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Introduction
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Canorus — Snow Flower is the forty-first chapter of Jun Mochizuki's The Case Study of Vanitas.
This article contains plot and/or ending details for The Case Study of Vanitas.
Read at your own risk.
Summary[]
Snow continues to fall. Olivier viciously slashes outward, blood and sinew falling with every swipe of his Hauteclaire. The monster he’s up against, a conglomerate of all the cut-down wolf parts all hobbled together like some terrible experiment, growls as it loses one of its many arms. Its other arms bearing claws makes to rip into Olivier, but they get ripped off as well—Roland swooping in to sever them using Durandal. With Olivier at its front and Roland to its back, they attack at once in perfect synchronicity. The wolf monster is torn to absolute pieces, not a single inch left untouched. Its mangled parts fall to the ground in bloody, grisly clumps and what’s left of it still standing wobbles and lurches in place. Then, from its severed spots starts a bubbling. A thick black ooze seeps out from the monster’s open wounds and shapes into more wolf heads, wolf arms, wolf claws, the abomination once again growing to full size.
Roland is exasperated, their attempts and beheading and dismembering not doing a thing to the monster. Olivier in comparison is much more frustrated, outright cursing at it to just lie down and die. Roland has to calm Olivier. More seriously, Olivier asks if it’s time yet. Roland doesn’t answer. Down below, the villagers continues to huddle together in fear, their fellow Chasseurs protecting them as best they can. Olivier says if their fight is dragged out too long, they won’t be able to protect them all any longer. Maria and Georges back-to-back struggle against the pack of wolves surrounding them. Olivier sternly tells Roland that when the time comes, he can’t hesitate. Roland, eyes just as intense, tells him he already knows. Roland looks into the distance at the ruins of the Château where all the dark energy is gathered and places his hopes on those two.
The Book of Vanitas shines its radiant light. Vanitas holds it out, exerting his power with every flip of its black pages. Jeanne, holding Vanitas up as they hover together in the air, strains against the force. The Book’s power is centered and focused on Chloé in the center of the space, being embraced tightly by Jean-Jacques. The pages continues flipping, its light continues shining, power continues to radiate off the Book, and Vanitas strains against the growing pressure. Vanitas’s eyes go wide—the answer comes to him in the Vampire of the Blue Moon’s voice, announcing the Malnomen.
“Millie, Theater of Ice and Snow.”
A revolving theater built upon the winter-bound memories of the curse-bearer. The cold unfeeling white of the snow, the foreboding howls of the wolves echoing through the air, the depths of the forest colored pitch black in the night; all these snapshots of time long past, all these memories of what had been lost ages ago. All spinning around endlessly, an eternal cycle of panoramic memorial, a performance suspended in time that repeats itself over and over. Until the curse-bearer caught in the center has their heart destroyed. The Vampire of the Blue Moon explained this all to a young Vanitas. He still hears their voice in the present, telling him how to cure this particular Malnomen. Unlike others previously seen, a simple inverse operation won’t work. The curse-bearer needs to reject the theater of their own accord, lest the link between them and the enclosed space result in them being erased as well.
Vanitas grits his teeth. He and Jeanne start falling, and Jeanne uses her Gauntlet to grab onto the edge of a broken wall where they hang in the air. Vanitas yells to Chloé, making Jeanne flinch—she can choose whatever she wants, either vanishing along with this world or live on in humiliation. Even if she survives, she will never gain back all that she’s lost. The d’Apchiers are gone, the Church will never admit to their responsibility for this tragedy, and she will continue to be hunted as the Beast until she dies. Jeanne tries to protest in alarm, but Vanitas continues. Living or dying, it will be hell for her either way. But even so, still she must make the choice.
