Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun Season 3

Episodes 8-9

If these two episodes have a theme, it would be that you never quite know what to expect from other people. As the harvest festival arc drags on, our friends in the Misfit Class, still working in their small groups, are having to face off against other schoolmates in order to maintain their right to the Royal One classroom. While this makes a lot more sense than what we saw in a previous episode, it still makes the whole thing feel very episodic, which is why episode nine being solely devoted to the travails of Asmodeus and Sabnock feels a little bit stronger than episode eight. But both do a good job of showing that difficult circumstances just may call for extreme measures if the whole Misfit Class wants to make it out of this intact.

For Asmodeus, this of course means being able to hold his head up proudly in the presence of his beloved Iruma-kun. However you interpret his devotion, it is undeniably the cornerstone and foundation of his fighting motivation, and he has a hair-trigger reaction to anything that might be interpreted as putting down his darling. I phrase it this way because it is purely his interpretation that the Dorodoro brothers are insulting Iruma; they're really just throwing as many potential insults as they can against a wall and hoping that one or more will stick. But it is Asmodeus' very special talent to make everything in his life Iruma-centric, so it's really not a surprise that a perceived slight is behind his rampage this week. As such, if you've been wondering what Asmodeus would look like on his evil cycle, you are about to be amply rewarded. Somewhat unsurprisingly, the answer to this question is “sexy.” Yes, it's a good thing that our favorite sentient tentacle isn't present for this one, because she just might explode the moment that Asmodeus' shirt unbuttons itself.

The point isn't that his evil cycle makes him unbuttoned, but rather that it unleashes his feelings for Iruma-kun in a way that is physically tangible. It would be interesting to know if this is what his evil cycle looked like before meeting Iruma, because it really does seem to be a manifestation of his feelings for the other boy. This ties in interestingly with the manifestation of Clara's special power, because both appear to be centered on their desire to be with Iruma in one way or another. How aware of this either of them are is certainly up in the air, but at least Sabnock and Balam are aware of how tied to Iruma Asmodeus' powers are; it's a little hard to miss when he makes his friend's name his safe word.

Of course, all of this mess could have been avoided had the Dorodoro brothers bothered doing any research before they broke into the harvest festival. Truly the best reveal of both of these episodes is the fact that they are needlessly pitting themselves against Asmodeus and Sabnock because their actual teacher wasn't Balam, it was General Furfur. Somehow, they completely missed this fact not just once, but multiple times over the course of their battle, failing to see that their stories about their master simply don't line up with what Sabnock and Asmodeus are saying about theirs. On the other hand, it's a good thing for Jazz and Alocer that the brothers don't figure it out, because I rather doubt they would have fared nearly as well against two battle-hardened boys. None of this explains how Ichiro manages not to gouge out his own eyeball with his oversized fang, but we'll just have to chalk that one up to one of the mysteries of the series.

It's also not clear who is in the more annoying position here: Asmodeus and Sabnock or Goemon and Agares. Goemon would absolutely say that it was the other two, because he's actually having the time of his life being Mr. Hospitality to the legions of stranded and frightened students looking for a safe place to spend the night. Of course, he also doesn't have to deal with a bunch of lovestruck girls like his pal; poor Agares is very unhappy that the secret of his hotness is out. Of course, much as I love Dosa-chan as a side character, I could see how she could be a lot to deal with if you were in his position. The girls do have a good question for him though; among the other things they ask, they want to know why his head is so pointy.

At this point, I felt like it's safe to say that we'll be in this story arc for the rest of the season. Although it hasn't been my favorite, it's starting to look more like things are going to get back to how the series started, with next week appearing distinctly wacky. Hopefully the misfit class will start to come together, and it at least looks like Iruma and Lead will be meeting up with Keroli next week. If the preview is any guide, it's going to be crazy, and I, for one, am looking forward to it.

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Welcome to Demon School, Iruma-kun Season 3 is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.