After a one week break with some fun fanservice and character development for Shadow Garden, the show works its way back with Rose Oriana betraying Shadow Garden!

Recap & Reaction

This episode features the start of a brand new arc. A newer character gets reintroduced and Shadow Garden end up in another major dilemma as Rose Oriana finds her way back into the Cult’s Hands. Shadow tries to reinvent himself, but when he finally figures something out, it goes awry..

Opener

The episode starts off straight into Cid being served tea in an inn, with the lady inn owner explaining the details of the current war. She goes on to explains that their town has been getting war torn and rations are becoming minimal. Very specially, she mentions of the destruction of the “main street.”

Since the events of the previous arc, Cid decided that it was time to take a step away from Shadow Garden for a bit, before he goes back to act like nothing changed. This has become the perfect opportunity for him to take a deeper dive into his self-reflection. Within his self-reflection, he ponders what direction the “Eminence in Shadow” should take. Before, it was kind of random of how he fought ‘shadows.’ Now, it seems like Cid wants to be more deliberate with where he takes his ’eminence.’

Right away, it’s easy for the audience to pick up the theme because of war. In the previous arc, it ‘satired’ the world of finance and how our money works, which is brilliant with the timing of society today with inflation. Now, we have what looks like an exposition at the beginning of the episode to satirize the theme of war.

Before Cid gets out of his thought of where wants to take his eminence, he speaks out loud with, “can things really go on like this?” Because of the lady inn owner speaking to Cid about the war, she thinks he’s referring to the war.

In any show or movie, this is a classic trope of “thinking one thing and saying one thing for the other character to think another.” I’m sure there are more technical terms for writers, but wanted to note that these miscommunications and the irony that it brings is perfect for this anime.

It begins to slowly pan to 664 and 665 having their usual banter around food next to Cid. Then, it transitions to 666 laying in her bed having night terrors while apologizing in her sleep.

666, formerly known as Rose Oriana, is a pretty traumatic character. Too weak to make a difference, felt she couldn’t have a relationship with Cid because of her “demon possessed” situation and felt forced to kill her father. With a new arc about to begin, it makes sense to put the focus back onto Rose, who has all the ingredients to make this next arc deeply connecting.

The Path of 666

Right on cue after the opening credits, Rose has flashback nightmare about the exact moment when she killed her father. Having guilt would be an understatement. With the remnants of a town being war torn, Rose realizes how far her kingdom has fallen. As she starts waking up in the inn, Rose explains that the town they are in is called, “First Castle Town.” In her quest to become stronger, she thought becoming a part of Shadow Garden would help her make a bigger difference in the world, resulting in her saving the ‘cult-riddled’ Oriana Kingdom.

664 and 665 go on wake up Rose to inform her of their next mission. As they walk around town, they all discuss 559 taking the lead onto their next mission. They detail that 559 defeated 89, which gives her the right to challenge the “Numbers” to increase their rank.

This is probably where the anime doesn’t do that great of a job providing how Shadow Garden really works internally. It’s not great for context within the organzation itself, but doesn’t make a big impact on the narrative.

559 Takes the Lead

The trio of 664, 665 and 666 rendezvous with 559, who starts to contextualize their situation. The “Perv Faction” started to take over strongholds, but their business isn’t exactly with war. Their true objective is to find out exactly what the Cult of Diablos is looking for. Rose Oriana was chosen for this mission as she is aware of the area of Fort First, where their mission is located.

Blessed with the power from Shadow, 559 notes the significance of Rose receiving power directly from him.. Then, it is emphatically revealed that only 559 and Rose were granted this blessing outside of the Seven Shadows. Except, there is a big difference between Rose and 559—Rose remains weak.

Season 2 has been teasing Rose’s most crucial character development being her “lack of strength,” this entire season. As her dilemma comes to a climatic point in her character development, 559 looks to make her rise to the challenge of being worthy of Shadow’s strength or just crush her instead.

Huge Revelations!

At the Fort First stronghold, the four numbers gather around from the shadows to get intel on what the Cult is up to. 664 points out a new character that “Kouadoi the Gale,” is one of the Cult’s leaders. Everyone with him are “Named Children.” For reference, they are all around the level of Rex, the Game of Betrayal. Kouadoi pulls out a card and inserts it into a cylinder platform. Rose notices this being reminiscent of the Sanctuary during the Goddess Trials.

In a stunning revelation, the Queen of Oriana comes out to place her hand on a triangular crest to open up access to a particular item. The other Numbers hint at Queen Oriana being just as significant as the event implies, but before they can specify, a ring pops out from where Queen Oriana placed her hand. Kouadoi marvels at the confirmation that Royal blood was the means to have access to this item. Added more into the lore of this special ring, it was “protected by the Hero Freya.”

