Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatte Iru - Volume 6.5 - Chapter Aft

Afterword

Good evening once again, this is Wataru Watari! Wait, not like this! Please put up with all those antics as well (after all, I’m Wataru Watari)!

The season is now summer!

I’m sure you’re all enjoying the season and thinking, Hey, it’s summer! I’m doin’ good, just like summer praying mantises, but I’m working. Don’t get close to me…

Now then, though this book is set in autumn before jumping to the Christmas season, this volume of My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected consists of the prelude to the latter part of the series, and then a half-time break during that latter part.

The publication timing of the volumes numbered x.5 are all over the place, so if that makes it hard to understand, I’m very sorry to all readers who are reading it in publication order.

Truly, I’m sorry for lots of things.

Okay, so about the sports festival story in Volume 6.5 here—it’s been improved and revised based on the story that we wrote behind the scenes for the TV anime extra number one.

With the anime, there are time restrictions and visual considerations to take into account when they adopt content and put together the scenario, but behind the scenes, we were working on something like this.

There are unseen parts to everything, not just this one story. It’s very common that you’ll just take the parts that are well-done and pretty to show to others. Even if you do get a peek behind the curtain, you may find an abyss.

This is also something that can be said about characters, too. In particular, since this series is written in first person from Hachiman Hikigaya’s perspective, his depictions change with his values as time passes. Depending on his degree of understanding, his portrayals will change. Whether that will be digging too deep into the hidden side of things or piling up a mountain of mistaken beliefs will be up to him, but whatever the case, I think he may not give a one-sided portrayal. Although it’s often the one looking who decides which side is the surface and which is the reverse.

Now then, since everything has a reverse side—a hidden side—of course even Wataru Watari has a hidden side. Normally, I’m just putting on this nonchalant face as I carefully ensure you only see a flawless version of me, you know… Huh? I don’t look flawless at all? For real? Crap. Oh crap. If even this flawless Wataru Watari that I’m normally showing doesn’t look flawless, then oh crap.

Well, not everyone who’s dirty behind the scenes is clean on the surface.

The fact is that Wataru Watari also has a heck of a lot going on, behind the scenes…

For example, behind the scenes of My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected, I’ve been steadily working on a new series! (Shameless plug.)

And so Wataru Watari’s new book is going to be published by Shogakukan Gagaga Bunko, and I’m presently hard at work getting that ready. So before anyone can be like We don’t care; hurry up and get the next volume out, or I’ll kick your butt, you useless piece of junk! I am also working super-hard on the new volume of Youth Romantic Comedy. I think new information about it will probably be available around New Year’s. For example, information about an extension or something like that! So I would be glad if you would check later for further news.

Work makes more work, and the spiral continues, but I’ll try to do my best. Man, I have way too much work, so I’ve been thinking about my life, wondering what I should do and if I should get some advice, but then this would turn into an ad for the life-advice TV anime Jinsei (Life), which will start airing in July on Tokyo MX and others, so I won’t. It’d bug me to do anything for Kawagishi-san, its author.

So this has been Volume 6.5 of My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected.

And the following acknowledgments…

Holy Ponkan : I never thought the day would come when Kawa-something would be on the cover… I never would have expected such rapid progress back when I was writing Volume 2, and having conversations with my editor, Hoshino, like, “This girl will show up in later volumes, right?” “No, she won’t…” “I see… But she will show up, right?” “No, she won’t…” “Oh-ho, I see… But—” “No.” Your wonderful cover illustration has touched me so deeply, I can’t stop crying. The cover of the special edition and internal illustrations were also the best! Thank you so much.

To my editor, Hoshino: I never thought the day would come when Kawa-something would be on the cover… Now I can say thank you for sticking to it, that time. Thanks to you, I reconsidered and thought, Maybe this character is actually important… Sorry for doubting. At the time, I thought, It’s just that she’s your type, huh? This is why I can’t stand people from Yokosuka… Hey, there’ll be plenty of room for Kawasaki to show up next time! Ga-ha-ha!

