The First Method

Canute sails toward Ketil's farm, and Wulf reckons a favorable wind will bring them there within days. Floki is puzzled that the king would personally confront so minor a clan when the Jomsvikings alone could manage it, but Wulf trusts Canute's design. Canute hopes for a bloodless surrender yet promises no mercy to any who resist. Leif's ship delivers the family home, and Thorgil startles the waiting men by rolling out a barrel that splits open to reveal Ketil inside. He orders the farm readied for battle and keeps Olmar close, though the younger brother, once eager for combat, now stays silent. The men who ferried them press Ketil for payment, but he only mutters Arnheid's name and wanders off.

As the walls are reinforced, Fox doubts the untrained farm can win. The bound Thorfinn and Einar sense the unrest, and Einar worries how Ketil will react to Arnheid's attempted escape, hoping his affection and her pregnancy will soften any punishment. Thorfinn regrets letting Gardar die and wonders whether a better path existed, insisting violence should be the last resort. Reaching home, Ketil ignores his wife and searches until she tells him Arnheid is bound in the stable for trying to flee with her former husband. Leif, meanwhile, tries to buy Thorfinn as promised and, worried for Arnheid, asks to purchase two slaves through Pater. At the stable Ketil demands to know why Arnheid ran, then beats her with a stick even as she begs him not to strike her belly and swears the child is his. Weeping that she was the one person he trusted, he keeps hitting her until Snake stops him, warning that any more will kill her. Ketil orders Pater to treat her wounds and refuses Leif's offer to buy her, though he frees Thorfinn and Einar for sale. With Arnheid unconscious and her survival uncertain, Ketil draws his sword and vows to punish anyone who takes what is his, even the king himself.

Ketil's family returns to the farm and Thorgil begins mustering the men for the coming battle with Canute, whose fleet approaches. Leif attempts to buy Thorfinn and Arnheid as agreed. Ketil learns of Arnheid's escape attempt and beats her savagely until Snake intervenes to keep him from killing her and her unborn child. Ketil refuses to sell Arnheid but frees Thorfinn and Einar, then resolves to take up arms against Canute himself.

Airing May 9, 2023, this is the forty-second episode overall and the eighteenth of the second season under MAPPA. It adapts chapters 87 and 88 with the opening of chapter 89. Yousuke Yamamoto directed, with storyboards by Shigeyuki Miya. The title points to violence as the first resort Ketil reaches for, a grim counterpoint to Thorfinn's search for a way that does not end in bloodshed.