I’m not bad at predicting things, I’m by no means an expert, as my Negima! theorizing proved. 😂😅

That said, I found Tonikaku Cawaii Chapter 141 to be quite good, even if ominous with the misunderstanding bit mentioned at the end of the chapter. As such, I expect trouble ahead for Nasa and Tsukasa, but we already know things will work out between them and Kaguya as well.