Oh good, Elder Tale also celebrates Valentine’s Day. Knowing what I know about this show and its potential pairings, I’m already dreading this episode.

— Apparently, there’s a heart-shaped fruit that also acts as an aphrodisiac. Hoo boy, I sure do enjoy love triangles in my anime series.

— It’s also that lull between arcs, so at best, we’re just setting things up for the next big revelation. In the meantime, the characters can afford to sit around and reminisce about the good ol’ days. Speaking of which, Tetra brings up Kanami from Shiroe’s old Debauchery Tea Party…

— It seems that everyone but Naotsugu has realized by now that Tetra is really a guy. Rudy and Tohya thus debate how to address Tetra. Riveting, huh? Sadly, I’d still rather see this sort of nonsense over that of Akatsuki and Minori fighting over the villain. But yeah, this is the sort of mundane nonsense that we’ll get shortly after the conclusion of an arc. Problem is, the last arc didn’t even have a satisfying conclusion.

— Yep.

— You even lose a few levels (temporarily) in order to gain the ability to cook. Ahhhhh.

— Cat dude is now teaching the girl how to cook with step-by-step instructions. I’m taking notes, too.

— Oh my god, you guys, Minori would like to give Shiroe a present, but it would be so embarrassing if he took her Valentine gift the wrong way.

— Tetra then tells Akatsuki all about the coconia fruit, which Minori overhears. Elsewhere, Marie also has an apron on and cooking up a storm in the kitchen. Immediately after this scene, we see Shiroe and Isaac discuss very important business with regards to Akihabara’s safety. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

— I mean, the contrast is very interesting, don’t you think?

— A bunch of girls have lined up just to give Soujirou presents. Hoo boy. Meanwhile, Lenessia is unhappy because she hasn’t heard from or seen Crusty in a while… but caeki fixed her mood right up!!! Ugh…

— Speaking of Crusty, we learn that Misa has been given a prosthetic arm. Apparently, healing magic won’t bring her “real” arm back because it has likely disappeared to wherever Crusty also disappeared to. Sadly, these tiny bits of plot development are all we get. I’m not sure if they even add up to five whole minutes out of the entire episode.

— And we’re back to Minori… she’s now asking Cat Dude to teach her how to bake. All of a sudden, Akatsuki also shows up with a bag of coconia fruits that she just happened to gather! Whoooooa! I’m going to need to take my heart medicine in case this episode gets any more action-packed.

— It’s this stupid bullshit where the girl is like, “Uguu, I want to make something nice for him, BUT NOT LIKE THAT OKAY, GAWSH GEEZ!” This lameass characterization is cliche, boring, overdone, cringeworthy, so on and so forth. If you want to do a love story, at least step your game up. Shiroe buying up all of the public land then leasing them right back to the server was sort of clever. Sort of. And the author came up with that all by himself! Yay! So what’s with this trite love triangle? If you can’t write a compelling romance, then don’t do it. Don’t shoehorn in romance if you don’t have the fucking chops for it. If your strength lies elsewhere, guess what? It’s okay! Nobody is ever say, “Man, this story about how to rule and govern an MMO world turned real is just missing that one crucial element… a shitty love triangle between three people who act like grade schoolers when it comes to the matters of the heart!”

— And that’s the other thing. It’s not like this is a torrid affair between three people. All of them are so fucking innocent about this, my five year old nephew’s got more game.

— Some wacky hijinks involving Marie, Naotsugu and Shoryou. Don’t really care, though.

— Shiroe is then presented with a very special cake. But like I’ve said, the girls are too innocent to get through with this nonsense, so neither of them has the guts to ask Shiroe anything. Welp. This has been another fruitful day in the lives of these Log Horizon characters.

— The episode ends with Intix berating Nureha, and revealing that she is the real leader behind the scenes. Alrighty then.

— Like I’ve said, the episode probably had less than five minutes of anything actually interesting. The rest of the episode was completely and utterly vapid. Oh well. Onto the new year. Maybe.