#lord delgal

[son-flower]

something something i think thistle would be more emotional at delgals life achievements than delgal himself

#my art// #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #delicious in dungeon #thistle dunmeshi #delgal #lord delgal #eodio #sissle #king delgal #freinag #dont tag as ship pleaseeeee

[breegadey]

i see... i see...

#gang i'm afraid lord-of-the-dungeon! marcille could never bring herself to ressurrct falin #she'd be too scared of what falin would think of her #and petrified at the idea that she would pull a delgal on her and try to leave the dungeon #nooo don't trap your loved ones in a gilded prison because you're terrified of being alone haha you're so sexy #marcille-thistle paralels are so yummy #dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #delicious in dungeon #delicious in dungeon spoilers #falin touden #marcille touden #delgal #thistle #posted

[laikabu]

isnt it fucked up how mithrun and his brother look like funhouse mirror versions of thistle and delgal. same eye shapes and everything. the difference was mithrun became dungeon lord because he violently hated his brother back then, but thistle loved his too much

#mithrun of the house of kerensil #mithrun’s brother #delgal melini #thistle #dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers

[haunting-hole]

Everytime I remember that one extra comic that shows that present day Thistle isn't even 16 yet I go a little crazy. Assuming he didn't just stop aging when he became dungeon lord he would've been even younger when that happened. Delgal really said damn my country is in crisis I know what will fix it: time to give the nuclear launch codes to the most autistic middle schooler I know

#dungeon meshi #thistle dungeon meshi #we should try that in real life #dungeon meshi spoilers

[ambrosiagourmet]

I love the Dungeon Meshi characters I love how Laios leaves Falin and Falin leaves Marcille and Marcille babies Falin because she’s afraid to lose her (to leaving) (to time) (to death) (something will take her away, eventually). I love how Rin loves Kabru and she is bitter and angry and he doesn’t seem to need her the same way she needs him but also he thinks about how much the elves have hurt her just before he throws himself into the abyss to keep the elves from taking everything. I love how Kabru chases Laios who chases Shuro who chases Falin who follows Laios who nervously asks Kabru to stay with him once he is king.

I love how Falin gave her life to protect Marcille and Laios, and how they would do anything to bring her back. I love how Thistle wants to help Delgal and wants to help the kingdom and wants to stop the Lion and brings Marcille back to life and because of all those things she becomes the Dungeon Lord. I love how Laios gives Marcille a piece of his armor so that she can stay alive and bring them all back, and it is simultaneous kind and cruel and selfish and selfless. I love how he saves her from her nightmares and that pushes her towards a self-destructive path, and I love that no one lets him take the blame for that, and I love that he holds so much responsibility and love for her anyways and won’t kill her even if it would save the world (or save himself).

I love that they wouldn’t be alive without Senshi, and Senshi wouldn’t know the taste of hippogriff stew without them. I love that they wouldn’t be alive without Izutsumi and she wouldn’t understand her two hearts (so full of love and hunger) without them. I love that they wouldn’t be alive without Chilchuck, and he knows it, too (and carries the guilt of leading them deeper, and doesn’t know how to let go of any of it).

I love that they make food and save each other and make food and save each other and make food and save each other and —

#dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #they are tangled in each others lives. again and again and again and again

[meefy]

I've talked about codependency and how it presents in Hunter x Hunter, and now I want to talk about how it presents in Dungeon Meshi - specifically between Thistle and Delgal.

Thistle, from the start, is in a perfect place to be taken advantage of and manipulated. He was taken from his family as a child, and he knows nothing about his past, not even his name. His sole purpose is to be there as a fool to entertain those with power. Delgal's father names him and raises him like a "son" and a "brother" to Delgal...but let's be honest, there is nothing normal or "brotherly" about how Delgal and Thistle interact here:

Thistle is not an equal with Delgal. From Delgal's perspective, Thistle is court magician and confidante, the one who can save his life and his kingdom. I certainly don't see Delgal considering Thistle a "friend" or member of the family. Perhaps when he was younger, but definitely not as an adult. Some of the earlier interactions between Thistle and Delgal as the latter grows up might have been sweet - sneaking food to share, talking about Delgal's marriage - but that sweetness quickly turns sour when we see how Delgal treats Thistle when the elf cannot be of use to him.

