GureShin

GureShin is the slash ship between Guren Ichinose and Shinya Hiiragi from the Seraph of the End fandom.

Canon
Shinya and Guren are trusted comrades who can count on one another on the battlefield. Shinya teases Guren constantly, leading to a lot of banter between them that Guren always ends with a "Shut up".

Book 1
Guren first meets Shinya when they are 15 years old while attending the same high school. Shinya waits in front of the school building for Guren. To test Guren's strength, Shinya immediately attacks him with a spell. At that point, Guren wants to hide his true strength and lets himself get hit by the spell.

They meet again in class. Instead of sitting in the front, Shinya intentionally chooses to sit in the back next to Guren. Shinya hates the Hiragi family he was adopted by and seeks for an ally in Guren. Though Guren tries to keep up his mask of a weak coward, Shinya immediately looks right through him, leaning over to him and whispering that Guren should stop the farce. Guren feels caught, but he refuses Shinya's offer to work with him.

From that on Shinya keeps trying to get Guren to notice him. He starts talking to him on a regular basis, even in class, and even though Guren avoids him. Shinya once asks him if they would go home together, but Guren tells him to "fuck off".

Even though Shinya had looked right through Guren from the moment they met, Guren keeps up his facade. When he gets in a fight with Seishiro, a full blood Hiragi and Shinya's adoptive brother, Guren is about to get beaten up. Yet Shinya interferes, taking Seishiro's hit and thereby ending the fight. Though Shinya helped Guren out, he is furious that Guren is not as strong as he expected him to be. He tells Guren not to talk to him again, though Guren says that Shinya had been talking to him the whole time.

Soon after the school is attacked and in the chaos only Guren and Shinya are able to keep a cool head. Shinya discovers Guren's real strength against Saito. Even though they banter about who's the strongest, they join forces in the battle against Saito.

Book 2
After the attack, Kureto, the students president and also a full blood Hiragi, keeps an eye on Guren. Shinya and Guren are talking in the schoolyard. Shinya notices it and tells Guren that he will punch him now so that Kureto would not get suspicious. Guren agrees, but instead of punching him, Shinya kicks him and Guren complains that they agreed on punching.

Nevertheless Kureto still commands Guren into the gym to test him. Shinya is also there. When Kureto orders Shinya to attack Guren, Guren decides to take a hit, thinking that he trusts Shinya to not kill him because they're comrades. Shinya indeed holds back because he does not want to hurt Guren, and Kureto notices it.

Book 3
Shinya keeps whispering to Guren in class. He writes him a short note that he has information about a meeting of the Hyakuya sect. Guren agrees to observe them together with Shinya. That day their other friends also come over. They play games even though Guren does not want to. Therefore Guren loses on purpose but Shinya looks again right through him. He smiles at Guren and Guren immediately knows that he had been caught again and curses Shinya. As a response Shinya laughs and says "I can't hear you but I know what you mean.".

Shinya and Guren meet alone later to observe the Hyakuya Sect but the meeting goes wrong and they get attacked by a vampire. Shinya saves Guren's life by pulling him on his motorcycle. They rush through Tokyo, trying to outpace the vampire. Guren holds onto Shinya, while fighting from the back of the motorcycle. Shinya jokes what others would think if they saw two guys riding a motorcycle together at night and without helmets on.

They are able to outpace the vampire but Guren gets hit on the head by a rearview mirror. When Shinya notices the wound, he asks if it had been the vampire. Guren says it was due to Shinya's shitty driving. Shinya laughs and tells him to watch out. Nevertheless he offers to help Guren with patching it up. Guren refuses (as always) and Shinya tries his best to help him, telling him to stop playing the strong man and joking that no one would marry Guren like this. Still in the end, Guren admits to him that he can trust Shinya a little now.

Book 4
The events of the novels get more and more serious. The school is attacked and Guren takes the demon cursed sword in order to protect his friends. Yet the demon sword posses him, making him kill everyone in his way. The Hiragi led by Kureto are able to barricade the school, trapping Guren, who had become a demon, inside.

Shinya reflects on his relationship with Guren. Mahiru, Shinya's fiancee, had told him upfront that she was in love with Guren and not him. Since childhood Shinya had always wondered what was so special about Guren and now he realizes that his will is "what makes him so attractive".

He notices that he admires Guren for his will to risk his life for others. He sees a shiny hero in Guren. Shinya decides to rescue him instead of killing him. He thinks that even though it's insane to risk his life for someone else, "We need you... We need to save you."

