Chapter 221

## Bear Man

**Bear Man** (ヒグマ男, *Higuma Otoko*) is the 221st chapter of the *Golden Kamuy* manga.

## Synopsis

Over some cups of tea, Kadokura begins to tell Kirawus about one of Abashiri Prison’s tattooed convicts, Heita Matsuda, saying that he remembers him well. Kadokura describes Heita as having a weird habit of constantly changing the way he talked, which he considered to be creepy. Heita had also admitted to Kadokura that he has several people inside of him that would keep switching in and out and that he was always afraid as there was a brown bear wandering around outside the cells. He claimed that the brown bear, called a Wen Kamuy, would attack and eat the people inside his head, one by one and that it would take over his body, killing people in the real world as well.

Heita revealed that when he kills a person in the real world, his body would explode into chunks of flesh and fly off into the mountains, causing him to go back to his old self only for the cycle to happen again repeatedly. Kadokura found this statement to be rather humorous but Kirawus explains the Ainu’s tradition on dealing with a Wen Kamuy’s body, believing that it might have been what Heita was talking about. Kadokura recalls Heita saying that he is glad that he has been caught since the Wen Kamuy is unable to take over his body so easily but becomes furious when he finds out that his body has been tattooed.

Kadokura then tells Kirawus about the crime that Heita had commited and wonders if Heita is undergoing the same cycle somewhere out there. At the Uryu River, Sugimoto fights back against Heita who believes he has been possessed by the Wen Kamuy and they roll off of a cliff. As Asirpa searches for Sugimoto, Shiraishi approaches her, asking where Heita is, revealing to her that he is one of the tattooed convicts.

Sugimoto’s gun is stuck in the trees so Sugimoto is forced to fight hand to hand with Heita, exclaiming how strong he is. As Heita overpowers Sugimoto, he takes his knife out and stabs him several times, causing him to scream out. Heita reaches out of the pelt and tiggers a crossbow trap, hitting himself in the neck and slumping over.

Asirpa and Shiraishi manages to find the both of them as Heita declares that he finally managed to beat the Wen Kamuy and Asirpa recognizes the area that they are in. Heita states that he had led them so that the Wen Kamuy would not notice that it was being guided into a trap. Shiraishi frantically tries to save Heita but Heita refuses, saying that this is how he wants it to end. Heita tells Sugimoto’s Group about the stories he had heard as a boy from the Ainu, which scared him so much, causing him to constantly think about them. He also revealed the financial issues that his family had and that the Wen Kamuy had killed them for their greed before turning its sight onto him.

With his last breath, Heita thanks Sugimoto for helping him to kill the Wen Kamuy before passing away. Asirpa states that Heita is mistaken that the Wen Kamuy isn’t something that kills people in order to punish them and that Heita must have a partial knowledge about the Ainu stories, leading a mistaken Wen Kamuy to growing up inside of himself.

Lastly, Asirpa stresses how important it is that things are passed down correctly and Sugimoto wonders if it is the greed for the gold dust that caused Heita to go crazy or that there might be some magic in the gold dust that drives people to madness. Shiraishi then takes Heita’s body and cradles it, asking him not to die so that he can tell them where they could pan for gold next.

## Character Appearances

* Heita Matsuda
* Kadokura
* Kirawus
* Saichi Sugimoto
* Asirpa
* Yoshitake Shiraishi
* Tokushirou Tsurumi
* Toshizou Hijikata
* Hyakunosuke Ogata