Xebek’s Blog

Interesting fight at the beginning as well as the advancement of Shirou’s character and the relationship between Saber and Shirou.

Summary:

We start off where the last episode left off. Shirou, Saber and Rin came across a young girl who introduces herself as Ilya and her giant Servant Berserker. Ilya’s last name which is some long German like thing I’m not going to look up rings a bell for Rin. Ilya quickly commands Berserker to attack and Saber jumps into the fray. Saber is doing pretty well, but not as well as Berserker. Rin tries to help by using some of her magic but Berserker is too strong. Just when Saber is hurt enough not to be able to move out of the way, to everyone’s surprise Shirou pushes Saber out of the way and takes the giant blow from the steel/stone 20 ton cleaver himself. Everyone is just in awe, that’s not what a Master is supposed to do. Ilya for some reason then leaves, I guess because of what Shirou did for some reason that made her retreat.

Shirou then wakes up all bandaged in his house after taking a swing from a heavy object at a force likely equal to a train. He finds Rin there who had apparently carried him here. Shirou asks why he is still alive and Rin mentions that Saber has the ability to regenerate herself and that magic may have carried over to him, but usually that doesn’t happen but usually you don’t have a Master as weak as Shirou either. Rin talks to Shirou about what he is going to do and Shirou says that he doesn’t want the Holy Grail; he just wants to stop people from doing evil things to get it. Rin tells Shirou to not tell Saber that or she will kill him. She says that Servants also fight because they too get a wish out of it too. She also mentions how stupid Shirou was to try and save Saber by getting hit, because Saber would die too basically if Shirou were to die. The two of them depart but before going Rin says that it would be best if Shirou would consider her not a human, and then leaves.

Shirou goes to find Saber who is in this shrine that is apparently in or next to Shirou’s house. Saber is out of her armor and again Shirou seems stunned by her grace. The two of them get to talking and Saber says that she doesn’t agree with Shirou’s actions during the fight last night. She says that combat is her expertise and he should stay to doing his job. Shirou says that he doesn’t need a reason to save someone and Saber is shocked at this, obviously not having encountered a Master like him if Servants are re used which I’m not exactly sure if they are. Saber seems a bit in awe at Shirou’s character in general and the two of them head off to eat together and the episode ends.

Impressions:

Interesting episode with the proper introduction of a new Master and a new Servant. We also saw a couple times just a shot of someone, apparently female in a hooded robe to be looking into some crystal ball, watching the fight between Saber and Berserker, possibly another Master or Servant. I was wondering during the fight however why the hell didn’t Rin call Archer to fight Berserker alongside Saber damnit. I realize they aren’t super happy go lucky friends but obviously Berserker was after both Shirou and Rin and at the meantime Shirou and Rin had a truce so they could have worked together at that time then go back to the cease fire till their departure, I guess Rin was either a coward or just… um a coward, either scared Archer will be killed by Berserker or by Saber.

We see a bit between Rin and Shirou when Shirou first woke up. Rin talked about how she didn’t remember being on the same team as him which brings more to the surface that they aren’t allies, they are enemies even though so far they had cooperated. We will probably see something between the two of them later on where they have to fight each other or they won’t because they know each other and/or one of them endangering themselves to save the other.

It was nice to see something between Saber and Shirou which could possibly develop even further. It seemed like Saber was surprised with Shirou’s action to save her as well as his reasoning that he doesn’t need a reason to save a person. There could very possibly be some more development in their relationship, maybe into something romantic will have to see.