Chain Chronicle: The Light of Haecceitas is a three part film alternative timeline version of the events of Book 1 in Chain Chronicle.
It originally was released in Japanese theatres between between December 3, 2016, and February 11, 2017, and was compiled into a 12 part anime series that aired January 8, 2017 – March 25, 2017.
It has a western dub, and is currently available to view on Crunchyroll.
Plot[]
The story takes place just before the confrontation between Yuri, Phoena, Pirika and the others in the Volunteer Army face off against the Black King.
Yuri fails to defeat the Black King, overwhelmed by him in the final battle, and getting torn apart by the Black King's magic, scarring him across the bridge of his nose. Pirika is crushed and killed within the Black King's grasp and the Chain Chronicle rips in two as Phoena and the Black King grab the Chronicle.
When Yuri awakens he is blamed for the loss, and the alliance falls apart. Feeling guilt for being unable to save the kingdom, Yuri and his party travel back to their hometowns. Along the way they come across Aram, a young thief who is fighting against the Black Troops to save a small village that is under attack. Moved by Aram's willingness to continue fighting Yuri snaps out of his depressive thoughts and helps save the village with his friends. That night he asks Aram to join his army, as they head to the Vice-Capital. Aram refuses, but agrees to accompany them to the city.
When they arrive they discover the Vice-Capital is overran by Black Troops, and the Volunteer Army leap into battle to help save the day. Yuri, alongside Kain and Michidia perform a Chain Attack, which is enough to impress Aram to want to learn this ability. Yuri reveals this kind of ability only comes from a deep bond between multiple comrades, and cannot be achieved solo. With that Aram decides he wants to join the Volunteer Army, and whilst Aram's ability to drain Mana rattles Burckhardt (largely because he was the one stolen from, which placed him in danger), Yuri has made up his mind and isn't ready to give up, instead planning to form an even stronger 'Black King Supression Army'.
Yuri and Phoena are planning to go to the three sages to learn of Pirika's whereabouts, realising they can still sense her life force. Along the way there Yuri attempts to get Burckhardt and Aram to make up, but this just causes Burckhardt to walk off to cool his head. Eirenus attacks him in the forest, engulfing him with dark energy. Whilst Yuri, Kain and Michidia are able to defeat the enemies Eirenus summons to hold them back, they are unable to save Burckhardt from being overcome and he is overtaken by darkness, assaulting Aram. Yuri steps in to save Aram, but gets infected with the dark energy himself.
During a travel to Maze Pass, Yuri and Aram are seperated from the rest of their party during a blizzard, tumbling into a ravine. Whilst waiting for his comrades to find them, Yuri is suddenly confronted with a dark energy version of himself, but Aram manages to snap him out of the illusion and they fight the Black Troops closing in on them.
Further on their journey they come across Shuza, a former member of Yuri's alliance, who attempts to steal the Chain Chronicle from them, planning to use it to defeat the Black King himself and become the new king in his place. Shuza reveals that he also has been infected with the black energy and blames Yuri's softness as the reason he is now suffering. Eirenus shows up with the corrupted Burckhardt and attacks the group. She offers Yuri a place by the Black King's side as he is already infected with the darkness energy, and the dark version of Yuri shows up again.
Refusing to lose to the darkness, Yuri stabs at his dark counterpart, only for the illusion to be lifted. He has in fact ended up stabbing Kain, one of his closest allies and friends through the chest. With this final push and Kain laying bleeding in his arms, Yuri gives in to the darkness and transforms into the Black Knight. Eirenus takes Yuri to meet the Black King whilst Marina, Phoena and Michidia save Kain from dying.
Yuri, now as the Black Knight, acknowledges that his efforts to save the world were hopeless, stating that if with this darkness he is able to destroy the world, it was never worth saving in the first place.
Several days later, the Black King kidnaps Phoena who begs Yuri, now at the Black King's side to come to his senses, but it's no use, and goes to fight the invading remains of his former allies who had come to rescue Phoena. He clashes with Aram, managing to brush off all his attacks, knocking him back and planning to kill him. Luckily Kain, Michidia and Marina show up to save Aram, and through team work Kain manages to cut through Yuri's black armor, with Michidia forcing him Yuri to leap helplessly into the air to avoid her arrow shots, and Marina to bind him with her magic. This leaves Yuuri open enough for Aram to return to force his light magic into Yuri, shattering the armour and awakening Yuri's true self.
Yuri overcomes his failures, killing his dark version and going to save Phoena with Marina whilst Kain, Michidia and Aram keep the Black King distracted, before Yuri rejoins the battle. Teaming up with Aram he is able to overcome the Black King, forcing him to transform into his Black Dragon form. Fortunately for the pair, Aram's pet, Furball, happens to be the white dragon in disguise and transforms and the two dragons clash, flying into the sky. Yuri manages to stab the black dragon in the eye, transforming the Black Dragon back.
Now weakened, the Black King puts up one last fight against Yuri and Aram, but they combine Yuri's blade with Aram's light magic to purge the dark energy from the king's body. With his dying breath, the Black King saves Phoena by absorbing the dark energy overcoming her back into his body before he finally dies. With the Black King's passing occurring, Pirika is returned to the world and reunites with Yuuri and Phoena once again.
Trivia[]
- This was the debut of Aram, a character that would be added into Chain Chronicle.
- The globalized version of Chain Chronicle was shut down prior to this leading many to hope Sega would bring the game back if the anime did well outside of Japan. It unfortunately did not bring the global servers back.