Inou-Battle wa Nichijou-kei no Naka de - Volume 6 - Chapter Aft

Afterword

This might seem random, but I’m the sort of person who never wants to meet their heroes if I can possibly help it. I genuinely never, ever want to encounter the cartoonists I love, the musicians I’m into, or the authors I respect in person.

Why? Simply put, I don’t want to be disillusioned. I would prefer for the people I admire to stay at a safe distance from me. I don’t want to hear a cartoonist I love explain that their story’s whole backstory was retconned in after the fact, and I don’t want to know that a singer I like autotunes their voice and can’t hold a tune in person. If I read an incredible book, I want to believe that its author is a total hunk, and I’ll go out of my way to avoid meeting them in order to maintain that belief.

On that note, the way it seems that idols, performers, creators, and artists are growing closer to their audiences lately just doesn’t do it for me. I’d prefer for the people on the other side of my TV screen to remain there, and I’d prefer for the people who feel like they exist in a realm far above me to not come down to my level. People who live in a different world from me can stay there, thank you very much.

That said, I realize that I might only feel that way because I’d rather run from the truth than face it. Perhaps I’m opting to force my own convenient assumptions on my heroes, to think they’re geniuses and claim that I’ll be their fan for life, stringing together platitudes and refusing to so much as consider that they’re operating in the same playing field as I am.

I wonder—is it just human nature to want the people you like to be perfect?

Anyway, that preamble’s gone on for long enough—hello! This is Kota Nozomi. This time around, I wrote about a topic I’ve been wanting to address for a very long time: Andou’s time in the eighth grade. This volume felt like something of a culmination of everything I’ve written so far, and I had a blast putting Andou through the agonies of struggling to reconcile fiction with reality and ideals with disillusionment. I also finally did it...I wrote an entire volume in which not even a single supernatural power gets used. This series’s title is starting to feel awfully inaccurate, all things considered.

Apropos of nothing, a major announcement:

When Supernatural Battles Became Commonplace will be receiving an anime adaptation!

I’m sure a lot of people are going to be surprised by this announcement, but trust me, I was definitely the most shocked of all to hear that an anime had been locked in. I mean, you have to consider that I learned about this quite a while ago! I was so tempted to spread the news around you wouldn’t believe it, and now I can finally shout it out from the hilltops.

The production will be handled by Studio TRIGGER, who are famous for their work on Kill la Kill. I’ve met with the production staff on a number of occasions, and I have to say that I’m incredibly grateful to them for the sheer depth of attention they’ve paid to my original work. We’ve had multiple exchanges where they were like “So, about this scene—is this what you meant when you wrote this part?” and I was like “Right, yeah... It was probably something along those lines...”

All sorts of information about the anime will be announced in the near future, I imagine, so please stay tuned! And while we’re on the subject, the manga adaptation’s first volume is scheduled to be released quite soon as well. Oh, and I doubt anyone really cares, but just in case: I got married the other day!

Now then, time for the acknowledgments.

First, to my editor: Thank you, as always, for your hard work! I’m sure it must be incredibly difficult to deal with multiple series under your watch getting anime adaptations at the same time, so do try not to overwork yourself, if possible. Next, to my illustrator, 029: Thank you once again for your wonderful drawings! I’m sure things are only going to get busier for us with the anime coming up, so let’s give it our all! Last, and most of all, I offer my utmost of gratitude to the readers who’ve stuck with me for six whole volumes.

May we meet again, if the fates allow it!

