Kokou no Hito by Nabeta Yoshio & Sakamoto Shinichi

[MattC302]

I'm at chapter 80 now, this story is super awesome.
Great storytelling. The time jumps really losen up the story, I think this is a much better format then just telling it by chronology - it's well done, so it's not confusing with just a little focus while reading. Talking about the story of the K2 preperation mountain traversal here.
The whole story is packed with breathtaking double spreads and great shots, both in portraits as well as in environmental images.
The protagonist is really interesting, and the story rather deep.

I'm in love with this manga, absolutely worth reading.

Wow. You are reading really fast. I'm so glad you like it. I can't wait until you catch up to the current chapters so we can discuss current events.

[Roflkopt3r]

Just caught up with Ch. 108, so sad to have read through (the released parts) of such a great manga, now the waiting begins

That was an interesting come back of those two. And Mori is so incredibly honorable, rather spending his own money than to call and tell that it got stolen
I wonder how "Mori vs. Society" is going to continue and what will happen with that student girl with glasses. That will certainly become interesting

Also, perhaps you know:

How much money was stolen? When the professor gave him the envelope, he says it was 300,000 Yen. But when it was stolen, someone said something about 1,000,000 Yen, and Mori said he had 800k on his bank account which he had to fully spend. I'm a little confused here. (Though it seems it was 1 million, why else should he have to struggle hard with 800,000 else...)
And, do you have any idea if that plane crash of ch. 108 is related to any previously appearing character? Shibata Hideki rings a bell... (I'm so bad with remembering names -.-)

Kokou no Hito was a great read overall (overall sounds so diminishing, rather: In every aspect). Interesting protagonist (as well as side characters), great plot and storytelling (especially storytelling), big drama and amazing arts. Also, seemingly a huge effort on mountain climbing insider knowledge. I'm really looking forwards for further chapters.

[MattC302]

Just caught up with Ch. 108, so sad to have read through (the released parts) of such a great manga, now the waiting begins

The wait shouldn't be too bad. OMFGG Scans has been releasing chapters at a pretty good pace since they picked up this series at chapter 23.

That was an interesting come back of those two. And Mori is so incredibly honorable, rather spending his own money than to call and tell that it got stolen
I wonder how "Mori vs. Society" is going to continue and what will happen with that student girl with glasses. That will certainly become interesting

I was a little bummed to hear Mori say he couldn't trust anyone anymore. I feel like he has grown so much and it is a real shame for him to revert back to his old self. I have a feeling that college girl will play a role in restoring his faith in humanity/society.

Also, perhaps you know:

How much money was stolen? When the professor gave him the envelope, he says it was 300,000 Yen. But when it was stolen, someone said something about 1,000,000 Yen, and Mori said he had 800k on his bank account which he had to fully spend. I'm a little confused here. (Though it seems it was 1 million, why else should he have to struggle hard with 800,000 else...)
And, do you have any idea if that plane crash of ch. 108 is related to any previously appearing character? Shibata Hideki rings a bell... (I'm so bad with remembering names -.-)

I don't remember the amount of money the professor gave him, but maybe the 300,000 yen was for something else, like a job prior to this one. If it is a mistake, the exact amount of money probably isn't the important thing anyway. It is just the trigger for Mori's regression and future development. About the plane crash, I am not sure what is going on there. I don't remember that name(I am really bad with Japanese names). Is that the rich guy that Mori used to climb for? It could be his plane. Maybe Mori will find a survivor or something and carry him/her down the mountain.

Kokou no Hito was a great read overall (overall sounds so diminishing, rather: In every aspect). Interesting protagonist (as well as side characters), great plot and storytelling (especially storytelling), big drama and amazing arts. Also, seemingly a huge effort on mountain climbing insider knowledge. I'm really looking forwards for further chapters.

I'm really glad you like it. I hope more people discover this wonderful manga and join us in our discussion.

What did you think of Chapter 106 where Takemura is presumably drugged and the art gets all crazy? Also, what are your thoughts on some of the symbolism utilized in the art? Most of the time, I am not smart enough to figure out what it is suppose to mean/represent, but I am still glad it is there because it makes you think.

