Tai-Ari deshita. Ojousama wa Kakutou Game nante Shinai Ep.10 - Wait, vs Alice now?!

Episode 10 of Tai-Ari deshita: Ojousama wa Kakutou Game nante Shinai goes back to the main heroine, Yorue Mio, and her fight against Café Ore, with Aya arriving to watch from the sidelines to add more weight to the match. Not that Mio actually noticed Aya was even there, though.

She was in a complete trance, repeating the same moves, and eventually lured Café Ore into a trap that allowed her to win the match. Again, I know very little about fighting games, but the commentary was quite good at helping the viewer understand that she was doing something incredible.

The shots of Mio focused on the game were quite atmospheric. She truly is a stunning beauty

Blushing Aya is great too, she's finally entering the phase where she get interest in her yuri partner!

This is also a step forward for the yuri relationship between the two, as it's the first time Aya has felt embarrassed and unsure of how to talk to Mio. She was thinking, "How did I talk to her before this?" I'm sure she'll recover quickly, but things are moving in the right direction; they just need one more small push.

Speaking of another yuri couple, there was a complete absence of Tamaki and Yuu in this episode. Tamaki received a few messages from her, but didn't respond or reach out because she was still trying to overcome the mental impact of the practice match with her sister, Hana. Clearly, the actual tournament will allow the two to meet and at least smooth out their relationship.

The series seems to shift its focus toward Arisa next: the mesugaki we've grown to hate up to this point. She lost her most recent match against a Zangief who kept repeating the same move over and over, leaving her extremely frustrated in the bathroom, cursing about it.

This leads us to learn the reason behind it all. The so-called "trauma" involved her best friend at school, Miyuki. They bonded back when Arisa knew nothing about fighting games, learning everything from Miyuki, who was proud to teach her. Eventually, Arisa started playing, and through practice, she became so good that during their first real match together, Arisa destroyed Miyuki. This led Miyuki to believe that Arisa was an experienced player all along who was just mocking her.

Back then Arisa was just a cute little girl with no hint of being that annoying. Can we get the pure Arisa back? Please?!

The two made good friends, hopefully they'll find a way to mend the relationship. Miyuki's influence might make Arisa behave more normally...

It's the typical plot that could have been resolved if they had just sat down and talked for a bit. Now, she is apparently striving to become stronger as a way to cope with this trauma, but I feel like she'll be defeated next week because she's facing Mio. What will her reaction be if she gets eliminated from the tournament?