Where can we find dialogues related to anime? I remember that the actual way that I learned to be fluent in English were by watching a lot of English movies. Since, I stepped foot on Japanese anime and I wanted to learn Japanese in the same way. Since English was a compulsory subject I could compare and learn, but Japanese is not. How I learned English was memorizing the fun dialogues and I want to do the same for Japanese. Since Japanese is not so easy to pick up and having Kanji to search for is definitely informative.

How can we get the subtitles for a specific anime? If it were lyrics it would've been easy, but I didn't find any sites that would give subtitles of the dialogues of anime. Are there any? If not, what can be done so that we can learn dialogues of the anime, since songs and dialogues are definitely easier to memorize.

Depending on how you get your anime fix...

DVD/BD

In my experience, while most Japanese DVDs do not have subtitles in Japanese, some do. It is usually easier to find movies than TV series subtitled though.

Streaming

Online streaming services such as Viki have some Japanese shows with Japanese subtitles. Most of them non-animated TV dramas though. But perhaps you can find some anime with the services available to you. Or you could watch a TV drama based on a manga/anime... (Below a screenshot from the Sherlock Holmes puppet show on Viki.)

Other online resources

Around the millennium shift some websites offered fan translations of Japan-only anime shows. That is, you could try to get the Japanese VHS/DVD and follow along with the translated script. If I remember correctly at least one of those websites had the Japanese script as well. This was before the fansubs found a home online. Maybe something similar exists today. I am not aware of any such resources though.


What is the song played in episode 492 at 8:30 There is a song played at around 8:30 in episode 492, which I have not heard of yet, but I really like. Is this an unreleased OST, or was it released in one of the movies? It would really help if somebody could answer. Thanks.

I believe the track your looking for is called Memories, and I think it's actually from the first Naruto, not Shippuden. I looked high and low man, and I finally found it lol


What happened to Yin Kurama inside Edo Minato after the war ended? After Orochimaru reincarnated Namikaze Minato, Yondaime Hokage and the war ended. Does Yin Kurama still reside inside Minato even after he goes back to the heavens or did it return to Yang Kurama and now it is inside Naruto.
Can you please clarify this?

Minato's half on nine tails goes into naruto. In the end of the war, naruto gets the other half of the nine tails so he has both halves now.


When did Luffy meet his father again in person? When did Luffy meet his father (Dragon) again in One Piece?

In chapter 100, was the only time they met. Dragon stopped Smoker from capturing his son Luffy. Despite the fact that they never actually talked to each other, this is the only moment we know Dragon and Luffy met, since Luffy began his journey.


Floor boss on level 18 So how did a floor boss appear on floor 18? Was it an outside influence that forced a boss to appear? Or was it always there/brought by the goddess Hestias use of her godly power?

There are no monsters on Floor 18 however they can come from floors above or below Floor 18.
The question was answered on a subreddit-

From just the anime's perspective, the dungeon is perceived as a living being. It is also said earlier in ep. 10 or so that the dungeon hates gods. Right after Hestia channels that divine power, the dungeon starts to shake and the Regenerative Goliath drops down from what looks like the floor above. It appears to be a much stronger, powered up version of the Goliath that spawns on level 17, which just happens to be the floor above.
From just the anime, it would appear to be the dungeon reacting to the presence of gods by spawning a powered-up version of the Goliath and dropping it straight onto where it detected the gods.

Source


How did Izaya Orihara get Celty's head? In the last episode of Durarara!! we see Izaya with Celty's head. How did he get the head?

Izaya traded Celty's head from Namie Yagiri for a favor. Namie works in Yagiri Pharmaceuticals where Celty's head was stored at that time. Namie had access to the storage room and didn't need the head that much, so she gave it to Izaya.

Also see this excerpt from a Durarara wiki:

  At his apartment, Izaya meets with Namie once again. He comments on her situation, giving up all she had for her brother's love and having her company being bought out by Nebula. He agrees to help keep her in hiding in exchange for Celty's head.


Are Dio & Lucciola gay? At first, I believe that Dio Eraclea and Lucciola were female due to their appearance and voice. However, at some part, people refer as "he" (English subtitle).

Wikia mentioned that both Dio Eraclea and Lucciola are male.

Are Dio Eraclea and Lucciola gay/homosexual (with explicit evident in anime/manga/novel)?
Do people in Last Exile always acknowledge that Dio Eraclea and Lucciola are male (without even mistaking them with girls due to their appearance or voice)?

Dio and Lucciola are both male and definitely share a special relationship, but they're not in any kind of romantic or physical relationship.

To wit, Dio and Lucciola were friends as children growing up.  This continued until they reached maturity.  In fact, Dio holds Lucciola in such high regard that...

   Even after Dio is initially brainwashed by the guild (and Lucciola snaps him out of it by effectively sacrificing himself before Delphine), when he realizes that Lucciola is dead, he keeps the rear seat of his Vespa empty out of respect of the memory of his fallen comrade.  (Note that initially Dio demanded it stay empty because he was still a little distraught behind the loss of his friend.  He somewhat mellows out in Fam, the Silver Wing.)

However, make no mistake:

They're both male,
They're not romantically involved, and
They were definitely close friends.

You don't have to be sexually attracted to someone to have a close relationship with them.


Was Bakuman deliberately made to attract new manga artists in the industry? The manga and anime Bakuman talks about two middle school boys wanting to be published on a Shonen magazine. The anime clearly set a goal and create antagonists for narration purposes but the story explain rather accurately expectations, procedures and workloads of a real magazine.

Was Bakuman deliberately made and published on Shonen Jump to attract new artists in the industry? If so, are there any documented effect of this type of promotion nowadays, i.e. about more young people trying to join the industry?

The magazine QuickJapan vol. 81 published interviews with the authors Ohba and Obata, and the editor Soichi Aida. Aida stated that:

  Like how the number of players who play a sport would increase after a manga on the sport gets popular, I do think about people who would think "I might try drawing a manga" after reading Bakuman. If Bakuman does well, we would see more people aspiring to be a manga artist. If we have more manga artist candidates, the future of Jump is bright. As an editor, I do dream about those stuff.

He might be drawing an analogy with how the population of Go players increased significantly after Obata's earlier work Hikaru no Go. More competitors + survival of the fittest = only the best of the best can remain... that's the editor's point of view.

Meanwhile, Obata has stated that he has always loved Fujiko Fujio A's Manga Michi (a semi-autobiographical work about the Fujiko Fujio duo), and the idea for Bakuman started from wanting to do a Manga Michi of his own. So, you can say that it was less about "bringing in fresh air to the industry" for the authors, at least; but there was no reason to keep the editors and the publisher from anticipating it.

As for the effect on the industry, the number of young people bringing their manga to Jump office did increase, according to the QJ magazine.


What did Prince Canute mean by "is there no love in the heart of man" in chapter 34? In chapter 34 of Vinland Saga manga, Canute seems to realize something, and starts narrating with "this snow is love". From page 33-36,

Pg. 33 I understand. It is as though a fog has lifted from my mind. (While holding a snowball) this snow is love.
Pg. 34 This sky... this earth... the blowing wind. The trees, the mountains...
Pg. 35 ...... but... how must I express it... though this world... though the work of God holds so much beauty...
Pg. 36 Is there no love in the heart of man?

I don't quite understand what the chapter means. Is this referring to the Christian religion? Could anyone explain to me what's this chapter's wisdom?

The mountains, the snow, the wind, and all of nature don't fight to get ahead, they don't fight to gain something and they don't fight to push something away. Nature and the elements just go with the flow and this is what the Priest describes as real love. Where something is completely complacent.
When Canute asks what then does the love I felt for Ragnar means, the Priest says that is simply discrimination because Ragnar let innocent people die to protect Canute. Because for humans, love is putting someone above everyone else and that cannot be fair.
Then the priest goes on to talk about Adam and Eve, which is the story of Eve being tempted by the devil to eat a forbidden apple, she goes on to eat the apple and after she does this, god punishes the human race by making them unable to experience this true love that the priest talks about. The only way to experience this true love is to die because that is the only way a human can be totally complacent. Thus the world we live in now is the true hell, where none of us can experience this true love until we die.
So basically, what this priest describes is a story from Christianity but of his take on how god punishes us for the first sin that Eve committed.


Why did ReLIFE release all its 13 episodes in one day? It's the first time I've ever seen an anime series that has released all its episodes in one day and not one episode every week, as it is normally the case.

Why did the producers do this?

I think CrunchyRoll and other streaming companies are looking at the full-release model more now that it is a regular feature of Netflix.

Netflix has done a lot of internal work on retention analysis - both for keeping paid subscribers, and for series watchers themselves (as that will increase the subscribers' enjoyment and reduce their consideration to leave).  I couldn't find any figures on this, but I presume the drop-off rate of series is lower when episodes are all released at once - Viewers can watch more than a single episode in their first viewing, meaning they will be more involved in the plot by the time they next sit down to watch something.

The way the Crunchyroll model works, the episodes were only available to premium members during the first few weeks of release - this might have also convinced users to subscribe.

While Netflix has done this primarily to non animated works, Re:Life is not the first instance of this bundled release. Voltron: Legendary Defender was released in this form earlier this year.


Which Type combination still exist for which there are no pokemon? With the introduction of Fairy type, the total Types has increased to 18. This has increased number of possibly types (unique, i.e. Primary/Secondary is same as Secondary/Primary) to 171.

How many of such combinations have been used and which combinations are still left to be used i.e. No pokemon exist for such type?

Examples off the top of my head?
Bug/Dragon, Electric/Poison etc.
Unique Type used in Gen 6 - Water/Fire - Volcanion

Edit: Gen 7 Introduced. Thanks @Kenny980 for updating!

The following image shows the Pokemon types of which there are no Pokemon as of Gen 6:

This information was sourced from: http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_type_combinations_by_abundance

--Update for Gen 7--

New types that are available in Gen 7:

Which leaves these types still with no Pokemon:


How can Gon be so tough physically when he’s just a child? Gon is shown too tough for his age.
In the case of Killua, it is understandable as Killua has undergone a lot of physical torture but in case of Gon it doesn't make much sense or is there a reason behind it?

It may be to highlight the fact that he grew up in the mountains where everything he did was a form of training he did unknowingly. This could explain his insane stamina, speed  and perception of the environment, all before he learned to open the gate, or learn nen.

Other that that, I guess you could say it's some genetic benefit?  Because his father was the only other person in the entire island who single-handedly caught the giant fish, and at the age of 7 no less! Besides it may also be the quirk of someone with enhancement type nen.