Do you remember when Mori and his team where training for K2 in the Japanese Alps and there was a blurred "streak" across the panel on this page and this page? I couldn't for the life of me figure out what that was and what it was suppose to mean, but kewl0210 and others at another forum explained to me that it is a skull:

I'm told that it is meant to be a memento mori, which means "remember your mortality". It is a technique known as anamorphic perspective and was supposedly popular among Baroque painters. Check out this painting called The Ambassadors for reference:

I think it is so very interesting that the mangaka would include something like this.

[Roflkopt3r]

Yeah the precise amount of money isn't that important after all, but it's good to have a scaling imo. It's a huge difference after all and Mori doesn't earn that much (or at least didn't do until so far).
That thing about Mori saying that he couldn't trust anyone anymore indeed was shocking for his developement. Yet I can't believe that he really ment it 100% seriously. At least to his employer/professor he seemed to have a very good relationship, and we even saw him smiling a couple of times in the latest parts. I hope for your idea too that that student girl will give him some confidence again.
I really wondered about that streak, too! Nice to know what it is after all, I thought "wtf, flying rock?". Kinda chose to ignore that without lookint at it further, what a mistake.

Ch. 106 was weird indeed, but I liked it
Very symbolic about the relation to women, imo the chapter was very well done though. It was easy to follow even though it was so abstract.

I think the symbolism and images he sometimes throw in often serve the purpose of symbolizing the feeling of a mountain track in a way "townsfolk" can understand. When Mori was climbing that japanese mountain and steadily thinking of K2 for example ("Now I would have to dodge an avalanche!"), he was shown standing on a broad street surrounded by big cars and trucks for a few pages, with a truck heading right at Mori. Probably to give us an idea of the extreme force, fear and noise and stuff of an avalanche heading right your way when you're trying to climb.
Obviously there is deeper symbolism than that, but I just remembered this one first. Such comparison of mountains to cities occurs a few times in the manga.
I also liked the scene when Mori saw that woman who tried to make a move on him as a praying mantis. Probably shows both his disgust and fear (a huge ugly bug and his fear of females - after all the female mantis is known to eat her sex partners)
Yet, after all it can be a little difficult to keep track of different timelines and symbolic scenes thrown in. Sometimes we are at two or three timelines at once and then get a symbolic scenes like that on this street inserted

Sometimes I think I read such manga too fast. I'm a focussed reader (no music or stuff) so I can usually keep track quite well, but sometimes I just think "damn are you stupid? How couldn't you notice that earlier?" to myself. The irony of that 32 yr old doctor for example, who dies on the northern alps when running into the avalanche. If I got it right, he had hallucinations of his dead friend's father chasing him, who on the other hand chased him to get more information about his son's death - leading to the only one knowing what happend living in paranoia and dying of it. (Or his mental condition was the cause of that accident to begin with, but I think there's no hint on that)
Was he even a doctor or do I just hallucinate that? I think he was shown in a brief flashback as a doctor who seemed kind of sociophobic (rather playing on a handheld than bothering with patients). I hope I can find that chapter again, I don't remember it very well.

All that stuff revolving around Mori's teammates was really nice imo. I wonder if we might see that old co-leader guy again, he might've survived, right? I really liked Ch. 81/82, "Niimi Taku's Lonelines" and "Nighthawk". Pretty poetic almost, and nicely done. Niimi was a cool character.
(had great panels: -1 -2 -3 -4 -5)

What I also noticed is that Kokou no Hito often shows sequences of pictures which follow the structure of the mind, how people think or how their eyes move and what they observe.
An example for latter case: Ch. 100
The confusing/chaotic stuff I mean with "like people think" seems to be mainly incorporated in the structure of storytelling. When there are several timelines at once plus those dream/imagination/symbolic scenes in between - that's pretty much showing Mori's mind from the inside I think. After all, thoughts are poorly structured and can be quite chaotic.


