I don’t think I really have to add a whole lot to that, do I?  Kingdom is on a great, great run – and this was one of those anime episodes that speaks so eloquently that it needs or wants little help from me in extolling its virtues.  It makes me sad how little attention this series seems to get in the West – at least anywhere I virtually hang out (including here).  Maybe the horrific visuals which cursed the first several episodes doomed it in many eyes, maybe it’s just too atypical of modern pandering anime – I don’t know, but Kingdom is pretty much a Japanese phenomenon.

As great as this series is generally (very), maybe what’s most brilliant about it (and why this arc shines so brightly) is the way it’s about to depict the heroism and brutality of war at the same time, without diminishing either.  That’s a very difficult balance to maintain, nearly impossible to maintain this well.  Ultimately Kingdom makes heroes out of warriors – that’s its raison d’être.  It’s impossible to glorify soldiers without glorifying war on some level.  Yet in Kingdom war is pain.  It’s loss, and desperation, and cruelty.  But for a former slave like Xin, it’s also the only way to move up in the world.

Honestly I feel like I’ve been under siege these past few episodes.  The sensation of being trapped, the exhaustion, the constant struggle not to despair – it’s all very real.  On no objective level can we say the defenders are right and the attackers are wrong – this is what kingdoms in the warring states era did, make war.  But because we know these people so well – Xin, Zheng, Diao, so many others – because we’ve seen their struggles and their successes and their fears, we feel besieged right along with them.  We want so badly for them to somehow hold on against all odds, even when it seems all hope is gone.

Zheng isn’t dead, at least – though he’s “pale, even for him”.  Changwen has seen enough – he’s ready to move the badly wounded young king out under cover of darkness and try to rebuild as a resistance movement.  Zheng’s injury has bought the defenders that small respite at least – now that he knows of Zheng’s presence Li Mu daren’t attack at night for fear of letting Zheng escape.  In doing so he’s ensuring that all the sacrifices of the defenders will have been in vain, but from his perspective there’s no other decision to be made.  The battle has been lost, if indeed there was ever any hope of victory at all.

Xin draws the task of trying to sell Zheng on the idea, but he knows he and his brother of the soul are on the same page here.  Rather, once the perfunctory effort is dispensed with the two young men are free to have the chat that’s long been denied them.  This is one of the best scenes in anime this year – these two brave youths who’ve each inherited massive responsibilities renewing their bond, all the while pretending they aren’t about to die.  In a different world they might be students or apprentices together, talking about the girls they hope to marry of the dreams they want to chase.  But that’s not the world they live in.

Day six is the worst yet.  Zheng drags himself into the saddle and makes a show of himself for the troops, and Xin propels himself forward in a superhuman display of ferocity.  But the enemy keeps coming – they always keep coming, even if those trying to steal a home are invariably less motivated than those defending one.  But even Xin has limits, and half the Fei Xin Force is “wiped out” in battle.  And it’s worse on the other walls – Jie Yi is a rock as solid as one could hope for, but he only has so many men to loan out as reinforcements.  Even if one more day is survived, the writing is on the wall.

When the stairs are finally breached on the seventh day, the reality of the moment sinks in.  There’s nothing to be done now but despair and die, and the reality of that is hard even for hardened soldiers to take, much less teenagers.  But Lord Changwen’s intuition is off by a day, and Xin’s sharp eyes pick out the arrival of the Mountain King on the horizon – Yang Duan He.  We haven’t seen Yang Duan He in a very long time, but we know the ferocity of the warriors she leads – and these are fresh forces, unlike Li Mu’s army on their seventh day of battle.  Hope without concrete cause can only be maintained for so long, but when given reason to believe once more, is a powerful weapon indeed.