JoJolion
JoJolion is a seinen manga series written and illustrated by Hirohiko Araki, and is the eighth part of the larger JoJo's Bizarre Adventure series. It has been serialized by Shueisha in the magazine Ultra Jump since May 2011, and has been collected into 23 tankōbon as of April 2020.
Plot
Set in the same continuity as Steel Ball Run, S-City, M-Prefecture was devastated by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. In the aftermath, strange structures known colloquially as the Wall Eyes appear all over the town of Morioh, with the ground beneath them having the strange property of swapping traits of whatever two objects are buried there.A local college student named Yasuho Hirose finds a mysterious youth buried under one of the Wall Eyes, they set off on an adventure together to try to recover his identity and his relation to the corpse of a man named Yoshikage Kira who was buried near him with parts of his body missing. Yasuho conducts her investigation while leaving the youth under the care of her suitor's father Norisuke Higashikata IV, who names him "Josuke". The two soon learn the Higashikata family are related to Kira by marriage, with Yasuho finding Yoshikage's hospitalized mother Holy Joestar-Kira, who suffers memory loss from an incurable disease. Meanwhile, Kyo Nijimura, Holy's daughter who works as a maid for the Higashikata household, reveals to Josuke that he is a composite of Yoshikage's missing body parts with that of another person, having undergone an equivalent exchange from being buried under the Wall Eyes.
When Josuke later confronts Norisuke's reasons of taking him in, he learns that the Higashikata family need Yoshikage's memories to end a family curse that is gradually petrifying them. The solution is explained to be the Locacaca fruit, which cures a person of any ailment at the cost of losing an aspect of themselves in exchange. Jobin Higashikata, Norisuke's oldest son, has been using the family fruit parlour to smuggle Locacaca trees into the country in cooperation with mysterious stone-based beings called Rock Humans. Josuke and Yasuho's further investigation of the Locacaca Fruit result with them being targeted by Rock Humans who attempt to hinder them, the former discovering the truth of his own existence by meeting Karera Sakunami and later Tamaki Damo who both knew him as Josefumi Kujo.
In a series of flashbacks, having been saved by Holy in 1997, Josefumi helped Yoshikage steal a Locacaca branch from the Rock Humans to cure Holy, grafting it onto another tree. But it resulted with the Rock Humans attacking the two, with Yoshikage fatally wounded as Josefumi uses their last Locacaca Fruit in an attempt to save him before they were buried alive during the Tōhoku earthquake under the ground on which Wall Eyes emerged: the same area of land where Yasuho later found Josuke. Coping with the revelation that he is Josefumi fused with some parts of Yoshikage, Josuke resolves to retrieve the Locacaca fruit and cure Holy while the Higashikata family have their own goals in mind.
Josuke's search for the grafted branch brings him to a plant appraiser named Rai Mamezuku, putting him in conflict with Jobin and the Rock Humans. Jobin's failure to obtain the branch upsets the Rock Humans, with this conflict escalating greatly when a Rock Human named Poor Tom attacks the orchard, forcing Jobin to set the Higashikata orchard on fire to protect both his family and the branch. Poor Tom is killed by an unseen person and the branch is seemingly taken by two Rock Humans disguised as EMTs; however, Jobin had his son Tsurugi mislead them with his Stand, and in reality they are the ones with the branch. One of the Rock Humans is later discovered to be a doctor named Wu Tomoki; by chance, Yasuho and Jobin's wife Mitsuba happen to be in the hospital where they encounter Tomoki, and the Rock Human attacks them while revealing the hospital's involvement in Locacaca research. The doctor is defeated when Josuke and Mamezuku arrive, and the two plan to hunt down the hospital's head doctor.
While searching for info on the head doctor, an elderly Rock Human named Satoru Akefu, the group is caught off-guard when the head doctor walks right past them. The group begins to pursue him, but soon come under attack by Satoru's incredibly powerful Stand. Unable to catch a glimpse of his face, their plans are halted even further when a bystander is accidentally killed while standing near Josuke and Mamezuku, causing the police to come after them. Meanwhile, Jobin and Tsurugi come under attack by Ojiro Sasame, a Stand user who Josuke had previously fought. Planning to steal the Locacaca for himself, Ojiro's scheme causes Jobin to reassess his plans, and ends up dying from Jobin's Stand ability.