To all the cast: Thank you very much for your efforts in recording the drama CD. I’m very sorry for writing hopeless scripts every time. The recording was about a year after the lines for the anime were recorded, but all your performances were even better than last time; thank you so much. I’m very much looking forward to seeing you for the second season of the anime. It’ll be great to work with you again.

All right, so this is about where I’ll lay down my pencil. Next time, let’s meet in Volume 10 of My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected.

A certain day in June, in a lukewarm breeze, while drinking a lukewarm MAX Coffee,

Wataru Watari

Translation Notes

Chapter 1 … Yet again, Shizuka Hiratsuka gives new orders.

1 “Ugh, what’s me minus me? I guess zero, which also just so happens to be the number of school events where I’ve been part of the group. Incredible.” In the original Japanese, Hachiman uses ore (meaning “I”) and puns it with au lait, as in café au lait, and then says, “If you were to soak me in milk and eat me, I’d probably taste good.” There is a popular brand of café-au-lait-flavored wafers with black-and-white packaging.

2 “It’s already at climax from the moment you start drinking it.” This is a reference to a line from the protagonist of Kamen Rider Den-O, who says, “I’m at a climax from start to finish!”

3 “But after every max must come a fall—people like me falling over themselves get more.” In the original, Hachiman calls MAX Coffee a deochi, a gag where just the appearance of someone or something is funny. This doubles as a pun, as ochi (punch line) can also mean “fall.”

4 “You know, there’s something lewd about the word laptop. Sounds like something that would go on at a shady cabaret club.” In Japanese, Hachiman compares the visual similarities of the word nopaso (the abbreviation of “notebook personal computer”) and nopan (no panties). The katakana syllables for n and so look similar.

5 “Normally, Miss Hiratsuka is kind of blunt, or, like, bludgeoning, blasting, or a Blastasaur…” Blastasaur Squadron Rampage Ranger is the twenty-seventh production of the Super Sentai television series, with footage used in the Americanized Power Rangers Dino Thunder.

6 “Um…from someone with the alias Homoo… That’s a weird emote.” Homoo, spelled with a dragged-out vowel, refers to a popular emoji of a slash shipper prowling around seeking BL.  

7 “While I was zoning out in a rather pleasant mood, watching their YuruYuri relationship…” YuruYuri is the name of a yuri gag manga. The yuru here means “gentle” or “relaxed.”

8 “Shippable? Is she going to send us somewhere?” In Japanese, Hachiman said, “I couldn’t tell if the word inappropriate [futekisetsu, spelled with the “rotten” character from fujoshi, meaning “slash fangirl”] was a typo or not.”

9 “And why’d she bring up HxH? What does Hunter X Hunter have to do with this?” Japanese ships are rendered with an x, where English-speaking fandom more often uses a slash. Hunter X Hunter is a battle manga by Yoshihiro Togashi.

10 “Talk about a certain sudden plot twist for these boys…” This is a play on the title of A Certain Scientific Railgun, a light-novel and anime series.

11 “I slammed the Enter key with a SMASH…” Hachiman is again referencing a Jigoku no Misawa (Misawa from Hell) comic about people doing annoying things.

12 “A straight one-game match! Producer! Geez, talk about a head-on fight—are you Cure March or something?” “A straight one-game match” is a quote from idol singer Sayaka Yamamoto’s song “Kassai,” the context being, she wants to live life like that. The “Producer!” call is an Idolmaster reference (the player character is referred to as the Producer), while Cure March is a character from Smile Pretty Cure!, who, during her transformations sequence, cries out, “Let’s fight with courage, head-on! Cure March!”

Chapter 2 … We meet Meguri Shiromeguri once more.

1 “What is this, the daimyo paying their respects on the way out of Edo?” The Japanese here says sankin kotai, part of the system of governance in Japan during the Edo period, in which provincial lords were required to serve two years in Edo (now Tokyo, the home of the shogunate) before being allowed to return home.

2 “At this rate, we’d be starting a band soon.” This is a reference to the series K-On!, which is about a group of girls who drink a lot of tea and occasionally play music as part of a band.

