Recap / Reign of the Seven Spellblades S1E06 - "Arise"

And then—a single spell came into being.

Japanese Title: 顕現 アライズ^Trans.Kengen, Lit. "manifestation", pron. araizu
Director: Kōzō Kaihō
Writer: Shinsuke Ōnishi
First Aired: 11 August 2023
Adapts: Volume 1, Chapter 4 and Epilogue

Previously on… Reign of the Seven Spellblades, Vera Miligan revealed herself to be the Bitch in Sheep's Clothing behind most of the past five episodes. Oliver and Nanao charge in to rescue Katie, but Oliver's spellwork and Nanao's swordplay, enough to overcome any previous opponent, is matched blow-for-blow by the Mad Scientist. But something strange is happening with Nanao: caught in a pitfall trap set by Miligan with spatial magic, Oliver is sure she's a goner, but Nanao slashes clean through the fireball and deflects an ensuing Razor Wind spell into a vat with just her sword. Miligan is mystified, and Oliver realizes Nanao herself probably doesn't know how she's doing it: she's acting on pure instinct.

Oliver hatches a plan, sending Nanao jumping off a table he enchanted earlier in the fight to catch Miligan in a pincer. Which is when he realizes he's made a critical mistake in his assessment of Miligan's fighting style: Miligan doesn't have one basilisk eye, she has two, and the second is in her off-hand! Nanao's finished!

Or is she?

"Too slow. I won't reach her like this. The curse inflicted by that eye surely travels at the speed of light. So I must first slice through the space that surrounds it, and the time that flows around it! And then my blade shall become faster than light itself!"

A dumbfounded Miligan can only watch as her left hand, impossibly, simply falls off the end of her wrist before she can curse Nanao. The samurai girl from Yamatsu has created the eponymous Seventh Spellblade.

Alvin Godfrey and Carlos Whitrow, alerted by an anonymous tip, arrive too late to deal with Miligan, but in time to heal their wounds and carry Katie and Miligan to the surface. To everyone's surprise, Katie laughs off her near-vivisection, saying she's going to go give Miligan the slap of her life and then figure out how to deal with her and the rest of the school going forward. Oliver is so relieved that the Cutie wasn't Broken that he bursts into tears.

After the commercial break, the gang is back together. They're in the midst of teasing Katie for picking another fight with Professor Aldiss, when Professor Grenville appears and tells Oliver to come see him tonight. Oliver follows Grenville deep into the labyrinth, where, in the midst of cleaning up the mess left behind by an upperclassmen who was recently "consumed by the spell", Oliver reveals he's deduced that Grenville was secretly backing Miligan, but can't figure out his motive. Grenville explains that he thought her research into "intellectualization" of demihumans could be repurposed towards his own life's goal of cleansing the human race of stupidity, and suggests that Oliver, as a Jack of All Trades but Master of None, would make an excellent research assistant for him. Oliver is flattered by the offer, but has one further question for him:

"In the year 1525 of the Great Calendar, on the eighth night of the fourth month, where were you, and what were you doing?"

Oliver isn't here to assist Grenville at all. He's here to kill him. The two mages draw their athames—and Oliver immediately receives a lethal blow to his throat.

Or not. In fact, Oliver is merely previewing this potential future. He knows full well he doesn't stand a chance against a teacher in a straight fight, but the future isn't set in stone: somewhere, somewhen, there is a potential future where by a one-in-ten-thousand chance, he lands the first blow, and he marks this potential future with his blade and forces it to come to pass. For he, too, wields a spellblade: "Angustavia, the thread that crosses the abyss." Like Nanao before him, he takes Grenville's hand off, before electrocuting him with a lightning spell.

With blood suddenly streaming from his face, he then explains to the shocked Grenville that he remembers every one of the tortures Grenville helped inflict on his mother that night, and Grenville is about to experience each one for himself in turn, unless and until Grenville finds the words that might make him forgive him for existing at all. "DOLOR!"

Wracked with pain, Grenville first threatens him, then tries bribes. Each is met with two words: "Non. DOLOR!" After a brief Flashback Echo of the blonde woman from "Ceremony" fleeing through a forest, Grenville is an immobile heap of flesh as Oliver taunts him for only making it up to 57 out of 128 tortures. Grenville is still unresponsive, and Oliver screams at him to say something—and gets a whimper: "Please, end it."

