Shangri-La Frontier – Season 1 Episode 5 Recap & Review

Episode 5

Up against the Mud Digger, a terrible match-up for him, Sunraku has to think of a new way to fight. He quickly uses his two evasive skills, Slide Move and Repel Counter, an evolution of Perfect Parry. However, he needs to wait to use those again, so he’s basically defenseless now.

The monster charges toward him, and right when it’s about to swallow Sunraku, Emul prepares herself. With a monocle and a book in hand, she uses Magic Edge, a slashing skill that sends Mud Digger flying away. After soloing Shangri-La Frontier for so much time, Sunraku forgot he had a partner in this fight. Although he says he won’t waste Emul’s efforts, his mobility doesn’t help him get closer to the monster.

However, when Mud Digger gets up, Sunraku uses the Evolution of Screw Pierce, Spiral Edge. To keep up the pressure, he quickly uses Edge Climb, a skill that allows him to climb the monster and reach its top.

From there, he gives Emul a command. Even though the boss tries to stop them, it’s already too late. Sunraku uses his Repel Counter, and Emul uses a boosted Magic Edge.

When he falls, Sunraku only takes 8 HP of damage. But it’s alright, as they have defeated the boss. He relaxes and congratulates Emul, only to turn around and discover he is wrong. Mud Digger is still alive and making its next move. It dives and traps Sunraku where he is. Thinking it’ll probably be a hit kill, he throws Emul to safety.

However, Mud Digger hurls him up in the air, only making a small damage. That’s when Sunraku remembers the monster’s characteristics. When it reaches a certain HP, it uses a special move. It throws people and makes the player die because of the fall damage they take. The thing about it is that it’ll always hit, so players have to do something about the fall with a specific skill or item to kill the monster.

Sunraku thinks it’s a dead end and gives up. However, Emul encouragingly shouts he needs to show his vorpal spirit and hits him with a magic scroll, making them teleport. They change positions to be right above Mud Digger, and then Sunraku’s luck comes to save him.

There’s a skill called Meteor Fall, which uses downward energy to cause damage. Even though he doesn’t have it, the momentum from his fall acts similarly and creates a Mistake Meteor Fall. He kills the boss and levels up.

Now, on their way to Thirdrema, the game’s third city, Sunraku recovers his HP with herbs and talks with Emul. They need to find a way to hide him, as they don’t want to draw attention like they did before. That’s when she uses a Vorpal Bracelet, a secret item. It transforms her from a bunny into a humanoid girl player. When Sunraku fears SLF is becoming a harem game, Emul comes back to normal, saying the item exhausts her.

Emul uses her item again when they are closer and both try to enter the city. The guards give him a bad time as Sunraku is almost naked, but things seem to be going well in general. That’s until someone named Animalia grabs his arm.

In the last episode, when the girls took a picture of Sunraku with the Vorpal Bunny, he started attracting even more attention than he thought. While, at first, players only talk about Emul and how the girls shouldn’t have taken a picture without asking, things get worse. Someone questions his scars and a player finds out it’s a curse from Lycagon through an NPC.

Orcelott from Ashura Kai, a clan of player killers, takes an interest in him and says they should keep killing Sunraku until he explains everything about the curse. But then Psyger contacts him and says she can protect him. She is a strong member of the clan that focuses on hunting Lycagon, maybe even their leader. So Sunraku obviously interests her too.

Back in the present, Animalia tries to make him explain how players can tame Vorpal Bunnies, but they get interrupted. Someone suddenly attacks them, but Sunraku evades and takes his distance. We find out it’s Arthur Pencilgon, the player we saw last episode who is an acquaintance of Sunraku. The episode ends by teasing the fight to come.

The Episode Review

The last part is really interesting as it shows how fast information can travel in the game and some other players. We could already guess that Sunraku would attract the attention of the clan that focuses on Lycagon.

However, Orcelott is a surprise; our protagonist might have to face way more enemies than just bosses and unique monsters.

Seeing how he’s used to soloing every game, it’s hard to believe he’ll want to join a clan. So, how will the ones after Lycagon be hostile to him at some point too? It certainly does a great job of raising questions and getting us hyped for the rest of the story. 

However, the battle against Mud Digger brings some mixed feelings. Although it’s cool to see Sunraku and Emul fighting together and covering each other’s weaknesses, it’s a bit lacking.

When fighting Lycagon, Sunraku says he’s not in a game where someone will magically save him. But Emul plays that role now.

Take the part in which Sunraku falls to his death for example. There’s some kind of way to survive that, as many people play the game alone. So it’d be fun if he thought of something by himself.

It’s not bad of him to depend on Emul, but it is the second time in the episode she uses a new skill out of nowhere and saves Sunraku. If they coordinate something, like when Emul uses the boosted Magic Edge, it feels more gratifying.

Overall, like always, we had a pretty fun episode of Shangri-La Frontier this week. And Sunraku’s fight with Arthur next week has the potential to be better than everything we’ve seen up until now.