「Declaration; 告白」 (Kokuhaku)

So I take back almost everything I said about Kuroyukihime. I can see why so many people love her now, and I don’t disagree, she has her own style of getting her point across. She was very subtle about everything before, but this episode totally pushed her over the edge. Previously, I questioned her motives and doubted her (much like Haruyuki) since she never made herself very clear… but you can’t get any more clear than a slap and self-sacrifice to realize that a girl likes you.

Personally, I thank the school reporters for interfering with Haruyuki and Kuroyukihime’s relationship. I’m not usually one for gossip, but in this case, it really got the ball rolling and left some interesting thoughts for Haruyuki. Even though he completely misunderstood them, at least it got him thinking. I can understand why Haruyuki would doubt Kuroyukihime’s feelings though (I would too). He never thought of himself as someone whom people would genuinely be attracted to. He grew up overshadowed by Chiyuri and Takumu, and up until the last episode, he even hid these insecurities from Chiyuri (who is supposedly his best friend). I’m not sure if he was in denial or ignorant and oblivious to Chiyuri’s feelings, however if he can’t even see that… it’s no surprise that he can’t read Kuroyukihime’s feelings.

If jealousy wasn’t an obvious enough sign, then I don’t know what is. Usually this would suffice as a good indicator that someone is interested in you; however in Haruyuki’s case, Kuroyukihime had to purposely buy shorter direct-link cables, slap him AND confess to him all in one go. It must have been difficult for her to hear all that self-doubt and denial coming from him. I can empathize with all her frustration since the sudden change in attitude coming from him IS very out-of-the-blue. The last thing you want is to realize that the guy you like, doesn’t think your motives are pure. In fact, he thinks you’re using him! That slap, in all fairness, was well deserved by Haruyuki in my opinion.

To make up for it though, the confession was very sweet and I admit that I did not see it coming (at least not this early on). If I mentioned that Accel World was predictable in the past, this episode definitely proved me wrong. Not only do we get a kiss/confession, but to risk your own life (and your points) for someone, is the ultimate sacrifice in my opinion. That act should speak volumes, and if Haruyuki didn’t feel indebted to her already, well… he really has no excuse or reason to doubt her anymore. The hospital scene (with the returned wallet) was so emotional and touching; anyone else feel like they were watching a K-drama? The music, the atmosphere around the ICU, and the realization that you would do whatever it takes to save this girl’s life… that pretty much screams K-drama to me (not that I mind, I love watching them too!).

Of course, other stuff happened this episode too. Cyan Pile finally showed up! I thought they were going to reveal him next week and leave it with Chiyuri’s back door, but ending on cliffhangers seems to be an ongoing trend with this anime. Next episode seems to focus more on the battlegrounds in Accel World, and Haruyuki gets wings! We’ll see how long Kuroyukihime stays in her slumber, although I doubt it will be for long. The story relies heavily on Haruyuki now to carry on his duty as her “knight”, so I hope he lives up to it.

Full-length images: 03, 21, 27

 

Preview

101 Comments

  1. This episode was simply EPIC. All my doubts for this anime is now gone and I look forward to this anime the most out of all the ones this season. I hope everyone enjoys it as much as I do and appreciates all the good thing this episode brought forward. So many amazing things in this series!!

    Mikeneko
  2. I totally agree w/ you on the love part. The anime really did a good job at bring out those emotions/tears!!
    I knew Taku was fishy from when he got angry about his kendo matches: I bet he burst links and gains superhuman speed. So he wins easy by cheating…..
    Can’t wait for the next ep!!!

    zleihsh
  3. Agreed. Out-of-the blue tsundere Kuroyukihime, out-of-the blue Araya accident, and ultimately, why Kuroyukihime don’t use Physical Full Burst to dodge the car ALONG with Haruyuki? Is it only for dramatic effect? Or I’m missing something here?

    1. Haru was on the left while she’s on the right but she had to move left to push Haru out of the way. Had she dodged right, she might have avoided the car but Haru would be the victim instead.

      Izzard
    2. What they said. Also, we have to assume there’s a pretty finite limit to the amount she can move. She can’t move Haruyuki, herself, and then go get a coke or something. She seems to have a couple of seconds at most. ANd that was just enough to throw Haruyuki out of the way.

      Basically, it was just enough time to do the sudden dive that she could have done normally if she’d had just a split-second more. Which I like. Burst Linking does not make them gods, even with the physical one. It’s a minor edge, but it’s there when it counts. I think that keeps it more acceptable.

      KaleRylan
  4. Haruyuki was kind of hard to watch this episode. Oh well. Next episode should be awesome. Fly Silver Crow!

