One Punch Man Chapter 173 review: BLAST’S SECRET FINALLY REVEALED

One Punch Man Chapter 173 review: BLAST’S SECRET FINALLY REVEALED

So, this was an incredible chapter, so many reveals in this one, things that we’ve been literally waiting years to find out. So, with that being said, there’s so much to talk about in this one, so let’s just go right into it. Coming on with the previous chapter, we saw that Saitama ranked up to a class, and with that, he was able to get an apartment in the Hero Association.

And as he was approaching it, he came with Black S and Rover, and that set off Metal Knight’s new defense system, and this caused like a whole bunch of robots to come out, and Saitama, of course, easily just destroyed all of them. And we’re finding out the aftermath of that because we’re seeing the Hero Association workers reviewing the footage and talking about it, and basically scrutinizing Metal Knight because of this, saying that they basically wasted money on him because it just wound up malfunctioning.

And this is because of the excuse Saitama gave them in the previous chapter, like he didn’t straight up tell them that he destroyed it himself because he was afraid of having to pay for them because he found out they’re worth like millions of dollars. And then we see Metal Knight himself reviewing the footage, and this is actually the first time in the manga that we’re seeing Metal Knight’s full face for the first time.

For some reason, he’s able to see security footage that the other workers weren’t able to see, where he’s just straight up seeing that it was Saitama. He’s like, “Oh, it was a Class Rank 39K balding,” and then he goes over Saitama’s accomplishments, but just through the eyes of the Hero Association records, so they’re not 100% truthful.

And he’s like, “You know, based on the blogs, he’s probably as strong as an S-Class hero, maybe even stronger. If by some chance he should become an enemy of mine, I’ll keep an eye on him.” So now Metal Knight is aware that Saitama is potentially the one above all, pretty much, and him saying, “If by some chance he’d become an enemy, I might not keep an eye on him,”

This is because One wants us to be suspicious of Metal Knight because obviously Drive Knight talked about many chapters back to Genos and Second Guard that Metal Knight is a bad guy, so he’s kind of keeping that going. But unfortunately, you’re watching my blog, and you probably know my stance on this by now, but I believe personally that Metal Knight is actually not a bad guy, and that Drive Knight is actually the bad guy.

I know I sound like a broken record, but take it for what you will. You’re probably going to see a bunch of people saying the opposite in the comments and other places on social media, and that’s good. But I digress. So then we’re coming to this emergency meeting that Sitch is holding because he feels that all the crazy stuff that happened in the previous chapter is linked to his “the Earth is in trouble” prophecy, and he’s right, because we know that most of this stuff is connected to God.

And in this meeting, we see Geno’s zombie man flash flash into my mask. This is important because all of these characters are going to have important storylines going forward. I’ll talk more about that at the end. But, sit just like you know, everything that we talk about here has to be kept in this room.

And Flash Flash is like, you know, even heroes have reported that it would be strange for anybody to turn into a monster at any moment. We should stay cautious. But then, on my mask is like, wait a second, I don’t really get what you’re talking about. Could you walk me through it step by step? You’re saying that anybody can turn into monsters, so this is interesting.

Of course, that my mask would be saying this because way back in the previous arc, after my mask had defeated Super S, we thought that he had killed her, but it turned out that he actually didn’t. And when she woke up, she tasted his blood because she had stabbed him in the eye previously.

She was like, this is Monster Blood. So that, along with my mask being able to regenerate from said grievous injury along with him being ripped in half by If you’re ugly and having his face mask crushed in, it’s looking like my mask is pretty much a monster at this point, or something like that at the minimum.

So him saying this here is funny because either he’s trying to save face, you know, acting oblivious because he doesn’t want them to know that he’s a freaking monster, or he somehow genuinely doesn’t know that he is a monster. But something is definitely sus about him. But first, let’s talk about the sponsor of this blog, Established Titles.

