Mondaiji Episode 5: The Oath Seems to be Beyond the Stars?

That’s it, I’m officially shortening Mondaiji-tachi ga Isekai Kara Kuro Sou Desu Yo? to just Mondaiji for the sake of my sanity.

Summary: The gang makes their way through Perseus’ castle in accordance with the rules of the game. It comes down to Izayoi to defeat Laius and his trump card, a former demon lord named Algol, whose powers echo that of a gorgon. After dismantling all of the Perseus guild, the No-Names have a bit of a victory celebration under the stars, while inside another mysterious letter appears on the table.

Impression: Fun times abound in this episode of Mondaiji, as we see Izayoi really unleash his powers to take on Perseus. You and Asuka do some work to help, but it’s mostly smaller stuff like distracting the guards, or using supersonic dolphin abilities to sense where invisible enemies are. Not to down play their contributions but really the main lesson you can take away from this episode is that you should not mess with Izayoi, because he will F your shit up.

It was a rather action oriented episode this week, which with the budget this show is so obviously on, was a bit surprising. The managed to pull it off well enough, and the animation didn’t look as horrible as it could have. Things start off with Asuka, Jin, You, Kurousagi, and Izayoi reading the rules of the game they’ll be playing in order to challenge Laius. They have to make it through Perseus’ stronghold without being seen, which is tough to do since there are a ton of guards some of whom have the power of invisibility (special helmets you see, based on one owned by the Greek god Hades.) Since Jin is useless, and Kurousagi can only participate as a referee, the success of the mission depends on Asuka, You, and Izayoi. They quickly come up with a plan, and start to make their way into the castle. Asuka let’s herself be seen, thus giving up her right to face Laius in the final battle, but she’s enough of a distraction that the guards have their hands full trying to deal with her. You, Izayoi, and Jin meanwhile keep sneaking further into the building, staying safely out of sight thanks to You’s keen animal sense that allow her to pick up on were the guards are even if their invisible. When a particularly tough solider shows up, she even uses something akin to echolocation to find out where he is. I don’t know where one would find a dolphin or a bat to befriend in order for her to have learned this skill but whatever. Izayoi picks up two of the special invisibility helmets and heads off to the final arena with Jin, so that they can face off with Laius of the crazy two-toned hair.

After a brief comic relief interlude involving pranks that you could pull on people when you’re wearing an invisibility helmet and want to have fun with a certain blue haired rabbit, Izayoi and the rest of them finally meet the head of Perseus. Laius, being that he is a crazy jerk-face, of course tells them that he’s not even going to be the one fighting and promptly unleashes the “dangerous weapon” that everyone’s been hinting that he has. This weapon is a former Demon Lord, a Gorgon named Algol. Not only is she ugly, but she also turns everything in the immediate area into stone (including Asuka and You). Not that this even bothers Izayoi, who makes short work of the beast, and is about to finish off Laius as well, when he chooses that moment to order Algol to unleash her ultimate attack. It’s a super-charged beam that has the potential to turn all of Little Garden into stone, and Izayoi takes it out with a single well timed kick. He then deals a death blow to Algol and beats Laius, after raising the stakes of the game so high that Perseus won’t ever be able to reform itself.

It’s a good fight, and one that was much longer than I though it would be. I though they would try and really save on the budget by keeping the action scenes rather short, but this was a good length and didn’t look really terrible either. I was quiet pleased with it actually, and I’m glad to see that the quality hasn’t really declined much since the first episode. Izayoi is great as the invincible ace on the team, and I haven’t really gotten tired of his constant winning yet. I still find myself enjoying him as a character, since he continues to be a bit of an enigma. He’s smart, but doesn’t flaunt it as much as his strength. When he fights, I still get the feeling that he’s not using all of his power, which is interesting. I wish the girls would have had a bigger part in this episode, but I knew once Izayoi’s power’s came back as “Unknown” he was going to be the “special one.”

The last bit of the episode was just pure fun and fluffy good stuff. Kurousagi arranges a party under the falling stars that once represented Perseus, the enemy the just defeated. All the kids are laughing and having a good time. Izayoi even get’s an idea for what his new goal will be for the No-Name community: He want’s their name written in the stars as well. It’s very romantic, just like Kurousagi says. Of course, they had to thicken the plot a little  by showing another mysterious letter, like the one that drew the kids into Little Garden in the first place, land on the dinning room table. What is in the letter? Now that Perseus is beaten, and the No-Name community has managed to get back their tiny vampire friend Leticia, what will be their next move? It’s hard to judge by the episode titles, since they often are only vaguely connected with the content of the episode. Only time will tell what’s going to be coming up next!

Final Though: What was that thing that Asuka had with her, the card that spurted water and eventually turned into a tree? Where did she get that? Was that supposed to be the same water seed thing that Izayoi won in the first episode? This show has some plot holes sometimes…