Acceptance

The most common interpretation of the end of EP2 since way back when is that Battler’s objective viewpoint is lost because he was deliriously drunk. But I never hear people talk about what might have actually happened.

There’s no need for a drunken hallucination excuse at all, right? There was never any rule that all fantasy scenes had to directly correspond to something that actually happened. The moment Battler opens the study door and we see a swarm of gold butterflies, that’s the trademark cue that ‘the following scene is a fantasy’. There’s no need to say ‘Battler was drunk and saw gold butterflies’, which feels a bit too convenient of an excuse. It’s easier to just say ‘everything after that point didn’t happen the way it’s depicted’. Battler being drunk just means that we don’t have to trust his viewpoint anymore…it doesn’t have to mean that he actually SEES the butterflies, Beatrice, and Kinzo. It just straight up didn’t happen.

So what did happen? I don’t think there’s any real reason to doubt that Genji came to the room and talked to him (albeit not about his bust size). He says that the ceremony ended after the 8th twilight – that’s before we even get to the part where ‘the witch will revive’. Because Shannon is dead. So Genji feels like it’s okay to come clean and answer any of the questions Battler might have. Genji isn’t gonna shut off the bomb or anything like that, but I think he probably feels like he owes it to the person his late Master cared about so much to understand a little better about what happened and why. He even tries to make sure Battler’s heart is prepared to hear everything he’s about to tell – and show (”what you see is as it appears”).

I think Genji lead Battler into Kinzo’s study, and through the tunnel (okay it’s been a while since I read but there WAS some sort of secret path down to Kuwadorian from the study, right? I’m pretty sure I remember being pissed about that after how often the ‘no hidden doors’ thing was stressed) into the room with the gold. Seeing all that gold Battler has no choice but to believe all the other crazy things Genji is about to tell him. Knowing Genji though, I doubt he’d just open up and start explaining the story from the beginning. He probably really did just let Battler ask questions, and answered those questions, rather than speaking for himself. Battler’s questions are exactly as we see him as ‘Beatrice’ in the fantasy scene. And Genji answers them. And everything makes sense. But now it doesn’t matter anymore because everyone’s dead and they’re gonna explode any minute now.

It’s probably not even necessary to speculate about ‘what really happened’ in the first place, since EP2 is just a tale written down by Yasu. But isn’t the whole point of her (and Tohya) writing these stories down for us to try and think about what it means? Isn’t it a little easy to just say ‘Battler was drunk and hallucinated butterflies’ and call it a day? I think this is a bit more in line with what we see, once you remove the butterflies, Beatrice and Kinzo from the equation. And I do think it’s something Genji would do. He was loyal to a fault, but he wasn’t Yasu, and probably didn’t quite hold her same feeling of DON’T SPELL IT OUT FOR HIM IF HE CAN’T FIGURE IT OUT FOR HIMSELFery. Once he found her dead, he probably thought it was okay to let at least Battler understand the truth, since they were all going to die anyways.