WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Season 1, Episode 18 of Fire Force, "Into The Nether."
After weeks of surprise ambushes from a mysterious, cloaked enemy, Company 8 finally decides to take the fight directly to the Evangelist's White Clad Knights in Fire Force's latest episode. Not only this but the anime also finally gives the 8th's woefully sidelined female characters a chance to shine on their own.
Thanks to their new science officer, Licht, Company 8 have figured out from the wreckage of Vulcan's workshop that the Knights are hiding out in an ominous place called the Nether. This subterranean network of tunnels used to be home to Tokyo's subway system until it was largely destroyed by the Day of Cataclysm. However, Licht has discovered that some caverns remain intact, which is most likely where the group behind artificial human combustion is lurking.
Sister Iris adds that the Holy Sol Temple teaches that the Nether is an "unclean" place where inhuman things dwell because it exists outside of the great Sol's light. Usually, it's strictly forbidden to anyone to enter it, but the church has granted Company 8 special permission to do so to stamp out the cluster of heretics. Just to add to the fear factor, we see flashbacks of Shinra's mother -- with a baby Shō in her arms -- warning Shinra as a child that if he doesn't do his chores he'll end up being sent to the Nether, a threat that fills him with dread. In other words, the Nether is the Tokyo Empire's Hell on Earth.
"We're not laying anyone to rest," Captain Ōbi instructs his crew. "This is a fight with our lives at stake," and then to Shinra: "We're bringing your brother back." That night, Shinra's dreams are filled with strange images of Iris; his Adolla Link buzzing. Outside, the city is shaken by a minor earthquake, which Luitenant Hinawa and Ōbi note is the latest in a string of them.
On the background of this unrest, a jittery Company 8 enter the Nether through what was once a subway tunnel. It isn't long, however, until the White Clad retaliates against this intrusion: Mirage and Jonah, the Knights' trickster pair, use their illusionary and doppelganger abilities to confuse and split the 8th up. Shō then sends in the big guns -- Flail, who we saw with Mirage outside of Vulcan's workshop, and Assault, a member of the "Slaughter" squad (or "Butcher," in the manga).
Flail takes a garrison of White Clad lackeys to confront a lone Maki, who he thinks will be easy pickings. "I don't care how brawny you are, you're still a woman!" Unfortunately for the cocky Knight, Maki is brawny enough to take out him and his entire support squad by herself. She uses her second-generation pyrokinesis to deflect their firey hits and then her Tekkyo weapons that Vulcan constructed specially for her twin flames, Splutter and Flare, to attack. Flail's huge heated flail almost overwhelms her but with Tekkyo acting as an extra set of floating metal arms, she's able to knock the air out of the Knight's body and put him down for good.
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Meanwhile, Tamaki and Sister Iris are met by Assault. Tamaki is far less assured than the experienced Maki and Assault's "Crimson Bullet" attacks leave her initially even less confident. Then she recalls, before the 8th set-off for the Nether, Shinra suggesting that if she is ever in need of help, she only has to call out his name. She brushed the offer off, snapping that she can fend for herself. In the present, the memory gives her a renewed burst of energy, which she puts into dodging Assault's next round of searing ammunition to get into striking distance. Her "lucky lecher lure" unwittingly does the rest for her, and while the bewildered -- and aroused -- Slaughterer is distracted, Iris finishes him off with a blow to the back of the head.
Fully vindicated, Tamaki pulls the young woman she successfully protected close, and the two continue their hellish descent.
New episodes of Fire Force are released every Friday on Crunchyroll; every Saturday as part of Adult Swim's Toonami block and are available as SimulDubs from FunimationNow.