Kota Nozomi

Bonus Translation Notes: On Drama CDs, Part 1
In the previous volume’s translation notes, I dug into the many forms of non-novel media that the Supernatural Battles franchise spawned over the course of its run. One of the most intriguing items that I managed to find evidence of was a pair of drama CDs, and I promised to try to get ahold of them and write about them for a future TL notes section. Well, I’m pleased to report that the future is now, dear readers: I’ve managed to import the first Supernatural Battles drama CD and listen to it in its entirety, and I have all the details about what goes down in this all but mythical piece of side content!
Before I dig into the actual story, a little context: the CD was initially released in mid-May of 2013, which places it just a little while after volume three came out and over a year before the anime’s first episode aired. That second fact is the important one and explains one of the most interesting aspects of the CD: it does not feature the same cast of voice actors as the anime! I can’t even begin to speculate why the drama CD’s cast didn’t return for the adaptation, but the end result is us getting to see two very different takes on the cast, which I’ll discuss more later.
First, though, the question of the hour: what the heck is the drama CD about? The answer, it turns out, is very simple: it’s, uh...well, it’s basically just volume one. There are seven tracks, the first of which uses the “sparring in Chifuyu’s wasteland” scene as a cold open, and then the remaining six are an abridged rendition of volume one’s major scenes. The whole thing clocks in at a little over an hour, and there aren’t any major additions or alterations to the story—most of the narration and dialogue are pulled directly from the source material.
So, yeah—a bit of an anticlimax, from a certain perspective, but on the other hand, it’s also kind of good news! It means, after all, that there’s precisely zero exclusive content in the CD, story-wise. You could skip it entirely and miss literally nothing whatsoever in terms of the series’ overall plot, and considering how hard it is to get your hands on the stupid thing, the odds are pretty good that most readers will, unfortunately, have no choice in the matter.
A total lack of new story content, however, doesn’t mean that there’s nothing interesting to discuss regarding the CD. In other words, it’s time to swing back to that line of thought I set up three paragraphs back: the cast. Oh, boy, the cast! Most of the voice actors who played a role in the drama CD offered a very different take on their character than their anime counterparts, and I thought I’d take the rest of this section to go through the list and give my own takes on what makes their performances so interesting.
Let’s start with the character who gets far and away the most speaking time on account of him reading most of the narration: Andou! In the anime, Andou was portrayed by Okamoto Nobuhiko, who gave him a fantastic degree of manic chuuni energy that sold his role in the cast super well. Drama CD Andou, however, was voiced by Miyano Mamoru, a voice actor known recently for his role as Mario Mario in the Mario movie, as well as a few other past roles that nobody really talks about. Y’know, Yagami Light from Death Note, Okabe Rintaro from Steins;Gate, JJ from Yuri!!! on Ice, Lin from Fullmetal Alchemist, Kida from Durarara!!, the producer guy from Zombieland Saga—obscure characters who aren’t at all universally iconic.
...So, yeah, they got an industry legend to play Andou, and dang does he ever kill the role! It’s no surprise whatsoever that Miyano can do chuuni excess very, very well—after all, he’d just played the main character of Steins;Gate in 2009, and again for its anime adaptation in 2011 (put a pin in that, we’ll be coming back to it in a minute). Nobody can shout hyperdramatic nonsense and make it sound both completely absurd and completely sincere quite like him, and he wields that skill to incredible effect here.
What I find really remarkable about Miyano’s portrayal of Andou, though—and what sets him apart from Okamoto’s portrayal, which nails the chuuni element as well—is how much more grounded Miyano’s Andou comes across for large portions of his focus time. Part of that, I think, is on account of how much more narrating Miyano had to do than Okamoto. We see into Andou’s thought process much more directly in the drama CD format, so we have way more opportunities to hear him speak without his chuuni persona obfuscating his thoughtful side. It lends a really different air to his character overall, and it makes it evident that he is much more considerate than his behavior suggests a lot sooner than in the anime. That’s not criticism, by the way—the anime’s pacing benefits greatly from Andou just looking like a pure goofball at first and developing depth as time goes on—but it really makes me wish we could’ve seen Miyano’s take on some of the later, more dramatic content in the series.
Moving right along, up next is Tomoyo, who was played by Yamazaki Haruka in the anime and Imai Asami in the drama CD! Imai’s another industry veteran who’s played a ton of roles, but my attention was instantly drawn to one role in particular when I learned she’d been cast as Tomoyo: Makise Kurisu from Steins;Gate. That’s right—they actually cast Okabe as Andou and Kurisu as Tomoyo, and nothing will ever be able to convince me that they didn’t do it on purpose. That being said, Imai isn’t really channeling Kurisu in her portrayal of Tomoyo any more so than Miyano channels Okabe. They have great chemistry in their verbal sparring matches, unsurprisingly, but they also don’t recycle the Steins;Gate dynamic at all.
As for how Imai sounds as Tomoyo, I struggle to describe how her portrayal contrasts with Yamazaki’s because they actually both went with very similar takes on the character! Imai maybe comes across as a little less shouty-fed up and a little more calm-fed up than Yamazaki sometimes, but all things considered, their performances hit remarkably similar beats in a lot of ways.
Now, a character who doesn’t hit similar beats—like, at all—is Hatoko. Hayami Saori’s performance as Hatoko is downright iconic (thanks in no small part to a certain rant), so taking on the character was going to be a tall order no matter how you sliced it, but honestly, Kanemoto Hisako’s Hatoko is so different from Hayami’s Hatoko that I don’t even know where to start comparing them. Kanemoto’s Hatoko has a much higher-pitched voice, to start, and sounds...well, for lack of a better descriptor, much more teenager than Hayami’s distinctively gentle, spacy tone. It’s kind of remarkable how different her character feels as a result of that shift—I like it a lot, but wow, was it a shock at first!
Sayumi comes across very differently as well, in a somewhat similar way. Taneda Risa gave anime Sayumi a very confident, in-control sort of tone, whereas Hara Yumi’s drama CD Sayumi comes across as much more quiet and reserved. Where Taneda’s Sayumi felt somewhat domineering (i.e. when she punishes Andou for his antics), Hara’s Sayumi feels much more matter-of-fact. It’s a subtle shift for the character, but one that does a lot to change how she comes across!
Last but not least, Chifuyu! This is another case where the anime and drama CD portrayals hit very similar marks. Yamashita Nanami’s anime Chifuyu is maybe a little more monotone while Kugimiya Rie’s drama CD Chifuyu is somewhat more quiet and whispery, but overall, I’d call them quite similar—though the fact that she has the least dialogue out of the main cast might play a factor in why I don’t have quite as much to say about her.
Okay, I’m almost out of space, so lightning round time for the rest of the cast: Asumi Kana’s Kudou feels a little calmer and less angry when she’s in incognito mode, and a little more panicked and pathetic when everything goes south for her, Seki Tomokazu plays a surprisingly restrained Kiryuu, and Leatia’s barely in it, but Otsubo Yuka does a good job sounding adequately exhausted with Kiryuu for the few lines she’s given!
And, that’s that for the drama CD! It’s a really interesting piece of series history, and if you ever get the chance, I’d definitely recommend tracking it down and giving it a listen, but rest assured that if you can’t, you’re not missing any vitally important content. That being said, you might recall I said there were two drama CDs...but since the second one came packaged with volume ten, I’ll be waiting to cover it until then. Instead, you can tune in next time for a discussion of the anime adaptation, assuming I haven’t decided to write something different by the time I have to get that note section done. In the meantime, we have a lot of references to cover this volume, so let’s get right to it!

