Made in Abyss – S2 07 – A Warm Darkness

After spending a good long while in the present with Riko, Reg, and Nanachi, we go back to when Ganja and the Three Sages first arrived in what would eventually become Iruburu. They used a Mitty-like hollow to activate the lift that took them down to the Sixth Layer, but soon learned that they would never be able to ascend again.

Faced with having to live down there the rest of their lives, they set out to find water. They also find a docile mammalian-like creature, showing them that living things can live down here. But while fighting off beasts, the creature, to whom Irumyuui had been incredibly attached, dies.

Of course, things soon get worse…much, much worse. That water they found? Not water, but an organism containing countless eggs or seeds. One by one, people come down with fevers and severe diarrhea and become bedridden. Then some begin to morph into bizarre forms.

Irumyuui, one of the first to get sick, is clinging to life when a glowing gold egg relic is found, and the Interference Units they befriended tell them it’s basically a wish-granting egg. It’s also apparently more effective if used by a juvinille as opposed to a more world-weary adult.

Vueko asks Wazukyan, and he agrees, that Irumyuui should have first dibs on the egg. In fact, he welcomes it being used on her, as he believes she will be the savior to everyone there. Vueko, looking deep into his eyes, believes him, because she believes him to be a divine prophet.

One morning, Vueko hears Irumyuui’s voice, and it’s full of mirth. Despite gradually metamorphosing into a hollow, she apparently feels no pain, and always has a wide smile on her face. Vueko is happy, but the others continue to grow ill, lie down, and never get back up.

One day, Irumyuui gives birth…after a fashion. But the “child” has no organs for taking in nutrition, and so it soon dies in her arms. She gives birth to another, and another, and another…all in fun colors, but all meet the same fate.

As Vueko can only be there and comfort Irumyuui in her continued moments of grief and loss, she also rues the day she gave the egg to Irumyuui. While it technically granted the girl’s wishes, it also twisted them, like a Monkey’s Paw, into something awful.

Then the day comes when Vueko becomes ill and can’t even get up to comfort Irumyuui. She seems resigned to her fate—the same fate countless others faced in this beautiful godforsaken place. But then suddenly she’s being fed a tasty-smelling stew, and before she knows it, she’s ambulatory and free of illness.

She walks out onto a promontory, where Wazukyan greets her warmly. As he promised, Irumyuui would end up saving everyone, and so she did. Was that stew made of Irumyuui’s body? Her stillborn offspring? I don’t know, but when you find yourself living within a legend, finding and keeping a foothold means making choices one might not have made on the surface.

This was one of the tougher watches of Made in Abyss’ run, but also a crucial one, lending us insight into the desperate choices a ragtag group of exiles made simply to continue existing. Vueko is right that she technically started this by putting Irumyuui and the wishing egg together.

In the present she might think she’s a “bad person”, but just like someone isn’t choosy about the “water” they drink when they’re dying of thirst, she, Irumyuui, and everyone else were doomed if they did and doomed if they didn’t in this place. Given the choice of death or chance, in the intrepid spirit that brought them this deep into the Abyss, they chose the latter. Only those others who’d been through what they did can stand in judgment.