In a way, Rudy’s story is over. He’s struggled and wallowed in pain and anguish and failure, but now he’s happier than he’s ever been. He has a wife and a beautiful home. He has friends and allies beyond count. The only thing missing from an otherwise ideal life is for him to be reunited with his family.
To that end, Paul sends him a letter reporting they have a solid lead on Zenith, so he’s sending Norn and Aisha to live with him. Both Rudy and Sylphy are excited for the chance to not only have a more lively home, but “practice” having kids before having their own. In turn, Paul can rest assured his daughters will be safe as he seeks his wife.
All the way on the other end of the Isekai Life Enjoyment Spectrum is Nonohashi Shizuka. She is seeking a way back to her and Rudy’s world. She is seeking it, all her thought and time is dedicated to it. After two years of research and a month of careful drawing, she believes she has created a magic circle capable of summoning.
But shortly after Rudy adds his mana to the circle, it suddenly shorts out, creating a tear through her years’ work. Shizuka quietly retreats to her desk, puts her head in her hand, and sighs with resignation. Rudy leaves her be, assuming she wants to be alone, but confident she’s strong enough to power through this failure and keep trying.
He doesn’t get halfway down the stairs when he hears her scream bloody murder, and returns to find her going all Charles Foster Kane on her room. He restrains her before she can hurt herself thrashing against the stone wall, but she then passes out, succumbing to the exhaustion borne from her labors, as well as utterly broken by the futility of said labors.
With Zanoba’s help, Rudy takes Shizuka to his house where Sylphy examines and heals her. Even after a good long rest, Shizuka stares out the window as she explains to Rudy how she’s concluded that she can never go home, because she wasn’t able to ever find a way to close the circuit on her magic circle. She is utterly lost and devoid of hope.
When Zanoba tells Rudy he looks just as pale as Shizuka, Rudy explains it’s because he just relived some bad memories: i.e. the time he too lost heart and closed himself off. The difference is, Rudy had embraced this world; Shizuka has always kept herself at a distance from this world, not wanting to get so attached she’d give up on going home.
It’s here where we see the true growth that Rudy has experienced since reuniting with and marrying Sylphy. Forget restoring his sexual vigor; those events also made him a more empathetic person. Shizuka is in deep, deep pain and despair. Rudy has experienced similar pain and despair in his past.
Rudy doesn’t want Shizuka to suffer, so he does everything in his power to help her. Fortunately, he has plenty of power, like the power of friends. He shows Cliff and Zanoba the failed magical circle, and despite neither of them having any experience with summoning, Cliff’s fresh magical perspective and Zanoba’s time with the magical doll pave a potential new road for Shizuka to travel.
They’re helping out their friend and master, yes, but they’re also mages, and there’s nothing mages love more than a puzzle to solve. It all boils down to the doll using multilayered magical circles in its operation. Cliff, Zanoba, and Rudy work to adapt this concept to a summoning circle.
When they present to her three magical circles lined up in three-dimensional space intended to work in concert, the virtually catatonic Shizuka suddenly perks up. The sparkle returns to her eyes, and the sides of her mouth turn up in a smile. This could work! she exclaims, jumping out of her chair and dancing about excitedly.
She works with Cliff, Zanoba, and Rudy to rework her summoning circle from scratch, this time exploiting the third dimension. The montage depicts Shizuka operating as one of the gang, as they work, laugh, and yell at each other. And when the 3D circle is finally complete and ready to try out, Rudy pours his mana into it, and it does not short circuit.
Instead, it summons a PET bottle from earth, a soft glass of which neither Cliff nor Zanoba know what to make, but both Rudy and Shizuka immediately identify as a resounding success. The bottle is solid and stable, and a triumphant Shizuka is ready to advance to the next phase: summoning more and more complex objects.
Nanahoshi Shizuka skidded off the road and into the ditch, but Rudy’s been in that ditch before, and wasn’t about to let her remain in there long. With his friends’ help he picked her up, dusted her off, and showed her a new road. When Shizuka tells Rudy he caused her a lot of trouble, he simply tells her to help him out someday when he needs it.
With the 3D circle a success, all that’s left is to celebrate. In his world, Rudy hated social get-togethers like the one that unfolds, with Rinia, Pursena, and Badigadi joining him, Sylphy, Elinalise, Cliff, Zanoba, and Julie in celebrating Shizuka’s big win. Shizuka even does some celebratory karaoke with a wooden spoon.
No longer content to live his perfect life, Rudy is determined to help those around him achieve happiness and fulfillment as well. He’s paying forward the kindness shown to him when he hit rock bottom. In other words, while he’s had his issues in the past, and still has a few, it’s hard to deny that Rudeus Greyrat has become a good and decent man.
As he walks home carrying Sylphy (who celebrated too much and passed out in his lap), he hears the familiar voices of two girls knocking on their door: Norn and Aisha have arrived, along with their escort whom Paul told Rudy he’d be happy to see: our boy Ruijerd Superdia. Aisha loves her big brother, but Norn is still hesitant. We’ll see if that changes once she sees how Rudy has matured since they last saw each other.
But that’s just a teaser for the next episode. I cannot overstate how powerful this episode was. Thanks in no small part due to Wakayama Shion’s powerhouse vocal performance (she also sings the ED song unique to this episode), I deeply felt Shizuka’s pain, and wanted someone to take her hand and lead her out of the darkness. Rudy did that, but he didn’t do it alone.
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