ハヤテのごとく！/Hayate no Gotoku 435 Manga Chapter
Hayate the Combat Butler Chapter 435 Review

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Some ten years ago, young Athena is meeting with Mikado to discuss how to open up the path to the Royal Garden. In addition to a King’s Jewel, one needs an a great deal of negative emotion as well, citing deep despair specifically. Since it is Christmas Eve, Mikado believes it is the perfect time to find a suitable candidate to open up the path.  So with Athena’s blessing, and a reminder that they only have a limited number of King’s Jewels, Mikado heads out into the night.

Dressed as Santa, Mikado first encounters Ashibashi-sensei, who is not yet successful and trying to get his oneshot manuscript published. Mikado takes it and tells Ashibashi it is terrible. Seeing Ashibashi’s apparent despair, Mikado is prepared to give him a King’s Jewel, but is shocked when Ashibashi agrees with him, saying he only did what his editor said, not what he felt. As such, Ashibashi goes back to draw the manga he wants.

Having been thwarted there, Mikado then spots a young Hina looking sad under a tree. Upon seeing Santa, Hina is cheered, but Yukiji kicks him out of the way, suspicious at his motives. As Yukiji walks Hina away from the scene, Hina reports that their parents are not home again, but she has a present for them with the money she saved.

Having been thwarted a second time, Mikado buys a beverage from a vending machine. In frustration, he hits a nearby tree, knocking the snow from it, which falls and knocks a young Hayate down. Mikado attempts to toss his empty beverage can in the trash, but instead, it ricochets and ends up smacking young Hayate in the back of the head. It is then that Mikado realizes that he’s found the perfect candidate to open the path to the Royal Garden.

Thoughts/Review:

Heh! Hata-sensei returns to the plot. Woo!hoo!

I don’t think it was confirmed before (correct me if I’m wrong), but assuming not, I think we all believed that Mikado was the Santa-san that Hayate met as a child. As such, it was nice to have that meeting confirmed in this chapter.

I do wonder if Mikado knew who Hayate was after he became Nagi’s butler. Clearly Hayate didn’t remember Mikado, but then again, as a child, Hayate was talking to “Santa” and not some old man named Mikado.

Hata-sensei has shown that he’s not afraid of showing much deeper ties between characters than might have previously been revealed. Here, we have Mikado meeting young Hina and subsequently Yukiji, who’s still in high school. I’d love to have their story told, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.

Also, having Mikado encounter Ashibashi-sensei before his success was a fun moment too.

The really interesting elements of the chapter came from the beginning, with young Athena’s meeting with Mikado.  This reveals that in addition to a stone being required to open the path to the Royal Garden, despair is needed as well. That explains why in the present time, Ruka was considered a candidate until she squared things away with her parents, Nagi, and ultimately with Hayate.

This brings up some interesting things regarding Athena.  We’ve long wondered why young Athena would see Maria during her time at the Royal Garden, but it would make sense if she’d been staying at Mikado’s place. After all, Mikado did take in Maria, and Maria has remained on the Sanzenin payroll after becoming Nagi’s maid.

However, that raises a problem, namely that I don’t think Maria recognized Ah-tan when she came to stay at Yukari-chan House. So if they did in fact know each other back in the day, then an explanation will have to be made to cover this.

I also wonder how Athena got to the Royal Garden before Hayate did if the path could only be opened with a King’s Jewel and despair.  I suspect is has something to do with King Midas.

With the despair element also being a factor in opening the path to the Royal Garden, I can’t help but wonder if this is the ultimate reason why Mikado initially set up the conditions for obtaining the Sanzenin inheritance to making Nagi cry. I get the feeling this is what Hata-sensei will set up as true, whether or not he originally planned it or not. (I think of how there was a small retcon so that young Hayate had a King’s Jewel when he’d not been shown to have it previously.)

Regardless, a good chapter that returns things to the plot (YAY!), but still has a few gags thrown in on the side.