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「Hit & Away」
General Impressions
Ernesti’s solution to the Levitate airships come in the form of crude anti-air projectiles. It’s cheap, and gets the job done. What more can you ask for? Cristobal forges ahead into enemy heartlands, paying no respect to the rumours he had heard about the enemy’s strength. He pays for his error with the ultimate cost – the price of his life. I like how Ernesti was shown to seriously consider the offer Cristobal made, and we are reminded that he is mostly a self-serving individual, especially pertaining to matters involving Silhouette Knights.
Say he was reincarnated on the Zaloudek side, the world probably wouldn’t have stood a chance against the combined might of Ernesti and Horatio, and I’m sure the boy wouldn’t have given a damn for the lives lost in the war either. Has he even thought about the dead mecha pilots? No. We only ever hear him grieve for the destruction of the Silhouette Knights. In this regard, I find him to be a rather callous person with a couple of screws loose in his head. But since he’s on the side of good, his dubious moral compass will mostly go unquestioned, while he carries on doing as he pleases. Fortunately for Fremevilla, and unfortunately for Cristobal, Ambrosius had the foresight to grant Ernesti with everything he asked for. This was not an offer Cristobal could match, contrary to his intial beliefs, consigning him to an young death as he stubbornly elects to go down with his Silhouette Knight.
After that battle, times are looking good for the Silver Phoenix crew. Everyone survives, Eleonara gets established as the new monarch of Kuschpercha, and Ernesti dabbles with the new etherite technology he picks up from the wreckage of the Levitate ship (I’m just a tad surprised that the chunk of ether made it past censorship). But the Zaloudek princess wants revenge for the death of her younger brother, and you’d bet that Horatio would use this as an opportunity to bring some costly projects to life. Using the explosive jet thruster technology he witnessed from Ernesti’s Ikaruga, a sovereign of the skies is invented. A draconic levitate ship, with the armour to withstand anti-air measures, and the firepower to raze cities. Literally, it fires a particle cannon that can even disintegrate castles. Talk about overkill!
Concluding Thoughts
The British Patron Saint would like to have a word on the matter of knights squaring off against dragons. Speaking of which, I wonder how Ernesti will go about prevailing, if he can even do so at all even with all of his current inventions. Judging by the previews, the Zaloudek Empire even look to have come up with counter measures for the anti-air projectiles. If I had to guess, a stalemate will occur for the meantime, until Ernesti manages to make a breakthrough in applying the newfound ether technology to further bolster Ikaruga’s capabilities.
Preview
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https://randomc.net/image/Knights%20and%20Magic/Knights%20and%20Magic%20-%2011%20-%2010.jpg
Oh, no doubt this was a Horatio episode. A Prince dies? A Princess consumed with grief? Horatio doesn’t even blink. He actually doesn’t even think up any new mecha either – he just dusts off an old plan that is now workable, thanks to Ernesti’s “explosive” propulsion. (Which Horatio still snidely opined was “inelegant”.)
Good tech background, as we see that the enemy’s Silhouette Knights run on…magic coal? A cruder method than Fremevilla’s Ether Engines, as the Ether-atmosphere-collectors seem to require a lot more outfitting and replacement, compared to the “battery” Engines.
Shouldn’t Ernesti be hitting puberty and his growth spurt soon? The narration said “several months”. It’s got to be more than a year since Knight’s and Magic began, and Ernesti still looks nine years old.
The tech and engineering process is explored to a much greater depth in the light novel. Though they ended up sacrificing this aspect quite a bit, I’d say they made the right choice playing to the anime’s strengths of visually depicting battles, which is infinitely easier than doing it through words.
It’s roughly been 7-8 years, if memory serves me correct. Too bad they had to blitz through the content to fit it all into a single cour.
Someone commented the LN’s action segments are weaker than the development parts.
No doubt the anime staff could’ve fleshed out more stuff if they were given a 2-cour, although I think they’re doing their best with just one. I wonder why they were only given 1-cour to work with though – maybe the producers thought the LN’s R&D appeal was too niche and therefore too risky to justify 2-cours.
Actually the enemy’s method was more advanced. If they can be compared to coal, then the traditional Ether Reactor is something like sails on ship.
I see the Ether Engines as batteries that require water & electrolyte (ether) after being depleted. The Ether Collectors have a two-step process with the “coal”, and Ernie mentioned about how they burn out after a single (long?) use and have to be replaced.
