Shakugan no Shana III Ep 7: Entering the Divine Gate

Summary

While beginning the procedure to recover Sairei no Hebi’s old body through the Divine Gate, Yuuji notices Hecate’s flame and realizes that she’s attempting to kill Shana. After sorting it out, Shana sees him off as he heads out to the Gate after giving a mobilizing speech to the masses of Tomogara in the Seireiden.

Back in Misaki City, Kazumi once again encounters the Tuner Flame Haze Khamsin, and asks him the reason why Pheles gave her the suicidal Hougu. Khamsin tells her a story about a prince who became a Flame Haze.

Impression

Hecate’s definitely changed from how she was back in Season 1, when she was empty, and had no emotions but an unlimited amount of existence. From both her interactions with Yuuji and memories as Konoe Fumina, she has enough emotion to act out of her own will, and try and kill Shana, seeing her as unnecessary. I think it’s probably due to some sort of jealousy or attachment to him, as she’s hesitated in attacking Yuuji in the past and now he’s both far stronger and merged with a Tomogara, there would be no taboo anymore. In any case, its the first time I’ve ever seen her so outspoken, completely different to her old personality.

Yuuji tells Shana (who now seems a lot less scared of him) and with more detail, Alastor that he wants to open the path towards where his old body was sealed at the end of the last great Flame Haze battle, the Divine Gate. Now here one of Sairei no Hebi’s objectives is revealed – he wants his old body back. Which is understandable, since sharing a body between two minds must be frustrating. How Yuuji and the Snake coordinate it, I have no idea. Though he tells Shana that both Yuuji and the Reiji Maigo are too important to get rid of, I wonder what exactly happens to Yuuji once the Snake gets his body back – aren’t they a merged entity now?

That speech Yuuji gave to the hundreds of Tomogara while having a dolled-up Shana by his side was so badass xD I don’t think the Flame Haze know about the exact proportion of Tomogara they’ll have to fight against, and that’s not even including any of the bigshots like Sydonay or Hecate. There’s Lamies too and his messing around with unrestricted spells, but we have hardly any info on that. At this point Yuuji seems to be doing a Suzaku and trying to change the balance of things from inside, though its certainly achievable with the fact that he’s the leader of Bal Masque. With him and the top 3 gone, it’ll be easy for Wilhelmina and Rebecca to gatecrash in and blow some stuff up xD And it looks like they’ll try and restore the Tendou-kyu to do that.

Meanwhile we have Kazumi back in Misaki City, who’s still struggling with the rejection and the concept of love. With no-one else to talk to, emphasised by how Oga cheerfully talks to her about getting everyone together without mentioning Yuuji, she tells her whole story to Khamsin, who finally reappears after all this time.

That story he told Kazumi was interesting, about the Flame Haze and Tomogara loving each other, but fighting all the same. I’m not sure if that “love” was figurative or not, since it could apply to Shana and Yuuji’s situation right now. Also I have this feeling the prince turned Flame Haze was Khamsin himself, there’s no way he could have mentioned so much detail just by hearing the story.

Okay, so we know that even after rejection, Kazumi’s actually contemplating on using that Hougu and leaving Shana and Yuuji alone. Bitch. Now she needs to hurry up and do it. Next episode would be helpful.

She actually seems a bit more tolerable now that she’s not a love rival anymore.