Sein shows his value as a fighter right away as they face a cursed plant monster. Then, Stark is forced to do something against his will!

Sein’s Shine

Two episodes ago, we are introduced with another ‘corrupt’ priest in Sein. Given his own personal battles with giving up on his adventurous dreams, he now gets to live it. In the prior episode, Sein got to showcase his adult man’s knowledge about social dynamics, including young budding relationships. This episode, we get to see the flashy characteristics that make Sein a perfect addition to the party that includes Frieren, Fern, Stark and now Sein!

A Man’s Man, Sein

The previous episode shined a light on Himmel’s attempted affection for Frieren, while showcasing the meaning of gifting to your loved ones. Behind the scenes in the previous episode, is Sein’s brilliant wisdom. Already, he’s shown to be a valuable asset to the party with his grown man wisdom. He helps Fern determine what the best course of action was when she got into an argument with Stark. He helped Stark understand how a young man deals with a young lady. Even though Frieren is a technically elderly, she has always been aloof when it comes to social dynamics, which culminated in the prior episode’s conclusion with Himmel ‘proposing’ to Frieren.

This episode starts off right away with a challenge that displays Sein’s best attributes. The party of 4: Frieren, Stark, Fern and Sein come across a village that have been cursed. A priest like Sein would have contextualize how to deal with it. Eventually, he determines exactly what it is and the location of the monster responsible for it.

Frieren explains the origins of curses and that mages aren’t usually adept at dealing with them, but they can sense its presence. Stark realizes that they are being affected by it and abruptly passes out from it.

Funny enough, the Frieren and Fern have become accustomed to floating the passed out Stark. As they get closer to the monster, one by one they start passing out. Frieren’s last words to Sein before she falls asleep is “don’t fight alone.” Given the unexpectedness of this, Sein takes it upon himself to fight it anyways.

This is the scene where we get to explore and find what’s even more appealing about his character. He deduces the monster’s ability and realizes that it “reflects’ attacks. This is a huge problem. It was previously mentioned that Sein can only use his magic to wake up Stark up for 5 seconds. Is that enough time for Frieren to navigate the fight at hand?

In another flashback scene but from Sein’s childhood, he recalls Heiter explaining how he needed to just trust what Frieren did, even when they haven’t come to an understanding. Trusting in that memory, Sein uses his spell to wake up Frieren and quickly yells “the core.” Frieren knew right away. In an exciting quick flash of a spell released from her staff, the flower monster received a direct inside inside of it’s core and vanished!

In the end for Sein, he got to be the villager’s hero. For his thanks, he received thanks from the villager’s top cougar. Check mark this event off of one of Sein’s “to do” bucket list. This show would be that much more funny if the ‘fanservice’ was just older ladies like this.

Father & Son

Stealing Stark

As the party move onto their next destination, Fern mentions how incredibly broke they are. All of the sudden like a true plot device that comes out of nowhere, a noble on his carriage goes to seek out Stark for recruitment. Bringing the whole party back to his mansion and to Stark and Frieren’s discontent, she wants them to leave. However, being broke leads people to be more open.

This scene introduced a completely new character, while introducing the party’s issue with their finances. Of course, this man just so happens to be a ‘noble.’

Lord Orden is this abrasive noble’s name, as Frieren details his family’s history. They are 3 of the main families of the northern region. Lord Orden has a direct way and condescending way he speaks as he dismisses Frieren’s request to leave. High strung and and very insistent, he eventually offers the right amount of compensation

The True Objective

Lord Orden takes Stark and the others along the mansion. Stark specifies that he is from the Klee Region of the central lands, in which Orden’s family is from. This leads Lord Orden to come across a painting of his eldest son, Wirt. He explains that he was the hero in these parts and recently died killing off a demon commander. Wirt looks just like Stark. It is here that Lord Orden reveals his true plans for Stark.

Gabel, Lord Orden’s butler and a few others are the only ones that know of Wirt’s death. Hearing that their hero died would be bad for the morale that protects Fort Vorig, which is a major stronghold for the region’s defenses. In an upcoming banquet event for the public’s consumption, they must see Stark as Wirt, to show that he is alive. In return for Stark and the party’s help, 10 Strahl gold coins is the offer. Frieren negotiates with adding a grimoire into the offer. In all of this negotiation, the young Stark shares his displeasure for the assumption that he would be fake Wirt, using his Eisen scar as an excuse. However, Lord Orden reveals that people already know that Wirt has received damage in battle.

Sometimes doing things for the “greater good” can go awry. Especially, when it involves people with a lot of power and influence like Lord Orden. He is a character that kind of represents the good and bad of having such a position. Morality gets blurred when it comes to “doing what’s best for everyone.”

The Plan Begins

With a deal in place, Lord Orden sends Stark off to practice “proper ettiquette.” In a classic Frieren montage, scenes breeze through to show Stark practicing everything from horseback riding, dancing and dressing up like a noble. Frieren, Fern and Sein go on to experience the town with Sein living it up in a tavern. Frieren and Fern are enjoying the eloquent offerings. These montages are always visually appealing.

