In Episode 4, Loid, Yor, and Anya are headed to the school interview. Loid treats this interview like any other mission. He is prepared for whatever comes their way, ranging from unexpected trials to exchanged dialogues with three housemasters. This also applies to Yor and Anya. Yet, there is more than just acing the interview: being an upstanding citizen even when the interview is crucial for Loid’s mission.
In the school yard, Loid notices that part of the interview process includes the instructors watching parents and kids, which is something new. All the previous episodes just showed the kinds of questions the principals would ask. In this episode, the instructors and Henry Henderson, the housemaster of dormitory 3, pass or fail the interview based on elegance. Loid tells Yor and Anya to walk gracefully even though they do not know what is going on. Yor just notices that there are people watching them.
Loid sees the statue of the school founder outside the school yard, which suggests the school upholds the founder’s values and ideas. He decides to pay his respects to the founder as Yor and Anya follow. Henderson finds him elegant and wants to know about his family’s background. The instructor tells him about Anya’s test result and Loid’s marriage. Anya barely passed the test, and Loid is remarried. With that said, Henderson is now in a difficult position to make a final decision about accepting Anya into the academy.
Henderson continues to observe him, Yor, and Anya as they encounter two dilemmas. One is planned, and the other one is not. The planned situation includes a boy trapped in a street gutter filled with water. Anya urges Loid to help him while Henderson wonders what Loid would do. Will he help the boy and get his suit dirty or pass him by? He thinks he will ignore the situation. To his surprise, Loid steps in the gutter, pulls the boy out, and changes into another suit he had in his briefcase. He is expected to be in unexpected situations that may catch others off guard. In all previous episodes, he always found a way out of difficult and unforeseen situations. In addition, he rescued Anya in Episode 1 even though he risked his mission to an orphanage. He helped our Yor in Episode 2 to save her from humiliation and embarrassment at her co-worker’s party. In Episode 3, he caught the thief with the help of Anya and Yor, by jumping the gun first.
Henderson is even more surprised when Loid brings the unexpected situation under control. A herd of cows is running toward people in the school yard. People start to run as they scream. One of the kids got separated from his parents. Loid sees the cow herd coming his way, and he saves him just in time. Later, he also decides to go after the cow boss to stop the rest of the herd. Yor jumps the gun to stop the cow leader by immobilizing it and bringing the entire herd to a halt. Anya then approaches the cow even though Loid tells her that it is dangerous. However, she does not seem to be afraid. Instead, she calms the cow down, and the cow herd starts returning to the farmhouse. Henderson applauds him for his elegance and approves of meeting with him and his family after giving Loid time to tidy up. However, Loid had already prepared another set of clothes.
Loid, Yor, and Anya are waiting for the final interview. He never feels as nervous as on his other dangerous missions in the past. He always depended on himself. Now, he has to rely on Yor and Anya’s responses to the housemasters’ questions, which he is not used to. At the meeting, Loid and Yor are able to answer the Housemaster’s questions. These questions are more about family relationships. Evans tells them they have a nice family, but Housemaster Murdoch Swan wants to destroy the family due to his personal family crisis and his behavior. He’s conceited, greedy, and heartless, not to mention that he is jealous of others who have good and loving families. He and his wife are divorced, and their daughter is in the custody of his wife.
Swan tries to humiliate the family. He asks Yor why she wants to marry Loid, whom he refers to as his baggage, meaning that he was married once and had a child. When Henderson tells him to behave, he ignores him. When Evans asks Yor what kind of food she cooks for Anya, after Loid comments on Anya—she is an intelligent and curious child, and she is very selective when it comes to food. Yor does not know what to say. Loid responds to them by saying that he does the cooking unless he is busy. Swan raises a question about the kind of women who do not know how to cook for their husband. He then rebukes her by telling her that she should discipline herself first before caring for Anya. Yor looks down, feeling bad about herself. Loid responds to the question as a way to preserve her dignity and to demonstrate respect in their relationship instead of embarrassing her. He points out her good points, such as tidying the house and being an excellent mother to Anya. Swan comes back with an answer that says Yor’s work is expected. Loid is angry, even though Yor is his pretended wife. He curls his fingers into a fist, ready to strike him.