Is the Dragon Ball Super anime mostly filler? I know the title might wound weird but were the first two arcs BOG and resurrection F and the episodes between the Champa tournament and Goku black arc filler untill the manga gave enough info to start the main arcs? Sorry if it doesn't make sense.

EDIT:I know that the battle of gods arc was in the manga but the resurrection F arc was just summarized and in the anime Ginyu was somehow added into the story.

No, those arcs were also in the manga. Both the manga and the anime are based in Akira Toriyama main ideas and guidelines, though both the anime and manga have more room for the writers to put their own ideas because there isnt a manga fully made by Akira Toriyama like there was in Dragon Ball Z.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbWLOvBIWlA


Is there enough evidence to conclude Hans is a fake brave? Hans initially accused Adlet of being the fake to escape suspicion.

Then when Adlet returned, he deliberately let him live in order to maintain his alibi. Because of this, Adlet no longer suspected Hans, which worked out according to his plan.

However, Nachetanya still suspected Hans, and pointed out his inconsistencies. Is it safe to say Hans is a fake brave or at least a potential fake brave? Is there any evidence proving his innocence?

Spoilers ahead, read if you really want to know. I came to Japan for a business trip last week. So, I went and bought all 6 volumes of Rokka no Yusha and started reading though them while slacking on the job, starting Volume 6 today. Therefore, this time, I will put in a brief explanation of each volume and prove each Brave's innocence one by one, then prove Adlet is guilty and Hans is innocent. However, the assumption is that there is only one fake in the Seven existing now.

Volume 1: Nashetania Arc

  Watch the anime.

Volume 2: Mora's Daughter Arc (Not really called this but I cannot think of a better name)

  In this volume, it is revealed that Tgurneu has held Mora's daughter hostage through getting one of his Kyoma minions which is a parasitic worm to build a nest in Shenilla's chest. Through a letter he forged with the Saint of Medicine, Toulo Maynes's handwriting, he invited Mora to an alley to discuss the conditions for Shenilla's release. Mora brought along the Saint of Words, Marmanna Keynes and also called out to the Saint of Salt, Weylynn Coteau, but she did not make it in time. Without Weylynn, the two saints and Tgurneu started the discussion. In the end, they made deals which cannot be overturned as Marmanna's powers forced them to follow the contract or they die. The important deals are as follow:

  Tgurneu was to never lie to Mora or he would die.
  Tgurneu would command the worm in Shenilla's chest to commit suicide if he was killed or Mora killed one of the other Braves.
  If Mora died before she killed another brave or if Tgurneu did not die at the same time, Shenilla would die.

  These deals forced Mora to undergo severe training and implanting a Volcano crystal in her chest as the last resort to kill Tgurneu. She also trained Rolonia Manchetta, the Saint of Fresh Blood to be able to revive the dead by letting her test her abilities of blood control on Mora as she was implanted with the crystal. Then they tested her abilities to revive someone on a dying old man. This is Mora's Plan B, where she would kill a Brave, then revive him again.

  A lot of things happened and Tgurneu, while using the body of the three-winged Kyoma, told a lie to Mora, saying she was the seventh Brave. Tgurneu then escaped through Mora's barrier in a jellyfish Kyoma in order to hide that his host had died due to the lie. This lie caused Mora to switch to Plan B as she believed she was the seventh. Mora knocked out Fremy and Chamo and his them in the cave in the barrier of the Saint of the Single Flower. She then used her power of echo to call for Adlet and Rolonia to head to the cave and asked Goldof and Hans to chase after Fremy, whom she lied that Fremy ran away leading them to a group of Kyoma under her command sent by Tgurneu.However, Hans went instead of Adlet as he saw through Mora's plans. Then, Hans and Mora fought, Mora slit Hans's throat with his knife, killing him. Then she asked Rolonia to revive him as she had trained her.

  When Hans died, Adlet realised a petal disappeared from his hand, this is the piece of evidence that proves Hans's innocence. Later, Adlet also proved Mora's innocence by proving that Tgurneu was merely using the three-winged Kyoma as a host and only the host died due to the lie. The point is if Mora was fake, the host would have lived. Adlet also revealed Tgurneu was a fig-like Kyouma as his spray had revealed through spraying it on a piece of the fig fruit that the host ate in their encounter when they all entered the Wailing Demon Territory. Furthermore, the author revealed this to us by saying Tgurneu was in a new host in front of the corpse of the three-winged Kyoma.

  Therefore, in this volume, Mora and Hans were proven innocent.

Volume 3: Nashetania's arm loss arc (Also not really called this but I think its funny)

  In this volume, we will prove Goldof and Chamo are real Braves. In this arc, Tgurneu and Dozzu have cooperated in order to kill off Chamo. In truth, it was a plan by Nashetania to use Tgurneu to save themselves from Cargikk, then use the Braves to then save themselves again from Tgurneu. Of course, Tgurneu betrayed them. They did so by getting Nashetania to activate the Blade Gem she implanted in Chamo's stomach though the use of Dozzu during a duel they had a few years back. Goldof's helmet, which is a Sacred Instrument, known as the Helmet of Truth, created by a Saint of Words activated as Nashetania was captured by Tgurneu and held captive in Dark Specialist No. 26's stomach, hidden in a lava area within a 1km radius of Chamo in order to keep the Blade Gem activated. Nashetania got her left arm amputated by Tgurneu in order to attach it to a monkey Kyoma to leak her blood to deceive the Braves into thinking they are chasing the real Nashetania as he tries to buy time until 3 hours passes in order to kill Chamo with the Blade Gem. Goldof hears Nashetania's cries for help and heads to rescue her whilst the other Braves try to kill him as they now think he is possibly the seventh. However, Tgurneu, in a new body, approaches Adlet, Rolonia and Fremy to ask for a truce and cooperate until Nashetania is killed. Of course, they questioned him and tried to kill him after they got information out of him. In this conversation, he claimed that Goldof is not his seventh Brave as his Brave is trying to save Chamo, not Nashetania.

  Not important stuff occured and Goldof found out Nashetania was held captive by Tgurneu after Dozzu hinted to him of No. 26's ability, which is similar to Nashetania's hiding ability. He found her in the lava area and stole a Saint's needle from Adlet and used it to kill No. 26 to save Nashetania during the scuffle with Adlet, Rolonia and Fremy at the lava area.

  Important things to take away:

  Tgurneu made a deal with Dozzu to respectively not harm Nashetania and Fremy.
  Goldof is a real Brave as Tgurneu was toying with him and even told him tons of truth such as the deal Cargikk, Dozzu and him made 200 years ago.
  Chamo is a real brave as both Dozzu and Tgurneu tried to get rid of her and they were clearly trying.

Volume 4: Fremy's mother is an ant arc (I cannot stop laughing about this.)

  Raina Milan, Adlet's best friend is the main character of this arc, though Rolonia is also proven innocent in this arc. Most of the details about this arc can be obtained by reading Raina and Nia Grasta's character biography on the wikia. Therefore, the important point is that Rolonia, Hans and Adlet learnt Fremy was the Black Barren Flower and Adlet kept this fact from the other Braves until the next volume and only revealed the existence of the Sacred Instrument and its functions. Rolonia proved her innocence by really trying to save the corpse soldiers and nearly died due to her naivety. In the final chapter of this volume, it was revealed that Fremy's mother was an ant and was ordered to raise Fremy with love, but it ended up really loving Fremy and continued raising Fremy's dog, waiting for Fremy's return. This contradicts what Fremy said in the first volume but this is cleared up in the fifth volume so I will explain it later. Not much to take away in this volume so I will just move on to Volume 5.

Volume 5: Adlet is fake arc.

  In this volume, they explore the Temple of Fate that was built by Tgurneu, here they discover the functions of the Black Barren Flower through deciphering the Holy Words carved onto the floor around the mummified body of the Saint of the Single Flower. Here is where they discover that the Crest of the seventh was created using the powers of the Saint of the Single Flower and hence would mean killing the seventh may prove disastrous. Fremy also figured out she is the Black Barren Flower by remembering that she went into the temple and saw the Saint of the Single Flower before. This led to a split between the Braves, where Adlet wanted to keep Fremy alive while the rest wanted her dead, even Fremy wished to commit suicide. This caused Adlet to cooperate Dark Specialist No. 30, who also thought Adlet was the seventh as he was the only one trying to protect Fremy, who would drive them all to death by draining the powers of the Crests. He ordered No. 30 to try and kill Fremy with full force and to swallow a Light Gem that has a secondary functions and find a way to get it to the other Braves somehow, like vomiting it out after being hit or get himself cut up. This is due to him telling a lie that he saw a message to not kill Fremy in one of the rooms in the temple. Of course, Hans saw through the lie when Adlet told it and started the chase in the temple a few chapters ago. The point is that Adlet managed to trick Mora, Nashetania, Rolonia and Fremy into believing Hans was the seventh and it was unwise to kill Fremy to stop the Black Barren Flower as it has a more disastrous secondary function if Fremy was killed. Hans and Chamo split from the other as they believed that Adlet was fake. Goldof also believed so but stayed behind to protect Nashetania.

  In the last chapter, a flashback to a chat between the three-winged Kyoma and Tgurneu revealed Adlet was the fake and Tgurneu had the power to incite love in someone. Tgurneu used this power to cause the Saint of the Single Flower to fall in love with him, persuading her to give the seventh Crest to him to be given to Adlet. He also used this power to make Adlet fall in love with Fremy in order to ensure he would protect her at all costs. This is due to his belief of, wait for it "LOVE IS THE MOST POWERFUL THING THERE IS!".

Volume 6: Tgurneu's death arc

  In this arc, Adlet discovers he is fake through Tgurneu taking out a petal from his body. This petal contains a message from the Saint of the Single Flower which is played to Adlet through his Crest despite Tgurneu being 2km away from his location. Only a part of the message was played but it goes like this: "Warrior of a thousands years from now, I hereby bestow you the Seventh Crest to...". Tgurneu only allowed the message to be played up until here. Through this, Adlet himself realised he was the seventh. Fremy also became a hostage of Tgurneu through him activating a tumour implanted in her chest. This tumour is special in that if Tgurneu was killed, Fremy dies too, he activated it from a distance by stabbing himself with his own vine. He also relayed a message to Adlet, saying that unless he killed the other Braves, the one he loves will die. After this, he switched his plans to help Tgurneu kill everyone but Fremy. He also wanted her to return to the Kyoma since the army have been shouting for Fremy to go back to them.

