Look, I could go a lot of different ways in breaking down this episode. But I think “finally” pretty much covers it. It’s the first time in many weeks Yofukashi no Uta has felt on-point and purposeful. The question is why it took so long to get here? The whole Anko thing was just way, way too long in hindsight. I wouldn’t have minded it as a three-week arc but pretty much the whole season? It was a whole lot of sound and fury signifying very little if you ask me. We just needed a fraction of it to get to where we were this week.
Episode 10 ended in a cliffhanger no question. But not over whether Kou would die – plot armor made that a non-starter. Rather, just how his survival would go down. The first we see of him this time is waking up in Kabura-san’s clinic (and her disrobing him). He’s alive, obviously. But a little too alive – apart from some drowsiness and a little mark on his gut there’s no evidence he’s just been shot at point-blank range. What we don’t see (via flashback) until Anko arrives on the scene is that something very weird happened in that classroom. Something making Kou’s Halloween costume seem totally appropriate.
What the heck was that all about? Anko will later serve up a theory (whose accuracy I’m somewhat skeptical of). It’s worth noting that I pointed out after the S1 finale that Kou showed some odd traits in that episode. Like jumping off an overpass and landing unhurt. And that his reflection seemed to waver in the apartment window. And here we’ll see him give Nazuna a hug powerful enough to make her scream in pain. This is a 14 year-old kid who has to run around in the shower to get wet, and recuperating from a bullet wound to boot – how is he that strong? Obviously something weird is going on with him now – but I think there’s possible evidence that it’s been going on for a while.
As for Anko, I don’t doubt her sincerity in expressing regret over what happened. She’s basically been trying to kill herself, but in her twisted logic she draws a line at killing other humans. But I don’t find her especially sympathetic. She did terrible things to (as far as we can tell) vampires who’d committed no crimes. She caused this whole mess over a stupid plan even she knew was stupid. Given all that it’s something of a miracle – and testament in part to Sawashiro Miyuki – that she comes off as so funny in this episode rather than just despicable and pathetic.
Kou winds up cheering her up in his hospital room (being told she’s still hot by a 14 year-old is not nothing, I suppose). But the real action comes when Kou – fully healed and released after only a day – and Naz call out Anko and wind up going to a pub with her to talk this out. Kou’s logic – vamps seem to know jack about themselves, and Anko is the most likely to have insight – is sound. This whole conversation is really a blast, from the heavy petting to the verbal sparring to Anko getting tanked on half a glass of 5% beer. But it’s an important topic – just what is Kou now, exactly?
Anko’s theory is that he started to turn into a vampire in the heat of the moment, as his emotions were heightened. This would mean that for an instant, he felt romantic love for Nazuna. But only long enough to prevent the bullet from seriously damaging his body. I have my doubts, as I said, but more about whether Anko is right than whether she believes it. And it sounds great to Kou, because that would mean he’s at least capable of romantic love. Which, if you have a good enough memory, you know is what Call of the Night started out being about.
For me, I have no doubt Nazuna loves Kou in that way. Or that he loves her, though for now at least not in that way. But Anko, for all that she’s enjoying being a troll, actually is addressing the elephant in the room here. If they want to move this relationship along, sexual intimacy is the logical way to do it. Kou is normally arousable for a pubescent male (read: a lot). Naz is clearly into it. That might just nudge Kou into falling in love with her for reals and that’s what they both want, right? Except she’s an adult (whatever age she really is) and he’s a child, and that’s the other elephant in the room. These are the sorts of waters Yofukashi no Uta traversed when it was truly excellent, so it’s great to be back – even if it should never have left for so long.
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