Xebek’s Blog

Shirou has to find a way to replenish Saber’s mana while Ilya looks for them. We get the beginning of a fight between Saber and Berserker near the end.

Summary:

We start off with Shirou, Saber and Rin escaping, running through the forest away from Ilya. Saber is still hurt and Shirou attempts to carry her. Even after her refusal at being helped by Shirou, Shirou picks her up and carries her because she is hurt. Rin leads them to an abandoned shack kind of place in the forest she said Archer pointed out on their way here as a hideout. They go inside to rest and Rin says it should be safe until morning here. Rin says they have to replenish Saber’s mana if she is to stand any chance in a fight. Rin says their only option is to establish a connection between Shirou and Saber so he can replenish her mana. Rin says they need to transfer Shirou’s magic circuit to Saber and Saber says how that is way too much, to a magician their magic circuit is more important then their life. Shirou says he will do it but Rin warns him that it is like the equivalent of ripping out a whole connection of nerves, he will never be able to reach his full potential as a magician. Shirou doesn’t care and they go ahead with the ritual in which Saber and Shirou get rather close as a lot of physical contact is required.

We shoot to morning where Shirou and Saber are asleep on the bed there next to each other. Shirou wakes up seeing this and gets really embarrassed and backs away. Saber gets up saying she is fine now and Shirou says that’s good. Saber thanks Shirou and apologizes for making him do something such as give up one of his magic circuits but Shirou says its ok, hit seems he can still sue the only magic he ever knew and he probably transferred over a circuit he doesn’t use. The three of them come up with a battle plan that they need to attack Berserker and catch him off guard so they can finish him off before he has a chance to counter attack. Shirou says there isn’t really a way they can sneak up on him but Rin says that she can conceal her presence and hide which Saber and Shirou confront him. Saber says Shirou as no way to fight and would be in danger but Shirou picks up a tick and transforms it into a bow saying he can use this, much to everyone’s shock.

Soon after Ilya and Berserker arrive and Rin hides up in a nearby tree. Ilya says it doesn’t matter that Saber has recovered, they can’t beat Berserker. Saber and Berserker start fighting, Saber fairing fairly poorly, but not being dead or anything. After Shirou’s bow shot does absolutely nothing he whines to himself how he wasn’t of any use but says perhaps he can make another weapon, a sword. Just then Rin jumps out and throws some of her magic jewels, managing to incase Berserkers arm with his cleaver in ice. Berserker grabs onto Rin but she blows his head away with her remaining jewels. He recovers to Rin’s shock as she is sure she killed him. Ilya says she did but explains Berserkers Noble Phantasm which is that he has twelve lives, he has seven left now. Berserker then continues to crush Rin and the episode ends.

Impressions:

The whole magic transfer deal was…interesting. It was interesting to know that because Shirou did this thing for Saber he will never reach the height of his potential as a magician. It showed really how much he cares for Saber and how much he places her and others before him. Although the actual transfer process was a bit odd and not explained as thoroughly as to what went on as it was in the game. It did hint at basically a big physical connection and closeness between the two of them. They are also now connected together and Saber stands more of a chance now that Shirou can replenish her mana.

I thought it was kind of interesting how Saber kept refusing to be carried in the forest but Shirou insisted, placing her safety as a high priority. He forcefully picked her up and it was kind of cute how she struggled, saying to let her down but kind of realized that Shirou just cares about her.

We finally get an explanation to Ilya saying how Archer killed Berserker five times yet here he is as good as new. One thing confuses me though, if Archer killed Berserker five times, Rin killed him once, and then how does he have seven remaining? So far he has been killed six times total, and he has a total of twelve lives so shouldn’t that mean six more lives left? Eh, maybe they mean that he can be killed twelve times before he is on his original life or something. More then likely something got messed up in the translation though.

We saw a bit more of a connection between Shirou and Archer, Shirou making a stick into a bow to use as he used to be in archery club and fairly good at it. Although just a normal attack from him didn’t really do anything to Berserker he still made the bow and Saber and Rin both seemed shocked, more at thee fact he did something like that in the first place though. He said he will try and make a sword to use but we don’t’ get to the point where he actually makes it, I think he will make one in the next episode and it could possibly be Caliburn. He saw an image of Caliburn and knows it’s connected to Saber somehow and would maybe work better then Excalibur.