There is a tremendous amount of pressure on Thistle's shoulders. He knows Delgal's love for him is conditional; we can argue that Delgal yelled at him in a moment of desperation, but the fact that Thistle later feels the need to apologize (for...not being able to make Eodio defy death?) tells me he's used to asking Delgal for forgiveness where there is nothing logically to forgive.

Delgal, however, offers heaps of praise for Thistle when he keeps his kingdom and people safe.

Delgal needs Thistle to maintain rule of his kingdom and keep Eodio alive, and in turn, Thistle needs to be needed to feel fulfilled and useful. Thistle is Delgal's codependent, and Thistle has misconstrued putting aside his own wants and interests (his Adventurer's Bible page lists his likes and dislikes as "Nothing") in favour of serving Delgal and only Delgal. Thistle craves the affection he receives in return, and who can blame him? He has no family to speak of, no connections to the world outside of Delgal. Praise from Delgal is all Thistle lives for - and so he pours himself into creating the dungeon, keeping his people safe to the point of immortality.

So when Delgal and Eodio begin to talk about leaving, it's understandable that Thistle reacts so violently. If he can't protect his people, he can't earn Delgal's affection and praise. He is too deeply entrenched into the role of dungeon lord - the role of Lunatic Magician - to see that the dungeon is falling apart, and that Delgal probably long regrets asking Thistle for help.

Thistle is so obsessed with protecting Delgal and earning his love that he maintains this obsession for an entire millennium. Mithrun eventually tells him that Delgal is dead, to set his people free, and Thistle is in complete denial. He continues to search for Delgal even after learning the truth from Mithrun. He is so panicked about finding Delgal and proving that Mithrun is lying that he is driven to self mutilation.

Thistle's love for Delgal is not "true" love - it is obsession. But, in turn, Delgal's "love" for Thistle is not true love, either. Delgal would not have placed blame on Thistle for his son dying, would not have praised his use of dark magic, would not have placed the weight of his life on Thistle's shoulders...had he truly, purely loved Thistle. And I think Yaad knows this, because, when Thistle finally "reunites" with Delgal, he gives Thistle the apology and accountability the elf never got at any point during his life. He's sorry he made Thistle worry, and he's sorry he placed so much weight on his shoulders...those are things Delgal likely never said to Thistle at any point in time, but that Thistle deserved to hear after a thousand years. And I think it's very telling that the apology he got from "Delgal" isn't from Delgal at all - because the real Delgal probably wouldn't have apologized to Thistle in the first place.

I know there's some debate about whether or not Thistle is dead at the end of Chapter 96. But I am of the belief that yes, he is - that after finally being freed from the burden of needing to earn approval and protect everyone, and hearing Delgal apologize for it all, Thistle is at last able to rest peacefully.

#meefymeta #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #thistle dungeon meshi #sissel dungeon meshi

[lesbianweed]

Lord Delgal...I must find him.

#SHE'S HEEEERE #dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #dungeon meshi spoilers #delicious in dungeon spoilers #dunmeshi spoilers #falin touden #gif #m

[room-surprise]

How Old Is Thistle?

(EDIT: I've made a follow-up post to this one that goes deeper into the math and additional evidence that the 5:1 ratio is correct. You can read it here!)

I've seen people debating this and a lot of folks insisting that Thistle is a child, and since Thistle just debuted in the anime, I wanted to do a full write-up to help myself and others figure this out.

We don't know how old any of the Merini family members are exactly, so the best we can do is guess based on the information we have, but after carefully studying the manga, I think Thistle is at least a teenager, but much more likely a young adult, and definitely not a prepubescent child.

