Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 12 – All Who Work Hard are Warriors

Frieren had already shown her trust in Fern and Stark even before their battles with Aura and her lieutenants, but she demonstrates it again as they continue their trudge through a harsh blizzard. Frieren suddenly falls asleep while walking. Without Fern and Stark, she would have frozen to death.

In her sleep she dreams of her party’s visit to the king, who only gave them a pittance in traveling money. Himmel is fine making money doing odd jobs for people on their way to the Demon King. Frieren learns his hero’s sword is a replica, and that Himmel became the man he is in order to prove Heiter wrong: even with a fake sword, he would become a real hero.

Not long after Frieren wakes up (but insisting upon Fern continuing to carry her) they arrive at the Village of the Sword, the custodians of the holy Sword in the Stone (i.e. Excalibur). It’s 49th chief is a little girl, who puts them up in cozy accommodations.

Frieren is fashionably late (by three decades) for her 50-year duty to the village: clearing out monsters. The chief also mentions that the “Lord of the Mountain” has been causing more trouble of late. Still chilled from the long road there, Frieren pushes those threats off until tomorrow.

That morning, the pack wolf-like monsters are no trouble at all for Stark, Fern, or Frieren, and when the so-called Lord of the Mountain shows up, Frieren is not impressed.

Even though it seemingly buries Stark in a shock wave of snow and ice, she doesn’t budge for the duration of their fight. She simply waits for Fern to put up a shield around them, then waits for Stark to lop off the Lord’s arm before she finishes it off with her Zoltraak.

All in all, her 50-year duty is easy-peasy lemon-squeezy. But Stark is confused. Within the cave is the Hero’s Sword, still embedded in the stone. Frieren tells him that Himmel failed to remove it, and went on to become a Real Hero without it. With Frieren, Eisen, and Heiter by his side, they defeated the Demon King.

She assumes the false word that he did pull the sword from the stone was spread by his fans. Someone as long-lived as Frieren has seen the stories of countless people embellished to the point their original identity vanishes. But in Himmel’s case she knows what he did, what he didn’t do, and what he used to do it. Carrying a fake sword didn’t stop him from saving the world.

Freiren, Fern and Stark’s northern travels take them to the first good-sized city in a while. While the youths are free to do what they want, Frieren is content to relax at the inn with a grimoire or two. She also offhandedly mentions that it’s Stark’s eighteenth birthday.

This catches Fern off guard, as now she must get him a gift despite not knowing what he wants. As for Frieren, she shows off her adorably mischievous side by showing Fern her gift for him: a potion that dissolves only clothing. Fern dumps it out on Frieren instead.

Fern searches for Stark, but everywhere she stops he has just left, having helped every single person whose paths he crossed. This gets Fern in a charitable mood, such that when she finally tracks him down, she lets out a rare smile. Unfortunately, her greeting is interrupted by Stark observing that a passing cloud looks like boobs and another like a turd … which is 100% in both cases!

Fern sighs away his childishness and offers to go on a walk with him, and that’s when she asks flat-out what he wants for his birthday. The question confuses him, as he’s never received a gift for his birthday. He then tells her about his village of warriors where weakness wasn’t tolerated, and his older brother Stoltz, the strongest warrior in the village.

His father praised him for defeating monsters without even staining his pure white cloak. But for all his strength and focus, Stoltz cares for his little brother and teaches him as much as he can, even when he gets  mud on that cloak.

His story ends with his village in flames, and him abandoning Stoltz and running away. But Fern tells him the past doesn’t matter, and the warrior Stark she’s known has never run, and she and Frieren will never let him. Changing the subject, she wants to give him a gift to show she cares. He initially asks for a gold bangle, but settles for a silver one.

When they return to the inn, Frieren is preparing gigantic Hamburg steaks, the recipe for which she found in her trunk. It was given to her by Eisen, who used to make the same steaks for the other party members on their birthdays, a custom from his village.

Eisen did it to honor warriors who have worked hard, and as far as he’s concerned, anyone who works hard is a warrior. Stark then remembers that Stoltz made him a Hamburg steak for his birthday once, but didn’t realize it was a gift. The taste nearly brings a tear to his eye, and that’s when Frieren knows she chose well. She also has a little bit of the nudity potion left if he wants it, but Fern again protests.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 11 – The Long Winter

With Aura defeated, all of the soldiers she beheaded can now be laid to rest, including Graf Granat’s son. Frieren congratulates Fern and Stark for defeating Lugner and Linie, and Granat not only pardons Frieren, but offers her Flamme’s grimoire on the town’s barrier, which he knows to be a fake. She knows that too, but still wants the book for her hobby.

The three then take their time in the town that they saved, whose folk are generous in their gratitude. While their eventual destination is Ende, Granat warns that due to the conditions of the northern lands, all adventurers must be accompanied by a first-class mage, as certified by the Continental Magic Association.

Before they set out Fern acquired her third-class certification, but as the organizations that govern magic have changed so many times in her lifetime, Frieren never bothered to get the newest certification. All she has in an antique amulet from a long-defunct predecessor of the CMA. No matter; she can take the first-class exam in the northern magical city of Ausserst.

The only problem is, to reach Ausserst they must traverse a mountain range just as winter approaches. Before they even reach the range they get lost in a fierce blizzard, Stark passes out from the cold, and Fern has to carry him. Luckily, an emergency shelter at the foot of the mountains is still being maintained after over 80 years. In the shelter they encounter Kraft the Monk, a swole elf doing crunches to keep warm.

It’s been over three centuries since Kraft met another elf, so he’d assumed they’d all died out except him. Frieren felt the same, and neither of them know of each other, or rather, Kraft doesn’t know who Frieren is beyond her connection to the Hero’s Party. Of course, we know that was intentional on Frieren’s part, as her master taught her to suppress her mana and lay low.

With the wintry mountains impassable and Kraft possessing ample supplies for all of them, Frieren, Fern, and Stark settle in for a winter with Kraft in this shelter. Six months pass by, and if there’s one knock I have with this episode, it’s that it doesn’t really feel like six months.

