Mushoku Tensei II – 17 – Being There

At first, it looks like Rudy is going to go scorched earth, flanked by Rinia and Pursena as he marches into Norn’s class where she’s currently absent with a head full of steam. Everyone in that room knows who he is and that pissing him off is not a good idea. But he tries to stay calm and ask anyone who was mean to Norn would come forward.

Those who come forward instead say that their interactions with Norn all involved them bringing him up in some way, comparing her to him, and urging her to follow in his footsteps. It dawns on him that no one in her class sent her to her dorm where she is currently shut in. It was all because of him.

Rudy knows what it’s like to be a shut-in. He was one in his previous life. But now that he’s a changed person he knows that it’s a brother’s duty to protect his sisters, even if its from himself. Only, he simply doesn’t know what to do. Rinia and Pursena laud him for his loyalty to his pack, but obviously aren’t going to help him on the psychological side of things.

What they can do is smuggle him into the dorm to at least meet with Norn, which is the first step towards getting her out of her room. The three are given cover thanks to Sylphy, who asks Princess Ariel to give an address in the common room that empties out the girls’ dorm. Even getting to Norn wouldn’t have been possible without his friends.

When he knocks on the door, the voice he hears is his own, from his past life. He imagines that his own brother must have felt this way as he visited him in his room again and again, giving arguments for why he should come out, telling him he needn’t come back to school, but only take one small step at a time to returning to his life.

Back then, Rudy ignored his brother, until he eventually stopped visiting him. And while he certainly doesn’t blame his brother for giving up, Rudy doesn’t want to give up on Norn. He knows if he leaves, like his brother did, there’s no going back. She’ll stay shut in. Her life will remain on hold. His experience with being in her situation drives him to want to save her.

Even there in the room, he has no idea how he’s going to do it. He just kneels there silently. We switch to the perspective and inner voice of Norn, isn’t sure what to make of him being there, and realizes she never knew what to make of Rudy. When they first met, she beat their dad up, the person she loved more than anyone and who had kept her safe.

The second time they met, it was outside his mansion when he was arriving home drunk with a woman on his back. She feared him because of the violence she’d witnessed, but when he let her go to the dorms without argument, she felt like he didn’t care about her one way or another, which is obviously worse than outright hatred.

At the academy and the dorms, Rudy was a universally respected and feared celebrity, and everyone who interacted with Norn spoke to her in the context of her relation to him. No one saw her for simply who she was. They even struggled to remember her name, because all that mattered was that she was his sister.

As she sits in bed, Norn realizes that all those opinions about Rudy from those at the academy reflected what two people she does trust told her about him: that he’s actually a good guy who has gone through some rough times. They said he’s not the person she thinks she is based on her limited time with him, and now she’s old enough to understand that they’re probably right.

But there’s still the matter of exorcising her mistaken idea of who and what Rudeus Greyrat is, and that can only happen by interacting with him. It just so happens that she calls out his name at the exact same time he calls out hers, and that leads her to pulling back the curtain and getting a good look at him.

Rudy might feel helpless as he stands there, but the words he chooses end up being the ones Norn most needs to hear: I’m sorry. I don’t know what to do either. I’m here for you. I won’t go away. I’ll see you for who you are.

Hearing these words opens the floodgates for Norn. Hearing those words convinces her that her fear was in her head: his clenched fist isn’t one of impending violence, but the same frustration she felt, and that their dad felt. Because her dad and her brother didn’t run, she won’t run either.

When Rudy sits beside her on the bed, Norn falls into him and lets it all out, finally able to see her brother for who he is, and who those others knew him to be. He’s someone who cares about his little sister, is there for her now, and won’t abandon her. He’s someone whose chest she can cry into as long as she needs to.

The next morning, she greets both Rudy and Sylphy with a smile on her face before stepping into the morning light and walking away, flanked by new friends. She and Rudy never exchanged any other words—neither of them heard the words we heard in their respective heads—but it doesn’t matter. You can tell that after that night, they’re both going to be all right.

If anything, Rudy admires how strong Norn is for sorting through her feelings mostly on her own, though he can’t know just how crucial his presence and words were to her finally coming to grips with who he is versus what she thought of him. It’s another heartfelt, happy ending. I could get used to these vibes, though the fact the next episode is titled “Turning Point 3” gives me pause.

RABUJOI WORLD HERITAGE LIST +
CERTIFIED GODDAMN TEARJERKEr

 

Mushoku Tensei II – 16 – A New Battle

It’s been three years since Rudy has seen Ruijerd, the Superd is naturally taciturn, and his mere presence reminds him of Eris, so their reunion is a bit awkward at first. Still, Rudy is glad to see his old friend, who he trusts more than anyone. I especially appreciate how Rudy takes’ Ruijerd’s advice vis-a-vis Eris to heart. Ruijerd doesn’t want to intrude, and seems to have some bad blood with Badigadi, but Rudy at least has him eat breakfast with them before departing.

