First Impressions / Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka

「アイキャントスピーク、イセカイゴ？」 (Ai Kyanto Supiiku, Isekaigo)
“I Can’t Speak, Isekai?”

Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka?’s ninth episode gets a little meatier with its set-up towards a large scale war between the human and demon realms. On Kumoko’s end, she is figuring out what her role in the world is now that she knows that she’s being used by the powers that be for entertainment purposes. But in the meantime, Shun gets bad news that Julius himself had an inkling about if any of the flags he dropped were of any indication.

This time around, we were introduced to the Demon Lord, whose council has been watching over Kumoko alongside the mysterious figure known as D. It’s been revealed that all of the overly convenient features that Kumoko has gained at this point have been instrumental in providing D with enough entertainment to make her worth rooting for.

Additionally, this scene introduces a member of the Demon Council that ultimately aims to trigger a war with the human population. It was pretty funny to see how she tried to interpret his language and desperately tried to work around the language barrier before the smartphone dropped down to give her a hand.

It was interesting to be introduced to the Demon Lord given how much foreshadowing we’ve had since we started seeing Kumoko get bonus upgrades. There are some nice tidbits to keep an eye out on such as the Demon Lord having webbing-based powers and the scarf that Julius had made from the leftover webbing from one expedition. But at the moment, we just see her gearing up for the untimely demise of Julius.

Speaking of which, it continues the tradition of the folks in the human realm gaining unwanted skills that Kumoko would’ve had a field day over. The Demon Lord being familiar with Julius’ original name of Yamada makes it neat to speculate what information she’s operating off of that she’s able to recognize characters from the past life even with the Demon Kingdom and the Human Realm being so far off. But Shun’s new title of will definitely be a subject of conversation soon as he is now expected to live up to the heightened expectations of being as excellent as the brother he’s looked up to for so long.

26 Comments

  1. I always appreciate when a series recognizes that there are language barriers and that isekai world denizens do not speak any Earth language.

    I was waiting for the Demon Council scene. I’m going to have to go back and look at the end credits to see who is voicing what character to see if they are giving stuff away or trying to mislead the viewers even more.

    LoliHat
    Reply

  3. Actually, when she said she felt sorry for Yamada, she was referring to Shun, not Julius as Yamada was Shun’s previous name. She probably knew that killing Julius would be a crushing blow to Shun.

    Cruiser
    Reply

    1. One of many reasons why the adaptation supposedly gets flak, in light novel it’s all spider stuff for 360 chapters, only then humans first show up in the story, but they decided to be different in anime and mixed it up. This episode pretty much says how it is, everything you see in the cave was 15 years ago.

      Duzz
      Reply

      1. The human chapters are in the LN right from the start. The first Shun chapter is literally the second chapter in LN1, and even in the WN it’s only ten chapters in.

        The manga version is the one that cuts out the human side of the story.

        Veltharis
        Reply

  6. This episode seems to have revealed that there’s a time difference between what we see in the human world and Kumoko’s time in the cave. It appears that the humans took some of Kumoko’s webbing years back when Fei was still developing in her dragon egg, and that’s how they made the spider silk scarf. It appears that given that the Demon Lord can use spider webbing that Kumoko became the Demon Lord since the time she was just a spider monster. So Kumoko’s days as a spider take place in the past whereas the human/demon stuff take place in the present.

    Vance
    Reply

    1. Also got to remember the teacher has a mysterious way of knowing about all the students. And she clearly said Wakaba is dead… so… 15 years time gap… lots can happen yes?

      KoroshiyaKi
      Reply

      1. Saying that Wakaba is dead could mean other things aside from her actually being dead. For one, it could mean that Wakaba is so different now that she might as well be a different person. Maybe the spider girl herself claims that Wakaba is dead, and she fully embraces her new role as the Demon Lord. Although it would involve a big twist, it could also mean that the spider girl only has Wakaba’s memories and not Wakaba’s soul, so in that sense, Wakaba would be “dead” because in that case the spider girl is merely an imitation of Wakaba rather than being the same person.

        In any case, I don’t think the spider girl will die so soon since she’s the main character of the story. Maybe she is killed at the end of the story, but I really doubt that she is dead in the present day when all-out war breaks out between the humans and demons.

        Vance
        Reply

        1. True, true, she could have ascended to a higher plane… usually you just call that dying though. But yeah Wakaba is indeed different from our MC spider, having the memories only and being a different being entirely could be a plausible theory. Maybe Wakaba survived and is actually just in Japan still playing games and out of reach of the teachers mysterious ability?

          But killing the mc mid story would be a hard one for a story to do, and making her the demon king would be funny and hilarious pitting two otherworlders against each other as hero and demon king, but I doubt that’s easy of an answer.

          KoroshiyaKi
          Reply

      2. There’s a few ways Wakaba could be “dead” from a storytelling standpoint at this point without her actually being dead. For example:

        1) D’s taken control/Wakaba has been sidelined/put in a box. The admin waited until she was powerful then took that power for her own amusement/goals.

        2) Wakaba is “dead” in the same sense Darth Vader was “dead”. Teacher doesn’t want to tell the future Hero that he’ll need to kill one of his classmates to save humanity from the demons. Eventually we get our “No, I am Wakaba!” moment and everyone’s gotta figure out who’s actually screwing with who.

        Dave K
        Reply

  8. there was no mention of the Demon Lord council watching over Kumoko nor having any relation to Kumoko in general. as already mentioned before me, reminder that Julius mentioned the spider silk 15 years ago. so Kumoko’s meeting with D was a long time past already

    GoXDS
    Reply

  10. okay another WHAM! episode…
    first things first we have big news that Kumoko timeline is circa 15 years before school/demon lord timeline
    implications are huge – first one, is that Kumoko might really be dead by that time, second one – alternative – she might have ascended to demon lord status herself by that time
    which is strongly suggested by former demon lord showing up in the war council as subordinate to “new” one, and spider-powers exhibited by new one (also mentioning abyss magic ass off-hand threat)
    as for D herself (I assume by voice) she seems to be like, isedaki’d programmer who become worlds “system administrator” either after godhood ascension, or as some cosmic twist of fate… hell, for all we know she can be still in Japan playing the world on her PC
    finally we have poor Julius meet untimely end leaving Shun/Schlein as successor to his title… and probable next target for Demon lord’s attack….

    by comparison, Kumoko defeating the big-ass dragon seems like small event in the whole story… and welcome onboard the crazy train, magic-brain no.2!

    ewok40k
    Reply

    2. While he certainly looks the part, that guy connected to the dragon said he was invoking Administrator privileges. That probably makes him a “god” like the cell phone generating D, rather than a mere demon king.

      heiro one
      Reply

      1. That guy was never demon king, but he’s been serving the nation tirelessly for so long he could’ve been crowned king if this one never showed up. That’s why his brother was so annoyed.

        Hanabira.Kage
        Reply

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