Chapter 1
? Mencius’s belief in the fundamental good of humanity!
Mencius was a Chinese philosopher who was prominent in the fourth century BC. Andou does a pretty nice job of going over the general gist of his fundamental good theory, so I won’t dig too deep into the details thereof, but it is worth noting that said theory—and Mencius’s work in general—was both heavily informed by and important to the development of Confucian philosophy.

? Xunzi’s belief that human nature is evil!
Xunzi was one of Mencius’s younger contemporaries, having been born around sixty years after him. Again, Andou covers the broad strokes of his theory pretty decently, and again, his work fell under the umbrella of Confucianism.

? Socrates’s concept of knowing that you know nothing!
Socrates was a Greek philosopher who lived and worked just about a century before Mencius. Technically speaking, the concept in question comes from Plato’s account of Socrates, rather than Socrates himself. There’s a lot of debate regarding the precise phrasing, and sometimes it’s referred to as a paradox, but it seems fairly generally accepted that the point of the concept is to emphasize the importance of acknowledging and accepting your own ignorance.

? Plato’s theory of forms!
Plato was another Greek philosopher, and one of Socrates’s students. The theory of forms, meanwhile, is frankly a pretty esoteric philosophical theory that digs into the essence of reality itself, seeking to explain the physical world through ideal, fundamental concepts (or rather, forms). This one’s way too complex to sum up in a single paragraph, but it’s fascinating to read up on if you’re ever in the mood to wrap your head around something pretty philosophically challenging.

