In this episode we’re getting a divine with Aura. As she uses “The Scales of Obedience”. It is actually a very interesting spell because essentially you put your soul on the line against another, and whoever has more mana wins. Essentially allowing Aura to forcefully control if she wins. It’s quite risky, but high risk, high reward. Still, as Granat points out, it is not perfect, as some can resist it temporarily. Though it makes sense for a demon to look at it the logical way. Well, just kill them, and they can’t resist. To beat Aura, it is clear you must have more mana.
It is funny as Aura mentions how Frieren is using such a roundabout method to deal with her headless knights. We see another example of demons unable to understand emotions and why, now that Himmel is gone, Frieren would continue to follow Himmel’s advice. Well, he is gone now; you can’t please him.
Next we got Fern against Lügner & Stark against Linie. As we know, both lack self-confidence in the truth of their abilities. We see in the flashback with Frieren that obviously Fern will never catch up to Frieren in terms of magic in a general sense. Fern has something that Frieren will never have, and it is the technique of how fast she can fire off her spells. Now the question to wonder is, is this a pure talent that Fern has at her disposal that Frieren can’t achieve?
Once again, Lügner’s arrogance is his demise. He could have killed Fern, but he thought there was no way Fern could beat him if she didn’t catch him by surprise. As his questioning her led to an opportunity for Fern. We have seen Lügner mention that he hates geniuses, and here he sees how fast Fern was at firing off her spells. Despite him raising his magic for so long, he has no answer for Fern’s technique. Is it quite fitting for him to examine the line from Flamme -> Frieren -> Fern, and you could say all of them are geniuses?
For Linie, she can examine a technique and memorize it. Of course, using the same technique as Eisen is quite intimidating. As Stark figures, it is more an imitation than the actual thing. In fighting with an axe, it is about both technique and power. She might have the former, but she doesn’t have the latter. As Stark follows the advice of his master in that it isn’t over until you can’t get back up. Simple advice, but here it works because seeing his master’s techniques was more damaging than how Linie demonstrated it. Much like how Lügner isn’t a genius or Linie doesn’t hold the power of a warrior. Which is how Stark was able to beat her. It’s superb to see Stark & Fern both holding their own and finishing the job without needing Frieren.
This episode adapted chapters 18-20. Of course the animation for the fights is outstanding. But what is even more impressive is how they transitioned between when Fern and Stark began their fights. Going from Fern to Stark. A wonderful use of the anime medium.