Wednesday 23 October 2013

Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Ars Nova - Episode 3

With Takao defeated in impressive fashion, the I-401 and her crew can continue onto their destination, which marks a return home for Gunzou and company as they dock in the port of Yokosuka, now impressively fortified to protect against the Fog.

With the resupply of food and munitions underway, but the supergravity cannon beyond repair with the materials currently at their disposal, Chihaya leaves the rest of his crew to it to visit a naval graveyard with Iona.  Whilst there, they bump into a young girl who seems to have rather unusually piqued the mental model's interest, but they and the rest of the I-401's crew soon meet a rather less friendly stranger... a group of strangers who seem to want to invite the crew to dinner.  At gunpoint.


All of this is at the behest of an admiral turned prominent politician, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out what he wants - to take control of the I-401 away from Gunzou; partly to use it in the fight against the Fog himself, and partly from fear of what might happen were Iona to defect and return to the Fog's side once again.  This isn't exactly the kind of thing Gunzou is likely to agree to, and any thoughts about forcing the matter are interrupted by a Fog attack, which in turn allows Iona to turn the tables on the crew's captors.  Thus, it's off to another battle we go, while in the meantime Takao is now yearning for a certain captain and Iona's counterparts I-400 and I-402 are on the hunt for the information...

Following last week's superb slice of action and tactical naval battles, it was inevitable that we had to return to the story, and probably equally inevitable that said story was all rather predictable as Gunzou finds himself troubled by human opposition as the rest of the plot rearranges itself to provide what is hopefully more of that aforementioned top-notch action.  If we can continue to move between plot progression and engaging naval battles, I'm sure I can forgive some mediocre attempts at the former in return for scintillating moments of the latter.

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