3 Nure-senbei means “wet senbei.” Senbei are usually crunchy like crackers, but nure-senbei are dipped in soy sauce in the production process, so they remain moist and chewy.

4 “Rice and soy sauce are the dreeeeeam (dream) collaboration.  ” This line is from the K-On! song “Gohan wa Okazu” (Rice is a flavor food).

5 “…when you don’t even have enough to do the fan.” The “fan” is a formation where you have a line of people holding hands. The people in the middle stand straight, while those on the side lean out at increasing angles to make a fan shape.

6 “I had about eighty thousand mental Hachimans in my brain agreeing with me…” Hachiman sounds just like “eighty thousand” in Japanese.

7 “Girls don’t do gymnastics formations…” This is actually no longer true, and at most schools, girls also do group gymnastics, possibly due to the influence of Western-style cheerleading. However, it was probably the case when Watari was in school.

8 “A name you don’t want to be called? Just like the emperor.” Traditionally speaking, such as for emperors, a personal name (imina) is not used after death, and they’re referred to instead by a posthumous name (okurina).

9 “In my head, I imagined a youkai that was just an eyeball running around yelling in a shrill voice.” Hachiman is referring to Medama-oyaji, a youkai and a character from the classic manga Gegege no Kitaro. “Hair that sticks up like an antenna” is also a characteristic of the protagonist, Kitaro.

10 “A cosprace… That does sound familiar…, or so I thought, but was that Comp Ace?” Comp Ace is a manga serialization magazine published by Kadokawa. It’s most well-known for running Type-Moon manga spin-offs.

11 “Is she an idol or something? Is she gonna dig a hole to bury herself in?” This references a dialogue conversation with the character Yukiho in the Idolmaster series, where she talks about digging a hole to bury herself in. It’s typical for idol stars to have blogs to share with their fans.

12 “…if you asked me how to spell ‘icup,’ I’d answer perfectly and get laughed at.” Originally, this was “…if you asked me ‘What’s glove backward?’ I’d answer perfectly and get whacked six times.” In Japanese, “glove” is tebukuro; backward, this is rokubute (“hit me six times”).

13 “How beautiful it is to have good friends” refers to the name of a famous 1951 painting of vegetables by Saneatsu Mushanokoji, an artist and writer from the Taisho and Showa eras.

14 “It’s the same as the king in Uptaten Towers in DQV, or the lady presenter in a sentai stage show. You have to answer here, or you’ll get stuck in a never-ending loop.” In Dragon Quest V’s Uptaten Towers section, you have to give the answer the game wants in order to proceed. The presenters at sentai stage shows are stereotypically attractive young women who prompt call-and-response from the audience to get them hyped up.

Chapter 3 … Just as he figured, Minami Sagami hasn’t changed.

1 “Is this Houbunsha? Is this Manga Time something-or-other?” Manga Time Kirara, published by Houbunsha, is a yuri magazine.

2 The Decameron is a collection of novellas by the Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio, written in the fourteenth century. Botticelli is an Italian painter who lived about a century after Boccaccio. “Chim Chim Cher-ee” is the name of the chimney sweep’s song in Mary Poppins. Cherry Boy (what Ooka is being called) is slang for “virgin.” Essentially, these are all just similar-sounding words, and the students are giving joke suggestions.

3 “Magical banana” is a rather dated name for basically a word-association game. You start off with banana, and so someone follows up with yellow, and that might lead to another color, etc.

4 “Not Nekomimi Mode.” “Nekomimi Mode” is the OP for Tsukuyomi: Moon Phase, about a vampire girl and involving cat ears.

5 Shinran (AD 1173–1263) was a Buddhist monk and the founder of the Joudo Shinshuu sect of Buddhism. This school preaches reliance on another power—that is to say, relying on the Amitabha Buddha, rather than engaging in specific acts.

6 Zazamushi are aquatic insect larvae, and Ebina’s mistake is a play on Zaimokuza’s name.

7 Ebi sushi is shrimp sushi and, in this case, Zaimokuza’s way of joking about Ebina’s name.

Chapter 4 … Haruno Yukinoshita continues to test them until the last.

