「イリヤの選択」 (Iriya no Sentaku)
“Illya’s Choice”

There’s another way.

The Strength of Empathy

Compare the steely-eyed logic of Angelica to the instinctive decisions of Kuro to wishy-washy Illya, and you can be forgiven for thinking better of the former two. Or of Kuro, at any rate. Illya doesn’t end up looking so good when she freezes in the middle of a battle to internally debate morality, and yes, she should have kept fighting at least enough to survive. No arguments there. (Though she is a kid, not a hardened warrior, etc . . . though that second argument is weaker than it used to be, what with the amount of magical combat she’s seen.) Yet don’t look down upon Illya, because she’s the most admirable of them all.

Empathy is not a weakness. Empathy is a strength. It doesn’t look like it when Kuro—who dismisses those she doesn’t know in favor of those precious to her—is able to act whereas Illya cannot, but is it always wise to act with gusto when you might be doing the wrong thing? I’m not saying Kuro is wrong. It’s complicated. I will just never accept that empathy is a weakness. Empathy is what stops us from turning into Erica, or her monstrous father. Empathy is what keeps us from being cruel. Kuro isn’t devoid of it, she cares for the people she cares about deeply, but I prefer Illya’s empathy. It’s the kind that makes the world a better place, rather than just defending her own little corner of it.

Never Like That

Speaking or Erica and her father, I was again struck by the roller coaster Erica sends me on. First was when she expressed complete confusion as to how death could be considered a bad thing. Putting aside death as an inevitable construct, untimely death certainly isn’t ideal, and she didn’t have a clue. Behind that innocent smile is a soul so thoroughly warped that it’s going to take a lot of therapy for her to come out the other side all right. In some ways, she might be the one that scares me the most.

But then her father wails on her with an evil look and a voice shuddering with rage, and I’m back to feeling sympathy for her. She might be the scariest, but she’s not the most evil, and spanking . . . look. There’s an argument that can be made for spanking, we’re not going to get into that here, but it should certainly never be done like that. Never in anger. You shouldn’t strike anyone in anger, honestly, but especially not a kid, you fuckin’ monster.

Taking a Third Option

It’s an oft-used trope, the page for which I just spent 45 minutes reading (and so can you!). It’s not unexpected, and sometimes it feels like a cop out. But here? I don’t think so.

All things must be supported by character, and preferably, theme as well. This is supported by both. While Kuro has the makings of a dirty adult who will make hard decisions and live with the regret—which is why she deserves to claim the onee-chan mantle, if you ask me—that ain’t Illya’s bag, baby. She’s an innocent girl, and a bit dense, and above all else, a magical girl. She’s the magical girl who learned to fly because magical girls are supposed to fly, and who figured out how to walk and talk as a stuffed animal because she believed she could—she, more than anything else, embodies the unique magic of Prisma Illya, which is why her name is in the title after all. Not only is refusing to sacrifice anybody in keeping with Illya’s character, leaning on bullshit wish-fulfillment magical girl magic is entirely in keeping with the ethos of Prisma Illya, which is why this works. As one commenter last time said, that’s the essential struggle in Prisma Illya generally, and 3rei in particular—between Fate-style grimdark and magical girl optimism. Illya embodies the latter, so her pushing back against a bad choice is exactly in line with the series and herself.

Plus, come on, no one wants to see Miyu or the world die, right? (Don’t say you do; don’t be that guy.) Miyu wouldn’t be able to countenance being saved if it costs millions of lives. It’s not the third option—it’s really the only option Illya’s side has, if they want Miyu to come out the other side still able to smile.

tl;dr: @StiltsOutLoud – Illya’s empathy almost costs her, but it leads her to the right answer. The only way to save Miyu is to save everybody #prisma_illya s4e9

Random thoughts:

  • Nice to see Kiritsugu-papa getting a cameo. Hopefully they’ll eventually be able to get back to their world, and maybe have him actually appear and say a word or two. I’d like to see him actually enjoying his hard-fought happiness. We can hope, right?
  • That ED was a love song. A love song between friends closer than any the rest of us are liable to have. Fortunately—I don’t want to go through what they’re going through just for a deeper friendship. Seems dicey at best.
  • Author note: I won’t be introing the Nanatsu no Taizai mini-series. I wanted to, but subs came out late and I’m beyond swamped with RL stuff right now. I’ll try to watch it and do a finale post if I enjoy it, though.