While hiding from the police, Josuke and Mamezuku come under attack from Satoru's Stand once again, resulting in Mamezuku being arrested and Josuke being sent to the hospital for serious injuries; however, this was part of Josuke's plan, as being in the hospital would allow him to be closer to Satoru. This plan quickly goes awry, as immediately after awaking in the hospital Josuke finds himself under attack by Satoru's ability yet again.
Josuke is fatally wounded by the stands ability but he is saved by Holy, who uses an experimental vat of the fruit to heal his wounds via rock petrification. Josuke tearfully watches Holy’s illness progress and vows to save her. He then realizes he can make the head doctor fight him if he were to make Akefu pursue him.
Yasuho attempts to scout the Higashikata household but is attacked by Jobin who immobilizes her stand in a toilet and attempts to drown her. When Mitsuba reluctantly agrees to kill Yasuho after being pressured by Jobin, her stand is affected by Akefu when she spots him on the property, his back to her and Yasuho. Mitsuba’s stand destroys a hole in the household, exposing the fruit graft. Upon investigation with King Nothing, Norisuke is incapacitated by Jobins stand, Speed King, which utilizes the power of heat to knock Norisuke unconscious. Suddenly, Mitsuba understands the nature of Satoru’s impending stand attack; creating intense misfortune. When someone spots the head doctors back, they are considered “pursuers” and are targeted by endless calamity and misfortune, unlucky events that violenty end their victims.
Satoru launches his attack on Jobin, first manifesting himself as a ghostly image through various solid surfaces and then by causing a can of hair spray to heavily wound Jobin with its drip tube. Tooru, a friend of Yasuho’s, is implied to be the stand user of the attack. Josuke locates the real Akefu by blackmailing him with videos of Kira’s mother. Mamezuku, having escaped the police and making his way back to the hospital with Doggy Style, spots Satoru Akefu pursuing him. Josuke waits for Akefu to arrive as Tooru closes in on the Higashikata household.
Mamezuku chases the head doctor to Wu Tomoki’s lab, where him and Josuke discover that Satoru Akefu is actually a stand. After Akefu senses Josuke’s trap, he attacks with a rock insect which poisons Josuke and Mamezuku. Akefu reveals himself as Tooru’s stand “Wonder of U”, and explains that the fruit graft is being brought to his location by the flow of calamity. A detailed flashback explains the origins of the Rock Humans, implying Rock Humans look indistinguishable to normal Humans but are different genetically, as they have a Silicon base compared to the Carbon base in DNA. Wonder of U reveals that it was responsible for Mamezuku’s fathers death as Josuke and Mamezuku prepare to attack.
Characters
- Josuke Higashikata is a young man with no memory of his past or name and is temporarily named "Josuke" by Yasuho after her dog. He would learn that he was originally Josefumi Kujo, a friend of the Kira Family whose body was altered by the power of the Locacaca Tree transplanting traits of Yoshikage Kira into him. He uses the Stand Soft & Wet, which allows him to produce soap bubbles that upon contact with an object can absorb, or steal an aspect of the object that can be used for other purposes, such as a person's eyesight or the friction of the floor.
- Yasuho Hirose is a young woman who discovers Josuke and helps him search for his true identity. She uses the Stand Paisley Park, which has the ability to direct things around Yasuho, although Paisley Park acts on Yasuho's subconscious needs rather than her being able to directly control her abilities.
- Norisuke Higashikata IV is the patriarch of the Higashikata family and runs a local fruit parlor. He uses the Stand King Nothing, which has the ability to track by scent while changing its physical appearance to resemble the target it is tracking.
- Hato Higashikata is the eldest daughter of the Higashikata family, and is a fashion model. She uses the Stand Walking Heart, which allows her to extend her shoes' heels into spikes, which can be used as weapons and to walk up walls.
- Joshu Higashikata is a college student who uses the Stand Nut King Call, which allows him to materialize nuts and bolts through objects or people's bodies; if the bolt is undone on a person, the limb it was attached to falls off.
- Daiya Higashikata is a near-blind teenaged girl who uses the Stand California King Bed, which allows her to steal people's memories and store them within chess pieces, as long as she does not step on the victim's shadow.
- Jobin Higashikata is the eldest son of the Higashikata family, and uses the Stand Speed King, allowing him to manipulate the temperature of his targets and store heat in objects which can then be released as a trap. He intend to obtain the Locacaca fruit and use it to end the curse plagueing his family, and against his father's own will in particular.
- Mitsuba Higashikata is a vain woman, and Jobin's wife who uses the Stand Awaking III Leaves, which allows her to create vector arrows that will repel anything from the arrow's direction.
