Reign of the Seven Spellblades – 06 – Mask Off, Mask On

My thoughts going in were They got this, right? Sure, Vera’s an upperclassman and mad scientist, but it’s 2-against-1 and we clearly haven’t seen all that Oliver and Nanao can do. And yes, indeed, they got this. But the boss battle is still steeped in danger throughout.

Oliver and Nanao prove a very effective duo, as Nanao launches forward attacks and Oliver bails her out when she’s too reckless. He also keeps Vera off balance with a creative array of spells. Nanao even shows she can deflect spells with her blade, as if it was truly the extension of her body she believes it to be.

Vera has a little too much fun against her kohais, allowing Nanao to slip behind her using a well-placed bounce spell from Oliver. She then reveals she has a second eye in her left hand, but faced with this unexpected tactic, Nanao continues to simply charge forward.

Rather than getting petrified or injured, her blade cuts through space and time to close what should have been an impossible distance and cleaves Vera’s hand clean off. To Oliver, this undefendable ability is none other than a heretofore unknown (and titular!) seventh Spellblade.

Godfrey and Whitlow arrive too late on an anonymous tip, interrupting Nanao’s attempt to get Oliver to give her a victory kiss. Oliver and Nanao both fine and will be fine, but worry about how Katie will take the betrayal of a senpai. But after she recovers in the infirmary and they tell her what happened, her reactions surprise them both.

Rather than despair in this betrayal, she turns the other cheek, then kisses Oliver and Nanao on theirs—simple tokens of gratitude for saving her. She then declares that she’s not going to let this get her down, nor is she willing to wash her hands of Vera. She forgives her, and vows to speak to her properly.

Vera’s betrayal only galvanized Katie’s resolve to continue toughening up while remaining quintessentially Katie Aalto: empathetic, emotionally intelligent, forgiving, and kind. She aims to graduate from a school a little kinder than when she first arrived, a declaration that brings tears to Oliver’s eyes.

Those tears are understandable; who wouldn’t be moved by Katie’s resilience in the face of face of betrayal? But I wouldn’t understand their additional meaning until later in the episode. As he expected and as Richard warned, Professor Grenville approaches him. Oliver leaves his friends to go with him, and on a path for which there may be no return.

Grenville explains the reason for summoning Oliver as they descend back into the Labyrinth. It was pretty evident by now, but the road of magical discovery is soaked with the blood of mages. When a powerful spell is too much for a mage, the spell absorbs him, and becomes even more powerful.

That makes it an enticing prize for the mage or mages strong enough to master that spell. Call it magical scavenging with a hint of magical cannibalism. It’s an interesting, and appropriately brutal mechanism for magical development, and explains why the mortality rate at a school is so high.

In keeping with the darkness of this magical world, we simply haven’t known Oliver’s Whole Deal all this time…until now. “Oliver Horn” is a persona; a mask he wore to stand out as a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none student who might prove a useful assistant.

Little did Grenville know he was recruiting someone who had a major vendetta against him. Oliver asks him where he was on a specific date and time seven years ago. When Grenville deflects, Oliver draws his athame and steps to Grenville. He then reveals that he is the Fourth Spellblade, using it to defeat Grenville with one move.

But he’s far from done with the man who murdered his mother. Adopting an entirely different demeanor, Oliver proves he’s both masochist and sadist when it comes to his bloody goal of revenge, explaining how he made sure to endure all 128 types of pain that were exacted upon his mom by Grenville and others seven years ago. That allows his own pain magic to exhibit those same 128 forms, which he uses one by one to torture Grenville.

Once Oliver gets to 57 (is the writer a Heinz fan?), Grenville finally says “the magic words” he wanted to hear: Please…end it. Reduced to begging for his life, Oliver obliges with all due haste. Immediately after, his older brother Gwyn, his sister, and his bodyguard Miss Carste appear before him, congratulating him for getting rid of the first of their mother’s murderers.