Once Ruijerd is gone, Aisha and Norn are now officially under Rudy and Sylphy’s care. Norn expressed interest in going with Ruijerd since one of her strongest memories of Rudy is hitting their dad, and the fact he’s with “a different woman” now. But while Norn is aloof and distrustful, Aisha couldn’t be happier to be reunited, and is eager to work as Rudy and Aisha’s maid. Rudy asks them both to at least take the academy entrance exam.

The tension below the surface of Aisha and Norn’s sisterhood is exposed like a raw wound when Aisha aces her exam and is thus allowed to skip school and serve as Rudy and Sylphy’s maid. Norn scores slightly below average for her age, but when she asks if she can live in the on-campus dorms and Rudy agrees, Aisha is outraged. She wonders if Rudy is letting Norn have her way because Aisha’s mom is a “concubine”, something Rudy never thought about Lidia.

Balancing his duty to protect his sisters in Paul’s stead while ensuring they’re as happy as they can be is no small task, and represents a new and unexplored challenge to Rudy. But he’s not alone; he has his wife Sylphy by his side to provide a girl’s perspective and as a sounding board for strategy and tactics. As I suspected, they have become his sisters’ adoptive parents.

A month passes, and every time Rudy sees Norn in the halls, she’s alone. He fears she’s made no friends despite living in the dorms, and that’s precisely the case. Rinia and Pursena don’t make things any easier by “gifting” him a bag of underwear from first years with certain figure. Rudy ends up in how water with Ariel, but he is forthright and honest and manages to get out of it unscathed.

The beastgirls’ prank seems a little out of place here, meant strictly to provide some comic relief in an otherwise bittersweet reunion of Rudy with his sisters. Aisha is happy as a clam and the house has never been cleaner, but Norn is clearly having a hard time, hiding under her sheets in her dorm rather than socializing.

Norn is clearly less extroverted and than Aisha, and if she’s just as talented, she struggles to apply herself, perhaps due to the pressures of her more overachieving siblings. Hopefully Rudy, no stranger to antisocial tendencies, can help lift her out of her funk, teach her ways to make friends, and help her find a place she feels she belongs. It may be his toughest battle yet, and his staff and eye can’t help him.

Mushoku Tensei II – 15 – Message in a Plastic Bottle

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.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 23 (Part 2 Fin) – Be Strong and Wait

My interpretation of Eris’s reasons for deciding to sleep with Rudy and then run off with Ghislaine is twofold: First, she wanted her first time to be with Rudy, whom she loves more than anyone else. Second, her note about not being “well matched” should be taken literally: she is overmatched by him. Their encounter with Orsted proved it. So off she goes.

She couldn’t have imagined this would cause Rudy to revert to his old self, the one who, once shamed at school in one of the worst ways possible, could no longer leave his room, despite being surrounded by love, understanding, and kindness—first his parents, and later his neighbors. He rejected them out of paranoia they were all laughing at him. So in he stays.

This episode seems to hint that the isekai world is merely in Rudy’s head, and that he wasn’t actually hit by a car as he would have us believe. If that’s the case—I have no idea, and I’m also fine if it’s meant to be ambiguous—the isekai world is no longer an escape. He may have been reincarnated and given a second chance, but he’s the same depressed, paranoid, emotionally stunted man he was in the old world. Eris leaving him and him not being able to understand why was the straw that broke the ground dragon’s back.

He may not be surrounded by the same support system as the old world, but things are definitely looking up in Fittoa. I realize that part of why it looked so wasted and bleak last week was because Rudy and Eris (and we) were comparing it to how it once looked before the disaster. But also the bleak washed-out look reflected Rudy’s post-Eris leaving mood. But color is slowly returning to the land, and there’s hope in the voices of the survivors as they plant new crops.

As they  toil and sweat, the people of Fittoa long for a “return to normal”, but the old normal is gone and never coming back. That’s true for everyone, as Ruijerd confirms that the curse that makes humans afraid of him is gone. I’m so glad we got to see the big guy one more time, and his exchange with the three friendly townsfolk is one of som many scenes this week that moved me to tears.

Another one of those scenes is where Eris confirms my interpretation of why she left Rudy (not that it was very much in doubt), with touching details like observing how the hands of the one she relied on for so long were smaller than his. The wind blows her cat-hood off her freshly short-cropped hair as she climbs atop a rock to shout out her love of Rudy to the mountaintops, and her resolve to become strong enough to protect him when next they meet.

