Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. So last week we took at Redo of Healer. A revenge porn story that many people took issue with and slammed the author Rui Tsukiyo because of it. However, the series accomplished its goal. It got people talking and checking it out. Rui played everyone perfectly. He took advantage of the internet culture and in the process got eyes on him which allowed him to showcase his other series, The World’s Finest Assassin Gets Reincarnated in Another World as an Aristocrat. A title so long I doubt I need to explain the premise of this series. No, no, no! Don’t go! You’ll miss out on a great series. Yep, when people found out Rui wrote this they were turned off and thought it was going to be another revenge porn story. But to everyone’s shock, they found a well-thought-out story. The series quickly gained a following. So much so that it was given an anime in 2021. Two years after its official release. By this time only six volumes had been released. That’s how confident they were that this series would be a hit. The anime was produced by Silver Link (Baka and Test) and Studio Palette who recently worked on KamiKatsu. Let’s see why this anime was such a success. This is The World’s Finest Assassin Gets Reincarnated in Another World as an Aristocrat.
Opening and Ending Theme
The opening is “Dark seeks light” by Yui Ninomiya. This was one of my favorite endings from 2021. It was banger of an opening that was just unskippable whenever you heard that first note. Yui also sounds great here and I love the animation in this opening.
For the ending we have “A Promise” by Aira Yuki. A very nice and peaceful that’s a lot better than I remember it being. There’s this hint of sadness in Aira’s voice that conveys the emotions of the character in the ending. Like she feels trapped within her own house but when she meets the one she cares for so much her life finally has color, meaning, and joy.
Episodes 1-4
We start the anime off at a secret auction hall where young girls are being sold to wealthy aristocrats until it gets interrupted by a girl named Dia and a maid named Tarte. They start killing the aristocrats with magic guns (always cool to see those), but the lady in charge escapes them. Luckily, she gets taken out by our main protagonist, Lugh (scene here: https://youtu.be/Xo5O_PBaSao). We get a flashback where we see that Lugh voiced by Makoto Koichi used to be an assassin in our world and not just any assassin he was the finest assassin (damn, I’m not even next to the guy and I’m scared for my life). After finishing up his last mission, he retires and heads to Japan where he’ll become a teacher to future assassins for his organization. On his plane ride to Japan, the organization that he works for guns him down in order to kill him (makes sense. You know too much. He had to have seen this coming). After dying he wakes up to the sight of a goddess who wants to reincarnate him in another world not to kill the demon lord but so that he can kill the hero who will defeat the demon lord (scene here: https://youtu.be/1m1aE0nrD9Q. Well, that’s new).
So we find out in episode 2 the reason why the goddess wants to kill the hero. In 16 years the hero will defeat the demon lord (that’s good). However, the hero will go mad with power and plunge the world into chaos until its finally destroyed in 2 years after defeating the demon lord (that’s bad). This means that Lugh has 18 years to kill the hero and save the world (pretty good time frame). He also has to wait until the hero defeats the demon lord because only the hero can defeat the demon lord (talk about a loophole). After gaining knowledge about the new world as well as the highest stats a human can have he gets to pick 5 skills that he’ll be born with. The first skill he chooses is rapid recovery (always great), spell weaver which allows him to create new spells (another good choice), limitless growth will help improve his abilities in a shorter time frame, martial arts which should be obvious what that does, and a mysterious lower rank skill. He then moves on to his attributes and chooses the four main attributes (earth, fire, water, and wind. He’s the next Avatar. Scene here: https://youtu.be/kKtRJCxMFTM). With everything settled he finally gets reborn into a noble family whose main trade is assassination (it’s the perfect family for him). Seven years quickly go by quickly where Lugh was raised to be an assassin, but he still doesn’t know how to use magic as he requires a magic teacher. We see he has a good relationship with his parents (scene here: https://youtu.be/nA8FCfGoxM0. (Baron): His mom’s a total MILF). In fact, he used to have an older brother who unfortunately died before he was born. On the surface his family works as doctors while secretly working as assassins for the royal family. After getting his body examined by his father, Lugh finally gets the greenlight to inherit the family’s treasured, Mystic Eyes (which do about everything you would expect Mystic Eyes to do). His dad performs the operation where it was a success and he gets the good news that he finally has a magic teacher who just happens to be Dia voiced by Reina Ueda (Mira from Dimension W. Scene here: https://youtu.be/TMQNX1-dkXk).