Shinya comes up with a plan and is able to defeat the possessed Guren together with their friends. Shinya attacks Guren and holds him close so that they are both hit by daggers, creating a spell circle that would exorcise Guren. While Guren is unconcious, Shinya holds him in his arms for more than one hour until Guren is no longer possessed.

After Guren is awake again, Shinya tries to get a "thank you" from him by teasing Guren but Guren refuses as always. When Shinya points out that Guren did not save him so Guren owes him something, they start to banter again.

Book 5
In the prologue of volume 5, Guren and Shinya meet up with their friends to play video games. Guren and Shinya are playing against each other but Shinya is playing unfair, always trying to push Guren. They end up in a quarrel. Shinya pretends to do it unintentially while Guren knows exactly that he's doing it on purpose and Guren is too stubborn to just let Shinya win. In the end, they agree that it's stupid to fight over it just to grab their controllers again the next second.

Guren, Shinya and their friends have to go to Kyoto in order to try to kill Mahiru or else Guren's father will be executed. Shortly after Guren has a call with his father, Shinya appears with Mito and Goshi in front of his door. Shinya already knows what's wrong because he had been wiretapping Guren. Shinya jokes that they are friends who "wiretap each other to make sure the other one isn't cheating". When Guren asks if he had been cheating, Shinya replies with "The relationship with your father is questionable."

Guren does not want his friends to help him, yet Shinya tells him that how he is acting is kind of cute.

They go to Kyoto and Guren falls asleep in the van. When he awakes, Shinya is watching him. Guren asks him what he is doing here and why he did not wake him up. Shinya replies that he just looked so cute while sleeping. As Shinya and Guren enter the love hotel together, they are mistaken for a couple by a teenage couple in front of the elevators.

Book 6
Guren gets into a fight with Seishiro again. When Guren attacks Seishiro, Shinya stops him and pushes him to the ground. He asks Guren what he is thinking, but Guren replies that he knew that Shinya had been there all along and asks him if he could "play the Hiragi card". Shinya jokingly complains that Guren is taking "advantage of him" but he nevertheless interferes, calling Seishiro out for his behavior and therefore ending the fight.

Shinya offers Guren to buy him a drink. When Guren refuses, Shinya jokes "if he's too good for his fizz".

It leads to them having a heart to heart talk in which Shinya reveals to Guren that his goal was to meet him and that he thought that if he met Guren, he might find his purpose in life. Guren asks if Shinya had found his purpose but Shinya just says that Guren was far from what he expected. Yet Shinya shares with Guren that he admires that Guren is always fighting for others and suggests that Guren should accept that this is his destiny. He tells him that he should choose his friends over power because power is worth nothing if you cannot protect anyone.

Book 7
After betraying the Hiragi to get information about the end of the world from Mahiru, Guren, Shinya and their friends end up in a love hotel again to hide from the soldiers.

Guren notices that Shigure's skirt has moved up and thinks about pulling it down again when Shinya notices and makes fun of Guren for being a pervert. Guren pretends that he had not even seen it and acuses Shinya to be the pervert. Guren then asks him why Shinya is here. Shinya asks "in the love hotel?" before he understands that Guren is asking about his reasons behind it. Guren asks him if it's because of Mahiru but Shinya tells him that he is no longer chasing after her.

Later they get cornered by soldiers. Shinya suggests to sacrifice himself in order for the group to escape but Guren forbids him to do it, yet he cannot offer a different option, suggesting to just give up. Shinya gets really angry at Guren. He shouts at Guren, near tears. Guren takes Shinya's hit. Guren then tells him that "maybe they met because they were weak" and that he does not want Shinya to die. Shinya almost cries, shouting at him why Guren is saying this now if they are going to die anyways but this leads to them making up. Goshi is really happy about this and asks the girls if "they haven't noticed the burning passion between them".

During their last fight against Mahiru, she kills Shinya and Guren's other friends. Guren is about to accept his demon powers to revenge his friends but when he notices that Shinya is still alive, he hurries towards him. Shinya dies in Guren's arms, telling him that he had found his purpose because he had met Guren and didn't run. With his last words, he tells Guren to accept his demon and die as a human.

Guren is broken. He had lost all of his friends, and instead of going rampage, he is not able to do anything. Left alone, he is so desperate about Shinya's and his friend's deaths that he accepts to trigger the "Seraph of the End" experiment which will revive Shinya and his friends but will only give them ten more years. Guren also takes the sin upon himself that he thereby causes the apocalypse and kills millions of people, just to be with Shinya again.

Resurrection at Nineteen Light Novels
The "Seraph of the End" worked. Guren's friends are healed and breathing again. But when he checks for Shinya, he isn't breathing although his wounds are healed. Guren is desperate, thinking, "If Shinya didn't come back to life, he had violated the taboo for nothing". Fortunately Shinya is revived by Ferid starting his heart beat again.

