Zero no Tsukaima II, episode 3

And so, the 3rd episode of the series has arrived. A war is coming to town (or country …what ever), and it looks like things are not pretty. Even all the male students from the magic school have been drafted in to the army, and all the girls look distressed. Cruel times indeed. Saito avoids this since he is a familiar.

Surprisingly, Montmorency is also very worried about Guiche leaving, and he is deeply moved by her concern.

Saito gets excited about the thought of being the only guy there, but is knocked out by Louise. Their antics get cut short once a new character appears, making his entrance on a flying dragon. The second he lands all the girls (minus Louise) go “ga-ga” over the new bishie

… yep – Montmorency as well, leaving poor Guiche with nothing yet again ^^

He walks up to Louise and introduces himself as Guilio – an exchange student from Romalia.

The lesson starts and all the girls (minus Louise) keep staring at the guy instead of listening, which leaves Saito pissed – he takes an immediate dislike towards the guy because of his popularity. A moment Later Agnes (the leader of queens Musketeer corps) bursts in to the class and declares that everyone must gather in the yard for combat training. The teacher voices his objections telling her not to bring war to the school, but Agnes draws her sword and points it at the teachers neck, leaving him no choice.

Everyone gets gathered in the courtyard and proceeds with training, but all the girls keep stalking Guilio, which pisses Saito of even more.

Then Guilio walks up to Louise and asks her to be his sparring partner. During her first charge Guilio evades and catches the stumbling Louise with his arm, which leaves Saito mighty pissed. (for a change he is the one acting jealous ^^).

However he doesn’t have much time to act jealous, because one of Agnes’s subordinates wants to see his skills and attacks him with a wooden sword, ignoring Saito’s complains that he can’t fight without a real weapon ^^

After he has been beaten down another argument with Guilio ensues, and the two agree to have a duel with real weapons … and Guilio proposes that the winner gets to kiss Louise, which leaves her pretty angry ^^

But Louise forbids Saito to use a real weapon, because she doesn’t want the duel to happen. Unluckily for her, Saito interprets that as a “go ahead” if it is with wooden swords, and thus the challenge is set for the next morning.

Later than night Saito seeks out Agnes and asks her to help him learn sword fighting, because his familiar powers only work with real weapons, thus they wont help him with the wooden sword. Since Agnes doesn’t like show-offs either, she agrees to help. They practice for a looong time, and finally Saito manages to distract her with some words, and gets an opening to strike at her.

This ends up with them falling down in a compromising position, and Louise just happens to come by, looking for Saito.

He gets a … smoking punishment ^^”

Next day the duel begins, despite Saito being in a pretty bad shape (courtesy of Louise blowing him up ^^).

Saito performs decently, but it becomes obvious that Guilio is stronger and has better fatigue. But as Guilio charges his sword is knocked out of his hand and all the girls gather around him in worry.

Derflinger then says he gets to kiss Louise since he won, which makes Lousie all embarrassed and blushy, but Saito unexpectedly reponds he doesn’t want it and angrily walks away, leaving a stunned Louise behind.

She then runs after him asking what was that all about, obviously feeling uncomfortable. Saito then says he didn’t win, because Guilio lost on purpose. Louise looks relieved, because she had thought she was dumped by Saito ^^.

The two then proceed in to a room, and are greeted by the princess herself!

It appears she intends to gather the only people she can trust here, meaning Louise, Saito, Agnes and Guilio, much to Saito’s dislike. Then Guilio walks over to Louise and kisses her hand, making her blush. Saito jumps in and starts complaining towards Louise about her turning red^^ (I can’t believe the guy is actually showing jealousy 0_o).

Scene shifts to Albion, and we see Sheffield, who was the former Cromwell’s secretary, making and inspiring speech to her troops about queen Henrietta has been gathering her forces to attack Albion, and some of the nobles commenting that there is no one in the world capable of stopping her now.

Overall this was a good character introduction episode. Having Saito display jealousy where Louise is concerned was a nice and welcomed touch. I just hope they won’t make Guilio a “love rival” for Saito – that was already done in the first season. A nice ep – looking towards the next. Till next week!