Chapter Black Saga
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"Chapter Black" is the third of four sagas in the animated supernatural series Yu Yu Hakusho.
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[edit] Summary
"Chapter Black" is the story of the ex-spirit detective Sensui and his human comrades who have gained psychic powers. Current Spirit Detective Yusuke Urameshi and his comrades must band together and stop Sensui from his plan of creating a tunnel to the Demon World (Makai)
With the aid of Kuwabara, Kurama, Hiei, and Genkai, along with some other teenagers who have gained psychic powers, Yusuke combats Sensui and the rest of the seven psychics: Gatekeeper (a demon named Itsuki), Sniper (a teenager named Kaname Hagiri), Doctor (a doctor named Minoru Kamiya), Sea Man (a teenager named Kiyoshi Mitarai), Game Master (a child by the name of Amanuma), and Gourmet (a man named Sadai Makihara). All of these humans have been turned against their kind by a videotape known as "Chapter Black." Detailed on the tape are the chronicles of humanity's greatest sins, and seeing such atrocities can turn a human against other humans in as little as five minutes of viewing. Four of the seven are defeated in battle, while one defects to Yusuke's side after witnessing humanity's acts of kindness. Yusuke and Sensui engage in a battle to the death while the others are helpless to watch in another dimension. Koenma attempts to intervene and stop Sensui, but Yusuke will not allow it. Sensui slays Yusuke, part of the detective's plan to awaken the power potential within his friends. Kuwabara, Hiei, and Kurama travel through the completed tunnel and fight Sensui, but they are no match for him.
Meanwhile, in Spirit World, King Yama, Koenma's father, sends his special forces to Earth to deal with the problem, while given another secret order: destroy Yusuke's body. He tells Botan that Yusuke is a descendant of a demon known as the "Mazoku", and that his genes contain an atavism that would trigger in Yusuke's body. Yusuke awakens before his body is destroyed, thanks to the intervention of Koenma and Puu. With Koenma in tow, Yusuke flies off to Demon World to rejoin his friends, and fight Sensui again.
During his battle, Yusuke is possessed by the spirit of the ancestor who gave him his demon blood: Raizen. There, Raizen powers Yusuke up to immense proportions and deals Sensui a fatal wound. Yusuke is angered because he wanted to beat Sensui, but Itsuki responds that Sensui, diagnosed with a terminal disease,and would have died anyway. Itsuki takes Sensui's body away so that Koenma and his people would not judge him, and Yusuke, despite his curiosity about the ancestor who fought him, decides to return home instead.
[edit] Episodes
- 67: Returning to Living World
- 68: Setting the Trap
- 69: The Power of Taboo
- 70: Genkai's Ruse
- 71: The Tunnel
- 72: The Reader
- 73: The Doctor's Disease
- 74: Sleep, Doctor, Sleep
- 75: Caught in the Rain
- 76: Kuwabara: Awakening
- 77: Sensui's Fall
- 78: Divide and Conquer
- 79: The Human Race
- 80: Moving Target
- 81: Let the Games Begin
- 82: If You Could Play Forever
- 83: Game Over
- 84: Kurama's Anger, Gourmet's Guest
- 85: Spirit Detective Showdown
- 86: The Difference Maker
- 87: Power Between the Teeth
- 88: The True Face of Sensui
- 89: Death of a Spirit Detective
- 90: Attempting Revenge
- 91: Waking the Lost
- 92: The Proof
- 93: Sensui's End
- 94: Topside
[edit] Characters
Shinobu Sensui See Shinobu Sensui.
Itsuki (闇撫の樹): The main psychic and partner of Sensui, Itsuki's codename is the Gatekeeper. Itsuki was a demon attracted to Sensui, for his power and his purity. At first, Itsuki merely watched Sensui from a distance, although later on, Itsuki became akin to a guardian angel, fending off demons after Sensui secretly. However, when they met face-to-face, Itsuki was just another demon to judge in Sensui's eyes. The Detective won in their fight, and Itsuki asked for one last favor: to let him live one more day, so he could see the finale of his favorite television show. This made Sensui laugh, and he allowed Itsuki to live.
