Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina is an anime series with a penchant for featuring stories with different characters and settings, similar to shows like Kino’s Journey. However, there are some episodes with happier endings than others and this one is definitely on the more grim, darker side. The ninth episode “A Deep Sorrow from the Past” shows us why it’s not a good idea to change the past and mess with fate.

In what is essentially a time travel episode, the main story follows the witch Elaina, who takes on a job request in the town of Rostolf from the Lavender Witch, Estelle. She wants to save a childhood friend named Selena, who was charged with murdering her abusive uncle 10 years ago after the sudden death of her parents by a robber. Estelle was forced to execute her for her crimes after Selena went insane and was beyond redemption. She asks for Elaina’s help in returning to the past to save Selena and her parents to prevent their deaths. 

This episode is as grim dark as it gets when you realize the characters had no chance of saving Selena in the first place. It does an effective job at lulling us into a false sense of security by depicting a relatively cheerful first half of Elaina meeting Estelle and Estelle reuniting with Selena in the past. The plotline hinges on the fact that Elaina and Estelle needed to stop the robber that killed Selena’s parents as she was out shopping. However, it’s revealed that Selena was the one who orchestrated their deaths in the first place.  

Although we’re meant to believe Selena was driven to insanity to murder her parents and uncle, the episode flips the script by showing us she always had a psychotic edge. She was a monster that needed to be put down before it put down others. We're tricked into believing Selena and her parents were innocent people, but it’s more depressing when we learn that her parents were abusing her too. In Selena’s words, her dad “did perverted things to me” and her jealous mom “hit me.” After hearing those haunted words, I wonder if Elaina and Estelle truly had any chance of saving her at all. 

This revelation is punctuated by the scene of Selena standing over Estelle and her deceased parents surrounded by flames. A horrified Elaina looks on as Selena adorns a bloody smile and twists the knife psychologically when she says she has no best friend, as she tramples over Estelle’s wounded body. She shows no remorse for her actions and it all culminates into an intense war of words with Elaina. Estelle hears the words of her friend and pins the latter to a wall. Angered by Selena’s words, Estelle blasts her with several magical spells as she becomes more battered and bloodied, laughing the entire time. Finally reaching her breaking point, she crushes Selena’s neck and beheads her as the town clock chimes in the distance. 

That is one hell of a way to finish an episode and, by the end of it all, no one ends up looking good in it. For Elaina in particular, she despairs at the shocking revelation that Selena was the murderer and had a hand in making Estelle relive her trauma. She becomes further distraught when she sees Estelle give up her precious childhood memories of Selena to boost her own powers to kill her. 

Perhaps Estelle not knowing the full truth behind Selena’s death would’ve prepared her to better move on with her life, while honoring her past friendship. Or, this could’ve been fate punishing both characters for interfering with it by showing them a twisted alternate timeline. It’s not really made clear in the episode, but I believe Selena was truly a psychopathic person that was a victim of miserable circumstances beyond Estelle’s control. To take it further, I think she may have wanted Estelle to kill her by relentlessly taunting and tormenting her in order to bring her miserable life to an end. Elaina herself laments at being an inexperienced "ordinary witch” and “ordinary traveler” in the end because she wasn’t able to save Estelle or Selena. 

The ninth episode of Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina is a perfect reminder that getting involved with people's past can have severe consequences. The lasting lesson that can be taken from all of this is that the past should be left alone and interfering with fate rarely turns out well.