Natsume Yuujinchou episode 8

One thing I hate to do is make my posts out of order, I can honestly be such a snob about it because I always feel like I have to follow a certain order to which I create my episodic posts. Though, the subbed version of Hidamari Sketch wasn’t coming out, so I went ahead and downloaded Natsume Yuujinchou instead. What angered me the most was that once I was done watching the whole epsiode, Hidamari Sketch episode 8 came out, but enough of my rants on my pet-peeves that nobody besides myself actually cares about. So, the epsiode starts off with Natsume prancing around in the forest (not literally) to go see a pond where tons of fireflies are meant to be. When he gets there, he notices another man just sitting by the pond as well, although he had a yukai sitting beside him as well. Nyanko and Natsume both presume that the man must have been possessed by the yukai, but soon enough the spirit starts to follow Natsume and through experience, Natsume obviously didn’t want to be possessed by a youkai again. Though, as he runs away he somehow completely forgets about nearby hills and almost falls to his death before the yukai saves him. The female Yukai who wears a mask that completely covers her face, claims that she had no intention to posses anyone, instead, she was just close friends with the man until he stopped being able to see her. It was so hilarious how she describes her relationship as the one to Natsume and Nyanko, but they both simultaneously disagreed and said it was a relationship simply between  a pet and his master. Nyanko continues the laughs by commenting on the fact that she doesn’t have a name by saying that he’ll giver her one. His suggestion was “curly-noodles” because of her hair, but she just chose to ignore him entirely. Though, ignoring Nyanko is a bad idea because it got him very upset as he was screaming for attention, oh how I love his self centered personality!

Much to my surprise the yukai ended up being really annoying and got upset when Natsume wanted to sleep, but he obviously didn’t care. The next day he decides to call her Kiyo, just so his life can be a bit easier now that he can call her by something. As Natsume heads towards the pond where the man was sitting, he starts to imagine how his life would be if her were unable to see spirits anymore, but that didn’t last long. Natsume decides to ask the guy odd questions that would make anyone else suspicious, but the guy didn’t seem to mind that much. At night, Kiyo ends up showing Natsume her memories of the time she spent with him. So, we then get to learn his story, which was basically that he used to cry a lot by the pond he always sits around and his name was Akifumi. Kiyo watch him throughout all this time (stalkerish much?), he didn’t really care for her even when he did notice she was there until they bumped into each other. After that incident they became great friends and even more than that until one day he was just unable to see her. Nastume realizes that it would really be terrible if he was unable to see spirits anymore, which surprises him because he knows how it has always been a dream of his since he was younger to no longer see them, but he had a change of view on the whole thing. Though, Natsume still had one question about the story, which was that he was wondering why Akifumi still went to the pond every night. When he visits Akifumi to talk about it all, Akifumi explains how he really loved the Yukai and because of it, even when he couldn’t see her anymore he still missed her and wouldn’t marry, which is a bit excessive, but it is still very romantic. Though, through time he met a new woman in his life and after his wedding he plans on not going to the pond anymore. As Kiyo heard his story, she was happy that he at least wasn’t alone anymore. While Natsume is walking home, Kiyo decides to hold his hand, which another yukai has already done. Honestly, when it comes to Natsume and spirits, he can be quite the lady’s man! How is it even possible that he’s not popular at school?

Afterward, we get a more elaborated version of the story between Akifumi and Kiyo. It was so sad when you saw how Akifumi couldn’t see Kiyo anymore, she was standing right in front of him, but he didn’t see anything. I was almost in tears at this point, he called her Hotaru, which must have been her real name. The tragic relationship just continued as you realize how she still stayed by his side even though he couldn’t see her; this is just too romantic! Damn, when she started talking about how she really loved him, I was in tears! She ends up being a firefly turned spirit, but she decides to turn back into a bug so that she can let Akifumi see her one last time at the pond because once she turns back, she’s going to die. Though, she really wanted to have one last meet with him, but when she already left, Nyanko thought it was a good time to mention that a giant spirit in the pond may not eat humans, but it does eat fireflies. Natsume, the guy who always cares about everyone, of course tried to help, while Nyanko just thought it was pointless, but he still gave a helping hand anyway. The big spirit in the pond almost ate the Hotaru, but she ended up surviving thanks to the help of both Natsume and Nyanko.

Hotaru ended up finding Akifumi, with his wife-to-be and once he saw the firefly he knew right away that it was his Hotaru. I have got to give the series full credit for making a scene between a human and a firefly so romantic because it was such a beautiful scene. We end the episode with Natsume thinking for one last time that even after all the troubled days he had because of spirits, would he really be happy without them? He decides that even if he did lose his power to see spirits, he wouldn’t be that upset, but only because he would still get to keep all the memories he had already made with all the spirits he has met. This was once again an amazing episode, that was simply beautifully and also tearjerking. This episode was in a way more of a quiet episode, in the sense that it may have been dramatic, but it wasn’t anything suspenseful, which is exactly what I liked about it. I’m starting to wonder whether this series can honestly get any better. Although, the one thing I’m curious about is where this series is headed. I’m almost certain now that it’s only going to have 13 episodes, so it will definitely be interesting to see where it heads for the final episodes, my guess is that not much will happen at all. I think it might be more like an XXXholic Kei ending, which would be nice, but then just a copy form another series of course. The next episode seems good, I think it may actually have some evil spirits and apparently some really stuck up guy who thinks of himself as the best person in the world, I think Nyanko and him may be good friends.