The Tale of the Outcasts

I've obviously been searching for something that I haven't yet found, as I keep starting new animes. I mean, I am finishing some, but I keep starting new ones. Such as: The Tale of the Outcasts.

I'll say right off the bat that this also isn't exactly what I've been craving, BUT, that said, it does seem like a decent show. There's a bit of an Ancient Magus Bride thing going on, but I won't fault it that, though so far I'd say the Ancient Magus Bride has the nod as far as art style and story. I've watched a few episodes so far. 

Wisteria is a young orphan girl who is forced by a (very nasty) priest to beg for a living and is then sold off by him to a nobleman who intends to torture and kill her. Before that sale, the only bright spot in her life was Marbus, a lion-like powerful demon that only she (and very few others) can see. While he has a human form, it costs him to wear it long. When he's a demon, almost no one can see or hear him, but Wisteria can. 

They've spent some time where he comes to her room at night to tell her stories. You see, he's terribly, terribly bored. Demons are NOT people and his values and the things that bind him are very different...but he's been alive for a very long time and he is BORED with a capital B. He's also relatively decent...for a demon, you might say he's quite honourable in his own way. He's at first not going to interfere in Wisteria's life, but that changes when he hears what the nobleman plans. He whooshes off to save her --where it turns out that noble also had a pact with a demon...but that demon is no match for Marbas...except...if a demon does something "good" without something big in exchange, it can kill them. When he tries to save Wisteria, expecting nothing, it immediately cripples him.

So Wisteria gives him her eyes (eyesight), forming a pact with him. Back in full form, he easily levels the evil demon dude.

Complicating matters is that Snow, a demon hunter and Wisteria's long-lost brother, tracks them...he's looking for his sister. After a standoff with Marbus, Wisteria convinces him that this is what she wants, and at the end of the last episode, she and Marbus are off on a new adventure, though I am sure it will be full of people wanting to tear them apart.

I am enjoying it so far and the dynamic between Marbus and the now-blind Wisteria, who has to rely on him to do things like clean when he's never done anything like that before. I truly hope it doesn't drop into romance territory as she's a literal kid and he's more or less like a father figure for her. But, we'll see.