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But then, Sitch asks Zombie Man, “Hey, you fought against Homeless Emperor. Is there any important details you want to share about that?” And Zombie Man is like, “Yeah, he said that when he was still a human, he was given divine power by something he called God.” So now everybody’s aware of the name God, and he’s like, ”

Yeah, during the fight, I found an opening, and I held him down, and I was going to make him spill whatever he knew. But suddenly, he just started crumbling into solder ashes and dropped dead, and the last thing he said was, “God seemed like he was trying to be shut up.” And then Flashy Flash is like, “By chance, did you hear anything being said to you telepathically?”

Because, you know, while we were under the Monster Association, we ran into something, and it was trying to grant us power, and it said that if you weren’t worthy, you would face forfeiture. So, I’m thinking that the thing that we ran into and the thing that killed Homeless Emperor is probably the same God that you just talked about. And of course, he’s right because you know we saw what had happened. And then Flashy Flash asked Sitch, he’s like, “Hey, you know something about what’s going on with Blast, don’t you?”

And this is because, you know, after Flashy Flash, Saitama, and Fubuki encountered the cube and talked to God, that’s when Blast made his first appearance in the manga. So, Flashy Flash is aware of Blast and what he’s doing, for the most part because he told them, “You know, he’s going after the cubes and the thing connected to them.”

So, there’s no hiding anymore for Sitch because we’ve known for years that Sitch has ties to Blast in some way and that he knows the truth. But he could not talk about it because it’s confidential. But now, he’s just spilling the beans, and he’s like, “Tell the truth, I’ve been keeping it hidden until now, but for the past 20 years, Blast has been continuously fighting this God you all encountered, he and his partner, and a group of many other collaborators.

They were searching for a mysterious Cube that could turn humans into monsters.” And we see Blast with this human-like hero guy, and those of you who have read the webcomic are jumping up and down right now, and I get it. So was I. But obviously, I can’t talk about it here because it’s massive spoilers for the future of the manga.

But just know that I’m gonna make a blog after this in the next couple of days, talking about who this guy is and why he’s so important to the story and how this all connects to him. So, if you haven’t subscribed already, please subscribe for that if you want to know the truth about everything.

I mean, it’s heavy spoiler stuff, but it’s fascinating. But going further, Sitch is like, “It has been handed down over time as some kind of communication device with this guy, what some would call a type of O part or an out of place artifact. He had been collecting them and together with collaborators attempting to analyze them. However, finally two years ago, while Blast was battling Elder Centipede, he came into contact with God directly.

He refused the transaction of power and pitted himself against God.” So, that’s another huge reveal here. We’re finally getting the answer what happened between Blast and Elder Centipede. This has been going on for like five years, you know, since we found out that this was even a thing. Because when King was talking to the Peter worker, he was like, “Hey, Blast fought Elder Centipede like two years ago, but I can’t talk about it because it’s confidential.” And for years, people were like, “Oh, Blast is weakling because he couldn’t even defeat Elder Centipede.”

because it was said that Elder centipede was able to escape, and I was like, “Guys, that’s not the full story, we don’t know everything.” And I’m sure you can find some evidence of me in a blog that I’ve made over the past couple years saying that God is probably involved with that incident. And it turns out that, yeah, of course, God is involved with that incident because he probably created double centipede like he created safe centipede.

But then Sitch is like realizing that it would be safer, if only by a small amount, if the other Heroes and employees were unaware of the existence of God. Glass made it seem like he disappeared without giving so much as a reason in order to protect everyone. So that’s the reason why Blast went M.I.A.

He was trying to protect everyone from knowing the existence of God because he felt that if everyone was none the wiser, then they would be less susceptible to being influenced by him, I suppose. And then Sitch is like the only reason Blast was able to do battle with God is because he’s a person with the ability to manipulate space-time. Other Heroes have no means of doing such a thing, and we pretty much knew this was the case when we saw Blast’s abilities.

