Spoiler Latest Chapter Discussion Thread for Death Mage Raws

It's true enough, but really Van is every single bit as much an individualist as Alda is a collectivist.

1. He objected to the idea of becoming an emperor, and upon becoming emperor he governs from an idea of listening to all his advisors, and every person he ever helped counts as an advisor no matter where they are on the social scale.

2. The dungeons are a place he provided where people can more easily better themselves. There is no mandate to be strong "for the country." His objective in making the dungeons was so that the people could better themselves.

3. Rather than having a formal state military or some form of draft, Van's solution for the national defense was to have every citizen have the strength necessary to protect themselves without having to rely on the military. There is also no form of formal military to begin with, the closest thing there is in Vidal to a military is "people who want to use their combat talents to serve Van."

4. Van does not organize work parties or demand people build houses to provide to the people, he does it all himself personally. He then also provides education and the ability to better yourself in order to find your own path and own ability to prosper as you desire.

Everything Van does is all about helping other people to forge their own path. Of course, most of them are extremely grateful and decide they want to use the power and ability he helped them gain to serve him, but he never demands it, and you very much get the sense Van would be every bit as happy if the person he just helped went off to open a resteraunt in some far off country and he never saw them again so long as he had the satisfaction that they were doing well.

Seriously, if you don't think Van is an individualist then you don't have a very good concept of what individualism actually entails. Individualism does not mean abolishment of government. It means that the government steps out of the way and any and all government programs that exist are geared toward increasing the number of opportunities people have to make their own choices, and to allow the people to make the best of their own lives.

Collectivism, meanwhile, is a system that focuses on a top-down imposition of power in order to accomplish some kind of goal or ideal that they are working toward. Collectivists do not care about the people who are crushed underfoot in accomplishing this goal. They are working toward this goal because they believe having this utopian perfect vision of theirs accomplished will make people happier in the end, but the road to accomplishing this goal often involves crushing massive numbers of people, usually greater than 50% of the population, underfoot and making their lives miserable, causing great amounts of suffering and death along the way. The collectivist though is so bent on accomplishing their vision that they ignore the people who are being crushed, and even if they do acnowledge them they just dismiss them as necessary sacrifices.

That's a text book definition of the two political philosophies, and their associated results. And no, you cannot call me biased for that evaluation. We saw it in action in Soviet Russia, Maoist China, and Nazi Germany. Some of those had very different ideologies from one another, but they were all extremely murderous, and the one thing they DID all share in common was that all of them were collectivist. It was the collectivism that caused them to be so murderous.

What I see, the author is making a genius move by expertly showcasing collectivism as the ideology of the enemy in the story. Collectivists also always demonize their opposition, and IRL the oposers of collectivism often get tired of the smears and decide to just ironically wear the mantle of "demon" that the collectivists keep smearing them with, and everyone opposed to the collectivism gets in on the joke and ceases to view whatever smear the collectivists are painting them with as bad anymore. In the case of Death Mage, it's the very literal title of "Demon King." In IRL, it's usually "Racist, sexist, mysogynist, Nazi, Hitler." And, true to form, those labels have both in world for Death Mage as well as the ones used IRL have lost their punch because the collectivists keep tossing them about on people who really are not all that bad and truly not deserving of being called those horrible things.

As for Van's model of individualism, I get the impression the author figured individualism is the dynamic opposite of collectivism, so Van should be an individualist. But, that's just by concept. Van's a bit more of a well rounded character that just does whatever Van does, he doesn't necessarily HAVE to be the absolute perfect picture paragon of individualism in order to fit the concept as being the polar opposite of a collectivist. However, Alda's most definitely a collectivist, and there is also most definitely a statement of anti-collectivism buried in this series.

 

Well this is a lot and I'm on my phone so I'll keep it brief.

If Vandalieu is representative of individualism within the narrative, then he's actually counterproductive to that end. Van is a living public utility, he is so integral to his nation that it CANNOT EXIST without him. From its infrastructure, all the way to his undead citizens, it all goes dark with him gone. How does that work with the supposed theme?

Also, how does Rodcorte fit into this? If anyone embodies individualism to an extreme it's him. His sole motivation is self preservation, even at the risk of entire worlds (trying to escape from lambda, more or less initiating doomsday for alda alligned life). Yet he's opposed to the other supposed individualist? I'm not saying two individuals can't conflict, but thematically how does that make sense if the author's intention is to set up two opposed forces? What side is he supposed to land on?