On a small side note: Damn, I feel personally insulted After I read the last chapter, some stupid side tried to give me advice what manga could be similar... "Category: Drama. One Piece"
What a comparison, Shonen li la lollypop world against this type of depressing and dark serious drama

[kewl0210]

Well, after marathoning translating this series once again, I got volume 13 done in under 24 hours. Now... I'm on to issue scans. Woo... If you wanna keep up with the story as I translate it, I always posted the high-res volume raws I scanned in the first chapter of each volume.

Glad to see some people here are discussing it here, too. I took it upon myself to scan and translate this manga because I loved it when I read it.
I usually remember everything I translate, but I don't recall where they were talking about money amounts. Mori lost the money that was given to him to cover expenses at the top of Mount Fuji at the weather station. The money is his bank account wasn't affected because he had his wallet on him, however that was only 800,000. He was so ashamed of what happened he didn't tell anyone and just went on like it hadn't happened. Using his own money and wages to make up for it, to the point where he got drastically underweight. I dunno how much has been covered in what's scanlated though. If there's somewhere that's not consistent I could double-check the raws. I know in one of those chapters I wrote "after college graduation" instead of "after high school graduation".

Also, the effects of what happened with Takemura in 106 don't become clear until the last few chapters that came out in YJ.

I did an explanation of Kunieda's story here I think people found clear:

Here's a quick explanation of Kunieda:
His character was kind of like, a side character who didn't gain much attention until the end. He almost never spoke except when they were discussing who stole Kase's wallet, and he said "there was no reason to look through people's bags". And he seemed to be obsessed with sex.

His backstory is this:
His real name is Murata. He is also a doctor and went to a medical college with a person named Tooru who became his best friend and he used to play video games with. (We see this in the beginning of Volume 6 I think)
Some years prior to the current story and the Northern Alps Traversal, he pushed his best friend Tooru and a girl named Eriko off a knife ridge (A really thin ridge that's like the width of a balance beam.) which killed them both. It seems that he thought his best friend and the girl Eriko were having a love affair behind his back and "making fun of him". He had fallen in love with Eriko and apparantly he became paranoid and obsessed with the fact that they had betrayed him or something of that air, and that the people he trusted the most, he couldn't trust anymore.

After this event, Murata was plagued with guilt over what he'd done. But still, he ran away from his crime and since it took place on a mountain with no witnesses besides him, the police had no evidence to make an arrest. However, it would seem he really did do it, and Kiriya, the old man who was Tooru's father, went after him to try to get him to tell the truth and find out what really happened to his son.
In order to escape the old man, Kiriya, Murata changed his identity multiple times and changed addresses. He supposedly had been ambushed by him at some point, with the guy waiting at his apartment. Kiriya never gave up and kept trying to find him, almost catching him several times, supposedly.

This made Murata start to get psychotic. And even though he was considered one of the best climbers in the country somehow, he was plagued by guilt and the idea that he would get caught. He also tried to rationalize it to himself saying "well it was their fault for doing that to me, that jackass and that slut". He was running away from his crime and his past, basically. It got so bad that at some point he started hallucinating that Kiriya was following him on the mountain. Niimi figures this out with the few phrases Kunieda said about it right before he died, and how it said "Murata" on stuff in his bag (We see this in some chapter. It's written in romaji originally anyhow, so someone might spot it.) He asked Mori not to tell anyone because Kunieda/Murata really was a good guy, just couldn't confess to what he'd done and it seemed he'd done it on impulse in a fit of jealous rage. He even always kept a photo of him, Tooru, and Eriko in his bag and kept it dear to him, never letting anyone look in his bag on the chance they'd see it. Kiriya, seeing Murata died in the newspaper article, came to Mori to try to get information. Mori respected Niimi and Murata's wishes by saying he didn't know anything, though actually Niimi had told him and he did know. Kiriya leaves basically with just seeing the picture, implying that Murata missed his friends and was sorry, really. Kiriya didn't understand that, though.

[Roflkopt3r]

Ah thanks for that summary about Kunieda, I didn't want to read it all over again only for that one character so soon after having it read the first time
Helped me to sum up the fragments I still remembered, totally forgot about the girlfriend thing. Perhaps his paranoid character was the cause of everything what happened to Kunieda then, and not the result (though it certainly became much worse after the event).

