Just some thoughts about Road

[youffie-17.livejournal.com]

I just realized something, while thinking about the last novel. It may not be much, but I'd still like to share to know your opinions. It's not really a theory, just some thoughts about certain things that keep bugging me.

I haven't read the novel, of course, only the summaries offered by kind leafyaki, but though it wasn't directly stated anywhere, I think it's strongly implied that the 14th's full human name was “Allen Walker.” Even if it wasn't, I think it's reasonably safe to assume that it's not just some random name crazy!Mana loved and gave to children/pets he liked, and it's most certainly related to the 14th, the Noahs and the main plot.

There is definitively something strange with the Earl and Mana, so strange I won't even try to make a theory out of it. What is sure is that his memories on the matter are a little foggy, and judging from his behavior I think we can say he doesn't or at least didn't remember the name's (possible) importance.

Still.

Look at this.

Did Road REALLY think there was nothing strange at all with an Exorcist named “Allen Walker” that can see akuma? Really?
Maybe she even knew his “father's” name, which I think the Earl knew and possibly told her (on higher quality scans you can actually read “Mana Walker” on the cross), and I would assume that she knew Mana's weird story at least to some extent.

She is the only Noah who survived the 14th, and apparently the only one to actually remember everything (except, maybe, Wisely). I daresay that she's one if not the most well-informed character in the whole series. She even seems to know why Tyki looks like the 14th (or like a younger Mana?), and she wants to keep it a secret for some reason.

She is not as childish as she first seemed to be, at all, and I think that even when she's being sadistic she has a more detached view over the situation than, say, Tyki. As if she perfectly knew what she was doing. If you ask me, she may enjoy being cruel, but most of the time she has an actual purpose for being so, too.

Back to Rewinding Town. Lero said he didn't know why she was there. Apparently she didn't tell the Earl or anybody else, just like she and Tyki didn't tell the Earl about their little game with the Exorcists while the Ark was being “downloaded.”

Surely Allen, Lenalee and Miranda weren't enough of a threat at the time, and she could have easily killed one of them if that was her goal. And yes, I first thought she might have been there just out of boredom, but she's smarter than that and isn't it too much of a coincidence? Of all Noahs, of all Exorcists, of all the places in the world?

What's more, all she did there in the end was dressing up Lenalee, nailing Miranda on her own clock, and, well, meeting Allen and stabbing his left eye with a candle. Which evolved some chapters later (“The darkness has returned…”) and seems to be connected to his Noah's form, somehow, as we saw from the last few chapters.

What if she went there just to, you know, make the Noah wake up faster, somehow? She seems to be very loyal to the Earl, and yet why did the 14th spare her? What if Neah really doesn't want to hurt the Earl? Obvious questions are too much obvious?

I think there were even some crack theories about what she might have done to Lenalee while she and Allen were unconscious, since she began having those weird and still unexplained dreams (connected to Allen and partially to the 14th, even) shortly after that, and Road is the Noah of Dreams – but really, I won't venture in there yet because it's just confusing and I haven't much to offer aside from some suspicious covers and “durr durr sometimes they wear the same clothes but in reverse colors durr.”

… Okay, I don't know. She looked surprised when Allen's sword turned out just like the Earl's, so maybe she really doesn't know anything. But. But still.

I'm aware this doesn't make a lot of sense, nor it adds anything significant to what we know, and I know I'm reading way too much in far too few pages, but we've known Road for so long and she's still such a mysterious character…

Does someone have any good theory about her? D: I'd like to read them.

Comments

[blind-alchemy.livejournal.com]

Road having something to do with Lenalee's nightmare is a plausible theory, and I do get the impression that she knows more than she lets on, but I can't agree about the 14th's name. I'll keep this hidden, since I know not everyone follows the online chapters, but in chapter 198 he says his name is "Neah". (or "Nea", I guess, depending on what scanlation you read.)
Also, the impression I got from the summary was that Mana thought Allen was his dog. And Road did say that the Earl had told her about Allen; so there would have been no reason for her to show any surprise in the town, since it sounds like she went to that town to meet him.

[sincere]

I've assumed his name was "Allen" ever since we found out the dog was named Allen and then he named his orphan Allen... XD It just seemed really suspicious. And "Neah", I believe, is his Noah name, like "Road" or "Wisely" or "Joyd".

Reasons why Road might not have recognized his name: "Walker" may have been an assumed name, and not Mana and his brother's original last name. It's entirely possible that the Noah don't care what his original name is, that the 14th, like Road, no longer bothered to go by his human name and so no one (except maybe the Earl) knew it. There's also no reason to think that crazy Mana Walker, who named dogs after his brother, wasn't -- well -- just plain bonkers, naming this kid after his brother as well, and the only significance is that he's involved with someone who's related to the 14th.

I don't think there's any real reason to imply that she knew about Allen when the Earl didn't; I think maybe she's been drawn to him for a number of reasons and never put things together.

One thing that's a bit of a flaw in the "Allen Walker is the 14th's human name" theory is this dream, where Allen dreams of the 14th calling him by someone else's name... When I saw that, I said, "Maybe not 'Allen'" but it doesn't make any sense that Mana and Cross would attach this much significance to a name that isn't the 14th's, so maybe Allen was just hearing "Neah" and being confused?

sob confusing manga is confusing.