Oliver's eyes go empty, and he calmly severs Grenville's head with his athame. Oliver's adoptive siblings Gwyn and Shannon Sherwood appear then, along with Teresa Carste and dozens of masked upperclassmen, who kneel to Oliver as their lord as he names the seven faculty members responsible for the murder of his mother Chloe Halford, the blonde woman we keep seeing, and reveals their faces in his memory: Darius Grenville, Vanessa Aldiss, Frances Gilchrist, Enrico Forghieri, Demitrio Aristides, Baldia Muwezicamili, and last but not least, Headmistress Esmeralda herself, shown running Halford through with her athame after pretending to lead her to safety.

Masked like his comrades, Oliver suddenly recalls Nanao's words from "Soldier", "Enjoy not the sword of vengeance, but the sword of mutual love," and muses that he's about to test the limits of that philosophy.

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This episode provides examples of the following tropes:

• Adaptation Deviation: Godfrey and Carlos didn't appear in the novel's version of the opening scene: it cut off with Nanao asking Oliver for a Smooch of Victory again.
• Adaptational Late Appearance: In the original novels, Chloe Halford's death scene was the prologue chapter, but we're only now shown it in this episode.
• Adaptational Romance Downgrade: The flashback to Chloe's impalement by Esmeralda omits the prologue chapter's mention of Esmeralda's unrequited crush on her.
• All Is Well That Ends Well: The conclusion of the A-plot: Katie's fine, Oliver and Nanao survived fighting a fourth-year, and since the troll is now the only one in the world that can speak Yelglish, the school won't euthanize it for attacking Katie. Katie says she's going to go give Miligan the slap of her life and then decide how to deal with her going forward, and Oliver is so happy he bursts into tears.
• Arc Words: Oliver recalls Nanao's words from "Soldier": "Enjoy not the sword of vengeance, but the sword of mutual love." Oliver's Series Goal is revealed to run directly counter to that philosophy, and he muses that he will test its limits.
• Armor-Piercing Question: "In the year 1525 of the Great Calendar, on the eighth night of the fourth month, where were you, and what were you doing?" This completely changes the tenor of the scene.
• Autopilot Artistry: Oliver surmises that Nanao has no idea how she's Parrying Bullets and then that she doesn't even realize she invented a spellblade: she's acting purely on instinct.
• Beam-O-War: Oliver and Nanao cast Flamma together to intercept a more powerful Fortis Flamma from Miligan. This one ends in a draw with both spells dissipating harmlessly.
• Blood Knight: Miligan is clearly enjoying her battle with Oliver and Nanao.
• Call-Back:
  • Nanao reminds Oliver that she's still waiting for the Smooch of Victory he owes her from "Glare".
  • Oliver says that the monsters Darius killed were each stronger than the garuda, and is awed by Darius making it look effortless.
• Camera Abuse: When Nanao enacts the Seventh Spellblade, her cut is depicted as shattering the camera lens when it lands.
• Cool Mask: Oliver's comrades, excepting the Sherwoods and Teresa Carste, are all clad in black dominoes. Gwyn gives Oliver one of his own: the gilt red-and-black one that's been shown lying on the ground in the opening credits since the first episode.
• Cuddle Bug: As before, Shannon tries to embrace her baby brother, but Oliver tells her to stay back because he hates the idea of getting any of Grenville's blood on her.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique: Oliver has blood streaming from his face after using his Spellblade, and muses to Gwyn that if he tried to use it three times in a row, the strain would probably kill him.
• Empty Eyes: Oliver's eyes go completely blank when Grenville begs him to end it.
• Enemies List: Oliver lists off seven Kimberly professors including Grenville as a kill list: Darius Grenville, Vanessa Aldiss, Frances Gilchrist, Enrico Forghieri, Demitrio Aristides, Baldia Muwezicamili, and last but not least, Headmistress Esmeralda.
• Flashback Echo: Oliver has several: he first recalls his mother's murder from her point-of-view, then recalls Nanao's words from "Soldier", "Enjoy not the sword of vengeance, but the sword of mutual love," and muses that he's about to test the limits of that philosophy.
• Foreign Language Title: "アライズ", the phonetic spelling of "Arise", with the definitional kanji "顕現 kengen", meaning "manifestation".
• Foreshadowing:
