In this chap­ter from “Blood Merid­i­an,” two men named Jack­son, one black and one white, exhib­it a tense rela­tion­ship as they ride under the bar­ren moun­tains. The white man attempts to engage the black man, who rebuffs him. Ten­sions in their dynam­ic are pal­pa­ble as the white man seeks his shad­ow for shade, while the black man seems deeply uncom­fort­able, sug­gest­ing his­tor­i­cal enmi­ties between their races.

Ear­li­er, the group meets in a court­yard where sup­plies, includ­ing a crate of pow­er­ful Colt revolvers, are dis­trib­uted. Glan­ton, pre­sum­ably a leader, tests the pis­tols on var­i­ous ani­mals and a clay jar, demon­strat­ing their pow­er by effort­less­ly destroy­ing a small goat and cre­at­ing chaos among the court­yard’s inhab­i­tants. This scene estab­lish­es the vio­lent under­tones that char­ac­ter­ize the group’s inter­ac­tions with liv­ing crea­tures and the sur­round­ing world.

After fir­ing the guns, a group of sol­diers arrives, their inter­est piqued by the gun­fire and dead ani­mals. Glan­ton inter­acts care­less­ly with the sol­diers, while the enig­mat­ic Judge Hold­en steps in to man­age the sit­u­a­tion. The sol­diers, rep­re­sent­ing law and order, con­trast stark­ly with the vio­lent ten­den­cies of Glan­ton’s group. The judge’s strong per­son­al­i­ty dom­i­nates the con­ver­sa­tion, hint­ing at a deep­er sig­nif­i­cance to his influ­ence.

As the group moves on, they encounter wan­der­ing magi­cians seek­ing safe pas­sage. Despite their des­ti­tute appear­ance and eager­ness to per­form, Glan­ton treats them dis­mis­sive­ly, believ­ing they won’t con­tribute any­thing of val­ue. This inter­ac­tion under­scores Glan­ton’s bru­tal prag­ma­tism. The scene shifts to a descrip­tion of a grue­some ambush, show­cas­ing the hor­ri­fy­ing real­i­ties of the land they tra­verse, pop­u­lat­ed by rem­nants of past vio­lence and suf­fer­ing.

The chap­ter con­cludes with Glan­ton and his men rest­ing among the ruins of civ­i­liza­tion, where the specter of death looms per­pet­u­al­ly. Their inter­ac­tion with the jug­gler’s fam­i­ly is marked by an unset­tling mix­ture of intrigue and dis­dain, fur­ther illus­trat­ing the ten­sion per­me­at­ing their jour­ney through a hos­tile world where vio­lence remains an inescapable real­i­ty. The jug­gler, per­haps a metaphor for fate or illu­sion, ulti­mate­ly cap­ti­vates the atten­tion of the group, hint­ing at deep­er themes of des­tiny and sur­vival amidst chaos.

In Part Sev­en of “Anthem,” the pro­tag­o­nist, Equal­i­ty 7–2521, finds him­self deep in the Unchart­ed For­est, reflect­ing on the events that led him to this soli­tude. His jour­ney began that morn­ing, as he pre­sent­ed a ground­break­ing inven­tion to the World Coun­cil of Schol­ars, hop­ing to con­tribute to mankind’s progress. How­ev­er, this act of indi­vid­ual bril­liance was met with hos­til­i­ty and fear rather than the antic­i­pat­ed awe.

Equal­i­ty 7–2521 recalls walk­ing into the solemn assem­bly of the World Coun­cil of Schol­ars, the guardians of knowl­edge, with his glass box—a device that har­ness­es the pow­er of elec­tric­i­ty. Upon reveal­ing his iden­ti­ty as a Street Sweep­er and not a Schol­ar, the room erupt­ed in dis­be­lief and out­rage, as he defied the soci­etal norms that strict­ly define each person’s role and knowl­edge.

Attempt­ing to mit­i­gate the Coun­cil’s ini­tial shock, Equal­i­ty 7–2521 implores the Schol­ars to rec­og­nize the sig­nif­i­cance of his inven­tion, argu­ing it holds the poten­tial to rev­o­lu­tion­ize mankind’s way of life by end­ing the reliance on prim­i­tive illu­mi­na­tions, such as can­dles and torch­es. How­ev­er, his impas­sioned plea is met with sus­pi­cion and fear. The Coun­cil deems his inven­tion a threat to the estab­lished order, fear­ing it would under­mine the col­lec­tive effort and uni­for­mi­ty cher­ished by their soci­ety.

The Schol­ars’ reac­tion evolves from bewil­der­ment to out­right hos­til­i­ty as they declare his cre­ation must be destroyed for the greater good, effec­tive­ly label­ing it an abom­i­na­tion that could dis­rupt social har­mo­ny and the dic­tates of the World Coun­cil. Faced with the Coun­cil’s inabil­i­ty to see beyond their rigid beliefs, Equal­i­ty 7–2521’s des­per­a­tion and dis­il­lu­sion­ment crescen­do. In a defi­ant act of preser­va­tion for his dis­cov­ery, he shat­ters a win­dow and escapes into the night, clutch­ing his pre­cious inven­tion.

The nar­ra­tive cli­max reach­es as Equal­i­ty 7–2521, now a fugi­tive labeled as a trai­tor to his own soci­ety, enters the Unchart­ed For­est. This act sym­bol­izes a phys­i­cal and ide­o­log­i­cal depar­ture from the col­lec­tive tyran­ny that sti­fles inno­va­tion and indi­vid­u­al­i­ty. The for­est, vast and untamed, stands in stark con­trast to the con­for­mi­ty and restric­tion of the city he flees, offer­ing him sanc­tu­ary but also con­fronting him with the unknown.

“Anthem” Part Sev­en thus vivid­ly depicts the strug­gle between indi­vid­ual genius and col­lec­tive dog­ma. Equal­i­ty 7–2521’s flight into the Unchart­ed For­est marks not only an escape from per­se­cu­tion but also the begin­ning of his true jour­ney towards self-dis­cov­ery and lib­er­a­tion from soci­etal chains.