Angel Sanctuary Part Two

After everyone has returned from hell, we move onto the longest and probably most major arc of the series. I will call it the Sevothtarte arc. This arc had really started in the previous arc because he is the reason why Gabriel's soul is asleep/missing. Upon returning to his own body, Setsuna realises Sara's soul as the group plan to head to heaven. With the help of Zaphkiel, Setsuna is able to get into heaven under the pretence of helping Zaphkiel with his rebellion army. Zaphkiel makes a brief appearence earlier in the series when he stops Setsuna from committing suicide. Setsuna says he is willing to help Zaphkiel playing the part of the Messiah for the Amina Mundi (the rebel army) but later abandons them in search of Sara/Gabriel. In the meantime, Sara befriends Raphael and her servant while in confinement as is able to escape with the help of some rebels under the ruse of merchants. Sara and Setsuna, both disguised, unknowingly miss each other as Sara runs away and Setsuna travels towards Sevothtarte's mansion. Setsuna is caught by Sevonthtarte's guards but chooses to jump of the mansion, which would normally mean death, however managed to survive due to a passing "cloud whale". He manages get back to base where Zaphkiel is, where he admits that he accounted for what Setsuna would and did do. They are then raided, Sara goes back with Sevonthtarte and Zaphkiel takes a bullet for Setsuna, because it is revealed that he is the the only one who can change the future of Heaven and Earth.

Still in the same arc, I can't remember at what point, but Rocial reappears and fights with Setsuna. In the process he manages to awaken Alexial within him, and rips two of the three wings and gouge out Setsuna's left eye, leaving him critically injured. Also, due to the death of Lucifer/Kira (human embodiment of Lucifer) hell has collapsed which also lead to heaven and hell colliding. In the meanwhile Sevonthtarte begins his two pronged torture: 1.torture of Zaphkiel for his insubordination and leading the rebel forces 2.Placing Gabriel/Sara under trial with the intent of execution.

With the trial, Sevonthtarte accuses Sara/Gabriel of 'committing the sin of incest with her blood born brother during her reincarnation'. Rociel in the meantime uses the left eye of Setsuna he gouged out to offer Setsuna a view of the trial, which he is in the midst of trying to stop. Sevonthtarte continues the trial and accusses Sara of the crimes, which she cannot deny because of a medicine she drank prior to the trial which disabled her ability to speak. Sevonthtarte then presents evidence, a hologram Rahael (who also doubles as a physician) revealing that Sara was pregnant with Setsuna's child upon her death as a human (Raphael later admits that this was false and was said only to please Sevonthtarte). Just as it seems that Sara/Gabriel will be found guilty, Uriel arrives, and reveals that the real Sevonthtarte is probably dead. This effectively leads to the trial being dismissed.

After the failure of the trial, Sevonthtarte tortures Zaphkiel by performing the 'wing drop' (ripping out the wings of an angel) which would lead to a slow and painful death. After the revelations at the trial and Zaphkiel's history with Sevonthtarte, is is revealed that Sevonthtarte is Layla, a former research scientist who was violated (raped) for knowing too much about Heaven's secrets. Layla is then branded a fallen angel as sex (let alone rape) is an unforgivable sin in heaven. She then takes on the identity of Sevonthtarte after he dies in the battle between heaven and hell. Layla, under disguise, slowly killed anyone who had to do with her past, Zaphkiel being the last. After the wingdrop, Zaphkiel slowly goes crazy, basically becoming a zombie before dying. At this point Metatron, the true ruler of heaven in the absence of God (God has been MIA for centuries) is struggling as his twin brother Sandalphon, who doesn't have a body as such begins to take over his conciousness. During the demise of Sevonthtarte, Sandalphon decides that Sevonthtarte (Layla) would make a good surrogate mother for a body for Sandalphon. Sandalphon impregnates Sevonthtarte, but with little success as she later commits suicide.

