Tsubasa Chronicle – 16

Short Summary:
Syaoran and company arrive in the middle of a colosseum during a fight. They learn that there is a tournament going on with a sacred treasure as the prize. Mokona senses a great power from the chest, so Kurogane, Fye, and Syaoran decide to compete. Sakura and Mokona wander around the countryside and find a hut where a young man and woman live. We learn that the young woman is frail because of a curse that was put on her a year ago. The young man, named Keefer, really wants to compete in the tournament so he can win the treasure and use it to remove the curse. Syaoran ends up winning up the tournament, but Keefer shows up and challenges him for the artifact. They fight, but Syaoran stops midway and hands it over after seeing Keefer’s tears and determination. Keefer removes the curse from the girl and two leave, promising to get married.

This was the first episode so far that was entirely original material. I didn’t really like or dislike it; it was pretty average Tsubasa Chronicle, if not a bit predictable. There was no way they were going to insert a feather into this world since the production crew probably wants to stick with the manga in terms of feather count.
Next episode will be the start of Outo country (or Sakura World as they call it in the anime), which is probably the best arc so far. It’s decently long and will most likely take us all the way to the end of this season. Then we can wait till next April for Season two. Yay! (/end sarcasm)
Parting thought: Mokona’s konnichipuu was just too cute.