Then again, if we look at it from Frieren’s perspective, six months isn’t even six days in her life. We also learn that Kraft is even older than her. And while Frieren is agnostic at best when it comes to the Goddess, in the untold additional centuries he’s lived he eventually came to believe in Her.

You’d think the opposite would be true of a nigh-immortal being, but he says he needs to believe in the Goddess. Everyone he knew, and everyone who knew his “righteous triumphs” in time immemorial are all gone. Surely there’s a heaven where he’ll not only be remembered by Goddess, but praised for his fantastic life upon his arrival there.

If Frieren isn’t sure about the Goddess at her point in her life, Kraft offers to praise her in Her place. But Frieren already had someone like that in Heiter, that “corrupt priest,” and she’d like to believe he’s in heaven despite his less pious habits in life. When Kraft and Frieren part ways, he’s sure he’ll see her again in a few centuries.

It’s nice to know that even if and when Frieren outlives Fern and Stark, she’ll still have someone in the living world who knows who she is and what she did long before anyone else was born. But that’s a long way off. With winter behind them, Frieren, Fern, and Stark begin their traversal of the mountains on the way to Ausserst. And what matters more to Frieren isn’t fame, but enjoying and treasuring the time she does have with her friends.

P.S. For an example of the companionship Fern and Stark have forged together, look no further than when Fern starts to slip off a snowy rooftop and Stark catches her.

Goblin Slayer II – 03 – Don’t Be a Stranger

Episode three is a bit of a respite from the goblin battle that preceded it and all about preparation and training. The little Rhea Warrior gets the piss beat out of her by the Onna Kishi because she’ll only get worse in a real battle. The Spearman tries to build up Wizard Boy’s stamina, while Slayer teaches the girls how to use a sling in case they’re out of options.

The day ends with Cow Girl, Priestess and Guild Girl providing a tasty lunch for everyone, and talk turns to dreams everyone has. Rhea wants to “make it” as a warrior even though she’s solo, while Wizard Boy simply wants to get better at defeating goblins.

Priestess tells him about a Wizard she knew wanting to slay a dragon, and when he says that’s unrealistic (unaware she’s talking about his sister) she says it’s a dream; it’s fine to dream. The Spearman also invites Slayer for drinks, and after a quick glance at Cow Girl, he accepts.

That said, I was extremely worried when he was prepping to leave and Cow Girl said her Uncle was also out, leaving her “all by her lonesome.” That dread of potential trouble on the farm affected the laid back atmosphere of the boys drinking at a non-guild tavern.

Slayer doesn’t get too drunk, but the three are tipsy enough to open up about their dreams. Slayer admits that he once wanted to be a legendary hero (kind of like Sword Maiden), but then the real world happened, and now he’s content to slay goblins and train others to do so.

The next day of training, Priestess is having lunch with the Rhea warrior, and with the Lizard Priest’s help, is able to recruit her into her party for an adventure of their own, so they can hopefully be promoted in rank. The Rhea girl warns her not to expect to much of her; I hope they take it easy with whatever their first job is.

Slayer continues to train novices and go out for drinks, and Cow Girl seems a little lonely. She also seems worried, as she drops her mask after he leaves. The village they lived in is being rebuilt, and both of them have mixed feelings, she believes the only thing to do is keep on living as the world turns and accept that change is a certainty.

Of course, some things never change, namely that you never know when goblins will pop out of the ground and swarm around you. One of the men working on the village rebuild learns this the hard way, and when Slayer and the trainees hear screams, Slayer draws his sword and instantly knows what’s up.

It was nice to see everyone take it easy this week, but the time for taking it easy can dry up fast. When goblins are running amok, dreams must be set aside, and all anyone can do is pray they have the skills, strength, stamina, and support to make it through.

Goblin Slayer II – 02 – Stick to the Plan

The Boy Wizard is rearin’ to murder some goblins, but soon learns that it’s not quite that simple. He also seems to chafe at the Priestess being the party’s leader; surely someone so delicate shrivels into a tiny ball in the heat of battle, thinks the desperately green, compulsive rookie.

The party seeks information from a dwarf craftsman, who like our Dwarf loves to day drink. He says a party of five went in, including two women, but they were all Porcelain and Obsidian ranked. Considering how the goblins treat their captives, it might be best if all of them died.

The party heads in, and immediately the boy is shocked by the level of blood and gore. Even so, when he first heard there were potential hostages, he’s determined to blast through the many rooms of the mausoleum as quickly as possible so he can be the hero.

The other party members go about their usual business, but the boy messes up their pace when he falls for a simple trap of bones and guts that makes him scream in horror, alerting the goblins. He finds the female acolyte, who is alive but being tortured with wire and nails.

In a rare moment of selflessness, the boy warns the others not to come in as the acolyte was bait and now a giant troll has arrived. But Slayer and the others pay his warning no heed, and the Priestess lays down some Holy Light to enable them to fall back with the hostage.

In a brief moment of respite, the boy sees the Priestess laboring from her magic use, and is ready to apologize for insulting her earlier. However, he doesn’t get the chance, as the troll is still ticking, even though Goblin Slayer set his head on fire. I’ll also note that the Goblin Slayer couldn’t seem more put out having to slay something that isn’t a goblin.

That said, he uses a nifty bit of chemistry, having the dwarf summon rain to douse the troll’s flaming head, then using a tosses substance to quickly freeze the heated stone-like flesh. From there, the Lizard, Slayer, and Elf bring the big guy down and mop up the goblin dregs.

It’s a testament to their skill, experience, and teamwork that even with the boy committing numerous blunders that should have killed him and others, this party got through this with minimal trouble.

The party returns to town to celebrate, but it doesn’t feel like a victory for the boy wizard. He knows he fucked up royally, but also knows that even though the acolyte is alive and recovering, he knows that “simply being alive”, as the Elf says, isn’t enough.

