September 25th, 2013 
AstroNerdBoy ユーキューホルダー!/UQ Holder Chapter 5 Review
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Touta cheerfully walks and sings beside Yukihime while Kuroumaru trails them at a distance. Touta hollers for Kuroumaru to catch up, but Kuroumaru refuses since they are opposites. Touta holds up the signed pact with Kuroumaru, making Kuroumaru irritated. Yukihime states that she no longer has a desire to kill Kuroumaru since Kuroumaru is a friend of Touta’s, even if only on paper. This leads Kuroumaru to tell about the clan’s mission and what failure would mean for Kuroumaru. Yukihime offers Kuroumaru a chance to be her disciple, something Touta is completely down for. The two of them decide on it, leaving Kuroumaru flustered and unable to get in a word.
Arriving at another village, they discover it has an onsen and decide to spend the night at an inn. This causes Kuroumaru to panic a bit, but Yukihime knowingly suggests that the two guys bathe together and that Kuroumaru should speak frankly with Touta. Touta drags the unwilling Kuroumaru off to the men’s onsen. Kuroumaru is tepid and shy about entering the water, and as such, keeps a towel up in a covering fashion. When asked, Kuroumaru says that it is due to a lack of bathing with strangers despite being from Japan. Touta again suspects Kuroumaru of being a girl, but gets whacked before he can ask to inspect Kuroumaru’s goods.
In the water, Kuroumaru starts to relax a bit, leading Touta to speak of Kuroumaru’s clan. Touta asks Kuroumaru to come with Yukihime and him. Kuroumaru is taken aback by this and when offered a hand by Touta, starts to take it before realizing what this means and slapping his hand away. Touta asks why, leading Kuroumaru to say it is complicated.
Touta decides they should follow a male tradition and peep on Eva, who should be getting into the women’s batch at an onsen on a nearby clifftop. Touta tries to tempt Kuroumaru by saying Yukihime has a hot bod, but Kuroumaru isn’t interested. Touta isn’t either, but Kuroumaru points out that if Yukihime is the real Evangeline, she’s one of the strongest people in the world. Touta isn’t so sure snf Kuroumaru is having second thoughts as well.
From a distance, Yukihime can be heard laughing, having heard the whole conversation. She challenges both Yukihime and Touta, the latter of whom she praises for his adolescent interest, and says that should they strip the bath towel off her, she won’t stop them from seeing her naked. Touta is game and races up the cliff like mad. However, he’s blasted away by Yukihime. Kuroumaru takes time to wrap up in a body towel before coming to Touta’s aide.
Yukihime gives Touta a taste of real magic by using ancient magic to bring forth countless ice spears, causing them to rain down on the two. Kuroumaru no longer doubts this is the real Eva and races to save Touta. Touta is pleased, though Kuroumaru says it is only because of the pact. Touta asks Kuroumaru to throw him, so Kuroumaru does as he asks. Kuroumaru goes flying through the air and snatches a towel off of Yukihime’s body.
Thoughts/Review:
Well now, well now.
I really do think Kuroumaru is a girl, though Akamatsu-sensei could be setting up the bishounen guy thing, or even someone who’s genderless. Eva’s remarks to Kuroumaru would seem to indicate that Eva know’s Kuroumaru is a girl too, thus she’s enjoying putting Kuroumaru into a bad position of having to bathe with a guy. Assuming Kuroumaru is a girl, I suspect that the way Touta treats Kuroumaru won’t change. After all, Eva supposedly does nothing for him despite having a good figure in her Yukihime form.
Kuroumaru is massively strong to be able to fling Touta with that much force. Question is, how’d Touta know that Kuroumaru could throw like that?
This chapter was done in part to remove all doubt that Eva hasn’t lost a step. I laughed out loud when Eva revealed she heard Touta’s and Kuroumaru’s entire conversation despite the great distance from her location to Touta’s. Further, she blasts him off with no effort and with little effort, does her usual panache when it comes to massive, ancient magic spells.