An exhausting Stark comes across Fern in the hallway and is asked about how everything is going? Stark responds with exhaustion and then suddenly gets on one knee like Himmel did to Frieren. Whether Fern admits it or not, she likely felt something tingling, but tells Stark that it “doesn’t suit him.” Stark moves on to his next batch of lessons.

As the show becomes more and more blatant about shipping Fern and Stark, it’s definitely an attractive scene for a younger audience. Stark suddenly dropping on one knee is the ‘fanservice’ for those fans of romance in animes.

Reliving a Trauma

Reminiscent of Stark’s childhood, Lord Orden takes him to train how his family fights. He comes across Mut, the second son of Lord Orden and future family head. Lord Orden mimics what Stark’s father said to him when he was struggling to get stronger as a kid. He even speaks condescendingly of Mut just like his father. Stark asks about his son and Lord Orden clears the air that he tells him that he will surpass him someday with his work ethic. Because he tells his son these reassuring thoughts of his potential, it actually has slowed down his growth. To Stark’s delight, he continues his sword lessons.

This is the kind of scene that gives the flipside of Stark’s childhood trauma. Sure, fathers should be loving and supportive, but too much praise can be too reassuring that the hard work stops. Lord Orden represents the balancing act between tough love and being supportive.

Surprise, surprise! Fern must learn ‘Soiree,’ in reference to the upcoming banquet. A young lord must not attend a banquet alone! Given that the only other option is Frieren, Frieren tells Fern, “good luck.” This sparks another montage of Fern’s ettiquette training. Frieren is lounging around in a sea of books, Sein is smitten by a sea of older women and Fern is falling over her uncoordinated dancing skills.

Frieren has fun lowkey humorous moments. From Fern’s reaction, to Frieren’s response of “not being the mommy” was very funny. Starting off Fern’s montage like many other ones before was also visually rewarding, with the hint of humor of Fern’s dance struggles.

The Banquet of Elites Begins

Fern feels awkward at the banquet, but Stark uses his gentlemanly newly found nobleettiquette to ask Fern for a dance. It’s a beautiful scene that we’ve seen time and time again like many other ‘dance’ tropes that pits together the two romantic interests. Stark leads Fern from nervousness to an enjoyable groove as the young budding romance advances one step closer to our heart’s desire. An eloquently dressed up Frieren and Sein are sitting at a table with Sein asking if Frieren wanted to dance? In a classic Frieren response, stuffing her gluttonous face in, she’s “just going to eat the cake.”

A Father and a Son

Stark enters Lord Orden’s room after the banquet was over. Lord Orden explains that their mission is complete and to pay Frieren. Then, he details his regret of his last fight with Wirt, saying the classic line, “I never want to see you again.” These are words that any loving family member eventually regret. Stark realizes where he is leading the conversation to and denies being any kind of a replacement for his real son. Given Stark’s strength and having no home to return to, it really would be a good match. However, Stark still has the same regret for what he said to Eisen and would rather satisfy his own desire to make his own caretaker happy.

As the ending credits play with the last scene continuing, a few jokes will get you to chuckle as Frieren goes through Lord Orden’s entire library of grimoires. Fern can sense Gabel’s distress from Frieren spending half the day trying to decide with his saying outright, “hurry up.”

Sein looks to Stark to reassure him that their army will be fine rebuilding. Stark gives a slight grin as he seeing Lord Orden train Mut. He responds with the fact that Lord Orden won’t have to worry about his ‘heir.’

Last Thoughts

This episode is the perfect example of how just enough of a plot can round out slice-of-life. Reward your viewers with some flare, as the story allows us to soak in the characters’ struggles and lessons. Sein has had three straight episodes to have us view him positively in a new light. From his struggles of allowing his childhood dream to become a reality, to giving adult man wisdom to Stark & Fern and to displaying his elite priest capabilities—the freshness of his character continues to round out the fun character dynamics between the four main characters.

The second half of the episode delivered the heartwarming vibes of Stark, seeing how his past trauma could work out positively. We even get an advancement of Stark and Fern’s relationship going one step further in their new designs. All the while, Lord Orden becomes a prime example of a great leader and father that has his own issues with grief; stemming from a mistake of how he treated his son before he died. As cliche as it is, Lord Orden did the typical regret of saying something to their loved one to never seeing them again. This mistake and misfortune never allowed him the closure and opportunity to mend their relationship.

Overall, the first half of the episode did a good job showcasing Sein with a short-lived, but exciting plot. The second half of the episode demonstrated once again, this anime’s best qualities of revealing life lessons and its philosophical questions that arises from the characters. At the same time, we got some good humor mixed in and were able to see a lovely scene with a ‘noble’ Stark with an eloquently dressed Fern dance, bringing us one step further into their blossoming relationship. This was a perfectly well-balanced episode with a rewarding end.