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My Re-Write of Lunarre’s Entire Anime Experience

Read this, and see how it differs from the nonsensical crap we got, separated into parts for convenience. Hell, it might be better. At least, I think so. I have succeeded if I can make you give a crap when you get to the end anyway!

Tell me what you think! ;)

The Man

In the prologue, we see the Scattered Bones preparing to ambush the princess Alisha and her bodyguards. One assassin, however, is restless, distracted. He is Lunarre, distinctly similar looking to the hellion he later becomes.

He is dutiful and obedient to Rose, but she can tell something is bothering him. In his mind there is turmoil, a conflict Lunarre stubbornly refuses to talk about.

Lunarre takes her comments the wrong way, and his anger grows. He recalls past words that only enhance his negative feelings.

Before the situation can escalate, the princess and her bodyguards are spotted.

The Monster

The ambush is launched, and in the ensuing fight Lunarre loses his mask and is ordered to retreat by Rose. When he refuses, he is told he is no match for the princess.

This sends Lunarre over the edge, and he transforms.

On becoming a hellion, Lunarre reacts. He finds himself filled with incredible power, power he never thought possible to wield. And he has it, right there in the palms of his hands. He doesn’t know exactly what happened to him, but it doesn’t matter.

Drunk on power, Lunarre attempts to finish what he started and attacks Alisha. Rose can see Lunarre for what he has become, and orders The Scattered Bones to attack him in response. Lunarre lunges at Rose, but seeing her face and hearing his name called out, stops.

He still retains a respect and fear for the woman he calls boss. He is still attached to both her and his guild, as joining them saved him from his previous life as a thief. He comes back to himself.

Shaken, he declares his time with the Scattered Bones is done, and he leaves before anyone can stop him

The Princess

The negative emotions that have created this form and given him the extraordinary powers he wields, chips slowly away at his sanity and he struggles to hold on. He is haunted by his confrontation with his guild, and repeated flashbacks of other bad times in his life, the former seemingly triggered by the latter. His newfound hellion form is fast becoming more of a curse than a boon.

He has no home to go back to, no family to speak of, no allies. He needs a distraction, and fast.

To this end he pursues Alisha, but finds himself unable to kill her after his confrontation with Symonne. His mind is confused, scattered, and her grief touches a sensitive, deeply buried part of Lunarre’s humanity, bringing back bad memories once again. Disturbed and frustrated, he leaves the princess to her sorrow.

Elysia

Unable to stay alone with his thoughts for long, Lunarre once again finds the princess’s trail and follows her to Elysia. His presence triggers the alarm among the seraphs, and he is confronted by the seraph Mason, whom he quickly defeats. Suddenly he is overwhelmed by the desire to consume his enemy in order to grow stronger.

Before madness can take over, however, Mikleo and Sorey arrive on the scene and interrupt him. An unstable Lunarre readily attacks the duo, channeling his bloodlust into the ensuing fight.

He has Sorey helpless, and is about to deliver the finishing blow when the fear in the young man’s eyes makes him remember the fear in Rose’s during their last encounter when Lunarre lost control. 

Lunarre hesitates, and this allows Gramps to intervene and confront the hellion.

Lunarre retreats.

Ladylake

He once more tails Alisha, telling himself that he means to finish what he started, as this will finally quell the bad thoughts inside him, when he knows full well he has no stomach for it. He knows killing Alisha will only make things worse, not better.

What Alisha is is an excuse to follow the path to Ladylake; if not his home town, then it a place with emotional significance to him. He seeks peace of mind, a purpose, a drive, and a grip on himself that he feels is slowly slipping away. He hopes returning to the city could help him find that.

Once in Ladylake, Lunarre visits his old home, or a similar place, where he finds that his instability only becomes worse. He remembers his childhood days, his time as a petty thief, the boring, listless days merely surviving day-to-day while being the bane of the city folk.

Feeling worse than before, Lunarre quickly leaves, only to be spotted by Sorey and Mikleo - fearing the hellion is targeting Alisha - in the crowds. They pursue him, not over the rooftops like idiots, but through the back alleys Lunarre knows very well. Lunarre is cornered and confronted about his intentions.