We also get brief check-ins with Tona, Zoruba, Geese, and the young adventurers they met in the Demon Continent. Everyone is moving forward, with their experience with Rudy and Dead End being something they’ll always treasure, even if they never see them again. Roxy, meanwhile, inadvertently becomes Kishirisu Kishirika’s newest savior when she pays the tiny troublemaker’s bar tab from the rowdy night before.

I love how we get the briefest peeks of that party that pack a punch when we see how drunk Roxy got and how bad her hangover must be. But she’s rewarded for her generosity to Kishirika by learning that Paul, Lilia, Norn and Aisha are safe and sound and reunited in Millishion. We get to see—and cry from—this reunion scene. But Norn still wants to know where her mama is, and we learn that Zenith is alive somewhere in the Labyrinth City of Rapan on the Begaritt Continent.

Roxy also learns from Kishirika that Rudy is in emotional turmoil, but rather than go to his student, she trusts that he’ll pick himself off and be able to move forward without her assistance. She and her party are headed to Begaritt. At the same time, it’s a beautiful memory of Rudy, taking over the end-of-the-evening chores for Zenith when he sees she’s tired, that finally gets Rudy to sit up, get out of bed, and step outside his tent with his cloak and spear.

He’s able to push past the fear of everyone laughing and mocking him, because Zenith is family, alone, and in need of help. Unaware that Roxy is also headed there, almost ensuring a reunion, he has to go find her. For that, he has to get up and take one step, and then another, past the pain of being left alone.

In the real world, Rudy does the same thing, and while it’s a mystery whether this is symbolic look back at his past life or his actual life running parallel to his fantasy life, it’s a major breakthrough for our protagonist. Like the people of Fittoa planting new crops, Rudy doesn’t give in, stays strong, and looks toward a future where his family is reunited.

Meanwhile, at Ranoa Magic Academy, Sylphiette, sporting Oakleys and whose hair is now white, makes the case for the academy recruiting Rudy. It’s clear he too will need to be stronger if he’s going to defeat the Dragon God. But with Sylphy here and Eris working to become stronger, he won’t be alone in that effort. He just doesn’t know it yet, but hopefully he can follow the advice of his original parents and continue to be strong and wait, just as we must all be strong and wait for Part 3.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 22 – Home Alone

Following his extremely close brush with death by Orsted’s hand, Rudeus has a series of disturbing dreams while unconscious, which are something of a culmination of his journey and his yearning. All this time he’s not only sought to keep his beloved Eris safe and restore Ruijerd’s rep, but to return home to his family. These dreams give him a glimpse of what that might look like, but also show him his old reality of being alone in a dark, cluttered room, only to be impaled once more by Orsted.

He awakes to find Eris dozing peacefully beside him as usual, and Ruijerd sitting by the fire keeping watch. Ruijerd is still trying to wrap his head around a Man-God and the fact the Seven Gods of ancient times are still kickin’ it. For a second, I thought Rudy was going to tell him that he came from another world. Instead, he says the Superd curse has been fading since Ruijerd shaved his head, and is all but gone; this moves Ruijerd to tears. Ruijerd!

After many travels and trials and tribulations, Dead End have come to their destination, Rudy and Eris’ home, only to find it a grey, dreary ruin, lacking all the green vitality it had before the disaster. As Rudy walks pasts spots where he, his mom, dad, Roxy and Sylphie once shared simple moments made so much more meaningful by the fact those moments are no longer possible; only in memory. Again, it feels like the series summing things up.

Now that Rudy and Eris are home, and no longer children, Rujierd declares them them as no longer needing a babysitter. He treats them like children once more by patting them on the head, then says goodbye, hoping they’ll meet again someday. It’s a perfect farewell for Ruijerd, as there’s little more he can teach Eris. Now that she and Rudy are back home in their new, more adult-ish form, it’s time for them to stand on their own, just as Ruijerd must walk on his own, after Rudy helped him take the first step.

The good news: Ghislaine is in town, as is Alphonse, both alive and well. The bad news: Eris’ family is dead. We know her gramps was executed, but her parents passed away after being teleported. Alphonse is primarily concerned with the future of the Boreas family and the fate of their lands and people. To that end, he mentions an alliance whereby Eris becomes the concubine of a neighboring lord in order to secure that future. Ghislaine is against it. Eris needs time alone…not even Rudy can stay by her side.

Later that day Rudy learns that Sylphie is among the missing, but not confirmed dead, so she’s out there somewhere. That was the first hint that his and Eris’ paths would diverge, but it didn’t come into focus until later that night when Eris visits Rudy in his tent wearing a flowing nightie. Eris mentions that she just recently turned fifteen—of age in her society—and for her birthday she wants a family. She wants Rudy to be that family; she wants them to sleep together.

