Score: A-

The whole situation unfolding in this show is honestly really engaging. Things seemed relatively simple when coming out of the previous episode. They must keep Lieselotte from getting turned into a final boss and getting killed. And in a sense that goal hasn’t exactly changed. But there are now a few more layers to the situation and more elements to keep in mind. Most of the love interests have death flags to try and avoid. It is nice that there was a reverse-harem end that could provide some ideas on how to avoid the worst results, but that’s also not something that these two are eager to reach.

These two are seriously loyal

The idea of them being able to extend blessings to Liese and Baldur makes things a bit more interesting. They are still limited to only communicating with Sieg and that could be a stumbling block for them. But their options really opened up with having Liese and Bal as perspective characters. Being able to just follow them around and have an idea what they are thinking about should allow them to avoid quite a few issues. I will admit that Bal doesn’t seem that useful for this since his biggest issue is getting killed when Liese turns into a monster. But it might come in handy in surprising ways.

What could really make things interesting though is how the two characters perceive these blessings. Their interpretation that their roles are to be shields for Sieg and Fiene could put them into unexpected danger along the way. Now that’s not extremely likely since the biggest issue is Liese herself getting turned into a boss monster. But it’s something to keep in mind. The benefit should be worth the risk though. Having three characters (Fiene, Liese, and Bal) to rotate between will give Endo and Kobayashi a good viewpoint on most major events. So, they don’t have to worry about missing out on what might be going on.

Main character power is through the roof

The most entertaining part of this episode might have been Fiene showing her protagonist powers in full. I was wondering if the girl would get chances to shine with the focus understandably being on Liese and keeping her happy. But Fiene had quite a few good little moments. That her first scene in this episode was gobbling up meat off the bone was strangely entertaining. The girl doesn’t exactly restrain herself and act like a dainty love interest. She isn’t the most active in conversation and I think that element shows her nerves and inexperience in this kind of setting. So, in that sense she does need a bit of support. Even more so when Liese sometimes acts a bit over the top and could give the wrong impression.

What’s even more fun though is that she’s a legitimate badass. The flashback scene about her being attacked in the past really shows that. The girl literally had her arm cut off, grabbed it, stuck it back on with magic, and then beat the heck out of her attackers! She also quickly beat up two potential love interests in a training exercise. There’s just some nice style in pulling off a move such as landing on her opponent’s weapon before punching them out. The action in this show obviously isn’t going to wow anyone, but it was still a fun scene. At least the guys take getting beaten up well.

Extremely suspicious

It does raise the question of why Fiene is already at max level though. It doesn’t seem like this game has New Game + mode or that they intentionally started one under that circumstance. And yet she is clearly already powerful. Of course, this whole situation is bizarre with them being able to interact like this and having the dialogue naturally change in response to Endo and Kobayashi. Something weird has already been going on and continues to be going on. Is the game itself magical or is some other force intervening here? And is it related to the mysterious guy from episode 1?

In that sense, I feel like this Artur guy is extremely suspicious. Could he be controlled/influenced by that other guy? Or is he able to enter the game world and that’s why everything is wacky? I’m just suspicious of him based on his behavior. The way he talked to Sieg reflected someone acting on information from the original storyline. He seemed to believe things were already going badly between Sieg and Liese, along with Sieg getting involved with Fiene. Now maybe bad rumors are spreading, but I don’t buy that. Things seem fine right now. But if he’s really going after Fiene, then Bal being pushed by Endo/Kobayashi could upset the guy.

This girl is an expert at blushing

Liese remains extremely cute. She’s almost the perfect tsundere thanks to the commentary. No matter how aggressive her tsun side is, it doesn’t matter. The “gods” will reveal what she was doing the whole time and explain things in a way that only shows her good side to Sieg. They can talk about all the things she was doing beforehand or note details that might get lost while people are shocked at how seemingly angry she is. The girl is bad at doing favours for people. Her intention to give Fiene a wand that is suited for her and not brittle could have easily come across as her being a jerk that broke the girl’s previous wand. And all of it because she was worried her (future) friend would get hurt if her cheap wand broke under serious circumstances.

This pair should end up just fine

This show is just fun. There are nice little details too like Endo looking at baseball news with a somber expression. Good chance he ran into major sports failure and left the game. It would explain his seeming depression when he first joined the broadcasting club. And his budding relationship with Kobayashi is only slowly moving along. I have no doubt they’ll end up together, but it might take a bit while their focus is on the other pairs. It is just fun seeing three different pairs all steadily moving in a positive direction. Even more so since I’m expecting some serious hazards to come up that will make this more challenging a situation than it appears to be.