  • The architecture in the area of the labyrinth where Grenville takes Oliver is notably different than we've previously seen: a ravine cut through red rocks and dirt, rather than crumbling stone ruins. This foreshadows the later explanation that there are deeper levels of the labyrinth: referencing the novels, this is likely the fifth layer, Firedrake Canyon, but it isn't identified as such. (This is original to the anime: the epilogue of volume 1 doesn't describe the architecture surrounding the dead student's laboratory.)
  • The portal through which the monsters emerged is our first glimpse at the quasi-Lovecraftian cosmology underlying the series, but it isn't explained directly by either Oliver or Grenville.
  • Three of the instructors on Oliver's Enemies List are ones we haven't met yet.
• Ghost Memory: Oliver is revealed to be carrying memories from his murdered mother, not just of her, and can use some of her combat techniques such as the Fourth Spellblade.
• Grievous Bottley Harm: One of the tricks Oliver tries is to blast a tableful of Miligan's glassware with Fragor, showering her with shards.
• Hand Blast: Miligan has a second basilisk eye concealed in the palm of her left hand, which can also transmit the paralyzing curse.
• I Am Not Left-Handed: Miligan reveals she's been holding back her real ace in the hole, simply because she's been enjoying fighting Oliver and Nanao too much.
• Informed Ability: Grenville grumbles to Oliver that he's better with the sword than Luther Garland, the actual Sword Arts instructor. He's admittedly shown one-shotting monsters that Oliver says were each stronger than the garuda, but we don't get to see much of his swordwork because Oliver kills him too fast, and given how much stronger Miligan was than Oliver and Nanao put together, one should probably assume by default that a Kimberly professor would make Oliver look like an amateur.
• Irony: Richard's warning in "Glare" about Grenville's tendency to steal the research of students he works with turns out to be unnecessary in hindsight, because Oliver was planning to murder him all along.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Chloe is run through back-to-front in a surprise attack by Esmeralda.
• In the Back: Chloe is run through back-to-front in a surprise attack by Esmeralda.
• Kansas City Shuffle: Oliver mistakenly thought that Miligan's Hiding Behind Your Bangs hairstyle was meant to conceal her basilisk eye. In fact, it's misdirection from her real ace in the hole: a second basilisk eye implanted in the palm of her left hand.
• Literal Disarming: Both Miligan and Grenville lose a hand to their respective opponents' Spellblades.
• Manly Tears: Oliver is so relieved that Katie is all right both physically and mentally that he bursts into tears on the spot, thankful that he was able to protect her.
• Missing Mom: Oliver's mother was murdered by seven of Kimberly's teachers seven years ago.
• No-Sell: Oliver and Nanao are already considered contenders for the strongest students in their year, but Miligan, by dint of being three years older than them, fends off the best they can throw at her with near-comical ease: when she crosses swords with Nanao, she beats off her attacks one-handed where in "Sword Arts" it was all Oliver could do just to keep Nanao at arm's length.
• Off with His Head!: Oliver places his athame over the catatonic Grenville's neck and pushes the blade through it with an audible crunch.
• Parrying Bullets: Nanao disrupts a fireball and deflects a Razor Wind spell with only her katana, baffling Miligan. In "Glare", Nanao discussed how she was taught to circulate her energy within her body when she learned the sword, and Oliver deduces that Nanao is so used to swinging her katana that it's just an extension of her body.
• Plot-Triggering Death: The entire Myth Arc of the series is revealed to have been caused by the murder of Oliver's mother, Chloe Halford, by seven members of Kimberly's faculty.
• Previously on…: The Teaser consists of a repeat of the last thirty seconds or so of "Glare".
• Rasputinian Death: Grenville's death is not pretty: Oliver severs his hand with the Fourth Spellblade, electrocutes him with Tonitrus to immobilize him, then proceeds to cast an Agony Beam on him 57 times before Grenville begs for death, whereupon Oliver decapitates him.
• Rule of Seven:
  • Nanao invents the Seventh Spellblade. Her given name actually means "seven".
  • Seven Kimberly teachers conspired to torture and murder Oliver's mother, which took place seven years ago.