Anya is startled when she hears Swan’s thought about ripping the family apart. She tells herself that she needs to do her best. Her first and second answers to Evan’s questions sound good. It does not raise any suspicion about her being an orphan or that Yor and Loid are not her real parents. Her third answer, on the other hand, almost leaks out what Loid’s plan for spying on Desmond is. Luckily, the three housemasters assume she is referring to the organization leader as the housemaster, about whom she wants to know what he is planning. Loid immediately points out that she is a curious girl who admires the headmaster as a way to smooth things out.
Henderson finds Anya elegant instead of underestimating her since she wants to learn at an early age to succeed. He asked if she knew the name of the headmaster. She pauses for a second, not knowing the answer until she hears Loid’s thought: Benedict Ivan Goodfellow. Another housemaster asks her how she is going to become like the headmaster. She uses the protagonist of the spy cartoon as a metaphor to explain how she succeeds as the headmaster.
Evans further asks Anya some other questions related to what Loid does for a living and how she feels about her new mother. Anya replies with flying colors. Loid is happy that she remembers what Loid does for a living. As seen in Episode 3, Yor, on the other hand, is startled when she not only describes herself as a good mother but also a frightening one. Moving on to the last question, Evans asks her to rate her father and her new mother. Anya evaluates them as the best parents, which is a touching moment. Yor and Loid are not expected to hear that, knowing that they are not her real parents. Anya knew that, along with their secret identity, their thoughts, and what she had to do to pass the exam and the interview. Still, she feels happy and wants to be with them forever, genuinely.
Evans is happy for Anya, but not Swans. He harbors hatred toward Yor and Loid, and he attacks Anya by asking her to compare her new mother to her biological mother. Evans tells him that is enough. Loid requests a different question. Swan refuses and demands an answer. It is either part of his interview questions, or it is part of his scam to throw Anya off. Loid does not know what Anya will say, nor does he know how she ends up in an orphanage, let alone about her real parents.
Suddenly, Anya’s eyes were filled with tears, and she could not stop crying. She calls out “mama” and “I see” with her hands clenched into fists, revealing that she had experienced something dreadful in the past. Her trauma regarding her parents and herself could be related to her ability or the conflict between Westalis and Ostania.In Episode 1, a flashback scene of a doctor telling her she could not tell anyone that she was a telepath. In Episode 3, she feels sad and scared after hearing all those negative voices at the National Party rally.
Swan comments that Anya prefers her biological mother to her new mother. Yor tells him in a firm voice that his remark was uncalled for. Loid advises her to calm down as well as himself. He wants to smooth things out instead of jeopardizing his mission, but Swan continues to slander Anya. He assures everyone in the room that she will not survive living in the dormitory without her parents. She cries over little things like this. Yor wants to teach him a lesson as she cracks her knuckles. Loid could not restrain himself anymore, nor could he overlook the problem. He punches Swan in the face because he sees a fly. He then walked out of the session regardless of his mission priority. He is impersonating what Swan is doing to Anya. He tells him that he and his wife chose the wrong school for Anya if it exploited a child’s feelings as part of the interview process.
Swan is angry at Loid for disgracing the school, but Evans and Henderson think that it is him who is doing that. Henderson tells Swan enough of his mischievous questions and behavior. Swan ignores him because of his father’s influence in the school, which gives him the privilege to abuse his power without consequence. Henderson gets angry and punches him in the nose.
Sitting at home, Loid, Yor, and Anya feel like failures. Yor goes to the kitchen to make some tea for everyone. Loid is speechless. He could not complete part of his mission, which was crucial for him to get close to Desmond. Anya tells him that she is sorry for her part, but he knows that it is not her fault. Now, it is not necessary for her to go to school, but wait. She wants to go to school because she wants to be together with him and Yor as a family. Yor feels the same way, even though she considers how it will affect her work. She and Anya tried to encourage Loid that everything would be all right.
Episode 4 is about more than just getting Anya into school and passing the interview. When someone mortifies family members, it’s about knowing when to draw the line, stand up, and walk away. It is also about finding hope and rising up to one’s feet again when things turn out in vain. Moreover, despite the lack of flashback scenes, the episode exposes more of Anya’s background. However, her response to Swan’s final question implies that something terrible has happened to her true parents.
Rating: 9.8/10