  Chamo and Hans appeared in Chapter 3 to stop the Braves. Here, Hans enacts his plan of pretending he was the seventh to lure out Adlet to negotiate a deal with him as he guessed that Adlet was doing everything to protect Fremy and not really on Tgurneu's side. Chamo was unaware of the plans and Hans also stole Chamo's surveillance Juuma in order to use it later. He wounds Chamo in order to pretend he was the seventh and throws knives at Adlet, these knives had messaged written on them to lure Adlet away from the others using a lie that he can kill Fremy through using Chamo. His plan after disabling Adlet and questioning him is: Adlet will lie to Tgurneu that Hans has been neutralised, then tell Tgurneu a fake plan as a cover for his real plan to kill Tgurneu, this plan was the plan that Adlet came up with in Chapter 1, which was to set the forest on fire and get a cheetah Kyouma to report back to Tgurneu after Dark specialist 24, which is what I would like to call "The Telephone Kyouma" has been eliminated, thus leading the Braves to him. But, instead of killing Tgurneu, now they will capture him, thus preventing Fremy's death due to Tgurneu's death. Then, out of the blue, Tgurneu appeared as Adlet was deciding whether to use Hans's plan, using the Book of truth to discover that Hans was lying about being able to kill Fremy.

  In Chapter 4, we discover that Tgurneu desires, he craves to see people in pain because of love. His lust for this has pushed him to create the perfect pair to see these emotions on people's faces. The pair being: the girl that wishes to be loved, Fremy. The boy that has an unbreakable heart to love her, Adlet. Due to his greed to see these emotions, he did not want to come up with more effective strategies to kill the Braves, but just wanted to see Fremy and Adlet suffer. This chapter really is just Tgurneu sadistically torturing Adlet by telling him the reason that he loves Fremy is because of him loving inducing powers, not out of his own heart. Adlet despairs after hearing this and despite Hans's pleas towards him while Hans himself was getting chased around by 40 Kyouma, he was unresponsive Hans also lost his Juuma that he wanted to release to call for Chamo's help (it got stabbed by Adlet's needle and was then tied up by Tgurneu). Fremy, on the other hand enacted a plan to get rid of the tumour in her chest. She would pretend to betray the Braves and purposely get her heart gouged out by Rolonia so that Dark Specialist 14 would heal her, thus ridding her of the tumour. But of course, 14 knows about the tumour and he believes that it cannot be simply 'healed away' as it integrates with the cellular structure of the host. The twist is, Fremy's mother evolved in a way that allowed her to rid Fremy of the tumour after her heart was regenerated. This was done by always rubbing Fremy's chest when she raised her. Adlet, however, was an idiot, after he heard Fremy's fake betrayal through 24, he believed it and told Tgurneu the real plans. Bright side: he found out Fremy loves him. Dark side: he fell into despair after learning that even Atro Spiker was manipulated by him, to groom Adlet into the strongest man to protect Fremy. This causes Adlet to enter an unresponsive state and want to be killed as he had betrayed everyone.

  Chapter 5, Dark Specialist 13 uses his Poison Gas attack (pokemon reference by me). He produced toxins that was washed into the underground drainage system of the ruins and used his 'little babies' to vaporise the water and unleash the gas onto above ground. Adlet was swallowed by a Hippopotamus Kyouma so that later, Tgurneu can release control over him and get him to kill Fremy, for him to achieve a higher form of ecstasy by looking at the despair that Fremy will display for him. In order to counter the poison gas, Mora collapses the ground below her, killing 13. After regaining his will to fight though the message:"I will definitely make you happy!" engraved on a gunpowder lattice given to him by Fremy, Adlet punched his way out of the Kyouma's stomach and heard Mora's echo message of Fremy has been saved. He looks at Tgurneu and intends to kill Tgurneu after knowing that Fremy will no longer be bound to him. He thought: "Dawn is coming, when the sun rises, One shall stand. One shall fall." That is obviously not what the book said, but it is what it intended to say.

  Chapter 6, Adlet and Hans cooperate and try their best to not get mauled by the Kyouma. Chamo senses something is amiss and discovers one of the message knives Hans threw to Adlet in Chapter 3, and managed to reason that Hans did not really try to kill her when he wounded her. Mora and Goldof are trying to regroup on the battlefield after Mora exhausted herself to kill 13. Rolonia and Nashetania held off the Kyouma while Fremy headed to Adlet. In this battle in some ruins, Adlet, Chamo, Fremy, Hans, Dozzu face off against Tgurneu and Dark Specialist 1, the Kyouma that is made up of forty Kyoumas and 1 leader bird-type Kyouma that Tgurneu inhabited. This Kyouma is the strongest Dark Specialist as it practically allowed Tgurneu to be in 40 places at once and coordinate the perfect attacks. After a game of cat and mouse, Adlet figured out that Tgurneu was controlling all the Kyouma they were battling simultaneously. Thus, he tricked Tgurneu into looking at him by confessing his love to Fremy as he realised that vision is not shared by the Kyouma despite them being controlled by Tgurneu. Adlet charged at Tgurneu but got impaled by Tgurneu. However, he instead spit his blood into 1's mouth, this caused 1 to drop to the ground and roll in pain. Adlet had stabbed himself with the Saint's needle and made his blood poisonous to Kyouma. Fremy shot 1 and forced Tgurneu out of 1. Adlet grabbed Tgurneu while his underlings tried to save him. Adlet was saddened that the thing that groomed him to be the Strongest in the World was such a pitiful existence and said: "I am not your toy as you had claimed! You existed for me. In order for me to meet Fremy, you were let to live by me!" Tgurneu, who believed that love was meant to be trampled by him, desperately wanted to reject the fact that he was defeated by Adlet's love, wanted to mentally wound Adlet and Fremy before Adlet killed him. He used the Book of Truth on himself and said to Fremy: "Your mother truly loved you!". To Adlet he whispered: "Your sister was killed by Fremy.". After Adlet killed Tgurneu, six shots of light flew out of Fremy's crest, one landing each on Chamo, Hans, Mora, Rolonia, Nashetania, Goldof. Only Adlet did not receive this as his seventh crest is very special and did not have its power stolen by the Black Barren Flower, unlike Nashetania's crest, which is a real crest but from the 2nd generation. Adlet passed out after killing Tgurneu and woke up later with the Braves discussing what to do with him as they now have to face Cargikk, who was originally oppressed by Tgurneu and did not attack them. Adlet, released from Tgurneu's control, no longer loved Fremy and returned to the man that wanted revenge on the Kyouma and nothing else.

  Epilogue: Cargikk wanders through the burnt forest that the Braves faced Tgurneu's army. He roared in despair and apologised to his fallen comrades, expressing his regret in not being able to save them. Meanwhile, the mummified body of the Saint of the Single Flower is released from her chains, presumably by her own powers as the chains just came undone without being touched. She teleported to the roof of the Temple of Fate from Volume 5 and get carried away by a bird Kyouma. She got carried to the Majin, a mud puddle. The mud puddle sprouted tentacles and devoured the Kyouma and slowly dragged the Saint of the Single Flower into itself. As it dragged the Saint, it grew beautiful lips and gratefully said Maon, do not worry, Adlet will bring the Seventh crest made for me and save me. Maon is the name of the Saint.

Finally all done, to be honest this is not a very good series. I originally bought and read it just to prove to krikara that Adlet was the fake and Hans was a real Brave. After proving that, I had lost all drive to finish Volume 6. However, to my surprise, Volume 6 was the best of all 6 volumes and I may consider buying Volume 7 when it is released. Overall rating 5/10, passable read.


How closely does the Initial D anime follow the manga? I have been watching the Initial D anime, but still haven't read the manga. How far does the anime cover, in respect to the manga? Are there any manga or anime exclusive content?

Altough the series stays pretty loyal to the story as told in the manga, there are a few exceptions. But these don't influence the story that much. One of the biggest factors affecting this is that a lot of the story in the manga got cut out.

  We Initial D fans love those little details. It's a shame they had to cut out so much in order to fit one race in each episode. Watching Fifth Stage almost feels like watching an extended version of Battle Stage... And for that reason, it's strongly recommended to read the manga after watching the anime. That way, you don't miss all the details from the original storyline. - ID fan forum

As to where to how much it covers, Fifth Stage episode 4 ends at Chapter 499. (I stopped reading at chapter 501, so I ain't too sure how far the rest of this season covers.) I do know that the new season Initial D final stage will cover the left-over chapters, making this series fully covered by the anime.

With this said, there is a ton of manga-exclusive content: like I said, a lot has been cut-out in the anime. There is also some unique anime content (fillers) in the series. A few I remember would be Initial D Episode's 13, 22, and 23.

There might be some more but I couldn't find a source to confirm this.


What was it that Ichimaru Gin wanted to avenge? I just finished watching Bleach. I wonder what was it about Matsumoto Rangiku that Ichimaru Gin wanted to avenge/protect?
Also, what would he have been thinking after he successfully extracted the Hogyoku from Aizen's body?

Gin found a collapsed Rangiku. They began living together in Rukongai. One night Gin spotted Aizen and three other Shinigami in a forest. He watches Aizen receive a pink ball of energy from one of the Shinigami. Gin had witnessed these three Shinigami leaving the area where he found Rangiku. It's implied that they stole the pink spiritual energy from her. For this reason, Gin vows to get revenge on Aizen.
As for what he was thinking after extracting the Hogyoku, I can only assume that he believed he was successful in killing Aizen and avenging Rangiku.
Source: https://bleach.fandom.com/wiki/Gin_Ichimaru#Fake_Karakura_Town_arc


Are there other ninjas aside Flashy Flash and Speed of Sound Sonic from the same village in One Punch Man? Supposedly Flashy Flash and Speed of Sound Sonic were trained in the same ninja village. Are there other ninjas from there in the series?

In the webcomic, there is currently (as of the time this answer was first written) nothing that unambiguously associates Flashy Flash with Sonic in any fashion. There are some things to suggest it, though:

   When Flashy Flash fights Garou he uses a technique called "Shadow Steps" to move even faster, and that kind of sounds like the name of a ninja-based move.  He also uses "Wind Blade Kick", a technique we saw Sonic use against Saitama in Chapter 15.

On the other hand, in the manga there is Gale Wind and Hellfire Flame, members of the Monster Association.  These two are explicitly said to be from the same village as Sonic, and more recently it has been made explicit that Flashy Flash hails from this village as well.