Rudy hesitates, his head swimming with all the reasons he shouldn’t; Eris is feeling hopeless and needs connection; he’s not fifteen yet…but then Eris draws closer and tells him all the reasons they should, and so they do. What ensues is one of the more tasteful lovemaking scenes you can pull off considering the ages of the participants. In any case, it’s a long, long time coming, considering how much these two have come to love each other.

Alas, that night was just another dream. In the morning, Rudy only gets a few magical moments of having “gotten it made” as a normie before he realizes Eris isn’t in the bed, has chopped off her hair, and left him a note stating “You and I aren’t well-matched right now. I’m going away.” Rudy learns from Alphonse that Eris set out on a journey with Ghislaine, and told him not to tell Rudy where.

So Rudy finds himself back home, totally alone but for Alphonse, with whom he never had the closest or warmest relationship. No more Ruijerd, and more devastatingly, no more Eris, on whose proximity day and night he’d become so accustomed. He wanders the tent city aimlessly, wondering what Eris meant in her note. I suspect she meant for it to sting so he wouldn’t follow, as she has things she needs to do without him at her side to rely on.

But Rudy doesn’t know. He’s not back in his smelly apartment in Japan, but he’s just as alone now as he was then. The question is, what will he do and where will he go next? His mother and Sylphie, for instance, are still missing; does he set out alone to search for them? Does he rejoin his dad and Norn and aid their efforts?

His possibilities are as endless as the horizons of this sprawling world, but just right now he’s paralyzed with sudden, crippling loneliness—the end of one journey marks the start of a new and far more difficult one.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 21 – A Spot of Bad Luck

Rudeus, Eris, and Ruijerd’s journey continues, and along the way Eris continues to train. She becomes so good, Ruijerd declares she’s no longer a child, but a warrior, and shall be treated as such. Eris asks Rudy to pinch her to make sure she’s not dreaming; naturally, Rudy pinches her chest and she slugs him. That is pretty much the sum total of the comedy in this episode.

From there on, things get pretty grim. First of all, the group’s travels take them up onto a desolate snow-covered mountain. Then they cross paths with a pair of fellow travelers. Ruijerd and Eris react viscerally to their presence before Rudy even sees them, and their pack ox literally leaps of the mountain to its death to get away from the guy. As for Rudy, he’s just wondering what the heck is going on, and who this guy is.

Turns out he’s the Dragon God Orsted, and the moment Rudy mentions he knows the Man-God, Orsted tries to kill him. Ruijerd comes between them, but is quickly defeated, beaten into a crumple heap unable to move. When Orsted goes for Rudy again, Eris tries to stop him, and ends up slammed against the wall, coughing up blood.

I don’t believe Rudy has ever come across someone more powerful than him, but that time has finally arrived, and it’s terrifying. With Ruijerd and Eris dealt with as easily as if they were two helpless kittens, Rudy unleashes his most devastating magical attacks, only for Orsted to easily nullify, deflect, or divert them into a portal. Then he puts his hand through Rudy’s heart, essentially killing him, telling him to give the Man-God a message: he’s going to kill him too.

The newly-dead Rudeus returns to the Man-God’s realm in his original form, only with the hole in his chest Orsted gave him. The Man-God tells him he couldn’t sense if or when Rudy was going to cross paths with Orsted, only that as the Dragon God, Orsted is “wicked”, and since the Man-God is “good” Orsted has it out for him.

He also makes sure to clarify that Orsted would win in a fight against the number one Technique God, curses and all. All this new information aside, Rudy is ready to accept his second death, thankful he got a second chance even if he’s upset he couldn’t fulfill his promise to Eris.

But the Man-God tells him he’s not actually dead, Rudy looks down to find his chest hole is gone, and he wakes up in a distraught-but-alive Eris’ arms. Ruijerd is also alive and simply unconscious. According to Eris, Orsted’s companion Nanahoshi said something that made Orsted cast a healing spell on Rudy, restoring his life.

Thus the trio escape the very closest of calls to date. While it’s understandable they should feel humbled and grow more vigilant in the future, they also shouldn’t feel too bad, considering they crossed paths with the most dangerous, powerful, and feared being in the entire world…and survived. The question is, what’s next?

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 20 – Odd Man Out

Back when the explosion that shatters the Greyrat family occurred, Lilia has the foresight to grab Aisha and hold her tight for the expanding blast. She ends up teleported into the water, but manages to swim to the surface before she and her daughter drown. She makes her way on foot to Shirone, only for Prince Pax to capture and imprison them once he learns Lilia knows Roxy.

