Sagrada Reset – 18

Now that Kei knows that Urachi Masamune is trying to eliminate abilities from Sakurada, he tries to determine what Urachi’s next move will be…and that inevitably leads to Ukawa Sasane, quietly the most powerful—and thus most potentially dangerous—of all the town’s ability users.

Urachi indeed pursues Ukawa, but not directly. He sends Tsushima, a non-user, to convince her to join the cause, siting the potential danger of ability users unconsciously and spontaneously activating their powers.

As Kei enlists the help of Murase and Nonoo to locate Ukawa, Haruki, whom he doesn’t enlist, just happens to visit the cat shrine, just for the heck of it.

Haruki expresses how she feels and how she’s worried her recent increased “selfishness” will annoy Kei. Nonoo doesn’t think it will, nor does she subscribe to Haruki’s notions of “being good enough.”

Haruki already has become more than Kei could ever have hoped for. The emotions she now feels are still new, but fiercely felt; a warm fire now burns within her cool, calm exterior. If she were to kiss Kei now, as opposed to the first time, I don’t doubt she’d actually feel something…feel quite a bit, for that matter.

As for Kei’s attempt to get to Ukawa before the Bureau, it fails. Ukawa unleashes her ability, and the rainy clouds part. Kei’s entreaties to Tsushima, about why abilities are the one problem out of all of the problems in the world, that must be dealt with, are largely brushed aside.

Tsushima urges Kei to embrace becoming a normal high school student, which also means being a normal boyfriend, and eventually a normal salaryman and husband and father. And as I’ve mentioned in earlier reviews…would that really be the worst thing? Kei and Haruki are, as their advisor says, burdened with too many unnecessary things.

Those things are very much putting a lot of strain on someone, trying to be a hero, but sacrificing his own life and happiness in the process. Tsushima thinks that’s wrong, and it’s why he convinced Ukawa to use her ability, thus compelling the Bureau to eliminate abilities.

But this episode presents a new and potentially terrifying prospect: Asai Kei can’t ever be normal. Urachi and the Bureau will eliminate abilities by eliminating memories of them in every man, woman, and child in Sakurada. But Kei’s memories won’t be affected.

Kei alone will remember the forty years of time Sakurada was a town of ability users. He is a loose end, and the way he sees it, killing him is the only way to eliminate his memories. Will Urachi stoop that low? Can he really call the town he’s trying to bring about “sacred” after that?

I’m gonna say no. I’m also gonna say…Poor Kei and Haruki! These kids can’t catch a damn break.

Sagrada Reset – 17

Another week, another dense, intricate Sakurada Reset. Let’s wade in, shall we? First of all, Souma’s second voice message to Kei leads to another incident involving abilities – specifically, an entire supermarket breaks out in laughter, including Kei and Haruki, which is actually pretty momentous considering how subtly the two usually express emotion.

That night, Hitsuchi calls just when Kei is about to call him, asking him for a head shot of Souma Sumire. He also tells Kei about about the Bureau’s current fear of every ability user in Sakurada using their abilities simultaneously.

Kei then remembers what he read in Manuscript 407, which is about the events of 40 years ago when the Bureau was first founded by the only three ability users who were aware of their abilities. Two were a married couple; the husband could “take something” from the entire world at once, and the wife could “retain” something. The third would later be known as the Nameless Witch.

Because of the husband, none of the people in Sakurada know of their abilities, but when he dies, the “spell will be broken”, and there will be chaos. So the Witch proposes they work together to expand the boundary of the wife’s ability (which negates memory loss the husband is causing worldwide), so that when the husband does die, people will know about abilities and they’ll be in a position to keep them under control; thus the Bureau was born.

Back in the present, Hitsuchi eventually sends Kei info on the ability users involved in the last two incidents, then calls Kei to report that after seeing Souma’s photo, he remembered certain things about two years ago. before Souma died, she went to Hitsuchi, who she used to borrow the ability of Tomoki to create voice messages without Tomoki remembering what he did. The messages, then, are from the Souma of the past, before she died.

Traveling with Sakuin, Souma engages with the human lie detector in non-superficial conversation, asking her opinion on the Bureau. Sakuin believes the Bureau’s foundation has started to crumble, even going so far as to call her boss Urachi a “monster” that nothing can be done about. Urachi’s plan is to eliminate information on abilities from the town, which would, after all turn Souma back into a “normal student,” which is her intent.

Despite knowing Urachi’s methods may not be the most moral, Sakuin is of the mind that abilities are “unnecessary,” but as she lacks the means to remove them from the town, she leaves it in Urachi’s hands. As for Kei, all the remembering of information—including the realizaiton Souma may have died for him—has led to him having a rough time; something Haruki can sense when he visits her house.

Why does he visit her house? No, not for a booty call…Souma’s third voice message instructs him to deliver a copy of his favorite book to Haruki. We don’t learn what that book is, nor does Haruki (he left it in her mailbox to look at later), but when Kei opens up about his problems to her, Haruki is heartened. She suggests he rests, but there’s more he needs to do, and Haruki isn’t about to stop him that.

That ‘something more to do’ apparently involves returning to Haruki’s dreamworld, where he finds both Michiru and Chiruchiru “locked” by Urachi’s underling. According to a blue bird Chiruchiru created to tell Kei what happened, the Bureau entered the dream world and locked Michiru, Chiruchiru, and the world’s Souma.

The bird implores Kei to help Michiru escape the lock, and also gives him the name of his “nemesis”, which he hadn’t known was Urachi until just then. It’s a name he knows, because two of the three founders, the husband and wife, had the same name, making Masamune their son.

After his parents basically kicked the abilities can down the road, Masamune is looking for a permanent fix, and seems to be getting closer. It remains to be seen if he’ll succeed, or what succeeding will mean for Kei, Haruki, Souma, and everyone else in Sakurada.