1 “Perhaps this is what communicating with the Ohmu feels like…” Hachiman is referring to the giant bug creatures the heroine communicates with in Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind.

2 “…creaking like Musubi or something.” Musubi is a character in the bleak classic war manga Barefoot Gen. Hachiman is most certainly talking about a particular meme that features Musubi with a syringe of meth looking particularly tense and strung out, trembling and sweating everywhere.

3 “Hogeeeeeeee!” is the common cry of the protagonist of Kochira Katsushika-ku Kameari Kouen Mae Hashutsujo (This is the police station in front of Kameari Park in Katsushika Ward), colloquially referred to as Kochikame, the two-hundred-volume-long Shonen Jump comedy series.

4 “Captain Sakura and a storm of dramatic adventure” is the Japanese tagline for the Sakura Wars game series.

5 “Maybe this is not in fact Hina Ebina, but Vigna Ghina?” Vigna Ghina is a mobile suit from Gundam F91. It sounds slightly more like Ebina Hina in Japanese: Bigina Gina.

6 “It was super-effective,” of course, is a Pokémon reference, and in Japanese, it’s spelled out all in hiragana like the Pokémon games write it (to make them easy for children to read).

7 “…I was justice all along…” “I Am Justice! Juspion” is the opening theme for the 1980s tokusatsu show Kyojuu Tokusou Juspion (Megabeast investigator Juspion), part of the Metal Hero series.

8 “…grab the thread of a spider…” This is from the children’s short story “The Spider’s Thread” by Ryuunosuke Akutagawa. The story features a sinner who, because of his one good deed, is given an opportunity to escape from hell via a spider’s thread. And so he begins climbing up it, but when he sees the other damned crawling up after him, he yells at them to get off, and that moment, the spider thread breaks. It’s a morality story about screwing others over to save yourself, and it’s very relevant to Sagami.

9 “Are my hands really so worthless? People wouldn’t pay a single yen for them? This is exploitation.” The Japanese here is a wordplay on aiteiru, which can mean “unoccupied” as well as something having holes in it. Hachiman says, “Huh? That’s strange. I don’t think there’s any holes in them, though. No ventilation holes, and I don’t suck youkai into them, either, you know?” Sucking youkai into his hand is something Miroku from InuYasha does.

10 “…the destiny of a capable man, a gifted loner elite—a Lolita, if you will.” The Japanese pun here was on bocchi (loner) and eri-to (elite) to create, somehow, Botticelli.

11 “Yeah, yeah, of course it was the truth; you don’t have to be Detective Conan to get that.” Detective Conan’s catchphrase is “There is always only one truth!”

12 “A lion will throw its own young into a bottomless ravine and kill it.” “A lion will hunt a rabbit with all its might and kill it.” “One must drive all the insects out of a lion’s body to kill them.” Hachiman is adding kill to a bunch of proverbs that didn’t originally include that word. The first proverb is about being harsh on your children to make them thrive, the second is about giving your all, even for minor tasks, and the third is about eliminating harmful elements from an organization.

13 “What’s with this eccentric family?” Eccentric Family is a novel series about a family of tanuki.

14 “…Komachi being the Ultimate Communication Weapon of the Hikigaya household…” This is parodying the title of She, the Ultimate Weapon.

15 “I was not enough of a devil survivor to survive that sort of environment…” Devil Survivor is a series of RPGs in the Shin Megami Tensei franchise. The original premise revolves around making it through a military lockdown in downtown Tokyo. It’s a little apocalyptic.

16 “…just as art quality is not what makes or breaks an anime, the numbers on a report card can only do so much against entrance exams!” The original Japanese here is a play on the Char quote from the original Gundam: “I’m gonna teach you that your mobile suit has limits when you go up against the Red Comet!”

17 “A night battle? Is it a night battle?” The term yasen was popularized by Kantai Collection, of which Watari is a big fan. Komachi’s cutesy declaration is just like the sort of battle quotes you’d see from girls in KanColle.

