I sometimes think about the old saw “any port in a storm” when it comes to Taizan 5. Because when you take to that sea, the storm is never-ending and there are no ports. Normally an author would give you some respites of calm, a change of pace here and there to make the impact moments more effective. Taizan’s strategy seems to be relentless pummelling until the victim is beaten into submission. There’s no one here to calm you, to reassure you. No one living a quiet, normal life for others to envy or aspire to. He’s the animanga equivalent of Hagler vs. Hearns.

So what about Azuma Naoki-kun, the boy who made overtures towards helping Shizuka only to have them knocked back? Surely Azuma is normal, responsible, sensible? But see, I think this is part of the message being delivered here. This is normal – dysfunction, abuse, selfishness. Anything else is just a temporary reprieve while suppressing the darkness underneath. Naoki stumbles upon Takopii and Shizuka in the woods, right after they’ve killed Marina. Initially Azuma-kun argues the sensible approach – even in the face of Takopii’s inexplicable presence. Murder is a terrible thing it’s impossible for kids like them to cover up, and Shizuka should confess and throw herself on the mercy of the court.

That all changes, though, as soon as Shizuka turns on the charm. We don’t know a lot of details about Shizuka’s mom – Marina’s overdramatic interpretation aside, it seems likely she’s a hostess. But it’s ironic that Shizuka does pretty much exactly what Marina accused her mother of here. She cons Naoki into helping her cover up the murder, making him a full-on accomplice. She also shows no sense of remorse whatsoever, which is sort of understandable given her home life and the way Marina treated her. But whether she was made that way or was born that way, it’s clear Shizuka is broken in some fundamental capacity.

In the end Azuma’s plan is to put Marina in Takopii’s preservation box and bury her, then have Takopii use his happy device to impersonate Marina the way he did Shizuka before. It’s ludicrous to imagine that would fool even Marina’s tuned-out parents, but these are fourth-graders after all. We then get a look at Naoki’s home life when Shizuka goads him into stealing his older brother Junya’s ring (just for her amusement more than anything, it seems). Junya (Ohsaka Ryouta, who’s as good as anybody at being a chameleon). And unbeknownst to her, that home life makes Naoki an easy mark for her machinations.

Naoki resents his older brother for being a golden boy and the apple of his parents’ eye. Not because of Junya himself (he seems perfectly nice to his brother) but because of the way their mother uses him as a blunt instrument to humiliate and belittle Naoki. She’s truly horrific (that pancake thing, Jeebus), but honestly that’s pretty much the default state in a Taizan 5 series. Frankly it’s surprising that Naoki didn’t turn out more of a sociopath than he is – he has a sense that what he’s doing is wrong and understands that even as he’s doing it. Naturally the whole ring theft plan is a debacle, and his reaction reveals that Naoki realizes just how deeply he’s screwing up here.

The last major developments here involve Takopii, and they seem pretty major indeed. When Naoki-kun tells him he should go fetch the time travel clock from his home planet and fix everything, Takopii reveals that he can’t go back. But, interestingly, he can’t remember why. As well, he’s predictably awful at pretending to be Marina. The father is so checked out that he thinks the change is great, but Marina’s mother is a mother and she knows something is off. She also turns physically abusive when Takopiina gushes over the idea of going to live with Papa, assuming that all Papas must live in Tokyo and that’s where they want to go anyway, because Chappy is there (he’s not).

This leads to perhaps the most important moment in the series so far. Takopii, for the first time, comes to understand the consequences of actions. He feels guilt and remorse, realizing that simply killing someone to make someone else happy – even if the person being killed is an awful one – is a terrible thing. People are connected, and eliminating one of them impacts all the ones connected to them. This is the biggest lesson Takopii has learned since he came to Earth, but the question is – what will he do with that understanding now that he has it?