These characters do not exist in the webcomic in this form.  They are evidently based on the monsters Gale and Hellfire, who are also brothers that team up to fight Flashy Flash. But these have radically different character designs (they're robots, for one), and are quickly dispatched by Flashy Flash without receiving any real backstory.  These monsters were originally designed by another mangaka, so they couldn't be used in the manga adapation due to copyright issues.

The situation in the webcomic has since changed, and there are at least 23 living ninjas we have now seen, not including a mysterious "him".  Flashy Flash and Sonic are now explicitly revealed to be part of the 44th Ninja Class, same as in the Manga, as well.

   The following is a list of all of the ninjas that showed up, taken from a scanlation, including their graduation class:


Can the effect of a certain devil fruit last through the effect of another devil fruit? Just to make it easy to understand my question here is the example below :

Suppose a person X

A User of the Modo Modo no Mi use his/her DF ability and make X younger by 12 years,

now another DF user (lets say) of the Toki Toki no Mi use his/her DF ability & sends X (who is 12 years younger because of the effect of the earlier DF) into the future...

my question is that, will the Modo Modo no Mi maintain its effect on X who was sent into the future or not ?

There are no known facts at the moment that support which way is the correct one.

But if I am to make an educated guess, I think the answer is no. I think that most Devil Fruits in One Piece have an "ability range" meaning that if one can manipulate the objects near him, they will remain modified as long as they are in this "range" of the Devil Fruit.

For ex: The DF of vice-admiral Tsuru, Woshu Woshu no Mi, allows the user to literally "wash and hang out to dry" people and objects as if they were clothes. I can't imagine that if she chooses so, those people will remain like that for the rest of their lives. Same goes with Trafalgar Law's ability or Sugar from Dressrossa. They have to be in a reasonable range so that their respective DF powers work.

At least that is how I imagine the OP world works because otherwise it would be total chaos and we haven't seen any other character that had traces of a Devil Fruit ability on them that was used in the past (not their own DF powers of course). And to answer your question, the person sent in the future will automatically revert to their original nature and nullify any other DF abilities that were used upon them.


Why is Genos directly promoted to S rank and surpasses Amai Mask? I remember Amai Mask decides to stay at the top of A class hero to prevent another heroes below him to get promoted. Then why is genos suddenly promoted to S rank and surpasses Amai Mask and other class A heroes just like that?

I couldn't understand the logic behind promoting genos who is just a newcomer in hero association (I know he's strong) and manages to get into the highest rank in just few episodes. And I don't see why Amai Mask has to keep his plan while knowing that there's a rule to promote a hero to S rank in instant.

Genos was already S-rank upon entering the Hero Association. Amai Mask couldn't stop his promotion as he was never promoted from A-rank to S-rank in the first place.

I couldn't understand the logic behind promoting Genos who is just a newcomer in hero association and manages to get into the highest rank in just few episodes. In Episode 5, The Hero Association interviewed Genos about the House of Evolution's destruction and upon confirming that Genos played a part in it, they made an exception and gave him the rank of S-class based on prior experience.

And I don't see why Amai Mask has to keep his plan while knowing that there's a rule to promote a hero to S rank in instant. Again, it's not promotion. Promotion is a change of rank from a lower rank to higher rank. Genos is initially S-rank so no promotion took place. He was not initially assessed as A-rank. Amai Mask maintains his plan to prevent those heroes initially assessed as A-rank below from climbing into S-rank. This might not be stated in the manga but I see this as his way to prevent diminishing the standards on what it takes to be an S-class hero, although he does acknowledge a few heroes not in S-class.

It's by his choice that Amai Mask maintains his rank as A-class Rank 1. The difference in ranking does not immediately mean that Amai Mask is weaker than Genos. Example being King, who's S-rank but is weak and Saitama who's B-rank but is probably stronger than most, if not all, S-class heroes.


How closely does Princess Tutu follow Swan Lake and The Nutcracker? I know that the Princess Tutu anime uses a lot of music and performances from the ballets Swan Lake and The Nutcracker. However, does the anime's main plotline -- of a princess who helps return the prince's heart to him, only to die upon confessing her love -- closely follow either story? If so, what are the major deviations?

The story is loosely based on this, but it actually revolves more around bending the inevitable fate thrown to Ahiru (Tutu) by third side of the story. The storyteller, if you prefer.

The ending of the anime is not same either, even though it uses the same kind of theme. IMHO the ending is most closely following the original story, if you look the big picture.


Why are Rin's classmates afraid of him in the first episode of Kyoto Fujouou-hen? The first season of Blue Exorcist ended with Rin lauded by his friends. Even in the movie, they are still on good terms.

What happened between these seasons to make everyone afraid of Rin? They already knew him to be Satan's spawn... Is it shown in anime media, or only in the manga?

Direct Answer: Senshin is correct, everything after episode 16ish and the movie doesn't actually follow the manga's original story-line. Therefore this second season ignores it in order to follow the manga.

Now for some clarity on the timeline divergence:
 We see numerous flashbacks in Kyoto Fujouou-hen to Blue Exorcist but only right up to the point that he's taken into custody, at that point you'll notice that while there are later flashbacks the details are different from the original series.

These details, start with things like Shiemi turning her back on Rin as he's dragged off, and then him not being encased in a blue crystal at the trial, and no earth-king attack, etc...

They did take some parts from the manga and integrate it into those last 9 episodes of the first season and you'll notice they are almost identical between the 2 seasons. Eyebrows(Izumo) is the first to approach him and tell him that offspring between demons and humans has happened before and isn't uncommon in exorcists. The candle training also proceeds in almost the exact same way in both, though obviously in different settings.


Chunin exam arc instructor with full head bandage I was re-watching all the Naruto episodes and in ep 24 of Chunin exam arc, there are several instructors who are watching over genins who are trying to cheat.

One of them hits a genin when he's caught and denies his act. This instructor has full bandage almost covering his eyes too.

Does anyone remember if he's ever shown again or can identify him?

I've watched the whole series so far and there hasn't been any more references to him. There's oftentimes filler characters just to create effect and fill out the space, so I wouldn't be surprised if they just stuck some random guy in that looked cool.


Which anime really started the explosion of new isekai anime? Why didn't previous entries in the genre succeed in doing this? It seems to me that this genre really spiked in 2017, but we've had Digimon and Sword Art Online for years before. What really started this boom?

According to Gigguk's video Isekai: The genre that took over modern anime, paulnamida's comment is basically correct - there were isekai shows in the 90s, but they were mainly shoujo-focused, and the recent boom seems to mainly stem from the boom in light novels that came after the popularity of Sword Art Online (which was not itself technically isekai, but it set things up well for them).


Anime sound bite repository? Does anyone know if a good anime sound bite repository exists? I know someone who is considering incorporating silly/hyperbolic/cute sound bites from various animes into her reviews as reactionary bits.

Unfortunately YouTube doesn't allow sorting or searching clips by time length (of seconds) and I haven't seen too much on archive.org. I can't think of other good sources aside from manual extraction.

One that I know is NiconiCommons (Japanese) (sister site of NicoNicoDouga, a Japanese video sharing site). Basically it's a site where users can upload and share resources/materials (image, sound, video, etc) for people to use.

You can browse all the audio materials, or search the one you want.

  Click Advanced Search button

  Input the Tag or Keyword in Japanese

  Tick 音声 (onsei, audio) only

  Press Search button

Alternatively, replace the [tag] or [keyword] from these URL:

Tag-only     : http://commons.nicovideo.jp/search/tag/[tag]?s=d&o=d&t=2&sc=1
Keyword-only : http://commons.nicovideo.jp/search/keyword/[keyword]?s=d&o=d&t=2&sc=1
Tag & Keyword: http://commons.nicovideo.jp/search/hybrid/[tag]/[keyword]?s=d&o=d&t=2&sc=1

Example: List of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure sound bites.

However, since these are all uploaded by users, you may not find what you want. You also need to have an account to be able to download, but the registration page is available in English.


Where does the idea of a Hadouken and Kamehameha come from? Having read a few manga/watched some anime, I have seen that many characters can use attacks where they gather their "ki" or, according to wikipedia, "Life force", and release it in a fireball like manner. The most widely known examples of these are the "Hadouken", and the "Kamehameha". Where does the idea for this kind of attack come from? Did one person think of it and everyone copy them, or is there like a old teaching or story about this?

Thanks in advance :)

I'm going to talk about the Kamehameha here if I talk about either one of them specifically, because I know more about Dragon Ball than I do about Street Fighter.

The Kamehameha is supposed to be the ultimate attack, in which the user gathers all of their Ki into one point and releases it at once.

Ki, also spelled Chi or Qi, is "life-force" as you mentioned. The idea of ki is one that is pervasive throughout East Asian mythology. It originates from tai-chi. Tai-chi is not just a martial art in the sense that someone brought up in the West like myself might think of it -- that is to say, it doesn't exist just so that you can learn to defend yourself from an assailant. It is a practice that was birthed from Taoism, also spelled as Daoism, which is a very spiritual set of beliefs.

Taoism, as you may know, has as one of its core principles the balance of internal and external force -- yin versus yang. Yin represents the internal force, and yang the external.

In tai-chi, one does learn self-defensive techniques and weapon drills, it's true. However, one also learns to cultivate the yin in one's body. This may be an oversimplification but I believe that defensive and weapons training is considered the cultivation of yang.

To cultivate yin, one learns completely passive techniques, such as breathing and meditation. These are designed to promote overall health and wellness of one's own body. To someone unfamiliar with tai-chi, the exercises might look like aerobics or even just stretching exercises. In mythology, it is believed that masters of such artistry can live for well over a hundred years, or even forever. (hint hint, Master Roshi, although it's explained in the show as him drinking from "The Fountain of Youth" -- that part is a parody of the "eternal martial artist" trope in Asian stories). The breathing and movement techniques are said to keep one's ki in balance, and cultivate untapped potential ki which has not begun to flow in the body yet.

In other words, although a show like Dragon Ball is fantasy, to explain it in real world mythology: Master Roshi became such a master of tai-chi that he can manipulate his ki into an external force directly.

The same principle applies to Ryu. He is supposed to be a master martial artist. To someone familiar with East Asian mythology and tropes, this means that he knows how to manipulate his life energy to make fireballs, to put it simply.


Why is Yukihira Soma not famous at Tōtsuki Culinary Academy? It is a known fact that Yukihira Soma is the son of one of the world's most famous chefs, Yukihira Joichiro, but why is it that the students from Tōtsuki Culinary Academy don't know about Soma?

