Dragons of Earth
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- This article about X/1999 is part of the X/1999 group of articles.
In the manga series X created by the popular mangaka circle CLAMP, the Dragons Of Earth (地の龍 Chi No Ryū?), also known as the Seven Angels (七の御使 Shichi No Mitsukai?), are a group of seven individuals who are fated to stand against the Dragons of Heaven in the apocalyptic battle on the Promised Day to determine the fate of the Earth and humanity. The Dragons of Earth ideologically represent the belief that conflicts between man and nature cannot be resolved peaceably, and that humans are on an irreversible path that will ultimately lead to the murder of the planet itself unless they are stopped. Unlike the Dragons of Heaven, the Dragons of Earth seem to have no common rationality for their acceptance of their roles as the destroyers of humanity. Many of the Dragons of Earth are textbook cases of antisocial, narcissistic, or avoidant behavior. They either lack the ability or desire to form meaningful bonds with other humans, or tend to form unhealthy relationships. Many of them seem to be amoral, not truly understanding why killing is intrinsically wrong. Although they all realize that humanity is destroying the Earth and that by removing humanity, they would be allowing for the Earth to be revived, they seem genuinely indifferent to this matter. Again at odds with the portrayal of the Dragons of Heaven, the Dragons of Earth lack the ability to create kekkai (barrier fields), and it seems to be the case that whenever a Dragon of Earth finally forms a sincere bond with another person or realizes that they wish to protect someone dear to them, they are shortly thereafter killed.
The Dragons of Earth are also known as the Seven Angels (translated also as the Seven Harbingers and the Seven Minions). Regarding the multiple translations for the title of the Seven Angels, the kanji 御使 is often translated into English as "angel", however, it's literal meaning is closer to a "messenger of authority" or a "servant of authority". While this ties in rather well with the etymological origins of the world angel (Ancient Greek, αγγελος, meaning "messenger"), the literal meaning of the kanji made for an awkward translation in the VIZ manga, resulting in the Angels being called "Harbingers". To add to the confusion, the official merchandising of the X movie in Japanese translated 御使 into "Minions" in English. The official translation, as per CLAMP's final word, stands as "the Seven Angels".
The sigil of the Dragons of Earth is a stylized representation of the Menorah.
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[edit] Monō Fūma
The primary antagonist, who, before his dark ascension, was a dear friend of Kamui's. Fūma is initially a kind and gentle person who helps his father dutifully and dotes upon his younger sister Kotori. After Nataku attacks Kyōgo and steals the first Shinken, Fūma's dying father tells him that he is Kamui's twin star. Accordingly, when Kamui chooses the Dragons of Heaven, Fūma is forced to become a Dragon of Earth, immediately attacking Kamui and killing Kotori. He proceeds to grant wishes to the characters with whom he interacts, in ways that oftentimes lead to their death or that of a loved one. Unlike in the movie, where Fūma is portrayed as sadistic, the manga portrays him in a less fiendish light.
Interestingly, it seems that Fūma (as the Kamui of the Dragons of Earth) can view, or in some other way sense, the true, heart-felt wishes of others—and even more strangely, it seems as though he is (at the very least) strongly compelled to grant the wishes of others, if not outright-forced to. Due to his perverse fixation with making his twin star suffer, and Kamui's acceptance of the treatment, it would suggest that Kamui wishes (or believes he deserves) to be tortured by Fūma. It should also be noted that Fūma does not always work in purely destructive ways; for instance, in volume fourteen of the manga, Fūma spares the life of a young girl and her mother before blasting Ebisu Garden Place to bits. His explanation for this seems to be that the young girl still truly wished to live.
As if to add to the complexity that is Fūma's character, even before his awakening, Fūma reminds whoever is looking at him of the person they care most about (to Nataku, Fūma looks like Tōjyō Masaki, the father of the girl Nataku was cloned from; to Subaru, he looks like Seishirō; to Yuzuriha, he looks like Kusanagi; to Karen, he looks like Seiichirō).
