Spice and Wolf II OVA : A Wolf on sick leave

This surely adds some spice to wolf

Let me start with this : For the people who liked season 1 of this series, there’s good news since the second season will air soon, more specificly this summer, and to keep us satisfied the producers made a nice OVA for us.

We start a some inn, in some town…Horo, Lawrence, Nora and her dog Enekk take a seat. The atmosphere is immediatly set since we see a quick snapshot of all three seperately, Horo with an annoyed face look ing at Nora, Nora with an obvious smile looking at Lawrence, Lawrence looking unaware of the atmosphere as always and Enekk…well he stares at Horo.

As they toast with a kingsize beer Lawrence starts talking about how amazing it is that he and Nora were brought together,  since if it wasn’t for her he wouldn’t have been there anymore. Nora is embarrassed by this and starts complimenting Lawrence for helping her as well, because he was the one that helped her out of the church, who used her for their own benefits. Horo is watching over the scene and tries to give Lawrence some subtle hints in order to get give her some attention as well. As Lawrence notices that she’s been quiet for some time he asks her if she’s gonna drink alone all evening. Horo, hoping that he got her hints, tells him he doesn’t need to worry and that she’ll be fine after a few more drinks. Nora also expresses her concern, but she only gets a glare from Horo in return. Lawrence then assumes she drunk already, Horo replies that she’s the Wise Wolf known to have swallowed an entire lake and that it’ll take a lot more to intoxicate her than just a beer.

After a while dinner gets served and as Lawrence places some meat on Nora’s place he asks if Horo wants some too. Horo smiles and tells him she can serve it herself, obviously giving off a hint that he should push on and give her a piece afterall. Yet our thickheaded friend doesn’t get it and moves on to serve himself, Horo is unpleasantly suprised by this but keeps quiet. Though…

This face tells us enough...

As you can see in the picture the conversation takes a weird turn, Lawrence starts talking how suprising it is that sheep can find a salt rock. Nora replies that once sheep find one they continously lick it. Then Lawrence mentions a story he heard once. According to him people in the east use sheep as a torturing device, they put salt on the criminal’s feet and make sheep lick it off. The criminal would laugh so hard because of it and would instantly turn into a good person.

This is what happens in Guantanamo.

I won’t go on on how this story doesn’t make any sense, cause it would be even more senseless to comment something like this. So for this case I’ll let Horo’s reaction speak for itself.

Kyon couldn't do it any better than this

What’s more important in this conversation is Lawrence’s reaction on how Nora is having trouble biting a piece of pork meat. She can’t seem to get a decent piece of it and Lawrence is completly infatuated by this clumsy girl moe-ness. And again Horo’s reaction speaks for itself with a nice *looks away* and a “you’ll soon feel my wrath”-comment. Lawrence admits that he made up the last part and both him and Nora start laughing. The conversation goes on a bit longer and Nora gives Enekk a slice of pork meat. Enekk stares at Horo again and she gives the poor dog an evil wolf grumble. Horo moves her attention back to the table but then it suddenly gets clear why Horo was looking for attention…

Horo faints and falls down onto the floor

In the next scene we get inside Horo’s memory where she tells us about her past where, she was worshipped by the people once a year and how dull the other days of the year were for her until she met Lawrence. The months she spend with him were more vivid than all the years she spend back then. At first when she started travelling with him she was sad since she missed her homeland, but with all the exciting events they went through she forgot about that sadness…

That's one big Horo figurine

I'd pray for something else if I'd see that...

Kowaii sou...

The enjoyment of travelling~

...The enjoyment of travelling...

As Horo wakes up from her dream about the past, she find herself alone in a bed covered by A LOT of blankets. She suddenly remembers how Lawrence dragged her upstairs and gets completely embarressed by that. She starts talking to herself about how she always gives in to that gentle smile of his, how gets angry when she dislikes his attitdute and how she laughs when he’s being funny. Then she wonders why he isn’t there in there…

Get the picture now?

