Summary:

With the key provided by Medusa, Eruka manages to free the man with the demon eye and learns that he had wanted to escape by digging tunnel with a spoon. Unfortunately, his plan was foiled because every meal was served with chopsticks. When Eruka suggests that he could have used urine to eventually corrode the iron bars, he gets so frustrated that he bangs his head against a tree. This gives enough time for their pursuers to catch up with them, but before he can resist them, they impale his face and neck multiple times. Eruka panics, but the man with the demon eye remains unfazed and reveals that it wasn’t that Mabaa imprisoned him without killing him – it was that she couldn’t kill him because he’s immortal. Maka and Soul meanwhile have gone to Stein for some extremely dangerous training – if they fail, their soul wavelengths might never match each other’s again. The two are surprised, however, when the training turns out to involve them talking about each other’s faults, and when Soul doesn’t hesitate to start listing off negative stuff about Maka, she gets angry and hits him. What the two don’t realize is that Stein is intentionally aggravating them with the smell of the special candles in the room, and he feels that if they can get past this, then their soul wavelengths will resonate more strongly than before. The problem is that Maka and Soul have come to an impasse over how she wants to become stronger to protect him instead of just fighting to make him stronger.

Elsewhere, Eruka brings the man with the demon eye to Medusa and is shocked to learn that Medusa only intends to remove one snake from Eruka’s body in exchange for every one task she does. Ignoring Eruka, the man with the demon eye talks to Medusa, and when he realizes that he has no official name anymore, he decides to have her call him Free. He also wants to thank her for freeing him, so she asks him to destroy a certain Meister/Weapon pair. Free gladly accepts, and sometime later, he confronts his targets on the Tower Bridge in London. Black*Star and Tsubaki are there with Maka and Soul, and since Black*Star wants to demonstrate Tsubaki’s youtou (phantom blade) mode, he goes first. He thus powers up and charges forward with great power, but he loses it all moments before reaching Free because he still can’t handle it for longer than ten seconds. Free doesn’t get a chance to turn his attention to Maka though because Soul immediately stabs him in the chest. Unfortunately for Soul, this has no effect on Free since he’s immortal, and Free then changes into true form: a werewolf. Maka tries to face Free by using Soul in his scythe form, however she quickly finds that holding Soul burns her hands because their soul wavelengths don’t match anymore.

Not giving Maka much time to react, Free begins to smack her around with his brute force and ice-based abilities. It culminates in him attempting to use his Demon Eye Cannon ability on her, but he screws up and accidentally impales himself instead. His immortality allows him to recover almost instantly though, and after he nails Maka with a giant ball of ice, she decides to wield Soul even when their wavelengths don’t match. Soul, however, becomes frustrated watching her get knocked around, and the two start arguing mid-battle about her wanting to get stronger. It is ultimately Tsubaki who steps in to lecture the two for not considering each other’s views and about being so angry. This leads to Maka deciding that she wants to become stronger with Soul, and Soul in turn opts to become stronger by finally approaching the small demon in his mind and taking him up on the offer. Maka and Soul then initiate a resonance of souls, and Soul nearly loses control, much to the joy of Medusa who is watching the battle. He manages to reel himself in though, and the two form the Witch Hunter blade. Free attempts to defend himself by using his tail as a wall, and though it initially stops Maka, she feverishly headbutts the shaft of her weapon until it finally cuts through. In the heat of the battle, she then throws herself at Free to push him off the side of the bridge. Soul manages to grab her arm to keep her from falling, but Free latches onto Maka with his claws, and she’s unable to get out of his grasp. It’s not until Black*Star uses Tsubaki to sever Free’s arm that Maka gets free.

Believing that the battle isn’t over yet, Free tries to create a block of ice in mid-air so that he can use it as a springboard back onto the bridge, but he accidentally materializes the ice over his own body, causing him to fall and sink into the water below. Medusa is pleased with what she’s seen though, and she’s now convinced that moving forward with the black blood research will lead to the evolution of a Kishin. In the aftermath of the battle, Soul and Maka make up, but she then starts coughing up black blood.

Preview

Well this fight with Free was interesting in the somewhat disturbing and anticlimactic sort of ways. I say disturbing because it was weird seeing Maka be so aggressive and determined that she’s banging her head against her weapon in an effort to force it through. It’s the kind of desperation that isn’t very pretty to watch (and I’m sure that’s part of the point). What’s worrisome is that Maka now has some black blood in her too, and that symbolizes to me that her quest for more power will take a turn down the dark side. As for it being anticlimactic, I was hoping for a better, less comical conclusion to Free battle after all that fighting, but I realize that it’s hard to do it in a satisfactory way since he’s immortal and all. I assume he’ll be back too at some point because he’s too good of a character to just throw away. What I really want to see now though is Black*Star use Tsubaki’s youtou mode in an actual fight since they keep teasing about it, but haven’t shown much. Perhaps he’ll have it down by the next time they face Free, assuming they do. Next week however appears to take place mostly at Shibusen and will involve a lot of blood.

24 Comments

  1. This fight was nerfed so much compared to the manga. It should have just been made into two episodes.

    If you didn’t read the manga, here’s what you missed:
    Show Spoiler ▼

    RmX
  2. Great episode with a good fight although I expected more from Free. I am sure he will be back and do much better next time (unless they use silver or something against him 🙂

    I hope to see a Death the Kid episode soon or, even better, him becoming a main part of the current story. There hasn’t been any focus on his character lately.

    Kalessin
  3. My favorite show currently airing even more so then Code Geass R2 and Macross.
    Just caught up with the manga it is amazing but it doesn’t seem to be ending anytime soon.
    So I’m wondering if Soul Eater can cover it all even with 50+ episodes

    Hei
  4. this episode was disappointing. they pretty much cut out the entire fight with Free, including the Maka/Tsubaki team up. this doesn’t bode well for the big arc that’s around the corner.

    v1cious
  5. wooot! man! next episode is the most funny and
    hilarious! in the manga it was my favorite chapter XD
    man! now i can’t stop laughing XD XD XD
    though this episode is a bit dissapointing
    since there are some parts which not shown
    in the anime and yup! i want to see Maka’s weilding
    Tsubaki in animation OX XP

    k0na-yume
  6. The part where maka was banging her head on soul to make a deeper cut… throw in the weird-ass, anticlimatic piano bgm… I guess the madness has begun, eh?

    nice, rock solid episode. And thanks to the cut-out scenes, reading the manga is still a joy. Hope they keep it up. Bring on the madness

    42-42-564
  7. thing is though and i wont spoil anything even though the storyline at the moment seems slow and it seems that with every story type episode it is followed with a sort of filler one the story line picks up soon and becomes very interesting and good to watch.

    i just hope the anime dosent mess up the manga story sice the manga story is perfect at the moment and animes always habe a tendency to change manga storylines for the worst when doing the anime but hopefully it wont happen here

    jay....jay

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