Edit: thought I would respond to your points as well

1. Federated gov't is pretty collective
2. Dungeons are public works projects in this society, they do everything from farming to hunting, even leisure. There's even a state run guild that will buy materials you hunt down there.
3. If I remember correctly, citizenship was contingent on leveling, not some self actualization excercise. Even if citizens don't form a organized militia, they are expected to be able to fight.
4. ...yeah? Public housing and education, that's what I said, a public good.

To be honest though, this is all meaningless as Vandalieu has infinite resources. He is a walking talking Utopia. Doesn't matter how individualist or collectivist you are, it works regardless.

 

It could be said that a soft description of collectivism is "the needs of the many outweigh the needs to the few, or the one", which definitely fits Alda. And I agree that he's top-down rather than bottom-up. However, he doesn't seem to be extremist about this. He doesn't seem to be against the private ownership of capital, for example. Where he seems to be extreme is in having a static society. While he does see individuals as nothing more than another brick in the wall, he specifically wants that wall to be unchanging long term. Rather than promoting an abstract Utopian future that's better than anything that came before, he wants to turn back the clock to how things were in the past.

Going back to Van for a bit, it's somewhat ironic in that a number of his early skills/titles specifically helped him promote group solidarity, though it's not like Van specifically aimed for such effects. His Guidance type skills have this effect too but they also promote individual growth and change

 

Does Talosheim have an Universal Basic Income or other things like Social Security, Health Care and stuff?

 

Probably nothing formal like that, it hasn't been mentioned anyway. However, pretty much all worldly needs are taken care of and vandalieu can heal you if you really needed it.

 

Never been mentioned but I don't think so. There's no pensions either, I believe. There seems to be school provided for children but it's not clear how it's paid for or whether it's mandatory or not or for how long.

A lot of the infrastructure is either provided for free (eg housing) or has a usage fee (eg the public baths). A lot of things Van owns as a private individual rather than being part of the state. There is an income tax but it's not clear what it's spent on.

 

I didn't want to mention them personally because it is disrespectful, but I think I have to do it to avoid confusion, in general both sides have good arguments, but in the case of jemini, their arguments after one point become extremist and Forget a primary lesson that the series has taught us, there is no evil or absolute good, each group or institution has its own problems, even talosheim that is basically an utopia has serious problems, such as addiction to vandeliu, which although it is now something on a small scale, in future generations it can be a serious matter for people born hearing the stories of vandeliu and how they have everything they owe to him, but they cannot transform into new races what would be a feeling of insecurity which can lead to suicide or the purchase of vandeliu material at any price as mentioned slightly in the series, or how immortality leads to loss of fertility, to the time that population problems become necessary.

Vannn's case has valid arguments, but they have already been overthrown, for example Robcorte's argument although it does not fall into individualism, if it agrees with the extremist idea of coleptivism given by jemini, Robcorte is the absolute ruler of souls in the worlds under his control, capable of burying souls if he considers them dangerous, or moving a soul of the world at will, and as you said in his goal of self-preservation, he is willing to lose not one, but 3 worlds, to destroy Go. the argument of the undead and that of the economy have already been seen in the work itself, in case of emergency all the vital resources of talosheim such as golems, contraceptives, magic and lunar tools can last more than 100 years, enough time for create a new infractucture and ask for help from the other tribes of life, which unlike humans, are decent enough to give "humanitarian" help to the inhabitants of talosheim, while the issue of the undead can be resolved by a way that even solves the economy, which is the artificial creation of new wizards of death, which although a 100% safe method has not been created, for that we have the undead and war criminals.

On the aspect of free homes and compulsory education, it has to do more with the personal philosophy of vandeliu, to give your people / loved ones a roof over their head and an education that allows them to function on either side is the minimum and you say it as if it were public is synonymous with bad, if in the real world most of the institutions that are created or receive financing from the government tend to have very low quality standards, as you said talosheim has infinite resources and it would be mean not to have high quality standards.

