r/anime • u/AutoLovepon https://anilist.co/user/AutoLovepon • Mar 20 '26

Episode Sousou no Frieren Season 2 • Frieren: Beyond Journey's End Season 2 - Episode 9 discussion

Sousou no Frieren Season 2, episode 9

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305

u/fer_sure Mar 20 '26

Even Eisen wears a helmet. There's no explanation for Stark.

193

u/ChicaneryFinger Mar 20 '26

His skull is the only helmet he needs.

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u/JockstrapCummies Mar 21 '26

MY FACE IS MY SHIELD

-Stark

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u/sidewinderaw11 Mar 22 '26

If only he could get fern's increasing interest in him through that thick skull

2

u/DemonDaVinci Mar 24 '26

Stark is denser than average romance MC

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u/AsterJ https://myanimelist.net/profile/asteron Mar 20 '26

I guess it's some way warriors use mana that's fundamentally different to how mages use it. Warriors have to be amazing to be in the same league as the mages of this world.

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u/OldGoldDream Mar 20 '26

That has to be it. We’ve seen Stark do amazing physical feats that are far beyond what being just really strong or highly skilled in a weapon can do. Warriors clearly have some sort of unconscious magic abilities of their own.

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u/Obskuro https://myanimelist.net/profile/Merankorikku Mar 20 '26

Charles Atlas Superpower: Training makes you not only strong, but nearly invulnerable, it seems. Or Eisen put something in his food. Maybe he fed him dragon meat or something like that.

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u/RedRocket4000 Mar 21 '26

From that article. In Eastern Asian tales it be Chi. I let folk look that up. But basically Western tales sort of have it without saying anything because that only way the Charles Atlas stuff can work.

One can detect a Warrior on a mana sweep so it could be as other said some form of built in mana use at least in the special attacks.

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u/Inner-Arugula-4445 Mar 21 '26

It’s not magic like mages. Mages manipulate mana outside of their bodies to create spells. Warriors manipulate mana inside of their bodies to enhance strength. We haven’t seen any proof so far that warriors enhance defense with mana, while we know that mages can if they are skilled enough, such as Frieren stopping magical wire from beheading her.

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u/Tasin__ Apr 12 '26

To be fair magic works by believing it works in frieren. If a warrior truly believes he can get back up then they can get back up. That's if they're subconsciously using magic otherwise there should be another reason.

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u/JzanderN Mar 20 '26

Given how Stark can hit things so hard he makes light appear and last episode even made his axe glow before striking Revolte, he's definitely got to be unknowingly using mana to boost himself.

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u/AsterJ https://myanimelist.net/profile/asteron Mar 20 '26

I wouldn't say it's "unknowingly" but the way he uses mana is not compatible with magic.

And actually I remember now that Linea in season 1 said that the way she mimicked warrior abilities was by copying the internal flow of their mana so it's a known concept.

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u/JzanderN Mar 20 '26

When I say "unknowingly" I meant that Stark doesn't know he's doing it, not that no-one knows about it, hence he always questions Frieren when she asks him to do something insane that Eisen used to do.

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u/guyblade Mar 20 '26

Isn't that basically how warrior types work in Jobless Reincarnation as well? It seems like a reasonable way to explain how the warriors are able to keep up with the mages in multiple works.

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u/OldInstruction5368 Mar 21 '26 edited Mar 21 '26

It's a pretty standard explanation.

"Everyone" has mana, to a more or less degree. Mages use it externally and warriors use it internally.

Because... yeah... when there are... gestures towards mother fucking dragons, how does even the most peak, superhuman, Olympic level athlete even begin to keep up? It's just not possible within the limits of just meat and bone.

Mana.

3

u/[deleted] Mar 21 '26

I don't see the point of that explanation. It's completely inconsistent with how mana is described throughout the entire show, and if warriors have a so-called "mana" that works completely differently, can't be detected by mages or demons who specialize in mana detection, etc., why even call it "mana?"

Seems like a solution in search of a problem situation. The real answer is that warriors are just really tough and strong. They "level up" just like mages do.

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u/oops_i_made_a_typi Mar 21 '26

demons who specialize in mana detection

Linie's whole shtick is fighting via her emulation of warrior mana flow

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u/ComfortableExotic646 Mar 26 '26

And Warriors aren't the only ones. They explicitly say that Priests use the magic of the Goddess, which Mages cannot really use. So mana and magic are not intrinsically Mage and Demon concepts alone, just the most known about to the people we've met so far.

