Daemons of the Shadow Realm 1×5 and 1×6 Review – “Hare and Tortoise” and “The Kagemori Clan and the Unknown Assailants”

Daemons of the Shadow Realm anime episode 5, titled ‘Hare and the Tortoise’, and episode 6, titled ‘The Kagemori Clan and the Unknown Assailants’, had Yuru and Asa reconnent while fleshing out their past and their current circumstances.

Though I had some doubts about whether or not I would continue doing episode reviews for Deamons of the Shadow Realm in the beginning, I have to say that this particular anime has quickly become the type of piece of content I want to write up opinions about. One of the most enjoyable things for me is the way the pacing strikes a balance between seriousness, action, emotion, and humor. The pacing of the narrative is chaotic in a manner that makes everything work to benefit the viewing experience. And that’s easy to do.

With the previous episode concluding with Yuru using Jin as a hostage to get Asa to come meet him in the parking lot, ‘Hare and the Tortoise’ opened with Jin trying to make Yuru agree to visit the Kagemori mansion instead of meeting his sister in public. Their negotiation allowed time for viewers to learn a bit more about the daemons accompanying Jin and his two team members.

Jin’s daemons, Ai and Makoto, were described as the Scavenger pair. Along with luring people away by morphing the esca, the anglerfish-esque daemon Ai could phase through walls and eat up almost anything. The little fish Makoto could throw up the items Ai ate. Both worked well as a pair and helped Jin accomplish missions without leaving any evidence behind.

As for Hauro’s deamons, Torty the tortoise could pin opponents down because of his intense weight. Bunbun the Hare was a speedster and quite good at hind leg attacks. I liked how Left questioned Hauro about how much Torty actually weighed and realized she needed to train harder if they were to fight again.

That was another thing I have been enjoying about the anime. Even though Left and Right were considered powerful daemons, they weren’t the type of OP beings who could face any obstacle with ease. They still needed to be smart about picking their battles. Even though Yuru had Jin, Left and Right still realized that taking on Jin’s teammates and their respective daemons wasn’t the smartest of moves to make.

With Yuru finally agreeing to meet Asa at the Kagemori mansion, I liked the awkwardness of his meeting with his sister. Yuru was still confused about Asa being his “real” sister after being around his “fake” sister in the village, while Asa was trying to reconnect with Yuru, an older twin brother she had thought had died.

Asa not wanting to keep any secrets from Yuru made sense. He might not trust her outright, but being honest was a step in the right direction. Their conversation about their parents took me by surprise. I had assumed the parents had died. But nopes. Turns out that their parents and child Asa were attacked by assassins from the village when they ran away one night. The Kagemori Clan appeared and protected them from assassination attempts for years. After things settled down a bit, Asa and Yuru’s mother decided to meet her side of the family, which resulted in both parents disappearing from a plane on their way to their destination.

It’s not the most intriguing mystery, but it gave Yuru a reason to stay with the Kagemori Clan to find any clues about his parents’ disappearance. However, with Dera setting out to retrieve Yuru from the expansive mansion, it will be interesting to see if Yuru will stay with Asa and the Kagemori Clan or decide to go back to the apartment with Dera.

Before Asa and Yuru could continue talking, ‘The Kagemori Clan and the Unknown Assailants’ featured a surprise attack on the premises. So, yeah, other than the ongoing beef between the Higashi Village and the Kagemori Clan over the twins, there’s a mysterious third party also in play. Apparantly, they needed Yuru alive before he obtained the power of the Seal. Asa, who had already activated her Break ability, could be brought in dead. The mysterious group only needed her head for whatever they had planned to do with the chosen twins.

According to the newly shared lore, Asa’s Break ability was weaker at night compared to mornings. Not only that, but Asa’s Break ability also worked on a metaphysical sense, which I wasn’t expecting at all. Having seen her use her powers to peel an apple, I thought she could break apart physical objects and daemons. But nopes. It’s revealed that Asa could not only break away from being sealed in pocket dimensions, but she could also break the contracts between daemons and their handlers. With Asa being able to do such things, I’m quite excited to see what Yuru’s Seal ability can accomplish.

As for the contracts, having one with a daemon meant the daemon would do its best to protect the person. Killing the person would terminate the contract and allow someone else to make a new contract with the freed daemon. If a new contract wasn’t created, the daemon would remain stuck to a particular location (it was last at when the contract broke) like a ghost. Leave such a daemon contractless long enough, and it would disappear in decades or even a century.

Due to the daemons having their own personalities, there was a chance of a daemon turning on their handler if tensions arose between them. The people who attacked the Kagemori mansion didn’t seem to care much about their daemons and treated them as tools. It’s one of the reasons the Yin and Yang-looking daemons ratted their ex-handler out so quickly after Asa broke their contract.

Another piece of lore added an interesting layer to Asa and Yuru’s dynamic with Left and Right. Turns out that while they were protectors of the village, Left and Right were also the twins’ natural enemies because they could negate the Break and Seal abilities. Asa’s was Right while Yuru’s was Left. Again, another thing I didn’t see coming at all.

I’m so into this anime!

Let’s see if Dera’s able to get Yuru to come back and how the two parties will decide to work together to face the third mysterious enemy that clearly isn’t done with the twins.

Did you watch Daemons of the Shadow Realm anime season 1 episodes 5 and 6? What did you think of them?

Let us know.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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