Alright, so I am a bit late to this episode, but it was worth the wait. This whole flashback sequence is up there with the great cinematic moments that Oshi no Ko season 2 had this past season as just some top tier pieces of art. The whole time I am watching that flashback with the happy kid, I know it is going to end tragically, but you can’t help but be moved by the animation and ost.

Zooming out a bit and looking at this series as a whole so far, how would you describe this show to somebody? Is it action? Is it romance? Is it a comedy? Is it a tragedy? It is some weird blend of tons of different genres layered onto an absurdly nonsensical storyline. Yet it somehow just works so well. Each week, you never seem to know what type of show you are getting that episode.

Haha, this was me basically the whole episode. I knew that as soon as the flashback started it was going to be tragic. However, it still hit because it was so well done.

Yeah, this episode really did a lot of showing rather than telling to convey the story. Sometimes that can be confusing, but they paired it with some really good direction and animation to really convey a lot of emotions. Really, really well done episode.

Looks like the bot comment has it (above the table of links). The bot gets updated show metadata like that once a week. Often links will get added as the show’s run goes on, especially for services used less often in US/EU/JP which comprise the bulk of AniList users. Earlier weeks likely just didn’t have that link, where they copy/pasted the post contents from.

These two conquerable background characters whose names I TOTALLY remember

Same. I went back to episode 1 to look at their introduction again. Here are the quick summaries, ripped straight from the subtitles:

• Blonde on the left: “Master Finn of the Smith family. He uses light magic.”
• Green hair on the right: “Master Curtis of the Kenwood family. He uses green magic. He’s not from any of the Five Great Noble Families.”

I agree with you that she probably pushed way past level 90. If anything is worth doing to Alicia, then it is worth way, way overdoing. It was definitely a setup episode this past week with Alicia hardly even appearing at all. I mean, who could Duke even be creepy towards? I think we are getting more and more hints that Liz is also a reincarnated person that is trying real hard to get the harem route, but Duke is just not playing along.

Just caught up with this series and it has been a lot of fun. The mechanics of the world don’t always make sense, but Jiun is a joy. Her being carried around like a baby kangaroo was hilarious.

I agree that this feels mostly unplanned from the beginning. The author has done a great job of slowly steering things to a longer, more complex story. Really looking forward to more.

It makes a lot of sense that Sanae would focus on the kids of the kingdom since that is all she knew in her previous life.

Looking ahead, it might be tough to convince people of germ theory. It took ages for the idea to be commonly accepted in our society. It really was the microscope and direct observation of microorganisms that managed to convince people.

Haha, this series is a nice little gift each Sunday.

Yeah, it’s harsh, I agree. I do think that from her perspective she could see that sequence of events as the sign that he wasn’t as committed as she was. Hanging out with Mitsuki is likely dragging up those old feelings from when they broke up.

Thanks for the chapter reference, I was able to go back and find it real quick.

I can’t go back and check right now, but iirc, she left after he didn’t want to commit to their relationship.

Agreed.

Here, let me, the author, explain to you how you should be feeling…

That is what that whole “theory” felt like to me.

swoons

I had forgotten about this character, but this is his friend from middle school, right?

I am going to keep this post relatively short this week as I have been doing a lot of traveling and am super exhausted. However, there are a couple things I wanted to point out. As for the story, it seems Jolenta is on a collision course with the church now. The point at which Nowak is asked to torture his daughter grows ever closer (I am guessing). However, this episode bears lots of historical parallels that I wanted to draw attention to.

• Venus

This is super quick, but I just like this shot of Jolenta after her conversation with Piast. We can clearly see Venus in the sky above her. We know it’s Venus both because of the color and because of its low position in the sky at dusk. Venus never gets very far from the sun in the sky from Earth’s perspective, so the only time you can see it is either just before the sun rises or just after it sets. Once you know how to spot Venus, it is actually quite bright in the sky. @rikka@ani.social

• Philolaus

This is one of the philosophers with the silly models that Badeni mentioned (the other was Aristarchus, which I discussed in the Episode 1 thread). I wasn’t familiar with this one, so after looking it up, his model is quite silly. It was not based on observational data at all really, but rather just based on philosophical arguments about what is higher up than other things. For instance, Mt. Olympus had a place at the foot of the central fire in his model. It also included a planet that was directly opposite the central fire from the earth called Counter-Earth. This was included simply to make a nice round number of 10 heavenly bodies.

• Piast’s Historical Basis

Piast is clearly heavily influenced by the real life astronomer Tycho Brahe. I have written about Brahe in multiple discussion threads up to this point because it is basically impossible to talk about astronomy of this time period and not mention it. A short summary of Brahe’s bio:

• Brahe was born in a noble house and educated in law. However, while at university, he developed an interest in astronomy and wanted to pursue it.
• Brahe was sent on a trip by his family in order to dispel him of the notion of studying astronomy. This did not work, and he ended up working with a distant relative to pursue astronomy instead.
• As a young man, Brahe observed a Great Conjunction, but the predicted time/date it happened was off by a day using the existing Ptolemaic models. This led him down the path of collecting data to improve the models.
• Brahe collected decades of astronomical observations that were more complete and more precise than anything that had existed before. The finest set of astronomical data that would exist prior to widespread usage of the telescope.
• In the final years of his life, he collaborated with a young, upstart mathematician, Johannes Kepler, who would later go on to provide a much improved model of the cosmos using Brahe’s collected observations…with the sun at the center.

Anything in there sound familiar? Hmm?

Wait, there’s more? I finished this chapter and was sure that this was simply a rushed ending to the series. No idea where we go from here if Miyabi is truly out of the picture.

I work in a building right next to where Boston Dynamics used to test these things. We got to see them climbing over stuff, dancing, etc. all the time from our lab’s windows. They moved to a different building not too long ago though sadly.

I feel like I just skimmed a whole volume or something. We just bounced from one thing to the next. Especially when it comes to the resolution with that (now ex-) boyfriend. He made some vague statement and then we hand waved our way through several important points.

This is not giving me a good feeling going forward. A mystery story really relies on how things are revealed to the reader, and this series has almost stopped trying to make it engaging. The first couple chapters were done so well, but I get the feeling that they hadn’t really worked out the story past that point.

Ummm, about that…

I lost it at this panel. I think she awakened something in herself today.

This stuco president is like Ruri after she gets control of her powers.