Hmmm, not sure how I feel about this opening arc. On one hand, if it is basically exactly what it looks like on the tin, Sara got hungry and decided to go for a snack, as a demonstration of the difficulty of making Vampire/Human dynamics work well, then I'm not a fan. It feels like it was handled too gracelessly, too on-the-nose.
However, they could build on it and do more interesting things with it as a basis, especially if Hitomi is still a relevant character after this, coming back in once she's recovered more. Will she become scared and distrustful of vampires as a harsh contrast to her initial cheer? Or will she remain optimistic? Will she and Sara seek each other out despite the latter's expulsion, only to collide the same disastrous way, like a toxic couple that keep getting back together? Whatever the direction, I hope that she sticks around, because the aftermath of this incident could retroactively justify it better and lead to some interesting dynamics.
On the other hand, and this may just be copium, but I also couldn't help but feel like there could be more to it than this. The extremely performative messiness of the incident (how much was spilled versus how much was drunk?) the fact that Sara wandered off somewhere out of the way, was missing for three days, looked like an abandoned puppet until Shirotae pulled her strings back upright, and the cloudiness of her memories during her explanation... it could just be a food coma, maybe, but I wonder if she wasn't actually in control of her actions and trying to retroactively justify what happened to herself. Her response afterward still isn't great, of course, and going by the explanation at the end of the chapter she might still be dangerous to Hitomi on some level, but still. The level of control Shirotae demonstrated over her was very unnerving in its own right, and I have to wonder if this was a setup. Either another Progenitor with their own agenda, or possibly Shirotae herself, given how mysterious she still is. The natural next question, then, would be of motive.
The whole thing feels too convenient, in that specific way that either signifies bad writing, or excellent writing. So I'm... cautiously optimistic, yet, want to see how this progresses before assuming one way or the other. I won't go on expecting my theory to be true, but if this is a twist for later, I want it on the record that I totally called it now.
last edited at Jan 4, 2026 12:37AM
