A lot of what Rakudai as an anime did was concentrated around that ideal of a knight, comparable to stuff found in A Requiem for Homo Sapiens, and the last battle contains the two characters that embody this the most. In that way it's not just that Ikki is fighting... he's getting exactly the fight he wants. It's a vindication for him to do this fight, the same as for his opponent. Both are throwing everything they are in that one swing, reinforced in probably the best possible way by the animation. Both are exactly at the same wavelength, so it's the fairest possible showdown, exactly the way both of them want it. For both of them the very participation in this showdown is at the same time a proof of their knight-like nobility, and a peak of their happiness with it. Which serves as a contrast with all the previous fights in this anime, and serves to round off the main idea in a really fucking beautiful way.
But that's not all. As Ikki says, he can't just collapse. There's more to it. Besides the ideals embodied in the anime, there's Ikki's interpersonal relationships too.
And that's why we aren't shown the final strike itself. That's why he can't collapse. We need to keep the tension until that other part of the anime gets its vindication and climatic moment too.
The marriage proposal.
It's a really fucking rare thing for an anime to manage to get its action hero to do his dream fight AND to get the main couple to engage by the end of the first season. And yet the story to be not even close to over.
I want a second season.
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