Satsuriku no Tenshi – Episode 15 [A Vow Cannot Be Stolen]

The priest, Abraham Gray, is slowly walking through all the burning floors of the dungeon. Is he its ultimate creator? Is he an angel, and that’s why he doesn’t appear to be getting hurt by the flames?

Gray makes his way to the broken stained glass window and looks up at the staircase, the one Zack and Rachel are trying to escape on.

Speaking of which, our duo have reached a dead end. Partway up the staircase they reach a metal cage wall with thick bars. Zack insists on trying to slice through them with his scythe but he is unable to. Unfortunately for him the flames catch up to him and Rachel by this point, and having the flames at their feet causes Zack to flash back to his childhood. Seeing that Zack is unable to do anything Rachel attempts to step up and break the iron bars by beating on them with the handle of Zack’s knife (yes really), and seeing Rachel actually *try* to help them seems to snap Zack back into reality.

Side note: the flames are right at Zack and Rachel’s feet in this scene and they don’t appear to be hurt by the fire either, so maybe the flames are just an illusion? Maybe the explosions combined with the fake flames are just designed to create the appearance of a self-destruction?

Zack launches into his power-up mode a la Dragonball Z-style and with one heavy swing of his blade, he’s able to cut right through the bars. Huzzah! Zack picks up Rachel and together they clear other obstacles on the staircase, such as large rocks blocking their path and a hole in the floor. They’re finally able to see the light at the top of the staircase when several large boulders fall from the ceiling and completely block their path.

With a simple command from Rachel Zack is able to break through the rocks fairly easily, but doing so causes his poor scythe to finally break. So now the only weapon between both Zack and Rachel is Zack’s old knife. Hopefully it will be enough to fend off any other dangers they may come across. If you want to look at the breaking of Zack’s scythe in a metaphorical light, one could probably argue that this incident represents Zack turning over a new leaf and being less of a cold-hearted murderer, etc etc etc. But maybe I’m just reading into it too much. ;D

At the top of the staircase is a closed set of doors. Zack appears eager to get outside but Rachel has some reservations. After all once they go outside, Zack will kill her right? But what if she doesn’t want to die anymore…? Oh wait no, she still wants to die, she just wants Zack to kill her because he WANTS to kill her, not because she asked him to. Zack tells her to stop worrying about it; he gave her his old knife so it would keep her alive until he was able to kill her. So hey, looks like Rachel might still die at Zack’s hands after all.

From out of the darkness Doctor Danny suddenly slithers out and shoots Rachel in the back with a silencer. Fucking creepy ass dude – MidnightDevont was right, we hadn’t see the last of Danny’s ugly face. Zack attempts to attack Danny with his bare hands but is shot in the shoulder, forcing him to stop in his place. If he tries to approach either Danny or Rachel, Danny will shoot Zack again.

As she slowly bleeds out on the cold concrete floor, Rachel tells Danny that Zack is merely a human. And he has given her lots of things, even if he doesn’t always give her everything she wants. This really pisses Danny off, who points out that Zac only gave her his shitty knife while he gave her a floor of the building, clothes, food, and everything else she enjoyed as an Angel of Death. How dare she not be grateful?!

Rachel rebuffs this by saying what she really wanted was to be wanted both while she was alive and when she died. Making the promise with Zack and trying to escape the building helped her realize that they two very small desires were enough for her. She didn’t need a whole floor to herself, nor any of the creature comforts Danny gave her. After all she felt dead all the time, so what did physical things matter to her?

Rachel forces herself up off the floor long enough to reassure Zack that even if she dies without him having fulfilled his promise, he won’t be a liar. She will carry their promise, his vow, together with her into death.

Danny seems to be on the verge of another mental breakdown, but he pulls himself together enough to shoot Rachel one more time. He’s about to shoot Zack as well when he’s suddenly shot in the shoulder with an arrow from high above. It’s the priest Abraham!

Gray reveals that Danny is his son, and that he didn’t expect Danny to be so selfish. Gray tells Zack that Rachel is still alive and if he leaves with Rachel RIGHT NOW, he can still save her. Zack wastes no time scooping Rachel into his arms, but will he be able to escape with Danny still aiming at him?

After the credits roll there’s a film reel showing flashbacks from throughout the series up until this point. Rachel’s past, Zack’s past, Rachel with Danny, the other Angels of Death, and a few moments from each episode. A remixed version of the ending theme “Pray” (sung by Rachel’s seiyuu, Haruka Chisuga) plays in the background.

This was the first episode I’ve seen where Rachel is no longer a dead doll and both she and Zack have strengthened their bond, and all I can say is I wish it had happened sooner because it would have made this show a lot more enjoyable to watch. I was definitely caught off guard by Rachel being shot by Danny, almost as shocked as Zack really. xD

Speaking of shocking, I also didn’t see the blood connection between Danny and Gray.  I’m just really oblivious to these things sometimes, heh… ^^;;

So if Gray was behind this whole Angels of Death experiment, what was the point? Was he trying to judge just Rachel, or have there been other victims too? I hope we learn more about the building of death in the last episode, and what the whole point of the setup was.

The title of the last episode as shown in the post-credits film reel is “Stop crying and smile” and honestly, I think that’s a big hint that Rachel’s going to die.  But we’ll learn the truth next week!