D.Gray-man / First Impressions

Summary:

Faced up against Allen and his new eye, Eliade transforms into her Akuma form even though she says she hates it and prefers her human form. Outside, Krory has the upper hand on Lavi, but then he starts needing more of Eliade’s blood to continue fighting, and this weakness gives Lavi the opportunity to use his fire seal to smash Krory into the castle. When Eliade sees Krory’s wounded body, she returns to her human form and rushes to his side. After saving Allen from falling and heading inside the castle too, Lavi is suddenly met with a shocking sight: a mummified figure floating beside Eliade which he recognizes it as the Soul of the Akuma.

As she holds Krory in her arms, Eliade remembers the woman who brought her back. As per the Millennium Earl’s orders, Eliade had killed this woman and taken her human form. After she evolved, she concerned herself with shopping and her beauty. However, her Akuma side killed all the men around her, and it prevented her from the one thing she really wanted to try. When the Millennium Earl had sent her to investigate Krory, Eliade had thought to herself that he never praised her not matter how beautiful she became. She had eventually encountered Krory for the first time when he attacked her in the forest.

Eliade had gotten a very bad feeling when she saw Krory’s teeth back then. He had used them to bite her neck, and she had thought she’d die, but she woke up later still alive. She saw that Krory had curled up in the corner crying to himself, and although his teeth still gave her a bad feeling, she felt attracted to them. She had proceeded to kiss him, and learned later that Krory got amazing physical strength by drinking Akuma blood. Eliade now wants to live in this castle forever with just Krory, and that’s what driving her concern for him now. However, Krory is also able to see her soul, and Lavi attributes it to Allen’s new left eye. This causes Allen to wonder if Mana’s curse has gotten stronger so that other people can see what he sees.

Lavi and Allen then use the visible soul as proof to Krory that Eliade is an Akuma. With her secret out, Eliade fully transforms and throws Krory into a nearby pillar. Because she can’t let him become an Exorcist, Eliade knows that she has to kill him. Meanwhile, the man-eating flowers suddenly burst out of the floors to attack Allen and Lavi. Not paying attention to that, a crying Krory admits that he had loved Eliade ever since he first saw her. When he wonders why she didn’t kill him, Eliade claims to have had a use for him – there was something she wanted to do. For the sake of that, she had endured the urge to kill him. As he finally comes to terms with the fact that she’s really an Akuma, Krory licks up the drop of her blood on his hand and claims that he’s always wanted to kill her too. With that, the two fly at each other with the mutual intent to kill.

Preview

I always find it hard to consider Eliade a villain since she’s really not portrayed that way. If not for the fact that she’s under the Millennium Earl’s control, she’d almost be like a real human. It certainly makes her story with Krory feel like it’s about two star-crossed lovers who you know won’t be allowed to stay together. Actually, today’s episode expanded quite a bit on what the manga covers in terms of Eliade’s past, and I think it really emphasized her feelings for Krory.
The animation quality was also quite good this week, particularly when Lavi was using his fire seal against Krory. I think part of that might be because the fire made for quite a bright contrast to all the dark tones this arc has had. In any case, next week will probably conclude this arc, and then I’m curious where the series will go next (aka. if they’ll continue to follow the manga).

17 Comments

  9. Actually, I think they’re going to include an arc for the ‘certain’ general first, seeing as how they show a scene of him and Allen in the ending video… Who be interesting to see what are his abilities…

    Chaos2Frozen
    Reply

  11. Oh goody. :3 I hope Omni’s mentioning of better animation is true, for some reason the quality went down. :[
    Episode seems good as ever, but I have a weird feeling that the animators have incorporated Lavi’s fire seal too early. Anyone recall when it was first introduced in the manga? The memory has slipped my mind.
    @Chaos2Frozen: I second what Riki has said. Show Spoiler ▼

    Shii
    Reply

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