On this post on Castle Swimmer details that I haven’t completely threaded together but have been floating around my head: Kappa and his connection to turtles.

After episode 100 was released, one of the main things that quickly stuck out to me, other than the emotional devastation I was quickly going to feel, was how the main character from the story Kappa got his name from and the god that destroyed the witches’s castle we’re both turtles. Asides from setting up some more neat parallels between Kappa and the witches, it was something I kept in the back of my mind for when we learnt more about this mini god that destroyed castle and, oh boy, did it bring forward implications for the rest of the story.

When we first learnt Labbu’s name in episode 120, we found out they aren’t just any mini god, oh no, they are a full on god. The god of the abyss, the creator of the mini gods and the only other god that we know exists in this world other than the god of the surface. Knowing this put the turtle link in a whole new light, since it recontextualizes Kappa’s name having a link between the mini god that destroyed his friends’s castle to Kappa’s name having a link to the likely main antagonist of Castle Swimmer. As a result, it has caused me to go back to that children’s story now and again with Labbu in mind. I’ve seen the idea that the Kappa from the children’s story and Labbu are one and the same, and while I don’t think it’s the case, I do think that the children’s story could have parallels to the creation of Labbu. I don’t have a complete picture of this theory yet, but since the mini god’s powers come from fossils, Labbu being the source of this power and the fossils likely coming from the work of the ancient people, my money at the moment is on Labbu being some creation of the ancient people, whether it was intentional or not. I’ll probably try to make a proper theory post about this idea when I’ve smoothed out more of the details but I think it’s the idea that makes the most sense at the moment.

While I’m still on Labbu, thanks to episode 155, we now know for sure that there are, or at least were, multiple beacons. Since Labbu is the creator of the mini gods, this revelation really fuels the idea that the mini gods could be Labbu’s attempt of creating their own version of the beacons. Could they have something to do with what happened to these other beacons? Possibly, but either way, it’s going to be interesting to learn what exact feelings Labbu and the God of the Surface have about each other.

On a more outer-story discussion, it seems like these decisions around turtles could be based on Kappa in mythology. For those who don’t know, Kappa’s name comes from the mythical creature of the same name. A kappa is a reptiloid kami with similarities to yōkai found in traditional Japanese folklore. They are typically depicted as green, human-like beings with webbed hands and feet and turtle-like carapaces on their backs.

If both Labbu and Kappa from the children’s story were chosen to be turtles as a reference to Kappa in folklore, that’s a really cool detail!