It’s hard to not love this scene for it does to make the plot interesting, by introducing many new elements. It introduces a new character with her own unique personality. It throws a plot twist in the mix without revealing the true significance of it, which is Rose’s mom and how the Royal blood applies to these important items like the ring. One thing after another becomes more and more interesting by introducing something new. To top it all off, it did what the previous arc did by having Shadow Garden fight amongst themselves.

The Fight for the Ring!

Giving a surprising command, 559 tells the other Numbers that they will be fighting the Cult here, head on. The ring is of extreme importance to obtain from them, as it is a ‘key’ to something major. What is the key is for? That information is withheld from 664, 665 and 666. With Rose urgently wanting to help her mom, 559 makes an exploding entrance upon the Cult while saying, “why does that matter?” Displaying just how powerful and confident she is by the ground exploding as she makes herself known to the Cult, she makes the attempt to assassinate Queen Oriana. Before 559 can kill her, 666 is still Rose Oriana by heart and stops her in her tracks.

This brings one of the biggest surprises to plot twist. Given that this would have simply been a “Shadow Garden vs the Cult” scenario. Now, this twist has Rose having to fend off a character that wants to kill her mom and is presumed to be much stronger than her. This scene forces all of Rose’s dilemma in her character development to a major climatic moment. Rose is forced to get stronger and to protect her loving parent—tying in the emotional connection and the ‘shounenistic’ aspect of wanting to get stronger in order to protect.

Rightfully, the Cult finds it hilarious that Shadow Garden showed up just to fight amongst themselves and bring back Rose. Queen Oriana cries out in fear for Rose’s protection. 559 ends up clocking Rose right in the cheek.

The Named Children, “Howard the Cyclone” and “Alphard the Headwind,” are tasked with fighting 664, 665 and 559. Because of 666’s defiance, 559 has the reason she needs to kill both of them; being that all of her actions are for Shadow Garden’s objective and Shadow’s honor.

This is a nice little mid episode cliffhanger, but what happens next in the little time-skip can be confusing.

Nu’s Report to Gamma

The scene transitions from 559 stating that she would take down both Rose and her mom to Nu updating Gamma about everything that has been revealed of their mission up until this point. Gamma goes on to inform the audience of the commonplace of a mission like this against the Cult at the ruins. Furthermore, she explains “Mordred, the Ninth Seat of Rounds,” as being the main leader behind the Oriana Kingdom takeover form the Cult.

It turns out that Rose and Queen Oriana survived and was taken in by the Cult back to Oriana Kingdom. Given that the citizens are now aware of Rose’s return, this caused quite the ruckus politically with the pro-Perv and anti-Perv parties. She informs the audience that Lambda is preparing many Shadow Garden troops to make a move onto Oriana Kingdom. Since the Cult has Rose in their possession, this will force Sir Perv Asset and Mordred to reveal their next moves.

From this point on, Gamma makes the assumption that Shadow was the one that set this whole plan up from the beginning. It will be on him to save Rose. However, Gamma doesn’t know where Shadow’s end game will be.

This scene tied in with the later scene when they show 559, 664 and 665 again is a little confusing. Gamma updates us after Rose already made it back to Oriana Kingdom? The Cult took back Rose, but 559, 664 and 665 somehow end up fighting against Kouadoi again? How did the Cult escape with Rose the first time?

Cid Being Cid

Cid wakes back up in the inn and goes back downstairs to the inn’s cafe to have himself a drink. Reading the newspaper, he becomes aware of the political turmoil in Oriana Kingdom. His whole dilemma is over what he wants to do as the Eminence in Shadow. Certainly, this is a scenario that calls for him in what he calls a “fixer move.”

Cid being Cid.. Confident in his take of Rose wanting to be queen so bad that she would kill her father to do so, is quite the Cid conclusion. The idea of a tyrannical Queen Rose Oriana sounds like something he can get behind. It’s not because Shadow is an evil tyrant himself, but he wants to set himself up for an epic showdown with her after she plays villain against all the heroes that try to stop her. Given their backstory and connection with each other, it calls for the perfect climatic end in his vision as the Eminence in Shadow. In the mean time when Cid ponders these wild narratives, he continues the running gag of speaking out loud and the inn owner continually misinterprets it.

Typical Cid, thinking of wild fantasies that he 100% believes is the case and the ironic miscommunications with the lady inn owner are pretty much Eminence in Shadow motifs. At this point, I can see if people start to feel stale about Cid’s character. Again, Cid is best in that comedically ironic role and displaying his wisdom upon the other characters. When the focus is solely on him, he has to provide some sort of satisfaction for the audience. In this case, comedy and setting up future punchlines.