? Hobbes’s Leviathan!
We’re jumping ahead almost two millennia here, since Thomas Hobbes was an Englishman who lived in the seventeenth century. Unlike Andou’s previous allusions, Leviathan is a specific book rather than a broad theory or philosophy. That said, it’s very much a book that ties in to both! More specifically, it’s a fundamental text of social contract theory, which is all about how states function and derive power over individuals.

? Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra!
We’re moving ahead another hundred or so years here! Friedrich Nietzsche lived in the nineteenth century and is largely associated with nihilist philosophy. Thus Spoke Zarathustra is a work of philosophical fiction that Nietzche wrote that focuses on a hermit named, well, Zarathustra, who has a lot of ideas that he shares with a lot of people, among which is the ever-famous “God is dead.”

? Descartes’s principle of cogito, ergo sum: I think, therefore I am!
And now we’re going back in time to the seventeenth century! René Descartes was a French philosopher and scientist who is perhaps one of the most influential western philosophers of all time, having established concepts and ideas that are studied to this day. “I think, therefore I am” is a particularly famous and significant concept that many other philosophical theories rest upon, asserting that the thinker’s ability to question their existence is, in and of itself, proof that they do, in fact, exist.

? The famed eighteenth-century German literary movement: Sturm und Drang!
The Sturm und Drang movement did indeed occur in eighteenth-century Germany, and it involved a number of significant philosophical figures producing works of music and literature that expressed their ideas. The nature of those ideas is varied and complicated, but it boils down to a reaction against the Enlightenment-age philosophy that had been prominent in Europe for quite some time beforehand.

? That’s how they use it in KochiKame, and that’s gotta be worth something...
Oh thank goodness, this one’s from an anime! Well, a manga, originally—KochiKame was an extraordinarily long-running series in Shonen Jump, written by Osamu Akimoto. The series revolves around Ryotsu Kankichi, a police officer in Tokyo, and the various high jinks he gets up to. It was also something of an institution, running from 1976 to 2016, which makes it the longest continuously running manga in history and the third longest by volume count, clocking in at a total of 201 volumes (for context, One Piece is at 104 and counting).

? I just did a tiny bit of research into it after Nyaruko made me curious, honestly.
We’ve covered Nyaruko before, but that was way back in volume two, and it bears brief repeating because of how absurd it is: Nyaruko: Crawling with Love is a light novel series that portrays the various horrific, mind-melting eldritch entities of the Cthulhu mythos as cute anime waifus. It’s worth noting that the works of Lovecraft are actually quite popular in Japan, with the Call of Cthulhu tabletop RPG in particular being very well-known and widely played (and is one of the primary sources that informs Nyaruko’s humor).

? “The avatar of chuunibyou,” I repeated. Y’know, that actually has a kinda nice ring to it. Feels like it could play a mean game of Hyperdimensional Soccer.
In this particular instance, “avatar” is being used in the Inazuma Eleven sense of the word! Inazuma Eleven originated as a soccer video game created by Level-5 (of Yokai Watch, Professor Layton, and Dark Cloud fame), and it quickly became popular enough to grow into an entire media franchise in its own right. The games are cartoony and over the top, as perhaps best exemplified by the avatars themselves—introduced in Inazuma Eleven GO for the Nintendo 3DS, they can more or less be described as soccer Stands (see the past several volumes’ worth of JoJo references for context on that comparison). Hyperdimensional Soccer, meanwhile, is a term reportedly first coined in the franchise’s first anime adaptation. It’s worth noting that while only one of the games in the series (the original Inazuma Eleven) has been released in the United States, almost all of them have been brought out to the UK.

Chapter 2
? So hey, Sayumi—how long did you believe in Santa Claus for?
Given the specific phrasing, this is almost certainly a deliberate shoutout to the opening line of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, an incredibly influential light novel series by Tanigawa Nagaru that was adapted into an equally influential anime by Kyoto Animation. The first book in the series opens with the main character discussing the very question that Andou asks (and dismissing it as a question so worthless it would never even come up in idle small talk).

