Impression
I did say Freyja was a trap! Her revelation as Thor helped secure their victory – they couldn’t have beaten Thrym without him, and that’s exactly how they failed during the alternate ending, with Klein’s requests to free “Freyja” from her cage denied. Of course, poor Klein probably had it worse off this way instead – I feel slightly bad saying this, but his attempts to woo lots of in-game AI girls totally made the arc for me. It was made ambiguous in the anime, but I’m pretty sure I remember him actually succeeding in getting Skuld’s contact info in the novels, hence why Lizbeth talks about respecting him right after that scene. God knows what that number actually is… but hey, anything’s possible if Yui’s real enough.
This was a short side story, so I wasn’t expecting too much, but it still felt a bit underwhelming (just like this review) – especially the actual scenes involving Excaliber, ironically enough. While there wasn’t much doubt that Kirito would succeed in getting it (perhaps more surprising was Lizbeth’s acquisition of a legendary hammer – yes, it went to Liz) I did wish they’d made his decision to let it go -and Sinon’s subsequent moment of glory- a bit more dramatic. And a bit more explanation would have been nice too. Kirito sort of tossed it after a bit of pondering, whereas it was actually quite a monumental decision since he wouldn’t have been able to get onto Tonkii whilst holding Excaliber as well – Sinon then defied expectations by successfully shooting a retrieving arrow 200m away when the effective range of the bow was really only 100m. Don’t ask me how I remember that without having read the novels, it just came to mind for some reason. I think her Cait Sith design could have been a bit furrier too, but I’m getting off topic. Whoopee for late night ramblings!