Well, for a lack of anything better to watch, I guess I’ll check this out. So what’s the premise? Arel, our protagonist, lives in a world where everyone is assigned a skill when they reach a certain age. His mother is a sword maiden, and his father is an archmage. Needless to say, people expect a lot from Arel! Unfortunately, when the fateful day finally arrives, he quickly finds out that he is classless. All is not lost, however, because our boy is a hard worker! Just like every shounen protagonist ever, but sure, he’s totally unique and special. Anyway, having a class means you get skills appropriate to that class. Naturally, if you don’t have a class, then you get no skills. But again, Arel is special, because he can learn skills by just observing them and working super hard.

Enter redheaded kid who is obviously a girl, but let’s just humor the anime and pretend we are clueless. “He” has a bone to pick with Arel, because “his” father is and has always been second to the sword maiden. The kid reasons that if “he” can beat the sword maiden’s son, then this proves that “his” family is superior. Nevertheless, “he” repeatedly insults Arel by calling him a classless loser over and over. How are you going to feel superior beating a “loser?” But whatever, you can chalk this up to kids being kids, i.e. dumb as rocks. The redhead wins the duel, but it’s okay because Arel is learning! After a lot of practice, he eventually picks up one of the redhead’s sword skills. Actually, he improves upon it by adding another hit to the skill, so he’s even better than people with classes. All that’s left is to save the “boy” from a life or death situation, and thus win “his” heart. Which is exactly what he does. Then you make “him” blush by saying how you’ve been thinking of “him” all this time. And just like that, we have secured ourselves a “husbando.”

So this reminds me of a recent show about people being assigned a skill by eating a special fruit. You can only do it once, though. Eating the fruit again will kill you. I think it was called Fruitmaster or something, but don’t hold me to that. The MC there wasn’t skill-less like Arel, though. I think he ended up being a gardener, which gave him the ability to consume skill fruits more than once without dying. Basically, he might not be overpowered (yet), but he had infinite potential. Just him, though. No one else. If anyone else tries to be special, they literally die. Will this also be true for Arel? Will he also be the only in his entire world to have infinite potential?

Both shows paint a fantasy world in which people are locked into a single path in life. If the goddess says you’re a blacksmith, then that’s all you can really expect to do. Try anything else will only result in destitution. This is why Arel’s parents tell him that they’ll hold off on retirement so they can provide for him. This is why his brocon of a big sister insists that she’ll also take care of him for life. As a fellow freedom lover, however, being pigeonholed into a single role for the rest of your life sounds absolutely miserable. Imagine going to the goddess and being told that your only skill in life is to wipe the king’s butt. I mean, that used to be a thing. I would want to be surpass my limits too if that were me. But can anyone else do the same? That’s the key question for me.

I mean, it looks to me like the redhead also works hard, so can the redhead also learn new skills? If this show ultimately ends up being a story about how you can be whatever you want to be — you just have to work hard! — then great. I’m all for that. Let’s open the floodgates, defy the goddess, and let everyone’s dreams come true. Who gives a shit if you have inherent talent for wiping royal ass? If you want to be a writer instead, then why the fuck not? But somehow, I doubt that this will actually be the case. I doubt the redhead’s hard work will translate to picking up new skills on the fly like our special protagonist, because we need our chosen hero to be unique. And if that ends up being the case, then it’s just another pathetic show that panders to its audience by only lifting up the self-insert protagonist. I’m just in it for me! Numero fucking uno! Everyone else can kiss my ass. But hey, I could be wrong. Maybe this show will surprise me and prove that I’m nothing more than a cynical old man. But I doubt it.

Either way, this show is probably destined for the “Everything else” pile. The animation is shoddy, and the story doesn’t have too much promise. I can’t imagine it being the best that Wednesdays will have to offer.