Here's what we know:

EDIT: Depending on what translation you read of some of the extra materials, Freinag implies that Thistle is the same age as some of his advisors.

Here's a detailed translation of this panel from my friend Fumi:

Elves age 5 times slower than tall-men.

16 year old tall-men in Dungeon Meshi's medieval time period are adults, they commonly join the military, get married, have children, etc.

An 80 year old elf is an adult. Pattadol is 82 and she's a lieutenant in a military unit. It's her first job and she's obviously a rookie, but Captain Flamela tells Pattadol to accomplish her mission or die trying.

Many fully adult elves look like what we might consider children or young teens, because they're short, petite, and have androgynous features.

An average elven adult is around 150-155cm tall (5 ft), meaning some are shorter than that, and some are taller. Thistle is 130 cm, which is short, but not unheard of.

Fleki is 130 (26) years old and she's 140 cm tall (4'7")

Otta is 137 (27) years old and she's 130 cm (4'5") tall, the same height as Thistle!

They are both women, but there's probably plenty of elven men in their height range.

Just so we can compare Thistle to some adult elven men, Mithrun and his brother are probably adults (or close to it) in the panel on the left.

Mithrun (in this image) is somewhere between 75 and 144 (probably in his 80's), and his brother is older than him (so he could be in his late 80s or 90s). As you can see, they don't look that different from Thistle, Otta or Fleki.

So, how old is Thistle?

(Spoilers below the cut)

Thistle was brought to the royal court as a child (found on the street, stolen or purchased, we don't know how they got him). At the absolute youngest I'd guess Thistle is 25 years old here (so about 5 years old for a tall-man.) He can already play the flute, and possibly the lute, and most children that aren't prodigies can't handle playing an instrument (physically or mentally) until they're around 5.

EDIT: We now know that Thistle is the same age as Freinag, the king that takes him in! So Thistle must be at least 25 years old in this comic, though realistically he could be anywhere from 25 to 40 based on how Kui drew Freinag.

He lived in the court for an unknown amount of time, Freinag hasn't changed much but Thistle appears to have aged a little, so let's say it's been 5 years and Thistle is 30 (6) when Delgal is born. More than 5 years could have passed, but I'm trying to keep the numbers low.

Delgal gets married and has a child. Delgal should be at least 15 at this point, but since he has a full mustache before his wedding, I think he's in his 20's, since teenagers tend to not be the best at growing robust facial hair.

(He has a full beard by the time Eodio's a young child.)

Thistle puts the kingdom inside the dungeon around this point, however, people are still aging: Delgal's grandson Yaad is born, and Eodio is clearly a young adult here, probably in his 20's. Therefore, there is NO REASON to assume Thistle stopped aging. "The dungeon lords don't age" is a common fan headcanon I've seen people spreading, but it has no clear canon basis.

Yaad ages until he looks about 13-15 years old, and at this point all of the people of the kingdom and Thistle appear to stop aging, and 1,000 years pass.

So, the youngest Thistle could possibly be, if he was 30 (6) when Delgal was born, if Delgal was 15 when he had Eodio, and Eodio was 15 when he had Yaad, and Yaad is 13 years old...

Is 73 years old, which would make Thistle about 14.6 years old by tall-man standards.

HOWEVER, I think it's VERY unlikely that all the characters are that young.

I think it's clear from Kui's drawings that Delgal and Eodio are not 15 years old when they become fathers, and that Freinag is at least 25 when he takes in Thistle.

If we assume Thistle was 30 when Delgal was born, and Delgal and Eodio were both at least 20 when they had children, even if Yaad is only 13 years old, that makes Thistle at least 83 years old (16.6), and makes him older than Pattadol, who is an adult at 82.