Chloé’s eyes are wide and filled with tears as she listens to his words. She hears the sound of a body falling. She looks before her. Jean-Jacques, back bloody from his previous injury, curled up on the platform of ice right before Chloé, breathing heavily and his face twisted in pain. She wonders, did she do this to him? Darkness starts seeping into her once again. Like an infection spreading, a black misty haze wraps around her form cocooning her in place. Black shapes form from the darkness. Like the last Marquis d’Apchier whom she couldn’t protect, like the final surviving d’Apchier who hated her for their deaths. They embrace her and choke her and pull her struggling, crying form further into the darkness. Vanitas speaks to Jeanne, and he tells her to go.
Down below, right underneath where the two of them hover. Noé and Astolfo still locked in their fierce battle, neither side letting up. Astolfo strikes repeatedly with his spear, and Noé defends himself against each strike as best he can. He thinks back to before, when he and Vanitas spoke with Roland. Noé warns Roland that he might end up hurting his companion in the following fight, and Roland understands this to be Astolfo. Roland looks over to the center of the chaos where Astolfo seems to be, almost wistfully. Roland tells them that Astolfo’s family had been killed by Vampires. Vanitas protests angrily, but Noé is already stricken to hear this. Roland apologizes and clarifies that he isn’t discouraging him from fighting, but he wanted Noé to know. Roland looks down. Astolfo had been too kind. Despite his family, the Granatums, having held the seat of Garnet for generations, Astolfo couldn’t bring himself to kill a wounded Vampire who was being chased by Chasseurs. Astolfo trusted him, holding out his hand and offering to help the young Vampire. And because of that…
Astolfo seethes, his memories fueling an entirely new rage within him. He mutters to himself what happened that day; his mother being violated right in front of his father, whose head was split open while he was lost to the deepest despair. And the entire time as their family was tortured and murdered, they laughed and laughed, endlessly, maniacally. And for the children left behind? They stole their blood. A little bit at a time, stretched out over days on end, their fanged grins and clawed hands reaching for them with hunger and thirst. Astolfo as a child, even as the Vampires around them continued draining them of their blood. had held on tightly to his little sister’s hand. Astolfo screams, she was only six years old and they still—! Noé winces in sympathy as he hears the details of the tragedy that defined Astolfo’s life.
Blood bursts out of his eyes and nose. Noé’s eyes widen in alarm. Marco, knelt on the ground nearby still clutching the two syringes, yells that Astolfo took too much of the Chasseurs’s serum. He begs Astolfo to stop, but the boy disregards him, and continues rushing at a still alarmed Noé. Astolfo draws back and prepares for another all-out powerful strike. Noé panics with the realization that he can’t avoid it completely, and the head of Astolfo’s spear aims right for his neck. Noé raises his arm, and he blocks the spearhead from piercing his neck with his forearm, straining against the weight of the attack. Dante watching the fight jumps up in alarm and concern, calling out to Noé. The spear pierces Noé’s forearm and shoulder, staining his white coat red, but he manages to lock it in place and keep it from moving further. Then Astolfo glares, his eyes intense in their madness and bloodthirst. A chill of fear runs over Noé’s body. There’s something else coming in Astolfo’s attack; the core of the spearhead starts to glow with power. Noé panics, making to step back, mind scrambling for what to do, if he should retreat, how he can avoid this attack, and—
“Don’t hesitate, Noé.”
Noé’s eyes are wide. Back during their talk with Roland. Vanitas tells him, he can’t think about whether Astolfo’s hatred is truly justified or not. Vampires and humans alike act on their own concepts of “justice,” meaning what is fair and right and good to one person can be cruel and corrupt and evil to another. Roland behind them preparing for battle listens as the two of them converse. Vanitas continues: “‘Being right’ is ‘power.’” And all too easily it can be a kind of violence that’s much more potent and insidious than outright malice. Rather than brandish it proudly like a weapon, keep it inside; Vanitas points to Noé’s chest where his heart is. That way rather than dictating and judging every little thing he does in life, the “justice” he believes will guide him along the right path like a light to illuminate the way. Noé stares at Vanitas. Vanitas stares back. Vanitas gets fed up and just grabs Noé’s hair, shaking him by the forehead in frustration. Vanitas tells Noé that this isn’t about “right” or “wrong,” and that Noé should base what he does on what he can’t concede. Noé stares in surprise. Roland listening to them smiles with satisfaction. Vanitas releases Noé’s hair and smiles at him with affection. He tells him that for Noé, that will work.