? Gregor Samsa may have woken up one morning to the sudden realization that he’d transformed into a monstrous insect...
Gregor Samsa is the unfortunate protagonist of Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, who does indeed wake up to find that he’s turned into an abomination for seemingly no reason! Spoilers: it doesn’t end well for him.

? I knew that Araki Hirohiko wasn’t a wielder of the Ripple, and I was aware that Kubo Tite and KBTIT were not, in fact, the same person.
These two seemingly obvious fun facts are in reference to the meme culture surrounding the creators of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure and Bleach, respectively! The creator of JoJo, Araki Hirohiko, is notoriously ageless. You’d never think he was sixty just looking at him, and since wielders of Hamon in JoJo age at a slower rate than most people, the jokes more or less write themselves.
The Kubo Tite and KBTIT connection, meanwhile, is a little more elaborate. Kubo Tite is the author of Bleach, while KBTIT is the commonly used fan nickname for a gay porn star (stage name Takuya) whose work was appropriated for meme purposes in the mid- to late-2000s on Japanese forums. The two men share a somewhat striking resemblance to each other, and the meme that they were, in fact, the same person is what earned KBTIT his popular nickname.

? I knew that Luffy and Krillin were voiced by the same person—same for Usopp, L, and Feitan; Toriko and Nube; Gin, Joseph, and Switch; and plenty of others.
These are all entirely true! Luffy (One Piece) and Krillin (Dragon Ball) are both voiced by Tanaka Mayumi; Usopp (One Piece), L (Death Note), and Feitan (Hunter x Hunter) are voiced by Yamaguchi Kappei; Toriko (Toriko) and Nube (Hell Teacher Nube) are voiced by Okiayu Ryoutaro; and Gin (Gintama), Joseph (JoJo), and Switch (Sket Dance) are voiced by Sugita Tomokazu (one of my personal all-time favorite voice actors!).

? I was just doing some solo Danganronpa role-playing over here, that’s all.
Danganronpa is a series of video games that revolve primarily around investigating and solving murders that occur under extremely weird and wacky circumstances! The games involve extended trials and interrogations, and several of Sagami’s lines during this sequence are directly quoting things that the characters shout during those sequences.

? And he’s pulling his background music from the Legal High soundtrack.
Legal High is a popular legal drama that was originally broadcast from 2012 to 2013. If you want to hear the theme song that Sagami’s humming here, a google search for “Legal High Yuki Hayashi” (Yuki Hayashi being the song’s composer) will pull it right up (and you should—frankly, it’s kind of a bop).

? This isn’t a Bugs Bunny sketch!
This is one of the relatively rare jokes that had to be significantly adapted for the sake of comprehensibility! In the original Japanese, Andou refers to Dachou Club, a three-person comedy group well-known for a routine in which two members trick the third into volunteering for an undesirable task. Since Dachou Club are entirely unknown outside of Japan and information on them in general is scarce, let alone information on their classic routines, an equivalent was needed. Thankfully, Looney Tunes happened to make use of an almost identical comedic bit with some regularity that slotted in perfectly to the context of the scene and even hit a similar “referencing a comedic but slightly dated TV show that most people would be familiar with” sort of tone.

? Kakashi once questioned whether there’s anything duller than listening to someone else brag...
That would be Kakashi the Naruto character, of course, and the line in question occurs quite early on in the series, in chapter 26.

? I think she probably would’ve picked a fight with Hanma Yuujirou himself if he’d decided to pick on Sagami.
Hanma Yuujirou is the antagonist of Baki, in which he’s referred to as “the strongest creature on earth.” In other words: not a guy you’d want to fight!

Chapter 3
? That would be because the singer’s a Vocaloid.
In this context, “Vocaloid” refers to the characters who personify the Vocaloid voice synthesis program! Essentially, the program allows its users to use voice samples to synthesize an artificial lyrical track for music. Each version of the program has an avatar that represents it, the most famous by far being Hatsune Miku, and a whole subculture of music and media has risen up around the software and its avatars since the release of Vocaloid 2 (the version that introduced Miku) in 2007.