Soon after that Lawrence enters the room, Horo is happy he finally arrived and puts up a smiling face. Lawrence however is quite angry at her for not telling him she was sick all this time and tells her that sickness could mean death if they would’ve been travelling now. Lawrence asks her if it is dangerous disease she has, Horo tells him…

Though this is some serious moe...

Lawrence eventually sits down on the bed and lets out a sigh of relief, telling her he was only worried about her health. After the atmosphere cooled a bit Lawrence places his hand on her forehead and notices she has a fever. Horo turns away, blushing completly…

m-m-moe...

She complains about how hard his fingers are hard just like a wolf’s nose. Then she turns away from him and mumbles that when wolves rub their noses together it is like when humans… she doesn’t complete her sentence and as usual Lawrence doesn’t get the clue. Horo however doesn’t give in and tells him to forget about it, she drops down on the bed and turns away from Lawrence. Lastly Lawrence tells her goodnight by rubbing over her head and Horo immediatly falls asleep dreaming about what she couldn’t say earlier…

At least he reads the vibe in her dreams...

When she wakes up the next morning she’s all alone in the room again, with the windows opened this time. Lawrence walks in and brought her some apple cider. The apple-maniac inside Horo wakes up and jumps up the bed, hitting her head against sealing brings her down as quickly as she jumped up though.

you and your silly questions...

Horo gets back up and drinks from the cider though according to her tastes it seemed kinda off. Lawrence explainesthat he diluted it and gives us a speech about the 4 body states (warm/cold and wet/dry) in relation with the body’s balance. It simple comes to this : an apple would’ve been to dry so he needed to add alcohol, but since strong drinks would have risen her temprature again he deluted it. Next he asks if Horo would like a porridge with apple and hot milk, Horo’s answer to that…

no pun needed here.

While Lawrence is out to get her porridge, Horo closses her eyes and gets a bad dream with her at the end of their journey in choice between the other wolves or Lawrence.  She runs over to Lawrence but when she gets their she only finds some of his bones as remains…

He's always been thick-headed

She wakes up with tears rolling down her cheeks and when Lawrence enters again asking her to sit up, she streteches out her arms for help. Because she wiped her tears away before he reached her Lawrence doesn’t notice. After she finishes the meal Lawrence tells her she should take her time to recover. He gets up and tries to put away the empty plates, but Horo stops him by pulling the ends of his jacket telling him not to leave her since the inn is too quiet for her. He sits down again and they discuss what they should eat later on, since they talk about sheep again Nora gets mentioned and Horo…well…

She is not amused...

Horo gets worked out about it and Lawrence is suprised by her reaction. When he asks Horo why she holds a grudge against Nora, Horo doesn’t know how to react. Luckily for her Lawrence misunderstood the situation again telling her she shouldn’t be so angry at Nora just because other sheperds were trying to harm her. Horo sighs and makes up an excuse.

When the sun sets Lawrence returns with the dish they agreed on, he also brought Nora who wanted to check Horo’s health. Horo wasn’t happy with her presence at first but after a while she starts talking with Nora asking her what the most important quality for a sheperd is. Nora’s answer…

This is quite a suprissing answer for Horo and to make the impact of Nora’s answer even bigger they both get shown in a open field with the wind blowing freely over them, Lawrence closes the windows after that making it a nice pun. Both girls start laughing as Lawrence asks what they were talking about…seemingly there must’ve been a hidden message in it, but this time I was at the same side as Lawrence was. In the end Lawrence just starts laughing with them making it a happy ending~

_

Kyon’s thoughts :

Well honestly, I love slow pace series like this one. The medieval theme, the lovely music and the whole Spice and Wolf atmosphere is just awesome for me. In this OVA the art style seems to have changed a bit in comparison the first season, but it doesn’t effect the vibe of the series. Also we get a nice view on how the characters are involved with eachother so it makes a good re-introduction for the ones that watched this series a long time ago. Plotwise this episode showed nicly Horo’s annoyance against Nora in the first part and the more developed relationship between Horo and Lawrence in the second. Not much other things happened here but it’s a nice warm-up for what awaits us in the second season. I’m really looking forward to more of this…

I should make a nice ending pun right? oh well…here’s one…

I hope you enjoyed it~