My SECOND novel, Freelance Heroics, is available now! (Now in print!) (Also available: Firesign #1 Wage Slave Rebellion.) Sign up for my email list for a FREE prequel short story. At stephenwgee.com, the last four posts: Freelance Heroics in print, and other matters, Freelance Heroics is available NOW!, I love sales jobs, and Good realism is character realism.

Full-length images: 05, 32.

 

ED2 Sequence

ED2: 「cuddle」 by ChouCho

Preview

51 Comments

  1. 🙁 Poor everyone really. The Fate universes are never kind to anyone.

    And before anyone says “Illya does that”, no actually it doesn’t. It is Illya, herself, that goes out and smacks everyone around into magical friendskinship from the horrible situations they either are unlucky enough to get into or just get suckered into.

    Honestly, if Illya didn’t have the magical mcguffin in her and working the way she wants it to, we would be in yet another Fate universe that has everyone get the fate that they’d normally get.

    Hurray for Illya!

    P.S.
    Please, friendskinship is totally a word that I did not just make up by entire accident due to the fact I badly need sleep.

    Dorian S.
    1. If Illya is not a lesser grail, and did not have a Kalaeidostick, normal Fate rules apply. I think the author is really out to show just what a lesser grail could be like given the right conditions, upbringing and personality. For a lesser grail, being able to dream and imagine may ironically be power for such a person; while empathy helps reduce the chances that a person of such realized power trigger the wrath of either Alaya or Gaia.

      Andmeuths
  2. Well we all saw it coming. Silly me considering they wouldn’t go with the save all option.

    That said, I feel like they belabored the point a bit too long. Found myself losing interest and just looking back when some action starts

    Juan
  3. Angelica is weary of Archer(Emiya) eh? Well no surprise there, Shirou was probably the one using it so he no doubt had 200% compatibility to the point that he was being eroded. The Ainsworth’s nameless cards are probably failures, so that means the 9 cards are successes. But you don’t need 9 Servants for the “holy grail”. So why do they have 2 Archers, and 2 Berserkers? Could it be that outsiders tried to interfere in the ritual? Would it mean that this holy grail does not have an upper limit on the number of servants it can use, and summon? If so that’s heck of a lot more mana than the einzbern’s lesser grail. Or maybe I’m jumping to conclusions, considering that Avenger has always been in the Einzbern grail, and Gil outside also makes 9 in that one.

    kazakiri
    1. Could be there are actually two sets of cards going on here, the first 7 being the Stay/Night Counterparts and the second 7 containing Gil and Thor? Perhaps things went awry when Miyu and the first set were transported to Illya’s universe so the Ainsworths prepared another set since the first set was lost.

      Yellow Mellow
      1. Problem with that is Shirou is imprisoned, and says to save Miyu. The Einzbern’s system had the greater grail choose participants and if there weren’t enough they could bring in some from the mages association. Considering that the Ainsworth specialty is displacement, that probably means rights as a master are not decided by a greater grail, and are interchangeable in their ritual, meaning they wouldn’t include someone opposed to it in the first place.

        Something I failed to notice before, “Saber Lily” probably means someone else has Avalon in that dimension, as the events that lead to Shirou getting Avalon don’t happen…

        Something else, this Assassin is the one from Fate/zero right?

        On another note, the fact that they can’t just open the way to the root, just goes to show that the Einzbern ritual is superior I suppose. (Remember the outside world is supposed to be overflowing with mana.)

        So world is changing right? Humanity will be going extinct because of this, that means Alaya should be moving on it’s own, to prevent human extinction anyway… There’s absolutely no way, the Ainsworths don’t know this. That being the case why do they need to be the ones to act to save humanity, using this method? Brings me to Darius’ obsession with plays, actors, and stages. Sounds like someone wants to be elevated to the throne of heroes…

        kazakiri
  4. New ED is amazing-sweet!! Just kiss already!! XD

    Sorry. *clears throat* Once again, Angelica is full of it. Illya’s a coward because it took her more than a split-second to choose? No, honey, that’s called having a pulse. Kuro had the whole time it took her to get to the fight to decide, and even then hers came down to losing Miyu and Illya if she chose the world because she knew that Illya wouldn’t leave Miyu. And while I think most people would go with her logic, Illya’s wasn’t a surprise. Sweet empathy has been in her character since Ep 1, S1, so of course she can’t just throw away roughly 8 billion people when she starts to think about it. I mean, didn’t her parents basically choose her over the world when they sealed Kuro? Isn’t that about what that comes down to? The she becomes friends with Miyu at breakneck pace and accepts Kuro, so the girl has empathy in spades, something that Angelica and Darius can’t even pronounce.

