For this week’s episode the story continues with some more preparation for the Ritual mission. My suspicion from last week of a love triangle gets confirmed and the consequence of this is disastrous.
First off, Okonogi is formally assigned the role of the Shinto priest in charge of the Ritual and Natsume openly admits in front of everyone that she’s in love with him. He must be pretty used to it because he doesn’t react to it. Natsume starts noticing Hisone and Okonogi interacting right away, of course. She starts following Hisone around and commenting on all of the things she does and it turns out that they have in common the fact that both speak their mind, but they do it for different reasons and feel differently about it. Natsume is cute, but she comes across as very haughty, so I wonder if Okonogi doesn’t feel the same for her for this reason.
Eventually all the girls instill fear in Hisone that Natsume will have her head if she finds out about her and Okonogi’s date from episode 7. Hisone reacts to this by avoiding both Okonogi and Natsume, but she eventually runs into Natsume and they talk. Natsume is angry because Hisone won’t admit she has feelings for Okonogi. 
Hisone laughs it off as a misunderstanding and she talks about reasons why she doesn’t dislike Okonogi, but then Natsume tells her those reasons she’s giving are pretty much how you feel when you have a crush. I was both really amused and shocked by Hisone’s reaction! She literally runs off blushing like crazy and screaming to the evening sky as she tries to come to terms with her feelings.
On another note, the cute miko are hanging out with the male pilots and flirting and the D-pilots are eavesdropping when Zaitou is about to take a picture with one of them. For someone who was such a flirt before, he’s very cold to the girl now. Then he notices Eri and runs out to follow her and try to explain himself. She tells him that he doesn’t need to, as they are just coworkers. The accidental kiss situation after that conversation was a bit questionable, but I’m forgiving because everything else about this show is wonderful!
There’s also some vague comments that make me think one of the miko’s life is in danger or has to be sacrificed during the Ritual. I like that they are giving out information piece by piece like this because it makes things exciting and progressive, but I also want to know now! So I’m torn.
More importantly though is the fact that anastomosis, something that the higher-ups were trying to avoid in order to carry out the Ritual properly, happens for Eri and Hisone. They describe anamostasis as the OTFs trying to digest the D-pilot based on the fact that the pilot’s emotions have changed since they created their connection to the OTF. Iiboshi asks both women right away and in front of the whole crew if they have fallen in love and man, that must be so embarassing!
I’m really looking forward to learning how they’re going to get out of this situation and if it’s possible for the feeling of love to coexist with the connection to the OTF. I’m also wondering what will happen with the love triangle and the miko! Lots of questions in my mind now that we’re getting closer to the end, but I’m hopeful this show will pull off a great ending.