Sousou no Frieren - Vol. 2 Ch. 15 - Draht

[RexNemorensis]

Looks like it's time for a good old exorcism

@TJL620 Demons are literally the incarnation of evil. You're picturing them as Hollywood pretty boys, when you should be picturing them as what they are, evil entities who torture mankind.
Of course all that could change in upcoming chapters, but there's nothing wrong with that particular approach. Demons have nothing to do with nazis or slaves, wtf they're demons lol. They've existed in mythology and religion since god knows when.

How retarded things have become that it's "racist" to call demons evil

 

[Duainfey]

Man the whole back and forth about empathy and then the demon girl going 'what's a father' when they are alone still gives me chills about these demons.

 

[ninjakai03]

FUCKING MURDERED ON THE SPOT OH MY GOD

 

[carlxd101]

Badass

 

[TheSilverhand]

ugh...ok...they are demons...nothing more nothing less....

 

[Sparkling]

If all the demons looked like Qual or some other monstrous form, I wonder if people would stop defending demons.

 

[nobaka]

it's so fun when we get to see frieren in action.

@zerracas
we don't really know that. we know they have zero empathy or consideration for humans. And really, why would they?

All we REALLY know about their societal structure is that they don't form family units. They still seem to have a hierarchy, even if it's based on power, and we know they have ambitions (Draht). It seems more likely that it's less 'they have no emotions' and more 'they have no emotions to share with non-demons'.

that said, the demon in charge here DID say 'wild beasts' was an apt description, but he could just be being snarky

@Duainfey
what about 'mother' being a magical word that makes humans not kill you? i thought that was pretty well done too.

@Kampfarsch
it is staggeringly painful, but japan fucking LOVES using loanwords and foreign words as [impressive stuff]

@Nightdotexe
no one is better at coloring inside the lines than she is. or more likely it's probably just a variation of the wire magic

 

[John_von_Shepard]

Thx i love it.

 

[lasercats]

hoyl fuck shes alpha af

 

[Sandycat135]

@TJL620

It's more portraying them as natural predators. The demons aren't evil, they just see humans as food, like a wild animal. You wouldn't say a man eating tiger was 'evil' more that it couldn't do anything about it.
However, I don't think the author will change their take on the demon race. If you don't like that, you don't have to read the parts about it, as they'll probably continue on their journey after 2-3 chapters.

About the humanoid races part, I think that's part of the reason why the humans here want to believe that demons can be changed. They look human. They look like us. But, they've shown they only see us as prey so far.

Still, I love how this is making people debate in the comments a lot. It's very interesting to see.

 

[Xcaliblaster]

Rip and tear

 

[Bootybug]

Getting shit done.

 

[TheTenk]

the absolute state of some of the people in the comments

 

[justhide]

@Sandycat135 Exactly what I was thinking. It's just predator and pray in the eyes of demons. And if they have no emotions or are disconnected in that front, then it's less evil. Nothing about race or group.

And people need to know, fiction is fiction and reality is reality. If people can't see the distinction, it's not the work's fault.

PS: Sorry if it sounds like I'm attacking someone, but as a non native speaker, my vocabulary is limited.

 

[Oculunus]

Frieren sure doesn't screw around.

 

[Yourself]

 

[CountryMage]

@Trexxe To the demons all humans look the same, they tend to think we are just as blind. Remember how the demon girl that cried for her mother, tried to get the villagers off her back by killing the mayor's family, and delivering a new child to the family grieving over their dead kid? It's like how humans will go out and buy a new playmate for their pet, when one of them dies.

 

[mikl]

Here lies Draht
He tried to gank, and ended up ganked

 

[Xevinaly]

@TJL620 There are some significant differences between the demons portrayed here and traditional "evil" races like Orcs and Goblins. Orcs are particularly egregious being tall, dark-skinned, "savages" with a "primitive" culture. How they're portrayed as "evil" is also important. They're shown as destructive individuals, rapists, thieves, and murders. Then, the narrative says all of them, are unable to escape their biological fate of being those things. The problem with these depictions is that they were, and often still are, the exact same used to dehumanize indigenous Americans and Africans.

In contrast, another set of evil races from D&D are the undead. They're described as having an innate desire to extinguish all life. I've seen quite a few criticisms of the other evil races in D&D but never of the undead, because the way they are depicted as "evil" isn't relative to any existing moral system. Its wrong to kill, but you wouldn't call a zombie a murderer because they're values of right and wrong are so fundamentally different from our own.

So, looking at the demons here, we don't see any parallels with existing marginalized groups, at least none that I can think of. The closest analog would be white European conquerers in South America who routinely used fake diplomacy to topple nations and viewed the indigenous population as resources to be exploited instead of fellow humans.

 

[Sotto_Voce]

A moment when we can really see just how powerful she is.