Here Lunarre admits he has no intention of hunting Alisha, but he dodges the question on why he really came to Ladylake. Sorey and Mikleo notice the hellion is depressed, and they have no idea how to deal with it. Before Lunarre was a highly dangerous, bloodthirsty monster, an enemy to defeat. Now he looks anything but.

Mikleo suggests they leave, but Sorey is compelled to stay. He wants to help, even though he doesn’t know how. He offers an ear to listen, but Lunarre stubbornly refuses and leaves.

The Shepherd

Later, at the ceremony of the Sacred Blade, Lunarre watches on from the shadows. He noticed the presence of Rose and Dezel earlier, but he wants to avoid them. He is intrigued by Sorey and Mikleo, however, and wants to see what will happen at the ceremony.

As expected, chaos erupts, and in the mayhem Sorey becomes the Shepherd and defeats the hellionised audience members. Lunarre is enraptured, excited, and desperate to see more.

The Journey

From this point on Lunarre decides to tail Sorey and his group. As he watches, be begins to grow attached to them and their struggles. He particularly focuses on Rose as her internal struggle.

Rose has blood on her hands, just as he does, has done terrible things in the name of her beliefs, and now finds herself questioning herself and her entire worldview, just as Lunarre does. For Lunarre, his boss has come to represent him and his own struggles more than the others. He is uncertain, however, and feels guilt over how be attacked her before, so he stays in the shadows.

Seeing her come out the other side is a great shock for Lunarre. He thinks, ‘holy shit, if she can do it maybe I...’

Game Changer

The turning point comes when the group first purifies a dragon, be that Ladylake or elsewhere. Lunarre finds himself overwhelmed by his desire to be part of their journey. Witnessing this feat, and all the good they have accomplished prior, have quelled the darkness within Lunarre and persuaded him that he is not lost. He realises, or rather remembers, the desire to do good, to belong, to matter, that caused him to join the Scattered Bones.

So, with some hesitation, Lunarre approaches the main group directly, and offers his assistance. He has no idea if he’s doing the right thing, but he’s willing to chance it. After all, what has he to lose?

Reluctant Hero

There is some wariness at first, especially from Dezel, Mikleo and Rose, but Sorey assures them that everything will be fine. Dezel reminds the hellion that if he steps out of line even once, he will pay. Lunarre accepts, glad to be accepted at all.

Lunarre then takes the opportunity to apologise to Alisha in a public display of humility that shocks everyone.

From this point on, Lunarre assists the group in their travels in whatever way he can, slowly gaining the trust of his more wary comrades in the process. He shares a heart-to-heart with his former boss and they make peace.

Despite his change of heart, Lunarre finds himself occasionally plagued by uncertainty, self-doubt and anger. He suffers from nightmares and flashbacks from his past. Sorey, Rose, Alisha and even Zaveid serve as helpful support in these times. 

Lunarre even begins to feel romantic affection towards Alisha, although he tries to hide it. Zaveid sees all, however, and badgers him to confess.

The End

The final battle arrives. After much reflection and preparation, our heroes ride into battle. Lunarre and Alisha, along with others, are the first wave of attack designed to clear the hellions blocking their path to the Lord of Calamity. There are thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, too many for their small number to destroy. Not even the additional help of Sorey and the others can alleviate the hoard.

Sorey orders the remaining fighters to retreat, but Lunarre refuses. He knows a way.

Rose screams for him to stop, but Lunarre has made up his mind. Using every last bit of power he has, Lunarre draws all the remaining hellions to him and destroys them, killing himself in the process.

He dies smiling, at peace. He thanks everyone for everything they did for him in his final thoughts.

Alisha finds his body first, and the others arrive shortly after. They are genuinely, honestly grieved. Rose is the first to point out that Lunarre has returned to his human form at last.

Later, they bury him, and have a moment’s silence out of respect for their fallen friend. 

Um, sorry, I have questions. 

Lunarre tells Sorey and Mikleo that he is no longer after Alisha. Presumably he made up his mind about this sometime along the way to Ladylake while being a highly unrealistic and convenient two steps behind the human princess, because Lunarre still referred to her as his ‘main dish’ before resuming pursuit in the previous episode.

Then again, Lunarre called her this in the prologue yet refrained from killing and eating his target, so honestly the term lost its meaning a while back.