It's even stranger that Nakiri, who is known as the God's Tongue for her extreme tasting skills, admires Joichiro but fails to realize that Yukihira Soma is the son of Yukihira Joichiro. She had seen Soma's application form, so it must have given her a hint already. One of the few people (or maybe the only one) who seems to know about this fact is the headmaster.

Why is that? Are they trying to hide the fact that Soma is the son of Joichiro, probably for some unknown reason?

I have not read the entire manga, but I read that Soma's father was formerly known as Saiba Jōichirō. It is not the same last name as Yukihira Soma, so this may be a reason why people don't know that they are father and son.

Source: Jōichirō Yukihira on Shokugeki no Souma wiki.


What does "There's a route but no loop" mean? "There's a route but no loop" is the episode title for Genshiken Nidaime - 08.

I'm assuming this is a reference to gal games, but what does that mean?

It's a double pun on the pronunciation and game mechanics, "ruuto" (ルート) and "ruupu" (ループ) sounds similar.

In VN/galges, you have to do a playthrough (loop) to unlock certain routes.


Are eye techniques in Naruto based on anything real? Are the eye techniques in Naruto (Byakugan, Sharingan, Rinnegan) based on true events? Or are they just myth or a fiction created by Masashi-Sensei? Anyone has any references or a story behind it?

According to the Naruto wiki page on dōjutsu, there are two potential points of inspiration for the dōjutsu techniques (rinnegan/sharigan/byuakugan).

The first:

  The concept of dōjutsu may have been inspired by Futaro Yamada's 1959
  novel, The Kōga Ninja Scrolls (甲賀忍法帖, Kōga Ninpōchō), which featured
  two warring clans of ninja that had developed mutations and abilities
  through selective breeding, with the young heirs to each clan
  possessing mysterious dōjutsu.

Or alternately,

  Another possible inspiration for dōjutsu in the series may also be
  found in the Journey to the West classic's titular character, the
  Monkey God-King, Sun Wukong: After having eaten all of the 'peaches of
  immortality', the 'pills of longevity' and drunk all of the 'wine of
  immortality', and then was captured after a long rebellion against
  Heaven, the Monkey God-King, Sun Wukong, was then sealed into Lao
  Tzu's Eight Trigram furnace to be burned to ash in order for Lao Tzu
  to reclaim his pills of longevity. But after 49 days, Sun Wukong broke
  out--stronger than ever--his body having been refined by the flames
  instead of being reduced to ash, His eyes had also become a fiery red
  and golden colour, becoming known as his "Fiery-eyes golden-gaze"
  (火眼金睛, Huǒyǎn-Jīnjīng); an eye condition that allowed Sun Wukong to
  now see what's really there just by looking and the ability to see and
  recognise the real form of evil despite whatever form that it took on
  — but, likewise, it also gave him a weakness to smoke, fogging his
  vision.


Anime with special weapons and female characters fighting? I am trying to find an anime that I had watched years ago. It has these female characters that are trying to fight each other. They have special weapons which they can summon and that I think they wear something that represents their team. They have these toys that help them to have these weapons summoned. I can't seem to remember this anime.

Does anyone know what it might be?

The anime that you are trying to find is most likely to be Kämpfer.

Plot:

  The plot revolves around Natsuru Senō, a normal high school boy with blue hair. One day he wakes up and found himself turned into a girl. A stuffed tiger "Harakiri Tora" comes to life and tells him that he has been chosen as one of the "Kämpfer", a female fighter. The Kämpfer are destined to fight with other Kämpfer. The story starts when he is attacked by an unknown girl who happens to also be a Kämpfer.


How often do multi-season anime break their previous cour count? Usually with multi-season anime, successive seasons tend to follow a similar episode-count as previous seasons. Even if the exact number of episodes is off by a couple, or some are replaced by recap episodes, but in almost every Season 2 or 3 I've seen, the number of cours always matches up with the same number of cours as the 1st season.

First, is there a particular reason for this, or is it "just tradition"?

Second, how often do second or third seasons break from the cour-count of previous seasons? Does it happen at least once a year, or is it uncommon enough that the last time it happened was ages ago? Does it even happen at all?

Third, are there any examples of anime that have asymmetrical seasons like this? Recent and otherwise examples would be nice.

Let me answer your question anecdotally. (A data-driven answer would be better, but I don't want to spend very long trawling AniDB/MAL/etc. If somebody does that, I'll award a bounty.)

From the bottom up:

  Third, are there any examples of anime that have asymmetrical seasons like this? Recent and otherwise examples would be nice.

Shokugeki no Soma (2 cours → 1 cour)
K-ON! (1 cour → 2 cours)
Monogatari (15 episodes → 1 cour → 2 cours → 1 cour → 2 cours, not counting the 2-hour-ish specials or the movies or Koyomimonogatari)
Full Metal Panic! (2 cours → 1 cour → 1 cour)
Kimi ni Todoke (2 cours → 1 cour)
Haikyuu!! (2 cours → 2 cours → 1 cour)
Nisekoi (20 episodes → 1 cour)
Psycho-Pass (2 cours → 1 cour)
Yama no Susume (1 cour → 2 cours; this is a short)
Little Busters! (2 cours → 1 cour)
Shingeki no Bahamut (1 cour → 2 cours)
Yowamushi Pedal (3 cours → 2 cours → 2 cours)

(This is mostly recent stuff; I haven't watched enough older stuff to have a good sense for how things worked back in the day.)

  Second, how often do second or third seasons break from the cour-count of previous seasons? Does it happen at least once a year, or is it uncommon enough that the last time it happened was ages ago? Does it even happen at all?

The list above is just the ones I remembered offhand as having "asymmetrical" seasons while I was scrolling through the list of anime I've seen. And, alas, I have not yet achieved my lifelong dream of watching literally all the anime, so there are naturally going to be others that I didn't notice.

I'd say this is the kind of thing that happens maybe a few times a year or so - it does seem to be infrequent relative to "symmetrical" seasons, but not so rare as it seems to you. Certainly not something that hasn't happened in ages - Shokugeki no Soma's second season was Fall 2016, and Shingeki no Bahamut's second season is starting soon, in Spring 2017.

  First, is there a particular reason for this, or is it "just tradition"?

Here is one clear reason this would happen:

Long-running cash cows aside, the number of cours in a particular season of a particular anime is a small integer - almost always 1, 2, 3, or 4; and most frequently just 1 or 2. Even if anime season lengths were randomly either 1 or 2 cours, we'd expect to see 50% of two-season anime be "symmetrical". In reality, there is a moderate bias towards 1-cour anime (at least in the present day), so that even absent other factors, we'd expect more than 50% to be "symmetrical".

Additionally, I can offer the following speculative thoughts:

Some varieties of anime intrinsically lend themselves to particular cour lengths.

Many sports anime, for example, are structured as a series of tournaments, each of which features a number of competitions, with each competition taking up multiple episodes; this is typically the kind of thing that lends itself to having a tournament per season, with each season consisting of 2 or more cours.
On the other hand, comedies that aren't Gintama seem to fare best when they don't drag on for too long, biasing them more strongly towards 1-cour seasons.

If you have an anime that's based on an ongoing manga/novel source, structuring it as a bunch of 1-cour seasons seems to be an effective way to both 1.) avoid running out of source material; and 2.) avoid having long gaps without an anime. Natsume Yuujinchou strikes me as a quintessential example of this.
If you have an anime adapted from source material that has a regular/predictable narrative structure, and you successfully adapted it into an n-cour anime season, it stands to reason that its next anime season would probably also be well-served by an n-cour run.

I think we see a number of systemic factors that bias multi-season into being "symmetrical" and no systemic factors that bias them into being "asymmetrical".

Of course, on a case-by-case basis, there will often be factors that make it make sense to have "asymmetrical" seasons. For example, with K-ON!, the first season was so enormously successful that the production committee would've been fools not to ride that cash cow into the sunset. And as for Haikyuu!! - while it does follow the "2-cour sports anime" format for its first two seasons, the thing is that its second tournament is long enough that they just split out the most exciting part of it into a separate season, which seems reasonable.


What language are the spells/chants in? In Brave 10, when a character goes to use a spell's incantation or uses a chant for a secret technique, the subtitles don't have any English words in it (I am referring to the home release by NISA, not fansubs). However, it does sound like they are saying something in Japanese. An example of this is in episode 2 when Hanzo Hattori goes to use Pure Flame Samadhi on Saizo.

I am wondering, what language are the spells/chants being said in? Or did they just throw random characters together?

What language is it?

That's Japanese. It's not ordinary contemporary Japanese, though, but rather Buddhist Japanese, which has some unusual qualities that make it rather unlike contemporary spoken Japanese.

Why isn't it translated?

Buddhist texts in Japanese are strange things. As the informed reader is aware, Buddhism originated in India, and as such, many of the foundational texts of Buddhism were originally written in Sanskrit. When Buddhism moved into China, those Sanskrit texts were translated into whatever the contemporary form of Classical Chinese was. Eventually, those texts made their way from China into Japan.
I'm glossing over a lot of details here to get to the important point: most Japanese Buddhist terminology was first introduced around the 6th century CE. Since these were loanwords from Chinese (many of which were in turn loans from Sanskrit), they used Sino-Japanese pronunciations (that is, on readings, and in particular, go-on readings). Buddhist terminology has changed relatively little since.
Modern Japanese consists primarily of 1.) native words (e.g. kun readings); 2.) non-Sinitic loanwords (e.g. borrowings from English); or 3.) Sinitic loanwords that postdate the 6th century (that is, the kan-on and tō-on readings). go-on vocabulary (like Buddhist words) are relatively scarce in the contemporary Japanese language, and the average speaker is unlikely to be particularly familiar with many go-on words.
Making things more difficult still is the fact that Japanese Buddhist texts are often straight-up Chinese texts simply being read in Japanese pronunciations, making it difficult for someone without training in reading Buddhist texts to understand what is being spoken.
So that's probably why it wasn't translated - it was too difficult for whoever was on hand. It's certainly possible to translate whatever was said (see below), but I guess it wasn't worth the trouble for the people at NISA. See also footnote4. Anyway, that's enough of that digression.

What is he actually saying?

