#gunxsword

Obviously Neo was having the time of her life confronting Ruby with all of Ruby’s perceived failures. After all, Neo has spent the past few volumes hunting down Ruby, believing her to be responsible for Roman’s death. Roman, as we all know, is pretty much the only person Neo cares about, so losing him was a huge blow, and Cinder had successfully deflected Neo’s thirst for vengeance from herself - to Ruby. And now that Ruby and Neo are together in the Ever After, and Neo’s Semblance has evolved into more complex illusions, there’s no doubt Neo would seize this opportunity to not only destroy Ruby but to make her suffering painful and tedious. Make Ruby suffer at the hands of the people who symbolize her failures and guilt. And as a cherry on top, Neo brutally kills the creature who continues to burn with hope for Ruby.

Yet, when Ruby finally reaches the point where she chooses ascension and drinks the tea, Neo is not gloating. She isn’t cheering, she isn’t happy, she just sits there as though in shock that she managed to get this far (Perhaps she expected Ruby to put up more of a fight?). Neo spent so much time and energy determined to destroy Ruby, and once she does it, she’s empty, she just accomplished the one overarching purpose of her life, and is left with nothing else, leaving her open to the Curious Cat.

Maybe, in that moment, Neo realized that even if she killed Ruby, that would never bring Roman back or undo what has happened. And now that Ruby is gone, Neo has no one else to blame or punish for Roman’s death.

I finished rewatching GUNxSWORD sometime before this episode dropped, so as a summary, it’s about a man’s quest for revenge as well, this time for his bride. He walks his world determined to hunt the murderer down (though unlike Neo who has decided to pin the death of Roman on Ruby, the murderer in this series really is guilty), and in one episode, when he is asked what he will do next once he has killed his bride’s murderer, he doesn’t know what to do next after that.

And that is what happened to Neo.

She doesn’t know what to do next. She finally got to see Ruby suffer and drink the tea and disappear, and she is now truly left with nothing.