The Glory of the NPC

Just when you question where the plot would take us now, a trio of military ruffians stop by the inn to cash in on their “military taxation.”

Just think about the metaphor here. The theme being about the military. Political jockeying over power. A few ruffians coming in to forcibly collect payment for the government. Low-key social commentary.

In typical Cid fashion, he’s just relaxing while these military ruffians rough up the lady inn owner. Enjoying his meal, he finally decides it’s his time.. Eminence! Scratch that.. Time for ‘NPCing!’ Cid goes straight NPC like a damsel in distress and pulls out the fake bravery acting to help protect the lady in owner, Mary.

Like many accounts of Cid being the ultimate NPC, he get his cheeks exposed for his bravery and properly beaten to a pulp. Mary comes out to consul poor Cid for bravery. Still crying for trying to stop the ruffians and not successfully doing so, he apologizes with his exposed cheeks. “There’s no need to apologize,” Mary said. If you haven’t noticed before, the lady inn owner is indeed the prostitute that Shadow saved in episode one. Before Cid continues his journey beyond his stay at the inn with Mary, she waves his fees for his exposed cheeks of bravery.

Even the Mary’s character isn’t that deep, but it is kind of a disturbingly dark one. It’s nice to see characters on a similar tier as like Kai, Omega, 664 and 665, be on the ‘Cid’ side of the show. Without Claire, Alexia and Sherry, there is a void for Cid’s character when he is not Shadow. She is kind of a redemption story that is in the same mold as to what Shadow did to help Alexia and Rose.

In his few days of traveling, he put himself in new situations to see where it would lead to. He purposefully got himself arrested to check out the jail and then made a spectacular exit. He joined the lowly “volunteer army,” but they quickly got exposed with him narrowly escaping. Then, he helped create an old Oriana Kingdom legend to become the hero, but other NPCs took credit for his glory. Disappointed in the result of his life as a random “eminent wanderer,” he finally stumbles upon something quite fascinating.

These are the quick gags, maybe even filler kind of moments for Cid. At this point in the episode, it’s clearly the scenes with Rose that really make you feel anything significant.

Doggy Dog World

Most of the time when clearly hated antagonists make their way to do something despicable like bullying your waifu, there is naturally an inclination to want to pound the bully into the ground. In this case of the “dark fantasy” coming out in this anime, Cid stumbles back upon the 3 ruffian bullies that forcibly took Mary’s money and even hinted at assaulting her.

The ruffians end speaking about some legend about ruins and money, which is clearly a Cid ammo. While one of the ruffians speak of their next move, Cid brutally kills the other 2 in silence without his knowledge. In a true vigilante moment, Cid reminds him of what the Lawless City rules are, “what you want, you take it, even if you have to kill it.” Thus, meaning that “the strongest always win.” In the first person perspective of the last standing ruffian, Cid brutally slimed his guts out.

It’s actually been a while since Cid did something vigilante-like in brutally killing some random antagonists. And then, turning around to help an easy to cheer for side character. Due to her taking care of him, being thankful to Shadow or just an act of kindness outside of his role-playing, he leaves a big bag of gold coins in front of inn. Before she hears the money being dropped at her front door, she showed just how much she needed the money, even considering selling her body again to help pay for rent. As she is looking at the money on the ground, she notices Shadow for a brief moment before he takes his leave again. Mary is thankful for Shadow and we get the feel good closure from a classic trope.

At some point, it always felt like Mary would play a bigger role at some point in the story. It looks like it took 8 episodes more before the story capitalizes on her escape from the Lawless City.

If Mary had time to develop an even deeper connection with the audience, it’d hit that much more. This is why I hold characters like Alexia Midgar and Akane Nishono in high regard. I think those characters had really relatable elements about them. You got to see their faults and how they developed for the better. Mary is literally just an ex-prostitute trying to make an honest living. While it’s commendable, it’s just not as relatable.

559’s Brutality

After Shadow takes his leave following a heroic deed, the scene shifts to 559 taking on all the previous cult members from Fort First. Using almost all of her magic to defeat many of the Named Children, Kouadoi attempts to make a stand against her.

If you’ve ever wondered whether these “Named Children” would become more than glorified NPCs, you are sadly mistaken. Kouadoi witnesses firsthand the overwhelming strength of 559. Heat Blast, Windstorm, Dry Wind, and Cool Breeze—all have been easily ‘weathered’ by her. Running out of strength, Kouadoi starts to gain the upper hand. In a surprising aftermath of what seemed like a fairly long fight, 664 and 665 lie bloodied and defeated on the ground. Kouadoi does what every villain loves to do—basks in his victory by detailing all the disgustingly evil deeds he’s about to do to these ladies.