If my ears are working today, what Hattori Hanzo says in episode 2 is:

オン ソンバ ニソンバ ウン バザラ ウン パッタ
on sonba nisonba un bazara un patta

Now, what does this mean? Heck if I know - I certainly don't know how to read Japanese Buddhist texts. Luckily, the internet has answers for us. This is apparently the mantra1 (in Japanese, shingon) for a being called 降三世明王 (Gouzanze Myouou; Skt. Trailokyavijaya)2, one of the five Wisdom Kings.
The Sanskrit equivalent of this chant appears to be:3

om sumbha nisumbha hum vajra hum phat4

I'm not going to attempt to translate this, because my Sanskrit is far too weak for that, but some of the relevant things to know are: Sumbha is an alternate name (or epithet or something like that) for Gouzanze Myouou, as is Vajrahumkara, here contracted to Vajra. Nisumbha is the name of the other asura that appears in stories detailing the exploits of Sumbha. "Om" is of course the sacred syllable Om. The rest I'm honestly not sure about, but I'm sure a better-educated person would be able to translate this.

Notes
* If you find this sort of thing interesting, take a look at the Buddhism proposal over at Area51! They need more committers!
1 Full text for the mantrams of the other Wisdom Kings here, I think.
2 See also this JAANUS article.
3 According to this guy and also the article on shingon on Japanese Wikipedia.
4 The astute reader will observe the startling similarity of the Sanskrit version of the mantra to the Japanese version, this despite Sanskrit and Japanese having no genetic relationship to one another. This is another reason why Buddhist mantras in particular are difficult to understand - they are often just plain Sanskrit processed through Chinese without translation and then readapted to fit Japanese phonology, and as such are often devoid of any actual Japanese words.


What happened to Yui's Heart when Kirito wiped out his Inventory? Yui told Kirito that it would be a good idea for him to clear out his inventory as all the items were bugged and he could be detected by the system if they remained. As he was about to, he was hesitant in doing so. I can assume one of the 2 reasons:

All the items were a record of his 2 years in SAO and had a personal connection to them.
Yui's Heart was in the inventory and he was being careful not to delete it.

However, in the anime, it didn't show any sort of filter was applied and his entire inventory was cleared. So I am wondering what happened to Yui's Heart - was it not in his inventory because Yui was right beside him or was Yui protecting it in some way from the system so that it wouldn't appear in his inventory.

Like your previous question, I don't think there's a way to confirm exactly what happened here, but I have 3 possible explanations.

Yui's Heart was marked as a special item and couldn't be deleted (e.g. Quest item, etc.), but I think this is the least likely, since as you said, the anime showed his inventory being empty and there was no filter on it.
It could simply just have been consumed when Yui was summoned, so it was already gone when he deleted everything.
It was simply deleted. Since Yui was already initialized in the world, it didn't matter if he had it in his inventory or not.


What is this place from episode 9 of Monogatari Second Season? In episode 9 of Monogatari Second Season, Shinobu says the following (around the 17:20 mark):

具体的には、この街中の人間を、
日本中の人間を、
世界中の人間を
吸血鬼化したのじゃろう。

Translated,

To be more specific, I turned the people of this town,
the people of Japan,
and the people of the world
into vampires.

The first line is accompanied by an aerial shot of the town where the story takes place; the second line by a shot of the Tokyo Sky Tree; and the fourth line by an image of an elaborate gravestone.
The third line is accompanied by the following picture:

What is this a picture of?

This looks like a shot of the Palais des Nations in Switzerland, formerly the headquarters of the League of Nations, and now the home of the United Nations' Geneva branch.


Was Mirajane born with Satan Soul? Just wondering on this but, was Mirajane born with the certain Take Over ability Satan Soul and how did she learn to master it? Also was Elf-Man and Lisanna born with their abilities too? I was wondering this when I noticed that she can change into not one but two other different forms of Satan's Soul including...

  Satan Soul Sitiri and Satan Soul Halphas as below.

I would like to know if this is revealed in any of the Anime's or Mangas

Answers are appreciated.

One needs to possess the Demon Factor to use Satan Soul. Mira said it herself:

It hasn't been explained if she already has it since birth or not.


What was wrong with Presea Testarossa? During the original series of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, on occasion when Presea Testarossa was alone she would cough up blood with more being coughed up as time went on apparently getting weaker as well. She also commented that she was running out of time to collect the Jewel Seeds to reach Al-Hazard leading her having to push forward with her plans before getting all the Jewel Seeds.

In the movies it's revealed that Alicia died from a prototype energy generator meltdown that Presea was developing so at first i thought that she was suffering from injuries from the accident she survived however the accident was in in 0039 and the Jewel Seed Incident was in 0065 so Presea had been alive for 26 years so she would have recovered by then.

So i am wondering, what was wrong with Presea? also when she said she was running out of time, was she referring to her own life running out or Alicia's preserved state?

Yes, whatever happened with the reactor probably caused it.  I don't think radiation poisoning is the exact condition, if only because an advanced, experimental technomagical mana reactor shouldn't be using nuclear fission, but the symptoms and progression seem to match media portrayals of that — and of tuberculosis, more closely; the "beautiful pallor", the exhaustion, and coughing up blood were originally markers, in prose and poetry, then later in film, of what was generally referred to as "consumption".  Tuberculosis is no longer a major killer in the developed world, but its symptoms remain in media as the go-to nonspecific slow, wasting death.

As for the time factor, I think her disease was the determiner there; Alicia wasn't going to get any more dead.  Whatever the actual cause of her illness, I believe that it was exacerbated by her throwing herself into Project Fate; as you say, she spent 22 years on that before Fate herself was decanted, presumably working at all hours and neglecting her health; she probably knew she was dying slowly before she realized Fate wasn't Alicia and moved to her mad attempt to reach Al-Hazard.  She gave Linith a hard (and near-impossible) deadline by which to build Bardiche and train Fate as a top-flight combat mage, so she certainly knew she had little time by then.


Name of Zaraki Kenpachi's Zanpakuto? In the manga, Kenpachi can't hear his Zanpakuto's sound at all in the beginning. But when he's battling with Captain Unohana (previous Kenpachi, I heard), he began to hear his Zanpakuto's speaking. Does anyone know the Zanpakuto's name or its abilities?

As of today's (16-04-2014) manga chapter (chapter 577) we got to know how Zaraki Kenpachi's Zanpakuto looks and what its name is.

The name of his Zanpakuto is Nozarashi. Also, in order to get into Shikai state the keyword seems to be "swallow".

How it looks:


Kawakami Minoru authors light novels reading order? Kawakami Minoru wrote 5 light novel which are connected I think.

City Series
Gekitotsu no Hexennacht
Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon
Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon Kimitoasamade
Owari no Chronicle

So should I read them release date order or I could just read read any of them randomly.

You should probably go in the order in which they were released, as Arcane also mentioned. But otherwise, an ideal order would be as follows:

Owari no Chronicle
Owari no Chronicle DC
Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon
Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon Kimitoasamade
Gekitotsu no Hexennacht
City Series

Note that Owari no Chronicle, despite being several thousand years before Horizon, sets up a lot of the technology and gives a lot of explanations as to why some of the stuff in Horizon is the way it is, so I recommend reading it before that.

And The City Series is sort of it's own entity. It takes place after Horizon (thousands of years...sort of), but was written before both Owari and Horizon, so nothing is "carried forward" in-universe. In addition, it's more of a set of short stories, with each novel in the series taking place in a different part of the world with different characters. Feel free to read whenever.

This should make for an ideal read, according to me because that is the order in which I read them/am reading/will read, and it makes sense. Unfortunately, I couldn't find an official source, so this is based on personal experience.

Also see this, regarding the release dates, though I'm pretty sure you would have already seen it : https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoru_Kawakami

Edit : Regarding Gekitotsu no Hexennacht, I found something that ascertains that it's after horizon and before city series:

  Clash of Hexennacht (激突のヘクセンナハト) is a light novel series written by Kawakami Minoru (川上 稔) and illustrated by Satoyasu (さとやす). It began serialization in Dengeki Bunko Magazine while its manga adaptation runs in Dengeki Daioh and is set for its first full novel release by Dengeki Bunko in August 2015. It takes place between Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon and the City Series, two other series by the author.

Source:https://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/index.php?title=Clash_of_Hexennacht

Also the order which I mentioned above isn't a strict order as such, but I have tried my best to arrange them with respect to the enormous time span in which they are set in. They are not very tightly interconnected, but basically set in the same world, as created by the author. So there isn't any specific order, but the above order is what you should follow, according to me.


Up to what Episode/Chapter of One Piece should i see before playing each of Bandai Namco's PC Games? on Steam there are several One Piece Games

(2015) Pirate Warriors 3
(2016) Burning Blood
(2017) Ultimate World Red
(2019) World Seeker
(2020) Pirate Warriors 4

the last i saw the series it "ended" but that was because i was watching the 4Kids version and have been looking to get back into the series, more so when i see these games show up on special.
the appearance of the Straw Hat Crew is unfamiliar to be even in Pirate Warriors 3 and i am seeing a bunch of characters i have not seen in the series myself before (have seen some in passing mention) so i would like to avoid spoilers as much as possible by watching/reading the series before i play any of these games
so i am wondering, Up to what Episode/Chapter of One Piece should i see before playing each game?

I doubt if you can keep off from watching the series as the requirement for the first game itself makes you curious for the following arcs. Yet, here is my answer based on the character list seen on wiki/google of games you've mentioned. All the arcs I've mentioned are till the end(inclusive).

Pirate Warriors 3 - Marineford arc.
(2016) Burning Blood - Return to Sabaody Arc.
(2017) Ultimate World Red - Dressrosa arc (could be an overestimate)
(2019) World Seeker - Wholecake Island arc.
(2020) Pirate Warriors 4 - Wholecake Island arc.


Does Anri know that Mikado is the leader of Dollars or part of the Dollars? Does Anri know that Mikado is the leader of Dollars or that he is part of the Dollars?

She doesn't know, and Mikado doesn't know that Anri is Aika.


What are the types of jutsus that exist in Naruto? There seem to be a number of different types of jutsus that exist in Naruto. These include ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu. What are all of the types of jutsus and what do they do?

DISCLAIMER: I've never seen or read anything Naruto.

This questions seems rather simple to me, so perhaps you're looking for a specific angle? There is a good ammount of info on Jutsu on Narutopedia. Here I will try to quote that article in brief summaries.

What is Jutsu?

  Jutsu ... are the mystical arts a ninja will utilise in battle. To use a technique, the ninja will need to use their chakra. To perform a technique, the ninja will bring out and release the two energies of chakra. By forming hand seals, the ninja is able to manifest the desired technique. Because of the extensive number of hand seals and different combinations, there are thousands of potential techniques to be discovered.
  -- Jutsu, Narutopedia

What are the different types of Jutsu?

