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Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?
Episode 4

by Rebecca Silverman,

The world of Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon continues to expand as this episode heads into territory not covered by the first novel, introducing a new god and two new races. Now that Bell's skills are so vastly improved from when we first met him, he wants to go ever deeper into the dungeon, something his guild contact, Eina the half-elf, isn't sure she feels good about. At first I thought that we were beginning to head into more serious harem territory when Eina asked Bell to go shopping with her, and while there still may be the implication that she likes Bell romantically, it's far more important to the plot at this point that she's worried about him because she likes him as a person. In her line of work, adventurers bite off more than they can chew all the time, resulting in serious injuries or death. Eina's clearly been at this long enough that she doesn't want to see it happen to Bell with his bright-eyed enthusiasm, so she's going to do what she can to help make sure it doesn't. Like Bell's relationship with Hestia, there's just a nice sense of caring to Eina's actions, and it's really a great bonus to the show that it is able to give us so many male/female relationships that are just based on caring rather than romance or lust. In fact, it's interesting to note that the one woman who has clear lusty feelings for Bell, the goddess Freya, is also being shown as the villain of the story. (And she's clearly up to something for next week.)

Eina's worry also surfaces in that she suggests that Bell find a supporter, someone to accompany him into the dungeon to take care of the loot-collecting and looking out while he dispatches the monsters. Bell stumbles onto one when he saves a small girl from a man who is inexplicably chasing her with a sword. (We can surmise why from her later actions.) Her name is Liliruca, and she's a chienthrope, or animal person, a member of the Soma Familia, and totally willing to be Bell's supporter. Naturally we should be suspicious of her, and the whys of that come clear quickly from what she does, but her familia appears to be part of that equation: when Eina hears that Bell's picked up a Soma Familia supporter, she grows concerned. They all seem desperate for some reason, and she, at least, can't figure out why.

Soma's inclusion in the story's world marks another Hindu deity, keeping the pantheons represented as Hindu, Greek, Norse, and Shinto. Soma is a difficult god with many representations (you can get a brief overview of him here), but generally speaking he's a moon god with his own special alcoholic representation. I'm not entirely sure why he would be so tricky in the story, but the fact that Lili is a chienthrope may indicate a moon/dog link (werewolves?), since the word combines the French word for “dog” with the Greek word for “man.” There's also the fact that before they see her ears and tail, most people assume Lili is a different race entirely, a prum, which appears to correspond with Dungeons and Dragons halflings – small, tricksterish thieves. I'm not convinced that the chienthrope appearance isn't some sort of disguise, since there's clearly a lot more going on with both Lili and the Soma Familia, adding a nice layer of mystery to the story going forward.

The main issue this episode is that we see very little actual action. While it is becoming clear that this a story that focuses more on Bell's relationships, it is still technically a fantasy adventure, and after last week's fight with the silverback, I was disappointed to see a grand total of one fight against giant ants that really wasn't all that impressive, although Bell's quick reaction against the man threatening Lili was good, albeit brief. Hopefully that will change next week when Freya launches her evil scheme...between her, Lili's trickery, and Hestia's jealousy, Bell may have his work cut out for him.

Rating: B

Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Rebecca Silverman is ANN's senior manga critic.


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