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Still Waters Run Deep (いまだ浮上せず, "Imada Fujō Sezu"?), also known as "Not Yet Surfacing" in the first Viz Translation, is the 14th chapter of the Urusei Yatsura manga.

Summary[]

An unintended kindness earns Ataru an unwanted visit to a kappa's palace.

Plot Overview[]

Brought up to some nearby mountains as part of a school project, Ataru slips away from his classmates for a secret rendezvous with Shinobu. His efforts to make out with her are foiled by her insistence that he climb a tree and recover a strange thing that seems to be a dried up frog. Even after she does so, she refuses to fool around with him. As they wander through the forest, they stumble across a spring, and are suddenly accosted by a female kappa, who seems to be smitten with Ataru. It's then revealed she's actually talking to the "dried frog" in Ataru's pocket, which is really her husband; once thrown into the spring, it becomes a giant male kappa, who insists on thanking Ataru by taking him to the kappa city in the depths of the spring. Ataru is unhappy, especially because the dancing girls are all kappa. Dismayed that he seems so disappointed with their hospitality, the kappas politely send him home with a mermaid escort... which only lands him in trouble with the jealous Shinobu and his envious classmates when he resurfaces.

Characters in Order of Appearance[]

Trivia[]

  • The chapter takes its title from a song by a band called Penny Rain.
  • The plot of this chapter parodies the famous Japanese story of Urashima Tarō, who is taken to the fabulous palace of the sea dragon king, Ryūgū, after rescuing a turtle.
  • On the first page, Kakugari complains about not being able to play pachinko. This is a popular Japanese arcade game machine similar in structure to an American pinball machine, but which potentially dispenses small metal balls in response to successful play, in a manner akin to a slot machine. Japan formally prohibits gambling for money, but pachinko machines exploit a legal loophole, where the dispensed balls can be exchanged for tokens that can then in turn be swapped for cash prizes.
  • Kappas are one of the most famous of all Japanese yokai; there are many variants of kappas across Japan's different regional folklores, but the fundamental concept is of a turtle-like humanoid with a bowl-like head that is used to carry water - if this water spills away, the kappa becomes weak and helpless. They range in demeanor from harmless prank-pullers to murderous monsters, but are always immensely polite, such that the easiest way to defeat a kappa is to bow respectfully to one, which will force it to return the greeting and thus weaken itself. Kappas are famous for their love of cucumbers (and entrails and/or liver, for the more malicious ones), and are deceptively strong for their small size.
  • The presence of kappas in a mountain pond has a mythological basis. Certain myths depict kappas or kappa-like yokai living at least partially in the mountains, with some versions even changing from kappas to an entirely different kind of yokai when they migrate to the mountain.
  • The title page of this chapter is interesting for two reasons. Firstly, it is a pastiche of an iconic image of Urashima Tarō, depicting his arrival at Ryūgū and meeting Otohime, done up in the classic style of the "your head here" photo stand. Secondly, it features not only Ataru in the expected role of Urashima Tarō, but Shinobu in the role of Otohime; this highlights how, in the earliest chapters, Shinobu was intended to be the female romantic lead of the series and Lum was intended as more of an antagonist character. It wouldn't be until Chapter 26 that Lum would effectively take over the role of female romantic lead.
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