There are three principal types of jutsu:

  Ninjutsu ...a term referring to almost any technique which allows the user to do something that they otherwise would be incapable of doing, including the usage of weapons.
  More info: Ninjutsu, Narutopedia
  Genjutsu are techniques that are employed in the same fashion as ninjutsu... However, the primary difference between the two is that the effects of genjutsu are illusory; instead of attacking the victim's body, like taijutsu or ninjutsu, genjutsu techniques manipulate the flow of chakra in the victim's brain, thus causing a disruption in their senses.
  More info: Genjutsu, Narutopedia
  Taijutsu a basic form of techniques ... refers to any techniques involving the martial arts or the optimisation of natural human abilities. Taijutsu is executed by directly accessing the user's physical and mental energies, relying on the stamina and strength gained through training. It typically does not require chakra, though chakra may be used to enhance its techniques. Taijutsu generally requires no hand seals to perform, occasionally making use of certain stances or poses, and are much quicker to use than ninjutsu or genjutsu. Taijutsu is simply put: hand-to-hand combat.
  More info: Taijutsu, Narutopedia

  -- Jutsu, Narutopedia

There are several sub-types including:

  Barrier Ninjutsu  ...the incorporation of barriers into techniques.
  Bukijutsu  ...techniques that entail the use of any handheld weapons in combat, whether the users be shinobi or samurai.
  Chakra Absorption Techniques ...techniques that allow the user to absorb another individual's chakra.
  Chakra Flow ...the flowing of chakra through an object as well as any technique that increases the potency of a weapon by flowing chakra through it..
  Clone Techniques ...techniques that create a copy of the user or objects used by them.
  Collaboration Techniques ...techniques which entails powerful techniques that are actually comprised of at least two or more pre-existing techniques.
  Fūinjutsu ...a type of jutsu that seal objects, living beings, chakra, along with a wide variety of other things within another object.
  Hiden ...techniques are passed down orally from generation to generation in certain regions or clans.
  Juinjutsu ...techniques used to bring someone under the control of the user.
  Kenjutsu ...techniques that entail the use of swords, whether the users be shinobi or samurai.
  Kinjutsu ...techniques that have been banned from being taught or used.
  Medical Ninjutsu ...a branch of ninjutsu associated with healing...
  Nintaijutsu ...a combination of ninjutsu and taijutsu, the Raikage uses nintaijutsu by first surrounding himself with his Lightning Release Armour.
  Reincarnation Ninjutsu  ...techniques that usually require or accomplish the transfer of life force between people.
  Senjutsu ...a specialised field of techniques that allows the user to sense and then gather the natural energy ... around a person.
  Shurikenjutsu ...techniques that entail the throwing of shuriken, kunai, senbon or any other of a number of bladed, hand-held weapons.
  Space–Time Ninjutsu ...techniques that allow the users to manipulate the space–time continuum.
  Tailed Beast Skill a unique ability or trait used by tailed beasts.

  -- Jutsu, Narutopedia

I hoped this helped! :)


What is the name of the manga which depicts Hitler as a Super Aryan? I've come across the following picture, can anyone please tell me what's the manga name?

It's called Mudazumo Naki Kaikaku. The characters are all based off of real-life politicians like George Bush, Kim Jong Il, Mao, Pol Pot, Putin, and of course, many from Nazi Germany, and they play Mahjong together in this manga. It was also adapted into an anime series.


Mysterious black hands on chapter 383 of Hunter x Hunter On Hunter x Hunter chapter 383, something that looks like black hands suddenly appear and it took 1 princess life.

Is that a "Nen" or is it the Black Continent thing?

If you read the succeeding pages of that chapter, Fugetsu Hui Guo Rou clearly realizes what it was and said to herself that:

  Leaving the ship...doesn't mean escape...but death?!

Also, after saving Kacho Hui Guo Rou, or her Nen beast to be exact, she told her that:

  There's punishment for leaving the ship.

This leads to the conclusion that it is probably a Nen ability or something similar, put in place around the ship to detect and prevent people leaving and eliminate them if they ever make it out. As to who put this up, it was never revealed if I recall correctly.


Would the Inuzuka or Nara technique count as a kekkei genkai? Kekkei genkai are considered abilities passed on through bloodlines, from this question: How is a technique characterized as a kekkei genkai? When discussing kekkei genkai, however, people never seem to include clan abilities such as the Nara shadow possession or the Inuzuka collaborative jutsu with their dog partners. Would these (or similar) abilities count as kekkei genkai, and if not, why not?

Nope, they are not. The abilities that you mentioned are just hiden (秘伝, not to be confused with "hidden") techniques, exclusive to a specific clan. There is a difference between them and kekkei genkai abilities.

Kekkei Genkai is passed down genetically, so every member of a clan has an aptitude for it.
The hiden techniques, on the contrary, are not passed down genetically, but rather "taught", so in fact anyone could learn them if they were not kept in secret.

For example, take Parasitic Destruction Insect Technique, which is exclusive to Aburame clan. However, it's not a genetically-passed ability, it's rather that only Aburame clan knows what needs to be done in order to place the insects into one's body and to learn how to live in symbiosis with them.

You can read more on the subject here.


Why did Historia see her father's memories? In Season 3 Episode 9 we see that

   after slaying her own father, Historia gains access to his memories.

According to Season 3 Episode 6 and Chapter 89,

   titan shifters are able to see the memories of their past and future holders. (read here for explanation)

Historia, however,

   has, up to this point, never possessed the power of the titans.

But we do know from Season 2 Episode 5 and Season 3 Episode 2 that

   she has blue blood which means she can use the Founding Titan's abilities to its full potential. (not exactly full, but at least more than Eren)

Is there an explanation for this?

As far as I know, it was never discussed as of the release of the most recent chapter. That specific scene in Chapter 68 was mostly what happened in the anime. It could be explained in a future chapter.
Looking closely at Episode 9,

   it can be seen that after the flashbacks of her father's memories, Historia opens her eyes as if surprised at what she saw. This might mean that her eyes were closed during the flashback scenes, implying that she saw her father's memories.

In the manga, this was not exactly what happened.

  She just widens her eyes and opens her mouth slightly as he killed him and as her father's memories were shown. From my interpretation, it could be that she was just surprised at what she had done.


Is the last scene in The Last: Naruto the Movie the end of Naruto? At the end of The Last: Naruto the Movie, after Naruto and Hinata got married and Hinata gave birth to two kids, is that the end of Naruto? Will they create a sequel to the story?

There's currently an on-going manga about a future story titled Naruto Gaiden: The Seventh Hokage and the Scarlet Spring.

At the end of The Last: Naruto the Movie, there is an announcement for the next movie called Boruto: Naruto the Movie. (Thanks to Ankit Sharma for pointing this out)


Why does Yasako have an encode reactor? In episode 23 of Dennou Coil, we find out that Yasako (Okonogi Yuko) has a working encode reactor. I think I missed the part where they explain how she got it and whether it's a physical device or a virtual one. Was it something installed into her body (or her virtual private data) during the healing experiment?

In a forum post asking the same thing you did,

  So, where did Yasako's encode reactor come from? It can't possibly be from Isako's prior encode; Satchii always chased Yasako even when she was "clean." It must have been built into her glasses from the beginning by the Cyberpappy. Exactly why he felt the need to do this, I don't know.

this was the reply:

  It came from the kilabug (kirabug?) that Isako transferred while
  trying to save Haraken.


Can mystic Gohan hold his own against Goku Super Saiyan Blue? In the week prior to episode 90th, where Gohan was going to have a training fight against Goku in Super Saiyan Blue, a japanese magazine gave an advancement saying this was going to happen and that mystic Gohan was going to be able to hold his own against Super Saiyan Blue Goku. But in episode 90th what we've seen..

   it's Gohan having an even match with Goku in base form. Later Gohan having an even match against Goku in SSJ2. Later a very brief fight between mystic Gohan vs Goku Super Saiyan Blue and finally Goku defeating Gohan using Super Saiyan Blue Kaioken.

Therefore, can it be said mystic Gohan can hold his own against Goku Super Saiyan Blue ? is he even or is he weaker?

I think he is probably weaker, if you look closely at the fight when SSB Goku and Ultimate Gohan clash Goku seems to shrug off the two punches Gohan lands, but when a Goku lands one punch on Gohan he is visibly hurt and shaken. I would assume Ultimate form Gohan at this point is 60-70%  SSB Goku max since Goku wouldn't hold back after seeing his son like that.


How could Rudy be a sorcerer before he was an adventurer? Heavy spoilers if you haven't gotten past the Return of the Goblin King arc.

   Rudy was not an adventurer until after Shiroe successfully raised him using new world-level magic.  How was he able to gain levels beforehand?  Can People of The Land have classes and gain XP even if they are not adventurers?  It seems to me that you have to be an adventurer before you can gain levels and things.

Landers (or People of the Land) do gain levels, but is very low compared that of an Adventurer.

As per his wikia:

  He put tremendous effort into this guise; as a Lander, his EXP leveling rate was 1/4 that of an Adventurer, yet he was able to achieve a class level similar to beginning adventurers before his status change


Has there been a study or documentary on the influence of Ani-song themes on Japan's music scene? As noted on How are the themes and songs picked for a particular series?, some anime openings are created for their show; thus, the song and anime theme usually coincide and work together.

Since these songs are widely promoted in Japanese society (and consumed largely by young ones that regard them highly as they grow), I guess these themes heavily influence Japan's music scene too.

At least the influence of early video game music is easy to note. The wide spread of anisons has to have had an influence in musicians.

Sure, the trace of influence might start with the society itself as in Society/Home → Author Experience → Piece of Work → Anime+Anison, and then feeds back to Society.

The background of the question

I think that there's a lot more of songs that talk about peers understanding (in love, hurting, etc) in Japan than in Western music. The motivation for this question is to prove or disprove, since I'm making the assumption that these anisons lyrics/themes have influenced current Japanese song writers.

I do believe that Japanese writers express the need of Japan's society to communicate their problems to others and to understand other people struggles.

But there has been any study or documentary talking about this?

Even a formal investigation about this theme bias I see in the lyrics of Japan's music bands works. And sure, this might be just my imagination, is really uncommon that theme on western songs?