Not much really happens in episode 3. We get some good interactions between Lugh and Dia. Dia teaches him how to use magic, and then Lugh finds the cheat code to using magic with Dia assisting him to create their own spells. Using this cheat code they learn how to make gold out of nothing (we’re rich! (Corbin): Big deal. Learn how to make weed out of nothing and then we’ll talk). They eventually learn how to make guns and even mortars (Isis: Ohh~ that’s such a turn on. Scene here: https://youtu.be/QRJD211JE7I). After 2 weeks Dia takes her leave and Lugh’s father takes him to his prison to show him how the family practices their killing techniques on criminals. It’s also here that Lugh’s father teaches him the importance of an assassin having human emotions: it’s so you don’t become tools (huge ones at that) and can make a sound judgment on if killing a person will benefit them or not.
Episode 4 opens up with the introduction of Tarte voiced by Yūki Takada. We see she came from a neighboring land ruled by a greedy and incompetent lord who extorted his people with taxes. The taxes were so bad that most people became poor such as Tarte’s family. Because Tarte’s family was so poor, they were forced to ration their food and in some cases a few family members couldn’t eat. Since Tarte was an unwanted child to begin with they wouldn’t feed her and with winter around the corner it would only become tougher to get by, so her family threw her out (and I hope Lugh kills them all). Desperate for food, Tarte journeyed to Lugh’s family land after receiving a message from God (the Lord works in mysterious ways. Or rather, the goddess works in convenient ways). Once she reached Lugh’s land she got attacked by a pack of wolves, but Lugh saves her and even feeds her (scene here: https://youtu.be/siXhdMeIpPU). After hearing her story Lugh invites her to work as his servant even telling her what he does and she accepts swearing to stay by his side no matter what (she’s a keeper). It gets revealed that she has a high level of mana within her and everything that Lugh did from feeding her to telling his secret was all a part of his master plan to earn her trust and give her a purpose in life to make her his obedient servant who would never betray him (it may be manipulative but goddamn is it brilliant). Two years pass by and Lugh is now 12 years old and Tarte is his maid (where we see all the nutrients she’s eaten went to a nice place) as well as his assistant for his assassinations. Lugh personally trained her where she’s a quick learner, but the problem is her combat skills have been slow as she’s only good at using a spear (not the best weapon for assassination. (Yin-Yang): Oh trust me, I know). Luckily, Lugh creates for her a retractable spear that can be concealed and it works perfectly for her (scene here: https://youtu.be/siXhdMeIpPU).
Episodes 5-8
While not much happens in episode 5 it’s still an enjoyable episode to watch. We see Lugh duel against his dad where he doesn’t use any magic and even though he’s the more experienced assassin, Lugh actually has a hard time fighting his old man. Lugh manages to win with a suicide gamble barely squeaking out the victory (scene here: https://youtu.be/UXNGcDKYZxE). After this he accompanies his dad on some missions (some kids bond with their dads through sports, others through cars and other stuff. For Lugh, it was assassination) and then receives his final test which is training to become a merchant for 2 years in order to earn the trust of nobles. His dad arranged for him to pose as the son of a merchant who owns his own company (dad with the hookups. Nice). At his going away party the child of a young noble named Ronah objects Lugh refusing to accept him as the next head (Tarte, go dig a hole and prepare a tombstone with ‘Here Lies Little Shit’ written on it). Ronah was supposed to become the next head of the house before Lugh showed up (really? You? I don’t see it), so you can understand why he’s a little pissed about everything going on. Lugh fights Ronah where he breaks his arm cleanly (the crispiest snap I ever heard). After the fight Lugh talks to him in private where once again he uses his manipulation skills to win Ronah over and become his subordinate down the line.