However, I think it's entirely possible that Thistle was anywhere from 40-50 when Delgal was born, and Delgal could have been anywhere from 20 to 30 when he had Eodio, and Eodio could have been anywhere from 20-25 when he had Yaad. If you use the maximum ages, and assume Yaad is 15, then Thistle could be as old as 120 (24).

I think a reasonable middle ground is assuming Thistle was 30 (6) when Delgal was born, Delgal had Eodio at 25, Eodio had Yaad at 20, and Yaad is 15... Which would make Thistle 90 (18) years old.

This of course says nothing about Thistle's emotional maturity or sanity, he's obviously stunted in some ways, but the point I want to make here is:

Thistle's age could be anywhere from 14.6 to 24 at the most extreme, but more realistically he's somewhere between 16.6 and 18.

And that's not even counting the thousand years that he's lived since then!

And that's all I've got to say about that 🙏🙏🙏🙏

(EDIT: Follow-up post with additional evidence here.) EDIT 2: I've seen a lot of people talking about the page Kui drew talking about elven earmuffs. It's considered just barely okay for Pattadol to wear them, but it's ok for Thistle to wear them... In which case I'd say Thistle could be any age younger than 83. That's handy as it knocks out some of the older ages!

So in that case Thistle's age is between 73 years old and 82, which makes him developmentally between 14.6 and 16.4!

#dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #dunmeshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #Thistle #Thistle Merini #thistle dungeon meshi #thistle delicious in dungeon #sissel #spoilers #theories

[loriache]

do you ever think about how delgal never blamed the winged lion for what happened to thistle?

I'll preface this by saying that he certainly COULD have done. most of the arguments that delgal had with thistle about returning the golden kingdom are off-page, and he doesn't seem to have relayed a lot of detail to yaad about how he understood thistle's behaviour.

however.

what we can infer, i think, is that if delgal blamed anything for thistle's increasingly erratic behaviour, it was the influence of "black magic" and power.

the winged lion is the golden kingdom's guardian deity, and that is how they understand it up to the present - including yaad. the prophecy that convinced delgal to leave the dungeon (which i assume the winged lion intended to use to attract another, more easily controllable, dungeon lord) is likely to be part of a long campaign the lion made of deliberately isolating thistle from the people of the golden kingdon and presenting itself as the victim.

we see that the lion is convincing, and keeps a facade of concern for thistle long past the point that it has any chance of winning him over - i don't have any doubt it was easy to present this narrative to the kingdom's people, including delgal.

but isn't it incredibly sad to think that the person who thistle trusted most in the world and did all of this for was unable to see the true victim, between him and the winged lion?

we see that very shortly upon becoming the dungeon lord, both marcille and laios become lost in their desires. this is standard.

Laios is only able to get through to marcille because he sees the root of her pain, and understands that ...

...the dungeon's power is evil.

thistle isn't acting rationally from the very beginning, but it is possible to reach him - if delgal could understand where his desire and his fear stemmed from, and that the winged lion is evil.

Thistle at least seems to know that the winged lion isn't to be trusted. Thus why he sealed it in the book. perhaps he picked up on what it was doing, manipulating the kingdom's people and him both.

But if he ever said that the winged lion was dangerous, not to be trusted, to delgal, he wasn't believed. to delgal, thistle sealed and misused the power of the golden kingdom's guardian deity. As a student of ancient magic, I believe thistle understands that isn't what the demon is - or at least not all of what it is - even if he doesn't know the details of why it's so dangerous, or that it can devour his desires. But as an 'outsider' to the golden kingdom, despite his (unofficial, i'm sure) adoption, and the fact he's been there most of his life, I doubt his saying so would be received well by the kingdom's people.

As far as we know delgal also doesn't understand the fear that is driving thistle's refusal to let the dungeon go -- the need to be useful that he instilled.