While Rudeus intends for the Ruijerd figurines he’s crafted to improve the Superd’s reputation, this week they actually come in handy rescuing him from Pax’s clutches. Pax’s older brother Prince Zanoba, you see, happens to be a figurine otaku the likes of which Rudy knows well from his old life. Wisely Rudy only owns up to being the artist once he realizes Zanoba wants to praise him and become his apprentice.

Zanoba doesn’t care about Roxy like his perverted brother does, just the figurine of her, which we learn has a detachable clothes. As such, he cares nothing for Pax’s plots, and so is immediately an ally to Rudy by default. Meanwhile, we see Ruijerd, Eris, and Aisha’s side of things as they work with Shirone royal guards to free their families, whom Pax has hostage to secure their loyalty.

That shortsighted strategy backfires as expected, first when Rudy tells Zanoba to lower the barrier and Zanoba grabs Pax out of bed by the head and presents him to Rudy, revealing Zanoba is a “Blessed Child” with superhuman strength. Ginger is Pax’s last line of defense, but when she learns her family is safe, she turns on Pax, informing him she first swore loyalty to Zanoba to begin with.

Shortly after Zanoba and Ginger free Rudy, Ruijerd returns from freeing Ginger and the soldiers’ loved ones, along with Lilia, who is immensely happy to be reunited with both Rudy and Aisha. Basically, Rudy didn’t actually have to do anything to get out of his latest predicament, other than make that figuring of Roxy years ago. Everything else kind of fell into place.

Later, Lilia gives Rudy a big hug, along with the box containing Roxy’s underwear and a pendant Sylphiette made for him. Also, Aisha wants to join the “Kennel Master” on his continuing adventures, thus saving her from the “perverted clutches” of her half-brother.

After Rudy gives her his Dead End head protector, she either connects the dots about him actually being her half-brother, or decides to drop the charade. Either way, with Zenith and Sylphiette still missing, Rudy can go forward knowing at least one of his little sisters likes him!

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 19 – The Man-God’s Fast One

Rudeus appears once again in his original form from his own world before the Man-God  Hitogami, a year after their last meeting. Rudy decides once again to let the Man-God guide him to his next objective, agreeing to trust him in exchange for helping find Zenith, Lilia, and Aisha. While we can’t yet say Hitogami has steered Rudy wrong, his true motivations remain unknown. Is he earnestly trying to help Rudy, or just seeking entertainment?

After much vomiting over the side of a ship, Rudy, along with Eris and Ruijerd, arrive at last at the Central Continent, and the capital of the kingdom of Shirone. As has now become commonplace, the “OP” consists of a sequence of vistas of the new land, along with a new song to accompany it. It’s big, it’s grand, and it’s awesome. It’s a city I’d love to spend weeks exploring.

Of course, Rudy doesn’t have time for that; he has a family to locate and rescue. Going off the vision Hitogami gave him, he searches the city for Lilia and Aisha, and finds the latter, now six years old, being bothered by city guards. Rudy uses his incantation-less magic to bear both him and Aisha away from the guards, and just like that, he’s reunited with a sibling who was only a baby when last he saw her.

Unlike Norn, Aisha is friendly with Rudy…but only because she’s not aware that he’s actually her older brother, whom she’s certain is an awful pervert due to Roxy’s underwear he’d been keeping that she found one day. It’s a little sad that Lilia taught her daughter not to rely on his brother, but Rudy follows the Man-God’s advice to use an alias rather than reveal his true connection to Aisha.

With Aisha safely under Eris and Ruijerd’s careful watch, Rudy accepts the invitation of Ginger York, a member of the seventh prince of Shirone’s royal guard, who escorts him to the castle of Shirone. He’s under the impression Ginger is taking him to see Roxy, who has been serving the prince, and is excited to see his master for the first time in seven years.

Alas, it’s only a trap. Lilia is indeed in the Shirone castle, the captive of Pax, the seventh prince.  But Rudy ends up falling down a hole into a king-class barrier meant for Roxy. Pax is determined to lure Roxy back so he can capture and have his way with her. Since Lilia wasn’t sufficient bait, he’ll use Rudy instead.

It’s understandable that, now that he finds himself in this predicament after following Hitogami’s instructions pretty much to the letter, Rudy considers the possibility the Man-God played a trick on him. But to what end? Is Rudy really trapped? I doubt it; a trap intended for Roxy means Rudy, who has far surpassed Roxy in magical ability, should have no trouble escaping it.