The aspect that you are only considered a citizen if you are a fighter is not at all true, yes, military training is mandatory, but it is not like in Star Ship Trooper where you are only considered an adult if you fought against the invaders and it is due to the Search for the safety of citizens due to two simple aspects, 1, the territory of the races of life is extremely dangerous, having monsters of rank 3-4 walking in a group just outside the cities and if one of those monsters is left loose in a normal human city, I would put together a massacre, 2, at the time it originated, we were in a stage where they had no direct information from outside, and to avoid a hostage situation during an invasion as in tensei shitara slime, It was decided that each person would be able to defend himself or herself from soldiers or monsters.

 

Rodcorte doesn't even see anyone else as people, so neither philosophy applies to him. He sits outside the political spectrum by virtue of being a total ass.

 

I like how you explained it eloquently.

 

To be honest that's no longer true, as Mei does possess the death attribute charm skill. Remember she gained her own undead followers and turned the floor into golems? The existence of our tentacle loving toddler is proof that the charm skill is not limited to just himself and as such should be inheritable to one or more of his future children. Which will probably become a future requirement to inherit the throne, like being able to speak the common tongue is a requirement for to inherit the throne in the Noble Orc Kingdom.

 

Maybe, but you run into the same problems, only ONE person, or one bloodline, can operate an entire country. Extremely fragile and still not a long term solution.(Plus I don't like stories of genetic destiny) Best case scenario is that there's a "Death Element" introduced and it becomes magic anyone can learn. That or van becomes a god of lambda and densuke storycrafts a way for him to manage the kingdom eternally. Most likely the research into undead makes them just another race that doesn't need management, maybe they can inherit the death attribute?

But I only mentioned that in response to Gemini and their hypothesis.

 

Not only is Van extremely hard to kill and effectively immortal, he can pass the same tricks he learned down to the next generation.

It's not genetic, because it's a soul trait. And if there is no successor with the death attribute, the current ruler can just produce one.

 

https://imgur.com/a/fxALQBb wip
Any suggestions i should add?
It's pretty hard to fill the negative space.

 

To your first point, even Vandalieu realizes he's not invulnerable, which is why we see him obsessively plan out every possible encounter and contingency. It would be in my opinion character breaking if he never considered his own permanent end, especially since he has no intention of reincarnating again. Hell, it's in the title.

I used "genetic" loosely, inheritance might be clearer. I find stories where the protagonist is imbued with some special destiny just because they were born boring. Vandalieu's existence is more or less an accident, even his access to the death attribute. His mastery of it, and his success in his third life is due to himself and the relationships he's forged. I personally find that way more compelling than "You're a wizard, Harry".

Honestly, if I were to make a unified theory of DM, it would be "fighting against providence". Or nakama power, whatever.

 

the monster girls are the best waifus.

 

I think there should not be so many concerns on this subject, on the one hand it has been mentioned that the attribute and skills usually have nothing to do with genetics, in the best case a son of a range s is born a little stronger of the normal, but neither the attribute nor the talent will be inherited, on the other hand I believe that the true solution to the problem is pluto, although it is accidentally she created Mei, if the process can be repeated we can have unlimited death magicians, that moral aspects should be taken into account, but it is not too different from the average undead baby.

That the best way to cure a mental illness is to satisfy it?

 

Elemental magic is an inherited trait; under normal conditions an individual cannot learn to use an element they have no affinity for. It'll never become something anyone can learn because the old races emphasize racial purity over genetic advancement. However, in a few centuries time it'll start to become more widely available among the new races, because of the growing number of women wanting to bare at least one of Van's future descendants. That however does not account for the charm skill few like the Noble Orcs capable of talking in the common tongue have. That said, some effects of the charm skill may already be redundant, as it is possible life gold already accomplishes the same thing, on an individual level.

 

Since when was elemental magic an inherited trait. I thought magic was completely reliant on what affinity your soul was given. As far as I can recall, elemental affinity has nothing to do with race or parents, only your soul. Van's children wont have death attribute.

 

I think there are races with tendencies towards or away from certain elements, but no race that does not have access to a specific element.

 

That is correct, it is a soul trait. However, from what I recall, soul traits are based off the parent's elemental affinity. Origin's elemental testing center exists to establish which parent's elemental affinity the child has inherited. The scientists on Origin simply are unable to determine where the elemental affinity is mapped to the individual, because they're assuming it's mapped to the DNA and have not yet confirmed the existence of the soul & god (preVan, that is). Having said that, it wouldn't make sense for the elemental affinity to be an inherited trait from a previous life because Rodcorte's system wipes everything clean.