About the money on his bank account: Yeah obviously it wasn't stolen. I just mentioned it, because after the university money was lost he thought something like "I still got 800k on my bank account which I'll have to fully spend" (which is ~7100 €/almost 10.000$ - with such a job like he had that must've ment a long long time of saving).

[MattC302]

Chapters 109,110,111, and 112 are out thanks to OMFGG Scans.

Wow. Those were 4 amazing chapters. I'm glad the story is moving away from Miyamoto and his betrayal, though I don't think we have seen the last of that plot line.

Mori is so awesome. He rescued that girl just like I knew he would. And from his determination he showed to return home alive in the flash forward scene, I think he probably wants to return home to that girl. I think her name is Hana Katou. Maybe 3 years in the future, she is his girlfriend or wife.

[Roflkopt3r]

Wow it's crazy how much progress there is in these chapters, and great that four were released at once

Another time jump... how old is he then when climbing Nanga Parbat? 26? As "Katou Buntarou", interesting.
I don't know about Japanese habits, but isn't it usually the case that the family name of the husband is used for marriage if there hasn't been an explicit choice beeing made (or is it perhaps different in Japan?)? Perhaps that could mean that Buntarou doesn't really like his family or something like that...

First I thought "Hm, that must be the girl hallucinating" when Buntarou took off her clothes, it took me a moment to understand that it must be because of the humidity

Btw, there's nothing known about Buntarou's parents, is there? I just wondered. All there has been shown about them is that his mother once left him a note at home that she went out early, but other than that there hasn't been a single appearance or sign of them. So all we can know is that his mother is alive, but nothing beyond that. Kinda weird imo.

[MattC302]

I was wondering about his name too. Like you said, maybe he wanted to distance himself from his family to the point of dropping the family name. They seem to have done nothing for him and probably were the cause of his social issues. Or maybe he took Katou Hana's name because her family is prominent or something.

I don't recall any information given about his family. Maybe that will be a future plot line. I wouldn't mind seeing a flashback of Mori's childhood to see why he turned out the way he did.

[Roflkopt3r]

I was wondering about his name too. Like you said, maybe he wanted to distance himself from his family to the point of dropping the family name. They seem to have done nothing for him and probably were the cause of his social issues. Or maybe he took Katou Hana's name because her family is prominent or something.

I don't recall any information given about his family. Maybe that will be a future plot line. I wouldn't mind seeing a flashback of Mori's childhood to see why he turned out the way he did.

I don't think that his family was that much of a cause to Buntarou's character. Even this only one clue we have (the note) already tells us that his mother wasn't extremely careless at least (or that she at least did not intend to be this way, perhaps she had to do so much work or something like that.)
It might've been a concurrent though, that perhaps his parents weren't able to detect what's going on with Buntarou. Maybe it was Mizuki and his suicide who had more influence on him, after all Buntarou probably was different before that. He really seemed to have a friend in Mizuki, and after the suicide it appeared like he didn't have any friends at all anymore.

However, perhaps there really was something going on with them (me @ running around in circles verbally) if he dropped his family name x_x

Prominent? I don't really see that somehow, but who knows

Btw her name definitly is Katou. In Ch. 110, in her memories, someone is commenting about her, saying "That Katou-San. There's something a little off about her".

[MattC302]

I don't think that his family was that much of a cause to Buntarou's character. Even this only one clue we have (the note) already tells us that his mother wasn't extremely careless at least (or that she at least did not intend to be this way, perhaps she had to do so much work or something like that.)
It might've been a concurrent though, that perhaps his parents weren't able to detect what's going on with Buntarou. Maybe it was Mizuki and his suicide who had more influence on him, after all Buntarou probably was different before that. He really seemed to have a friend in Mizuki, and after the suicide it appeared like he didn't have any friends at all anymore.

