Two down, three to go.

It was pretty obvious last week that Tanehiko’s “cleaner” was the more important of the two as far as the plot was concerned. A serial killer Tanehiko may be, but Kuchinawa vibed as another of the five Goko disciples from the get-go. It should also have been obvious that Tenko-san was an ayakashi I suppose, given her connections with Mao, but I confess I didn’t quite get there on my own. Needless to say Tanehiko has bitten off (and had bitten off) more than he can chew here.

Being a youkai, Tenko has the ability to send a sliver of her power to Mao to ask for help. That help arrives just in the nick of time, as Kuchinawa is just about to eliminate her (or so it seems at least). Mao recognizes him immediately – not the name, but the face. And indeed this is Kamon, another of the five apprentices. And unfortunately for Tanehiko, his family has grown tired of the trouble he causes and decided to cut their losses (or at least have Kamon do it for them). This Kamon does in quite brutal fashion (some might even call him… no, I won’t make that pun).

I’m a bit confused about why Kamon was ready to eliminate Tenko, and then after killing his former master is happy to let her go along with the others. And not only that, give her medicine to treat her wounds (well, she did just get hit by a car). Like Hyakka, his first reaction on realizing this is Mao – which he only does after Mao flat-out says it – is “well, you must be here to kill me then”. Mao has no interest in doing that, and as with Hyakka it seems that Kamon is reasonable enough not to become his enemy under the circumstances. But if these two are alive the other three probably are too – and indeed, Hyakka sees evidence that at least one of them is likely on his way to Tokyo from the West (presumably the Goko compound was located in Kyoto).

Hyakka in fact has rejoined his circus troupe and is on his way out of town (headed west) when he sees a couple of shikigami (a frog and a turtle) disguised as humans headed the other way. He promptly re-quits and races back to the Imperial Capital. Clearly Hyakka is a bit of a tsundere. No matter how much he protests there’s one main reason Hyakka is doing this – to warn Mao. And the two of them will wind up taking the invaders on together, though as their master is a magician specializing in the water element and Hyakka is fire, it’s not an especially good matchup.

There’s another problem here, which is that the shock troops are humans cursed by whoever is in control of frog and turtle. Mao resolutely refuses to kill them – I suspect Hyakka’s contrary argument is mostly bluster. That makes the coming fight a lot more challenging. Fortunately Mao has determined that Nanoka is of the earth element – well, not fortunately for her, necessarily. And as we all know water is weak against earth, just as fire is weak against water. One lock of hair and some bamboo whittling later we have a katashiro, and Nanoka is drafted to the front lines whether she wants to be or not (not).

Screw elements – seems pretty obvious Nanoka is weak against frogs. We’re seeing a bit of a trend here, which is that Mao is only to happy to throw Nanoka right into the fire if the situation demands it. That’s sort of refreshing actually, and even kind of complimentary, though she certainly doesn’t see it that way. I like how matter of fact Mao is about showing how freaked out Nanoka gets when things go all scary – as well she should, she’s just a kid. And how matter of fact Mao is about leveraging her as an asset. I wouldn’t call it romantic but it’s a nice change from the usual dynamic we see in these sorts of series.