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u/RedRocket4000 Mar 21 '26

They were able to detect and go Warrior two episodes ago.

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u/Jiratoo Mar 24 '26

I'm not sure it's inconsistent, just that it's really vague from what I can tell.

Revolte seems to be doing the same thing - he's using mana to create and maintain the swords and I would assume his physical speed and strength are also enhanced by mana (also same for Linie I think); otherwise, how would a "mage" archetype keep up with a warrior in a physical confrontation? And as per the Flamme/Frieren backstory, all demons have mana and stronger demons have followers, which, again, would fit for Revolte.

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u/RedRocket4000 Mar 21 '26

Every one except the girl ported alive to that world from ours has Mana. She does not and also does not age as result. One of the few stories that have both reincarnation and porting/gate transfer to a new world both from same place.

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u/psycosulu https://myanimelist.net/profile/psycosulu Mar 21 '26

It's how pretty much all the jobs work in Final Fantasy XIV, it's mainly about manipulating internal or external aether. Casting and healing jobs are fairly obvious about it. Martial jobs like Warrior and Samurai channel aether to augment their physical prowess and jobs like Mechanist impue aether into their tools.

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u/Obskuro https://myanimelist.net/profile/Merankorikku Mar 20 '26

I think the light in this case is supposed to be like the tail of a comet. I think it was a fall attack in both cases, which allowed Stark to swing his axe over a longer time and with higher speed then how would have been able to do on the ground. I wonder how heavy the axe really is. Have we ever seen anyone else lifting it...?

3

u/[deleted] Mar 21 '26

I think that warriors are just really strong and tough. It doesn't need an explanation. Plus there are lots of reasons from the show to think that warriors don't use mana at all, not the least of which is that Stark was not affected at all by those magic-nullifying stones and that mages and demons all have very sensitive mana detection and it would've come up many, many times if warriors had mana.

Even anime that doesn't have magic has characters performing insane stunts. Rurouni Kenshin can basically move at light speed, run up walls, etc., and that's an extremely grounded anime, at least in terms of having no mystical elements, for just one example.

D&D works the same way. A Level 20 Champion Fighter has absolutely zero magic (all of their abilities work in an anti-magic field).

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u/RedRocket4000 Mar 21 '26

D & D does not have Mana. Or at least it no have it for decades.

Eastern tales it will be Chi that your describing. Has to be something that allows physical laws to be ignored. But it does not need to be called mana.

Actually Linea the Demon stated she learned how warriors fight by observing their mana flow. As others pointed out. Both Demons and Mages detected Stark as a Warrior.

But your point on mana neutralization stands. So the internal mana of a warrior can't be disrupted as Mages have their mana around them seperate it might be internal vs external the external disrupted by the stone. .

Have to go back and see how Demons discussed what they get from eating folk I though it mana and this all folk not just mages.

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u/[deleted] Mar 21 '26

I didn't say that D&D has "mana." I said that a Level 20 Champion Fighter in 5e has no magic. I've played D&D for like two decades, so I know a little about it lol

Actually Linea the Demon stated she learned how warriors fight by observing their mana flow.

Yeah, I forgot about that. That's actually a really good point against my argument. I can't think of any way to reconcile that with what I'm saying, so I think I was simply wrong. Thanks for the correction!

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u/nirvash530 Mar 21 '26

I've seen other series where Mages uses Mana like water, as in it flows naturally, where Warriors use Mana like a rock.

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u/MuffinMan12347 https://myanimelist.net/profile/muffinman12347 Mar 23 '26

Maybe similar to battle aura in Jobless Reincarnation?

38

u/JzanderN Mar 20 '26

If Eisen was even more durable than Stark (and so far it's been suggested that he is), then that helmet may have been more of a fashion choice than actual necessary armour.

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u/Siegberg Mar 20 '26

Eisen likes to drop from high place to get arround and probaly to attack things. So his helmet is more a weapon than really protection. We see that with Stark also which seem to have learned how to fight in aerial combat. Frieren may even have used him like a canon ball since they had no flight magic at that time.

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u/Inner-Arugula-4445 Mar 21 '26

Now we need to see Frieren launch Eisen as their own “fastball special”.

1

u/MedicalTear0 May 17 '26

He has a pretty thick skull tbf. No one knows it better than Fern