This chapter was also done to continue to show Touta is more than he seems to be, something that has been hinted at for a while now. We have the impressive way he climbed the cliff as if it were nothing, but also in how he snatched the towel from Eva. I’m not convinced that was the real Eva though. I can envision a scenario where Touta thinks he’s gotten Eva’s towel, but in fact hit a decoy, leaving a still towel covered Eva to gloat over him.
If Touta really did succeed, then Akamatsu-sensei is rapidly pushing forward his power progress for some reason that I can’t fathom. I know some folks will say that this is a sign that Eva has gotten weaker, but I just don’t see it that way.
I was glad to see Chachazero’s little cameo. I really do hope an explanation of what happened to her is given at some point. After all, Chachazero had been with Eva for how many years or centuries, going back to when Eva was still not that strong. Chachazero was Eva’s partner, and since I’m confident Chachazero’s body had a soul in it, then it was a true pactio, not a doll contract like Chachamaru had with Eva.
So, a fun chapter where we get to see Eva unleash a bit, Touta still be Touta, and Kuroumaru still behave like a girl.
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Personally I think Kuroumaru is genderless, maybe whatever race she is(we know she’s not a vampire) will shed more light on it.
Also I’m sure there’ll be a twist next week about Touta taking Eva’s towel.
I’m enjoying the series but I’m looking forward to them reaching Tokyo and finding out more about the world, and the Negima cast since I’m sure a lot of are important figures in the world.
>Personally I think Kuroumaru is genderless, maybe whatever race she is(we know she’s not a vampire) will shed more light on it.
It is possible.
>Also I’m sure there’ll be a twist next week about Touta taking Eva’s towel.
That’s what I’m looking for.
I’m not convinced that was the real Eva though. I can envision a scenario where Touta thinks he’s gotten Eva’s towel, but in fact hit a decoy, leaving a still towel covered Eva to gloat over him.
I have a feeling that it was the real Eva and i doubt its a decoy. Most likely she was going easy on him, plus the fact that Touta is the unpredictable type.
I feel the most likely scenario would be Touta thinking he won would look at Eva’s body only to see her real form, thus revealing to Touta that Eva’s real immortal body is that of a 10 year old and not the mature one.
I mean, Touta is interested in seeing the nude body of a mature woman, not a undeveloped body of a 10 year old kid. That would be quite a shock to him.
> Most likely she was going easy on him, plus the fact that Touta is the unpredictable type.
I can buy that.
>I feel the most likely scenario would be Touta thinking he won would look at Eva’s body only to see her real form, thus revealing to Touta that Eva’s real immortal body is that of a 10 year old and not the mature one.
Hmmmm…interesting. At the moment, he think’s Eva’s body was the illusion and Yukihime is the real one. That would certainly put a twist on things.
This chapter made me think that Akamatsu-sensei just isn’t taking the series seriously. I don’t care how much potential Touta has, if Eva truly is the same old mega boss then there is absolutely no way Touta should’ve gotten the upper hand. She could keep up with the speed of lighting but couldn’t foresee a physical speed that most likely wasn’t even on the level of a shundo?
You can try and rationalize it anyway you can, the moment Touta won the challenge is pretty much equal to moments like Akira outrunning Misora’s artifact.
>This chapter made me think that Akamatsu-sensei just isn’t taking the series seriously. I don’t care how much potential Touta has, if Eva truly is the same old mega boss then there is absolutely no way Touta should’ve gotten the upper hand.
Unless, as others have suggested, she wasn’t really trying. We’ll see what the next chapter has in store.
If she indeed wasn’t trying then you can’t pull any conclusions like, “There’s more to Touta than meets the eye.” If she wasn’t trying then it’s no big deal for anyone with greater-than-human abilities to get the upper hand. It also means that there was no point to her challenge if she wasn’t trying and if there was no point to her challenge then there was no point to the chapter which is why I equate it to the Akira moment.
