English Dub Review: Tsugumomo “The Library and the Childhood Friend”

Let’s go to the library!

Spoilers Below

Tsugumomo picks up right where the last episode left off. Kazuya agrees to take Kiriha to school with him, but only in sash form. Instead, he tricks her and leaves her at home. In all the commotion of the night before, Kazuya had forgotten to do his homework, so he heads to the library.

Chisato (who in the last episode hosted the animated attack wig) offers to come over to Kazuya’s house to help him with his studying. He gratefully accepts until he remembers his angry magical sash woman at home. It turns out that Kiriha has made her way to school anyway, just in time for the three of them to get locked in the library. They’re trapped by some sort of magical force field.

When Kiriha determines it’s another amasogi locking them in, she knows she has to find and fight it. Kazuya introduces her to Chisato as his “cousin” who is “interested in magic”, so she knows about these things. Kiriha then realizes that the entire library is to amasogi, and she has to fight it.

Seeing a small woman fight various inanimate objects is at least an acceptable filler for stretching out the main mystery. The action sequences are creative and worth looking forward to. Even if the conflict is practically a repeat of last week’s, it’s nice to get re-familiarized with what we’re dealing with here.

After the books band together to protect Chisato, Kiriha realizes that she is again the host. The study came to life after Kazuya’s earlier rejection – with Kiriha’s approval and Kazuya’s acceptance of the study date, the amasogi disassembles.

Then we get the new information of the week – Kiriha explains that a malison is also after them. It’s a distortion in reality at the root of all creation. What’s not explained is why Kiriha is here, and why now. But she wants to control the malison, which is partially contributing to all these amasogi attacks.

This episode was mostly an extension of last week’s vocabulary lesson and a reestablishment of the magical rules, but the story did move forward a little. Now Chisato is involved, and Kiriha is starting to see that it may be necessary to play by some of Kazuya’s school rules. The monster of the week format looks effective for Tsugumomo. I hope each episode continues to throw in some action while opening up the foundations for this world.