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So, I came across a line in a manga that I'm interpreting in two ways. There's the main character who gets cornered by a monster, and the MC is vexed because he was weakened from a previous fight and can't believe that he monster is about to cause damage to him, when usually the MC would have finished it off easy. MC says:

腹立たしい 腹立たしい 弱者のように脅かされるのは

After this he says nothing, he gets up, very determined and kills the monster, not wanting to die there.

Now, I think he says "It's so annoying...so annoying. To be threatened like a weakling" But, I also thought of another way which I don't know if it is right and maybe needs to be rephrased in another way. ""It's so annoying...so annoying. The one who should be getting threatened (or scared) like a weakling should be..." Would this sound okay? I feel that the MC could say that "It should be you (monsters) that should cower in fear", something like that. Can this interpenetration work or the sentence needs to be rephrased? I would like to know if it's a possibility!

Thank you!

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"It's so annoying...so annoying. To be threatened like a weakling" sounds adequate. "It's so annoying...so annoying. The one who should be getting threatened (or scared) like a weakling should be..." does not. If I were writing a manga and wanted to convey the latter, I would either write it out as a full sentence (弱者のように脅かされるのは[whatever the MC refers to the monster as]であるべきだというのに) or at least write 弱者のように脅かされるべきは, with べき to denote that the situation of the monster being frightened is not happening at the moment of speech but rather how the thing should be.

Hence, I believe the only possible interpretation is your first one.

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  • Thank you! I also thought that べき should be used for making the latter interpretation possible, so I wasn't far off, but I still wanted to hear an opinion.
    – Alice B. Rabbit
    Feb 27, 2020 at 8:51
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腹立たしい 腹立たしい 弱者のように脅かされるのは

I would read it as a rhetorical anastrophe/inversion (倒置). The normal word order would be:

弱者のように脅かされるのは 腹立たしい (腹立たしい)。

... which would sound less emotional and emphatic, with less rhetorical effect.

So it means:

"It's so annoying...so annoying... to be threatened like a weakling."

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  • Thank you! I was wondering for some time how I should interpret that. Reading those lines again after some time, I was like "Hmmm, could MC actually be saying this perhaps?". Whenever I get ideas for multiple interpretations, it's best to seek out opinions :)
    – Alice B. Rabbit
    Feb 27, 2020 at 8:55

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