Isekai no Seikishi Monogatari OVA Ep. 12 Review
異世界の聖機師物語 OAV Episode 12 (Blu-ray version)
War on Geminar – 12

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

With Dagmyer suffering from panic attacks after his last encounter with Kenshi’s Seikijin, Lan takes command of Dagmyer’s forces with Ulyte’s tacit blessing (in spite of Emera’s concerns). Her orders are to have Swan destroyed no matter what. As her forces track Swan, it changes course to Yukine’s home country so that Kenshi can take the sacred giant pillar and compress it into a powerful sword capable of defeating Gaia. As the Seichi student council works with the Pope and the principle to attempt to restore order, Lan’s forces stop outside of where the Swan is to observe. Ulyte figures they are making a compressed sword, so Lan decides to hold off her attack until Kenshi’s people are most vulnerable.

Using a couple of upgraded Seikijin, the Seikishi, including Ceres, take it in shift to support the weight of the pillar as Kenshi slowly compresses it, stopping to take breaks for sleep and food. As the giant pillar gets smaller and smaller, the gravity ring Wahanly has to place the base of the stone in as a grip is positioned and with the Seikishi exhausted, Lan’s forces attack. Chiaia and Aura, who are supporting what’s left of the pillar, cannot react and have to take fire as does Kenshi, who cannot stop compression at this point lest he be unable to complete the job. Yukine uses a regular Seikijin to try to shield the other three but the attacks are too much and the support from Wahanly and Ceres in Wah’s mecha is pinned down. However, Lithia arrives with a large number of Seikijin who repulse Lan’s attack. Kenshi now has his sword, named “Tenchi-ken,” and a mere swing of this rock sword defeats Lan’s forces.

The battle won, Lithia stuns Kenshi by taking a knee before him as she asks to join “Kenshi-sama’s” forces along with all of the other Seikishi from the various kingdoms. As the girls fawn over “Kenshi-sama,” Vanessa and Angela not this to Mahya, recalling the older woman’s words when Kenshi first joined Lashara to go to school. Kenshi is collapsing, suffering from exhaustion, and thus is ushered to bed.

Lapis and the principle are left in charge but that night as they sleep, Doll sneaks aboard in her Mexiah form to pass some information to Kenshi that she learned from her adoptive father. It seems that since Gaia actively sought to destroy those brought over from the other worlds and the people of the Senshi area could not bring over fresh people from the other worlds. However, they could send over an artificial human to another world where it could produce offspring with a real human and said offspring would be more powerful than the original. Then said offspring would return. Mexiah states that since it is embedded deep within them to not fight each other as they are the same type, this is the reason for Kenshi’s fever. With that, Mexiah removes a bracelet and Babalun’s image appears as he attempts to take control over Kenshi.

Outside, Lashara and the others are having a war council and are unaware of Kenshi’s plight. Flora and the King of Shurifon (Schlieffyo?) make the stunning announcement of Kenshi’s betrothal to both Aura and Maria, signaling an alliance between Shurifon, Schutreiyu, and Havoniwa. Meanwhile, Kenshi breaks the binding spell that Babalun had placed on him and the ruckus causes Chiaia, Aura, and the others to come in.

Having been ordered to destroy the Swan, Mexiah remote releases the gravity ring on Tenchi-ken, causing the giant stone sword’s weight to be too much for Swan. Mexiah turns to Doll and escapes as the Swan’s crew attempts to keep the airship from crashing. Kenshi makes it to the modified Seikijin and uses it to stop and hold Swan until Wahanly can replace the ring. Babalun is furious and vows to take out Kenshi since Kenshi defies him.

Thoughts/Review:

“Tenchi-ken,” eh? *lol* Well, Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-ohki had a Tenchi-ken (the energy sword and “master key” that Tenchi used which came from his grandfather) so it isn’t surprising that Kajishima-sensei would use the name again. Kenshi didn’t react to the name, thus I wonder if he knows that’s the name of the energy sword, assuming he knows much beyond the standard legend told to the Misaki family until they become an adult.

I do find it interesting that Kenshi is apparently the offspring of an artificial human from the time of Senshi and a regular human (or rather a human of Juraian decent). Considering the issue was raised over Kenshi’s mother being named “Rea” and it sounding like “Leia” (Neizai’s other name), one could argue that Rea may be the descendant from Senshi. However, Nobuyuki has already sired Tenchi, whom as TM!R fans know turned out to be quite special, and so he might be the descendant, aided that he’s also supposed to be Yosho’s descendant as well though Yosho’s first marriage. That combination may have been the one-two punch needed for Tenchi and Kenshi.

Well, no matter which of Kenshi’s parents is the “fake” (or descended from the artificial human), clearly Babalun didn’t expect Kenshi to be able to overcome and frankly, I didn’t either. Why? Because the standard, cliched story would have been that Kenshi is controlled but the harem gets him to break his bonds and go to the next level. Frankly, I’ve enjoyed Kenshi just kicking keester at encounter after encounter, taking some licks along the way.

Somehow, I suspect that the sabotage of the Havoniwa railway won’t end up mattering much. I tend to think that Flora would be prepared for such an eventuality, considering the limitations of rail service.

While I’m thinking of it, the stage has been set to have the harem ending with Kenshi betrothed to both Maria and Aura. There’s no doubt in my mind that Kenshi will end up with them all (Maria, Yukine, Lashara, Chiaia, Wahanly, Aura, and possibly Lithia) since Kajishima-sensei is such a fan of the harem ending. Considering the political justifications for such a wedding arrangement, considering how many countries there are in this world, Kenshi could end up marrying into each ruling family.

Just when you thought no more characters could be introduced, Kajishima-sensei introduces us to Morga-sama, Lithia’s predecessor at the role of student council president. That suggests to me some sort of blowout for the final episode — a battle of battles if you will. We’ll see though.

Going back to when Swan first arrived at Yukine’s homeland, the issue of Kenshi being able to penetrate the barrier to access the “holy place” reminded me of a similar scene in GXP where Seina activated the “god.” Kajishima-sensei does love his parallels of story concepts even if they are played somewhat differently.

Anyway, after such a big deal was made over no one having been able to penetrate the barrier and the obvious comedy stuff of reacting to Kenshi doing so, it all seemed like a red herring as the barrier was forgotten while Kenshi started compressing the humongous pillar-rock. I likely need to rewatch the episode but at the moment, I’m just wondering about it all.

With only one more episode to go, it seems that there are a lot of unanswered questions to be addressed and a lot of things to be resolved. Based on how Kajishima-sensei does things, I rather doubt well get 100% explanation of things and the doujinshi and/or novels in the future might address some of those issues. Also, it is looking more and more unlikely that Tenchi and company will have a cameo, which if true will be a bummer for me.

I’m sure there are other things I’m forgetting to address, but the main thing here is that I enjoyed this episode, and ultimately that’s what watching anime should be about — enjoyment. I’m looking forward to the series finale, after which I’ll need to rewatch the entire series before writing a final review. If it holds true to most Kajishima-sensei works, the rewatch will be more enlightening than the first time through.