Karen's Anime Blog

Man, this episode. What the actual–? I was not expecting anything like this. I’m pretty sure we’ve gone beyond the realm of the first three RAAVM translated novels that I read, because I would have remembered this nonsense.

Well, let’s get started. Still at Origin Stratum, Hulemy has programmed the transport circle so monsters can’t use it. Wasn’t the whole reason Menagerie of Fools went on a monster hunt last episode because they couldn’t stop monsters from messing with the transport circle? Hmm, maybe Hulemy just needed more time. People are paired up to handle any leftover monsters, and Shui has officially had it with being stuck with Hevee. He makes some comments on how she’s a “frail young lady” and “emotionally unstable” and she starts shooting him with tons of arrows, which he easily dodges. I’m realizing that this show has the same mix of the super silly and super serious that Turkey! Time to Strike has, but it doesn’t bother me nearly as much here. Maybe that’s because the characters don’t act like idiots most of the time.

Shui does act like kind of a doofus here, but I would probably be at my wit’s end if forced to deal with Hevee for a whole day.

Kerioyl and Filmina invite the group to come visit the Menagerie of Fools’ base, so off we go. There’s some talk about how the group was started by Kerioyl, Filmina, Ako and Shiro, with Hevee and Shui coming later. Mishuel is perturbed about something and he tells Boxxo that it’s something he shouldn’t be speculating about; this mystery will be put to bed in about five minutes of screen time.

They reach the base, and it’s a totally unfinished wooden frame. The actual base is accessed via a hidden door in the floor. Once seated at the table, Kerioyl reviews that beating the lowest stratum lord will allow for a wish to be granted. Apparently the lowest stratum lord was defeated at one point, the wish was granted, and then the stratum ceased to exist. Then it gets confusing: they wonder if Clearflow Lake will cease to exist if someone gets their wish granted, but uh, wasn’t it just beating the lowest stratum that grants a wish? Now they seem to be saying that any stratum will do, but there’s only one level of the dungeon that’s considered “unconquered,” which I thought meant that the stratum lord wasn’t beaten yet. I’m really not sure what to make of this.

They go into a hidden room that Shui didn’t know existed, and it’s a room made up of crystals. There’s a large crystal configuration in the center of the room with a person sleeping inside. Keriyol and Filmina reveal that this boy is their child…and Ako and Shiro are also their children; they were triplets. This is what Mishuel was alluding to before, because he could sense that the boys had a similar presence to the parents. Why was any of this a secret? With Ako and Shiro, how much of a pain must it have been to pretend that their parents weren’t their parents when they were on missions and such? It’s not a completely insane plot twist, I just don’t see what the point of the deception was.

The third child has been placed in a crystal coffin, so he’s remained in suspended animation while Ako and Shiro have grown. The boy has a Blessing of Decay, a negative blessing that causes everything he touches to rot– shades of Rogue from X-Men here– and also causes his own body to decay. He also has the Blessing of Hyper-Recovery, which you’d think would be a good thing, but that just means he’s doomed to constantly be feeling himself rot and healing the damage, over and over again; he can’t even die. Well now, that’s pretty horrifying.

Obviously, the family’s wish is to get rid of the negative blessing. The crystal coffin won’t last much longer, so Kerioyl and Filmina are left with a choice: try to beat the stratum lord to get their wish the normal way, which will take too long, or join the Netherlord and take a quicker path to victory. They want Boxxo and co. to join them, but of course our heroes aren’t defecting to the dark side so easily.

As sudden as it is, I think this is actually a good plot twist, because Kerioyl’s family has a good reason to betray Boxxo, Hulemy, Lammis, Hevee, Shui and Misuel: They say they would do anything to put an end to their child’s pain, and as a parent, I can’t argue with that. I hate big betrayal scenes where it feels like everybody involved suddenly got a lobotomy off-camera, but this makes sense to me.

Hulemy points out that the Netherlord may go back on his word, but Kerioyl doesn’t care; as far as he sees it, this is the only chance they have. The two teams start fighting to keep Kerioyl’s family from defecting. This is different from fighting monsters though because they don’t actually want to kill each other, just defeat each other, so Lammis has to sit out; it’s too easy for her Might Blessing to kill someone. Boxxo extends his barrier so Hulemy, Shui and Lammis will be protected.

Okay, maybe it’s true I wanted Hevee to get a little beat up, but not like this.

Kerioyl takes on Hevee, while the twins fight Mishuel. Kerioyl manages to nick Hevee with poisoned blades, but the poison doesn’t appear to affect Hevee. The healer reveals that he has the Blessing of Sensory Manipulation, so he can just turn off his pain response. Briefly, Kerioyl perks up that maybe the Blessing could be used to put an end to his son’s pain, but Hevee explains that the Blessing only works on himself. I guess we can’t have nice things.

Mishuel defeats the twins fairly easily, which doesn’t surprise anyone. Kerioyl has had enough of playing fair and starts using his own Blessing, which turns off other peoples’ (or vending machines’) Blessings, so Hevee is suddenly in pain and Boxxo is without his barrier. Filmina uses a mist effect to cloud everyone’s vision, and the family escapes. Mishuel offers to pursue, but it’s too dangerous. Looks like Kerioyl and family won this round.

Director Bear! So glad to see him during these trying times.

The group reports these events to Director Bear, who puts the family on the Wanted list. Director Bear says he was “naive” not to foresee this, and uh, I don’t think it’s your fault, DB– no one saw this coming. For the time being, the family isn’t powerful enough with just four people to defeat a stratum lord, but there’s nothing stopping them from recruiting new people, or getting in touch with the two other extant Menagerie of Fools members who haven’t been mentioned until now. Apparently it was once Hevee’s job to track them down, but he got sidetracked by being put in prison for shoe-related debauchery.

The crew goes to leave Origin Stratum, but the transport circle appears to have been tampered with; Boxxo gets sent somewhere by himself. A few moments later, Director Bear and Hulemy teleport in, but there’s no sign of Lammis. Boxxo starts freaking out that he doesn’t know where his partner is, and that’s the end of the episode.

Well. So. That was an episode. I really was not expecting this show to throw such a big curveball halfway through the season, but I’m cautiously optimistic that the writers know what they’re doing. At least we’re pretty much guaranteed to get more Director Bear next episode, so you know I’m up for that.