Talentless Nana may seem like a story of youth and battle surrounding a group of boys and girls with mysterious powers and the "enemy of humanity," but it's actually a suspenseful story of intrigue and strategy. Talentless Nana is filled with numerous mysteries and hints, and it's exciting to see how they'll all be resolved. In this article, we'll take a look at the mysteries and hints that appear and predict how the story may unfold!
Mystery/hint #1: Is Nakajima Nanao, the person with the ability to nullify abilities, still alive?
No matter how you look at it, Nakajima Nanao is the obvious protagonist of a supernatural battle manga. However, in the first episode, he is dismissed by the girl he thought was the heroine. Is he still alive? This is the first mystery we encounter in this work, and it's an incredibly intriguing one. Nakajima Nanao was initially portrayed as the protagonist, overcoming his complexes and becoming a leader after meeting Hiiragi Nana, a new transfer student. However, he is killed by Hiiragi Nana, who appears to be the heroine but is actually the protagonist.
The Enemy of Humanity is the Supernatural
In this work, there are supernatural beings with the ability to control paranormal phenomena and "enemies of humanity" who threaten humanity. Supernatural beings are supposedly trained to fight against these enemies, but this is a lie told by the government. In reality, there is no such thing as an enemy of humanity; supernatural beings are the enemies of humanity who disrupt social order. In order to secretly eliminate these supernatural beings, the government has isolated them in a school on an isolated island under the pretext of training, and sent the assassin Nana Hiiragi to do so. Nanao is the first to fall victim to Nana's hand.
Nanao Might Still Be Alive
Nanao is killed by being pushed off a cliff into the sea. However, his body was never recovered, and this situation, with the ocean below and this height, is a sure sign of survival in fiction. While the deaths of other characters are depicted fairly clearly, his death is not, and it's not surprising that he could still be alive.
May Have Received a Special Education
Nanao was born into a distinguished family, but he was a character who was treated as incompetent by his family and classmates. However, as he was born into an elite family, he may have received a special education and possessed a certain level of physical ability. His ability only nullifies other abilities, making it useless on its own, so training to improve his physical abilities would have been essential. He may have been surprisingly athletic and a good swimmer.
Possibility that Jin helped him
If someone could have helped him, it could have been Tachibana Jin, a survivor from the school five years ago who is hiding on the island. Jin has the ability to transform and usually transforms into a cat to gather information at the current school. Nanao was also acquainted with a stray cat. If the cat involved was Jin, he could have been present at Nanao's murder and rescued him.
Possibility that reality is cruel
Nanao is a character whose life or death is unclear, but a normal person would die if pushed off a cliff into the sea. It's possible that he appeared to be alive but was actually dead. However, if he survived, he would likely be an important character given the nature of his ability.
Mystery/Foreshadowing #2: The Mystery of the Estimated Number of Kills
Our protagonist, Nana Hiiragi, has been sent to secretly kill students with special abilities. Each student is given a number known as the "Estimated Number of Kills." This number was presented to Nana by the "Committee," the organization that gave her instructions. It was calculated through sophisticated calculations to estimate how many non-specialized students a student with special abilities would kill in the future if left alone. This number was used as one of the criteria for selecting targets.
Is the Estimated Number of Kills a Lie?
This estimated number was not revealed to Makabe Moe, a transfer student who was later sent to back up Nana. Tachibana Jin believes that this number is a meaningless number meant to ease Nana's guilt, and Nana is also suspicious, given her encounter with Michiru and the fact that Moe had not informed her.
Why is Nanao's estimated number of kills so high?
Regarding this estimated kill count, the first character to be eliminated, Nanao Nakajima, had an extremely high kill count of 1 million. The reason given was that he would later lead the group as a leader, a rather vague one. However, if this estimated kill count were false, it could be that there was some other intention behind it. For example, Nanao's "ability nullification" was extremely inconvenient for someone. Perhaps that's why they wanted to find a reason to eliminate him first.
Are Ability Nullifications a Problem?