An example of these kind of differences between japanese music and western music is noted by Marty Friedman (former Megadeath guitarist). But what he talks about is the music composition, not the topics on jpop/jrock lyrics.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find a documentary specifically on the subject you requested, purely because I do not think that one currently exists. I did, however, find a number of articles that conducted largely unofficial research on such a topic. In general, has anime music affected the Japanese music industry?

Yes.

How?

I think the most significant effect is the broader audience. Due to anime's rapidly growing international fanbase, and with more and more shows being dubbed in languages other than Japanese and English, the music of anime is being broadcast across the globe. Anime allows the artists of this music to take their songs to the international stage. I think the effect of this globalization if you will can be see across many different anime.

For example, consider the music artist Linked Horizon. Before 2013, Linked Horizon produced a number of smaller projects, including a song for a Nintendo 3DS game. However, it wasn't until 2013, when the band composed the opening to Attack on Titan, that they truly took off in popularity. Their song rocketed to the top of the leaderboards and was and is a fan favorite across the world. This would not have been possible without anime.

In addition, there are examples of people changing their whole music tastes and playlists due to their newly found interest in Japanese music from watching anime. You can read here about anime watchers in the US and their changing tastes in music.

It conclusion, the largest effect anime has had on the Japanese music industry is its internationalization. Anime has helped to significantly broaden the audience of Japanese music.

Here's a very good article about anime's affect on Japanese music.


Who was Hajime talking to at the end of Gatchaman Crowds? At the end of the last episode:

  She called her mother to tell her that no matter what happens, "I'm just me". Then after the credits, Hajime was tapping her chest and was having a conversation with someone with another voice. Who was she talking to? Was that supposed to be Katze?

Yes, that's Katze.

Most of the time, Katze talks with a high pitch, especially when bullying people. However, when Katze is not in control of the situation, his/her voice drops. This can be heard several times in the battle between O.D. and Katze that starts at 6:05 in the same episode. It's the same voice.

Besides, at the end of the series everybody else likes Hajime; who except Katze would claim to be sickened by her? :-)


How can a player in ALO make an original Sword Skill? I know the fact that Kirito's Dual Wield in SAO was an award or was awarded by the system for being the top player with the fastest reaction time. see here

And that Yuuki can pass down her insane sword combo - 11 hit (Mother's Rosario) to other players like Asuna. (Because kirito is having a hard time reproducing Starburst Stream in ALO which is 16 hit combo, as stated here)

But how did Konno Yuuki create this skill? Or is it just a skill which came from her converted account because she was in some other VRMMO?

Is there a chapter in the light novel / manga where this is discussed?

The wiki page has an explanation on this:

To record a new OSS, the player needs to open the menu, move to the OSS panel and activate the Sword Skill recording mode by pressing "Start" there. After that, the player only needs to swing one's weapon in a desired set of moves and press "Finish" once done. The downside of this system is that such skills are only accepted by the system if they meet very high speed, combo and execution requirements. To create an OSS the player must be able to execute the skill flawlessly, at the same speed as the completed skill but unassisted by the system. This should be impossible without the system's assist, but players have managed to create various OSSs.
Besides adding the ability to automatically use desired moves, it also adds elemental damage, which can be from fire, earth, lightning, water, light and darkness, to the Sword Skill. A skill can have up to two different elemental attributes and the damage rate of the skill is a combined percentage between the physical damage and the magical damage.

http://swordartonline.wikia.com/wiki/Original_Sword_Skill


Why is Kabuto referred to as "Four Eyes"? During the fight between Jiraiya and Tsunade against Orochimaru and Kabuto in the Search for Tsunade Arc, Jiraiya refers to Kabuto as "Four Eyes". Why did he get that name?

Because he was the only one among all present there that was wearing a pair of glasses.
The term "Four eyes" refers to people that wear spectacles.


Do "red button" and "blue button" mean anything in the GoShogun OP? This is a follow-up question to this one: Is the GoShogun OP being translated correctly?
The GoShogun OP had a couple lyrics that struck me as strange:

Do you know the red button?
Do you know the blue button?

There don't seem to be any special red or blue buttons in the GoShogun anime (at least as far as I've watched it), and it's not clear to me what those lyrics are referring to. Is there some context that Japanese kids in the 1980s would have had to make sense of the lyrics, or are the lyrics just as nonsensical as they appear to be?

The red button is the button to merge with GoShogun, and the blue button is the button to fire the GoFlasher.
According to Japanese Wikipedia,

なお、オープニングの歌詞にある「赤いボタン」とはゴーショーグンへの合体ボタン、「青いボタン」とはゴーフラッシャーの発射ボタンの事である。

This translates to the statement above.
This was also backed up by some Japanese fans' tweets that this was referred to in the anime, although without mentioning a specific episode/event/occurrence.

ひふみ @hifumi_x's tweet om 12:43 PM · Jun 27, 2020

#意外と忘れている設定
「戦国魔神ゴーショーグンOP ゴーショーグン発進せよ（藤井健）」赤いボタンはゴーショーグンへの合体ボタン、青いボタンはゴーフラッシャーの発射ボタン。[...]
#UnexpectedForgottenSetting
GoShogun's OP Go Shogun Hassin Seyo! (Ichirou Mizuki). The red button is the button to merge with GoShogun, and the blue button is the button to fire GoFlasher. [...]

レオれお @MJfWBXkRIlbkeql's tweet on 4:39 AM · Jan 26, 2018

戦国魔神ゴーショーグンOP。[...] 僕はアニソンの本で知りましたが赤いボタンは合体ボタン、青いボタンはゴーフラッシャー発射です。[...]
GoShogun's OP. [...] I knew about (the buttons) from an AniSong book. [...]

ひふみ @hifumi_x's tweet and replies on 11:06 AM · Aug 17, 2019 stating repeatedly that without watching the anime, there is no way to understand the meaning of "the buttons" in the lyric.


Naruto Episode 28 music What song starts playing at 19:11 in Naruto episode 28 Eat or be Eaten: Panic in the forest???

https://www.crunchyroll.com/naruto/episode-28-eat-or-be-eaten-panic-in-the-forest-520336

While not an exact match, that is sounds like an unofficially released variation of the track Sneaking Nightmare (OST 3, Track 20). Here is another version of it as well.


What is the origin of the face fault? In many anime, when characters are surprised or seen to do something stupid, the other characters will sometimes fall or keel over on their faces in some comical positions with their legs in the air. Where did this originate and is it used in any other case and or culture where stupidity or shock is (or) not implied?

This link offers some information on it but it doesn't verify or explicitly state its origin.

  When shocked or surprised, often by an absurdity or non sequitur, the
  listener may fall over onto his face, his limbs in a twisted mass
  above him. In its typical form, the character in question has just
  heard someone else say something so incredibly stupid that it, quite
  literally, floors them.

According here

  When shocked or surprised, often by an absurdity or non sequitur, the
  listener may fall over onto his face, his limbs in a twisted mass
  above him. In its typical form, the character in question has just
  heard someone else say something so incredibly stupid that it, quite
  literally, floors them. A device usually limited to humorous anime,
  this may have been imported from a similar trope in early American comic strips called the 'flip-take'. A variation used mainly in films
  (as falling on one's own face in real life tends to be dangerous) has
  the characters briefly faint backwards, as opposed to forwards. Often
  includes, and is confused with, Wild Takes.


Change from Gold Roger to Gol D. Roger Was there ever a reason given for the name change? I thought at first that it was possibly a mistranslation in the initial episodes. However, in LogueTown Luffy visits a bar named "Gold Roger" and considering the owner knew Gold Roger you'd think they'd get the name right.

There hasn't been any change, I think.

The real and first name is ゴール・D・ ロジャー (Gōru D. Rojā, Gol D. Roger), but he is also known by the name of Gold Roger. I think it's just an in-universe thing.

That said, his real name carries the D. which in the story is being described as "more than a simple initial", often mentioned when talking about The Will of the D:

  In the series, few characters have the middle initial "D.". This mysterious middle initial has been called "the Will of D" (Dの意志 - D no Ishi) or "D's will" by several characters in One Piece. [...]

By the way, the  meaning for the D. has not been revealed yet, but it certainly holds great importance and is likely to be a major point in the development of the One Piece story.


How powerful is the Rinne Sharingan? It's clear now that Rinnegan boasts the most powerful dojutsu out of the 3 dojutsu (not including Tenseigan here).

There are few occurrence where we got to saw Rinne Sharingan in action. So, where does it put the power of Rinne-Sharingan?

The current power level is laid out as such:

Sharingan 1st < Sharingan 2nd < Sharingan 3rd < Byakugan < Mangekyo Sharingan < Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan < One eye Rinnegan < Both eyes Rinnegan

Where does the Rinne Sharingan lie?

Due to the Infinite Tsukuyomi, it should be ahead of everything except the Rinnegan. It should be above them as well but Kaguya didn't show enough of it to be a 100% sure.

Note: I wouldn't necessarily put the Sharingan above the Byakugan, especially the incomplete versions.


How does Hiruma get all the information in his black book? Whenever Hiruma wants somebody to do something for him, he pulls out his little black book full of black mail material which has information on seemingly everybody.

I know he started the book to get approval to start the American Football club but is it ever explained how or where he gets all this information?  He seems to have dirt on pretty much everybody in Japan.

The information were gathered using hacked cameras, mostly in cellphones. The hacked network was that great, that he could get information of nearly anything in Tokyo, and he never stopped that network.

Funfact:

  In one of Q&A column, it is revealed that the book was actually blank- All the information lies within Hiruma's brain, and the book only serves as a threat tool.

Source: Eyeshield 21 Wiki


Why doesn't Hiashi Hyuga use the curse mark during the Fourth Great Shinobi War? During the Fourth Great Shinobi war, Hizashi Hyuga is reanimated by Kabuto and is forced to fight against Hiashi. Why doesn't Hiashi use the curse mark and destroy Hizashi's brain cells?

The answer is simple, really. Because destroying his brain means nothing. Why? Because an edo tensei-ed person will rebuilt any broken body part after awhile, which is why the only way to fight them is to seal them.


What happens when a Contractor fails to pay their remuneration? What happens when a Contractor fails to pay their remuneration? Do they lose their ability or what?

Although this payment can be delayed, especially in the midst of
  combat, it is ultimately unavoidable. It is unknown what happens to a
  Contractor that fails to pay his obeisance, although Amagiri has
  stated that Contractors who fail to do so seemingly 'melt like butter'
  when depriving a captured November 11 of his remuneration.

Taken from: http://darkerthanblack.wikia.com/wiki/Obeisance

(It was also a pretty easy google search)