In episode 6 Lugh begins his new life as the son of a merchant. We don’t focus on him long as the episode focuses on a new character named Maha voiced by Shino Shimoji, an orphan who lives on the streets with other girls. They all make an honest living by giving tours to visitors, buying leftover food from shops at a cheap price, and trying to earn enough money to one day buy their own place (hell, one of them is even voiced by Hololive’s very own Nene). However, the girls get captured and forced to work at a sweatshop under the disguise of an orphanage (and Annie complained about being an orphan). Things only got worse when the girls started to be sold as prostitutes. One by one the girls were broken mentally with one of them even going as far as taking a field axe and cutting her face up so that no one will buy her (good Lord that’s so dark and uncomfortable. It really hits hard, you really can’t help but feel sad and angry for these girls. They were trying to live life the right way and this happens). With Maha’s 12th birthday around the corner she’ll be sold off as a prostitute as well. With this knowledge she decides to cut her face as well, but Lugh stops her (why couldn’t you have come sooner?). Lugh has decided to adopt one of them as his right hand and he chooses Maha (good eye). However, he’ll have to wait 3 days to officially adopt her because her handler intends to have some fun with her and make some money in the process (you disgust me). Maha tries to escape only to get captured again, but she gets saved by Lugh (scene here: https://youtu.be/VV51dvpFCzg, what a Chad). The human trafficking gets exposed and everyone involved gets arrested. Maha’s friends also get a happy ending as Lugh fixed the face of the girl who cut herself up and Maha officially becomes Lugh’s sister (scene here: https://youtu.be/K6w6SxxrTTU. Who has a crush on him, but it’s okay because they’re not related. (Baron): Hurray, loopholes).
Lugh finally gets to show off his merchant skills in episode 7 (and he’s a natural). His adoptive father puts him in charge of his own shop where he turns it into a cosmetics and sweets shop for the noble ladies (genius. The quickest way to a noble is through his lady, mistress, or wife. No man would risk making a woman angry). He introduces moisturizer to this world which becomes the shop’s hottest item and even gets Maha’s friends to work in the store (which means, Nene’s back! Kon nene~). In just six months the place becomes a hotspot with growing profits. Naturally, this angers his competitors who try to steal his secrets, but when you’re surrounded by two girls who love you to death (and are trained assassins) and will protect you at all costs you really have nothing to worry about. We get a funny moment with the goddess. I forgot to mention that Lugh isn’t the first person she’s reincarnated, she’s actually reincarnated over 400 hundred people to take down the hero. So far we’ve seen a soldier and samurai reincarnated where the soldier became a lazy bum and the samurai stupidly got killed by a dragon. The next project we see is a rapper (you can tell she was getting desperate here) who unfortunately can’t fit in (scene here: https://youtu.be/TM2vFK1yNPc. Shame, I was sure he’d be a poet or something). Back with Lugh, he goes to visit Dia. We find out that once a month he goes to visit her where they chat, drink tea, eat snacks, and exchange new spells with each other (sounds like a fun time). Lugh also has his first wet dream (he is reaching that age) and of course the girls don’t mind helping him out in that area (scene here: https://youtu.be/A9LBWqbceZw. (Corbin): Hey~, just because you’re out to kill the hero doesn’t mean you can’t have a little fun. (Baron): Bow chaka bow! Bow chaka bow wow wow).
In episode 8 Lugh’s two years of training is finally over and he returns home leaving his company in the hands of Maha as well as his information network (she’s got this. Way to be ahead of the times Lugh). We actually do find out that Maha came from a family of merchants until her parents were killed by her dad’s right-hand man. Maha fled fearing for her life and has secretly been planning to retake her family’s company. Once Lugh returns home he goes to meet his dad who gives him the option of abandoning the family business of assassination and just sticking to being a merchant. Lugh of course says no and even tells him he wants to marry Dia (cue Maha and Tarte crying in the corner) which is something he can’t do as a merchant because he lacks the status (scene here: https://youtu.be/G6wyPjszPMc). After seeing his resolve, Lugh’s dad gives him his first assassination mission.
