> これ以上は 死タからその 前に殺さナいと

I find it perplexing that 死タからそ is conjugated in the past tense. It being the
reason (-から) for 殺さナいと, shouldn't it be in present tense? Or am I mixing it up
and (-と) takes precedence? Which still wouldn't further my understanding of
why this is past tense? Or is he thinking he's already dead.
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2017-10-27T10:38:17.977
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question
particle-と katakana particle-から past
past tense conjugation これ以上は 死タからその 前に殺さナいと
first しんでいたから &second ころさなきゃ
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2017-10-27T13:27:34.170
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My take is that it should be 死ヌ not 死タ. タ and ヌ are visually similar so
someone (or an algorithm?) might have misrecognized it. In standard
orthography, the entire sentence would be:

> これ以上は死ぬから、その前に殺さないと。

(I assume the use of katakana is a stylistic choice to illustrate a not-normal
way of talking.)

I don't know what it exactly means, though, because the subject and the object
are made implicit. It says 死ぬ but who will die? It says 殺さないと but who must be
killed? We will need the larger context to be sure.

One possible interpretation (with a hypothetical context I'm making up) is
that "we are bound to die [because of the opponent's actions], we need to kill
him [=the opponent] sooner [than something that he controls kills us]".
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2022-05-27T10:59:42.970
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