- Tsurugi Higashikata is a nine-year-old boy, and Jobin's son, having pretended to be a girl as part of his family's tradition that the eldest Higashikata son poses as a girl until the age of 12 to avoid the evil eye. Tsurugi truly fears the family curse, allowing him to played by Yagiyama after seeing him restore a petrified dog with Locacaca fruit which he named Iwasuke. Tsurugi uses the Stand Paper Moon King, which lets him create origami that upon touching a person gives them prospagnosia, though this is later revealed to be a single application of Paper Moon King's ability, which actually disrupts his target's vision and causes them to be unable to discern objects and people from each other, such as making Aisho see a bus as Jobin. It additionally allows him to create origami from other objects than paper and is able to control origami creatures he has made.
- Kaato Higashikata is Norisuke's ex-wife and the mother of Hato, Joshu, Daiya and Jobin, and has served a fifteen-year sentence for the murder of a child. She uses a Stand that allows her to store objects in the middle of a deck of cards.
- Kyo Nijimura is the Higashikata family's maid, and uses the Stand Born This Way, which takes the form of a robotic rider on a motorcycle, which attacks when its target opens an item, such as a door or a notebook, and attacks by freezing everything around it. She is later revealed to be Holy's daughter and Yoshikage's sister
- Rai Mamezuku is a plant appraiser and fruit grower who works for Norisuke's fruit company. He uses the Stand Doggy Style, which allows him to peel his flesh like an apple, turning it into a ribbon that he can manipulate.
- Holy Joestar–Kira is an ophthalmologist from T.H. Medical University Hospital and an associate professor at Morioh's T.G. University. She is hospitalized, as parts of her brain and other organs are missing.
- Yoshikage Kira is a doctor who is a descendant of Johnny Joestar through his mother and thus a distant relation to the Higashikata family. He was also a friend of Josefumi Kujo, who attempted to help him save Holy's life by stealing a Locacaca Branch to use its fruit. But it ended with Yoshikage fatally wounded by the Rock People with Josefumi attempting to save him with last of the Locacaca Fruit they stole before the two were buried alive by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The fruit takes effect with Kira's body parts being swapped with Josefumi's to turn him into Josuke, with what remained of Yoshikage's body uncovered a few days after Josuke was found. Yoshikage's Stand is Killer Queen, which can produce exploding soap bubbles, its "soap bubble" aspect transferred into Soft & Wet. It can also summon out multiple tank-like stands called Sheer Heart Attack
- Tooru is a part-time worker at the same hospital that Holy's in, and Yasuho's ex-boyfriend.
- Rock Humans are a mysterious race of humanoid silicon-based lifeforms with the ability to turn into stone, having infiltrated Morioh under assumed aliases. The groups active in Morioh also have ties to both the Locacaca Tree and Jobin, silencing anyone who learns of the former's existence. Currently, there are two selective groups of Rock Humans who are after the Locacaca and its fruit including the following:
- The Locacaca Smuggling Organization is a mysterious, secret smuggling operation serve as the first collective antagonists in the start of the series, their goal is to secretly obtain and sell Locacaca fruits:
- * Yotsuyu Yagiyama is the first of the Rock Humans to appear, tricking Tsurugi to help him kill Josuke while stealing the Higashikata fortune. In his civilian identity, Yotsuyu is an architect of some regard, and was the one that the Higashikata family hired to design and build their house. Yagiyama's Stand is I Am a Rock, which turns his target into a gravity well that pulls certain objects towards them.
- * Aisho Dainenjiyama is a Rock Human who is among the protectors of the Locacaca Tree, attacking Yasuho and Tsurugi when he realized they were following him before the latter used his ties to Jobin to trick him into getting run over by a bus. Dainenjiyama's Stand is Doobie Wah!, which allows Dainenjiyama to create small razor-sharp tornadoes that automatically track down their target by means of their breath, and grows bigger as the target breathes more.
- * The A. Phex Brothers are twin Rock Humans who pose as street performers while targeting Karera before they come across Josuke, having played a role in the attempt on Josefumi and Yoshikage's lives prior. The older brother's Stand Schott Key No. 1 allows him to transfer objects between his two hands, using it the younger brother's Stand Schott Key No. 2 a soccer ball concealing a doll-like figure that releases a poisonous gas, for risky combination attacks.