The acolyte, the sole survivor of her party, could well be ostracized in the future for her failure. The boy doesn’t know how quick this cuts to the Priestess’ past situation. He also finally mentions the reason why he’s so desperate to get out their and kill goblins: his sister was killed by a poison blade.

It dawns on both the Priestess and the Goblin Slayer that this boy is the little brother of the female wizard in the Priestess’ doomed party. Slayer gets up and leaves, retiring to an alley to remove his helmet, vomit, and curse himself for not being able to save everyone.

Goblin Slayer II – 01 – Come Out and Slay

After a flashback to the horrible fate of the her former party before he rescued her, Priestess is now in a good place, and so is he. Along with Elf, Dwarf, and the Lizard Priest, they have something of a found family. To paraphrase Aldo Raine, Goblin Slayer has one job, and one job only: killin’ goblins, and cousin, business is-a-boomin’. He doesn’t care about the gossiping of the other guild members.

He strides in, picks up a huge stack of goblin slayin’ quests, and heads out with his party. They return well after dark, battered, filthy, exhausted…and victorious. While GS is settling up with Guild Girl, he notices the red-haired rookie wizard who bumped into them earlier that day. Seeing that he doesn’t have a proper place to stay, he takes him to the farm, where the kid mistakes Cow Girl as Goblin Slayer’s wife—something Cow Girl is just fine with!

Uncle doesn’t trust the kid, but also isn’t about to make GS stay up all night keeping watch, so agrees to let him stay in the barn GS rents out. The kid is hardly grateful, as he just wants to get out there and slay some goblins ASAP. I imagine if he knew what befell the Priestess’ old party, he’d have some second thoughts.

Alas, the next morning, he’s rearin’ to slay some goblins, something no one believes him capable of actually doing, at least not on his own like he wants to. Priestess is also upset because she didn’t rank up the way she expected. She thinks it might be because her party-mates are higher-ranked than her.

Onna Kishi overhears the rookie kid and Priestess arguing and comes up with a plan that will help the both of them out: the kid will get to go on a quest and slay goblins, but he’ll be in a party led by his senpai, the Priestess. My first thought…I don’t like the idea of either of them heading out without GS!

After six years, Goblin Slayer is back, and while its opening minute or so is thoroughly unpleasant, it serves to remind anyone who forgot just how awful and dangerous goblins are, and how one  mustn’t rush into battle unprepared. On the other side of the coin, we get plenty of banter and camaraderie with GS’s party; they’re just a fun bunch to hang with, so I’m glad to see them again.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 05 – The Front-Liner

One of Fern’s favorite memories is of Heiter telling him she’d better do as Frieren says, because if she’s bad, he’ll haunt her after he dies. She takes that to mean she’ll just get to see him, so he flips it around: if she’s a good girl, he may just come and visit her.

She wakes up leaning against Frieren as their wagon arrives at the next village on their journey. There, they hear reports of the villagers seeing the ghosts of loved ones, appearing as they did in life. While that rules out the undead, it doesn’t rule out the threat to the villagers.

While Frieren is fine moving on in the morning, Fern insists they help, as “unlike” her master, she’s a good girl. So they head into the forest to investigate, and find evidence of magical use; specifically illusion magic. Frieren IDs the one behind the “ghosts” as an Einsam.

An Einsam uses the loved ones of its victims as bait, though she assures Fern that the illusions don’t affect mages. And yet when the forest suddenly grows misty and a ghostly Heiter appears before Fern, she freezes. Even knowing it’s an illusion, the Einsam also uses her memories and his past words against her, which Fern notes is pretty damn cruel.

Frieren, who has so many centuries under her belt, is less taken in by her ghost, but she is surprised and a little bemused that it’s Himmel now instead of her old master Flamme. For an unchanging immortal elf, something like this suggests she’s changed after all.

When she uses her magic (which really packs a punch, both visually and aurally), it also snaps Fern out of it. When she sees the true form of the Einsam, she follows her master’s attack with one of her own. The monster is defeated, and the village is safe.

Frieren and Fern have both lost people dear to them, and there are times when they want nothing more than to be reunited, even if they know that’s impossible (at least until they reach Aureole).

Their encounter with the Einsam (German for lonely) tugged at that longing, weaponizing it against them. But while they must be vigilant, they can’t close themselves off from the love they still harbor for the departed.

When their travels take them to the Rigel Canyon in the Central Lands, they encounter a red solar dragon sleeping beside its nest. Frieren notices a grimoire in the nest that she wants, so she has Fern fire an attack at the dragon, only for it to have absolutely no effect.

Frieren’s reaction to this is basically “Huh, they really are tough” and indicates that the proper course now is to run. The resulting chase scares the living daylights out of Fern, and when Frieren says if they repeat the cycle enough they’ll eventually prevail, Fern isn’t having it.

The solution to their problems is to add a party member: specifically, front-liner; a warrior. Eisen told Frieren that a town in Riegel Canyon is where she can find one: Stark, his former apprentice. They’re approached by tiny old lady, who for once doesn’t want them to clean a statue of Himmel.

She leads them to Stark, who is playing with some kids. Stark is the hero of the town for standing his ground against the dragon, so surely he’s front-liner material. But while he’s warm to the kids and their grandma, he’s cool to Frieren, who after all riled up the dragon.

He’s also unimpressed with her reason for retrieving the grimoire from its nest—for no particular reason, but simply because it’s a hobby. We catch a glimpse of a memory in which Himmel praised her for her weird spells, and she says that’s the reason if he needs one, but he’s still dubious.

That’s when we learn why Stark hasn’t defeated the dragon he stood up against: he’s not the fearless hero the townsfolk believe him to be. He only “stood his ground” because he was too terrified to move, and the dragon departed on its own and has stayed away on its own.

As Stark cries and tugs at Frieren’s hem, a disgusted Fern says he’s “no good” and they should find another warrior. But Frieren still gives Stark the night to think over joining them. She’s convinced he’s the man for the job.