Before Kouadoi can take in his victory kills, the “ray from the moonlight is upon us.” Shadow appears in front of the moon to heal 559 and help her regrow a limb. Feeling reinvigorated, she deals Kouadoi his killing blow instead and it rains blood in Shadow’s triumphant return. 664 and 665 wake by up having healed from Shadow’s blessings. 559 starts to update Shadow about the current events of 666, as he asks about the ruins, where those 3 dead ruffians mentioned of some treasure. These “Shadow Garden x Shadow” dialogue scenes are always the best kind of humor. Even less informed than the audience about exactly how Shadow Garden works, she tries to contextualize 666’s betrayal for him. Completely unaware and thinking that 666 is some employee ID number.

559 continues her bloodthirsty intentions of wanting to wack traitor 666. While she is speaking, 664 and 665 try to defend her until 559 mentions of them losing the key. Completely aloof, Shadow tries to logically think through what they are talking about and it may relate to Mitsugoshi. Feeling repetitive with the ‘betrayal’ plot, Shadow starts to feel the staleness of the episode winding down until..

Shadow notices a piece of the updated newspaper fall down from above. In his horror and anger of what he reads, he starts to go bonkers the same way John Smith went ballistic when his gold went missing. In 559’s complete and utter happiness to murder Rose Oriana and 664 & 665’s shock, Shadow starts to say how much Rose’s ‘betrayal’ has hurt him. It is revealed that Sir Perv Asshat will actually go through with the marriage with Rose. Shadow emphatically blasts off to stop this plot mishap that Rose is about incur. In Shadow’s despair, he can’t fathom why she would kill King Oriana, if not to become a tyrannical queen. The need for him to be the Eminence in Shadow would be for not. Before the ending credits roll, it looks like Shadow will do all he can to make sure Rose ends up being the queen that rules over Oriana Kingdom.

At first, it’s a fun little gag that’s been repeated before in The Eminence in Shadow. What makes having you burst out in laughter is how it gets incorporated into the plot and be the punchline. The ironic nature of 559 wanting to kill the traitor 666 and Shadow being so disappointed in Rose, ruining his epically dreamt up climatic plot to defeat the Tyrannical Queen Rose Oriana is in shambles.

One of the last character development points that hasn’t been addressed yet, is now setup to end in irony. Rose discovered that Shadow saved her from those bandits when she was a kid. Now, he is likely going to save her again in some fashion. The funny thing is.. Shadow will likely be quite hostile towards her in his grand disappointment.

Even though this episode’s ending was the comedic irony we have come to expect, Shadow does bring up an important point that was never contextualize about Rose killing King Oriana. Rose’s nightmare at the beginning of the episode was a reminder for the audience of what seems like a random plothole, so far.

Last Thoughts

What Rose Means for the anime

By contrasting an episode like this one with the previous filler-like content, you can feel the world of difference between them with the feeling of tension from a real dilemma. Using a significantly important character to the plot like Rose with all of her issues, this displays how much the viewer values Rose and what it would mean for her character, if she saw her mother get executed.

Building Rose’s Defining Moment

All the comedic irony aside, the plot in this episode stands alone as impressive without any of the comedic elements involved. Taking a page out of the previous arc and even the filler, the best plot has been Shadow Garden finding creative ways to fight amongst themselves. The writer consistently finds natural ways to incorporate this dilemma into the plot, all the while setting up incredible character defining moments for these side characters.

Shadow, the Vigilante

For Shadow in this episode, we really got to see the remixes of what we’ve all already seen Shadow do. He plays a really funny NPC role with trying to save Mary. After getting his cheeks handed to him, he eventually gets the last laugh. A the end, he even gives the audience the satisfaction of killing these easy to hate antagonists and saving the episode’s waifu.

It’s not until he gets wrapped up into the plot that he finds himself in a major dilemma. Just like the audience not wanting to see a repetitive arc with the whole betrayal plot, Shadow now has to stop Rose from ruining his grand plot as Rose is supposed to be the tyrannical queen—not marry Sir Perv Asshat!

In conclusion, this episode stands out as another excellent installment, and its conclusion serves as a brilliantly crafted, comically ironic punchline. The narrative delivers an epically comedic payoff that resonates well. While the current arc’s plot seamlessly extends into the next episode of this arc, the episode’s meticulous construction, incorporating elements from Rose’s character, the Cult plot, and Shadow’s irony, contributes to yet another exceptionally thrilling and humorous viewing experience. The episode achieves a near-perfect balance. If there’s a minor drawback, it could lie in the repetitive nature of Shadow’s character and his vigilante actions. Mary had her role as the episode’s endearing waifu, but may need more character development. Nevertheless, the payoff at the end justifies any minor shortcomings, presenting another unique scenario for Shadow that effectively keeps the audience thoroughly engaged.