KonoSuba 3 – 05 – Divine Treasures

Kazuma was soaking up the renown from everyone recognizing his name, deeds, and general awesomeness. But once the battle begins, all it takes is for one scared little kobold to lure him into a pit where a hundred kobolds are waiting for him to suddenly lose his life. Darkness and Megumin steal the show instead with their bravery and explosion, respectively.

Eris resurrects Kazuma once more, but tasks him with collecting the Divine Treasures, meant to be used only by the Resurrected like himself and extremely dangerous in the wrong hands. And while he unceremoniously dumps the still-recovering Megumin on the bed of his room at the palace he’s once again granted, they still get to have a weekly Sweet Megumin x Kazuma Moment.

They’re both ready to head back to Axel, but when Iris comes in to say hi, Megumin notices her golden necklace is imbued with ridiculous amounts of magical power. Iris shows them the inscription on the back, which turns out to be Japanese, and when Kazuma reads it the necklace glows and flashes, and suddenly Kazuma and Iris have swapped bodies.

I’m on record here as loving any and all body swap episodes, and this one doesn’t disappoint. Iris moves and talks exactly like Kazuma, the latter a testament to Iris’ seiyu Takao Kanon’s vocal talent. Fukushima Jun similarly does a great job sounding like Iris in Kazuma’s body with a higher pitch and far gentler and polite speech patterns.

Both Iris and Kazuma decide that now that they’ve been thus afflicted, they might as well have some fun. Iris heads into town without retainers for the first time in her life, in Kazuma’s body and with Megumin as an escort. Kazuma meanwhile gets to serve up a much more smug and haughty version of Iris that flummoxes Claire and Mitsurugi with her new attitude.

Kazuma also uses this opportunity to be a little perv, heading to the bath to wash Darkness and Claire’s back. Claire’s a little too enthusiastic about this, while Kazuma ends up emotionally unprepared for the sheer amount of noble skin that awaits him in the bath. As Iris gets his body’s ass beaten into the stone age by some toughs Megumin provokes on purpose, Kazuma blesses his luck and decides not to worry about tomorrow … until tomorrow.

KonoSuba 3 – 04 – Mansion Life

Lord Aldarp grudgingly welcomes Kazuma, Megumin, and Aqua to his mansion to investigate the noble thief, but only because he still has the hots for Lady Dustiness. He’d even set up a magic mirror to view her in the bath, which Kazuma condemns while vowing to spend the night there. Darkness smashes the mirror, but it’s only the start of her troubles.

Between Aqua stuffing herself and getting loaded on all of the lord’s booze, Megumin frightening the residents of the city with her practice Explosions, and Kazuma essentially lazing about, Aldarp gets more than he bargained for. That said, I did enjoy Kazuma and Megumin’s sweet interactions as the latter all but admits she was worried about him before inviting him on a “date”—which is just her casting Explosion and him carrying her home…which isn’t a bad time at all!

While grabbing a midnight snack, Kazuma encounter what he believes to be the noble thief, but it turns out to be Chris, who assures him she’s there for a very good reason. Kazuma insists that he doesn’t want to hear it, as he knows the more he learns, the more trouble he’ll get pulled into. Chris agrees not to tell him the next time they meet. Kazuma doesn’t want to hear it then, either!

He does have Chris cast Bind on him to make it look like the thief got away, but when Aqua, Megumin and Darkness find him, none of them are in a hurry to untie him. Aqua first apologizes for breaking a bunch of his stuff while he was gone, while Darkness force feeds him flan and makes him apologize for putting her through so much hell throughout this trip.

After making a report to Princess Iris, Kazuma and his party are denied further access to the castle and end up at an inn. Before that Mitsurugi Kyouya gives Aqua the gift of a beautiful sapphire ring, but Aqua forgot who he was, and the ring doesn’t fit. Then in the middle of the night Chris visits Kazuma again to tell him what she’s been up to, whether he wants to hear it or not: she’s been collecting “divine treasures”, i.e. cheat items like the one that created money. She wants him to help, but he’s unenthusiastic about doing so.