That night, after dinner (and we get some pretty delicious food sakuga), Frieren heads off to bed, but suggests Fern go check out what Stark’s up to. There are loud thunderous booms coming from the canyon, and when she reaches the location where they met, Fern sees that the sheer gap between the cliffs was caused by him, rending the cliff asunder with his axe.

Back before they left Eisen’s Frieren got the skinny on Stark: he was the only one to flee when his village was attacked, which made him a coward, but also kept him alive. Eisen, who saw that coward in himself (he apparently wasn’t around when his loved ones were killed) decided to teach him everything he knew.

Stark may well still be a coward, but he now possesses the skills and tools to protect others, should he wish to. He certainly wanted to defeat the dragon, but wasn’t strong enough alone. With Frieren and Fern backing him up, perhaps he can prevail, both in becoming the hero the town believes him to be, and gaining a little courage and confidence.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 04 – Not Just a Sunrise

Now 28 A.H. (After Himmel), Frieren and Fern find themselves in the a town by the Grantz Channel. An old man, who was only a little boy when Frieren was last there, tells them the townsfolk can’t keep up with the debris and wrecks along the beach, so in exchange for a grimoire of the legendary mage Flamme, Frieren agrees to clean it up.

Fern is well-studied enough to know that virtually all books purported to be written by Flamme are fakes, so she wonders why Frieren took the job. She replies “to help someone in need”, and while she admits she may really only doing it for herself, who’s to say she isn’t in need?

Since taking on Fern as an apprentice, Fern has obseved that Frieren is a bit of a mess. She has to be woken up every morning, bathed, clothed, and fed. Fern is always cleaning up messes she makes in their room. There are times she feels more like a mother and a maid than an apprentice.

After three months of cleanup in the winter cold, Frieren and Fern complete the cleanup, just one day before the town’s anuual New Year’s sunrise viewing. The old man hopes Frieren can experience it “this time”; the last time she was here, she missed out on it because she slept in.

This time, Frieren is determined to be awake for it, so she stays up all night, only to fall asleep and dream of those days. While she knows Heiter was “bedridden” due to overdrinking, Himmel still would have liked to watch the sunrise with her, and believes she’ll know why when she sees it.

Despite nearly missing out again, her trusty apprentice pulls her out of bed, bundles her up, and takes her by the hand to the beach, just in time for a gorgeous sunset. And while Frieren admits to herself it’s pretty, she doesn’t think it’s any different form any other sunrise.

That is, until she sees Fern’s sunlit smile, and hearing her say how beautiful it is. It isn’t that Himmel didn’t understand Frieren, he did. This is what he wanted her to see and to know: a sunset is more beautiful when there are others beside you to see it. And if she didn’t have Fern, she wouldn’t have been able to see it at all.

During their travels, Frieren’s party found themselves at Eisen’s home, where he pays his respects to the graves of his long-departed family. He always believed the dead become nothingness, but Heiter believes there is a heaven. Even if it wasn’t so, and unlike most priests he considered that possibility, it was simply more “convenient” to believe somewhere better than nothingness awaited them.

It’s with that in mind that Frieren and Fern pay Eisen a visit at that same place in the Bredt region. His armor and cape are a littl dingier and his face and hands are a little more weathered, but unlike Heiter he’s far from his deathbed. He asks Frieren for help searching for Flamme’s notes…the real ones, not the fakes. A lovely search montage ensues.

As for the why, both Heiter and Eisen, who wrote to each other regularly, wanted to do something for her after seeing how sad she was not to have known Himmel better. Since it is storied that among Flamme’s notes there is a method of conversing with the dead, he seeks the means for Frieren to right a mistake.

It’s Fern who spots the biggest tree in the basin, one that is over a thousand years old. Frieren recognizes this tree and this spot. She was there when it was a mere sapling planet by her master, Flamme. Even though Flamme would pass away in the intervening thousand years, she also knew Frieren would still be around, and the notes the tree would grow to protect would be there too, if Frieren wanted to speak to the dead, as she does now.

While remarking how her old master, an “unpleasant” and “irresponsible” woman, had predicted this would be how things would go down with Frieren, upon opening the entrance to the ruins and reading the grimoire (a sequence elevated by crescendos in Evan Call’s sublime score), she learns that on her travels long, long ago, Flamme found heaven on earth.

The land where souls rest, called Aureole, is located on the northernmost tip of the northern continent, in a land now appropriately known as Ende. That also happens to be the current location of the Demon King’s sprawling castle. No doubt he built it there to establish his dominion over heaven and the dead.

The Demon King may be gone, but the caslte in Ende remains, and that is where Frieren will be able to speak to Himmel (and possibly Heiter too). The catch? It’s a long, long way to Ende. On her original journey with Himmel, Eisen and Heiter, it took a decade. There’s no getting around it; Fern will be pushing 30 by the time they arrive.

Eisen isn’t accompany them as he says he’ll only slow them down (a shame, as I really like Eisen), but as they’re on a wagon to take him back to his hovel and Frieren is asleep in Fern’s lap, he asks Fern if Frieren is a good master. She finds it hard to give a simple answer, for there are times it feels like she only took her on as an apprentice because she promised Heiter.

Frieren’s often single-minded search for both new spells and remnants of her past travels with her comrades makes it feel to Fern like she’s not interested in her. And yet, she also gives her birthday presents, so clearly there’s a part of her that appreciates she’s by her side.

In this, Eisen knows that Frieren, despite looking unchanging, actually has changed since Himmel’s death and gaining Fern as a companion. Now Frieren knows that while being alone was “nice and easy”, sharing her adventures with another, no matter how fleeting a time as it may seem, is its own reward. She didn’t take full advantage when Himmel was alive, but perhaps that too can change when she and Fern reach Aureole.

We’re now four episodes into Frieren’s story, and now the titular elven mage and her cute apprentice have a fixed destination. Its distance away suggests their journey will be chronicled in the weeks to come, and will likely be as important than their final goal. Needless to say, I’m incredibly eager for the next episode.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 03 – The Best Defense

Now that I’m accustomed to Frieren’s tendencies, I appreciate them all the more when certain things occur. The cutaways, for instance. A show like Family Guy will run them into the ground, but Frieren employs them judiciously. We’ve seen Frieren’s quirker, sillier side expressed in this way, whether she’s hopelessly stuck head-first in a chest, or describing weird spells she’s collected.