However, Nanao's ability to nullify abilities is, in theory, a counter to ability users. As long as those with special abilities don't become enemies, they're harmless, but if anything, it's the ability users who are more troublesome than those without abilities who become enemies. In other words, it's the counters of those with special abilities who are the most troublesome. It's strange that the Committee, which secretly wants to eliminate those with special abilities, would also want to eliminate the counters of those with special abilities first, so there may be some intention behind it. But it could also just be because Nanao's family home was a pain.
Mystery/Foreshadowing #3: Who is Nana's brother? Who is Kyoya's sister?
This work pits a battle of wits between Nana, the culprit behind a series of incidents in which people with special abilities die, and Kyoya, who is suspicious of Nana. Both possess exceptional insight and are wary of each other, making them similar in some ways. Kyoya loves a certain old manga, and Nana also loves that work. Kyoya is terrible at tidying up, and Nana was also terrible at tidying up as a child. It turns out that Kyoya's younger sister had twin tails, just like Nana's. These two share many similarities, but they also share the fact that they both have siblings.
Are they siblings?
Nana has an older brother who left home before she could even remember, while Kyoya has a younger sister with special abilities who came to the island in search of her sister who went missing from school on the island. Kyoya is also depicted as immortal and his actual age is that of a Famicom generation. This commonality clearly hints at the possibility that the two are siblings. However, if that were the case, it would mean that Nana has special abilities...
Could it be this?
However, another possibility is that Kyoya's sister actually came to the island and is already deceased. Among the corpses controlled by the necromancer Yuuka Sasaki was one with pigtails that vaguely resembled Nana. Could this corpse be Kyoya's sister? The idea that Nana and Kyoya are siblings could be a misdirect.
Mystery/Foreshadowing #4: What is the Committee's Purpose?
The "Committee," the organization that runs the school, secretly sends Nana to assassinate supernatural beings. However, if their goal is to kill supernatural beings, all they need to do is create an opportunity for them to fight each other. In fact, Gin, the only survivor, recalls that five years ago, a massive war broke out at school, with supernatural beings killing each other until only one remained. If their goal was to kill the supernatural beings, they should have done the same this time...
Don't they have to kill them?
Ultimately, once multiple casualties had occurred, the Committee returned the supernatural powers to the mainland. This clearly contradicts the fact that they had prepared a school on an isolated island to isolate uncontrollable supernatural powers, and I'm sure the Committee has some kind of ulterior motive. Tatsumi Fujioka has said that they want the returning supernatural powers to cause trouble and focus criticism on the current administration, but this seems highly suspicious.
The Mystery of Tatsumi Fujioka, the Man Behind the Scenes
The objectives and true identity of Tatsumi Fujioka, the superior officer who fueled Nana's guilt and desire for revenge and drilled her with brainwashing-like education and murder techniques, are also a mystery. Not only did he brainwash Nana with his carrot-and-stick tactics, but he also managed to gain control of the students on the island, making him a dangerous character no matter how you look at him. According to Jin Tachibana, he has the ability to instantly discern and control the inner desires of others, making him a master of mind control.
Could this guy be the one with the mind-reading ability?
Given his position, Tsuruoka shouldn't be considered a mind-reader, but he was clearly not normal, as he instantly identified the characteristics of Gin's ability, one of the strongest mind-readers, and even though it was a draw, he still managed to inflict a wound on him. His dangerous manipulation techniques and knowledge of his classmates' secrets that only they knew. Nana Hiiragi pretended to be a mind-reader, and Tsuruoka was the one who taught her. From these, I can infer that he is the one with the mind-reading ability.
[Talentless Nana] Mystery and Foreshadowing Summary
I've looked at the foreshadowing and mysteries that appear in Talentless Nana. There are quite a few other hints that make me think, "Could this be the same?" It's fun to speculate, and while I'm hoping they'll be right, I'm also hoping they'll be wrong, but it's a work that really keeps me wanting to know what happens next. The Talentless Nana anime is scheduled to start airing in October, so it might be fun to watch it and speculate about it.
