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“
Gods don't exist, and Buddhas don't either. Yet these people lived for decades without realizing it. Once they die, it's all just gonna return to nothing. They won't feel anything. And then they rot into the ground. As long as you live on this Earth, that's your eternal fate. They just can't accept that simple fact. It must be so hard being stupid. I want to make these sorrowful people happy. I want to help them. That's the reason I was born, after all.
„
~ Doma's expressing his nihilism and misanthropy.
“
In reality, humans who live virtuously and decently suffer irrational tragedies. While evil people do what they want because they live insane, interesting lives and drink sweet nectar. "Since these people are not getting divine punishment, at the very least they'll got to hell when they die." That's what mentally weak people have to think, or they wouldn't be able to live with themselves, right? They keep it deep in their minds. Humans are so pitiful.
„
~ Doma expressing his opinions on the right and wrong to Kanao Tsuyuri and Inosuke Hashibira.
Doma (in Japanese: 童磨, Dōma) or Douma is a major antagonist in the dark fantasy action manga/anime series Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. He is the overarching antagonist of the Entertainment/Red-Light District Arc and one of the main antagonists of the Infinity Castle Arc.
He is a psychopathic, emotionless, nihilistic demon serving under Muzan Kibutsuji as Upper-Rank Two (formerly Six) of the Twelve Kizuki. He is also the leader of a cult named the Eternal Paradise and is responsible for the deaths of Inosuke Hashibira's mother, Kotoha, and Kanae Kocho, the elder sister of Shinobu Kocho and the adoptive older sister of Kanao Tsuyuri. As a result, he is the archenemy of Shinobu, Kanao and Inosuke.
Doma didn't have any emotions or humanity since his childhood, and even when he saw the death of his parents, he started thinking of venturing, saying he hated the smell of blood rather than feeling sad. Although, Doma's past can be seen as very sad and tragic as he is said to be a victim of abuse and exploitation by parents who have filled their desires with pseudo-religion, it doesn’t hold up as he is unsympathetic and the atrocities he has committed outweigh his tragedy, regardless of his background, like Muzan, who was born sick from birth, but never even worthy of sympathy. And he's been a misanthropic psychopath since he was human. Thus, all of Doma's Freudian Excuses were shut down, with his transformation into a demon simply amplifying what was already there.
As it turned out in the fan book, even the demon king, Muzan, was uncomfortable with Doma and hated him for his lack of emotions. Also, despite being friendly with him, Gyokko is actually afraid of Doma, and the rest of the demons try not to get close to Doma because of the inhumanity he holds dearly.
Despite his complexity, Doma is considered completely unsympathetic, being responsible for causing more tragic events than other Upper Moons. Except for Hantengu, Gyokko, and Kaigaku, most Upper Moons have a tragic background, honor, and insecurity, but Doma doesn't. Writer Gotouge unraveled Doma's past and relationship with Kotoha, but Gotōge never portrays Doma as a pitiful character like the other Upper Moons. This proves that even the writer Gotoge sees Doma as just as bad as Muzan Kibutsuji.
Past[]
After becoming a demon thanks to Muzan, he carried out all kinds of cruelty freely. In particular, he caused the deaths of many women. He also worships Muzan, but it is only a fanatical worship to Muzan's demonic power rather than true loyalty. It's implied that his sociopathic personality was enough to impress Muzan, given the large amount of blood that he gave him.
He appeared eating a woman in Gyutaro and Daki's past. He also turned and corrupted them into demons.
He seduced mentally limited people into his believers, and in this way, he gathered believers and ate them. Moreover, Doma thinks of his believers as nothing but his food and does not treat them with genuine care. This shows that he is not a savior, but a delusional hypocrite. When one believer realized Doma's true nature, she screamed for Shinobu to save her, but Doma told her to be quiet and mercilessly killed her.
When he was with Kotoha, Doma grew attached to Kotoha, but she could not prevent his evil behavior. Eventually, when Kotoha discovered his true nature, Doma murdered and ate her. Before being killed, Kotoha tossed her son Inosuke from a cliff to a river as a last-ditch effort to save his life and for this reason, Inosuke is raised by boars.