This time, in the trade town of Warm, Frieren says she and Fern will split up the shopping, but when she asks what Frieren will actually be buying, Frieren makes a certain face. Fern’s been with her long enough to know that face can’t mean anything good. It means she’s about to waste their traveling funds on something weird, like a giant skull or a potion that dissolves clothing.

So Fern does what she believes she must: she delays her own shopping to shadow Frieren. She’s surprised to find her making very pained looks of indecision as she inspects accessories in the market. Then she watches Frieren go into the basement of a tavern where some very unsavory-looking adventuerers offer their genuine recommendations for…desserts.

Fern may later call Frieren dense about how humans feel, but she herself is dense in this instance, since it’s clear to anyone that Frieren was being coy about what she was doing because she wanted it to be a surprise. It’s Fern’s sixteenth birthday, and to celebrate, Frieren takes her to the most picturesque spot to be at sundown, and treats her to some sumptuous pancakes.

She also presents her gift to her—a gorgeous metal hair ornament with butterfly motif—but was worried it wouldn’t be the right one. Fern makes it clear to Frieren that she’s overjoyed not just that she did all this for her, but that she’s happy they’re together as well.

27 years after Himmel’s death, Fern has now grown taller than Frieren. That’s another bittersweet moment when Frieren compares their heights (and chests), because depending on how long this show goes on, barring her untimely demise, Fern will have to watch Fern grow old and die, just like everyone else in her life.

Frieren clarifies to Fern that their journey isn’t entirely aimless; she intends to retrace the adventures she had with Himmel, Heiter, and Eisen. This is her way of not only honoring their memory, but interacting with those who have memories of those adventures, before they all fade away into time.

Their journey takes them into the Grosse forest, where Frieren stops to show Fern that while her defensive magic is powerful, it is not invincible. Watching her offensive magic bend around Fern’s shield and fire off in all directions, it’s clear Fern needs to have more finesse: a large sphere of protection around her at all times will sap her mana too quickly and doom her in a real battle.

There’s a reason Frieren is reviewing Fern’s defensive bonafides: their next destination is a village in the forest where Qual, one of the Demon King’s most powerful mages, was battled and sealed by Frieren’s party eight decades ago. The oldest man in the village knows Frieren’s name and face, because Himmel visited every year until he died to inspect the seal, promising that one day before it failed, Frieren would arrive to defeat Qual for good.

Frieren may see it as simply taking care of unfinished business, but Himmel clearly knew her enough to know she wouldn’t let a loose end like Qual linger. Fern also learns that despite the seeming innocuousness of most of their journey thus far, this is not one of those times. She and Frieren are there to save the village from death and destruction, should an unchecked Qual awaken.

That said, Fern has been procrastinating about reading the magical tome Frieren bought her—one of the few non-weird impulse purchases. Rather than read it that night, Frieren tells Fern to get a good night’s sleep, because the next morning, she unseals Qual, and after a few pleasantries, the battle begins.

Fern is shocked to find that “Zoltraak”, the defense and equipment-piercing magic Qual is known for inventing, is nothing but an ordinary offensive spell she can defend with relative ease. Had she read the tome Frieren bought her, she’d know that in the 80 years since Qual was sealed, humans’ magic technology has improved to render Zoltraak run-of-the-mill. It’s another clever demonstration of how time has passed in this world.

I never knew at time when motor vehicles were a rarity, but my grandparents did. At the same time, I remember when computers were dumb, slow, and monochromatic in a way my nieces and nephews never will. 80 years may only be a drop in the bucket for Frieren and a good night’s sleep for Qual, but for humans, it’s the difference between him being a fearsome foe and No Big Deal.

Frieren also knows that Fern has progressed enough as a mage to successfully defend Qual’s attacks, giving her the opening to fly up above him and deliver a blast of killing magic so powerful it not only atomizes Qual, but exposes an aquifer a few feet below ground level. I love how it reflects the sky, appearing almost like a hole in the earth.

With Qual dealt with, Frieren and Fern prepare to move on to their next destination. Before they do, the village elder thanks them, and Frieren recognizes his hat from eighty years ago. This old man was the same little brat who flipped her skirt! I love those little details, like the old lady’s twin braids in the previous episode. The hat may be old and frayed, but still keeps the sun out.

The former brat has grown up and grown old, and is glad to have lived to see Frieren return, just as Himmel promised. He believed in Himmel, and Himmel believed in Frieren. While she may worry about losing all memory of her comrades, and has trouble with human feelings in general, it doesn’t mean she doesn’t have them.

As they ride a cart out of the village, Fern is studying her magic tome hard, and Frieren pats her head…just because. Part teacher, part friend, part big sister…and part mother. Frieren is all of these things to Fern, and she’s happy to have them all. And so the 5-star ratings will continue until quality declines!

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 02 – Rhapsody in Blue

Frieren doesn’t mince words when it comes to Fern’s development: she has control over mana, which is the hardest of three things a mage needs. Unfortunately, Fern lacks sufficient mana itself, and the necessary strength to use it. She can gain both, but it will take years.

We watch those years—four of them, to be exact—unfold in a sequence of beautiful little slice-of-life scenes. Meals are shared, different seasons are enjoyed, magic training and long hours of study in the library take place.

After four years, Heiter has a fall, and is no longer able to walk. Fern has improved, but still can’t hit the rock across the gorge. She’s been patient with herself as Frieren advised, but “eventually” being able to blast the rock isn’t good enough for her; not when Heiter has so little time left. She wants him to be glad he saved her, and to know she’ll be alright without him.

While sitting by Heiter’s bedside, Frieren asks why the “Corrupt Priest”, as is her nickname for him, chose to take Fern in. Turns out he happened to be having a drink atop a high cliff when a lil’ Fern, who had lost her family, was considering jumping. He convinced her not to because it’s what his good friend Himmel the Hero would have done, were he still alive.