Episodes 9-12
So in episode 9 Lugh’s target is a count named Azba who’s been selling military secrets to a neighboring kingdom for a drug called vizein (https://youtu.be/dFKylgGk73I). Before Lugh assassinates the guy he needs to make sure he needs to be assassinated, so he finally gets the chance to test out his network (it’s not as good as modern technology but it’s reliable and won’t spy on you). While he waits, we get a few moments with Lugh’s mom who sneaks into his room in the hopes of seeing his morning wood (scene here: https://youtu.be/KeGN2tyZ50k. What is up with this mom? Seriously, she dresses him like a girl and now tries to see his morning wood. If this keeps going south we’re going to have to play Sweet Home Alabama). She also tries to set Lugh up with marriage interviews and is even okay with Tarte bearing his children (scene here: https://youtu.be/a8f8GWS0q-E). After this, we see another candidate the goddess chose to defeat the hero. This time it was a paparazzo (okay, she’s screwing around. This confirms it) and he fails like the rest. Back with Lugh, he and Tarte go undercover to do their own investigation on Azba in his territory. They come across a young girl who’s being forced to work with drug dealers in order to get vizein for her addicted mom. Maha sends her report to Lugh where we find out that Azba is the ringleader of vizein and has been selling it to other nobles in the area. In the second half of the episode, the assassination gets underway. Lugh and Maha infiltrate the mansion using their network and meet Azba and his wife (the quickest way to a man is through his wife). That night it’s time to go to work where Lugh makes it simple and just shoots the bastard with a tungsten bullet (sometimes the simplest assassinations are the best). However, Azba’s wife sees her husband die before her and Lugh is filled with emotions for the first time (he’s no longer a tool like in his previous life. He is human now), but Tarte is there to comfort him and they take their leave (scene here: https://youtu.be/78R8r9By-gE).
Episode 10 sees Lugh and his gang go hunting for a divine treasure, a powerful weapon made by humans. Maha has found one of these treasures, Gae Bolg the magic spear, but negotiations in acquiring the spear have been tough and it’s believed that the owner, Setanta, is most likely the hero. As if that wasn’t a problem, a civil war has broken out in the neighboring kingdom of Swoigel which is where Dia lives. Dia’s family has already joined the war efforts and the rebels are said to be receiving help for Setanta. Lugh goes to visit Dia where she seems fine and he tries to arrange for her and her family to escape to safety but she doesn’t want that. This is her kingdom and land, she can’t just up and abandon it. The two switch gears and go into town wearing disguises and have a good time (scene here: https://youtu.be/Z4ld9Z00pag). They even go in the hotsprings together (control your lower body Lugh) where they kiss (and I have to admit I find this whole relationship intriguing. Is Lugh really in love with her or is this just another one of his manipulation ploys). After their date is over, Lugh takes his leave where after the credits he gets his next assassination mission, kill Dia (don’t mess with me~).
