134 - Petshop of Horrors vol. 9 We Appreciate Manga

Listen with discretion and care since on today’s episode we speak about intergenerational trauma, modern slavery, and human trafficking. Pretty intense stuff for a fantasy manga but Akino Matsuri is an expert anthologist when it comes to episodic storytelling. Skip plot summaries @ 7:17
 
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134: Petshop of Horrors vol. 9
By Akino Matsuri
Translation by Tomoharu Iwo and James Lucas Jones
Lettering by Nunu Ngien
 
Dreams:
A young woman pines over D, having recognised him from her dreams. D tries to find one of his supernatural pets for her but fails upon realizing that she already has such a spiritual companion. A Phoenix has given Monica the chance to constantly reincarnate herself and move to the next life if she fails to achieve her wish in one life. Her wish to win the heart of D. Monica’s dreams are in fact flashbacks to a past life where she had met one of D’s ancestors. D begins to feel sorry for Monica and decides to date her, he regretfully informs her that he cannot love someone who is human albeit very cryptic as to his reasons why.
 
In the end Monica decides to take a plane home but D sees the plane blow up in a fatal accident. The Phoenix appears to D once more and claims that she will no longer be reincarnated. The reason being that D did have feelings for her, thus Monica’s wish came true, even if he chose not to pursue a relationship and her life was cut short after it.
 
Desire:
A criminal working his way into the ranks of an organisation needs to acquire a pet tiger from D so that he can be king of the concrete jungle that is China town. The man sends a little girl, Xiao Hua, as a mediator so that she can butter up D with gifts to win the man’s approval. However, the Xiao Hua notices a hanging wall scroll painting in D’s tea room, and in that painting is a tiger.  The tiger only appears in the painting upon greeting its master.  Learning that Xiao Hua is destined to own the tiger, D gives Xiao Hua the painting.  Afterwards D learns of Xiao Hua’s lifeless body appearing in a back alley.  D takes it upon himself to find justice for her and retrieve the painting.  A fight ensues as D intrudes into the triad’s house but D has a trick under his sleeve that turns the tables on Xiao Hua’s killer.
 
Death:
A mother comes to the pet shop after the death of her daughter’s pet, she buys a new one only for it to be mysteriously killed.  As D investigates the deaths of the pets, he finds a family that has inter-generational trauma and the making of a serial killer.
 
Desperation:
D and Chris are abducted by a woman who, mourning the loss of her dead lover, intends to exact revenge on the police detective Leon Orcot.  T-Chan, the Totetsu is shot in the struggle to prevent D and Chris from being taken. However, their captor does not know that she is pregnant.
 
Topics:
 
·       The Power dynamic we see in the ‘Desire’ chapter implies that Xiao Hua is a child slave who may have arrived in the U.S. due to human trafficking. At the time of this podcast episode being published, Modern slavery and human trafficking seems to be more prevalent in the U.K. according to this Vice article by Amandas Ong and the BBC.
·       If you are a witness to human trafficking and modern slavery you can use this website and the “stop app” to report it and gain support. Please be aware that this no substitute for contacting the police, and if possible, one should contact the police, be it 911 (or 999 for U.K.) otherwise use the following website as a second choice and download their app, if for some reason you are afraid of contacting the police.
https://www.stopthetraffik.org/
 
·       The International Salvation Army is a charity organisation that also intends to abolish slavery and human trafficking, they can provide resources such as housing and protection for those in ne