He told Fern it would be a shame to die, because all of her precious memories of those she loved would vanish from the world. But once the grimoire is deciphered and Frieren reports that it contained no immortality or resurrection spells, he says that’s fine. What matters is that Fern is now a true mage, and thus won’t be in Frieren’s way.

Heiter wants to spare Fern the pain of watching someone else taken from her, so he wants Frieren to take her and leave before he dies. This makes Frieren (and me) tear up (for the second episode in a row). Heiter’s heart is in the right place, but he’s wrong: Fern wants to say goodbye to him properly. Before that, she makes sure Fern has some time with Heiter to make a few more little memories before the end.

Frieren then take Fern with her on her aimless journey through the world in search of spells. Fern learns these spells are very specialized and random, but it’s Frieren’s hobby, so that’s what they do. Frieren also makes clear that the bulk of “adventuring” is doing odd jobs for people who can’t do them easily themselves.

This brings them to a small village where an old lady shows them a tarnished and weathered statue of Himmel the Hero. In a stirring, emotional flashback that lasts only a few moments, we travel all the way back to when this grizzled woman was just a frightened little flower girl in the path of a demon…until Himmel saved her.

The statue got the way it was in part because no one in the village other than her even remembers Himmel. It’s now been 76 years since Frieren’s party saved the world (50 years between meteor showers, plus 26 years since Himmel’s death). The world is now short on humans who were even alive when the Demon King was around.

When the statue is repaired and cleaned, the old woman mentions that she’d like to give it some more color, perhaps by planting some flowers around it. When Fern notes that Frieren has a spell to conjure flowers, Frieren says the only flowers that will do are Blue Moon Weed flowers, which grew in Himmel’s hometown.

The only problem is, the old lady, an herbalist, says the weed has all but died out where they are. Nevertheless, Frieren is determined to find it so she can analyze it and make a spell to conjure it. Six months of searching pass without any progress. Fern grows concerned Frieren’s obsession will go on indefinitely owing to her elven perception of time.

She shares her concerns with the herbalist, who gives Fern some seeds from a very similar blue flower and urges her to tell Frieren how she feels. Frieren is receptive, and doesn’t want to take up too much more of Fern’s comparatively short life on the search, so she’ll end it “soon,” whatever that means!

Fern then asks Frieren why she loves collecting spells so much. Frieren insists it’s just a hobby, but also notes that she once lived a much more “apathetic” existence before she met and joined Himmel. Like Heiter, being with Himmel changed her. We flash back to the days of yore when Frieren filled a field with flowers, Himmel made her a pretty crown to wear, and told her his wish to one day show her the Blue Moon blooms of his home.

During their conversation, Fern’s seeds were stolen away by a seed rat. The two follow its tracks (another spell), which lead to an old abandoned stone tower. A single blue petal falls, and leads Frieren to magically launch herself up to the top of the tower, which is absolutely covered in the blue flowers she’s been looking for.

Frieren smiles, because she was finally able to see the flowers Himmel wanted to show her. Later than she’d like, but still. She whips up a conjuring spell, surrounds Himmel’s statue with them, and even makes a crown of them for him, just as he once made one for her. His little gesture, and many others like it on their travels, awakened a joie de vivre Frieren didn’t have before.

By the same token, Frieren takes exception to Fern saying the two of them are far apart when it comes to being passionate about magic. Yes, Fern may have been able to choose something other than magic in order to show Heiter (and herself) that she could support herself later in life.

But, and this is the important part: she did choose magic. And in one of the most heart-swelling cutaways of the episode, we see that she did it for largely the same reason as Frieren: because there’s great beauty in magic, and beauty in the faces of those watching you use it, especially if they’re people you care about.

I’m only halfway through the four-episode opening salvo of Frieren, but I’m already pretty confident this is a top contender for Anime of the Season, if not the year. It’s just so well made, so bittersweet and nostalgic. It’s like wearing a warm blanket and holding a mug of cocoa by the fire. It’s the kind of show that reminds me why I keep watching anime.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – 01 (First Impressions) – The Unchanging One

As the title indicates, Beyond Journey’s End isn’t about how a party consisting of the hero Himmel, the warrior Eisen, the priest Heiter, and the mage Frieren defeat the Demon King. We only see them returning from their ten-year adventure after they’ve successfully defeated said king. This is the story of what happens after the foe is slain.

Of the four in the party, Himmel and Heiter are mere humans, while Frieren is an elf and Eisen a dwarf. As such, they perceive time differently. The party is welcomed to the great capital to jubilant celebration, yet they seem content to enjoy a quiet moment together witnessing a once-in-50-years meteor shower.

Frieren parts ways with her party-mates, embarking on a journey of her own to find new spells. When fifty years pass, she returns to the city to find the hero Himmel has aged, well, fifty years. As an elf, she hasn’t aged at all. Her appearance is identical to the statue of her erected half a century ago.

This is the simple, quiet magic of Beyond Journey’s End. So much goddamn time passes in so little runtime, and yet I felt every bit of that time pass, even as I acknowledged that it didn’t feel like so much time at all to an elf like Frieren.

There’s also a profound sense of happiness that accompanies Frieren taking her party-mates to a spot where she had promised to take them fifty years ago, to watch that same meteor shower. You can see that happiness, that contentment, in Frieren’s face.

That happiness dissipates when Himmel passes away. And while I’d only known him for around five minutes, I actually started tearing up before Frieren did. She cries not just because a friend has passed, but because it feels so unfair to her that he passed so quickly by her reckoning—before she believed she’d even gotten to know him.

The party that defeated the Demon King traveled together for “only” ten years, but that decade feels like a drop in the bucket to Frieren. Still twenty years after Himmel’s death, she visits the holy city where the priest Heiter is still kickin’.

