By The Grace Of The Gods is yet another isekai anime that came out in 2021 and is back again with a season 2. After its debut, it managed to gain a small fan following mainly due to its source material and its nature as an isekai.
Season 1 of the anime was hardly decent, but it actually progressed the plot a bit and established the protagonist’s shop. The anime currently has 2 seasons and almost 24 episodes in total, making it quite a time-consuming series to watch. So we decided to watch both seasons of this anime to write this review to help you decide whether you should invest your time watching this anime.
By The Grace Of The Gods Season 2 Episode 9 Recap:
Episode 9 starts off at the academy that has been mentioned throughout the many episodes of this anime. The episode starts off with Elia attending classes in the academy only to deem them boring, as most of them are basic stuff that had been taught to her before she even started attending the academy.
Elia even expresses her concerns over not being able to make friends due to her noble status scaring away anyone who might want to be friends with her. Luckily some of her boredom and concerns go away when she meets Michelle, another fellow noble.
Elia and Michelle spark off a conversation about the studies being boring while also trying to evade becoming part of any sort of weird factions that are arising within the student body, which ends up making them both into some sort of loners even though both of them have the makings of really popular students.
Especially Michelle, who had become quite popular when she first arrived in the academy, most probably due to her stunning androgynous features and noble mannerisms. The conversation takes a turn when Elia asks Michelle about her motive behind being in the hall.
Michelle pulls out a piece of paper with a magic circle on it as an answer. Michelle informs her that she’s studying magic circle science, a form of magic that had branched off from alchemy.
Unfortunately, the only teacher that used to dabble in magic circle sciences quit before their academy session started, so now she has no choice other than to experiment on magic circles by herself to continue her studies.
Elia’s knowledge and normal demeanor toward magic circles and alchemy interested Michelle as alchemy and magic circles were tied to many misconceptions, but Elia’s encounter with Ryoma, who could perform actual alchemy and was a pretty frequent user of magic circles kept her clear from such misconceptions, eventually helping her get a clearer picture of such magic.
Michelle draws magic on the floor and activates it, only for it to produce a few sparks, startling Elia as well as Miyabi, who was observing them from some distance. This eventually sparks an inevitable conversation between them, allowing Miyabi to introduce herself to Elia and relay the good luck message that Ryoma had sent to Elia through none other than Miyabi.
Ryoma’s message manages to Elia up, clearing up her doubts and anxiousness regarding her inability to make friends, and she even takes the opportunity to make friends with Miyabi. Michelle takes the opportunity and pitches in the idea of forming a team for practical training, which is readily accepted by the other girls.
The groups formed in the academy are formed by the students themselves. This eventually led to the formation of groups that ended up dividing the student body based on their status as nobles or commoners.
Elia, Miyabi, and Michelle decide to form a group devoid of such shallow ideals and decide to form a group of their own. Elia and her friends then go on to search for more members as a team needs to have 5-6 members to be actually recognized as a group.
Michelle suggests recruiting one of her acquaintances as a member. The acquaintance ends up being Riela, a daughter from a family of knights that rose to the position of baron through their successful endeavors.
Riela readily joins Elia’s group even though she had gotten numerous invitations from different teams beforehand as she disliked their ideologies and denounced them for mistaking the honor of nobility with boastful pride.
Later they go on to recruit a beast folk girl named Kanan. These 5 members form a team where Riela and Kanan would serve as the vanguard with Elia, Miyabi, and Michelle as supports.
All the new students of the academy are then taken on a camping exercise which would serve as practical experience for them. The exercise takes place among different groups formed by the students beforehand, resulting in scuffles among different teams, essentially highlighting the divide between the so-called nobility and commoners.
But Elia’s team eventually manages to calm things down among both parties due to their good-willed nature and disregard for statuses.
By The Grace Of The Gods Season 2 Episode 10 Story Breakdown:
Episode 10 starts with bamboo forest employees planning the layout for their store’s stall that will be on display during the founding festival. Ryoma observes them for a bit and then heads outside to get a glimpse of the rehearsal of the Semroid troupe that is said to be the main attraction of the founding festival. Ryoma is approached by Worgan, the guild master of the town of Gimul.
Worgan inquires about Ryoma’s availability for the next few days stating that he heard the news about Ryoma wanting to increase his adventure rank, and thus he has a job that might interest Ryoma, especially since it involves a particular monster called a treat. The proposition proved to be of interest to Ryoma, and as a result, he accepted Worgan’s proposition.
Ryoma later visits the guild, where Worgan debriefs him about his proposition. The town of Gimul was mainly based on mining, and thus they wanted to make a tourist attraction in the town that would attract people even if the mining reserves got depleted.
The attraction that they finally decided upon ended up being a whole other town meant to be constructed outside Gimul, which would have a fighting arena as the centerpiece. Apparently, they hired a really famous but eccentric architect to design the arena.
As a result, the architect decided that the entire arena would be constructed using treant wood. Worgan sought Ryoma’s help and formed an entire adventurer party in order to gather a huge amount of treant wood for this very reason.
