Nanatsu no Taizai, Chapter 143: Scream of the Guardian Saint
I've never liked Jericho that much. I don't actively hate her, but she's the fun B-list character who's only use to the plot is to be a sidekick (to Guilla earlier, and now Ban) and butt-monkey. And her unrequited love for Ban has been a gigantic riot to just have fun with, but holy shit, the feels for her in this chapter! As predicted, Elaine goes all yandere and attacks both Ban and Jericho, while Jericho rants on and on about "that lunatic just slashed your throat!" and Ban is all like "no harm no foul, uh... Elaine calm down". And I do like the sheer calmness that Ban has on his face and words when he confronts Elaine when she's just tossing Jericho around with wind.
Then Elaine the psycho bitch (as Jericho so eloquently puts it) just starts wind-hacking Ban apart and ranting about how she was the one who wanted to go on a journey and live with Ban and shit. Ban's reaction is a slightly-pissed "what's happened to you, Elaine?" but Elaine is just wind-slicing through everything and Jericho charges in, first just calling Elaine names like psycho-bitch and wand-up-her-ass princess. Elaine is just doing all her twisted troll logic about how Jericho had it coming because she forced Ban to stop Elaine.
But Jericho manages to pin Elaine down. Ban is all like "stop, Jericho, Elaine isn't herself!" but Jericho confronts Elaine with words, and, man, I really do feel bad for Jericho. It's hard to describe this scene without transcribing Jericho and Elaine's conversation, but Jericho basically just confronts Elaine whether she loves Ban at all -- mind-controlled or not. Elaine of course goes I do I do I do and Jericho replies with the loudest, most anguished-looking "AND I LOVE HIM TOO!" Jericho and Elaine get to some basic sniping with how 'I will not give him over to you' and 'Ban won't ever love you. Ban realizes Elaine is controlled, but Jericho just goes into this awesome rant. First, she just rants about how someone with tits and ass suits Ban better than some short washboard-chested girl (damn girl, shots were fired) and rants about how Ban saved his life... before continuing to shout about how she would never, ever cause any kind of suffering to the man she loves...
"And yet... somehow Ban... he just can't go on without you..."
And Jericho just rants that drunk or asleep or fighting or whatever, the only thing that can consume Ban's mind is Elaine and how to revive Elaine and how Ban's just thrown away everything just to get Elaine back. And Jericho just confronts Elaine with "If you really love Ban half as much as you say you do, then how could you let yourself be manipulated this easily?"
Fucking powerful scene and speech and no I don't care if it doesn't make sense for Elaine not to just whirlwind-slice Jericho up right there and how it's a bit of a bad Aesop since Ban really likes to strip Jericho's clothes and whatnot...
But it got through, and Elaine, despite attacking Jericho with a half-assed tornado, basically asks someone to stop her.
And Ban hugs Elaine. "I will come steal you away some day. I promised you that. You're mine for all eternity." Man, the feels! Ban continues to talk to Elaine (while we cut away to a hilarious shot of Jericho saying "well, fuck me") about how he'll steal away all the skeletons in her closet and whatnot... before Elaine faints.
And we get a monologue about how the "Law of Grudge Revival" only amplifies the feelings of regret and affection and rage, and with those feelings suppressed, the Grudge cannot hold them back to life. And, well, shit, the Ten Commandments are here! Way to fucking segue from all this interesting Ban stuff back to the Ten Commandments! Apparently it's rare for anyone to resist the Law of Grudge Revival. No one has any idea what's going on but Elaine is dying, Jericho is scared, and Ban is fucking pissed.
Ban leaves Elaine to Jericho, and is ready to fight not one, but two members of the Ten Commandments alone -- despite him being barely as powerful as pre-power-up Meliodas who got his ass handed to him by Galan alone.
And now, we have Galan and Merascylla (that's her name, I forgot last chapter), ready to throw down with Ban. Galan is of the <Truth>, which we know, but Merascylla is of <Faith>. I'm not quite sure which of the ten biblical commandments that corresponds to, and her grudge anger power thing also doesn't really correspond to any of the biblical commandments. Eh, we'll see, I guess.
Holy shit, the feels! And the hype! But mostly the feels! Taizai is definitely the strongest chapter for this week's weekend trio. And this really is how you handle an admittedly one-sided love triangle. And how you do a talk-no-jutsu. This chapter is awesome.
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