    The Ainsworths are the cowards. They took a convenient option, turned it into a personal tool, and hide it away so that it was left to no one but them, hiding behind crap like “justice”. Illya’s looking to be the Righteous Hero and save everyone, and taking that option when its there is what takes the real guts.

    Aex
    1. Sadly there are many “Angelica” type people in the world who believe so strongly that not only is their opinion correct, but also so obvious that everyone should “just get it” that her character seems real enough to me. She doesn’t think that Illya needs time to think about the choice, because to Angelica, there is no other choice.

      kushieda
  5. Illya truly becoming the hero of justice which her dad and brother couldn’t. Who know you only needed to become a magical girl to achieve it.

    either way, next week is going to be hype as the true protagonist of 3rei makes an appearance maybe possibly perhaps.

    Show Spoiler ▼

    xxvan
  6. That new ED is actually fucking amazing. They said they wanted to top the starlog OP with another Chouchou song — they said it was supposed to be Asterism.

    But holy shit the amount of catharsis this ED had paired alongside Illya’s decision was mind-numbing. I love it.

    Frontrow
  7. It might be the subtitles, but saving only humanity by using the grail to change/adapt humans to the new world will not work if i am imagining correctly, since all other life is being threatened/killed by the lack of mana which results in a lack of resource or sustenance for the saved humans. Not sure if thats a solid plan, unless the grail turns humanity into immortal beings.

    But they did say “jinrui” which is humanity translated…

    sithstormjedi
    1. Well if their wish is to make it so human can survive to the new world, I guess that wish might include being able to live of whatever sustenance would remain or just not require sustenance at all.

      Yellow Mellow
    2. Course, how “human” they would come out of it is debatable itself.
      Fate-logic certainly points in the direction of that wish turning all of humanity in unrecognisable monsters. Or guinea pigs.

      Seph
  8. Wow, now Angelica is another one of the antagonists who’s really bad at what she does. Because she’s clearly intending to want to kill Illya, but she couldn’t do it while she was a doll and she doesn’t do it while she’s busy giving the most extended lecture on how magical energy is categorized. And then it’s hilarious that she then gets mad when Illya can’t decide after talking for five minutes, AND THEN tries to kill her. Like, the intention is there but she keeps stopping for Reasons.

    And it reminds me of this video I saw, where a guy kept getting taken out of a show (I think it was Heavy Object) because the protagonists kept making mistakes that would get them killed, and they kept getting away with it. Because if that happens, then you can never truly believe anything bad will happen to your protagonists. And that’s the issue here. Because both the protagonists keep getting away with mistakes AND because the antagonists seem like they give up to even want to kill sometimes, I have a tough time believing anything bad will ever truly happen, and it’s just kind of boring to know that. Also, Darius is really keen on wanting to have someone fight to stop his plan, because….hey, you want to save the world, but you don’t reeeeally feel that inclined to save the world, I guess.

    Maybe that’s how the Grail works in this instance, but if that’s the case, they do a terrible job portraying that. These honestly are becoming the worst antagonists I’ve seen, because their intentions never seem to be consistent (gotta save the world, but this kink in the gears, eh, we’ll let them through) and they really want to do what they can to have their plan be stopped. But I’ve gone this far, so I will finish it, because I still like Illya, Kuro, and the other protagonists as characters. And it still does present interesting ideas, even if they’re not at their full potential, but I give them an A for trying at the very least.

    Fuwa Fuwa
    1. This is the risk of using insane villains, some will not like the restraints a logical person would not have and thus not get into the story. I am always wary of the insane villain in a story as often they are used to put in twists to surprise or shock done in poor way. But when the villains have a major power advantage something has to limit their effectiveness. I am still finding it fascinating in this case as the Fate universe allows the madness that comes from researching “things man was not meant to know”. Angelica seams to be emotional dead, maybe a construct, and thus not capable of the correct action at time. But clearly your millage is varied from mine.

      RedRocket
      1. My mileage sure does vary, I just find Angelica’s not capable of doing anything to get this job done, she can kill Illya while talking, but she just waits until after she’s done talking, Illya dodges or gets saved, and it happens all over again. I can’t help but find it bad writing, because it’s strongly telling me “You don’t want to do that thing you say you want to do, saving the world. You say it’s important, but in practice…meh.”

        But I’m not going to say you should find it bad, if you get something more out of it, more power to you. I’m just speaking from my perspective, in that the show just feels sloppily handled, that I barely care about what’s at stake. Whether you change your opinion or not is up to you, I’m not here to force my opinion, just to state my own stance of why I think it’s bad.