But aside from the completely unexplained change of heart - remember, we know so little about Lunarre as a person that his transformation from human to hellion, from what we were shown, boils down to ‘because he’s loopy’ - where the ultimate question: 

WHY ALISHA?

Seriously, why her? What about her and her experiences is guaranteed a more interesting ‘spectacle’ than Sorey and the gang? If anything, Lunarre has deprived himself of infinitely more interesting conflict, drama and action by restricting himself to Alisha. Thank God this is the X anime and not the games! It’s only by sheer luck, plot contrivance, and an boosted Alisha focus that Lunarre gets to see some of the things encountered by the main cast that make him following her worthwhile.

Lunarre says he likes the princess, and in the dub elaborates that it’s her spunk and feisty attitude in particular that he likes. Aside from the fact that this is the man who not too long ago wanted the princess for dinner, how are these personality traits limited to the princess alone? Lunarre could easily find the same measure if not more of these in Rose or any of the other cast, who also struggle valiantly against adversity and despair. 

Rose, you would argue, would be more delectable to Lunarre’s taste (figuratively this time) as, in the anime, she wavers, she doubts, and she struggles enormously as her way of thinking and doing things is challenged. And she changes. But instead of turning into a hellion, as Lunarre would have expected, she dusts herself off and carries on. 

Alisha, on the other hand, never changes. She never wavers. She holds tight to her values and this works for her. From their conversation by the river in season 2, it is clear Lunarre cannot understand or relate to her.

And yet later we’re supposed to assume that his following Alisha somehow spurred the desire to do good within him. Sorry, I don’t buy it. Not only was there zero time to properly develop Lunarre’s character, nor a relationship between the two, but Alisha is precisely the wrong character to bring this change of heart about.

Rose, on the other hand, is the kind of hope someone like Lunarre could - consciously or otherwise - seek out. She has done many questionable and outright bad things in the past, her hands are definitely not the cleanest, and yet in spite of having her entire worldview turned on its head, she changes, and she does not give way to darkness.

So, with all that said, a final question:

WHY THE HELL DIDN’T HE FOLLOW ROSE INSTEAD?

divinaaquis:

Well, it appeared the fox went for the bait. If not for the danger that would soon come, then perhaps Mikleo would have been amused, and maybe sighed in relief. This one was a hellion, a beast, and all he wanted to do was wreak havoc and gobble up human and seraphim as he so pleased. He couldn’t let that happen. As much as being near the other froze his breath in his throat, he had to swallow his fear back and try to keep Lunarre back. Especially when he was after Alisha. Sorey and the others would arrive soon. They had to. 

A fireball soon hit a branch he was perched on before he could make his jump, and it was quickly engulfed in fierce, blue flame. The water seraph had to grit his teeth as he pushed himself up from where he had stumbled, feeling a pain shoot through his body. Dammit. He hadn’t landed too well there. 

“Unless you would prefer entire body a frozen statue, I suggest you back off now.” He threatens, leaning on his staff a slight. “I’m not playing these games of chase with you. It won’t be just your foot alone next time.”

Lunarre laughed. It was shrill and wild. Somewhere in his mind there was the memory of a different laugh, echoing from a different life. Lunarre pushed it further back into the dark. 

This was his life now. Here he was alone, but powerful. Alone, but happy. Singing, laughing, tap-dancing happy.

But devouring the little seraph brat would make him that little bit happier.

Blazing balls of blue fire erupted into existence and burned in the palm of his hands as he faced his enemy down. The little magic trick had worn off, and the seraph was now in plain sight.

“I agree,” Lunarre said, grinning. “Playtime’s over. But your ice won’t touch me again.”

Lunarre had been taught to spot weakness in others for as long as he could remember. Weakness that would equal an easy target that would equal a job well done. It had served him well in his thieving days, and his time with the Scattered Bones, and so it continued.

The seraph had not got off without injury from his fall. He favoured one foot over the other, and his staff was doubling as support. There was a weakness, and any weakness could be readily exploited.

One as alone in the world as Lunarre could rely on that universal truth alone.

Seizing his moment, Lunarre lunged forward, using his superior speed to catch the seraph off-balance. With a sweep of his arm, he unleashed an arc of flame that fanned out low across the grass, singeing the green blades black. No matter where the serph went, left or right, the weak spot should be hit. Such was the hellion’s thinking.