This whole Tothman sidebar isn’t among the most riveting material Helck has had on offer, fair to say.  But credit where it’s due, the series didn’t milk it.  Two eps and it was done, and not much of the second at that.  After that the material was mostly comedy-driven but that’s OK – Helck can do comedy very well.  The wide range in tone it offers is interesting, but it wouldn’t matter if the series didn’t have the chops to tackle both ends of the spectrum effectively.

It’s pretty obvious that this whole thing with the Tothman king has something to do with the human-hero power-ups (at least I’m assuming it does, or it was kind of a waste of time).  The king was basically begging to be put out of his misery and his soldiers thanked Helck and Annie (well, it was mostly Helck) for doing it.  As for the Erille tribe they turn back into cute little piggies once the curse was lifted, and their princess promises they’ll sing the praises of Lord Helck and Lady Anne for time immemorial.

With that, the road beckons.  But soon info comes that the two neighboring kingdoms have destroyed themselves in a war (which almost sounds thermonuclear the way a passing traveler describes the rumors).  The main trio stop off in a town where a lady troubadour is singing a sad ballad about “Augis”, which may be the name of one of the vanished countries (or its leader).  Before further exploration can be done Helck spots a map seller who claims to have a map showing the “Great Dragon Empire”, which is apparently the name of Vermillio’s homeland when it’s at home.  But he wants a ridiculous sum for it, forcing Helck and Vermillio to consider how to raise funds in a hurry.

I certainly think there’s something fishy about the “Augis” lady, but so far it’s not revealed.  All this is really a setup to get Helck entered into a cooking contest, and Helck to engage in an episode long parody of Chuuka Ichiban/Mister Ajikko and their ilk.  And it’s really on-point and very funny, once again proving this show has the chops to go full comedy when the mood strikes it.  As for the contest there’s never really any doubt that Helck would win it (he pretty much wins everything).  And Anne is his most enthusiastic taster to be sure.

Piwi’s importance should be noted here, because even though he’s absent for most of the episode (shopping for samples Helck doesn’t need in order to win, mostly) he still delivers a lot of its funniest moments.  Even a simple “Pii!” is good for a laugh, but lines like “The Empire sure is tiny, ne!” rise to new levels in Piwi’s capable hands.  I don’t trust the troubadour, and I suspect she’ll have been up to something during her alone time (after a duet) with Piwi – pumping him for information about Vermilo and Helck at the very least.  What she wants to do with that theoretical information could be a very important question.