It’s a grave injustice that (as far as I know) the voice actors for the various chibi-youkai that inhabit Miira no Kaikata aren’t credited.  Because you know, they’re each doing a terrific job in their own way (well- I haven’t heard Mukumuku say much).  And they’re really important to the success of this series in anime form – it’s not so easy to communicate the emotions of a character with brief grunts and yips, and these little creatures are fully-realized emotional beings, just like people.

This week, the focus is on Conny – and as much on Tazuki, his well-matched human foil.  These two are both outliers in Miira no Kaikata, standing out as quite different from the others in their peer group in this super-positive setting.  Conny, for his part, is actually the driver of a fair bit of the action in this story because he’s the one who acts out (Sora has him perfectly pegged, actually – it’s a cry for attention).  This time around it’s a matter of stealing Tsukiyo’s sweets – an especial problem here because it was one prepared by Sora-kun, who Tsukiyo clearly has a crush on.

What we know, of course, is that Tazuki-kun is a hardcore tsundere – though seeing a human be this tsundere towards an oni is admittedly a first for me.  In fact this episode is rather fascinating in that it acts as a kind of deconstruction of the whole tsundere trope – we pretty much see Tazuki’s psyche sliced open and laid bare as he wrestles with his own demons quite openly.  What we don’t get so often in anime is a tsundere being this honest with themselves about what they are, but Tazuki clearly knows who he’s looking at when he looks in the mirror.

The nut of it is that tsun-Tazuki basically tells Conny he’s not family and he can do what he wants, so Conny takes off (though not, as we’ll see, with the intention that Tazuki assumes).  Meanwhile the other youkai are missing him at day care, where Mii-kun has drawn Conny-pantsu and a Conny mask to wear.  When Isao (how I love dear Isao) sees how upset Mii is, he comforts him with his dragon tail (just kill me now, seriously).   Even here Tazuki can’t bring himself to admit how he really feels, and forbids Sora and the others from searching for Conny themselves (like they’d ever listen).

In a sense I can see how Tazuki might feel slighted by fate here – he was, after all, the first of the human cast to save Isao (if indeed that was Isao).  But Isao – the mature, easy peasy, helpful mythical beast – has ended up with Asa-chan, while Tazuki has been stuck with the high-maintenance Conny.  But love is about accepting others as they are, after all, and maybe Conny is a better partner for Tazuki in the sense of helping him become a better person.  And Conny is a good kid at heart, after all – in fact he hasn’t run away here, but gone to pick a hydrangea to give as an apology gift to Tsukiyo, only to get himself stuck in a hole in a fence.  He’s a long way from perfect, but in the end Conny just wants what we all want – to be loved unconditionally.  And why shouldn’t he be?