- * Tamaki Damo is a Rock Human and their leader who set up the Damo Can Cleaning service as a cover, using Hato under to infiltrate the Higashikata estate to track down those who killed his allies. But he ends up being mortally wounded by Hato and then killed by Josuke. Damo's Stand is Vitamin C, which allows him to render a living being's body malleable or completely liquefy into nothingness after they touch an object that has his fingerprints on it.
- The Locacaca Research Organization is a group working in the medical field whose interest in the Locacaca fruit seems to stem from a desire to make Rock Humans the dominant species:
- * Urban Guerrilla is Rock Person whose real name is Ryo Shimosato; he's a gastroenterologist who was assigned to take down Mamezuku before Josuke and Yasuho meet him to find the Locacaca branch, he later attacks all three of them at Mamezuku's summer home/ski lift in his pet Rock Animal Doremifasolati Do. Guerrilla's Stand is Brain Storm, which can melt the flesh of anyone that comes in contact with him, they grab onto the skin and then break through into inside the victim's body. This causes hemolysis within the body while they constantly multiply as the target begins to break down into holes dug into the skin. However, the Stand can be nullified by washing it off with water before it has the chance to burrow into the victim.
- * Poor Tom, a short, infant-like Rock Human covered in wrinkles and smokes cigarettes who is enlisted by Jobin after Guerrilla's defeat and tells him to bury his Stand Ozon Baby in the ground to prevent the others to find the branch only to betray him and trap him and his son Tsurugi in the Higashikata household via his Stand. He is killed after by an unseen enemy, who shoots him in the head with an unknown object after he suffers fatal poisoning from a Yew tree seed. His Stand can depressurize an area upon activation and can inflict depressurization sickness in seconds, also any room will regain normal pressure closed when but still is dangerous as the pressure will gradually increase to lethal levels. Ozon Baby can also create illusions of itself, and getting close to it will the cause the body to cave in on itself from the intense pressure.
- * Wu Tomoki, a Rock Human who's an orthopedic surgeon, he's first seen by Yasuho examining Mitsuba's right ear and later curing her with a 200 million yen cure involving Locacaca fruit. He is killed when Josuke seals his fragmented head in medical cement. He has a Stand called Doctor Wu, that's bound to Wu's body, and allows him to disintegrate into tiny, independent stone fragments in order to possess someone.
- * Satoru Akefu, the head of the T.G. University Hospital and a possible Rock Human. Believed to be 89 years old; he is the head of the research group and the mastermind behind the Rock Humans' various operations in Morioh. Yasuho suspects that he and Wu Tomoki were involved in the death of Poor Tom. Mamezuku tries to ask the receptionist for a meeting with him, but he refuses to interfere. He possesses a mysterious Stand ability that prevents anyone from following him by causing various objects to collide with them, with the energy from the collisions being stored and eventually released as a single attack which can cause a chain reaction-like transfer to others around the victim; a bystander was hit by a car after suffering a sudden injury after coming into contact with Josuke's blood. This ability only works if someone is trying to find him explicitly, but if he is simply a barrier in the way of their actual goal, then the Stand cannot affect them.
- Dolomite is a limbless Rock Person whose real name is Masaji Dorokoma, he is currently the only Rock Person not affiliated with any of the groups above. In the past, he was a carefree, handsome man until he saved his blind girlfriend from going into a power plant, destroying his arms and legs in the process; he was assigned by Jobin to take out Josuke. Dolomite's Stand is Blue Hawaii, it can possess a person only by having someone touch something that belongs to the user like Dolomite's tooth, it can then possess another or more through the same process. It has to be physical so touching through something like plastic wrap doesn't count, but blood dropped onto another person or more does. Once it is done, the possessed victim will go after a specific target the user desires, its weakness though causes the possessed to walk in a straight, linear direction towards that target; the possessed are also functionally blind while under the Stand's thrall, and "see" through their own spilled blood.
- Shakedown Road is a location in Morioh where the residents are known for extorting visitors; and despite not being a person, it has a Stand called Les Feuilles that allows it to move people very fast and unnoticed when stepping on the ginkgo leaves.
- Milagro Man is the Stand of a well-known unnamed arms dealer who burned his family, fortune, house and himself on fire after a losing a 50,000,000,000 dollar lawsuit. The Stand caused whoever stole money from its previous owner to gain an increasingly large amount of money by creating and duplicating it until they are literally buried in it regardless of spending it or destroying it, the only way out is to either give it back to the previous owner or give it to a new one.
Production
On the inside cover of volume 2, Araki explained that the "...lion" in the title comes from both the Christian concept of blessing and the gospels, and the Ancient Greek myth of Pygmalion.