Urusei Yatsura – 40 – The Young Man Dressed Like a Woman and the Sea

When the newly-resurrected Nagisa has no place else to go, Ryuunosuke and her dad invite him into their house, but he proves to be an annoying freeloader who sleeps in and eats more than his fair share. When Ryuu complains, Nagisa pretends to get upset and cry. Meanwhile, Ryuu’s dad considers Nagisa his “son’s” precious fiancée, and so offers Ryuu no relief.

Things take a turn when Nagisa invades Ryuu’s school life. Lum helpfully informs him that the crying schtick won’t work on Ryuu and a more aggressive approach is needed. When Ryuu evades Ataru’s advances and throws him into a wall, Nagisa does the same to her, displaying strength equal to hers. Everyone is shocked.

As the school day ends, Ryuu has had her fill, and decides to settle her little Nagisa problem with violence. Alas, beneath her girlish appearance, Nagisa is a man of the sea, and thus strong as a mule. Not only that, even the formidable Ryuu can’t land a single punch on him. She’s saved when Sakura uses a ghost-warding talisman on Nagisa, but doesn’t believe their fight to be over.

When Ryuu comes at Nagisa again and Nagisa makes use of her champion sumo skills to artfully dodge every blow, then bear-hugs Ryuu into submission, Sakura (who along with Lum and Ataru are enjoying the match while scarfing concessions) has no choice but to declare Nagisa the winner. Ryuu cries in frustration, telling Nagisa how little he thinks of her and saying she hates him.

In his defense, Nagisa tells Ryuu he could never hit a girl, especially one he has feelings for. He held back because he likes her, not because he doesn’t consider her a worthy adversary. Watching Nagisa sulk away, Ryuu softens her stance and agrees to let Nagisa stay with her. She then proceeds to immediately regret her decision when Nagisa can’t seem to stay in his own futon.

The second segment is all about Onsen threatening to prescribe supplementary lessons to Class 2-4 on account of their constant chatter during lessons. They collectively decide they won’t make a sound, not even when he calls upon them to read from the textbooks, deeming that a trap.

It’s an extremely rare instance of the characters of Urusei Yatsura actually being silent. Onsen is loving that silence at first, but soon it starts to feel mocking, and becomes a different kind of annoying, equally intolerable to their usual chattering.

When Ten shows up in a floating space Yankee bike to exact revenge on Ataru and his friends for ignoring him earlier, the students are put to the ultimate test. Can they maintain their vow of silence as they come under increasingly violent attacks from the tiny alien? The answer is yes.

They outlast both Onsen’s threats and Ten’s assault, and the bell rings announcing that class has ended. I must note that the scenes of the injured students slumped over their desks are a bit too evocative for my tastes, but as with the cute segment with the little fox who loves Shinobu a few weeks back, Urusei Yatsura proves it can still deliver the goods even when its characters aren’t constantly shouting at each other.

KonoSuba 3 – 06 – The Man in the Mask

When Kazuma and Iris switch bodies again, it leads to Kazuma being banished from the palace, which is when Chris meets up to discuss Divine Treasures. Kazuma tells her about the body-swapping necklace, and learns that it can be extremely dangerous in the wrong hands, as one can kill the person you’ve swapped bodies with and keep switching bodies to gain immortality.

This leads to Chris and Kazuma dressing up in cool clothes and go on a palace heist to steal Iris’ necklace. They gain access easily enough, but when Kazuma starts grinding on Chris under the pretense of maintaining the lowest profile possible, she raises her voice and they’re discovered by guards, leading to a chase through the palace.

The duo eventually ends up cornered by Claire and Rain, which is when Kazuma decides to finally “get serious.” With his Devil Army General-defeating powers, he’s able to easily dodge Claire’s charge and overwhelm her with magic that seems to deliver a pleasurable kind of pain.

When Kyouya shows up, he proudly proclaims the Steal ability won’t work on him anymore, so Kazuma uses Freeze instead to seal his sword in its scabbard and get him to lose his footing. Kazuma then gorges him with water, such that he and Chris can slip away when Claire and Rain are busy helping him.

Ultimately, Darkness, Megumin, and Aqua are the last line of defense between the masked thieves and Princess Iris (who even brandishes her own adorable sword, unafraid of combat). Alas, Megumin is completely smitten with the thieves’ style, and she and Darkness are quickly bound by Kazuma.

Even drunk, Aqua is able to lift the binding spell and rally Darkness, well aware that Megumin is no longer useful. But Kazuma and Chris are still able to slip past them and cast Steal on Iris’ necklace at the same time as they leap through a stained glass window and into the water below.

Darkness soon tracks the thieves down, and even when she learns it’s Kazuma and Chris, she doesn’t hold back on the face-crunching. That said, when Kazuma tells Darkness and Chris he only managed to Steal Iris’ ring, Darkness gets serious and grabs his arm.

That ring is only meant to leave Iris’ hand when it’s being given to her betrothed. She impresses on him the importance of protecting the ring at all costs, whatever trials come in the future. Trying to give the ring back could get him killed to protect the secret of how it was stolen.

At their farewell ceremony, everyone seems to adopt an opinion of the noble thieves similar to Megumin, only less intense: they are seen as impressive and admirable because they stole the ring to protect the princess. Kazuma gets the sense Iris actually knows he, her Big Brother, stole the ring, and that’s exactly the case, though he never confirms it.

As we saw in their flashbacks together, Iris has grown quite fond of Kazuma, as he alone doesn’t put on airs or dote upon him (though during their goodbyes she nearly gets in a brawl with Megumin for calling him Big Brother too much).

When Darkness tells Iris that Kazuma will defeat the Devil King and Iris’ face lights up with excitement, Kazuma just can’t quite move himself to contradict Darkness. She hopes he’ll return someday so they can continue their chess games and, perhaps, once he’s defeated the Devil King, so he can ask for her hand?