    Watching this part animated, I kind of think
    Show Spoiler ▼

    1. why leave the whole thing to change when she could be sure that she can save him? the car is so close to them i don’t think they have enough time to even duck. If you’ve ever seen a car crash u would totally know that there is barely enough time to react. My question is… why didn’t they get out of the way sooner… that would be my first instinct… to duck when i see a crazy car scrolling out of cntrol.

      aimless
    2. Going by the formula velocity=distance/time, if the car was going at around 50kph and the distance between the car and the two is very close, say around a meter or two, at the time they used Burst Link, there isn’t really enough time even if they just used the one in your spoiler. That’s why Kuroyuki had to use the Physical Full Burst and even then it’s not powerful enough to save both of them. It’s a burden to accelerate the body like that.

      belatkuro
  5. I have a few mild gripes about this episode, but it was a pretty decent episode overall, due to the half decent-half great execution. Admittedly, a lot of them come from the confession scene. It was much harder to take seriously due to Haru’s pig form, and while it would be ridiculous, I was hoping for some kind of alternate reality dream sequence shit, so that they could be seen in the normal bodies. It’s not a major flaw, though, as much as it is preference. Another would be the absurdity of driving a car into a another person merely for humiliating them, but I’ll let that slide.

    GuardianEnzo also made a lot of good points about how the confession felt too surreal and too early on his blog, which I mostly agreed on. While he definitely has his good points, Haru really has to prove himself that he’s worthy of Kuro’s love. I definitely get her selfless actions of pushing her friend out the way (I have friends for whom I would definitely do the same), but the confession felt early. It was well done, but early.

    Click
    1. in my opinion, using Haru’s pig form was mostly symbolism, to drive home the point that even someone as insignificant and useless as him, and is always looking up towards people, deserve some love. and what i think of it is that, more that anybody else, Haru has to prove to himself that he is worthy of Kuro’s love.

      Nitro
  6. That got serious fast. I expected a fun virtual reality battle anime that I expect out of Sunrise but I didn’t expect someone to get run over by a car IRL. This is like Air Gear levels of “takes itself too seriously”. Its still a fun watch though and I expect some awesome battle next episode.

    fragb85
    1. As far as I’ve read the story it is still pretty fun. This part is unusually harsh. But it’s not related to the game. It’s just that, unfortunately, Haru’s bully was a murderous psychopath. And while that might seem far-fetched, that sort of thing does, sadly, happen.

      KaleRylan
  7. A lot of guys have probably been in the situation where they feel that a girl who’s out of their league is only being friendly with them to feel better about herself, so it’s pretty easy to see where Haruyuki was coming from when he pulled a 180 and questioned Kuroyukihime’s sincerity. That proved to be the perfect setup for her sudden confession where she talks about experiencing feeling of love for the first time, which was unbelievably sweet.

    Then there was the kiss and self-sacrifice where Kuroyukihime entrusted her dream to Haruyuki. Then the bloody photo… If that chain of events didn’t make a guy devote his life to a girl, he isn’t human. I can’t imagine I’m the only one who got a bit choked up watching all of that play out.

    Haruyuki is my hero with the way he guarded Kuroyuki through the night and rushed to challenge Takumu to a battle to protect her. So manly!

    The last thing you want is to realize that the guy you like, doesn’t think your motives are pure.

    So I’ve been told…

    1. I’m amazed no one has noticed this: DIVINE SIGHTING!

      It’s always good to see you return to impart your wisdom every now and then. Now we pray for the mighty Omni to return in a similar manner……

      Kinny Riddle
    2. I agree with everything you said her. In fact, this basically describes my relationship with the woman I’m with now, who I’m going to marry in a few months. That transition from not believing her, to her proving it really goes a long way.

      I’ve really enjoyed how they’ve handled the main characters in this story. They’re all very human and layered. Haruyuki is fat, ugly, apparently bad at school, and horrendously bullied. But they go along way to show that despite all of that, his biggest weakness is his own self-loathing. Kuro is beautiful, intelligent, popular, and powerful. But she’s also selfish, vague, a little manipulative, and single-minded. And this is never shown to be ‘good’ or ‘evil.’ It’s just who they are.

      KaleRylan
    3. After your Post, i thinking into try this Anime out.. I am still unsure what Anime i should follow. i am still hold to “old” Animes, like the Moretsu Pirates… Thx, that you still dropping bye

      Germanguy
      1. Why i said “Ghost”? Well, the Backdoor…(more is spoiling)

        And yes, it use to look like .Hack. But i dunno. Children fleeing from the Real World into Virtual World, i dunno. I just have mixed feelings

        Germanguy
    4. True, it was sweet and touching to see this kind of ecene so early in the series and that should make a nice push to upgrade Haruyuki´s self-steam. Next week seems like awsome fight between Silver Crow and Cyan Pile but I´m a lot more interested in the clash of Haruyuki and Takumu´s personalities and grudges, because I don´t Haru is the only one of the trio with secrets.

      haseo0408
      1. Sometimes people can’t really explain why they fell for someone — they just did.

