With the seasons passing by, Achiga Mahjong club start gathering their next team members to get ready for the inter high tournament

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In search of a fourth member, Kuro brings the other 2 to her house to meet her sister who’s under a kotatsu, even though it’s summer. This is their potential fourth member and conveniently enough she, called Yuu, have wanted to join their children’s Mahjong club, so it’s an easy yes.

For their fifth member Yuu remembers Sagimori Arata from Kuro’s class who used to be a fan of Akado and played a lot so Kuro decides to go see her the next day. She visits Sagimori bowling alley and tells Arata about the club and that Akado is playing professional now and leaves the decision to her.

We enter a flashback of how Arata used to admire Akado greatly and still has kept the tie she gave her when they met all those years ago. She gives some more thought to joining the Mahjong club.

As the school term starts, the original three gather in the Mahjong room with Yuu and Arata comes knocking making their club official with 5 members.

Because Akado’s company isn’t doing so well, she decides to come back and visits the school. She hears noises inside the Mahjong room to discover the rebuilt Mahjong club who’s aiming for the inter high tournaments. She wants to help out as a manager or coach but Arata doesn’t want that as she wants her to play individually. But because her team lost in the Japan league playoffs, they were disbanded, seemed that the inter high tournament from 9 years ago where she lost still haunts her til this day. She thinks she lost something at that tournament, but thinks if she experiences it again, she will get it back.

Arata finally accepts this and their team is formed with Akado as advisor. On the way home, she receives another offer for a team place but she declines as she wants to head into the inter highs with these 5 girls.

So first off they need to win the preliminaries, usually with Bansei high school it’s impossible as they’ve only lost once in 40 years. But now the player who made that one loss possible, Akado, is here on their team, they’ve got a chance.

Kuro greets an old friend from middle school who went to Bansei and she warns them that this year will be different, that they can beat Bansei. Kuro leaves and their senpai comes out and she tells her not to worry about them.

Thoughts:

Arata and Yuu are definitely not disappointing in my opinion at least… disappointing for me though, but isn’t out of expectations. This episode fitted too much in for my taste, I didn’t expect their team to be formed so easily, was hoping for some Mahjong battling beforehand to convince people to join, but nope, those two accepted without much of a thought. I wanted a bit more ‘adventure’ to the player searching, but I suppose moving on swiftly with the story isn’t too bad. But already it’s much more moe than Mahjong, not what I came for.

Yuu’s coldness is just weird, if they wanted to have her being ‘cold’ then have her be ‘cold’ in the evil ‘cold’ way… not literally cold… I don’t see her being a regular member of the team of 4. The other girl Arata was a little better, being a fan of Akado is believable, but I dunno, I just felt she sorta came out of nowhere and she was in instantly. Don’t have anything against that, but wanted more of a story, oh well.

Also thought it was a little convenient for Akado to have left her team right when the Mahjong club needed an advisor. Can’t say I didn’t see it coming though, who else to lead them against Bansei than the very person who beat Bansei last and only time.

With that team sorted, they can get started on their way to the inter high. The first obstacle will be Bansei and all the other teams at the preliminaries. Wonder if we’ll meet anyone interesting there. At least if not, I’ll finally see some over the top lightning induced Mahjong. Which is exactly what I came for, some tile slamming!