Kiyataka Narumi vanished. He left behind a brother, Ayumu, who felt he could not begin to fit into Kiyataka's shoes: a young wife who looks after Ayumu (and/or vice versa): and the Blade Children. All of them are abandoned, angry and frightened.

As Ayumu works through his feelings of inferiority, he gradually comes to realize that the people comparing him with his brother Kiyataka are afraid that Ayumu will also disappear and abandon them. But is Kiyataka dead? How did he disappear? Kiyataka disappeared in investigating the Blade Children, and Ayumu never hears of them again until a murder is committed at his school. Soon the Blade Children are trying to kill Ayumu as well.

This might have been a four-star anime, if only it had a more complete ending. As it was, after viewing the last disc, I wondered whether I had dozed off and missed something vital. The mystery of Kiyataka's disappearance is never openly solved, and there are some unresolved hints he may still be alive. It is never explained where the Blade Children came from (or why) and why they're being hunted down. Nor a really permanent solution to their troubles.

Still, it's gripping and suspenseful as Ayumu goes head-to-head to save himself from the intricate traps of the Blade Children.

At some times it seems a little too contrived...for example, Ayumu's flawlessly prepared escape from certain death would have failed if the train was a minute or two late. In some ways these deadly intellectual contests between Ayumu and the BC's remind me of those melodramatic scenes where a villain leaves the hero about to be sliced in half by a buzz saw or suspended over a pit of pirahnas, then departs so we can be amazed at the hero's quick wit and lightning reflexes as he escapes.

Still, hope is the great theme of this series, and as Ayumu repearedly foils the Blade Children, they gain a little more hope that he is the one who can save them from their dark destiny.Ayumu's relationship with his sister-in-law also goes through interesting developments, as she struggles to protect and to hold on to him, as he appears determined to follow the same path as his brother.

Visually, the show is attractive, though not particularly eye-candy-ish. It features a lot of atmosphereic shots. Irises (symbolising 'the hope of those who believe') are a prominent visual theme, and their colors can often be found in scenes where their images don't actually appear.

If you can get past the first ear-splitting bars of the theme song, it will probably grow on you, and the opening animation, with its images of puzzle pieces, natural spirals and growing shadows, is fun to watch.

Overall, I recommend it...though the manga isn't being released in the US until this October, which means it will probably be a very long time before we non-Japanese-readers find out how the story actually ends.