A whole army of young mages file in and bend the knee before Oliver, whom Gwyn calls by his real name, Noll. He places the mask from the OP over his eyes, the symbol of his right to lead the family, presumably as the inheritor of their mother’s Spellblade. But there is still much work to do. There were seven people involved in their mom’s demise, and six remain.

As he lists them like a magical boy Arya Stark, w learn they consist of other Kimberly professors we’ve met, who similarly don’t seem to suspect who Oliver is and what he wants. The fact he doesn’t look much like his mom, as well as concealing his true power, has helped him maintain anonymity.

Chief among those names, and likely to be Oliver’s final target, is Esmeralda, the current headmistress and someone who literally stabbed his mother in the back seven years ago. Notably, and crucially, it doesn’t seem like Emmy enjoyed having to do so one bit.

That makes me wonder: were these seven assailants simply Bad Guys trying to steal Oliver/Noll’s Spellblade, or is his family actually a serious threat to the magical world, making his mom a kind of WMD that couldn’t be allowed to live? Considering all the twists and turns I’ve endured thus far, I can’t help but consider all possibilities.

Oliver/Noll proves he’s no different from Vera: driven towards a singular goal: in her case, a future where demi-humans have equal stature and rights as humans; in his case, revenge for himself and on behalf of his family. And that’s where those tears at Katie’s words come back into play.

He wasn’t just moved by her resolve, kindness, and forgiveness. He wept because he believes he is beyond those qualities do not, cannot, and will never apply to him. He wears his royal mask with pride and conviction, but I can’t say with certainty that his Oliver Horn persona was merely an act.

And then, of course, there were Nanao’s prescient words: there is no joy in a blade wielded for revenge; only one wielded out of mutual love. I want to think Oliver and his siblings’ mom would not want them to sully themselves with the bloody business of revenge, which may offer some comfort and justice in the immediate, but is ultimately self-defeating.

Noll’s greatest enemy is himself. I believe Nanao, Katie, and the others have the power to deliver him from his ruinous path, but they have to somehow be made aware of it first. I don’t see Noll revealing who he is to them anytime soon, but at some point professors are going to start dropping, so one of his friends will surely catch a hint at some point.

Until then, this episode caps off the first half of Seven Spellblades by dropping some enticingly volcanic plot and character bombshells, and promises that the next seven (ha!) episodes will be must-see anime.

Senryuu Shoujo – 12 (Fin) – The Day They Met

During a rooftop lunch together on a beautiful day, Nanako asks Eiji if he remembers the day they met, and the final episode proceeds to re-tell that reliably adorable story. It was indeed their mutual love of senryuu poetry that brought them together, as they meet, and are the only two young people, at a poetry workshop around Christmas.

When Eiji comes in late with a head of steam, everyone is content to take him at face value—as a thug. Nanako, on the other hand, claps when he quickly comes up with a senryuu asking Santa to stop his dad from smoking so much. They exchange pleasantries outside, but Eiji warns Nanako not to get too close lest people speak ill of her.

But Nanako isn’t interested in what others think of Eiji, she feels she’s connected with him on a major level, and can’t stop thinking about him. They don’t see each other at a workshop again, but begin exchanging senryuu on a public bulletin board, essentially becoming senryuu pen pals. Nanako arranges for them to meet up when the cherry blossoms bloom in Nishi Park—truly a poetic setting for their next rendezvous.

When she sees no reply on the board on the day they’re to meet up, Nanako asks around, but no one knows what has become of Eiji. She starts running in a tearful panic, worried she let the one person she connected to most slip through her fingers. But she had no reason to fret: Eiji shows up under the same cherry blossom she envisioned for their meeting.

Back in the present, as Eiji lazes in the sun and Nanako sits beside him, she simply casts a big, beaming smile at him, and the two of them couldn’t look more content, regardless of whatever relationship boxes Amane thinks they still need to check off. It’s a pleasant, cozy end to a feel-good series about two very different people with the same very specific hobby.