The problem is, Lilia is currently Prince Pax’s hostage. Rudy can’t act carelessly lest any harm come to Aisha’s mother. I don’t foresee Pax being a credible threat for long—I mean look at him—but at the moment Rudy does seem to be in a rather sticky situation.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 18 – The Most Important Thing

After a brief scene showing a seasick Rudy and Eris (and a very unseasick Ruijerd) headed to the Central Continent by ship, the rest of the episode belongs to Roxy, who is always either a step ahead or behind her apprentice. We learn she was once in a party with Bojack…er, Nokopara, who has cleaned up his ways since getting burned by Rudy two years ago.

Nokopara, who is a bit older than Roxy, tells her to go visit her damn family already, citing his own family he built since they last met as evidence that family is the most important thing. He would do anything for his wife and three kids, and suspects Roxy’s parents would do the same for her. I must say I appreciate the softening of the initially assholeish horseman.

When Roxy arrives at her home village, she’s immediately given a painful reminder of the main reason she left: in this village, she is “deaf”, i.e. unable to hear the telepathic communication of the other villagers. When they try to greet her, she’s just hit with a static-y feedback accompanied by pops of light—which to the show’s credit is almost as unpleasant for us as it is for Roxy.

Even when she makes a connection with three kids by healing one of them, when they try to thank her telepathically and she doesn’t respond, then a parent shows up and tries to do the same, everything goes pear-shaped. This is a place where Roxy has always felt oppressed by her difference, and the reluctance of anyone there to accommodate it.

It’s a bad start to her return, made worse by a stilted reunion with her parents. Clearly still off from her previous interactions before arriving at her old home, Roxy is noncommittal about how long she’ll stay. When her parents tell her she can stay as long as she likes, then immediately settle into their usual telepathic banter, they unintentionally exclude her out of force of habit.

At this point Roxy has had about enough, and as much as I want her to reconnect with her folks, whom we know to be so loving and kind and caring of her from when Rudy visited, I can’t blame her for wanting to go. She feels like an interloper, an outsider, and always has.

But then her mother starts to cry, after Roxy agrees to visit once in the next fifty years. Even that extremely loose promise is enough to bring tears to her mother’s eyes. Then Roxy catches in the corner of her eye the doll her mother made for her, which she’d clutch while she taught her to read and write, all the while speaking verbally.

One day, lil’ Roxy encountered some kids who she would have been able to befriend, if only she could hear what they were saying telepathically. When they don’t answer her, she understandably feels like she did something wrong, that she was somehow wrong herself, and didn’t belong. That’s why she ran away: so she wouldn’t cause problems for her parents.

But remembering what Nokopara said about parents (good ones anyway) doing anything for their children, and seeing her mother weeping and her doll on the shelf, Roxy can’t help but start crying herself. Oh, she tries to stave off the tears, but that just makes them fall in a great sobbing torrent all at once, in a wonderfully beautiful moment where the camera simply rests on her contorting face.

Roxy gathers her mother into a hug, they both apologize, her dad, getting misty-eyed himself, joins that hug. You have to hand it to Mushoku Tensei, because two straight episodes with these kinds of tearful, cathartic embraces might’ve come off as repetitive and even emotionally manipulative. Instead, I felt right there in that hug, where Roxy suddenly realized this place is still her home, because the people she loves and who love her, are there.

She also learns that Rudy had visited with Eris and a Superd, which enables her to finally connect the dots: Rudy’s the one who revived the Dead End name, and if a Superd is in his party, he must be doing just fine. Roxy rejoins her own party and continues the search for the missing, buoyued by the strides she made with her family and relieved that her apprentice is fine, wherever he is.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 17 – Having It Easy

Lest last week’s episode make us too hard on Paul, we flash back to the same disaster that sent Rudy and Eris to the Demon Continent. Paul suddenly finds himself a stranger in a strange land, with only Norn with him. With Zenith, Lilia, and Aisha nowhere to be found, all Paul could do is keep Norn safe and try to find the rest of his family. Just as Rudy did everything he possibly could to keep Eris safe, Paul did the same with Norn.

Back in the present, Paul once more escapes into drink, but he just so happens to know Geese, who tells him that actually, if he stops and thinks about it (preferably while sober), he was pretty harsh on his eleven-year-old son. Yes, Rudy was an amazing and special prodigy, but that doesn’t change the fact that he is also a little kid who went through a lot and still managed to come out of it with himself intact.

Geese’s man-to-man chat with Paul really provides a key assist to Rudy, as Paul dries himself out and visits Rudy once more at the tavern. Eris is ready to attack him, but Ruijerd stops her. As the two leave to allow Paul to be alone with his son, Ruijerd reminds Paul that the grievances he has with Rudy are only important because Rudy is still alive. As in, Paul still has much to be thankful for.