After Fūma's drastic transformation into the Kamui of the Dragons of Earth, he is referred to in the manga solely as "Kamui" (which sometimes makes for awkward translation, due to confusion with the actual Kamui). In fanon, Fūma is often referred to as "the Dark Kamui" or "the Shadow Kamui" in order to distinguish him both from his former personality as Monō Fūma and from Shirō Kamui.
Fūma makes an appearance in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE, where he is Seishirou's younger brother and a hunter of precious things.
- Power: powerful psychic, demonstrating both telekinetic and telepathic ability, the proverbial "power (authority) of God", the ability to sense a person's true wish, the obligation to grant a person's true wish.
- Trivia: The given name "Fūma" is meant as a play on words to be interpreted as "sealed truth" — which is very appropriate, given his character's nature.
- Relatives: Monō Kyōgo (father), Monō Saya (mother; deceased), Monō Kotori (sister)
- Romantic interests: Shirō Kamui
- X Tarot Card: The Sun, The Judgement? (speculative)
[edit] Kigai Yūto
A water master, Yūto is a polite but largely amoral bureaucrat in a sexual relationship with Kanoe. He sees Satsuki as a sort of protégée and attempts to educate her about emotions. In the anime, he is killed by Aoki and Karen, but not before mortally wounding Karen. Yūto actually originally appeared in a dōjinshi work of CLAMP's known as "Hagun Seisenki". In it, as a college student at CLAMP Campus, he was a comrade of Takamura Suō prior to becoming a Dragon of Earth. He has not yet died in the manga.
Yūto makes an appearance in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: mizutsukai (water master): hydrokinesis, generating water and controlling flows of liquid, specifically in the form of water balls and pillars, fights with a dual pronged whip.
- Relatives: Kigai Tomoe (sister)
- Romantic interests: Kanoe, Yatōji Satsuki
- X Tarot Card: The Devil (Volume 15)
[edit] Yatōji Satsuki
A complex and ingenious young woman with utter contempt for humans, and a love for the digital world. At a young age she developed the uncanny ability to interact with computers through cables inserted into her skin, and to hack into any technological system. This led to her father sending her to a lab for further study; she amazed the scientists by mastering the Sephiroth at the age of 14, and they planned to use her ability to conquer the world. However, she rebelled against the boredom she felt and in the anime TV series, through her "friends" in the computer world, arranged for the death of her father (in a road traffic accident), along with anyone else who stood in her way. While escaping from the lab she encountered Kanoe and joined her cause, having learned from the digital world that she was one of the Dragons of Earth; later Yūto forcibly convinced the scientists to never bother her again. In the manga, she kills the people in the lab (who are implied to be Freemasons), but it is unknown if complications arose from this or when and where she met Kanoe.
Satsuki is an extreme rationalist, and attacks Yuzuriha when the latter cannot explain why killing humans is more wrong than the killing of the natural world. She spends much of her time wired into a massive supercomputer named the Beast (provided for her by Kanoe), through whom she can physically control cables across Tōkyō, using them for reconnaissance and offensive purposes. She develops feelings for Yūto; in the anime and movie versions, this causes the Beast to become jealous and kill her by invading her entire body with its cables. For now she remains alive in the manga.
Satsuki makes an appearance in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: the ability to communicate with any computer and (via The Beast), control any cable within Tōkyō and hack just about any computer (excluding, perhaps, the network of CLAMP Campus).
- Relatives: Name Unknown (father; deceased)
- Romantic interests: Kigai Yūto
- X Tarot Card: The Hermit (Volume 9)
[edit] Shiyū Kusanagi
A member of the Japanese Self-Defense Force (JSDF) who is telepathically linked to the plants and animals of the Earth, and thus strongly resents humanity's pollution and destruction of the natural world. Although his punch carries the force of an earthquake, he is the least antisocial of the Dragons of Earth, and the least active in the destruction of Tokyo. He meets Yuzuriha (and is the first man she ever met who can see Inuki) and develops an affection for her; although she falls in love with him, his intentions remain platonic as she is still a child. He frequently rescues Yuzuriha from death at the hands of other Dragons of Earth, and indeed in the anime threatens Fūma and ultimately switches sides; as a result he is attacked and grievously wounded by Nataku and Arashi, the latter having also defected to the other side. In the manga, he has, at the very least, expressed personal opinions that run contrary to the goals of the Dragons of Earth—specifically that life is sacred and should never, under any circumstances, be willfully destroyed. He also seems to think that conflicts between nature and humanity should be resolved with as little harm to either as possible. In the movie he doesen't show this pacifist notion, instead attacks the dragons of heaven without hesitation and is a very violent character.