? Sagami suggested that we start things off by all playing a round of Idolmaster...
The Idolmaster (sometimes stylized as THE iDOLM@STER) franchise is a series of simulation and rhythm games that kicked off an enormous multimedia franchise that continues to this day! Broadly speaking, the franchise revolves around the player (or protagonist) training a group of pop idols in an effort to raise them to superstardom. The very first version of the game was released as an arcade machine in 2005, and though home console versions came not long after, it maintained a presence in arcades for quite some time.

? And that’s the mindset of a man who’s about to lose his shirt at a pachinko parlor.
Pachinko is an extremely popular and omnipresent game in Japan, and pachinko parlors are facilities set up exclusively for the purpose of playing it. The game itself is sort of an odd mixture of pinball and slot machines, with the goal being to send small metal balls into particular holes in a vertical pegboard. Modern pachinko machines are loud, flashy, elaborately designed, and often based on licensed media properties.
It’s hard to overstate the popularity of pachinko, which ties directly into the idea of how one would lose their shirt at what’s ostensibly just a game: pachinko is often considered a form of gambling that falls into a legal gray area. While gambling for real money is illegal in Japan, pachinko parlors ostensibly do not pay out in actual money—or at least, not within the premises of the parlors themselves. It’s an open secret that the “prizes” the parlors offer can be exchanged for cash at a nearby, supposedly separate business, and that loophole has led to the game gaining a dominant degree of popularity and becoming a symbol of gambling addiction across the nation.

? “Maybe I should approach the situation from another angle... Maybe I should pretend to let it have my money!”
This line echoes a piece of advice given to Jonathon Joestar by his father in the early chapters of JoJo (though in that context, he was referring to a dog rather than a crane game).

? Juu’s putting on a performance worthy of Tatsuya Fujiwara!
Tatsuya Fujiwara is an actor, known among other things for playing Yagami Light in the live-action Death Note adaptations and Kaiji in the Kaiji films. As one familiar with those characters might imagine, he did an awful lot of screaming in those roles and seems to have developed a bit of a reputation for it, at least circa this novel’s release.

? He’s gone on a binge! Jurai’s binged his way through four thousand yen! Jurai’s filled with regret!
These lines are very closely paraphrasing lines of narration from Kaiji, a manga by Fukumoto Nobuyuki revolving around a deadbeat gambling addict who ends up drowning in debt and being forced to participate in incredibly high-stakes gambles, often with his life on the line. Kaiji is prone to bouts of self-destructive indulgence, and this line occurs after he’s tempted into spending money he can’t afford to lose on food he doesn’t need.

? In this world, the weak are the sustenance of the strong. The strong live. The weak die...
As Sagami notes, Andou’s quoting Shishio Makoto here, an antagonist from Rurouni Kenshin (who was also played by Tatsuya Fujiwara in the series’ live-action adaptation).

? Phew! I feel better.
Back to JoJo! Andou’s quoting Esidisi, one of the villains from Part 2 who at one point throws a screaming, sobbing fit after a minor setback in a battle. Note that only Part 4 of JoJo has received a live-action adaptation, which Tatsuya Fujiwara did not have a role in.

?  I see it now—that flimsy claw is shaped like something designed to take lives...
We’re back to Bleach this time! Andou’s quoting Hisagi Shuhei here, who describes his zanpakuto (a shinigami’s signature weapon) in essentially these same terms.

? I’m gonna hit up the Vocaloid game before we go.
Sagami’s referring to the Project Diva franchise here, a series of rhythm games notable for featuring exclusively Vocaloid music. The first version of the game came out on the PSP in 2009, and the arcade version followed it a year later.

? Guess I’m dealing with a scissor blade or something.
The scissor blade is an iconic weapon in the anime Kill la Kill! It does indeed look like it has a double-bladed edge, at a glance, but being one half of a pair of scissors, it’s really just single-edged. This reference is especially notable given that the studio that created Kill la Kill, Studio TRIGGER, was also responsible for the anime adaptation of this very series!

Chapter 4
?  I’m talking, like, a full-on Veau Shot trajectory!
The Veau Shot is one of Sanji’s special moves in One Piece! Most of Sanji’s attacks (most of which are kicks) are named after food, cooking techniques, or just random French words.

