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The following contains spoilers for Episode 4 of Arknights: Prelude to Dawn, "Loyalty" now streaming on Crunchyroll.

Arknights came back strong this week with a more relaxed episode introducing a new locale and new characters, dropping hints of a more significant battle to come. Until that happens, however, it's nice to see a new city to get a sense of what normal life is like in this world that has so far only been explored through ruin and war.

Last week, the Chernobog incident came to a close with the characters narrowly escaping at the presumed cost of Ace and the majority of his team. In the aftermath, Rhodes Island has geared up for their next quest: brokering an alliance with the higher-ups in Lungmen to protect the city from another attack from Reunion.

RELATED: Arknights: Prelude to Dawn: Episode 3 "Escort" Review

Wei the Cunning

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Arknights' cast is almost entirely full of humans with some animal traits, typically ears or horns, but Wei Yenwu, the chief of the city of Lungmen nicknamed Wei the Cunning, is on a whole other level. His character design and the regal nature of his office immediately make an impression, giving him a unique air of significance in this world that solidifies the strength he holds within the scene.

He is negotiating with the Doctor, Amiya, and the newly introduced Doctor Kal'tsit, about a contract between Rhodes Island and the city of Lungmen, to work together and share intel. With fears of another attack from Reunion, Kal'tsit insists that a contract is integral to stave off disaster and that Lungmen's infected policy won't eschew the ire of Reunion.

It speaks to the groundwork laid in the first three episodes that these deliberations might be the most interesting part of the story thus far. There are the competing motivations of the factions, the political landscape complicating the discourse, but also a mystery that has gone unexplored by the characters as yet.

The city of Chernobog never moved away from the oncoming catastrophe, even though the cities are established to be mobile, and it's unclear why. Sabotage could be the answer, but if that's the case, it makes one wonder how a similar fate might befall the metropolis that is Lungmen. Having started the series seeing how Reunion can destroy a city, it makes the introduction to a new one that much more interesting.

Once again, the background art of locations is stunning, with the use of depth of field to give the imagery a particularly filmic look at times. This is the kind of globe-trotting adventure story that thrives specifically because of its art direction and with anime's arguable decline in background art quality, the industry should take notes from this show.

Protect Misha

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In stark contrast to the towering buildings seen in the early episode, the slums of Lungmen appear almost a world away, and it's there that we find Misha, an Ursus girl on the run. She's hidden among the undocumented infected flocking to Lungmen, though not much else is revealed about her thus far. It's only known that she's wanted by the authorities and that plenty of punks in the slums are searching for her.

This episode also introduces members of a PMC group called Blacksteel that occasionally works with Rhodes Island. Just as Amiya learns about Misha being hunted by bad guys from the children in the slums, the two members of Blacksteel talk about searching for her on the orders of Lungmen's Guard Department.

So when watching the scene it seems like there might be tension between Rhodes Island and Lungmen's government who are using the PMC as hunting dogs. However, by the end of the episode, Amiya, the Doctor, and the two from Blacksteel meet Misha and convince her to come with them together.

So all seems well, but it wouldn't be surprising if there was some tension arising later, especially given the treatment of infected in the city. For the time being though, that's the least of the characters' concerns, as the episode ends with a new antagonist watching on from high.

The complaint from last week stands that there are an abundance of characters and only so much time to introduce and explore them properly. However, for what it's worth, this episode, full of mostly new characters, does very well by them. With four episodes remaining, the series has built itself up nicely despite all the troubles of mobile game adaptations, and it'll be very exciting to see if it can stick the landing.

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