But if Ernie thought his two-Ether-Engine mecha was revolutionary, the Drake with multiple Ether Collectors has him beat.
They changed up alot from the LN here, No Revantiers, also Eru managed to force the Flagship down intact (which is where he managed to observe and reverse engineer the Etherlite elevator). While Horatio reversed engineered the propulsion for the dragon ship from the magic scripts recovered from the Missile Javelins that were lodged in the Levitate ships that got back from Misselier.
Also they skipped out the Blue Hawk Knights harassment operations against the first wave of Black Knights.
Also no Boss’s 4 armed silhouette gear 🙁
LN Vol 8 of Knights and Magic releases this coming 30 September 2017, and wraps up the ongoing adventure arc started in Vol 6.
The souce webnovel’s also jumped up to become the 14th most read title on Shosetsuka ni Narou.
Last time it was the mid-20s.
http://yomou.syosetu.com/rank/list/type/total_total/
(Titles like Re Zero(6th)and Mushoku Tensei(1st) still hold sway on the Top 10 list).
https://randomc.net/image/Knights%20and%20Magic/Knights%20and%20Magic%20-%2011%20-%20Large%2018.jpg
horatio was amazingly smart really, not only a genius on technology but also smart at war tactics…he purposefully made a chance of escape by letting the flagship retreat first so the enemy will focusing attack on it.
I noticed that. Horatio literally sacrificed his own prince to save his own skin.
I doubt Oracio cares about anything other than his beloved flying machines.
Horatio is pretty much Ernestine evil counterpart and rival, both of them are geniouses about magical mecha but where Ernei is angel Horation is a selfish demon.
Think that’s pretty one dimensional. I’ve never seen Ernesti show concern for human lives lost, and only mourns destroyed Silhouette Knights. He might seem like an affable eccentric, but that’s still pretty messed up.
Well an angel can also be cruel though haha
Oracio’s just as callous and selfish as Ernie is. The differences are that he’s crazy for flight and has hammier acting.
Not denying that, but I’m quite surprised at how many people give Ernesti a free pass.
It’s probably because he’s on the side of the good guys. That, and he looks like an angel.
I like that the Princess x Knight ship is sailing along smoothly haha. That aside, I’m excited to see how Ernie will deal with the Dragon Ship. I do have to admit Ernie is actually more amoral than he might look at first glance lol. He and Horatio are REALLY similar.
I like the ship too.
If this were another WN, the author’d be hooking Ernie with all the other female cast, no matter how forced.
It figures that if Eru builds a Gundam, his enemy would build a Mobile Armor as a counter.
Reminds me of a certain Space Sheriff’s ride.
I dunno that Ernesti was SERIOUSLY considering Cristobal’s offer, but rather just highlighting how he wasn’t offering anything that Ernesti didn’t already have. If Ernesti was feeling disgruntled, maybe, but Fremmevilla has been an extremely generous patron for him. I would think there isn’t much that Ernesti would find in Zaloudek that would make it worth it to burn the existing bridges he has.
Ernesti already knows everything from Fremevilla’s side. It’s clear that Zaloudek technology is vastly different, and worth learning about. I peraonlly think he wouldn’t pass up the chance to acquire more knowledge if it was presented to him.
Good point. That said, it’s likely Ernesti decided his existing bridges were far more beneficial to his present situation over the lure of learning Zaloudek’s tech.
Breakthrough?
he goes there and invent Cruise Missiles, powered with the convertors of their own Air Ships. Because so they never run out of fuel
But yeah, penetration would still the problem
Looks like it’s about to catch up to the LN translations. And the LN mentions a few times, here and there, how Ernesti gets a mad look when he talks about fighting in robots.
I’m liking the tech arms race between Horatio and Ernestine. Does Horatio become a recurring rival in the WN/LN?
Concept art of the Ikaruga’s cockpit. https://twitter.com/TENJIN_hidetaka/status/904369364186546176/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fknights-magic.com%2F
The Ikaruga’s controls are very complicated compared to other mecha, considering the typing key buttons on the control gears AND the extra piano keyboard to cover its functions.
Knights’ author got some anime merchandise samples. https://twitter.com/Amazake_Write/status/904194118154194944/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fherobunko.com%2Fbooks%2Fhero04%2F7295%2F