[TF RyuShin]

This! THIS! This is *chef's kiss*. Perfection. I'm glad that Die ended up enjoying this one a lot and reignited the reason why we all love Yua. This might be my second favorite ep of Zero One, behind ep 30. I might be in the minority here and it's going to be a hot take but I always love and enjoy Yua even in the Job Arc. The conclusion that Takahashi gave to Yua's character was the perfect culmination of Yua's development in the series.

Die already made a splendid opinions about this episode. Your opinion about how Yua is different from Aruto and Fuwa was spot on because there's always something about Yua that clearly set her apart from her companions. When Yua said 'Dream, dream, and dream. What kind of bullsh*t is that!?' that's what they key line to summarize Yua's whole character and your opinions in a single line. Yua had always been a reactive character. She only does thing in reaction not by consciously doing so herself. She only transforms to Valkyrie in the first half because of reaction to Rogue Humagears and doing everything that Gai ordered in the second arc. So it's also relieving and refreshing to see her finally took an action for her own cause. I must give props to Hiroe Igeta who was able to do incredible acts in the climax of her character in spite of all the shortcomings she might have several episodes back.

I also love that it was 'Fuwa' who was the trigger that pulled Yua from Gai's hand and started rebelling against him. It might be subtle but Yua has always care for Fuwa even in the early series and even in the Job Arc. So, the fact that someone used the technology, that she has believed in up to this point, to harm not just a normal civilian but also someone Yua knows and also cares for is the single line that Gai had crossed in this episode. In addition, it was also Yua who aroused Fuwa again after receiving such harsh truth from Gai. It was after seeing YUA, the single person who was loyal to Gai but now standing up for herself and him also, Fuwa managed to regain his spirit not only to crush Thouser again but to declare his newfound dream. I can continue this all day long but Takahashi did make a good step in this one. I don't think Yua's redemption would make such a big impact had it not been because Gai harmed Fuwa and Fuwa's declaration of his new dream was enriched after Yua took the action. Say that Aruto was the victim of Gai, instead of Fuwa, I don't think the impact result would be as good as if Fuwa was the one who Gai had machinated.

Now that I mention it, it's kinda weird that we are in more than a half in to the series but Aruto and Yua barely had meaningful interaction. Aruto said 'Yaiba-san!' was the single line that Aruto had to call Yua by her name instead of Aims or Zaia to refer Yua. I might be greedy because Fuwa and Yua's relation was more than good enough but I wish we had more interaction from the Main Rider to our 'Tertiary Rider'. Sougo and Woz, Sento and Kazumin, Emu and Taiga, etc. I think from our past series, I can say we had a solid relationship between our Main Rider and our Tertiary Rider even in the early stage of the series. It's a bit shame that we didn't have the same amount of interaction between Aruto and Yua, especially late into this series.