Title: D.Gray-man
Author: Katsura Hoshino
Publisher: Shueisha
Language: Japanese
Page count: 41
Genre: Shounen, Battle
Publication Date: October 15, 2015
Three months have passed and we have received the 220th chapter of D.Gray-man! Chapter 219 left us with a cliffhanger that had the entire manga community cursing up a storm because three months couldn’t come fast enough! The 14th Noah and The Millennium Earl were the same being. Now Chapter 220 gives us an information dump and leaves us on, yet, another cliffhanger.
Allen, or Nea at this point, questions whether or not The Millennium Earl, or Mana, remembers what happened and it causes Mana to have a flashback where he looks at himself in a mirror. This part of the manga got pretty confusing, but reflecting on it, it starts to make a bit of sense as with most of Hoshino’s chapters. In the beginning, Mana devoured Nea and became a sole being. Thoughts began to plague Mana’s mind and he slowly went insane. He said that Mana no longer existed and that there was only The Millennium Earl. He even goes as far as to disfigure his own face so that he wouldn’t recognize himself if he were to look into a mirror again. That is how much Mana didn’t want to associate himself with that name any longer.
We then divert our attention away to Link. The search for Allen Walker is still being commenced by The Black Order and Link senses they are getting close when they find Timcanpy, Allen’s golemn. It is here that we get some nice internal conflict with Link as he knows Allen is the 14th Noah and must be stopped, but at the same time he remembers how kind and gentle Allen himself is. It’s really a tug-o-war of emotions with Link where he questions whether or not capturing him is the correct action, but in the end, he makes the tough decision that he must be brought in at all costs.
The chapter ends on the cliffhanger that Link locates Allen and activates his talisman, paralyzing him. It appears The Black Order has finally captured Allen Walker. It is assumed that Mana has escaped during this moment, but it’s only suggested.
Final Word
This was a slow-paced chapter, but that’s typically how it goes with information dumps. After the cliffhanger we saw in D.Gray-man 219, I had a feeling 220 would end up being this way. The information, however, still raises some questions that Hoshino seems to be dancing around. Questions such as:
How did Nea reincarnate if he became one with Mana? (I have a theory on that in a moment.)
How did Mana raise Allen?
If Allen is Nea, then how did Allen come to be? Is it an alias?
There’s still a lot of confusion that needs to be answered. With The Black Order capturing Allen (maybe) at the end of this chapter, I suspect it’s going to be a while before we find out. If The Order did, indeed, capture Allen, then perhaps with will interrogate him and that is how we will end up getting part two of the information dump. But again, this is assuming they really did capture Allen because even Link himself questioned the power of the 14th so it’s just possible that Allen may escape here as well. That’s the trouble of cliffhangers… it always makes you guess as to what will come next.
Now… for my theory on how Nea reincarnated, we have to take a look at one little interesting point in the chapter where Mana said that he needed to destroy The Heart. I’m not sure if it’s an English translation thing or not, but with the way the manga was worded, it seemed as if Mana devoured Nea in order to destroy the heart. The chapter is translated as “I must destroy the heart, which is why… which is why… I devoured Nea.” I mean, that translation is pretty direct so there really isn’t any shrouding of words here. It clearly states why Mana devoured Nea.
If that is true then we can formulate a theory here. If Nea/Allen is, indeed, The Heart of Innocence, it would explain how Nea was able to regenerate after being devoured. If we think back to when Tiki destroyed Allen’s arm, the particles of his innocence floated away into the air and re-entered Allen’s body. The end result was the Innocence regenerating into the Crown Clown form, giving Allen his first major power up in the series.
So what’s to say the same thing happened when Mana devoured Nea? That over time, the Innocence bonded with Nea and it caused him to regenerate? What does that also say about the power of The Heart? Is it indestructible? It’s just a theory that I have, but from past events and what is being explained, it seems to be heading in that direction.
I guess time will tell.
D.Gray-man Chapter 221 is due out in January 2016 so I guess we’ll have to see then.
Until next time,
Ja ne!