? I’m not Zura, I’m Jurai!
Andou’s shouting out a running gag in Gintama here, in which a character named Katsura is regularly referred to as “Zura” and never fails to correct the mistake. In Japanese, “katsura” and “zura” are both words for wig, with the latter being a little more colloquial.

? This would fetch a good hundred thousand yen if you threw it up on Yahoo Auctions!
Yahoo Auctions is more or less the Japanese equivalent of eBay. The service used to exist in a variety of countries, but it never really caught on in most parts of the world. The Japanese branch is one of the only ones that’s stood the test of time, and it’s still widely used to this day.

Chapter 6
? No, no, this isn’t the end! Not by a long shot!
Andou’s directly quoting a gag from Dragon Ball in this line! In the original context, it’s said by Master Roshi in a cutaway panel right at the end of the Piccolo arc—in other words, shortly before the beginning of Dragon Ball Z, by American standards for the series’ progression.

Chapter 7
? After all, what’s yours is mine, and what’s mine is mine too!
The “Gian” that Andou attributes this line to is specifically the Gian from Doraemon! Gian, real name Gouda Takeshi, is the sometimes friend and sometimes bully of the series’ main character, Nobita. ‘What’s yours is mine and what’s mine is mine’ is one of his most famous lines, and it more or less sums his character up.

? ...if he’d made a Neo Armstrong Cyclone Jet Armstrong Cannon...
This is a reference to another Gintama gag, in which a few characters make a conspicuously phallic snow sculpture that they identify as the “Neo Armstrong Cyclone Jet Armstrong Cannon,” sending one of the other characters into conniptions as one character after another shows up and immediately identifies it by its full name.

? Winter’s not ghost season by any stretch of the imagination!
This is an interesting point of cultural contrast! In Japan, summer is traditionally the season for ghost stories and spooky stuff. The most reasonable explanation for that association I’ve heard theorized is that it’s on account of the Obon period taking place in late summer. Since Obon traditionally involves the spirits of people’s departed ancestors returning home for a period of time, it makes a certain amount of sense that it could’ve led to the season on the whole being associated with ghosts.

? Even Onoda Sakamichi himself would give up and take the train to Akihabara under these conditions!
Onoda Sakamichi is the protagonist of the bicycle racing manga Yowamushi Pedal, written by Watanabe Wataru. A big part of Onoda’s shtick is that he’s a huge nerd who loves going to Akihabara, but he doesn’t have much spending money and chooses to regularly bike a preposterous distance to get there instead of taking the train. In the process, he inadvertently trains himself to be a remarkably capable bicyclist.

? Actually, make that a mounted Double-Edge...
Tackle and Double-Edge are both attacks in Pokemon. Specifically, Double-Edge is an attack that hurts both the target and the attacker.

? I’m not a cat, though.
Andou’s referencing I Am a Cat, a very well-known novel by Natsume Souseki. The novel’s first line—“I am a cat; but as yet I have no name”—is extremely famous in Japan and is constantly quoted and riffed on in all sorts of media.

? Hearing three Vs in a row took me right back to Valvrave for a second there.
Valvrave the Liberator was a mecha anime produced by studio Sunrise that aired in 2013! The series has something of a reputation for its over-the-top nature—there aren’t that many mecha shows out there that feature body-swapping space vampires and a teenage superspy named L-elf as their main characters, after all.

? Nobody beats Softbank when it comes to phone plans!
Softbank is one of those ultramassive Japanese conglomerates that has their fingers in a little bit of everything! Telecommunications are its bread and butter—hence Tomoyo’s mom talking about their phone plans—but relative to these notes, it’s most notable for its subsidiary company SB Creative, which runs the GA Bunko imprint, which published—among many other series—When Supernatural Battles Became Commonplace. In other words, the whole Softbank sequence was Tomoyo’s mother breaking the fourth wall to plug the parent company of the book’s publisher.

Phew—that’s finally all of them! See you in the next volume’s TL notes, where I’ll finally be digging into Supernatural Battles’s anime adaptation and discussing all the things that make it interesting!

-Tristan Hill