        Fuwa Fuwa
      2. @ Fuwa Fuwa: I get what you’re saying and I agree to a certain extent, but her behavior also kinda matches the Ainsworths overall: They’re so arrogant they come off as lethargic. Like when Darius broke into the school, Angelica is so sure that Illya is cornered she doesn’t see any problem with sitting back and having a muffin while she torments her, since she can just kill her any time. I think she also remembers that Erica likes Illya, so if she can break her will and turn her back into a doll then it’s better for them. When Kuro shows up she picks things up a bit, but the arrogance is still there so she’s just like “whatever”. I agree that it makes her look kinda dumb from the audience’s perspective, but I wouldn’t go as far as bad writing. This part of her character and the family in general has been established.

        In a way she’s taking Gilgamesh’s lackadaisical outlook on fights and cranking it to 11, so that Card really does suit her.

        Aex
      3. @Aex: Alright, I can understand the stance of lethargy, that’s one thing. But the other thing I feel is ultimately detrimental is the fact that after the doll idea doesn’t work, Angelica even slashes the doll, and just gets back to trying to kill Illya again. So it’s almost back to square one, in a way. Illya learned how nuts the Ainsworth family is, I suppose, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time.

        If “saving her world” wasn’t Angelica’s and the Ainsworth family’s prime goal, that’d be one thing. But it is, it’s like the main thing driving them and the main thing I’m tying with them, and they’re doing everything they can, it feels, to make sure it doesn’t succeed. They’re almost their own worst enemy. Lethargy is one thing, like to showcase your own power. But as you said, it’s cranked up to 11. I honestly think all that’s missing is them shrugging when something really doesn’t go their way.

        Fuwa Fuwa
    2. As I noted in my own blog post, Angelica is looking for both Kuro and Ilya to acknowledge that the Ainsworth plan is the right and only plan for the world. I quoted Gul Dukat from the “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” series when asked about killing an enemy and victory.

      A true victory is to make your enemy see they were wrong to oppose you in the first place. To force them to acknowledge your greatness.

      Replace the word “greatness” with “rightness” and it is the same idea. Angelica never goes all out on Ilya nor Kuro or else she’d have slain both. She holds back and if they manage to survive another round, Angelica gives them another opportunity to submit and choose this world over Miyu. If they’d have done that, I’m guessing Angelica’s attacks would have immediately ceased because she obtained true victory.

    3. You have basically stated story should have ended episode two or at the school, the sane Ainsworth’s would be unstoppable story over.

      Your not disliking writing in general, something can be written well on a extremely boring topic to yourself. Your disliking any story where there is a villain more powerful than the hero. I can see that. When this type of story is done poorly I dislike it too.

      In this case though the villain gained their overwhelming power though a mystic means that has severely limited them in a way that I think fits the Fate multiverse.

      Many seam to love Gilgamesh even though the only reason he loses in fate stories normally is his megalomania, lackadaisical nature normally and love of a good fight. Your sort of asking a Gilgamesh card to not act like a Gilgamesh.

      RedRocket
      1. I haven’t read half of this comment thread ’cause Stilts-oniichan is busy, but a quick word on Gil:

        It is a bit frustrating that he loses in UBW ’cause he holds back so much, yet everything he does ties so inexorably back to character that it makes sense. Every one of his actions is so clearly Gilgamesh being Gilgamesh that it more often than not works. That’s because he’s an extremely well defined character, as are many of the original Fate/stay night characters. He’s almost an element in and of himself—the element of ego.

        Compare that to the Ainsworths, and we just don’t know them that well. They’re not as well defined. Part of that is time, but most of it is probably that they’re just not as good of characters as Gilgamesh. Which is fine and understandable! That kind of character is lightning, you can’t always depend on creating them, at least not without years of practice doing exactly that. But it’s damn nice when you trap the lightning in the bottle and have a character that everyone understands.

      2. What? No. Who’s emulating Gilgamesh? Ya lost me.

        All I was saying is that Gilgamesh is a much better defined character, whereas the Ainsworths (and most characters in most series, honestly) are not. They’re still defined enough—they’re not like Natsuki Subaru of ReZero, who is less a character than a collection of attributes—but they’re still vulnerable to plot wonk since they’re not so cleanly conveyed.

