It was his sword, Mr. Krabs! He was Number One!

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

Eugeo allows the Integrity Knight to get dressed. He then asks about Fanatio, though Eugeo flips that he cares about one knight over others. The knight responds that he’s just more invested in Fanatio than the others, though he thinks that Alice might be able to take him down. Their duel begins, with both parsing out the others’ stances before a single swing is made. The knight announces himself as Bercouli Synthesis One, much to Eugeo’s shock, and makes a strike that seems to distort the air and overpowers Eugeo. Bercouli explains that his power can slash a moment in the future, with his sword having been made out of a Divine Object called the “System Clock” that existed when Underworld was first made, much like Alice’s Osmanthus sword. Though unlike that sword, that cuts through space, Bercouli’s sword cuts through time.

Eugeo then starts planning to use long-range attacks, something Bercouli has seen in every opponent before. So, Eugeo uses his Blue Rose Sword’s ice powers to create distractions before tripping and throwing Bercouli into the water, then freezing the room with “Release Recollection” to trap him. When he resists, Eugeo activates its other Recollection ability to start absorbing Bercouli’s life energy. He then tells him about the legends he’s inspired, the village he founded, and his previous ownership of the Blue Rose Sword, all in an attempt to trigger his memories before he became an Integrity Knight.

But before their conversation can continue, a crackling ball bounces in, revealing himself to be a clown named Prime Senator Chudelkin who starts talking down to the injured Bercouli, threatening that his loss counts as treason against the Pontifex. Bercouli starts talking back, pointing out that he and the rest of the knights have been lied to, so Chudelkin casts “Deep Freeze” to completely petrify him, setting his eyes on Eugeo next as he also succumbs to the freezing.

Meanwhile, Kirito and Alice continue to chat and recover. Eventually, the topic turns to Alice’s sister, Selka, which strikes a chord in her. She then asks for more details about her past life, which Kirito begins to tell. This leads into a recap episode that we are thankfully skipping!

OUR TAKE

I’ve mentioned before how, between the two of them, I find Eugeo to be a more compelling character than Kirito. For one, he’s far less skilled and experienced in combat, meaning he has room to improve and therefore room to grow and develop as a character. He’s also got a more rigged view and moral outlook of the world, meaning there are more things about it are bound to get a reaction out of him. In particular, his previous exaltation of the Integrity Knights giving way to resentment and malice as he learns that what he once knew about them was actually a farce. And coupling that with his drive to save Alice from their control, he’s more driven and desperate to fight the system that took her, even when he’s massively outclassed.

Luckily, while he’s up against Bercouli, the ostensibly strongest knight of the bunch and the source of Eugeo’s own heroic aspirations, he seems to have found him when he’s long past his prime. Oddly enough, this actually makes him the perfect opponent for Eugeo’s first fight without Kirito to guide him or lend him back up. As the original owner of the Blue Rose Sword, it serves his character much in the same way as Luke’s duel against Darth Vader in “Empire Strikes Back”, where he idolized heroic figure of legend is faced by the idealistic young warrior to best illustrate how the former has strayed from the path while the latter is still not nearly prepared enough to face them. And while Bercouli very clearly isn’t Eugeo’s father nor a force-choking masked asthmatic, he IS the source of Eugeo’s standards of a hero that inspired him, much like the idea of Anakin was for Luke, so seeing him as less than the warrior he used to be is just another example of how the Axiom Church is corrupting these knights by sealing their memories and forcibly extending their lives.

Yet a minor point of annoyance for me is that, despite plowing their way through these supposedly legendary warriors, neither Eugeo nor Kirito has really been faced with much in the way of a moral dilemma so far. Kirito pretty much always seems to know exactly what’s best, so every action he takes is basically the “right” choice, while Eugeo has never been faced with a situation that really tests his character (and no, deciding to whether or not allow his friends to be raped does not qualify when the correct answer is blindingly obvious). He ALMOST had a chance here to be conflicted between killing his idol Bercouli out of vengeance OR wanting to uphold the ideals of a knight that he once believed by sparing him, but then that chance was taken from him when Chudelkin arrived. Either way, it at least looks like Eugeo’s struggles aren’t over yet, so we’ll see where his path goes next.

Score 8/10