        Kuroyukihime described what she was going through pretty well and came to the conclusion that it must be love, so it wasn’t even apparent to her until now (making it even more sweet).

        To me, it seems like Haruyuki was everything that she was looking for in a guy (honest, supportive, not overly confident) and that mattered more to her than what he looks like.

  8. hmmm I thought to myself OK Taku could be simply hunting down the hated outlaw of burst link. Being from martial arts background i thought honour and all that. Then I thought WOH! A guy considered competent in the ranks of it could have used accelerating to his advantage! noooo I thought Taku might be a good guy. If he turns out to be later they are sure painting a bleak picture of him so far. And then I thought….what kind of a ****er hunts down people in a hospital!? wow dude!

    Breedo
    1. you need to relax, fan boy. It’s just a freaking show. No one needs to die; getting beaten senselessly would be acceptable. Besides just look at this show, it’s not one of those with characters dying. It’s a PG show is the gist of what I’m saying.

      .....
      1. I am perfectly relaxed and probably a fanboy. Anyways, I know that Taku is going to be sticking around from the OP/ED and what not so I know he’s not going to die. I also didn’t mean it quite as literally as you have interpreted though that is my fault for being so vague.

        The point is, this guy

        1. Uses burst points to win competitions (maybe? probably?)
        2. Keylogged his girlfriend (maybe it was a mutual agreement? lol)
        3. Tries to prey on an incapacitated girl and deliver the loss that will end her career just to get his hands on some more crack burst points

        He better do something amazing to redeem himself because he’s not doing too well in my book

        dy
    2. And if he dies, Show Spoiler ▼

      Hakarum
      1. Show Spoiler ▼

        jrj
      2. Show Spoiler ▼

        Hakarum
      3. What you all said is true, Taku needs to stay around but it´s still difficult to justify how he is preying on an unconcious girl and used his own girlfriend as a decoy to hunt the Purple King down. He really needs some redemption because I don´t think there is anything that could justify those cowardly acts.

        haseo0408
      4. Hakarum, LN 10 is a short story collections, with a cross over to sword art online (the other LN by the same author), so the actual story picks up again in LN 11, which is awesome since Show Spoiler ▼

        haseo0408, I don’t remember if they mentioned in the anime, but Taku is very low on his B points, and since his level is much lower than Lv.9, beating the black king will grant him a huge amount of points, and to him it is the best way to keep BB with him

        jrj
  9. Apparently Haruyuki’s insecurity pretty much stays the same throughout the series, as people have read in the manga. (I dont even know where to go to read the chapters they’re at, the usual manga sites arent that far at all)

    HungryKoala
  10. Not surprising about Taku being Cyan Pile. More like I expected it…there were so many hints during those times he was conversing with Haru, with his lines about his kendo matches and all. Cheating hints, perhups? Yeah I like Taku, just because…no definite reason, I find him awesome for being Cyan Pile~

    Pshaw, this is what I get for reading the light novel and manga before the anime started, sometimes I just have to smile at people’s reactions for some reason…

    Kuroyukihime’s down..but there’s something fishy about that. I myself know that once she wakes up, a lot of things will change. XD

  11. Oh boy, a confession scene as early as episode 4? I’m calling it right now that Kuroyukihime wakes up with amnesia and no recollection of Haruyuki at all. There’s like an unwritten law that states such a thing would happen.

    BACKSPACE
  12. This reminds me of one of those Chinese martial arts fantasy novels I read ages ago:

    Female Master falls in love with Lowly Male Disciple, and suffers near-fatal injury to save his life just to prove her love for him. Now it’s up to the Lowly Disciple to return the favour and prove he is worthy of her love, by protecting her life from all of her enemies who would jump at this golden opportunity to finish her once and for all.

    Kinny Riddle
  13. good episode… the confession part is awesome as it is in the LN… the BGM is great 🙂 so is the end where Haru rush to set up battle… why doesn’t that happen more often in the real world? Someone with great computer science knowledge, please develop BB2039 as soon as possible…

    guess I shouldn’t complain, but if they had kept the interaction between Haru and the nurse, the impact would be even stronger…

    and the preview revealed too much… 🙁 that wing is the most epic battle moment in the entire vol.1 🙁 oh well, hopefully they will also show Show Spoiler ▼

    nonetheless, next episode will be epic, and thanks for the post, cherrie!

    jrj
  14. Male protagonist is wimpy, no confidence, and low self esteem.

    Amazingly beautiful girl confesses, is attacked, and is hanging
    on to life by a thread.

    Protagonist vows to protect her, bad guy shows up, protagonist
    gets pissed – not on my watch!. Cliff-hanger.

    This was epically executed!