Noé snaps back to the present. His eyes flare red, determination and conviction filling his veins. He grinds his foot into the ground, refusing to give in or step back in the slightest. He tells himself that no matter what he can’t retreat, not now not ever. Astolfo screams, “Burst!!!” His spear explodes, the head splitting apart into two blades, lighting up the area with a burst of heat and flame. Dante gapes as he watches. Noé’s hand which he’d used to block the spearhead is severed clean off and drops to the ground uselessly. Astolfo’s spear drips with blood and crackles with residual energy. Astolfo winds down from the attack, then his eyes widen.
Noé lunges down and out of the way of the explosion. His one good hand is formed into a fist and curled back, ready. He screams as he attacks, and he reflects. Noé wants to save Chloé and Jean-Jacques, and no matter who he’s up against. That’s the one thing he will not concede.
Noé punches Astolfo in the face.
Astolfo is sent flying backwards and crashing in an explosion into the rubble behind. Marco pales. Dante lifts both fists up into the air and yells triumphantly. Noé pants heavily. The side of his face and his shoulder are burned and his left arm is clean off, but still he stands victorious. In the aftermath of his win, he breathes in relief. He knew that taking that attack head-on would’ve exploded him to pieces from the inside out, and he’d be done for. So he made the decision to press on, sacrificing his arm in the process, but winning in the end result. Marco runs over to the rubble where Astolfo landed, digging through frantically, calling out for his “young master.” Noé looks to where Astolfo’s spear landed, lying amid the rubble. A blinding light flashes behind him. Noé’s eyes widen.
Chloé wanted to be human. Because that was what her father wanted. He had spent his entire life dedicated to research for the purpose of “returning” her humanity to Chloé. It made her very happy, because it was all an expression of her father’s love for her, and—
“And that’s a lie.”
It’s a lie. Because the truth is, throughout all her life, from her childhood where she watched her father do his research all by herself to the present where it’s all fallen apart—through all of that, she has always been so, so lonely. After all… The phantoms of Chloé’s family, the specters left behind in the shapes of the d’Apchiers embrace and suffocate her in their pitch black arms. That meant that if Chloé wasn’t human, she wasn’t really Chloé. Johann next to the Alteration Device yells that they’re nearing the limit and she’s about to destabilize again. Vanitas standing on top of the broken wall holds out the Book of Vanitas, pages frantically flipping, worrying that the operation won’t happen in time.
All Chloé wanted was for them to accept her. As the daughter of her father. As a part of the d’Apchier family. Chloé’s hand held out into the air, looking for something to hold onto.
Two hands grab onto hers. Jeanne and Jean-Jacques both scream, “Chloé!!!”
Chloé, ensnared by the darkness, by the pitch black birdcage of the specters of her long dead family, has her hand held by Jeanne and Jean-Jacques, desperately pulling her back towards them. Chloé stares at them in awe. She starts to cry.
“I wanted them… to love me.”
Chloé sobs and pulls out of the embrace of the d’Apchiers. Vanitas’s voice echoes: “You make the choice.” She steps out of the darkness.
Chloé leaps into Jeanne and Jean-Jacques’s arms. The pitch black birdcage filled with everything she once loved and lost begins to fade away into ashes. The three of them fall together, all holding onto one another tightly, like a promise to never let go.