18 “Nanoha’s sold out” is a form of famous information warfare that was used on otaku at Comiket. The Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha industry booth was for many years a popular table, so lies of this nature were told to narrow down the competition for merch.

19 “Seems the type to enjoy night battles…” Kawauchi is a deliberate misreading of Sendai, a light cruiser anthropomorphized as a cute girl in Kantai Collection.

20 “Hmm? This is odd…?” is a line that Conan from Detective Conan says very frequently. While pretending he’s a little kid, he says this before pointing out deductions as if he hasn’t already figured everything out.

Chapter 5 … Based on the aforementioned, Hachiman Hikigaya has a hunch.

1 “What the heck is a man-hour?” The original Japanese gag here is a pun on the word ninku, an obscure term for human labor. Hachiman says, “What’s ninku? Is it, like, sort of like Koizora? No, that’s Ninku [the name of a martial arts manga].” Koizora is a cell phone novel—similar to self-published online fiction. The kanji for koizora superficially look like the kanji for ninku, despite being pronounced differently.

2 “…if I’d hit my finger, I might’ve screamed something like Kugyu!” Kugyu is the nickname of voice actress Rie Kugimiya, who’s famous for voicing tsundere characters. Also, kugyu sort of sounds like the words kugi (nail) and yubi (finger) stuck together, or just a weird cry of pain.

3 Emiko Kaminuma’s Chatter Cooking is a cooking and talk show where actress and presenter Emiko Kaminuma invites guests on for interviews, and they also cook with her.

4 “Banging at the nails was starting to feel like part of some curse ritual.” Hachiman is talking about ushi no toki mairi, which is a shrine visit at the hour of the ox—between one and three AM—a traditional method of cursing someone. The modern version usually involves wearing candles on your head as you hammer a straw effigy of your target into a tree—traditionally, wooden spikes of a length of five sun (six inches) are used for the nailing. It’s generally considered a weird occult thing now or used for humor.

5 “Stats-wise, I feel like she’d have about 90 Politics or so. Also, I feel like Miura would have around 95 Leadership.” Hachiman is most likely referencing the Nobunaga’s Amibition series of RPG/strategy games.

6 “I shot a ‘Bancho Sarayashiki’–style resentful look at Yukinoshita.” “Bancho Sarayashiki” is a classic ghost story. While there are a number of variations on the tale, all versions of the story involve the ghost of a woman counting plates and always coming up one short. The joke here involves the fact that both plates and sheets of paper involve the same counter suffix for flat objects (ichi-mai, ni-mai), so Hachiman really sounds like the ghost here when he’s counting papers.

7 The Dempsey Roll is a boxing move that involves weaving your body side to side in a figure-eight shape. Odds are, Hachiman learned about this one from the boxing manga Hajime no Ippo.

8 “…quietly muttering ‘Makkunouchi, Makkunouchi’…” Makunouchi is the name of the protagonist of Hajime no Ippo, and the crowd tends to chant “Makkunouchi” when he pulls out his signature Dempsey Roll.

9 “Like from Pocky or Kari-Kari Ume. Oh, and there was Otoko-Ume in there, too!” These are all Japanese candy products. Pocky, candy-coated biscuit sticks, are fairly popular even abroad. Kari-Kari Ume and Otoko-Ume are both candies made from Japanese plum. The former is the actual plum; the latter are gummies.

Chapter 6 … But even so, Meguri Shiromeguri is watching.

1 “Therefore, loners are wise, and I’m a wise guy.” In Japanese, he says, “Loners are wise and in wise-man mode all year round.” Wise-man time is a Japanese idiom that refers to the moments after orgasm, when a man’s thoughts are clearest.

2 Mother Farm is a tourist hot spot / fun family-outing sort of place in Chiba. Hachiman has mentioned it before.

3 “What the heck, I’m ridiculously psychic; this is wild. Maybe my dad is gonna make me pose nude for a painting.” Hachiman is referencing Mami the Psychic, a 1970s manga by Fujiko F. Fujio (of Doraemon fame). Mami poses nude for her artist dad.

