Basilisk - Tenzen Question (Ending Spoil

[Magic_Knight]

SPOILERS

I just finished watching this series. What exactly was inside Tenzen? I didn't quite understand the flashback. Looks like a woman got killed while she was pregnant but her baby survived. What happened?

[kimmiepooh]

SPOILERS

I just finished watching this series. What exactly was inside Tenzen? I didn't quite understand the flashback. Looks like a woman got killed while she was pregnant but her baby survived. What happened?

While I can't say for certain what was exactly inside Tenzen, what I can tell you is that it was something that would heal him that he had acquired when he betrayed the Kouga to go to the Iga side. This "thing" (whatever it is) heals him so whenever he gets hurt, he never dies. As for the pregnant woman, well you've totally lost me there. :( That's all I'm going to say on the matter for now. :)

[akcoll99]

I don't think the anime ever gives a good explanation. But I just finished reading the last volume of the manga, and they DO explain it. Apparently, the "thing" inside Tenzen is his twin brother. His mother was pregnant with twins, but Tenzen's one brother was born inside him. I believe this is called "in fratro" birth and has happened in real life (and on the Venture Bros. cartoon).
How exactly this makes Tenzen and his internal brother immortal, I'm not sure, but the one brother is able to heal any and all wounds that happen to Tenzen's body.

[Magic_Knight]

Thanks you two. :)

[JasonSolaris]

Hi. Does the manga explain any further on how Oboro was able to stop the creature from regenerating Tenzen? I thought he powers were to negate any ninja technique.. But the regeneration powers wasn't really a technique, right?

[Oniko]

Hi. Does the manga explain any further on how Oboro was able to stop the creature from regenerating Tenzen? I thought he powers were to negate any ninja technique.. But the regeneration powers wasn't really a technique, right?

The ninja ability was not Tenzen's, but rather his twin brother's abiity. So she was essentially halting the twin's ability to heal Tenzen's wounds.

[DocWatson]

For a bit more on the real condition, see the Wikipedia articles Parasitic twin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitic_twin) and Teratoma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teratoma). Pinoko of Black Jack is another parasitic twin.

While watching the Basilisk anime I wanted someone to cut off Tenzen's ears...

[nakimushi]

Well, I just finished the show last night, and I'm really wondering what the flashback scene with Tenzen slashing the pregnant woman was about.

When I first saw it, my initial thought was that he obtained his little helper by eating him Fat-Bastard style, and that was what the flashback was showing. However, the twin explanation makes more sense. Then what was the flashback about?

My next thought was influenced by Oboro rembering that Ogen once told her to never completely trust Tenzen, but then she never tells her why. Oboro, remembers this again when she is preventing Tenzen from regenerating.

I thought perhaps that the woman was Ogen, and that the baby was Danjo's, and that Tenzen, some time after the Iga are almost wiped out by Oda Nobunaga's and the Kouga's attack (the latter of which Tenzen set up), kills this baby to prevent any possible chance of a reconcilation that its birth might provide.

Also, why was Oboro screaming "Why?" after this flashback? Did her power enable her to see it? She could have been asking Tenzen why he was so determined to kill Gennosuke, but that seems kind of silly considering the show thoroughly demonstrated that the Iga and Kouga needed very little provocation to kill each other.

My other thought was that the baby was Oboro, and that somehow she was remembering this flashback (although it seems physically unlikely that a baby just ripped from the womb would be able to see anything), and that was what Ogen was going tell her.

Except, I don't see any reason for Tenzen to have killed Oboro's mother. Who at one point might still have actually raised her as her "big sister", but I may have misunderstood that. Other people have been confused, the wikipedia article seems to have missed the facts that Ogen is not really Oboro's grandmother, and Danjo is not really Gennosuke's grandfather. :)

It might not have been either Oboro's mother or Ogen, but then who was it?

In general the flashbacks were meant to humanize the other ninja either just before or just after their deaths, but in Tenzen's case this one is clearly meant to further demonize him. However, I keep thinking there should be more meaning to it than just showing Tenzen randomly slicing up pregnant women.

Any thoughts?