Victorique, Kazuya, Grevil go to dig up the grave of Nicole Leroux. Do the final fragments of chaos still exist for Victorique to provide definitive proof of who murdered Coco Rose? What does the alchemist Leviathan have to do with the current mystery even we thought his story was complete. Even if Victorique can solve the murder she is still trapped between the rock and the hard place that is the war between the Ministry of the Occult and the Science Academy. Is there any safe way out?

The Case

So from the last episode we knew there was some type of body switch, but things are a lot more complicated and the answers are the kind only Victorique can come up with. Which is exactly what the mystery needed because the previous episode just made it seem too easy. I was surprised that it was years between the deaths of Coco Rose and Lulu. And it struck me as incredibly odd that they had kept the queen’s body persevered for all those years . . . just in case? I also didn’t suspect the king, probably because of all the Science and Occult academies swirling about the deaths. And I loved the smuggling of the head! Each piece of the puzzle was a nice little surprise. But then I’m not sure how I felt about the double twist in the end, it was a bit too much. However, I did like that in this case Victorique couldn’t really back up her theories with evidence, it was more of a test to see if she could figure it out once again. And the note she uses for a bit of insurance instead.

This episode is mostly the explanation of how Coco Rose and Nicole Leroux we murdered (or not murdered for that matter) with the cat and mouse game of Albert de Blois and Jupiter Roget playing out at the same time. As I stated last week the mystery of how two simultaneous murders took place is not that hard to figure out once the existence of Nicole Leroux is uncovered. The King being a murderer was also fairly easy to discern last episode as well. The real questions were the how and the why. The ultimate reveal that the real Coco Rose was still alive and that two separate woman who looked much like her had been killed was a bit surprising. But not as surprising as the motive for the original murder and then the second more famous murder. I will say that the previous Leviathan story set up the fact that he and Coco Rose had a little something on the side so the reveal of the King’s motivate was not out of the blue. The chance encounter with the real Coco Rose and her son was a huge coincidence but it gave a nice conclusion to the mystery. I was happy to see that I was right in suspecting that a bit of knowledge from all the previous major mysteries was needed to solve the mysteries in this arc.

Final Thoughts

Green. Cordelia, I am green with envy in these last few moments. I really didn’t think there were two Brians! I thought it was merely a magic trick. But to be fair Cordelia has had to suffer a lot. I wonder how much we will learn about these guys, perhaps one Brian will live after all! And speaking of love, the final scene of Victorique and Kazuya walking hand in hand made me smile quite happily.

I think I was the only person who was a little bit shocked that Jupiter Roget and the Science Academy was just as nasty as the Ministry of the Occult and their agents. I suppose that assumption exposes the prejudice within myself that despite my general fascination with the occult I am technocratic enough to automatically think that the Science Academy were the good guys. In retrospect that was a very silly idea as they have done some shady and nasty things. This case was proof positive they are little better than the organization they are up against. Also two Brian Roscoes was a bit surprising to both of us but it does explain a bit of the head scratching scenes involving him in the past. I guess the question now is how many of men we know as Brian Roscoe are going to survive until the end.  Another good story although I have to wonder how this is all going to wrap up in the end. Is Albert de Blois going to frame his son for the murder of Jupiter Roget? How can everything be tied together neatly at the end? These last few stories have been good enough that I have some confidence this last arc will be able to pull off a proper conclusion to the story.