Dōma brutally murdered Shinobu's elder sister, Kanae, which forced Shinobu to live a hellish life of grief. And this also hurt Sanemi Shinazugawa, who loved Kanae unrequitedly.
Demon Slayer Kimetsu no Yaiba[]
Dōma has the same sick and twisted view of art as Gyokko, decorating the pot given to him by Gyokko with the skull of a woman he had murdered.
He had some comedic moments at the Upper-Rank meeting, but in the Infinity Castle Arc, he lost all comedic traits and showed his true darker and brutal colors. Moreover, his crimes and misdeeds became so detestable that they outweighed all of his humorous actions, similar to Gyokko.
In the Infinity Castle arc, Doma met Shinobu, whose whole life was ruined by himself and ridiculed her before killing and devouring her.
What's worse, Kanao tried to save Shinobu but ultimately failed and is forced to watch Shinobu slowly being devoured by Doma.
Also, in front of Kanao and Inosuke, he did all kinds of ridicule. This proves that Doma has no respect or honor, which is contrary to Kokushibou and Akaza, who show honor and respect as warriors.
He pretended to care about Akaza after hearing of his demise. This is akin to the narcissism of "I am close to other demons." And this is also evident in his attitude toward Gyutaro and Daki. It is Doma that turned them into demons, but when they died, it turned out that he didn't care about them at all.
After being insulted by Kanao, he immediately drops his faux affable nature and tries to kill her.
In front of Inosuke, he revealed that he had killed Kotoha, and he made fun of the fact that she was an unfortunate child.
After he attempted to kill Kanao and Inosuke, Dōma proceeded with attempting to wipe out the rest of the Demon Slayers with his ice clones.
His death was portrayed as sympathetic, but his actions later in the afterlife deprived him of any sympathy. Even if he had a twisted mind because of his parents neglecting him, it's all his choices and the results of them as he stays evil and willingly accepts going to Hell. Dōma can't be sympathetic like the other Upper Ranks (except for Hantengu, Gyokko, and Kaigaku).
When he died, he met Shinobu's soul in the afterlife and made a terrible remark about going to hell with him, who lived a hellish life because of him. Additionally, like Muzan Kibutsuji, Enmu, Gyutaro, Gyokko and the Snake Demon, he didn't have any regrets for his actions among the Demons, and, unlike Akaza, he refused to change.
What Prevents Him from Being Pure Evil?[]
He has moral agency issues. While his tragedy is no excuse for his actions, because of his parents' treatment of him, treating him like a god and starting a cult solely dedicated to him, Doma is too delusional to have a proper moral agency, as he believes that he is genuinely saving the women he eats and that he is treating them kindly on the basis that superior beings should treat their followers fairly. Kanae Kocho even expresses pity for him due to him being so broken inside his head. However, this is a minor prevention, as Doma is aware he is abnormal and exhibits a sufficiently sadistic and manipulative nature.
Although he is extremely vile, misanthropic, and heinous in a psychopathic way, he seems to have admired the concept of feelings he never felt before and he monopolized that human emotions at the moment of his death were nothing more than a fantasy of another world to him, but afterward, he realized that he had genuine feelings because of Shinobu in the afterlife, falling in love with her as displayed by him calling her cute. Realizing it, Doma felt the feeling of ecstasy for the first time in his life. However, even after meeting Shinobu in the afterlife, Doma stays evil even after understanding his feelings and he shows no reflection or regrets about his actions, and it should not be forgotten that he is the one who killed her, so this is a very weak prevention.
Trivia[]
Ironically, he is similar to Shinobu Kocho, in the senses that both are considered "Near" the edge of their respective morality, in that Shinobu, despite her massive heroism, is near pure good because of her ruthlessness and lethality, and Doma, despite his cruelty, is near pure evil because of moral agency issues and because he fell in love with Shinobu.
Doma's Kimetsu Academy counterpart doesn't qualify as Near Pure Evil due to being a bog-standard scam artist beyond fake marriages.
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Near Pure Evils