That will be true. If she wasn’t trying, then I’d be wrong about Touta. But, there’s no denying that he’s unusually strong and fast, as is Kuroumaru.
^
Touta getting the towel is not much different than Asuna been able to cut Eva’s cheek. Its common that went manga characters are not fighting seriously, their reaction time slows down.
That’s a good point. Eva, while toying with others, has been defeated.
I mean, Touta is interested in seeing the nude body of a mature woman, not a undeveloped body of a 10 year old kid. That would be quite a shock to him.
Actually, Touta isn’t interested in her body at all, if what he told Kurou was true. He has seen Yukihime naked a few times already. In my opinion, the bath scene shows more that Touta is kinda hollow inside because he picked up that cliché to peep in an onsen from one of his friends again.
I really do think Kuroumaru is a girl, though Akamatsu-sensei could be setting up the bishounen guy thing, or even someone who’s genderless.
It’s getting more and more tiring this discussion, but I didn’t want to participate in the whole gender discussion anyway, so all the talk about Kurou’s actual gender boring me is partially my fault. If Kurou is not a girl, he’s hiding something else behind that towel. However, if this isn’t story relevant and Akamatsu is only doing this for the gags, then I’m kinda disappointed.
>In my opinion, the bath scene shows more that Touta is kinda hollow inside because he picked up that cliché to peep in an onsen from one of his friends again.
Touta seems fairly hollow to me. I hadn’t put my finger on the word to describe what I was feeling, but reading “hollow” made me think, “Yeah, that’s pretty much been him all along.” Many parts of him seem insincere or false.
>However, if this isn’t story relevant and Akamatsu is only doing this for the gags, then I’m kinda disappointed.
I think Akamatsu-sensei is doing three things.
(1) Trolling — This causes debates and discussions among most fans. Sure, some few won’t like it, as you’ve pointed out, but enough will. The more chatter, the more publicity.
(2) Gags — No doubt, he’s doing the gag thing with Kuroumaru’s gender.
(3) Story — I do think there will ultimately be a story reason for Kuroumaru to hide their gender.
I also think that was the actual towel, and that he being able to get it doesn’t mean much. She was still not really being serious, she was expecting him to have fallen all the way down there and not being saved by Kuroumaru and quickly thrown on the top of the cliff. Plus remember that current Touta can’t even get past her magic shield, so if he was trying to attack her instead he wouldn’t have done any damage.
Also a do think Chachazero and all her others dolls had Dolls Contracts. Heck, they couldn’t even move while she isn’t around and when she is powerless. Completely different from the Lifemaker constructs for instance.
Chachazero had a real contract as best as I can tell. Chachazero had an artifact. Chachamaru did not.
The other dolls of Eva’s resided in her resorts, where the magic in the air allowed them to function easily. There wouldn’t be a reason for Eva to make doll contracts with them as she did Chachamaru, who was the combination of magic and technology.
Unfortunately, Akamatsu-sensei didn’t give us a great deal on the dolls other than Eva had the power to control a very large number of them.
Im kinda disappointed how Akamatsu-sensei is using Evangeline , Evangeline is Overpowered for christ sake , And , About Touta , He is abit overpowered from the beginning , I Mean , He survived the Zanmaken and can even catch up on speed without even using shundo`s ? I Get it that he is immortal , BUT STILL LOL !
We don’t even know yet what kind of obstacles they are gonna face. Eva is extremely strong, but it’s a bit early to jump to conclusions and say she and Touta are “overpowered”, isn’t it?
Besides, while Shinmeiryuu are very effective against especially unnatural beings, Touta was sired by a shinso, the strongest vampires we are aware of at the moment.
Yeah, we’ll have to see how things go. Akamatsu-sensei mostly kept Eva on the sidelines due to her massive power. However, for her to be the lead, I’m guessing he’s found a way to make it so that her massive powers won’t solve all issues.