4 “It was like she was saying, Ninja! Why ninja?!” This bit is a reference to Ninja Slayer, a series of novels published piecemeal on Twitter. They claim to be a translation of some English novels, but this is just part of the fictional backstory. The story is deliberately like American pulp fiction, the kind of novels Americans would write about Japan around the 1980s, and everything is spelled out in katakana, with lots of strange slang to make it sound more American.

5 “Maybe Superstarman, but that’s it.” Superstarman is a character from the gag manga Tottemo! Luckyman and is the middle schooler who wants to stand out the most in all the country.

6 “Beaujolais may have found a way to annually churn out quality you usually only find once every ten years…” Beaujolais is a brand of wine that very often has advertising slogans (in Japan) like The best in ten years and A great year that comes only once in ten years. They use these slogans more often than once every ten years…

7 “…they won’t get even a third of it. I mean, the ending for Kenshin said so.” One of the ending themes for Rurouni Kenshin, “1/3 no Junjou na Kanjou,” includes the line “Even if I love you enough to break me, you won’t get even a third of it.”

Chapter 7 … And now the final meeting breaks into action.

1 The Battle of Yamazaki, also known as the Battle of Mt. Tenno, is the battle in which Hideyoshi Toyotomi fought Mitsuhide Akechi, who had just killed Oda Nobunaga, and won, taking Nobunaga’s authority for himself. It was a key battle of the Sengoku era.

Chapter 8 … That’s why their festival won’t end.

1 “I just like it that way” is a quote from Ryoma Sengoku in the sentai series Kamen Rider Gaim. He’s the scientist who came up with a belt that announces a transformation sequence in a rather unique-sounding way with a rather corny line.

2 “No, you’re mistaken!” is a line Lelouch says as Zero in Code Geass—he says it multiple times in the original series, and it’s considered a fairly iconic line among Japanese fans, though not really in English.

3 “A-an air throw… What the heck, is she Master Asia? Is she going to die at dawn?” “Farewell, My Master! Master Asia Dies at Dawn!” is the title of episode 45 of G Gundam and features, as you might expect, Master Asia dramatically dying as the sun rises. The English title is “Master Asia’s Last Breath.”

4 “…it was Totsuka, wearing a button-down gakuran-style uniform.” A gakuran is a traditional style of boys’ school uniform derived from Prussian cadet uniforms. It’s a bit old-fashioned and less common at more elite, modern Japanese schools (where a blazer is favored), but the military aesthetic makes it an appropriate costuming choice for this sort of competition.

5 “Just what kind of Egg of Columbus idea is that…?” An “Egg of Columbus” is a brilliant idea that seems simple once you know what it is. The Japanese gag here had the abbreviation of koro-tama, which basically just means “rolley ball” and is the name of some Doraemon toys.

6 “It’s like causality has been reversed and I’m being guided by the Law of Cycles.” The Law of Cycles is from the magical girl anime Puella Magi Madoka Magica and involves basically changing the principles of the universe into something else.

7 “…he was throwing out useless factoids about wedges and Vs and the six and three strategies.” Zaimokuza is specifically referring to the “fish scale” and “crane wing” battle formations used by the famous general Shingen Takeda, and they refer to the wedge and V formations, respectively. He is also talking about Three Strategies of Huang Shigong and The Six Secret Teachings on the Way of Strategy, two of the seven Chinese military classics (which includes the most famous, The Art of War).

8 “In Three Kingdoms terms, you’re Guan Yu. Totsuka is Liu Bei. Meaning that at a time like this, you’re the only one to get everyone going and lead the army.” Guan Yu and Liu Bei were generals in third-century China whose deeds have been lionized and fictionalized in the classic Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms. This novel has been very widely adapted into many forms of popular media, notably the Dynasty Warriors video game series.

9 “Stealth Hikki!” is a reference to “Stealth Momo,” or Momoko Touyoko in the mah-jongg manga Saki by Ritz Kobayashi. She calls herself Stealth Momo because she is so often ignored and unnoticed.

