This was a pretty good episode of Tonari no Youkai-san overall, though not one of the best. But my takeaway from it is how important Buchio is to my enjoyment of the series. This was the first episode without his presence (apart from a non-speaking cameo). And he was missed. Partly because of the main character threads (his and Mu-chan/Jirou’s) Buchio’s is the more compelling and relatable. But also because he tends to carry with him a different thematic side than we saw this week, and it’s where Tonari no Youkai-san seems to have the most narrative impact. For me, at least.

Before a full episode of Mu and Jirou, we did get a little appetizer with Rain and Ryou (which I found the best part of the ep). Rain’s recent chills have a medical source – “reversion”. What’s that you ask? Reversion in this mythology is when a youkai reverts back to some earlier point in its evolutionary (mythological?) development. In her case, kappa used to crawl from the rivers and climb mountains to hibernate in winter. She’ll be fine, her kappa doctor says, as long as she stays inside on really cold days and avoids cold water. Which is Chekov’s prognosis if ever I heard one.

It all comes down because Ryou – who’s been feeling guilty over giving Rain the cold (no pun intended) shoulder – falls into a hole in the river while retrieving a cyclopian soccer ball. This is winter and the River God is asleep, but it’s a warm day so only shallowly. Rain dives into the cold water to rescue him, and then needs rescuing herself (I think this is because as a child of the river, she falls into the Kami’s dream). In steps Jirou as usual, and flying solo as usual. But Mu will have none of that, and everyone jumps in to help. Rain is saved but she does go into hibernation for a while as a result.

The rest of it is a return to the basic Jirou-Mu-chan themes we’ve seen over the first eight episodes. There’s not much new to see here, really – it’s kind of a lather, rinse, repeat thing. Mu is angry because Jirou is reckless with his own life, Jirou guards his emotional center zealously. The new element here is the reveal that Mu-chan’s grandma finds in a letter Haru wrote to Jirou, where she admits she wanted to be with him forever but apologizes for the fact that she plans to order him to forget her when her time is close. That’s not a request than Jirou can honor, and he’s pretty much wasted his life trying to.

The other wrinkle here comes in the epilogue, which for a moment there felt for all the world like a finale (it had me ready to check ANN and MAL for a minute). I can only assume that hand reaching for Mu from the shadows was her father, trapped in that world that Betobeto-san spoke of escaping himself. That promises to be a significant plot point over the final few episodes, though I’d be happy if Buchio came back into focus for much of them.