Unji Zuma

Following their father's death, a young Unji and his little brother watch their mother argue compensation with the man's superiors, who refuse responsibility and pin the death on his own carelessness and decision to log extra hours. Back home, she pleads with the landlord for another month to pay, only to be turned away and ordered out, the burden of two children counting against her. In the next room, the younger boy wonders aloud whether an umbrella could carry someone through the sky, and Unji admits he does not know.

Out on the street, the brother gets taunted by a few boys for forever toting an umbrella and, around town, sporting rubber shoes, until Unji steps in to defend him; the boy then asks if Unji envies that umbrella. One rainy evening Unji bolts outside when his brother fails to come home, only to learn of a fatal accident at the river. Grieving the loss, Unji later joins his mother for a day at an amusement park and genuinely has fun. Yet as it winds down, she tries to pull them both into the path of an oncoming train, and though Unji wrenches free, his mother does not, dying as she intended.

With the father gone, money troubles crush the mother as she tries to raise both sons. Mockery over his cherished umbrella hounds Futa until Unji shields him. During a storm, Futa drowns chasing that umbrella into a river. Later the mother takes Unji to an amusement park, and the two share a happy outing. At its close she attempts to drag them both onto the train tracks, yet only she goes under.

Placed in Volume 18, this chapter opens a flashback sequence devoted entirely to Unji Zuma. Told in the past, it grounds his fury at society and the umbrella motif bound to his brother Futa. It came out on May 21, 2024.