When it comes down to it, these first two episodes of Devils' Crest are almost all setup. They are most concerned with providing context to the audience so that the ongoing plot, what little we get of it here, makes sense. For example, the first episode is basically a single extended scene to let us see how the game system works through "show don't tell". We see how the taming skill works as our heroes catch a horned rabbit and how magic and combat work as they go on to fight a dragon.
At the same time, there are a few scenes of character interaction to jump-start character development. While the first episode is mostly focused on the core group of Yuuma, Sawa, Kenji, and Minagi, there is one scene where our heroes meet their classmate rivals and clash with them. While it doesn't deliver a ton of depth, it at least gives us a baseline for who each of the rivals is and their place in the classroom social hierarchy—i.e., above our heroes.
It is the second episode where the honestly rather bland first episode of kids playing an online game starts to pay off. Yuuma is the last to awaken from the test play session and therefore the one who understands the least of what's going on. The once pristine room is filled with rubble and broken VR pods—and he is attacked by what looks like a classmate using a severed human arm as a club.
It is from there that the premise for the series is laid out: The real world is now infected with monsters, and our elementary school heroes can use magic just like when they were in the game. And, of course, the danger of death is very real. So this isn't the story of being trapped in a VR death game or the story of being forced to play a real-world one. Rather, Devils' Crest is a merging of the two.
Beyond that, the second episode is filled with flashbacks that tease important past events regarding our young heroes. From these, we learn not only why Sumika—Yuuma's friend-turned-monster—is more than just the class princess she first appears to be, but also why Yuuma refuses to give up on her. It gives the conflict a bit more emotional drama and makes her circumstances as tragic as they are mysterious.
On the visual side of things, these first two episodes look great. The action is fast and fluid, and everything remains perfectly on-model throughout. The only real issue is that the show reuses animation wholesale—even within the same episode. The cliffhanger to episode one is shown three times across the two episodes, while other scenes reappear as flashbacks mid-battle just to make sure the audience remembers what's going on. It's almost insulting, the visual hand-holding that's going on. It feels like the creators have no trust in the audience to be able to keep up.
As for the music, while the show's soundtrack is fine and the ending theme is above average, the opening steals the show—but that's hardly a surprise given how often Ado belts out bangers.
All in all,feels like it's off to a slow start—though by necessity. It spends these first two episodes making sure the foundation for the series is stable and ready to build a story upon. However, that doesn't mean we have any clue what's really going on, as the ever-growing pile of questions is already staggeringly large. I wouldn't call this show captivating so far, but I am interested in seeing what it becomes now that the groundwork is out of the way.