Then an alarm sounds, indicating another Devil King’s Army attack and calling all high-level adventurers to joining the knights in repelling the attackers. At first Kazuma has no interest, leading Darkness to call him a coward, but then she begs him to help her get Aqua out of bed and keep Megumin from running off and Exploding everything.

Kazuma eventually determines that if he puts on a good show in this battle, he might just be allowed to live in the castle again, which is currently his primary goal in life. So he suits up, grabs Aqua kicking and screaming, and leads the party to the city gates where the other forces are stationed.

KonoSuba 3 – 03 – The Princess’ Playmate

When Kazuma asks Rain if he’s technically been kidnapped and brought to Belzerg by Princess Iris, she asks that he indulge her desire to have a companion for a few days, as she rarely makes selfish requests of anyone. At first, Kazuma’s conscience directs him to comply, but after telling her some stories about his friends and his school in his old life, and she calls him “onii-chan” and repeats it several times at his request, he decides to stay.

Thus begins a period of Kazuma waking up in his cavernous chambers looking like a shoujo character, calling his butler by the wrong name and refusing to get out of bed so the maid can change the sheets. His days are spent playing with Iris, whether it’s hide-and-seek or tag or chess (which she’s very good at). And while perhaps Kazuma is getting something out of this by having an adorable royal little sister, it’s still very nice for him to keep her company.

That’s made clearer by the fact that she isn’t able to attend school, nor can she leave the palace grounds, without an armed royal guard, due to regular surprise attacks from the Devil King’s Army. But after a week, Kazuma’s friends come to bring him home, with Darkness asking Iris in as diplomatic and polite terms as possible that he belongs back in Axel with them. Despite Kazuma dispatching four spirit clones to subconsciously persuade her, Iris agrees to let Kazuma go home.

That’s not before she hosts a banquet in his honor, which turns out to be anything but due to the nobles not knowing who he is and being far more interested in courting the still-unmarried Darkness. That includes Lord Alderp, whose palace was destroyed in a previous season.

When Kazuma jokes to Darkness about being her lover, he’s exiled outside, but he’s soon joined by Iris. While her reasons for liking him sound like insults, they’re not: she’s valued their time together, and the fact he’s vibrant and honest and rude like no one she’s ever met.

He and Lalatina have even inspired her to possibly pursue adventuring once she’s older, as her family possesses innate skills useful to that profession. But before that, her offhand comment about a Robin Hood-like mysterious “noble thief” running lurking about the capital gives Kazuma an in to stay put in this cushy palace with servants.

He asks if he can investigate and catch the thief, and while Claire’s approval is hesitant, the nobles are extremely excited that someone, even an “unremarkable lad” like Kazuma, is on the case. Aqua and Megumin are also on board, but both they and Kazuma get a rude awakening, as they’re assigned to Lord Alderp’s residence for the mission.

In other words, no more palace servants or all-you-can-eat banquets. Instead, what Kazuma has done is given himself and his friends more work to do. That said, if they do manage to catch the noble thief, it will improve their rep in Belzerg. That can’t be bad, right?

KonoSuba 3 – 02 – Guess Who’s Teleporting for Dinner

After a successful sale of pocket lighters at Wiz’s shop, Kazuma & Co. prepare for a formal dinner with Princess Iris. As the only noble among the party, Darkness takes point in this venture, and impresses upon everyone how their usual repartee isn’t going to fly in front of royalty: one wrong word or look and they could literally lose their heads.

As you can imagine, things don’t go that well. Aqua tries to whip out a card trick and drinks too much, Magumin does her Crimson Demon schtick, and Kazuma’s look and tone insult the princess. It’s only thanks to Iris happening to like the sand portrait Aqua made of her (ahoge and all) and Darkness’s manners manage to smooth things over.