Itsuki taught Sensui about demons, how they were not all evil. He was amazed that Sensui was so pure and judgmental, but open to new ideas at the same time. The two became partners, and Itsuki helped Sensui on various missions. Koenma recognized Itsuki's power and allowed it.
After Sensui set his plan to purge humanity in action, Itsuki is in charge of opening the portal itself. He spent most of his time in the boat under the pseudo-space distortion, apparently, not even needing to sleep. The tunnel grew faster than he expected, and Itsuki comments that it seemed to have a life of its own.
Itsuki has tamed a demon, Ura-Otoko, that fed on human trash and lived in the bowels of the Earth. He was able to use this beast to separate Kazuma Kuwabara, Hiei, Sea Man (Kiyoshi Matari), and Kurama from Yusuke, allowing the battle between Spirit Detectives to be uninterrupted.
After Sensui's death, he takes the man's body to Limbo, where they can stay in silence for eternity.
Itsuki is openly affectionate to Sensui, and has stated, in both anime and manga, that he wished Sensui to become his lover. Itsuki recognizes the different facets of Sensui's psyche, and likes Shinobu the most, followed by Naru.
Kaname Hagiri (刃霧要): One of the humans who gained psychic powers, Hagiri, codenamed Sniper, Sniper was an extremely strong psychic. His specialty is long-ranged attacks with often non-lethal forms of ammunition, favoring dice and marbles, coated in his own energy to make them deadly. Sniper can make the item as strong as he chooses (such as enough to break the skin, but not hard enough to fracture the skull), and can fire with deadly accuracy from as far away as 500 meters.
Sniper also has a special talent known as the Death Print Bulls-eye, which allows him to never need to aim at his target, as long as the target is within his territory. Also, the objects can hit the target without ever missing, evidenced when Yusuke dodge two knives that it keeps following him which includes the truck.
Sniper trails Yusuke and marks him, nearly killing the Spirit Detective. Hiei comes to Yusuke's rescue and pierces Sniper with his sword. Amazingly, Sniper does not die from this; Hiei's wound was just a few inches from the heart, only enough to stun him. He's saved by Doctor. After high school, he disappears.
Sniper is 17 years old, born on December 3, and has a blood type of O. He lives with his older sister, brother, and mother; his sister is also a psychic, able to see into the past by touching things. He is also a direct tribute to the Akira character Shotaro Kaneda, wearing similar clothes and driving a bike practically identical to the one seen in the manga and anime.
Minoru Kamiya (神谷実): Dr. Kaimya is a human gifted with amazing psychic talents by the opening Makai door, and was recruited by Sensui. Codenamed Doctor, Kamiya has four distinct powers related to his medical knowledge. The first is to manipulate his energy and make his hands able to cut human flesh like a scalpel. The second is to alter his body chemistry to make him stronger and impervious to pain. The third is to infect anyone in his territory (which extends at least 8 floors straight up, and can cover the ground of a hospital) with a psychic disease spread by altered demon parasites. This disease causes most of those afflicted to pass out, and they die within a half hour of infection. The last of Kamiya's powers allows him to heal any cuts or injuries, even reattaching limbs, simply by touching them.
The Doctor first appears at the hospital where Murota, an ally of Yusuke's group, is being treated after being struck by one of Sniper's projectiles. When Yanagisawa and Murota are bitten by the Doctor's disease carriers, Kido (after splitting up from Yusuke and Genkai) is attempting to find the one responsible. Kido finds him, but is taken out of action when the doctor attacks his spine and paralyzes him. Kido is able to get this information to Yusuke through his own psychic powers, and Yusuke fights the crazed Doctor, who, after seeing Chapter Black and watching countless people die in the hospital, believes humanity is a disease.
The Doctor provokes Yusuke into killing him several times, but the Doctor himself is slightly afraid of death. The Doctor tries to deceive Yusuke into saving him, but Murota's mind-reading and Yana copying a nurse, who can get close enough to the Doctor without realizing it's Yusuke's ally, and splashing him with acid, allows Yusuke to brutally attack him. However, he is saved by Genkai, who doesn't want death to be on Yusuke's conscience.