Even if he doesn't really realise, he is talking to a, at most, 15-16 year old in relative human years, and putting the responsibility for the kingdom on him - it's no wonder this is a weight that Thistle isn't able to let go of. Especially if this is how he attempts to persuade him:

It doesn't get to the root of why he asked thistle to do this to begin with - the fear of death. It's just "hasn't it been long enough, people want to leave." Well, if they leave, they will die - thistle's right about that! The only way to get him to accept that is what Yaad eventually does on his behalf at the end of the manga.

To admit that he was wrong to ask to begin with. To ask Thistle to accept loss and death. To accept it himself, truly.

Without doing that, there's no way he'd ever get through to him. So the route he takes - running away from thistle, begging that someone kill the "lunatic magician" - might be the last resort of a desperate man who blamed himself for what happened to his brother. But it's also something he does because he can't understand Thistle, and can't see his pain for what it is or his relationship with the Winged Lion for what it is.

The way that the lion manipulates others' perception to make him the victim and thistle the - well, the 'lunatic', the unstable villain and captor - really evokes DARVO to me. the demon as a metaphor for an abusive relationship. like.... look at this extra:

and it makes me sad that no-one realised what was going on until it was too late for thistle.

#dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #dungeon meshi meta #dm meta #the winged lion #thistle dungeon meshi #sissel dungeon meshi #delgal #dunmeshi spoilers #all the way to the end - anime onlies dont touch #delgal not good brothering :( makes me sad

[ydotome]

Lord Delgal... I must find him. - Dungeon Meshi - Episode 16

#Dungeon Meshi #Delicious in Dungeon #Dungeon Food #ダンジョン飯 #Touden Falin #Falin Touden #my gifs #my post

[tofixtheshadows]

No offense to Mithrun but he really was dumber than a 14 year old. Thistle had that shit locked down for ONE THOUSAND YEARS. Sure he wasn't having a great time for most of it but in terms of duration that Minecraft kid was the most successful Dungeon Lord in history. Mithrun's fake little tea party collapsed and got him eaten within 5 years. The hubris of snake pussy. Meanwhile the Winged Lion had to orchestrate Delgal's escape to the surface and a whole fake hero prophecy just to get out from under Thistle's littlest jester boot.

#not putting this one in the tags it just makes me laugh #Dungeon Meshi spoilers #since I'm bringing up Thistle and he's been teased in the anime now #also if you're a Mithrun stan seeing this and you're mad I called him dumb don't worry it's a joke #that's just what having a massive superiority/inferiority complex combo will do to you #the snake pussy part is also a joke. he might not have fucked her. who's to say. #musings with Dea

[pollyanna-nana]

Thistle and Marcille as narrative foils

Outliving your loved ones sure does sucks…

It’s funny. Despite being a “pure-blooded” elf, out of everyone in the cast Thistle is the one who can best understand what Marcille is going through. There weren’t any other elves in Melini, and everyone he loved and held dear was destined to die long before he would. Is it any wonder why he said yes to Delgal’s pleas for him to “protect” everyone, even if that meant taking on an incredible burden? Perhaps if even if things had played out differently, he still would’ve ended up becoming the dungeon lord for similar reasons to Marcille.

Even when the demon was punching holes in his psyche, protecting people was still on the forefront of his mind… though he lost sight of their happiness. But, ultimately…. He just didn’t want his family to die, just as much as Marcille did.

Glass houses, and all of that.

#polly speaks #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #delicious in dungeon #thistle dungeon meshi #marcille donato #dungeon meta #thistle posting #He’s just a little guy who wanted to keep his loved ones safe…. #Of course Freinag’s death was very similar to Marcille’s father dying for him. I’m sure that’s when he first really realized oh shit #this is going to keep happening to me over and over again isn’t it #and yet… #he alienated himself from Yaad and the other citizens in the end…. #tragic tragic tragic

[britcision]

GUESS WHAT FRIENDS I HAVE BEEN DOING MATH AGAIN no one is going to be happy about it 🥳

1) by the time Delgal reached the surface (6 years pre series), Senshi had been living in the dungeon for 44 years.

