I can’t relate to this episode’s title because I’ve grown up with a father. I’m not even trying to say this to make it seem like I’m above those who don’t have fathers. This is just the first thought that came to my mind when I saw the preview for this episode last week. And now that the episode has aired, what thoughts do I have about it? Here we go!
We begin with a bit of a backtrack: Takumi reveals to Syl that he knows that Alan and Elena are the water god’s kids and asks where he is. Syl doesn’t answer this (it’s my headcanon that Syl had to sign an NDA), but there were also more developments for Takumi: for example, he’s now Syl’s disciple, with the symbol of education and nurturing! However, this doesn’t seem to get in the way of him raising his kids, as doing just that allows him to fulfill his symbol. Takumi also receives gifts from the fire god through Syl and is promised another contracted beast (which I was expecting due to the opening), as well as…
Fire magic?!
I’m sorry, Takumi already has wind and water magic. I was willing to allow him to have both as they sort of go hand in hand. But fire magic?! While yes, fire can be empowered by wind, that feels like too much magic for just one guy! If we were told from the beginning that there are people who could theoretically wield all kinds of magic (even if we only know that he can wield three even though there’s likely more), then I’d be more accepting of it. But right now, this is starting to veer more into self-insert power fantasy land than I would like to see. Oh, and Syl also tells Takumi that his actions are improving the cooking in this place.
Anyway, once that discussion with Syl is over, we get to see what’s happening with Syl up in whatever godly land he’s in, and we find out both what the fire god looks like and what species Alan and Elena’s mom is. She’s a human…and the water god is currently off with another woman. Ouch.
It makes me wonder if the water god ever truly wanted the twins or if they were an unintended consequence of an affair.
No time to ponder that, however, as we need to talk about Takumi and the kids! They’re playing on a beach with the other contracted beasts, with some of the play involving Takumi using his water magic! Then there’s a burst of fire from behind him, and we get to see the new contracted beast – a red lion which Takumi names Vector! It can’t shrink as small as Joule and Feat, and unlike the other beasts, it doesn’t have telepathy yet, so either Vector can’t learn telepathy, or it needs to train enough to be able to use telepathy. Probably the latter.
Everyone gets back to playing, and Vector finds an unconscious person, which it brings back instead of what was thrown for it to catch. At this point, they have lunch, and Takumi even makes some for this person (a vampire spy…for some reason). She introduces herself and explains what happened to her. Because we see Vivi (the vampire spy in question) in the opening, I think she will be more than a one-off character for this scene.
To tie into the title, Vivi has her suspicions about whether Takumi is Alan and Elena’s big brother or father. When she’s gone, the kids ask Takumi what a father is. Takumi tries to teach them, but they don’t appear to get it. At the very least, they understand the basic triangle of the dynamic, and that’s probably what we should expect from them at this point.
Takumi also heads to the Adventurer’s Guild in town, and quite a bit of commotion occurs. Takumi also gets to meet the provincial lord…but we’re going to tackle that next week, as I think that will be somewhat of a focus of next week’s episode!
In a previous episode, I had my gripes with inventory ex machina, and now Takumi will be picking up fire magic?! I know this show’s focus is meant to be on Takumi and the kids and their dynamic, but it feels like he’s going by a bit too smoothly! It doesn’t feel like any conflict intended to impede Takumi at this point, and even if there was, I bet Takumi would just conveniently have precisely what he needs to get around it in his inventory.
I am going on a rant, but regardless of whether the main character is a self-insert, in a story like this, there has to be a conflict that takes them a while to get around; that way, it doesn’t feel like they can flick their wrist and quickly solve their problem. While we had some of that when Takumi first got his water magic, it’s not like that mattered because he already had contracted beast(s) with water magic! And right now, this just feels like some kind of power fantasy.
But at this point? I’m going to keep watching this show. I’ve already placed enough time into this show that backing out now would cause me to feel like all that time was for nothing. But if this show does get a season two, expect me to cover it only if something happens in the next three episodes to make me change my mind.
Additional posts about A Journey Through Another World: Raising Kids While Adventuring:
Sara Talks Anime 
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