When Kazuma won’t show the princess his adventurer’s card, she accuses him of lying about defeating Mitsurugi, speaking out loud instead of relying on the help to speak for her. Darkness responds by slapping her, and blocks the sword of her attendant with her wrist. Then she gently takes Iris’s cheek in her hand and calmly scolds her for insulting Kazuma.

Moved by both Megumin threatening violence on his behalf and Darkness defending his honor, Kazuma finally decides he’ll show Iris’ attendant how he beat Mitsurugi: with his Steal ability. Unfortunately, whether due to lack of focus or something else, rather than steal the attendant’s sword, he ends up stealing … her unmentionables.

While everyone is scandalized by this, both the attendant and Iris are sufficiently impressed that they admit Kazuma must have what it took to beat Mitsurugi. Iris even apologizes out loud and hopes Kazuma will regale her with more stories of his adventures. When he says that he will, she takes that to mean right now, and before she’s teleported away she grabs his hand and he ends up at the royal palace with her. It’s a Kazumanapping!

This was a comedic tour-de-force in which the KonoSuba gang butted up against royal manners and propriety and more or less came out on top. The tension of the earlier parts of the dinner have melted away by the end, and Iris is precisely the cute and curious princess Kazuma hoped for. If he plays his cards right, she might even start calling him Onii-sama!

KonoSuba 3 – 01 – The Dawning of Our Age

While I love Megumin, the spinoff focusing on her and Yunyun just didn’t do it for me. A True KonoSuba needs the whole team involved: Megumin, Darkness, Aqua, and Satou Kazuma. And yes, Kazuma still says “Yes, I’m Kazuma” when the others address him, which is never not hilarious.

Also funny? That due to all of the female attention Kazuma is getting due to his heroic deeds, and his various recent “close encounters” with certain aggressive women, has led to him developing a complex to the point he decides he’s going to change his job from adventurer to monk and live a life of chastity and service.

The gang accompanies him on his journey to the strictest order Luna (whom he had a crush on) could find, with the goal of dissuading him from uprooting his life to such an extreme. When he says his will is as strong and unmoving as a mountain in the distance, Megumin uses her Explosion magic to stylishly reduce the mountain to dust.

When Aqua and Darkness enter a fitful sleep, Kazuma keeps watch by the campfire with Megumin, who puts her hand on his and tenderly expresses her wish that thinks simply stay the way they are for everyone. When Kazuma takes this move as some kind of overture, he enters a cycle of overthinking to the point Megumin eventually simply falls asleep.

As their journey continues, they encounter an adorable and apparently wounded little girl from whom Kazuma instantly senses danger. She’s actually a “Tranquility Girl”, a type of plant monster that preys on good-natured and caring people by turning their protective instincts up to eleven, then preying on them.

Aqua, Darkness, and Megumin fall for her hook, line, and sinker, but Kazuma stays lucid, and they survive the encounter. Kazuma doubles back and observes the girl in her normal state, in which she bitterly laments letting his party go unscathed with the most teeth-sucking I’ve heard in a while.

When Kazuma recovers a mallet from her deceased last victim that creates gold coins when you make a hammering motion, he suddenly decides to abandon his desire to become a monk and heads home with the others. Unfortunately, by the time they return to Axel having planned all the ways they’re going to spend their newfound cash, he realizes he’s lost the mallet.

Oh well, at least he’s back home where he belongs. Just before bedtime, Hagen, from Darkness’ household, stops by with a letter for Kazuma from First Princess Iris, inviting him to regale her with tales of his heroic exploits. While Darkness is weary, Kazuma, Aqua, and Megumin are eager to accept the Princess’ invitation.

KonoSuba is so back, people! In fact, t’s like it never left, despite the second season ending seven years ago. The rat-a-tat-tat dialogue, the over-the-top facial expressions, and of course the epic explosions—it’s all there, and all the voice actors remain at the top of their game. There’s even the odd wholesome moments like Kazuma and Megumin by the fire. I can’t wait to watch what happens when these goofballs have to interact with legit royalty!