• Shadow Archetype: The episode draws a direct contrast between Oliver and Nanao, and not just in their usual Brains and Brawn Battle Couple combination. Nanao invents the Seventh Spellblade and severs Miligan's hand with it out of a need to rescue Katie from her, but spares her life, as her sword style repudiates the idea of vengeance in favor of finding joy fighting a Worthy Opponent. Oliver severs Grenville's hand with the Fourth Spellblade, which he recreated from memories of his mother, and then proceeds to torture Grenville until the man begs to be Mercy Killed. Oliver himself notes the difference.
• Silk Hiding Steel: Katie proves far more resilient under pressure than you'd expect: she literally laughs off her ordeal at Miligan's hand and says if she couldn't handle that, she doesn't belong at Kimberly, so she's going to go slap Miligan silly for being an asshat and then decide what to do with her next.
• Slashed Throat: The first potential future Oliver sees when he uses Angustavia is one where Darius cuts his neck almost to the spine.
• Smooch of Victory:
  • Nanao asks Oliver for a kiss on the cheek for winning again.
    Oliver: You're unbelievable.
  • Katie gives both Oliver and Nanao kisses on the cheek as thanks for rescuing her from Miligan.
• Students' Secret Society: Oliver's foster siblings are revealed to have been gathering dozens of like-minded Kimberly upperclassmen together to wage war against the faculty members responsible for Chloe Halford's murder.
• This Cannot Be!: Darius is utterly shocked when Oliver disarms him: not just by the fact that a first-year beat him or because he did it with a spellblade, but because he did it with that spellblade in particular.
  Darius: That spellblade was lost! Lost with her life!
• To the Pain: Oliver menacingly tells Grenville that, As You Know, the pain curse can only inflict pain the caster has experienced—and unfortunately for him, Oliver has the memory of every one of the one hundred twenty-eight tortures that Grenville and his co-conspirators inflicted on his mother. He starts from the first of these and works his way down.
• Unblockable Attack: We finally get our first look at a spellblade in action, as two are revealed this episode.
  • The Fourth Spellblade, "Angustavia, the thread that crosses the abyss", which explores possible futures to find one where the wielder succeeds in striking down their opponent. Previously learned by Chloe Halford, her son Oliver is able to use it in extremis by drawing on his mother's Ghost Memory from her soul contained within him. He uses it to win a Single-Stroke Battle with Darius Grenville.
  • The currently unnamed Seventh Spellblade, with which the wielder uses sheer force of will to simply cut everything between themselves and their target, even the space and time between them. Invented by Nanao in her and Oliver's fight with Vera Miligan, in order to defeat the basilisk eye on Miligan's left hand when she's out of range of a conventional strike. Nanao herself doesn't know how she did it.
• Villains Want Mercy: Over 57 castings of Dolor, Darius Grenville goes from indignance that Oliver would attack a teacher, to trying to bribe him to stop, to limply begging him to just put an end to him already.
• Wham Episode: It starts out pretty normal, segueing from the last episode with Nanao and Oliver fighting Miligan. It's already exciting enough when Nanao invents the eponymous Seventh Spellblade to defeat her. Then (corresponding to the epilogue of volume 1) Oliver gets invited to come alone with Darius Grenville who wants his assistance after his good performance in class, and it becomes very dark very fast. Oliver's real reason for enrolling in the school, the explanation for Oliver's secret collaborators, and ultimately the underlying Myth Arc of the entire show and the full truth of his Roaring Rampage of Revenge, are all finally revealed: following the Cruel and Unusual Death of his mother, Oliver's true goal has actually been to slaughter all her murderers... with Grenville as the first on his hit list. The teacher ends up getting violently and bloodily mutilated, tortured and finally killed by Oliver, and the episode reaches its end with our somewhat morally ambiguous protagonist reiterating his vow to enact bloody revenge on an Enemies List that includes over half the faculty.
• Wham Line: Oliver to Darius Grenville: "On the eighth night of the fourth month of the year 1525, where were you, and what were you doing?" Finally we're introduced to Oliver's true purpose in attending Kimberly, and it's a doozy.
• You Killed My Father: Oliver reveals his Series Goal: he's plotting to kill six teachers and the headmistress to avenge their murder of his mother, Chloe Halford.

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