When I asked God for brain and brawn, he gave me puzzles in life to solve.
As if Mamoru being abducted wasn't enough, Usagi soon finds out that Chibi-Usa runs the risk of being erased from existence if Mamoru's condition continues to worsen. Refusing to lose her family, Usagi heads off into Nehelenia's Nightmare World; the rest of the Guardians follow suit but end up being separated by Queen Nehelenia who intends to pick them off one by one. Starting with Mercury and Uranus.
Tropes in this episode include:
- A Day in the Limelight: The second half of the episode greatly focuses on Ami, her approach to fighting that heavily contrasts that of Haruka, and in memories of her past, which draw a paralel between two situations where she contributed to a team using her smarts (as a child, she helped her school's basketball team win a game by calculating a strategy for them; in the present, she used her computer to calculate the source of Nehelenia's illusion).
- Attack Its Weak Point: Through her computer, Mercury discovers that the source of the illusion is coming from the moon in the sky. Uranus destroys it which destroys the Grecian backdrop and exposes Nehelenia as a Mirror Padedri.
- Attack Reflector: The Nehelenia copy is able to redirect Mercury and Uranus' attacks back at them.
- Bathos: While the Guardians prepare themselves for the upcoming battle and how dangerous their one night of destiny will be, Venus jokes that it's almost as bad as studying for an upcoming test.
- Berserk Button: Mercury's eyes of determination triggers Nehelenia into attacking her with deadly force.
- Brains and Brawn: Mercury uses her brainpower to figure out how to dispel the fake Nehelenia's power while Uranus uses her strength to pull off the finishing blow.
- Cliffhanger: Nehelenia sets her eyes on Mars and Neptune as her next targets and traps them in a Ring of Fire.
- Continuity Nod: Nehelenia brings up how Usagi gambled her life to save her daughter only to be rescued by Pegasus.
- De-power: Usagi loses her Eternal transformation upon entering Nehelenia's domain.
- Declaration of Protection: Before they unleash Sailor Teleport, the Guardians remind themselves about their duties as magical girl warriors and how they will give everything they have to protect their princess, her prince, and the people of Earth who fell victim to the curse.
- Failed a Spot Check: Setsuna admits to the others that she never considered how exactly the timeline would be influenced, particularly Chibi-Usa never being born, even though Nehelenia's curse has forced her to intervene to preserve the timeline.
- Failure Is the Only Option: Even though Mercury and Uranus succeeded with escaping the illusionary ruins, Nehelenia has them trapped in giant mirrors to incapacitate them.
- Fate Worse than Death: Nehelenia monologues to herself that Mamoru will be forced to endure horrific nightmares for as long as he's cursed.
- Fearless Fool: Inverted with Usagi. The others warn her that going into Nehelenia's Nightmare World is a trap mixed with the evil queen expecting her to show up. But Usagi refuses to have her cherished lover and her future daughter be taken away from her while she stands by and do nothing. Thus, she transforms and leaves without backup.
- Fisher Kingdom: After Mercury brings up how they'll save the people who fell under the curse, it cuts to Tokyo that shows it's victims unmoving in the middle of a decaying and ruined cityscape.
- Flashback: While catching up to Uranus, Mercury remembers a time she was unable to play basketball with some classmates because of her cram schools. She later remembers how she used her smarts to improve her team's basketball performance.
- The Friends Who Never Hang: Mercury and Uranus, who rarely ever interacted with each other, are paired together while navigating the Grecian ruins and fighting the Nehelenia. The last scene gives us a taste of Mars and Neptune teaming up.
- Friendship Moment:
- When Chibi Moon feels herself fading while mid-teleport, Saturn squeezes her hand and tells her that it'll be alright. And earlier, she rushes to Chibi Moon's side the first time her body flashes.
- Rei instantly notices that Usagi is preparing to transform so she can fly off to the Nightmare World. And the second she does, she rushes out in a desperate attempt to stop her.
- A Glass of Chianti: Nehelenia drinks a cup of wine while watching Usagi walk through a frozen wasteland through her mirror. She also manages to weaponize it when she throws the glass towards the mirror to make the shards separate the Sailor Guardians that came after Usagi.
- History Repeats: A Sailor Team uses their teleportation technique in front of the Hikawa Shrine in order to confront an evil queen. Usagi even ends up in a frozen wasteland.
- In Medias Res: The episode continues from where Nehelenia succeeds in kidnapping Mamoru while setting up the deadline for his curse to take full effect.
- Mass "Oh, Crap!": The Sailor Team share this reaction after Chibi Moon starts to glow bright white after her father's abduction.
- Party Scattering: Queen Nehelenia sends a burst of glass shards at the traveling Guardians, forcing them to separate and crash land on different parts of her Nightmare World.
- Pay Evil unto Evil: Nehelenia intends to imprison the Guardians in their own giant mirrors so they could suffer in solitude like she once did.
- Plot Hole: Nehelenia explains that by the coming dawn, Mamoru will be stuck in his curse with no hope of salvation. However, the next scene shows the Sailor Guardians regrouping in Rei's shrine with the day at sunset. This shouldn't be possible since it was already nighttime when everyone raced to reach Mamoru's apartment and confront the evil queen.
- Ret-Gone: Since Mamoru is trapped in a curse that will leave him practically dead, Chibi-Usa runs the risk of never being born. Thus her body is starting to flash and break down because of the time paradox at play.
- Ruins for Ruins' Sake: Uranus and Mercury end up in a world modeled after the ruins of Ancient Greece.
- Stating the Simple Solution: With everyone in shock over Usagi leaving to confront Nehelenia, Hotaru suggests that they all go after her.
- Supervillain Lair: Within the Nightmare World, Nehelenia resides in a dark castle modeled after the Dead Moon Circus base.
- Taking the Bullet: Uranus stands in front of Nehelenia's electrical attacks so Mercury can figure out a plan to defeat her.
- Temporal Paradox: Setsuna reveals that Nehelenia's actions are creating a time paradox which heavily impacts Chibi-Usa's existence and the future of Crystal Tokyo by extension.
- This Cannot Be!: Nehelenia states this when her security mirrors alert her about the arrival of the Sailor Guardians.
- Traumatic Superpower Awakening: Realizing that her cherished family is going to be taken from her, Usagi manages to unlock her Eternal form using only her emotions and without the help of her Sailor Guardians.
- Unnaturally Looping Location: Mercury and Uranus are disturbed to learn that the ruins they're stuck in is set on repeat.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Uranus is offended to see Mercury refusing to fight against Nehelenia's dark energy attacks.