She’s guided to Heiter by a little girl named Fern, an war orphan Heiter took in. Heiter also has a grimoire for Frieren to examine said to contain lost spells of resurrection an immortality. He also admits to fearing death more than when they last saw each other two decades ago.

In addition to asking her to decipher the grimoire to give him a bit more time, he asks Frieren to take little Fern on as an apprentice, as she shows great potential as a mage. Frieren tells him she can’t in good conscience do so, noting the mortality rate of mage apprentices.

But when Frieren witnesses a demonstration of Fern’s power, then asks her if she likes magic, Fern answers “somewhat”, mirroring Frieren’s own position. So it looks like she’ll take her under her wing after all.

Beyond Journey’s End starts strong with an epic, sprawling tour-de-force of quiet, teeming grandeur. We’re dropped in Frieren’s shoes as someone detached from time as humans know it; I grieved the passing of Himmel as she did, and was shocked by how much had changed as she went off on what she perceived to be a brief jaunt.

She is the unchanging one, who with her party-mates helped save the world. Now she lingers on, wandering the earth searching for the next great truths, but with the arrival of Fern in her life, she appears destined to not wander alone for long.

I couldn’t help but be reminded of Elrond’s haunting prophecy to Arwen in The Two Towers. But like Arwen, Frieren’s future need not be marked with darkness, doubt, longing and despair. For while human lives may only be fleeting, they live on in their progeny. When Heiter passes, a part of him will live on in Fern.

This was the first of four episodes of Frieren released all at once…I’ll be getting to the other three soon!

Mushoku Tensei II – 00 – The Bodyguard

This prologue to the much-awaited second season of Mushoku Tensei shows us what happened to poor Sylphiette (Kayano Ai) after the Fittoa catastrophe. She’s transported to a spot several thousand feet above the gardens of the royal palace of Asura, where the second princess Ariel Anemoi Asura is enjoying afternoon tea.

A giant boar monster happens to attack Asura just when Sylphie arrives, crushing the boar’s skull when she lands on it. She ends up unconscious in a bed of flowers, making quite an impression on the princess, who reminds me of a less sadistic Princess Renner from Overlord: an outwardly cute and kind blonde royal with hidden depths and ambitions.

She wakes up nude (for some reason) in a bed, and when Asura learns the name of the village where she’s from, she informs Sylphie that Fittoa has been destroyed and her family and friends’ fate is unknown. Asura then tells her that she could get in trouble for trespassing on the royal grounds, so she has her assume the identity of a male and her new mage bodyguard, “Silent Fitz”.

“Fitz” finds the hustle and bustle of the royal court tiring, especially when her elf ears can hear all the offhand comments and mutterings about her. When she loses focus, stumbles, and knocks over a noble’s wine, Princess Asura bails her out by gracing the crowd with her beautiful singing voice (courtesy of Ueda Reina).

In that same mingling session, we meet Asura’s older brother, who is in line for the throne despite being an illegitimate child. He suspects Asura is trying to gather support to usurp him, and even arranges for her assassination. Thus Sylphie has found herself in one tangled mess of palace intrigue and backbiting.

On top of that, she suffers nightmares of her fall, but Asura invites her to sleep in her bed. Initially I, like Sylphie, worried that Asura might use her station to take advantage of her, but turns out to only be joking (or saw Sylphie wasn’t into it and stopped). She also admits to suffering nightmares from the day of the boar attack, and finds Sylphie’s presence soothing.

Later that night is significantly less soothing, as an extremely lithe and scantily clad assassin attacks them. Sylphie demonstrates that she’s no slouch by matching blows with the tiny ninja-like killing machine, and even when she’s nicked by her poison blade-animated, , she manages a coup-de-grace that sends the attacker smashing through the room’s main window and into the forest below.

Once again, Asura lives thanks to Sylphie. And while I realize the assassin is just a tool of one of her political enemies, I wish we’d have been given a little more about her besides her name later on, and wonder why she had to be introduced on the lap of that big old bald guy. Oh well…

Under council from a loyal minister, Asura decides to exercise the better part of valor and flee the capital, gather foreign supporters, and bide her time for the eventual coup. That’s right: Asura’s brother’s suspicions are correct! But because he and his pal are jerks and Asura is nice to our elf girl, I’m totally on Team Asura.

Asura even releases “Fisk” from her service, as she regrets the underhanded circumstances under which she was hired and doesn’t wish to burden her further. But Sylphie remembers Asura calling her a friend, and she considers her a friend as well—a friend who is no burden to protect. She puts the Kamina-like shades back on and re-assumes the mantle of Silent Fisk of her own free will.

I quite enjoyed this royal detour from the main story of Rudeus, which succeeded in its world-building and in weaving a simple but compelling story of an underdog princess trying to claim the throne. We don’t meet the other prince or princess above her in the order of succession, but I’m sure they’re jerks too. The promo art for the season suggests Sylphie and an older Rudy will cross paths at some point. I’m hoping they’ll recognize each other and reunite as pals!

Isekai Ojisan – 07 – Power Trip

We witness along with Takafumi and Fujimiya Ojisan’s continued misinterpreting of Elf’s words and actions (ironic considering his translation ability), accusing her of being a thief for insisting on keeping the hoodie she believe was gived to her as a gift.

That said, Elf did give Ojisan something in return: her sparkly green dress you can bet cost a lot more than the ratty hoodie. Ojisan lets Fujimiya try it on, and Takafumi admits she looks good in it. The trio are trying to determing how Ojisan’s “Wild Talker” translation is triggered, but Fujimiya is called away on an errand.

Takafumi and Ojisan keep watching, and come upon the first time Ojisan met Alicia (Toyosaki Aki) and her party-mates Raiga and Edgar, who came to fight a horde of goblins and assumed Ojisan was one of them due to his looks. The group then teams up to fight the actual goblin horde.

That said, Alicia’s party doesn’t get to do much but watch as Ojisan puts on an amazing display of magic. Ojisan claims that playing Golden Axe on Genesis prepared him for this fight while the opposite is true. That said, he prevails, and as the party heads to the village for their reward, Alicia takes Ojisan aside and tells him she witnessed him raising the barrier protecting Luvaldram.