He coulda visited on the way up, and probably passed the veggie-golems

2) Thistle kept his dungeon at level 1 (per the canaries’ dungeon guide) for almost 1000 years

Mithrun’s entire span as a dungeon lord was over in 5

Now, Thistle’s did also progress pretty fast from level 2 to 5… but it still took 6 years

This is actually a super similar timeline, especially because we know Mithrun’s dungeon never hit 5… and we don’t actually know what level it got to, since it all depends on when he became a monsterfucker

(His lover’s snake half is referenced here around level 2 - see the gold scrapers

We know that’s the lover because they are always drawn with the unique shirt and hair and the lover is never depicted with legs, which is wild

However, it’s still possible this is a chimera rather than a lamia or naga, which is a level 4 problem… which is when the Canaries usually come dungeon busting anyway)

Of course, the Winged Lion was boxed for the entire span of the dungeon’s rapid development and the Goat wasn’t, which might account for a difference in speed… if Thistle’s dungeon grew much slower

Mithrun, with a fully active demon, didn’t hit the same goal in damn near the same timeframe, so we can infer:

- approximately a 5-6 year turnover on dungeons coming from level 2 to level 4-5 (sooooo that’s a lotta dungeon lords, especially if a change of lord usually forces a reset - Marcille and Laios sure didn’t tho)

- the demon is all one entity, so the cumulative effect from other dungeons around the world may have been used to strengthen the Island’s dungeon

- sinking the continent around your dungeon is a damn good way to keep it contained

- Mithrun was a mid-tier dungeon lord at best, “I wish I never took this job” is a weak ass desire especially when compared to Thistle and Marcille’s desires to Defeat Death and probably why he got spit out - his desire to fuck the demon up seems to be a lot more powerful than a moment of weakness in front of a mirror

(The demon even said it didn’t want to finish Thistle right away and save some for later; it ate the last scrap by accident because it was too dang good so we do know it can choose to leave someone behind… for A Reason:)

- the demon fucking angler-fished Mithrun’s ass by spitting him out, leaving behind only the desire to come back and find the demon again, and letting that build for 40 years. He didn’t reach Thistle levels of maturation but oh boy that’s an intentionally cultivated snack - so how many more of the dungeon lords in the group meeting had the same path

#delicious in dungeon #dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #delicious in dungeon spoilers #the winged lion #thistle dungeon meshi #mithrun #mithrun dungeon meshi #i hope senshi made delgal soup on his way up

[mithrun-house-of-kerensil]

Truly what was Thistle's crime but loving too much- oh he went too far, he killed the main party- so did rabbits with knives for feet, okay. he was the equivalent of a teenage boy who watched his father get brutally murdered and then became burdened with the weight of his nephew's life. He was the only elf in a nation of humans. His younger brother became his older brother in what must have felt like a blink. Delgal begged him to save everyone's lives so he did. And despite all his work, despite doing what he was asked to do, Delgal still chose to die.

How could you ask him to give that up? Have you never loved to destruction? Sunk your nails into the present out of fear for the future? Have you never loved so intensely that anything but total reciprocation felt like a betrayal? He gave everything for his nation and they resented him, how could he forgive that? He lasted 1000 years as a dungeon lord and all he wanted was to protect his people in the only way he knew how.

#dungeon meshi thistle #dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #delicious in dungeon spoilers #dungeon meshi spoilers #i just think about him a lot #its a ramble but i love him #my post #thistle

[shisurus]

anyway i can't stop thinking about how 3 out of the 4 dungeon lords we get to know during the manga have siblings that deeply influenced them becoming dungeon lords. these are very different relationships but in the end all of them found comfort in their sibling, and it highlights just how very lonely marcille is compared to everyone else. i bet my ass she's jealous of that too, that she wanted to have a sibling as well... it would've literally made her whole life and experience so different. mithrun's older brother was his main caretaker and stepped up for him when no one else would, thistle could only know peace once he saw delgal again and laios saving falin was the best and most important thing he ever did in his life. they spent lifetimes together and relied on each other until the very end, that one bond that nothing could truly sever no matter how much they tried to themselves.

but marcille will have to experience that cycle of being left all alone for eternity, never having that one person to accompany her on her journey from beginning to end, always mourning by herself because no one else will remember them. her memories are hers alone and at some point, they will be all that's left of the people she loves, until she's gone too.

