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Balsa does not know that his decision to saved the Second Prince when he fell from the bridge and dragged by the river will take her on the hardest duty she ever take as a bodyguard. This incident made the second Empress, Chagum’s mother hired her to be his bodyguards and took him out of the palace. She tells Balsa that a horrible and mysterious creature was dwell in the Chagum’s body.
In the New Yogo’s official Legend, two hundred years ago, Torugaru the Son of Heaven came to the Nayoro peninsula and establish a new kingdom called New Yogo. Yakoo which is a native of the Nayoro peninsula choose to get away to the mountains. New Yogo become a prosperous country after Torugaru had defeated evil spirit that controls and curse the river. The spirit was dwelled and transformed into a boy from Yakoo. So when Chagum’s body was suspected to be the host of the water demon which had been defeated by Torugaru, in order to maintain the honor and prestige of the royal family, and to keep political stability, The Mikado, the ruler of the New Yogo, Chagum’s father and the Star Reader – an institutional adviser to the court- trying to kill Chagum secretly.
Balsa is a thirty years female warrior from Kanbal, a place in northern New Yogo. She is an expert on martial arts and skilled using short spear and famous for his kindness in helping children and the poor. He has sworn to save eight lives to redeem the eight lives who had been sacrificed to save her.
In her flight with Chagum, Balsa realized that his duty as the second prince’s bodyguard was not as easy as he had imagined. He realized that beside they have to face the hunter agents of the Mikado, she also was confronted with the power that comes from another world. As their flight goes, the truth began to unfold. What is being dwells in the Chagum’s body is the egg from Nyunga Ro Im, the spirit of water.
In Yakoo tradition and belief, there are two worlds. First is the Sagu world, the visible human world, and second world is Nayugu, the invisible spirit world. Nyunga Ro Im is the spirit that lived in Nayugu. The breath of Nyunga Ro Im will create the clouds that produce rain both in Sagu and Nayugu. Before his death once a hundred years, Nyunga Ro Im lays an eggs and plant into the body of a boy from the Sagu world. The egg carrier is called Moribito. And Chagum has chosen to become Moribito. The safety of the eggs would save New Yogo from the threat of drought.
Their flight’s getting more difficult when it is not only the Mikado and his Hunter who possessed Chagum, but the egg-eating monster from the world Naguyu named Rarunga also want the egg. A hundred years earlier Rarunga had killed the Moribito and ripped his body to eat the eggs of Nyunga Ro Im. Together with Tanda, Balsa’s childhood friends who are experts in healing, and Master Torogai, their master, they’re trying to save the Moribito from Rarunga and tried to revive the Hunters and the Star Reader, who the real enemy is.
The story set in in fantastical world called New Yogo which is in some ways influenced by the cultural depictions of Japanese medieval society. This novel has a tone that is almost the same as Japanese anime and manga in general. A belief in the spirit of land, water and the existence of the spirit world that coexists with the human world is a depiction of Japanese society animism. This Japanese culture is often used as background story for many anime and manga. In fact that this novel has been adapted into the two forms of those Japanese popular culture.
More than just an ordinary juvenile fantasy story, Moribito includes many moral force and philosophical expressions. Man often couldn’t escape from the destiny. Balsa has a painful childhood that made him have to survive and to forge himself in the hard world even though she just a woman. Realizing that eight lives have been toke for saving her life, she has his vow to save eight lives in return, although she had to destroy the lives of others.
Along the journey and battle, the relationship between Balsa and Chagum changed from merely relationship between bodyguard and her clients, become more closely and deeply. Chagum changed from a second prince whose life living in the palace with all the politeness and manners, being a boy who must survive in the lives of ordinary people. Meanwhile, He never stop thinking why should he be chosen to be Moribito.
Moribito also touched the cultural gap because of the influence of colonization. Yakoo’s people as a native Nayoro peninsula before the arrival of the Yogo, gradually lost their original culture because the excluded and also because of assimilation. Similarly, the original Yakoo legends about Nyunga Ro Im have been manipulated in order to confirm such domination and power. The fake Legends that have been manipulated hereditary told and believed as truth.
Moribito, Guardian of the Spirit is the first book of ten books. The author, Nahoko Uehashi is a professor of ethnology at the University of Japan. This novel won the 2009 Batchelder Award, an award given to children’s books translated and published in English language in America, which is considered more prominent than the original book published in non-English language in a non-American countries.
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