The Doctor is arrested, but he escapes from prison. While he's loose, he finds and heals Sniper, then alters his appearance using his powers as a cosmetic surgeon, and starts a clinic known as the "House of Miracle Hands", where he cures people using his various powers. Also, he somewhat regained his sanity after learning that Sensui is just using him and the other five.
Kiyoshi Mitarai (御手洗清志): A young, extremely gifted psychic, Mitarai was a kid constantly bullied and ridiculed as an outsider by all of the others, developing a deep mysandry because of this. He was recruited by Sensui to take revenge on all of those who hurt him.
Codenamed Sea Man, Master of the Floods, Mitarai's territory is actually a separate dimension composed entirely of water. The physical conduits of that realm are monsters Sea Man creates by mixing his blood with water. The more blood Sea Man uses and the more moisture in the air, the bigger the monster becomes, thus, Sea Man's powers work best in the rain.
Sea Man is sent to take out Kuwabara after he and his friends go out for a night on the town, leaving the safety of the group. There, Sea Man ambushes Kuwabara and his friends, and holds Kuwabara's three friends captive while the two men argue their convictions. Despite his hatred of humanity due to being vilified and seeing the entirety of Chapter Black, Sea Man's ideals are not as strong as Kuwabara, and Sea Man becomes defensive whenever he is attacked. He takes his anger out on Kuwabara's friends, stabbing one in the leg, and then encasing them in his monster, effectively drowning them. Kuwabara tries to save them, but gets caught. But Kuwabara's powers awaken and slice through the monster, knocking out Sea Man and rescuing his friends.
Sea Man thinks he's going to be killed, but Kuwabara can't do that. Kuwabara believes that Sea Man is a scared little boy, confused and hurt, calling out for help. He picks up the barely-conscious psychic and his three unconscious friends and hauls them all back. There, he is treated and interrogated, and he tells them about what he has seen in the Chapter Black.
Sniper interrupts and draws the crew outside, leaving Sea Man and the girls away, and that's when Sensui attacks them with a ball of energy. Sea Man is nearly crushed, but saved by Botan, who shoves him out of the way and is crushed in his place. He's orribly confused by the kindness of humans, when Chapter Black showed him nothing but atrocities; Kurama responds that Chapter Black is a one-sided argument, and not meant to be viewed by itself. He becomes resolute, and changes his ways, hoping to help Kuwabara, kidnapped by Sensui because of his powers.
Sea Man proves himself against his former comrades; Both Game Master and Gourmet try to make him waiver by pointing out that Yusuke's crew would never trust a traitor, and that Kuwabara could be killed simply to punish Sea Man for betraying. But Sea Man becomes resolute, and leads Yusuke's crew right to Sensui. He even defends Yusuke from the Spirit World Special Forces.
After the conflict is over, Mitarai is accepted into the city's finest high school. He remains close friends with Kuwabara.
He is aged 14, born on February 10, and has a blood type of A.
Tsukihito Amanuma (天沼月人): Amanuma is the youngest of the seven, and codenamed "Game Master". His power allows any video game to come to life in his territory, and all who enter, including the Game Master himself, are bound by the rules of the game.
Amanuma is amazingly good at games, having no one else to turn to, since kids picked on him for being weird, and his parents spend their time working and fighting with each other. Only Sensui has beaten him at a game, and he joins Sensui's team because he's the only one who ever cared for him.
Unlike crazed psychics like the Doctor or Sniper, Game Master is cheerful, bright, and pleasant. He can be a bit smarmy and competitive, but he doesn't plan on killing Yusuke's crew himself; Game Master plans to trap Yusuke's team in his territory by playing games, specifically choosing Goblin City, until Sensui opens the tunnel. After this, Game Master will throw the match and let Yusuke out. Until then, even if Yusuke's team loses all the time, Game Master will allow them to start again if they want to.