#dungeon meshi #marcille donato

[eruhamster]

hours have past and i now have a full belly and my nap meter has been fulfilled and so i am no longer angry but i will still insist that people thinking thistle is a child are, in fact, bitches

There is not a single suggestion he is a child through that entire manga. the most we get is a fan translation of a piece of that adventurer's bible that says it's "ok" if he wears elf earmuffs but "just ok" if pattadol or marcille wear elf earmuffs. but the same fan-translated blurb also says "children and young people" wear them, and specifies that young women often do not - implying that the difference in "ok" and "just ok" could be that Thistle's more fine to wear it as a man, versus Pattadol and Marcille.

We do not actually know the ages of any of the people from the Golden Country. We have nothing we can go on beyond estimations from the Tall-men aging. People saying "Thistle is short he must be a child" are full of it, because elves ARE short - he is the same height as another adult elf, Otta.

We physically see Thistle age through his backstory. We know he is fully grown.

He had to have been at least around the human equivalent of 10 when Delgal was born. We do not know a pureblood elf's equivalent to this, but it is going to be older than a dwarf's since elves live longer. To put it in perspective, Senshi, at 13, was the human equivalent to a 6yo:

Able to do simple chores. About 6 or so. So dwarves likely age at about half the rate of humans. Elves live even longer than dwarves, and likely age even slower. So a human 10yo would be a dwarf 20yo or so, and for an elf, that is likely 40 years old since they live 400 vs dwarf 200 years - So when we're looking at Thistle at Delgal's birth, what looks like a 10yo tall-man child would be a 40yo elf. It is highly likely around there unless it's said otherwise anywhere.

At 40 at the time of Delgal's birth, we could just add how old Delgal is. We don't know his exact age, but this man looks at least 40. He already has a son.

So going by this, Thistle is probably about 80 at the time he officially becomes Dungeon Lord. This is the elf age of maturity according to the Adventurer's Bible.

And you need to remember, while immortality exists in the Golden Country, it does not mean aging is ground to a halt.

Delgal's son continues to grow, and has a child who grows into adulthood all within the dungeon. Delgal continues to age:

Absolutely nobody is stunted in aging since the start of the dungeon. There has never been a suggestion of that. At some point it appears he made sure to lock everyone in the age of their prime, but Thistle continued to physically age at least through Delgal seeming to be at least a 70yo man.

So Thistle is solidly an adult, in body and mind, ESPECIALLY at the time of the story but including when he became Lord of the Dungeon. At absolute best, if you shave off years, possibly initially he could have been maybe the elf equivalent to late teens, but that's really pushing it.

Not a single time in the entire series, even when the Canaries see Thistle, does anyone remark that he is a child, or even exceedingly young. He is treated like an adult by absolutely everyone.

Every single person that says he is a child is working on pure headcanon or are overly distracted about his size and cute face, which is ironic since that's an ongoing issue elves deal with with with non-elves. He is not any shorter or any less babyfaced than other adult elves we know.

EDIT: Had one person point out a single part of Thistle's first proper introduction, where Marcille thinks "a child?" - A possible misunderstanding on Marcille's part, or a later retcon by Kui by the time we see his whole backstory. Regardless, I wasn't aware of it, and now that the episode that would have it is out - it's worth noting that the anime removed that.

He is not a child.

#thistle #dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi spoilers #worst part of manga getting an anime is having to deal with animes getting mad abt spoilers tbh