        Put it this way: for some of my characters, I have to ask what they would do in a given situation. For some, I already know. Gilgamesh is so well-defined that readers, not just the author, can do the latter. He’s pride, ego, and hedonism incarnate. That’s what I was saying.

    4. Everything makes sense if you just stop seeing the Ainsworths as a group of evil people. They’re not sane for sure, but that doesn’t make them evil. They wouldn’t have tried to save humanity if they were.

      Killing Illya & friends contribute nothing in saving humanity. It’s just meaningless slaughter. Only Beatrice is insane enough to enjoy such a thing & Darius did quite a good job in restraining her so far.

      What the Ainsworths did in order to stop Illya & company was showing off their overwhelming power to make her give up. It’s done in order to achieve the goal without any meaningless killing. Angelica took it one step further by revealing their world situation & the solution they came up with to Illya. She hoped that Illya would understand & support their decision. Of course, killing them may`eventually become necessary if they insist on saving Miyu even after learning the truth.

    5. @AstroNerdBoy: An admirable goal if that’s Angelica intent….though that seems like it’s not much the case because she explains Illya the way magic works, and then tries to kill her when Illya doesn’t answer immediately. Her actions seem very contrary to that, even if that is her goal and something I can get behind. However, it also seems like a slight issue because Kuro would definitely use that to their advantage, “lie to let her guard down, then go in.” But I can get your point of view.

      @RedRocket: I find a hard time seeing any sort of limitations on the Ainsworth’s part, aside from they give the protagonists enough time to talk among themselves. They seem more than capable for a task that shouldn’t be that hard. Realistically, yeah, story could have ended by episode 2 or the school. But in a matter of convenience, it’s dumb. I could write “Beatrice goes to slay Illya, but she trips on a rock and knocks herself out.” Illya gets out in the similar way, but reading that, it doesn’t feel any sense of accomplishing or realism. It’s elements like that which talk to me like less than subpar writing.

      @Ryuutobi: I haven’t seen them really as evil, I’ve been seeing the Ainsworths as people who’d go to any lengths to make sure their plan succeeds. But so far, they’ve proven terrible at that. I’d say killing Illya and her friends would benefit their humanity, because it’s proven their aim is to complete the Grail ceremony. Illya can counter this, but they just…let her be most of the time. And Angelica even started to attack Illya when Illya doesn’t respond right away. So yeah, that approach may work, but they execute poorly if that’s the case.

      Fuwa Fuwa
      1. Just in what way killing Illya & friends will help them complete the ritual? They only want to save Miyu & the Ainsworths need only to stop that. But, stopping != killing. Killing is just one of the many ways to stop them. If another way to stop them existed, why would they need to kill them? They didn’t kill Miyu’s brother either, did they?

      2. @Ryuutobi: But it seemed clearly intended that when Angelica hit doppelganger Illya when going for Kuro, I’m pretty sure there was killing intent there. I…don’t think I’m reading that scene wrong. But they seem pretty intended on going the killing route if need be, but when a prime opportunity presents itself, they just stop.

        They tried the reasoning thing so many times. Angelica explains how magic works and decides to kill Illya when she doesn’t answer right away…rather than do it while explaining. Then they do the “put Illya’s mind into doll” plan, that does not work, and then Angelica decides to slash the doll. But then Illya survives and Angelica just…kind of lets her do her thing and power up again. Two different routes, no avail.

        I’m just saying, they’re honestly shooting themselves in the foot. Sure, there are other methods to this problems. There’s also ways to get rid of a mouse. You can lure it out with food crumbs, you can get a cat, you can set the mouse hole on fire, you can talk to it….or just use a mousetrap. It’s the simplest and direct route, and fairly consistent. Sometimes, the fastest route is a straight line.

        It’d be something else if Illya and co. escaped the issues with cleverness, but they make mistakes like “Oh, doppelganger Illya wasn’t really Illya, let’s have Kuro talk this out” and the Ainsworths never take advantage of it. And if mistakes like that can happen, how do I believe they can be stopped? And yeah, they didn’t kill Illya’s brother, which that didn’t pan for them with ep. 10 but that’s another topic.

        Fuwa Fuwa
      3. Angelica attacks Illya in order to press for her answer, that’s why she always pause every once in a while. And of course the attack can’t be done at the same time with her explanation because that will be counterproductive. It’s similar to the standard operational procedure of interrogators up to the first half of 20th century. Basically, they alternated between questioning & inflicting pain to get the words they wanted.