Moving on the the final arc of the story, Rocial takes over where Sevonthtarte left off, becoming the effective ruler of heaven. He decides he wants to get into the highest level of heaven where God, Adam Kadmon and Alexial who is imprisoned in Eden are. Setsuna and co also try to do the same to not only stop Rocial, but also to save the Earth from the apocalypse. At the same time, Sandalphon disguises himself as Setsuna to try his plan on Sara which not only succeeds, but also leaves her unable to tell the real Setsuna from the 'monster' Setsuna. Setsuna decides to end this all by going to the highest level of Heaven. Thanks to a 'reincarnate' of Lucifer (looks like him, but his memories before death are gone), both parties are successful in breaking the barrier into heaven. Rocial/Lucifer fight Setsuna in Eden, where the body of the orignal Alexial is. It is at this point that Setsuna once again, fully awakens as the organic angel Alexial. Both parties then head for the tower where God and Adam Kadmon are.

Once inside, Rocial asks god that if he really loved his children, then he should let them end them suffering of never ending life. Setsuna and Lucifer then proceed to kill god, which turns out to be nothing but a projected image of what they expected god to be. It is then revealed that Adam Kadmon has been trying to avoid God's plan of destoying the Earth by confining him within the tower. The archangels (Michael, Uriel, with the assistance of Kurai substituting for both Raphael who is injured and Gabriel, who has returned to her state of slumber) seal the powers of Adam Kadmon, thus sealing the powers of God. At this point, Rocial is dying. He finally realises that Alexial sealed herself in Eden to protect him, and dies, giving his power to Setsuna, which gives him 6 wings (which only Adam Kadmon has). In the meanwhile, Sara breaks the stronghold Sandalphon has on her, and with God's powers sealed, Setsuna is able to defeat God, thus ending the war in heaven. This allows everything to return to how it was before the demolition the awakening of Alexial, with the angels in heaven returning to a life free of dictatorship, and Sara and Setsuna, returning to Earth with the flow of time resuming. The End.

There! 20 volumes done! Um...It's a lot to comprehend that is all I have to say. With the characters, even though he is the villain for the majority of the series, I quite like Rocial! He has an unhealthy obsession with his sister, which leads him to mimic her facial expresions so they even look alike! Well he does look feminine! Here are some shots!

 I kind of like his warped personality, I think that is what makes him such a great Villian

Anyways, that's about it for now, until next time :)

Angel Sanctuary and Olympics

Oh my Tacos!! The Olympics have finally started and I am so happy. I have already become a recluse for the next few weeks, as living in Australia, all the best stuff is in the middle of the night. However this is not a problem for me seeing as I am usually up all hours of the morning anyway. A few kudos I have to say, Congratulations to the Women's 4x100 Swimming Relay Team, for not only winning Australia's first medal of 2012, but also Australia's first Gold medal, what a great strike rate. And I also have to say congratulations to Vinokurov from Khazakstan for winning the road race before he retires at the end of the year. A gold medal is a great way to end any career. People were a bit disappointed when he one because he was caught and banned for 2 years for returning a positive drug test, but unless he turns in positive samples at the Olympics then I think there is nothing wrong with it.

Onto Angel Sanctuary by Yuki Kaori, I finally finished it, and I am glad I stuck with it and finished reading it. It is pretty violent, a lot of the characters die, and there are a lot of moments where I sat there with absolutely no clue what was going on. The story is about Setsuna and Sara, who are brother and sister. The first few volumes set up the story, where Setsuna is told that he is a reincarnation of the organic angel Alexial who hold the key to stopping the impending apocalypse that will destroy Earth.  At this point, one of the Antagonists, Rocial, the inorganic Angel and Alexial's twin brother awakens after being sealed within the Earth for centuries. Rocial immediately starts to look for his sister in order to fulfill his plan. During this time, Setsuna and Sara decide to act on their incestuous feelings for one another (yes, it is an incest series) by running away. They decide to return home, but on the way back, they encounter Katan, one of Rocial's servants (more like hitman). They try to kill Setsuna in order to kill Alexial who is dormant inside him and continue the cycle that all of Alexial's reincarnations suffer a short life and painful death, however, Sara breaks this cycle and changes the future by covering for Setsuna, being killed herself.At this point, Alexial awakens within Setsuna, causing a large scale demolition of the world. Adam Kadmon, the Holy Hermit, through an astral projection, descends to Earth to freeze time in order to delay and hopefully avoid the apocalypse.