Having revived Shinya and his friends, Guren continues to live with the guilt of having caused the apocalypse.

When Shinya takes him for a ride on his motorcycle, Guren leans against Shinya's back and enhances his demonic powers to be able to hear his heart beat. Guren starts counting his heart beats, just to be reminded that Shinya is still alive and that he made the right decision reviving him from the dead.

Vampire Reign Manga
Guren had distanced himself from his friends to keep them safe as they will die if they learn about their deaths. Nevertheless he gathers his friends, including Shinya, to help him.

Yet Guren betrays them in chapter 83 and becomes a full demon. Shinya wants to stop him. He begs his demon to give him more power which results in an internal monologue between Shinya and his demon. Shinya's demon, Byakkomaru, tells Shinya that he acts as if he was in love with Guren. Shinya just laughs and replies with something that can roughly be translated to it's just longing ,A LONGING is a strong feeling of need or desire for “someone” or “something”. It is “unrequited love OR unrequited crush” meaning LOVE NOT RETURNED. ... LONGING isn't love …it's when you ache with desire for someone you can't have! It's a painful yet elating sensation which gives birth to loads of fantasies, which indicates Shinya is in love with Guren. His body language shows just how much he cares about Guren. He puts his desire into one final sentence: I will never give up on Guren.

This scene extends Shinya's feelings about Guren from the light novels to the manga. It had already been described that Shinya admires Guren, had realized what "made him so attractive" and that he had found purpose in life because he had met Guren (see Catastrophe at Sixteen). This scene shows how much Shinya values Guren and how strong his feelings about him are.

Even though Shinya gets a power-up from his strong desire to save Guren, he is defeated by Guren. When Guren is about to leave, he tells Shinya that "he will like always, let himself drown in power to save him".

In chapter 99 Guren cries as he reveals that he thinks he was supposed to die with Shinya back then, referring to their last conversation before Shinya died. Shinya told him not to become a demon and stay human but Guren was so desperate that he ignored Shinya's directive. The scene emphazies their deep connection that is reciprocated by Guren.

Catastrophe at Sixteen Drama CD1
The drama CD is a short story about Guren and his friends having a summer party at the pool. Shinya attacks Guren with fireworks and they start a fight. They end up falling into the pool together. When they look up to the sky, Shinya says "the moon is beautiful" and Guren replies with "Whatever!".

Later Shinya repeats that sentence in a slightly different way "Tsuki ga kirei (nanda)". This phrase is known in literature to mean "I love you" as Japanese people are not that upfront.

Catastrophe at Sixteen Drama CD2
Guren and his friends are having an early Christmas party together. While Goshi is very excited about celebrating with the girls, Shinya says that he does not care about girls.

Vampire Reign Drama CD
Shinya visits Guren in his office and talks to him while Guren gets annoyed (as always). Shinoa enters and tells Guren that Yuu and Kimizuki are not getting along so well. Guren says that he dislikes one person in the room. Shinoa automatically assumes it's her and not Shinya and offers to leave but Guren tells her that he does not refer to her. Then Shinoa asks them for advice. Shinya says that they just need to do it like Guren and him back in their school days, referencing a "night of passion" they shared back in high school.

Fanbook/Q&A

 * In the character interview in the fanbook Shinya is asked what he looks for in the opposite sex. He replies that his "fiancee was like this and that he got tired."
 * In the Q&A on the Owari no Seraph Homepage, Kagami explains that Guren is the sun to both Mahiru and Shinya. Mahiru is confirmed to be in love with Guren.

Fanon
The best friends to lovers trope is one of the major reasons why fans are drawn to this ship. Another is the unique ways in which they show how much they care for one another - Shinya with his playful teasing and Guren with his seemingly harsh words.

Guren's past relationship with Mahiru Hiragi is featured in some GureShin fanfics, often with Shinya helping Guren recover from his heartbreak before they eventually realize that throughout that process, they have fallen in love with each other.

In some fanfiction that includes both this ship and MikaYuu, Guren and Shinya tend to play the role of supportive parents to Mika and Yuu as the younger pair's relationship gradually develops into a romantic one. Having been best friends ever since they were in high school, they have grown quite close over the years.

On AO3, GureShin is the most written ship for both Guren and Shinya. It is the second most written ship within the Seraph of the End tag.

Fandom
FAN FICTION
 * Shinya/Guren tag on FanFiction.net
 * Shinya/Guren tag on FanFiction.net

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