Kusanagi makes several appearances in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: the ability to communicate with plants and animals, the ability to channel energy into powerful blast attacks.
- Trivia: "Kusanagi" is an epithet of Ame no Murakumo no Tsurugi, the sword of the Japanese Imperial Regalia (literally referring to it as the "grass-cutting blade").
- Relatives: unknown
- Romantic interests: Nekoi Yuzuriha
- X Tarot Card: The Star (Volume 17)
[edit] Sakurazuka Seishirō
Originally from Tōkyō Babylon, in which he appeared to be a kindly, magically-aware veterinarian, Seishirō is in fact the Sakurazukamori, a lone assassin whose signature is cherry blossoms and the symbol of an inverted pentagram. (There is also the popular but erroneous fanon notion that there is a specific 'Tree' that the Sakurazukamori feeds with souls; often confused as being canon.) The Sakurazukamori is supposedly unable to love, but in Seishirou's side story, his mother (with whom it is implied he was romantically involved) contradicts this, saying that Seishirou will be killed by the one he loves the most. Seishirō himself became the Sakurazukamori at the age of fifteen by killing her, after a lifetime of training. A powerful onmyōji, Seishirō can attack in many ways, including shikigami (spell servants), energy blasts and more direct physical combat. He can also create elaborate illusions in which people are trapped (separate from the physical world), and in which the dangers are all too real; these are heralded by sudden, uncanny showers of cherry petals. Seishirō is a bon vivant, enjoying what he regards as Tokyo's decadence and moral corruption. In the manga, he and Fūma seem to get along well - in X14, they invited one another to eat at all the best restaurants in any area they are about to destroy.
In Tokyo Babylon Seishirō claimed to be in love with the young onmyōji Sumeragi Subaru, and on many occasions protected him from harm, even losing his right eye to a knife-wielding attacker. However, he ultimately revealed his true self, a ruthless, cold-hearted assassin who could never feel any emotion for anyone, and would have killed Subaru had the latter's twin sister Hokuto not intervened at the cost of her own life. Seishirō defeats Subaru in battle when they meet for the very first time since the events in Tokyo Babylon nine years ago, but leaves the younger man alive. Subaru at first believes this is because he isn't worth killing, but in their final battle at Rainbow Bridge, Seishirō arranges for Subaru to kill him -- his last words (of which the readers only know "I... you...") strongly implying that he loved Subaru after all. This also means that Subaru becomes the new Sakurazukamori, as Seishirō's mother prophesized.
In the movie version, Subaru and Seishirō annihilate each other in magical combat during the first 10 minutes.
Seishirō makes an appearance in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE. In this manga he is searching for vampire twins, one of whom is Subaru. By paying with his right eye, he received the power to cross dimensions from Yuuko Ichihara, the Witch of Dimensions. He was also the one who taught Syaoran how to fight.