Vanitas’s face is filled with resolve. He smirks and curses, exasperated. His Mark of Possession glows a bright blue. He prays for strength from “Luna, Blue Moon.” The Book of Vanitas and Vanitas’s Marked arm holding it shines a radiant light, like the very essence of a star is emanating from Vanitas’s form. Noé stares at him in awe. Vanitas’s eyes are filled with light. The pages of the Book flip and glow with power. Chloé, Jeanne, Jean-Jacques—the three of them wrapped up in one another’s embrace are engulfed in a shining light. It pulsates off of them in waves, power surging through the area all around them. The vestiges of darkness leftover by the Malnomen fade away instantly as the light touches it. Dante winces, the light blinding him. Up in the air, little sparkles appear and glitter and start to connect to one another with lines of light, like constellations being drawn into the skies above. Noé stares up at it all in wonder, marveling at the sight, like a clear blue sky filled with stars. Vanitas still holding his Book finally finds it, her True Name. He smiles.
“‘Canorus,’ She Who Plays Snow Crystals.”
The sky full of falling snow. Cracks like glass breaking, spreading upwards, outwards, in every direction, all through the skies of Gévaudan. It shatters, collapses, falls all apart—into a burst of white. Like little crystals blanketing the air and fall up into the heavens. The snow fades. The wolves scatter apart. The skies clear up. All into a whirlwind of gentle white. The people of Saugues realize it’s no longer cold. Maria jumps up and down, relishing the actual ground beneath her feet rather than the gravitational mess before, and Olivier’s Vice-Captain tends to an exhausted Georges. The children hold out their hands in awe at the falling white. At first they think it’s snow, so used to the eternal winter that reigned before. But they realize—these are not crystals of snow. They are flower petals.
Roland and Olivier glare forward together. Despite it all, neither of them lose the fierceness or spirit to fight in their eyes as they continue to lock onto the monster in front of them. Before long, it too fades away, scattering into petals of pure white and joining the winterless snowfall embracing all of Gévaudan. Olivier sags down tiredly, relieved for it all to be over. Roland looks over yonder and smiles with pride, thanking those two for giving their best.
In an endless field of blooming white flowers, cradling them as lovingly as they embrace all of Gévaudan, Chloé, Jean-Jacques, and Jeanne continue to hug one another. Tears in their eyes, all of them unconscious, but still, never once letting go.
Characters[]
- Olivier
- Roland Fortis
- Maria
- Georges
- Vanitas
- Jeanne
- Jean-Jacques Chastel
- Chloé d'Apchier
- Vanitas of the Blue Moon*
- Beast of Gévaudan (Mentioned only)
- Noé Archiviste
- Astolfo Granatum
- Astolfo Granatum's Younger Sister*
- Marco
- Dante
- Chloé d'Apchier's Father*
- Johann
- Olivier's Vice-Captain
(*) - Denotes that the character did not appear physically, but as a part of another character's memories.
Terms[]
Trivia[]
- Canorus is a Latin adjective which can be translated into English as "of or pertaining to melody," "melodious," "harmonious," or "euphonious."
- The monstrous mass of wolves fighting Roland and Olivier, and the wolves transforming into flower petals were drawn by Yoneda Taro.[1]
References[]
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| v - e - t | The Case Study of Vanitas Chapters |
|---|---|
| Parisian Excursion Arc | 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 |
| Bal Masqué Arc | 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 |
| Hunters of the Dark Arc | 12 • 13 • 14 • 15 • 16 • 17 • 18 • 19 • 20 • 21 |
| The Beast of Gévaudan Arc | 22 • 23 • 24 • 25 • 26 • 27 • 28 • 29 • 30 • 31 • 32 • 33 • 34 • 34.5 • 35 • 36 • 37 • 38 • 38.5 • 39 • 40 • 41 • 42 • 43 |
| Amusement Park Arc | 44 • 45 • 46 • 47 • 48 • 49 • 50 • 51 • 52 • 53 • 54 • 54.5 • 55 • 55.5 • 56 |
| Miel Incident Arc | 57 • 58 • 59 • 60 • 61 • 61.5 • 62 • 62.5 • 63 |
| Intermissions | 15.5 • 46.5 • 51.5 • 60.5 |
| Volumes | 1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 |
| Omake | Romance is a✰LOVE MISSION |
| Other | Vanitashu no Karute • Author's Notes |