      1. That´s what I thought at first but this part of Ilya´s story is based on Notes so I´m thinking she might be something much MUCH WORSE than that. Think about it, Counter Guardian are Heroic Spirit that are used by the planet as anti-bodies to protect both the Earth and Humanity, no matter the means or the cost, if the Ainsworth are truly the heroes of the story then i makes no sense that Tanaka would wnat them all dead, Gaia couldn´t care less if 10 million lives must be crushed to save 7 billon and the planet, Miyu´s life? Completely meaningless to a Counter Guadian.

        I suspect Tanaka might be

        Show Spoiler ▼

        haseo0408
      2. @haseo0408
        About Tanaka
        Show Spoiler ▼

        Zannafar
      3. That’s what I love about the Nasu-verse. Whatever crazy theory you can think off, it’s guaranteed that the actual answer is far more crazy or out of this world (most of the time literally).

        Seph
  9. Loved this episode and the third option being thought of by the Illya was very touching. I love power of love stories especially when they are used in the Fate universes. I love that peaces of this story are in other Fate universes and that magical girl Illya could be shifted to any Fate universe and function the same. In a way it the messed up minds of the typical Fate magus that prevents them from realizing that when dealing with powers driven by wishes Illya’s magical girl thinking is the way to go. But this is where Empathy a major weakness comes in for the typical Fate magus. And I think it empathy that drove Kiritsuyu in this world to chose his only moral option and destroy the evil system instead of seeking it’s false glory. Although it more grim dark Shirou in other Fate universes is the empathy and love ends up winning magical guy.

    This magical girl vs grim dark has been subverted in other work but more often it is now often more grim dark in other works as well but with the magical girls ending up winning. After watching the much better done Sailor Moon Crystal 3rd season along with the prior 2 seasons though I learned the starter of the magical girl genre is heavy with the grim dark when you think of it even thought the villains are more two demential. Sailor Moon even Show Spoiler ▼

    Sailor Moon also has a gender fluid character, Sailor scouts earning money by “compensated dating aka. escorting”, Sailor Moon sleeping with her boyfriend and more (more than one sure under the radar things make it sure, yuri sex with girls living together. So magical girl is sort of returning to it’s roots as more a nobel knight vs true darkness than the light hearted stories of most of the earlier parts of the genre.

    RedRocket
  10. Interestingly, Assassin!Illya is Hundred-Faced Hassan, AKA F/Z Assassin. Considering how Install has worked up to this point, Miyu might get F/SN True Assassin (Cursed Arm Hassan) if she Installs the card…or she might get Sasaki just because. Who knows, right?

    Hanabira.Kage
  11. Oh my dear god! It´s exactly like Notes! The humans transform into a new life form in order to live in a now dead world. But I don´t buy it, in the original Notes Humanity did kill the Earth and Gai took one hell of a vengeance against those bastards and they deserved everything they got so the plan of the Ainsworth is doom from the start if you ask me, if this paralel universe has the same laws of magic then Gaia must have one last ace against humanity as well and that´s why I think Tanaka is so suspicious.

    haseo0408
  12. I’ve been waiting for this episode just to see what everyone has to say about it. It’s pretty varied I’d say, but overall it’s good.
    For me, I’m just in total agreement that this is the personal identity of Prisma Illya and I love it like that.
    And I’m telling you, Erica is just a lost cause at this point.

    1. Actually never mind, I just remembered it is the Flash Air they talked about in the previous episode. But I still don’t understand why can’t Angelica produce the same result with her Gate of Babylon, if Flash Air is considered so “low-ranking” where Gate of Babylon is “High-Grade,” considering how both can manipulate space.

      L002
      1. It’s probably to do with, ownership of “Noble Phantasms” It works similar to “Gate of Babylon” but to achieve the same destructive force, you’d need contents on the same level as those contained in Gil’s vault. Basically you can link “Flash Air” to anywhere but unless that place has an infinite number of powerful “Noble Phantasms” that can be used without mastery or special conditions then it’s simply not as powerful.

        kazakiri
      2. Gil’s vault is like a inventory box, you can take things in and out but the in is only in the other dimension things are stored. “low-ranking” magic is simple magic but can be powerful depending on usage.

        aaoyu
      3. Both manipulate space but that doesn’t mean they do the same thing.

        Flash Air is literally displacement, as in move space to another point. Seemly useless but they have developed it to the point where they can literally move consciousness to another point in space or the tips of a sword to behind the attackers back.

        Gate of Babylon however is just a vault. It can manifest anywhere the user wants but it’s still just a vault. Things can be taken out of it and be returned to it. That’s pretty much all it does.

        Seph

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