However, perhaps there really was something going on with them (me @ running around in circles verbally) if he dropped his family name x_x

Prominent? I don't really see that somehow, but who knows

Btw her name definitly is Katou. In Ch. 110, in her memories, someone is commenting about her, saying "That Katou-San. There's something a little off about her".

Yeah, I think you are right. I pretty much forgot about Mizuki's suicide. I guess I need to reread the series. It has been a while.

[Roflkopt3r]

After realising that I was totally unable to conclude Kunieda's fate on my own, even I think that I have to re-read it (just five days or so after picking up the series ^^)
For a more complex work like this it can't be bad at least. There were too many details to grasp them all in the speed of a first read for me.

Reading a story a second time always makes a lot of things appearing clearer.

By the way, what do you think about this panel showing Buntarou carrying a cross up the mountain (when he's actually carrying Katou)? Is this something about absolution or repent? Did he perhaps already regret that he decided not to trust people anymore?

And what is the "wildfire" he's seeing when seeing naked Kato? After all Wildfire also is the chapter title. Was that the moment I fell in love with her or something like that? Would be a very surprising reaction, given his former aversion/disgust against women.

[MattC302]

By the way, what do you think about this panel showing Buntarou carrying a cross up the mountain (when he's actually carrying Katou)? Is this something about absolution or repent? Did he perhaps already regret that he decided not to trust people anymore?

And what is the "wildfire" he's seeing when seeing naked Kato? After all Wildfire also is the chapter title. Was that the moment I fell in love with her or something like that? Would be a very surprising reaction, given his former aversion/disgust against women.

I think the reason I don't remember much from the beginning is because things changed a lot after the initial time skip. Now that you reminded me of Mizuki, I hope even more that the plot touches on Mori's past.

Well, the first thing that comes to mind when seeing him carry the cross is that it represents Mori's burden or responsibility that he alone must cope with. I don't think it means that Katou is a burden on Mori, but that it was his responsibility to save her. I remember seeing a similar scene with Mori carrying a cross not too long ago in the manga, but I forget what chapter. In that case, I think I remember it representing something negative.

About the wildfire: The first thing that comes to mind in fire symbolism is that fire represents passion. That passion could come from both the sudden feeling that he needed to save this girls life and the fact that he was seeing a beautiful woman nude(something he is not used to).

[Roflkopt3r]

Yeah, the very same panel with cross was already used once, I'm quite sure of it. But tbh I don't remember the context
I'm not sure if this is about a burden... or perhaps it could be, it just didn't appear to me. I thought of the christian salvation aspect rather than of it beeing a burden, but obviously carrying a cross (to a place of crucification) isn't positive in itself.

Perhaps it is his fear? Of facing her, when she awakes? After all he's always trying to avoid people. It possibly could be both then: Carrying his cross -her- to face his fears, but ultimately gaining salvation from that. That would be very similar to the bible story as well I think, so perhaps this could be a valid explanation.

Just a sidenote: That corpse Buntarou finds at Nanga Parbat probably is a German climber from the 1930s. There's a flag shown on it: http://www.omfggscans.com/Reader/ser...%20111/173.png
Colours would match (Black/Red/Gold were on German flag during 1919-1933, too) and Nanga Parbat is known as the "Mountain of Fate for Germans" ("Schicksalsberg der Deutschen). Germany not only had a role in mountain climbing in general (many terms mentioned in Kokou no Hito are from German for example: Seil, Abseilen, Eisen, etc.), but also wanted achievements during that time, but couldn't get to Mt. Everest because it was on british territory. Thus they chose Nanga Parbat, but many mountaineers lost their lifes there.

[kewl0210]

Nanga Parbat take a big role in this current arc. The glossary at the end of volume 12 has a HUUUUUUGE thing about it and things relating to it.

Buntarou's parents are only rarely hinted at. In one chapter in part 1 there was a note that said something like "heat up this for dinner, signed mom." And in volume 13 he calls his mom and we hear only his side of the conversation. Couple things like that. They seem to be purposefully absent.

Katou Hana does play a big role in upcoming events, as is pretty clear. They discuss how Mori decided to take on her name instead of the other way around in one of the next few chapters.

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