Last week, both Paul and Rudy learned a lot about themselves and each other. Rudy learned that yes, he actually was kind of treating this like a game this whole time, because he didn’t know the extent of the disaster that befell Fittoa (Paul warns him there’s basically nothing left of their home). When the bartender tells Rudy to look his father in the face, he sees a face he hadn’t seen since the last friend who hung out with him when he was a shut-in in his previous life.

When that friend was doing his best to help Rudy feel like what he was and what he was doing wasn’t bad or wrong, Rudy at the time took it as nothing but patronization and pity. He lashed out at his friend, who never returned to his place. But Paul did come back, to apologize for being too harsh with his son. So Rudy, in turn, suggests they simply forget the previous day happened and start over with a simple father-son hug.

Back at the inn, and with Paul present, Rudy has another Dead End strategy meeting with Eris and Ruijerd. He tells Eris that the home they knew doesn’t exist anymore, and to his surprise, Eris had long ago already accepted that possibility. Thus their mission is no longer to return home, but to find the rest of his family.

Now his party will be active in the same search Paul’s party and Roxy’s party have been involved in since the disaster. That means there’s a good chance one of those groups will find someone. After all, Paul and Rudy found each other. And while it was initially a tough reunion, once both of them committed to being grown-ups they were able to be honest with each other.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 16 – Son, I Am Disappoint

After a beautiful sequence showing the quartet journeying by horse and wagon, Rudy, Eris, Ruijerd and Geese arrive at Millishion, capital of the Holy Country of Millis. And it’s quite a city; between the white stone of the buildings and the very religious sounding leitmotif, I was reminded of the Holy City of Aquaria from Star Ocean: Till the End of Time.

Once there, Rudy proposes the three take a day off. Eris is off to hunt goblins, Ruijerd will tag along just in case she’s in over her head, and Rudy wants to produce more Ruijerd statuettes for sale in the human city, as well as write his first letter to his family in over a year and a half. But Dead End’s mandate to save any and all children in need results in him running into a group of kidnappers led by none other than his dad, Paul.

Paul is still a formidable opponent, despite being drunk and desperate. This reunion of father and son is not a happy one, and only gets worse when Rudy regales the entire tavern with the story of his adventures since being teleported to the Demon Continent, adding enough flourish to make it sound like he was having fun with his cute rich girl…when both he and Paul know he could have been doing so much more.

The thing is, Rudy, and we as extension, thought he was doing everything he could with the cards he’d been dealt; keep Eris safe and get her home. But Paul knows the power his son possesses, and doesn’t understand why Rudy didn’t try reaching out sooner (indeed, he never ends up writing that belated letter). As Rudy says, it just never occurred to him all this time that anyone other than him and Eris were teleported.

Being berated by Paul throws Rudy into a rage, and he starts beating up on his father until his little sister Norn, who doesn’t remember him, bravely puts herself between them. It turns out the entire tavern is occupied by a search-and-rescue party dedicated to finding the missing people of Buena Village, including Rudy’s mom, Lilia, and Aisha. The only bully here…is Rudy.

In light of all this, Rudy finds himself ostracized by the entire place, and there’s nothing to do but stalk away. He tries to put a brave, optimistic face on things (and also, ahem, whacks off) but only ends up vomiting as the weight of everything his father said—everything he overlooked all this time washes over him. When Eris and Ruijerd return and see what a mess he is, and he tells them why, Eris wants to murder Paul.

But Ruijerd tells her to comfort Rudy instead. And even though it’s not something she says she’s very good at, all Rudy really needs is a hug, so when Eris gives him one (after some adorable hesitation), he immediately cheers up. He remembers he’s not all alone, and he has a family in her and Ruijerd.

Can he make amends with his father and join him in locating the rest of his other family?  Considering everything he and his party of three have been through and overcome thus far, I’m not about to bet against them now.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 15 – Sisters Big and Small

As the seasonal rains soak Dedoldia Village, Rudy and Mushoku Tensei get his pervy antics out of the way quickly, with Gyes warning Rudy he’ll kill him if he messes with his daughter Tona. Rudy is either off to the side or in the background of this whole episode. Instead, it’s an almost wholly Eris episode, one I’ve been looking forward to and one that does not disappoint.

Eris, now and forever the true MVP of Mushoku, really gets to shine as she takes a shine to Tona and her friend Tersena. While a noble only child, you can tell Eris just fits better in this kind of environment. She quickly adopts the adorable local dress (the wardrobe design is strong as usual on this show), and looks after the beastgirls as her younger sisters.

