With Kiyoka busy out in the field to investigate the removal of the Grave’s seal, and dealing with the dangerous Grotesqueries, it was time for our weekly dosage of romance to take the backseat. While I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss our fluffy content between our wholesome lovebirds, I’m equally as excited to see the new conflict put in the center of the spotlight for an exchange.
Miyo has been focusing on her lessons with Hazuki, which is honestly something I am thankful for since it gives her something else to do at home while Kiyoka is very busy. She and Hazuki have been getting along swimmingly, but we saw how the deeply rooted trauma that Kaya has scarred her ability to be able to refer to Hazuki as “sister”, and it prompted her to wonder what it means to be family. Understandably so considering she grew up in a household that didn’t treat her like family. In fact I really liked the way they conveyed that bit. This was more or less close to what I had hoped to see them do back in episode 4 when Miyo had the unfortunate encounter with Kaya in the city. Small details like that do a great job displaying how she’s internally coping. Actually it does make me wonder if following up from last week’s episode, if the staff (at the time of the development) realized at that point that it’d be a good idea to start putting more attention to detail in that regards, but I digress.
However that instance of trauma briefly resurfacing was the least of Miyo’s concerns as this week, the main culprit for Miyo’s suffering is being plagued by nightmares of the Grotesqueries. And that, combined with her determination to do well in her lessons, she’s just downright exhausted. Thankfully this doesn’t go unnoticed by Hazuki and Yurie, but unfortunately Miyo’s condition took a nosedive before they could get back home after realizing that Miyo was not in any condition to continue their outing in town, which led to her meeting Arata.
Oh Arata… I’m feeling exactly how I felt about him when he first emerged in the novel all over again, hahaha! He certainly does a good job of leaving a not-so-hot first impression considering he rubbed me the wrong way right off the bat. The way he was talking to Kiyoka about being envious of his engagement, like that wasn’t subtle at all, especially later at the end of the episode, when he refers to Miyo as “my dear”. EXCUSE ME SIR, I NEED YOU TO BACK OFF. Also did I mention that he referred to her name despite the two having never met before? Yeah, talk about screaming ULTERIOR MOTIVES! Also doesn’t help that he claims to be ‘its protector’, sure buddy. Keep telling yourself that. So naturally, seeing him be the one to catch Miyo when she collapsed had that “Ah this little shit” feelings resurface again. Still, better that someone had caught her because that would have been a very rough landing, but we could see that the first person she thought and hoped was Kiyoka– oh the immeasurable disappointment of it being someone else entirely.
Although Arata goes by the name Tsuruki, with asking the Emperor permission to finally act, seeing him next to the sakura tree that we know is closely tied with Sumi, and bringing up Miyo’s awakening at that all points to that he (and the old man we saw for the first time) are in fact part of the Usuba family. It’s almost infuriating in a sense of Kiyoka has been struggling to find any clues to Usuba in order to try and help Miyo, and then this motherfucker quite literally just walks into his office feigning ignorance.
But it makes sense that he has a different family name. We already know that due to the nature of their powers, the Usuba family has gone out of their way to practically remove themselves from the grid of society. That’s why people think they are just a myth.
Apart from his suspicious involvement with Miyo, Arata’s purpose this week was to contribute to handing Kiyoka vital information regarding the Grave’s location and the Grotesqueries following the meeting with Prince Takaihito. Okaito, Kiyoka and Kazushi were all called in hear the revelation he had regarding the matter of the destruction of the Grave’s seal.
The tomb otherwise referred to as the “Grave” is a burial ground for gift-users, where vengeful spirits of the gifted transform into Grotesqueries. The purpose of the seal is to keep them at bay, or else should they run wild, they would create a crisis that would be difficult to control. And we saw just how much Kiyoka’s team struggled to deal with a few, to the point they fear what would happen if an army of them were to invade the imperial capital. It’s an ominous foreboding of the things to come following the revelation Prince Takaihito had of an imminent battle, and the warning that if things don’t go well, some will lose their lives.
But that wasn’t the only thing that he brought up. He also personally gave Kiyoka a heads up that Miyo will likely be involved in the upcoming crisis, as seemingly indicated with her endless nightmares of the Grotesqueries– which seems to be progressively getting more brutal as time goes on.
Interestingly, at the exact same time— we did get to see a similar mannerism of perspective with Kazushi (the new head of the Tatsuishi family) when he had to use his powers. His job in the investigation is to remove curses, but the (suspected) curse the Grotesqueries had inflicted onto their “victims” (the perpetrators) causing them to be catatonic, making it impossible to interograte them. But in the end, Kazushi was unable to do so because the Grotesqueries’ powers were far too overwhelming for him to deal with. The fact that Kazushi was able to enter the same sort of “realm space” so to speak as Miyo gives us a hint as to what kind of role Miyo may be playing once she undergoes her ‘awakening’.
And speaking of Kazushi, it was nice to see despite his carefree demeanour, the guy knows how to act appropriately when needed. He already left a much better impression on me than both his brother and father. That doesn’t stop him from being true to himself with his flashy colors (though in fairness, as he said, he isn’t part of the military so there’s no uniform to be worn to begin with). I do find him to be an amusing guy, especially with the way he spoke of the perpetrators’ condition and what they’ll get into once they wake up.
As for Kiyoka, he has his hands full with dealing with the Grotesqueries, so sadly he hasn’t been able to spend much time with Miyo lately. But that hasn’t stopped him from checking up on Miyo when he can, and keeping up with his personal investigation on the Usuba family. It’s the little moments that count.
Unfortunately that meant some bits of the kinds of nightmares Miyo was having had been cut out. I am hoping that maybe they decided to reallocate to the next episode instead, but I suppose it’s not a huge deal breaker if they cut it out entirely. It just shows that there’s more going than just the Grotesqueries plaguing her. We’ll have to wait and see whether it comes about in the next one!
