Princess Connect! Re:Dive – S2 07 – Foggy Memories

On their way to the tavern for a meal after tending some fields for a job, the Gourmet Guild encounter Ayane and Kurumi, who live at Sarens orphanage. Kurumi is extremely cute and shy, while Ayane carries around a staff with a seemingly sentient bear named Pikuchi on the end of it (though Karyl suspects ventriloquism).

The Serendia girls join the guild, but they soon encounter Chika of Carmina looking very much the worse for wear. Kokkoro heals her in the tavern, but she seems to have lost her memories and forgotten who she is. This tracks with the cold open of her running through the forest from what sounds like a laughing spirit, cursing herself for unsealing it.

Chaos reigns in the tavern when Kurumi’s memories are manipulated, turning her into a girlfriend who slaps the shit out of Charlie and demands he leave his (nonexistent) wife. Then Chika’s memories change again, and she starts to exhibit animal-like behaviors like licking and biting. But she also saves Ayane from getting hit by an errant bottle.

This clues Ayane in to the fact that somehow her beary good friend Pikuchi is inhabiting Chika, and helps the real Chika to surface so she can explain what’s going on. Her, Ayane, and the tavern owner’s strange behavior is due to memory manipulation by Foggy, the great trickster spirit of memories. Chika was trying to help Yuuki get his memories back, but instead all this happens.

Peco and Karyl are dispatched to the spring where Foggy’s seal lies; on the way Karyl twists her ankle, but Peco is happy to carry her the rest of the way. Its nice in the midst of an episode packed with so many characters that these two get a little alone time; their first since the two found themselves at the bottom of that pile of golem wreckage. As Karyl picks burrs out of Peco’s locks, Peco likens her to a big sister, with Kokkoro as their mom and Yuuki as their litle bro.

A helpful bird points them to the location of Foggy’s seal, and soon they’re back in town, revealing Foggy’s true form. When Peco slices Foggy in to, it splits into four Foggys, but Chika, who is herself again, sings her signature song of spirits, and Nozomi backs her up in taking care of the trickster spirit.

Before that happens, however, Foogy launches an attack at Peco, whose Princess Strike split it into four. When Yuuki shields her, he’s hit by a sudden rush of memories of a previous life he shared with a totally different family-like guild, led by a girl named Yui. The five-person party is preparing to go to the Sol Tower. Just the latest chapter in Yuuki’s mysterious and complex backstory.

With Foggy dealt with and everyone back to normal, Ayane and Kurumi set up a lemonade wagon, treating their new friends and local kids alike and showing that Saren really is the best orphanage mama. That said, it was some kind of tawdry romance novel Kurumi found at Saren’s orphanage that was the source of her switched out memories, so…maybe hide those from the kids!

As everyone enjoys their lemonade, Yuuki keeps looking up at the Sol Tower that looms high in the sky over Landosol, as if looking at it long enough may help him to remember more of that life. Kokkoro, who’s always been most attuned to Yuuki’s behavior, can sense something’s wrong, but even Yuuki probably couldn’t tell her exactly what. Perhaps more answers will come in time, but even if they don’t, there’s plenty to love about the family he has here and now.