At the start of episode 11 we find out that the royal army of Swoigel was defeated. Even though Dia’s family paid their indemnity and surrendered most of their wealth and land it wasn’t enough (it never is). They want Dia (good eye), with her high potential of magic she’ll give birth to a powerful offspring (assuming the partner can measure up to her). Dia was willing to hand herself over to avoid needless bloodshed, but her dad’s vassals refuse to hand her over and have formed a volunteer army to protect her as well as her family (well one thing is for sure Dia’s family is popular). In order to prevent another war from breaking out, the new regime wants to kill Dia (if they can’t have her no one will) and if that wasn’t crazy enough the person who put in the request was Dia’s dad (bastard! How dare you try to Titanic this ship). The good news is this is all a façade. Dia’s dad knows that since they started another rebellion there’s no way they’ll live but he intends to save his daughter. The plan is to make it look like she died and have her escape with a new alibi. Want to make things weirder, we find out that Lugh’s mom comes from Dia’s family which means Dia is Lugh’s cousin (scene here: https://youtu.be/fGmV1Qi8mok. Girls, play Sweet Home Alabama). Despite this obvious incest development, Lugh still intends to save Dia and heads out. Tarte goes with him halfway where we see that she knows Lugh is using her as a tool, but she doesn’t care. Throughout her life she was seen as an unwanted child nobody needed, but Lugh needed her and gave her purpose when no one else did (and it’s because of this that she’ll dedicate her life to him. Even if he just sees her as a tool). After she reaches her limits, Lugh goes off on ahead without her where she cries because she lost to Dia (scene here: https://youtu.be/jeyz2r86P1c, and that ship has been sunk by an iceberg. Hey if we’re lucky maybe this world allows polygamy). Lugh finally arrives and causes the rebellion army to fall in disarray (scene here: https://youtu.be/srDfXLasAnU) allowing the voluntary army takes advantage of this diversion and a battle begins. Lugh uses this chance to sneak into the castle and makes it to Dia.
In the final episode Lugh meets Dia and her dad where the plan will be to burn the room and say that Dia committed suicide. Before the plan can be enacted Setanta arrives the owner of Gae Bolg and the man believed to be the hero (scene here: https://youtu.be/0YQicvC-o5M). After Lugh blasts him with a canon, Setanta activates his berserk skill and calls out Lugh for a duel saying that if he wins he won’t bother Dia or her family ever again and withdraw the troops. Lugh goes out to face him where he stalls long enough for his tungsten spear to strike Setanta and it actually kills him (scene here: https://youtu.be/B15ywcn2gSM. Holy shit, that actually worked for once). The only downside is he killed all the other enemy soldiers (still worth it) so they can’t fake Dia’s death (let’s just say she died in the massive explosion). So the episode ends with Lugh and Dia kissing (scene here: https://youtu.be/-HQEzbzSDV4), returning to his family territory, and we find out that Setanta wasn’t the real hero. We actually do get to see the real hero and his name is Epona.
Final Thoughts
Man was this a good anime. In a genre that seems to be overexaggerating the market this anime does a good job standing out from the pack. It’s not the greatest but it is a good watch in my eyes. I actually do like the premise of an assassin given the mission of assassinating the hero but having to wait and bide his time for the right moment. In the meantime, we get to just focus on his life and see him grow in this new world. Lugh definitely goes through a big change throughout the anime. In his former life he was just a tool for assassination but now he has become the hand. He gets to decide what he wants to do and he becomes a better person for it. I do like how they keep it a secret if he’s really in love with Dia or if this is all one big manipulation that he’s working. It’s interesting and keeps you intrigued in the relationship and how it develops. The girls are good. Their roles are minor but they each contribute to the story, assist Lugh, and aren’t just there to be the girls that faun over him and provide the occasional fanservice. Dia helps Lugh create spells, Maha runs Lugh’s information network and business showing how much he trusts her, and Tarte serves as his assistant on his missions acting as his support. If I had to choose my favorite I would pick Tarte which makes it all the sadder when Lugh chooses Dia over her but also makes her an endearing character because she still remains by his side. She knows she’s a tool in Lugh’s eyes but it doesn’t matter to her. Lugh gave her life purpose when no one else would and that’s why she’ll remain loyal to him forever.
The animation is good as is the music and I did get a laugh out of the other candidates the goddess chose before Lugh. The weak point of this anime is the world isn’t anything special. It looks like any other isekai world which isn’t a bad thing but they really don’t do that much with it. At least things we haven’t already seen before. Surprisingly this anime doesn’t have that many dark moments. Aside from Maha’s story which was good this anime is pretty tamed which is a shame as I feel like the dark moments would have enhanced the story, so here’s hoping the next season has a few more of them. I also would have liked to see more assassinations.
Final Score
The final score for this anime is a 7/10. A good isekai that’s worth checking out and well deserving of a second season. It also serves as proof that Rui has range and knows what he’s doing. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.