After a comfortable run of consistent lore drops, episode 9 finally put an end to that. Instead, this week served as an introduction to the Northern Lands, establishing the foundation of what Aoi needs to accomplish in order to fulfill the conditions of receiving Kiyo’s support. As result, it was quite frankly the most boring episode to date. There were a handful of things that happened, but they were so brief that I was just ready to get onto the next episode, but unfortunately we have to wait a week for that.
So what are the conditions they must fulfill to receive Kiyo’s support and promised seal? In return for throwing his support behind them, Kiyo would like some assistance of reviving Northern Lands’ prosperity as a tourist destination once more. First, he asked of Tenjin-ya and Orio-ya to give them some of their airships so they could use that to promote safer and alternative way to give tours. This is because of the poor security and unmaintained roads leaves travellers vulnerable to choke points where bandits lies in wait. (Though this does make one think Kiyo’s predecessor did a pretty bad job to let it get that bad in the first place… but I digress). However even with the airships, they still have a security problem with sky pirates lurking in the skies as well. Aoi and the other had ran into them earlier before Byakuya had told her and Ginji to get off and take the more discreet route to not draw attention to themselves. So the security part of the problem will have to be resolved by Kiyo and his team.
The second condition he’s asking for in return, is for Aoi to create a local specialty that can be exclusive to the Northern Lands. He wants it to promote the local ingredients, and served as a souvenir food people can eat or take back with them like the Inferno Buns. Seeing Kasuga wanted to help but was being shot down from it, Aoi had requested her to work as her assistant with this assignment.
Creating a new dish will have it’s challenges, but perhaps the one thing that is the most difficult to get around is getting the local to warm up to strangers. By nature, the folks of the Northern Lands are the wary types, and it’s a big reason why Kasuga is having so much trouble integrating with them. She’s trying, but they won’t trust her, or they are actively trying to assassinate her because they aren’t happy that she’s Kiyo’s betroth. In-fact, we saw one attempt that she claimed was targeting her: An ice plate that was filled with poisoned water to seep into the food. Thankfully Kasuga was able to detect something was amiss before she and Aoi took a bite from it. It was thanks to all that reading she has done over the years back at home that she even knew the trick behind it.
So considering Aoi is an outsider, it will be interesting to see whether the wariness of the locals may prove to be a challenge when it comes to getting them to warm up them and seeking assistance from them. I can’t imagine it’ll be received very well that Kiyo’s seeking an outsider’s help to make a local delicacy over someone who understands the lands far better than Aoi does. Heck, whether they’ll even trust to eat Aoi’s meals may be yet another potential challenge she may find herself facing. So we’ll have to see how this plays out.
Finally last but not least, we did to sort of hear Odanna. Aoi had also dreamt of him calling out to her, but unfortunately he was interrupted by her waking up, so there’s no way to tell whether that was actually him or not. Though I did wonder if the fire we saw in the lantern on the tramcar was in fact Odanna’s ogre fire. It may not have been a total coincidence that they kept showing us it, especially with it being green too. Needless to say, Aoi misses him a lot (it’s been over a month after-all!). The saying, ‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder’, is certainly applicable here!