The next arc is how Setsuna puts himself in a state of temporary death (basically he committed suicide) to battle through the ghouls of Hades in order to reclaim Sara's soul and bringing her back to life. Once in Hades, he meets  Katou, a senpai who was killed by Setsuna through a series of events. Together they battle through Hades until they find Uriel, the angel of Earth (element, not the planet) who works there on the reincarnation process. He informs Katou and Setsuna that and Angel from heaven has already claimed her soul and taken it with him. This means Setsuna must return to Earth before his body ends temporary death and actually dies, however just before he returns, an accident causes the sword in him to be removed, meaning his temporary death ends, leaving Setsuna's body in a state of permanent death. Fortunately, Setsuna's soul transfers into Alexial's original body.

The next arc follows two stories. The first is Kirai, an evil princess (evil is species of demon, not the adjective) who falls in love with Setsuna. This part of the arc deals with her feelings for Setsuna and what she would do for him to ensure his happiness. Kirai ultimately chooses to sacrifice her freedom and marry the demon lord Lucifer in order to give Setsuna a chance to return to his original body. The second part of this story is how Setsuna goes to hell to get Kirai back, because he believes everyone should be happy. The other part of the arc focuses on Sara's soul awakening in heaven, being heard by Metatron who has the ability to read dreams. Eventually, Sara's soul finds it's way into Gabriel, the angel of water who had been in a state of slumber for many centuries. The two tangents of the story meet up when Gabriel/Sara, along with the wind and fire angels, Raphael and Michael help fuse Setsuna's spirit back into his original body after he and Kirai return from hell.

Anyway, I think I will leave it there and continue another time, but that's about it, until next time :)

Nothing Much Doing

So, I'm still waiting for the start of the Olympics, seems it can't come quick enough. In the meantime, I have had very little entertainment, well, not completely, like 99% of people, I have seen the new batman movie. I must say, without spoiling it for the few people who haven't seen it, it is surprisingly good. You know when your friends see a movie before you and they build it up about how good it is and then when you see it, it doesn't live up to the expectation that your friends made you believe it was? Yeah, that totally didn't happen, it was as awesome as everyone says it was. Also without giving away too much again, I think that after the release of the Superman movie in 2013 (yes, because the last one was just oh so successful, anyone even remember the guy who played Superman in that one, I sure don't) that the producers of these films will probably look at expanding the batman series by making a film about Robin. I don't know, the ending was kind of open from that perspective, leaving the possibility that perhaps in the future, there will be more movies in the franchise.

So other than batman, my life has been kind of dull. I mean, I am still working heaps, which means my bank account can't complain! In terms of Angel Sanctuary, I am only half way, or 10 volumes through. It is quite a slow read, it does have a lot of text and the plot line is somewhat complex and intricate so it takes a while to read a chapter. I am kind of getting what is happening at the moment, but still a bit confusing. I feel that the main story has kind of been overtaken by the sub plot at the moment, the main story being Setsuna's quest to search heaven and hell for the soul of his sister Sara, but for the last 2-3 volumes it has been  more about Kirai, who has been assisting Setsuna and her story. I guess this is her arc, but it's still going, and for not even being a protagonist as such, I feel 20 chapters is way too long. The arc also doesn't look like it is going to end anytime soon either. Oh well, nothing I can do to change the story.

Anyway, that's about it for now, until next time :)