10 “He was still staggering around, making noises like gouf! and agg! and bigzam!” Gouf, Agg, and Big Zam are all names of mobile suits from the Gundam franchise.

11 “But in Yukinon’s eyes, anything less than a nonpareil performance was nonfeasance. Is that why Yuigahama calls her that?” In the original, Hachiman is punning off of “gathering storm.” Yukinon sounds like kennon in Japanese, which means “dangerous” or “stormy.”

Bonus track! “When the Flame of That Christmas Candle Wavers…”

1 “Don’t pray to god—your heart shall be crushed. Don’t beg for it—earn it. Do it, and you’ll be rewarded.” The first part is from the manga Project ARMS, while the second is from Eureka Seven.

2 “You have to value your teatime, you know?” is a quote from the character Kongou in Kantai Collection.

3 “…I don’t really know about the World or Stands or whatever…” Hachiman says world standard in English, and Yui hears “Za Warudo!” or “The World,” which is Dio’s Stand (a special ability) in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure.

4 “The culture’s so different!” is a quote from the manga Historie by Hitoshi Iwaaki. The protagonist says it a lot.

5 “They say not to count your chickens, after all.” In the original, Hachiman is asking about whether he is using the correct counter for live chickens. Like some other Asian languages, Japanese has a system of “counter” words for categorizing nouns. There are generally rules for what you can use a counter for, but they’re not always intuitive (for example, using a different counter for live fish versus fish on your plate). The counter wa (meaning “wing”) is used for birds, but also for rabbits (for historical reasons). It’s not uncommon in Japanese for people to use generic counters or the wrong counters, which is why Hachiman is asking.

6 “You, Yukino, and Yui together look like the strongest.” This is referencing an Internet meme, a quote from the infamous Final Fantasy XI player Buronto, of “Kore de katsuru” (With this, I can win!) fame, which has been referenced in earlier volumes: “Equipped with both darkness and light, it looks like the strongest.” This tends to refer to RPG types who wield both light and darkness. The implication here is that Hachiman is the darkness elemental in this trio.

7 Hinedere is a word that Komachi made up to describe Hachiman a few volumes back, and it’s a play on tsundere and similar terms usually used to describe girls in anime. It means he seems twisted but is secretly a softy on the inside.

8 “She said satsuma, didn’t she? So the the correct answer is Kagoshima prefecture.” The word for Japanese purple sweet potatoes is satsuma imo (Satsuma potato), referring to Satsuma Domain of the Edo period, which is modern-day Kagoshima prefecture.

9 “…sometimes you’re kind of an apple polisher…” In Japanese, Yui says, “That reaction of yours was kinda painful…” (itai means “painful,” but also “cringey” or “awkward”), and Hachiman responds with “No, it doesn’t hurt at all. Not even if I put her in my eye.” This is an idiom used to refer to someone you dote on or love dearly.

10 “While Zaimokuza was wheezing with a sound like fushururu…” Fushurururu is the characteristic laugh of the villain of Metal Max 2, a SNES RPG that never saw an English release.

11 “Hikari ni nare!” meaning “Become the light!” is what the hero of the super robot anime GaoGaiGar says when he punches enemies to purify them by turning them into light.

12 “Fair Play, Fair Duel!” is a Yu-Gi-Oh! anime tagline, rather ironically, since many of the characters cheat.

13 “There are no true mysteries in the world.” This is a quote from Natsuhiko Kyogoku’s popular series of mystery novels.

14 “My burning pathos is overflowing.” This is a reference to the famous Evangelion OP: “A cruel angel’s thesis / will someday fly high from the window / if memories are betrayed by / the overflowing, burning pathos.”

15 “Someone this cute can’t be a girl!” is riffing off the title of Oreimo (My Little Sister Can’t Be This Cute).

16 “But she’s usually such a Miss Yarukinainen.” This is a play off the character Aila Jyrkiäinen from Gundam Build Fighters into a word that means “I don’t wanna do it” with a Kansai accent. It’s an Internet meme.