The adventurer party sets out for the mission on the very next day while planning their operation on the way. All the party members are then debriefed about treants, their attacks, and their weaknesses which is just the fleshy face-like structure on their trunks.
Apparently, treants mostly hide their face-like structures, making them hard to differentiate from regular trees, thus making magic detection the only sure way to differentiate treants from regular trees.
Ryoma and the party later reach their target forest and set up camp for the night. Asagi takes the opportunity and lays out a plan for their treant extermination operation while also mentioning Ryoma to relax a bit as they are there to support him.
The party sets out for the mission the next day only to come across a few treats right towards the entry of the forest. The party faces next to no challenge and swiftly takes down a few treants due to being actual veteran adventurers. Ryoma also joins and cuts down one treant in order to check his abilities and match up against them.
Treants usually prefer dark areas deep into the forest and shouldn’t be around the outskirts in such high numbers. Taking note of this anomaly, the adventurers decide to regroup and reassess their strategy while also being cautious towards the malicious magic emanating from the forest.
During their break, the party discusses their next course of action while also making sure to tell Ryoma not to push himself too hard.
They even take the opportunity to take ask Ryoma about the Katana hanging from his hips, which is actually a slime, essentially solving the fund issues in acquiring an actual katana. The party also comes across a new kind of slime called fluff slime, which Ryoma eventually tames.
Later on, the party goes back to the forest in order to continue their operation, only to find out that the treant population had somehow skyrocketed during their few hours of break. The party makes quick work of the treants until they come across the source of the problem, an elder treant.
The elder treant ends up being quite a threat to the party due to its magic being able to corrode iron, but this magic is soon negated by Ryoma’s pure iron slimes, which were able to resist the corrosion. The party ends up triumphant against the elder treant with help from Ryoma’s iron slimes and goes on to have a hearty meal on their campsite.
By The Grace Of The Gods Season 2 Episode 10 Review:
By The Grace Of The Gods, season 2 continues the story right from the end of season 1. Season 1 focused on establishing a base and relations around the main character Ryoma while season 2 focused on expanding the relations even more.
By The Grace Of The Gods, season 1 debuted during the fall of 2021 and quickly gained a decent fan following, like every 5 isekai animes that come out every season. By The Grace Of The Gods, season 2 is just like season 1.
There is essentially no substance to the story, no plot, and even the animation is barely decent. The character design for the main and secondary characters isn’t unique or notable in any manner whatsoever.
There are interesting bits of lore here and there, but that’s it. One of the biggest downsides of the show would be the staleness and the sheer lack of inaction, along with bland characters.
Episode 10 does deliver some interesting moments, like the adventurer party fighting a huge army of treants with an elder treant at the center of it only because the architect they hired demanded treant wood to construct a combat arena.
It also sheds some light on the concerns of the citizens of Gimul due to the town itself being a hub for mining activity, essentially putting a timer on the prosperity of the town.
By the Grace Of The Gods also showcases some interesting uses of magic, like Ryoma’s use of the abilities of metal slimes to make different sorts of weapons for himself, essentially providing him with a nearly infinite arsenal of really strong weapons as well as the use of spatial magic to target and teleport objects to the caster’s vicinity.
But this doesn’t deter from the sheer blandness of the anime. The worldbuilding is almost non-existent, and the characters look no different from generic character designs one might find in any other generic isekai manga.
Another downside of the anime is the characters. By The Grace Of The Gods has a huge cast of characters, and almost none of them are memorable. The main character is a reincarnated 39-year-old who got a chance at another life, but his character sees almost no development.
Even his demeanor is more like a child even though he has all the memories from his past lives. The supposed primary love interest of the protagonist, Elia, is an even worse case.
Overall, By The Grace Of The Gods season 2, episode 10, is below decent at best, especially since there are so many animes that are sure to deliver a better viewing experience.
By The Grace Of The Gods Season 2 Episode 10: Where To Watch?
By The Grace Of The Gods is available to Stream on Crunchyroll and Ani-one Asia on youtube, along with the Season 1 of this series.
By The Grace Of The Gods Season 2 Episode 10: Final Verdict
Overall, the episode delivers the same quality as the rest of the anime. If you have watched episode 9 of this anime, then you would even be able to skip this episode and lose nothing notable. There is no worldbuilding, no character progression.
The plot is non-existent in the first place. The comedy feels forced and outright bad, the characters are annoying, and the designs of the towns and even the characters are generic. One of the only interesting parts about episode 10 was the huge chest of magic stones that was feeding power to the elder treant, but the anime fails to expand on it.
The main character has taming skills but wastes them in only taming slimes; as a result, the anime wastes what would’ve been a really interesting premise. By The Grace Of The Gods is one of the most generic skis out there and would be a waste of time for almost anyone who decides to watch it.
Our rating: ⭐(1.5/5)
Also read: By the Grace of the Gods Season 2 Episode 11: Release Date, Preview & Where To Watch?