    My guess (I haven’t read the LN) is that the bad guy will under-estimate
    the protagonist and get the ass whooping he has coming to him. I surely hope so!

    mac65
  15. Haruyuki definately acted like a man towards the end of this episode and was anyone besides me not surprised at the true identity of Cyan Pile? Heck even our Hero berrated himself for not thinking of it sooner.

    This show really threw a lot of curveballs this episode and I actually found myself asking “Is she going to die”, normally I’d say no but then most shows don’t have such an occurrance this early on in the series. Can’t wait till the next ep.

    Roguespirit
  16. I’m not feeling this series. The “emotional” scenes just aren’t working for me since I’ve seen similar ones countless times before. I mean, c’mon, girl suffers from accident and taken to hospital while boy awaits results nervously? Practically a carbon copy of those never-ending drama clichés!
    Hopefully the next episode actually helps me get attached to the characters, because right now, I just can’t sympathize.

    That Bored Shounen
  17. I’m going to get flak, but I still think there is a possibility the Kuroyukihime could be conning Haru. Slim, but here is my theory. She is waiting for him at the entrance to the school and she is doing something on the net. She could have been pulling Araya’s chain trying to get him to do something so she could show Haru her devotion to him. But she got hurt! Well, the plan didn’t go as she expected, in fact, it went terribly wrong for her. And yes she lost major points but she was desperate to get someone to take out the Kings before they got her. With her experience and abilities getting them back might not be a big deal for her. Shorter cable? Make sure he’s close to her so she could “save” him. Yes I do have a suspicious mind.

    Bear
    1. Actually, she’s being hunted down in the game, so any connection to the global net is going to have nasty consequences for her (hundreds of challenges per minute). So I highly doubt that she can contact to Araya.

      on the other hand, if she was using a notebook to communicate with the global net instead of the neural linker, that would be another story altogether…

      info600
    2. I basically agree. I still don’t find Kuroyukihime’s confession very convincing (Do I think too much like Haru?). K. saving Haru and taking the risk of getting hurt herself could well be a means to engage him and put him in her debt. Don’t get me wrong, I love K. nevertheless!

      jreding
  18. Yup. This is it: Taco vs Porky in one of this series’ epic battles. Not as epic as his later battles, but epic nonetheless.

    They did it in the manga a little differently though: they were out of the BL mode when SnowBlack moved like a ninja and in a split second had pushed Porky away from the car.

    The Moondoggie
      1. I think they did the physical full burst in the anime just to show the significance of that “command” is in BB, not if the effect is shown in “real time”…

        info600
      2. Physical burst -> x5 body movement for 3sec and 5 points
        Physical Full Burst -> x100 body movement for 99% of your points, lvl9 only

        About the visuals.. well it’s an anime so they had to add some dramatic effects.

        Algent
  19. For those of you who are annoyed by Haru’s low self-esteem, don’t worry 🙂

    Show Spoiler ▼

    Jellyfish Marine
    1. Show Spoiler ▼

      jrj
    1. I wondered about it when i saw the episode too. Araya’s face was deemed too murder driven and someone posted in MAL forums that 2 recent and similar accidents happened in Japan. Both having killed pedestrians on the sidewalk.
      Now I’m not sure if that’s true, but that’s a valid reason to put censoring on the scene (though it was a mood killer censor).

      MrRei
    2. apparently there is a similar incident happened in RL somewhere in Japan, and to avoid being criticized about mimicking the incident (since they can’t delete the scene), they had to put censor in…

      jrj
      1. Which is why the death penalty is so needed for F@##@ers like them, they never learn their lessons even after being suspensed fom school, they will only going to commit more serious crimes, ppl like that will just grow up to be in gangs and murderer, should just kill them off before they commit anymore crime.

        In anime, TV and in RL.
        some might disagree but who can disagree with me that how many career criminal that go in and out of jail just doing the same thing over and over, why even bother putting them in jail and wasting our tax payers money to fee them, are we really hoping for some sort of god’s miracle that these person who commited the same crime again and again will what suddenly one day wake up and change its ways?
        Set them to death penalty kill them off, saving tax payers money not to mention the amount of innocent lives that could be save from these criminal in the future.

        Benz
  20. honestly, i was so in love with Kuroyukihime I ended up drawing her and rewatched the same scene OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN for at least fifteen times in the last 5 days. *cries*

    I always thought Senjougahara is my type, but a little too scary. Kuroyukihime is identical to Senjougahara in personality minus the ultra violence, instant top heroine now~

    thenewhorde
  21. I hate the MC in this – so much rage

    He’s like the worst kind of small fat kid you could get in school, normally they try to make up for their disadvantages by being nice people to be around, you know the sort you think you can confide in and can tell a good joke, this MC make me want to drown him in the toilet. He has an attitude more akin to a tall handsome delinquent a lot of the time in the way he treats people around him.

    But oh well, maybe he’ll finally stop being a douch bag now.

    Matt_d

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