Rather than trust her to keep the secret (and she says she will), he wipes her memory and those of Edgar and Raiga, ending their friendship before it could really take off. However, Ojisan soon encounters the three again, this time assuming he’s the beast they were sent to slay due to his appearance It’s not deja vu for them since all memory of him was wiped.

When they describe the beast as a prickly hedgehog that rolls up into a ball to attack, Ojisan’s mind naturally wanders to visions of Sonic. However, the actual beast turns out to be a biologically correct hedgehog, and thus unrecognizable to Ojisan. Worse, when he uses Wild Talker to converse, he learns the giant hedgehog is a sadistic monster, and incinerates him on the spot.

Suddenly a phone rings; Fujimiya’s phone, which she left at Takafumi’s. He enlists his uncle’s aid in flying him to Fujimiya’s college where they spot her being hassled by a skeevy looking dude. Ojisan leaves the handling of the situation to his nephew, lending him his powers for an hour, just in case.

But when Takafumi gets a better look at the red-haired menace who is all over Fujimiya, he suddenly recognizes him as her cute little brother, Chiaki…who is still in the fourth damn grade. Similarly, when Chiaki realizes it’s Takafumi, his twisted, grotesque face (a quality his older sister shared at that age) suddenly becomes flush and enthusiastic.

Chiaki looking like a skeevy twenty-year old while he’s actually Fujimiya’s fourth-grade brother is an amazing joke that had me rolling, especially due to the consistency with which young Fujimiyas are depicted as more orc (or goblin)-like than everyone in the other world regarded Ojisan. As a little kid, he has also never heard of most of the stuff Ojisan talks to him about, once he joins the group.

When Fujimiya asks what Takafumi would have done if Chiaki had been an adult guy flirting with her, he shows off his temporary uncle powers and makes the two of them invisible, creates two holographic decoys, then teleports them to Fujimiya’s lecture hall several stories up.

Fujimiya is impressed by how quickly Takafumi has managed to master Ojisan’s magic, and notes that this situation reminds her of when he stood up for her when she got shoved by three boys back in grade school. Takafumi decides to tap into her memories and project them as Ojisan does so they can take a look at what happened.

Naturally, things unfolded much differently than either party remembers. Fujimiya wasn’t shoved, she was the shover, and was probably going to do more had Takafumi not arrived to “rescue” her. But even though she was the instigator, Fujimiya was happy then, just as she’s happy now to know he’s got her back.

Takafumi then meets Sawa, Fujimiya’s friend since high school, who tells him Fujimiya has gotten quite popular with the guys since “becoming cuter” in the last six months. Takafumi, still drunk on Ojisan’s temporary power, demands to know the names and locations of said guys (so he can wipe all memory of Fujimiya from their heads).

This protectiveness/possessiveness and his blushing when Fujimiya leaned in to whisper to him suggest there’s something there, but she has a long way to go to get out of the Friendzone. Back at Takafumi’s, he and Fujimiya watch as Alicia reveals herself to be the Hero, AKA “Shining Crusader”, just as I suspected she would be. I look forward to her future interactions with Ojisan.

Isekai Ojisan – 06 – Skipping Karaage Night

Ojisan continues to show Takafumi and Fujimiya his torturous first days in another world, where his captors try to sell him but end up making forty times more bronze coins selling a used scoring pad, adding insult to injury. Ojisan is imprisoned for seven days, but thanks to his translation ability is able to communicate with the world’s spirit of light.

He reaches out to the beam of moonlight in his cell, and it becomes a solid sword in his hands. He uses that to break out of jail and release all the cute little creatures imprisoned there, but they turn out to be vicious monsters and he spends the rest of the night slaughtering them.

This, to Ojisan, represents being “off to a good start.” Fujimiya gets a text from home; it’s fried chicken night, but she’s eager to learn more about how he saved Elf from the vemon dragon. She later regrets passing on the chicken as the dragon fight is over in five seconds. Ojisan makes the right first move by offering the half-naked Elf his hoodie, but she temporarily “glitches” from the sudden urge to kill the orc-looking man before him.

She checks herself and stows her dagger in the transdimensional inventory, but to Ojisan it looks like she’s stabbing herself, and lifts up the hoodie expecting to find a gaping wound. Needless to say, it’s not the best first impression to expose a girl’s nudity right after covering it, so in this instance Elf’s berating of Ojisan is justified. But he’d only ever interpret that verbal abuse as contempt, when really the opposite is true.

That’s proven to be the case when Ojisan fast-forwards to the night he was frozen by Mabel, as he wakes up with both Elf and Mabel sleeping on top of him, perhaps to hasten his thawing but also because at least in Elf’s case she has a thing for the guy despite herself (and his looks).

Elf’s monopoly on Ojisan is disrupted by Mabel, who talks in her sleep about not wanting to work. Ojisan suggests that after sleeping in a bit, they go out for breakfast. Mabel and Elf formally introduce themselves and their goals (Mabel wants to explore, Elf wants to find ancient relics, and Ojisan, AKA “Wolfgunblood”, wants to find a way home. “Wolf”, as Mabel starts calling him for short, plans to scout out a dungeon where the storied Hero known as the “Shining Crusader” apparently is.

For now, though, it’s late, and Fujimiya is starving from skipping dinner. Ojisan in his magnanimity offers to treat her and Takafumi to ramen. Even though Takafumi ends up being a few yen short and Fujimiya has to pay after all, the three slurp with great abandon, as watching Ojisan’s adventures clearly worked up an appetite.

I imagine next week will pick up on the part of Ojisan’s story where he currently has two ostensible party members and seems poised to gain a third. I bet the “Hero” mentioned is the third female character in the OP and promo art, voiced by Toyosaki Aki.

Considering what entertaining characters Elf and Mabel are, I’m looking forward to her introduction and seeing how she bounces off the others…not to mention how Takafumi and Fujimiya react and comment on her arrival in Ojisan’s life.