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I'm trying to understand the pitch of the sentence fragment

それであたし何にもしてないのに...

In particular "何にも" is giving me trouble. When I enter this word into OJAD, it shows as Atamadaka:

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But dictionaries are reporting it as all sorts of things:

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Moreover, it looks like the reading of "何" from "何にも" can be either なん (slang?) or なに. If the latter, the pitch changes again?

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Finally, is "何にも" distinct from 何 + に + も? If not, an accepted pronuncation of 何 seems to be "naNI" (Heiban), so wouldn't a third acceptable pronuncation be "naNINImo", since the first particle would raise (since 何 is being treated as Heiban), and the second particle would lower (since second successive particles lower, as a rule)?

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At least when 何にも is used as a negative polarity item (which is almost always the case), it is always pronounced as heiban (なんにも【LHHH】/なににも【LHHH】). That result from OJAC seems confusing to me.

See also: The pitch accent of なんの意味もない

But なににも【HLLL】 may appear in rare cases where it is used as an equivalent of 何にでも/何に対しても (e.g., なににも【HLLL】使えるソース "sauce you can use for whatever/everything").

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  • It looks like 何にも is being used as a negative polarity item in 「それであたし何にもしてないのに」, no? So it should be pronounced Heiban?
    – George
    Sep 15, 2022 at 3:18
  • @George Can you elaborate? Do you mean you know a video where a native speaker clearly used atamadaka for 何にも(してない)?
    – naruto
    Sep 15, 2022 at 3:19
  • The source of this line is at 2m32s of Episode 1 of Death Note. It sounds Atamadaka to me here, but I'm a beginner so might just be mishearing it.
    – George
    Sep 15, 2022 at 3:21
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    @George Oh, the girl is saying なんも rather than なににも or なんにも (yet another subtitle mistake). And this なんも is pronounced as heiban to my ears. This question applies perfectly.
    – naruto
    Sep 15, 2022 at 3:26
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    @George Not all NPIs are heiban (ちっとも is an NPI but not heiban). As for 何も, it has this usage.
    – naruto
    Sep 15, 2022 at 7:51

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