Black Clover Chapter 185 Review by BelserionChapter Title: A Chance Dream EncounterWe pick up from last chapter where members of the Black Bulls and Sally are trapped in the dream world created by the elf controlling Captain Dorothy’s body. At the end of the previous chapter several doors appeared creating exits from the Dream World. Now, Elf Dorothy has countered the creation of doorways by sealing them with chains, effectively blocking her prisoners from escaping. Magna panics, trying to trick her into creating new exits which doesn’t work. Vanessa is worried because they are being affected more by the Sleep Magic linked to the Dream World, noting that if they don’t escape soon they will die. She mentions that anything should be possible in a dream world, which triggers an idea in Luck.
Luck’s idea is to have the “real” Dorothy defeat the Elf version. Like most mediocre villains, Elf Dorothy states that she doesn’t know what they’re planning but they will never escape her dream world. Magna casts
Flame Magic: Timed Duration Explosive Magic Bombs, whose explosion creates a cloud of smoke that hides the Black Bull members. Elf Dorothy scoffs at this and tells them it’s pointless to hide from her in the world she created. She’s shocked when she sees the outline of the Real Dorothy through the smoke. This Dorothy is a doll created from Charmy’s Cotton Magic and Vanessa’s Threads. It’s actually a great plan Luck came up with here. What they did was use the heat and flames from Magna’s magic to obscure the doll, but the fact that the outline was in the shape of the real Dorothy, the Elf version couldn’t stop her imagination from picturing the real Dorothy whose body she currently inhabits. So when she pictured the real Dorothy, the Dream World created her. So now we have two Dorothys.
The real Dorothy is actually a surprise. Contrary to her always sleeping appearance, her personality is cheerful and bright. She reminds me of Sailor Moon. She tells the “kids” to leave it to her since she’s a captain. When they call her out for calling them kids, she declares she’s 27 years old, and Charmy warns her not to steal her older Loli character slot. For some reason I found that whole interaction hilarious. Elf Dorothy interrupts and tries to attack, but Real Dorothy counters and states that she’s finally found an opponent she can share a dream with. This was a bit sad even though it wasn’t presented that way, but having a magic linked to sleep and dreams that keeps you sleeping a lot of the time must get really lonely. Real Dorothy invites Elf Dorothy to have some fun with her, but as usual and with the arrogance of the elves she states that she would never entertain the likes of a human. Real Dorothy doesn’t even care, commenting that it’s getting entertaining now. Her elf counterpart gets annoyed and tells her to shut up. I’m just here wondering where all Elf Dorothy’s big talk suddenly went. It’s like the first rule of war, know your opponent. Why are all these elves bragging about their superiority only to be shocked and made to look like fools when the humans they look down on expose their ignorance?
Anyway, the two go at each other, creating all sorts of creatures in the dream world. One downside of this Dream Magic is that whatever is created in the dream world cannot be erased, even by the one that creates it. So with these two attacking each other with whatever their imagination can come up with, the Dream World is getting overly crowded. Elf Dorothy realizes that the Glamour can’t handle both versions of their dreams, but it’s too late and the Dream World collapses. Real Dorothy cheerfully bids the Black Bulls farewell, tasking them with looking after her body.
After breaking out of the Dream World, Luck acknowledges the high level of Elf Dorothy as an opponent and figures that makes it alright to go full force. Magna and Luck cast
Combination Magic: Flaming Lightning Exploding Canon , with Sally stating that while Elf Dorothy’s spell was top level it was ill suited to deal with them since it could not finish them in one blow. This gave them time to come up with a countermeasure. The chapter ends with the combined spell hitting Elf Dorothy.
I’d rate this chapter 7/10As someone who’s waited a while to see Dorothy in action I was a little disappointed. It’s my own fault for expecting something epic, and in a way it is, but I feel like the weaknesses are too glaring for it to impress me as much as I anticipated. Maybe it has to do with seeing it for the first time being used by a villain. Perhaps if the real Dorothy had demonstrated it, we would have seen it in a better light. Or perhaps it was the sheer idiocy of Elf Dorothy, who fell into the basic villain plot hole of revealing the special characteristics of her magic before the good guys had time to even realize what was happening. When the Dream World is created, anyone trapped in there will eventually succumb to an eternal slumber a.k.a death. The Black Bulls didn’t know that. All they knew was that they were getting sleepier and sleepier. So like any good helpful villain, Elf Dorothy of course explained what was happening to them, which lead to them panicking and working even harder to break out. These guys have always been really good at thinking on their feet. That was my first issue with it. Then we learned that she had to have full concentration because if she didn’t control what she thought, it would be created. That was how they tricked her into creating exits the first time, and Real Dorothy the second time. If that wasn’t bad enough, whatever she creates, she can’t dispel or erase. It stays there. So she only has basic control over the things she creates. This is just my opinion though. Her magic is unique and it was nice meeting the real captain Dorothy for a brief moment.
As for next chapter, I’m not even sure what’s going to happen. Most likely we’ll move on to another fight if the combined attack managed to hit and defeat Elf Dorothy, which it should since the Dream World collapsed and that’s basically the root of her magic. However, as a member of the Followers of Sephira and one of the chosen ones needed for the ritual, I wouldn’t be surprised if she was rescued by Liar or Patri. She wouldn’t be very useful to them if she was out of commission.
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