DANG IT, WE DON’T GET TO SEE OODANNA EAT CURRY! But we do get to jump start into the grand opening of the Restaurant!
The eatery has been named as Moonflower, a gift from Matsuba, who was sure to book the whole place and bring his clan with him for her grand opening. However after that, a week has passed and there has been no customers. Yet another problem emerges when Aoi is summoned to the Accounting Office to meet its chief Byakuya, who is in charge of managing Tenjin-ya’s finances. I can’t imagine it being a good thing, and can think of a major problem off the top of my head: She is (likely) using Tenjin-ya’s finances to buy her ingredients for her recipes, but with no customers she has no way of paying back what she had used up.
Regardless of being Oodanna’s fiancée it does not give her the right to simply use up the money without a care in the world. Should that be the problem, Aoi is really going to have to work hard to get the business going. Ginji’s said the place has never been popular, hence all his shops have failed there, so Aoi needs to learn from his mistakes and figure out how to bring in customers. The key to that likely has to do Oodanna’s advice to her: In order for her business to thrive, she needs to value the encounters and establish relationships (loyal ones that that). A good start would be befriending the likes of Rokusuke, the one who runs Mizumaki Farm, or being on good terms with the Tengu for them to visit on a more regular basis. Another thing that changed is that up until now, Aoi has given out free food, and almost nobody will say no to that. Now that they have to pay up, we aren’t seeing them show up as much as they used to. So it will be up to Aoi to not only get the word out there that her eatery exists, and make sure the chefs in the kitchen aren’t doing anything stupid to sabotage her (I can totally see them doing that).
However besides having to figure out how to make her restaurant a success, there is another major problem she needs to worry about. An assassin appeared and attempted to kill her, and had Sasuke, the kamaiachi hadn’t showed up, she may have very well been dead. The arrival new and deadly enemy at this point of time only tells us that there is a much bigger problem, hidden within the shadows. The most pressing issue is how the enemy got away, leaving no way of identifying them at this point of time. Their power is nothing to sneeze at either. Sasuke may have been in serious trouble himself had it not been for her to use her fan (she ended up slipping on the bloody banana after-all), but it had also looked like he was aiming at Aoi given the direction he was facing. Given how the word has gotten around on the tabloids of how she is Oodanna’s fiancée, it seems plausible that the enemy who is perhaps a rival or archenemies with Oodanna would elect to choose to go after her to anger/send a message to him, since they probably think she is an easy target. That or because she is related to Shiro, they want to get rid of her.
But what I found to be the most rewarding from that encounter was how instead of freaking out, she comes to the logical conclusion that she should start putting in practice in case of emergencies. Actually at first, I thought she was able to dodge it herself, but it happened so fast, I didn’t notice that it was Sasuke who swept her out of the way. But still, she is certainly not a delicate girl who waits to be saved by someone, but rather is willing to throw herself in the frontline to protect others.
What I enjoyed about the episode the most was how they really made the most of its time without feeling rushed. By doing so we were able to meet and interact with several characters, starting with the jealous chefs from the main kitchen who thought of a childish method of getting back at her (leaving a messy trail of banana peels in hopes for her to slip on it), Sasuke, (who is actually 80 years old) who serves as the inn’s security guards, and was close friends with Shiro. The two of them were notorious for getting themselves into trouble, especially during Sasuke’s rebellious days when he didn’t want to take up the job. and then there is Rokusuke who runs Mizumaki Farm, he sells veggies and fruits, and also produced the cherry juice Ginji had gifted her. Aoi had recklessly followed him out after she had intially thought his mask resembled the one the Ayakashi who helped her in the past.
In the matter of fact, I am glad we are starting to see some development on this encounter as well. It’s clear Aoi cherishes the memory, and is grateful to the Ayakashi, but she doesn’t know who it is and secretly hopes to meet them again. We saw this when she was inspecting the mask shop, that was mainly filled with Ogre masks (since this is Oodanna’s domain). It is a curious thing of who it belongs to, especially given how plain it is. But perhaps the Ayakashi chose that particular mask in order not to scare her, who was still a child at the time.
We were also given some insight on Oodanna’s and Ginji’s relationship. A surprising twist of how Ginji hasn’t been working at the inn for that long, (around 50 years now). He was previously employed as Oodanna’s rival’s place, and was headhunted to join him instead. He says it’s a long story, but I am sure we will find out in due time. But the two have certainly developed a friendship, and Oodanna is pretty much used to his mischievous (yet clever) tactics of taking on his cute form whenever he wants to be treated to good food.
It is worth mentioning how comfortable Aoi has become in the Hidden Realm. With the tengu fan Matsuba has gifted her, it is a certainly a bit of a double-edge sword when it comes to giving her a sense of security, and sense of fearlessness, forgetting that she is in a world where everyone wants to eat her. While she may not be as carefree as her grandfather was, she is certainly shares his sense of adventure, and comfort in this realm. It is quite funny how both Oodanna and Ginji both find that part of her scary. But Oodanna was justifiably angry at her for wandering off out of sight, especially since the night before, someone attempted to kill her.
Given how we are starting to move forward with the plot at Episode 6 makes me incredibly excited for what’s to come. It gives the series so much time to flesh out they story and character. Also a special mention to Chibi, the little Kappa! Chibi is absolutely hilarious, I am so glad we will be seeing the little one live at her shop.
Ah man, I love this series so much, is it next Monday yet?