However, Sensui betrays the boy. The game Goblin City depicts the death of the Goblin King (the part Game Master plays, being the villain) if the heroes win. Thus, if Game Master throws the game or loses, he will die. Kurama figures out this plan and reveals it to Game Master. Torn and confused between the only person who was kind to him and the realization that Kurama was right, Game Master is distracted and cannot beat Kurama at a Tetris-esque game. A very disturbed Kurama wins, and Game Master perishes.
Kaito takes the boy's body out of the cave, only to pass Koenma on the way out, where Koenma uses his pacificer to return the boy's soul, feeling guilty that Sensui, the man the Prince of Spirit World created, caused the death of an innocent, yet foolish child.
After the conflict is over, Game Master makes a lot of new friends and goes to a private school. He is aged 12, born on November 7, and has a blood type of B.
Sadao Makihara (巻原定男): The psychic known as Gourmet for his uncanny ability to eat anything he wants and gain its powers, Gourmet is the catalyst behind Sensui's plan to cut the Kekkai Barrier, along with Kuwabara. Since Kuwabara would never willingly do such a thing, Sensui will have Gourmet eat Kuwabara and gain his powers. However, Gourmet consumes the Elder Toguro, whose existence proves to be too strong, and takes over his body, effectively killing the psychic, but still retaining his body and his power. However, Kurama is able to destroy the heinous ex-human by condemning him for eternity in the arms of the Sinning Tree, a plant that makes its victim experience a horrible fear while draining them of life. But since Elder Toguro is immortal, he will be cursed for eternity; in Kurama's own words, that fits him, since Elder Toguro doesn't even deserve to properly die.
Asato Kido (木戸亜沙斗): Kido is a human with psychic powers. He appears early in the saga in a plot arranged by Genkai to let Yusuke see what he will be encountering with Sensui and the others. Kido's power is with shadows. By stepping on someone's shadow, he paralyzes them and renders them immobile. Kido can also move his shadow independently from his body and affect the natural world, such as writing a name in blood while otherwise paralyzed. He is friends with Yana and Kaitou, who all reside in Mushiyori City.
Mitsunari Yanagisawa (柳沢みつなり): Yanagisawa (known to all as simply Yana) is in league with Kido and Kaitou in Genkai's plot. His power is the Copy Technique. With it, he is able to fully become another person, copying everything about them including their physical appearance, memories, and even their energy imprint, which renders Botan's Megiru Seals incapable of determining the difference.
Yuu Kaitou (海藤優): Kaitou is a human with the ability to steal souls through words. In his territory, he sets a taboo word; If anyone in the territory says the taboo word, their soul will be taken. Kaitou is also Kurama's rival at school; he is very jealous of the ever-studious Kurama and is tired of always coming in second to him. Even though he is only supposed to be playing along with Genkai's trap, he really does try his hardest to defeat Kurama, but ends up losing. Kaitou does come out on top in the Three Kings Saga, with Kurama coming in second for once. Kaitou is the only one of the three (Kido, Yana, and himself) to appear after the Chapter Black Saga.
Shigeru Murota (室田繁): Murota is a human with the ability to read minds. He starts a fight with Yusuke in a restaurant, thinking he can defeat him. Even with his powers, Murota is still defeated in the brawl. He is later injured by Sniper, and taken to the hospital where Doctor is and is poisoned by a Makai Insect. Shortly after helping Yusuke in defeating Doctor, Murota is attacked and consumed by Gourmet.
[edit] Trivia
The first filler season of Bleach, the Bount Arc, seems to be based off and inspired by the Chapter Black Saga. Similarities include a test in the beginning in the form of a dangerous mission, needing to find out the impostor during the test, and later, the real adversaries with a grudge against humanity.
[edit] External links
[edit] References
| YuYu Hakusho |
|---|
| Characters |
| Yusuke Urameshi | Kazuma Kuwabara | Keiko Yukimura (Kayko Yukimura) | Koenma | Botan | Hiei | Kurama | Genkai | Yukina |
| Story Arcs |
| Spirit Detective Saga | Dark Tournament Saga | Chapter Black Saga | Saga of the Three Kings | The Movie | Poltergeist Report |
| Other |
| YuYu Hakusho characters | Ability list | Manga chapters | Makai | Episodes | Trading Card Game |
