A man on the run calls his daughter to grab a bag full of money he had hidden in their home and run — run away as far as she can and that her mother in heaven will always be with her.

Thus begins the NEET Detective Team’s follow-up case. Since it isn’t resolved by the end of this episode, I won’t focus on the case details other than the fact that it involves an ex-Yakuza member trying to make a clean break from crime. Well, as clean as stealing a cool hundred million yen can be. Rather than lose a finger (or two), he only had to help his crime syndicate launder money. What would possess him, then, to think he could steal from them and get away with it?

We’ll find out the answer to that question next week. This episode bored me a bit so for now, let’s talk Yakuza culture for a bit. All the talk of losing a finger reminded me of a Japanorama episode from years ago. Losing one’s finger isn’t just a fairy tale; it’s reality:

You’ll notice that this ex-Yakuza member lost two fingers. He took one off for his boss and the other for a chairman of the group. So in a way, once you join the Yakuza, they will always keep a part of you. For a lot of ex-Yakuza members, returning to society is no easy task. People aren’t stupid — they can see someone’s mangled fingers and connect the dots. It’s not as if you can come away from the Yakuza with just a hideable body tattoo. Without fingers, it’ll be difficult to both find jobs and make friends.

For some lucky individuals, they can go to clinics and have specially-crafted prosthetic fingers. Of course, each finger will cost them tens of thousands of yen. If you’re already desperate for a job because of money, buying artificial fingers will simply compound matters. Still, what can you do? Rob a hundred million yen like the father in KamiMemo?

Stray Observations

• Narumi repeatedly insists throughout this episode that he is Alice’s assistant and he will do whatever it takes to help her. Why? She condescends to him and she bosses him around. Alice isn’t exactly a peach. Y’know, I can believe in a world where a NEET is a super-detective, but my suspension of disbelief doesn’t apply to dubious character motivations.

I had just watched Dantalian no Shoka shortly before viewing KamiMemo, and I can’t help but compare Narumi to Hugh, the other show’s protagonist. The former acts like a spineless lackey and the latter does not. Being a doormat might work in some anime, but on the contrary, I don’t think a lack of confidence will get guys with the ladies in real life.

• “What do you think killed the most people in history? It wasn’t explosives or drugs. It was information.”

Yeah, unless you’re making some allusion to the apple of knowledge or Pandora’s box, I’m going to doubt that….

• This business card looks like it belongs to an expensive host club:

Maybe one that sends the hosts to the NEETs instead of the other way around. Still, I don’t look at a card like that and think “Ooh, private dick!

• Then again…