But when the subject of Ghislaine comes up, Gyes’ mood suddenly darkens, and he dismisses her as a “disgrace” who betrayed the village by shirking her duty, and expected her to be dead in a ditch. Eris doesn’t care how big and strong Gyes is, she will not let that slander of her master, friend, and surrogate big sister stand, and lets Gyes have it. Rudy confirms to Gyes that Ghislaine indeed became a far more admirable person than the sis he knew.

As you’d expect, Tona and Tersena are eager to learn more about the kind, strong Ghislaine who taught Eris everything she knows and was always there to save her…not to mention helped her develop her rock-hard abs. Tona, who has always hated her father’s insistence on her sword training, changes her tune when Eris offers to teach her the way Ghislaine taught her.

There’s a beautiful poetry to an outsider and the student of Ghislaine, all but disowned by his big brother, finally getting his daughter excited about swordsmanship. Eris is no easier on Tona than Ghislaine was on her, but there’s still that underlying care, affection, and kindness in the way Eris always helps Tona up after besting her. Two weeks pass and the tough training pays off, with Tona showing marked improvement and ferocity.

The three girls also continue to grow closer as friends and surrogate sisters, until word comes that the rains will soon subside and Eris and her party will be on their way. Tona doesn’t want Eris to go, but Eris says she has a home to go to. Tona reacts by lashing out at Eris, who understandably holds back. That night, Gyes tells a sulking Tona how he doesn’t feel great about how he and Ghislaine parted ways, and doesn’t want her and Eris to go through the same.

Rudy wisely takes the Sacred Beast for a walk to get out of the way so Tona, with Tersena as moral support, approaches Eris and apologizes. The girls make up, and spend their last night together having fun and laughing. There’s so much love and strength in these scenes, especially when you remember what they’ve all been through, with Eris so far from the only home she ever knew and the beastgirls narrowly escaping slavery and death.

After a tearful goodbye to her new sisters, Eris indulges Gyes’ request to spar, so he can get a taste of how Ghislaine now fights through her student. It’s an unexpected but welcome and very awesome demonstration of how far Eris has come, even though she narrowly loses.

Of course we, like Rudy, didn’t get a great look at what actually happened, just Eris cursing when it did. Still, losing to Ghislain’s big brother is nothing to be ashamed of, and she isn’t—instead, she’s motivated to beat him when she inevitably returns to the village.

As they’re departing the village, Geese hops aboard the wagon and joins the party, at least as far as the Holy Country of Millis. On the way, the party passes a memorial to the Seven Great Powers, the legendary strongest fighters in the world, with whom even Ruijerd says he might have trouble.

The fact Rudy is committed to avoiding such dangerous people by “living quietly” almost assures that they’ll run into at least one of these Powers, and possibly more. Whether they’re friend and/or foe will be fun to discover, hard as it will be to top this week’s wonderful Eris-centric story.

Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation – 14 – The Dedoldia Redemption

Rudeus begins this episode by giving us a wonderfully sarcastic tour of his not-so-luxurious, insect-infested accommodations in the Ewok demihuman village in the trees. It’s yet another gorgeous, awe-inspiring environment where he is content to sit tight and wait for rescue, but then one, two, three days pass , and he soon grows bored…and a little worried (mostly for Eris).

Did I mention he’s totally naked for the extent of his incarceration? Well, he is. But despite this, he manages to bring his new cellmate Geese to heel with the force of his confidence. Geese’s crime is a lot less severe than “attacking the Sacred Beast”. The two quickly bond, but the days still pass, and there’s no Ruijerd, no Eris, and no rescue.

Just when Rudeus is ready to burn the whole forest down, a band of smugglers end up doing it for him. He drops the helpless act, uses magic to fashion a key to escape. The smugglers are there to capture beast children to sell to the rich; Geese is not okay with this, but unlike Ruijerd, Rudy isn’t automatically inclined to help them.

For one thing, part of him is glad to see those who wrongly accused and imprisoned him getting their comeuppance. For another, getting back to Eris is paramount. But when one of the beast children captured by the leader of the smugglers—Gallus, “The Cleaner”, who also happens to be a “North Saint”—cries out for help, Rudy can’t just ignore it. With crucial assists from Geese and the Sacred Beast, he’s able to best Gallus and save the beast children…though he passes out in the process.

He comes to Dorothy-style, surrounded by friends both old and new. Eris and Ruijerd were delayed (in much the same way Gandalf was, as it wasn’t that bit of a deal for them), but now she’s heard of his heroics, Eris is as enamored of the little brat as ever. Those who captured him, now known to be members of Dedoldia Village, apologize for how he was treated.

Eris looks forward to telling her gramps of their exploits, but we cut back to her home continent, where Sauros Boreas Greyrat is relieved of command of Fittoa and summarily executed for allowing the mana disaster. Looks like returning home will only open a new can of geopolitical worms…