17 “With this mobile suit…I will become a super pilot…” Super pilot is the term Gundam AGE uses for that series’s version of Newtypes. Gundam AGE is also wildly reviled by Gundam fans and was a massive flop, thus Zaimokuza’s derision.

18 “Shining inside the storm” is a lyric from the opening of Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team.

19 “Now it’s your turn!” is a line from Shiro Amada in the dub of 08th MS Team during his fight against Norris Packard. The Japanese line is more literally “I’ll hit you back double!”

20 “My brother isn’t wasteful, after all. He just wants someone supporting him.” The original Japanese line here is “My brother wants the sort of fuyou that is being supported.” Fuyou means both being a dependent and being unnecessary (Yukinoshita said the sofa is “unnecessary” for him).

21 “Or is she bashful because you could bash her logic full of holes?” A pun, in Japanese, this one is on hanikamu (to be bashful) and hanikamu (honeycomb).

22 “…you must be magic! You’re living the life! Livinitani! Magitani!” In Japanese, Tobe calls him a maji riajuu (totally fulfilled by real life; riajuu is often translated as a “normie” in this series), which then pivots to majiriatani, then Majitani, which is the name of a minor villain from Hunter X Hunter.

23 “…his hand shot up, forming the sign of the horns like Stan Hansen.” Stan Hansen is an American wrestler who became more well-known for his wrestling career in Japan than in the United States. He often made a hand gesture with his pointer and pinkie fingers extended, like the horns of a bull.

24 “W…eight man?! So in Japanese, Hachiman?!” Hachi means “eight.”

25 “…could he be from the organization?!” is a line that Rintaro Okabe says a lot in the visual novel and anime series Steins;Gate, especially when assuming his mad scientist persona. He claims a villainous organization is after him.

26 “Hey? Let’s stop projecting on the cakes, okay?” A “Christmas cake” is an old insult for an unmarried older woman—that is to say, no one wants to marry her after she’s twenty-five years old. This has been a dated insult for more than twenty years now, seeing as the average age of first marriage in Japan is now about thirty. Miss Hiratsuka being unmarried at her age is actually not at all unusual.

27 “Don’t make it worse! Stopppp!” This particular wording in Japanese, Yametageteyoo!, is a reference to what Bianca tearily says in the Dreamyard in Pokémon Black & White when a Pokémon is getting kicked around. It’s since been adopted as a meme among Japanese fans.

28 “My memory of Tobe will disappear in a week…” “My memory of my friends will disappear in a week…” is the tagline for the manga One Week Friends by Matcha Hazuki.

29 “Jooshy polly yey!” is a greeting coined by Chiaki Takahashi, a voice actor, singer, and gravure model. It’s meant to sound like “juicy party yay” and has no particular deep meaning.

30 “…Komachi commanded (Maybe we should call her Comma-chi?).” The Japanese gag here was “Komachi said like she was in trouble” (komaru) (because she’s Komachi, get it?).

31 “Just when you’ve taken one step forward, you immediately take two steps back…” This is a play on the lyrics to the 1968 song “The 365 Day March,” sung by Kiyoko Suizenji. It features the lyrics “One step a day, three steps in three days / three steps ahead and two steps back.” It’s definitely too old a joke for even Miss Hiratsuka.

32 “Shuffle tiiiiiiime!” In the Persona series of video games, “Shuffle Time” is an event introduced in Persona 3 in which the player gets a chance at additional rewards after a battle. Tarot cards are shuffled together, and the player chooses one.

33 Hot spring essences are like bath salts; they’re little mineral packs that are supposed to emulate the waters of various famous hot springs, since supposedly, the mineral content of natural hot springs will have different effects, depending on where you go.

34 Morusua is the cry of a mutilated Furby from a 2chan copypasta about someone who chopped the head off their Furby.

Afterword

1 “Hey, it’s summer! I’m doin’ good… Don’t get close to me…” is from a poem by Naoko Kudou about a praying mantis.