But in response, Genos is like, “Oh, is that so?” And he pulls out the core from the future and then he goes on to explain to them everything that had happened between Saitama and Garo in the previous Arc, and it takes him like four hours. Afterwards, Second Guard and Sitch are like, “No, but you claim he flew to Jupiter or destroyed it, then came back, and on top of that, you say he went back in time and changed history.

That’s a bit out there.” And it’s totally understandable that they would react this way. But Zombie Man, trying to make sense of this, is like, “Hey, if that’s the case, we can confirm by asking Garo, right? Like, what did the police learn from interrogating him?” And Second Guard’s like, “Apparently, the shock of the final punch made him lose his memory. So not even Garo is apparently aware that Saitama was the one that punched him.”

And yes, that directly conflicts with what he said to Bang a couple of chapters back about the people that he would like to fight in order of their strength, which made it seem like he knew that Saitama was the one that defeated him. But I guess this means that he doesn’t know.

But then Flashy Flash is like, “So we don’t have any definitive info at all, so this is a good way of having everyone know and not know at the same time that Saitama is the one above all. There’s still that air of doubt, like they’re not completely convinced because they, of course, don’t have definitive proof.”

Then Sitch is like, “One thing we can say is that interaction with God’s Dimension has increased rapidly. Blast said there might be something in our Dimension that’s summoning him here.” And we see Saitama, so this is another huge reveal. This is confirming that Saitama is the reason why everything has been happening since the beginning of the series.

Everybody’s been saying for the longest time that monster sightings have increased more and more lately, we’re seeing demon and dragon level monsters way more commonly than we have before, and it’s because of Saitama because he removed his limiter, and God is aware of it.

And I know that for the longest time, I’ve been saying that I didn’t think that God was aware of Saitama because he removed his limiter. I thought him removing it made him like become outside of God’s view, but I was very wrong. I was foolish, sorry about that. But yeah, God is very aware of Saitama removing his limiter because it’s implied that God made the limiter himself because he was afraid that something like this was going to happen.

And now that Saitama has removed the limiter, meaning that he is a direct threat to God himself, God is now upping the ante and making more and more monsters and trying to create more and more powerful beings to be able to stop Saitama. But also simultaneously trying to have him being resurrected back to Earth, you know, trying to fulfill the prophecy, making that Orochi that can be powerful enough to be placed on the altar as well.

But then Saitama’s just like, you know, anyway, Blast will return to us soon with a plan for countermeasures. Until then, our top priorities are unity in solidarity. So this is just putting a pin holder in there, being like, Blast will return, guys, and he’s gonna have a plan, but it’s probably not going to be soon. But just know that he’s eventually gonna come back.

So then everyone starts leaving, and Zombie Man remembers back to what Dr. Genus had told him in chapter 88, and then I think it’s 86 on the Viz, like when Dr. Genus dumped all that exposition about the limiter and how monsters are made and all that stuff, and he was like, in exchange for removing his limiter, he lost his hair. And then he’s like, someone removed their limiter, huh? And he sees Saitama in this instance.

So Zombie Man is thinking, like, oh man, maybe Genus was telling the truth, and Saitama is the one that Genus was talking about, and he removed his freaking limiter. So like I said in the beginning, this is important because Zombie Man, Flashy Flash, who we also see being interested in Saitama, and the chapter ending with Amai Mask being interested in Saitama, is super important because they’re all going to be going after him in their own specific ways, which creates their own individual storylines.

And these storylines are so much fun, and I can’t wait to see how the manga adapts them. But that’s pretty much it for this one, guys. Let me know what you think about all this stuff in the comments. So exciting, and if you like the blog, please give it a like, and please subscribe if you haven’t already. Have a great day, and I’ll see you next time.

Andreea Blaga

That’s me, Andreea Blaga, author of the blog https://anime-everything.com. I work as a content creator in the US. I am also passionate about Japanese Anime.