Nanatsu no Taizai 153 Review: Plot Twist!

Nanatsu no Taizai, Chapter 153: The Melody's Confession

Ah, we return to the whole Dreyfus/Fraudrin thing! I've criticized and lambasted the sudden Fraudrin-gets-beaten-up-by-random-people plot twist to hell and cited it as one of the worst points in Nanatsu no Taizai, but at least they're trying to do something about it now. Fraudrin wakes up in front of this dude with absolutely epic facial hair, who is Denzel, captain of the Knights Pleiades of the Azure Sky. Also, he's apparently King Baltra's exiled younger brother, a little factoid that I am not entirely sure we already know before this.

Denzel knows that he's not speaking with Dreyfus, but with someone that is controlling the poor dude. They're also apparently in a building in the borderlands, and ever since the king had a vision of the upcoming holy war, Denzel has been preparing this super-ultra-magic safehouse thing and he's apparently spent a lot of time deciphering ancient magic texts and whatnot to build this safehouse to contain demons or whatever.

After introdumping a little, Denzel proceeds to stab Fraudrin in the shoulder with a blade blessed by the druids. Fraudrin tries to go all 'this is the body of your comrade!' but Denzel isn't having none of that shit and spins the blade around while it's still embedded in Fraudrin's shoulder. What an awesome old dude! The Azure Sky troops are still gigantic tools, but Denzel's cool in my books. 

Fraudrin breaks free from his bounds and notes that interrogation isn't what Denzel is planning, and Denzel's plan is simple: bring a demon to his knees. You could, y'know, slice the dude's throat while Deldrey's man-control powers are in effect, yeah? But hey, I just hope the 'spend an elaborate death trap to kill the hero allowing him to get away' trope doesn't come into play here. 

We see a bit of Deldrey, Arden and Wayoo doing their usual thing. Arden is a gigantic idiot for tossing around the incantation ball that's apparently keeping the prison in check.

We see a cool swordfight between Denzel and Fraudrin, and then Denzel does this 'Dead Man's Revenge' thing that summons the ghosts of the fallen Dawn Roar -- killed off too quickly with so little screentime that they aren't really characters bar Threader, but their death was super-sudden. Yeah, some Yamamoto shit going on in here. They got their revenge, doing some blood-splatty stuff. Denzel calls his ability 'Judgment', though whether Dead Man's Revenge is just one part of it or if it's the same thing remains to be seen. Fraudrin tries to do some explody shit, but he misses. A different knight shows up, who has the utterly awesome name of Deathpierce, and he has the ability 'Melody' that allows him to control the music of magic or some shit like that to cause Fraudrin's magical blasts to basically get lagged. 

Fraudrin tries to make a run for it from Denzel and Deathpierce, but apparently they've been sealed in Perfect Cube, the same spell Merlin used in the past.

Then come the big reveal. Fraudrin says that he's not one of the Ten Commandments, how he's a substitute or an understudy for one of the actual Ten Commandments. Of course, at this point we think he's talking about Meliodas, and probably cause these strong Azure Sky people to go after Meliodas (which would be dumb but not a bad plot development) and apparently the individual disappeared and only reappeared to Fraudrin during the battle at the royal capital (which was a 'few days ago' to Fraudrin but literal years ago for us readers). Of course, I thought it was Meliodas, or even Merlin when it showed her prominently among the Sins' group in the next preview panel as Fraudrin explains that the missing Commandment lost their entire sense of self due to their own Commandment backfiring at them. Again, it could've easily applied to the derpy-derp Meliodas.

But the true ten Commandment's identity?

Gowther the Selfless.

(We get a short page of Gowther just, well, being Gowther)

What in the utter fuck?

It's not entirely out of thin air, of course. Gowther's identity has been shrouded in mystery since the beginning, and we have seen him be suppressed by Merlin's armour (and Merlin herself is suspect, having knowledge of how to siphon Meliodas' demonic power, Balor's Magic Eye and all that), plus the revelation that Gowther is a doll raises more question than it does answer anything. And while we attributed Gowther's lack of emotion and scary powers to him being a soulless doll, being a demon who has his self wiped clean actually makes sense. Plus there was that meeting in the minds deal between Gowther and Fraudrin during said battle. 

But who in their right mind would make, like, a headcanon guess that Gowther was actually a member of the Ten Commandments?

Huh. Since the team is going to head off to Vaizel and presumably meet Diane there, the whole King/Gowther/Diane conflict might actually come off with a far more appropriate conclusion considering the revelations we had this and last chapter. It's one helluva bombshell to drop on us, that's for sure. I disliked that particular part of Taizai where Gowther basically fucked with Diane's memories, but delving deeper into the whole Gowther mystery works. Still doesn't make up for the sudden silly plot directions it did before with regards to Gowther, Diane and Fraudrin, but at least it's building up to something more interesting than previously thought. Good job!