Shinmai Maou no Testament Episode 5

How to train your Mio-sama!

Impression

Remember what I said last week about there being no fanservice? Yeah, I spoke too soon. Sadly, the whole censoring issue has degenerated into the point where it’s now tantamount to me beating a dead horse, and I’m sure you’re tired of me mentioning it every week anyway. I’m not sure whether to praise or condemn their novel censorship method of having an embarrassed chibi Mio cover up what would otherwise be hentai, but I think I do prefer it to the annoying white beams of light. I could see almost nothing during the Yuki scene, dammit. Perhaps counter-productively, the scenes with Maria end up being the lewdest of them all – she’s trying her very best, and she goes a bit further than the standard tits and asses because ironically it’d be approaching illegal if she stopped there. Instead, we get great(?) lines like, “Maria… I want to be inside you.” I know she’s a succubus, but I can’t help but feel that it’s just a justification for making her a perverted loli imouto.

Oddly enough, there are links between the fanservice and the plot, namely the Master-Servant contract that I didn’t think would continue to be relevant at all – it punishes ‘betrayals’ by the servant towards the master, and getting captured represents the biggest betrayal of all, as Mio would actively become a liability to a Basara who would definitely throw himself into danger to save his new imouto. Given that Mio gets uncontrollably turned on whenever the contract activates due to the involvement of a certain loli succubus, what exactly happens when that goes to its extremes? I was thinking of something along the lines of a full-fledged hentai development, but consequences like death and not surviving are surprisingly sobering – especially when all that takes is for Mio to be captured, which doesn’t sound very hard at all given all the people that are after her.

If there’s anything that surprised me this episode, it’s that Basara is still friends with Takigawa. Now, that was unexpected. They each know the true identity of the other, yes, and they’re in some sort of a working relationship – but it’s like nothing ever happened between them! Basara’s treating him to barbeque! Imagine if he could make friends out of all his former enemies like that! This might be strange, but I’m actually thinking that Takigawa can actually be trusted, at least more than any of the other demons or heroes that have come after Mio – there are a couple of factions all closing in, and none of them seem to be too friendly. I was hoping the hero faction would be reasonable at least, but after refusing to encounter Basara and Yuki it doesn’t look like they’re up for much negotiation at all.

They can wait, though. They can take as much time as they want. Because a new route has been unlocked! Best girl ship has set sail at last! All aboard HMS Yuki!