- Power: onmyōjyutsu (Tao sorcery): oftentimes carried out through the usage of ofuda (paper amulets) and shikigami
- Relatives: Sakurazuka Setsuka (mother; deceased)
- Romantic interests: Sumeragi Subaru
- X Tarot Card: The Death (Volume 13)
[edit] Nataku
An androgynous clone of extreme psychic ability, born of genetic material of Tōjyō Kazuki, the deceased granddaughter of the president of Tōjyō Pharmaceuticals and her father Masaki. It is sent to retrieve the Shinken by the Chairman Tōjyō who wishes to destroy the sword so that Nataku cannot become entangled in the matter of the Promised Day. In the process of stealing the Shinken, Nataku mortally wounds Kyōgo, Fūma and Kotori's father, who was attempting to protect the Shinken. Nataku later battles both Karen and Aoki, the former refusing to believe it can possibly be unemotional and regarding it as a "lost child". Nataku is haunted by the memories of its previous life as Kazuki, and follows Fūma unquestionably as Fūma resembles the person Kazuki cared most for—her father. In the anime, after Fūma is badly wounded by the spell Sorata casts as he dies, he absorbs Nataku's flesh into his own and is healed. In the manga, Nataku dies when Fūma realizes its greatest wish, to die by the hand of the one it loves most (Fūma, who resembles Kazuki's father) while protecting the person most important to it (Karen, who resembles Kazuki's mother).
Nataku and Kazuki both make appearances as separate beings in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: the ability to control specially designed silk scarves in order to attack others and defend itself
- Trivia: "Nataku" is the Japanese name for a Chinese god who descended to earth with a body but no soul.
- Relatives: Tōjyō Masaki (father; deceased), Name Unknown (mother), Name Unknown—the head of Tōjyō Pharmaceuticals (grandfather)
- Romantic interests: Monō Fūma/Tōjyō Masaki (Fūma states that as Kazuki, Nataku made its father the love of its life, although this is most likely the simple and childish way in which a young daughter loves and idly wishes to marry her father one day)
- X Tarot Card: The Moon (Volume 18)
[edit] Asagi Shōgo
A character who appears only in the movie to complete the numbers of the Dragons of Earth in the place of Kuzuki Kakyō, who had not yet been introduced in the manga. He's a smart aleck teenager as brash and cocky as Sorata and a water master (Yūto's ability to control water had also not yet been revealed in the manga).
Shōgo makes several appearances in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: mizutsukai (water master): hydrokinesis, generating water and controlling flows of liquid, specifically in the form of water balls and pillars
- Relatives: unknown
- Romantic interests: unknown
[edit] Kuzuki Kakyō
A dreamseer in a permanent coma, appearing as a tall man with a sad expression, golden eyes, long, pale hair, and almost always dressed in white. His ability to see the future in dreams was discovered at an early age, and as a result he was kept a prisoner by an unknown political group. Having never seen the outside world, he drew Sumeragi Hokuto into his dreams and fell in love with her after she showed him the sea through her own imagination. However, he foresaw that she would go to her death at the hands of the Sakurazukamori (as seen in the last volume of Tokyo Babylon), and broke out of his room in an effort to stop her; shot by one of his guards with a sniper rifle, he failed to reach her in time and sank into the coma in which he spends X. He came to believe that the future was immutable, and began to wish for his death.
In X he meets and befriends the fledgling dreamseer Monō Kotori within the dreamscape, but realizes that she, too, will soon die at the hands of her older brother Fūma. To grant Kotori's last wish that Kamui should be spared, Kakyō possesses her corpse during its "death dream" and clings to the Shinken, preventing Fūma from removing it from Kotori's body and using it to kill Kamui. However, in doing so Kakyō alerts Fūma to his presence, and the Dragon of Earth hunts down the dreamseer and convinces him that he will grant his wish to die in peace, provided Kakyō aids him as one of the Seven Angels.
In the anime, Kakyō is coerced into manipulating Princess Hinoto's own future-seeing dreams, but finally turns against Fūma after encouragement from Hokuto and Kotori that the future is not, after all, unchanging. He enables Hokuto to enter her brother Subaru's dreams and talk him into helping Kamui during the crucial moments of the final battle. At the end of the series he dies peacefully, and his spirit is finally able to join his beloved Hokuto and "go outside".
Kakyō makes an appearance in CLAMP's crossover work, Tsubasa: RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE.
- Power: yumemi (dreamseer): can forecast future events through the dreamscape, can also communicate with other dreamseers
- Relatives: unknown
- Romantic interests: Sumeragi Hokuto
- X Tarot Card: The Wheel Of Fortune (Volume 10)
