KONOSUBA - God's blessing on this wonderful world! 2

Episode 3

With its 14th episode overall, KONOSUBA finally ventures into the one staple of fantasy RPGs that it has so far avoided: the dungeon crawl. The result is an episode that definitely isn't one of its funniest to date but shows some other surprising merits.

Since Megumin's EXPLOSION magic is not at all conducive to going underground, and Lalatina/Darkness is apparently still off somewhere getting forcibly dressed as a proper noblewoman, it falls to Kazuma and Aqua to explore the new part of a dungeon that has recently opened up. In a sense, this feels like a throwback to the early stages of the series where it was just the two of them trying to get by, and the interactions between them are as fun as ever, even though they fall into familiar patterns of Aqua being a ditz, Kazuma wanting to leave Aqua behind, but then practically crying to her for help when undead (which Aqua is supremely good at turning) keep popping up. The part with the mimic (one of the oldest of old-school fantasy RPG traps) was a real treat, and as a long-time gamer, I quite liked how they handled the monster visually.

However, the neatest part was the encounter with the lich at the end of the dungeon. I thought we were in for something silly based on his goofy appearance, but his story and reasons for drawing our heroes there were astonishingly sincere and touching. As an undead, he's unable to commit suicide, so he wanted to be destroyed via turning so that he could be with his dead-but-not-undead lover. Apparently, the passage to his location didn't just open up at random, it opened because he had finally sensed an archpriest in the area powerful enough to do the job – in other words, Aqua. Of course, Aqua's presence was also drawing the undead to them, revealing the too-good-to-be-true side of the coin. The episode rounds out with poor Chris once again being accidentally victimized.

I gotta say, I love what the production is doing right now with facial expressions. They may not be the prettiest-looking things, but each episode so far has sported a collection of great faces, and this one is no different. The musical choices have also been great, especially in the scene where Kazuma abandons Aqua in the dungeon. There's also little touches like the “no explosions” signs that can help sustain the series' laughs even through its lower points. Something definitely feels missing without Darkness around, but based on the next episode's title, she should be back in the mix next week. Even though this is a less raucous episode, there's still a lot to like and nothing to worry about.

Rating: B+

KONOSUBA - God's blessing on this wonderful world! 2 is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.