Hayate The Combat Butler Chapter 458: Give a Troublesome Person Something Troublesome And Only Trouble Can Follow -- Review and Synopsis

OMG! Look at Nagi hogging the spotlight! I mean, she's only the CO-MAIN Character, after all. Why does she have to be in this manga all the time, huh?

Synopsis: Nagi wakes up inside the hotel room and after complaining a bit about “working so hard,” she starts thinking about how Hayate is doing right now and that she should help him as his master. Outside the room, she gets a glimpse of Isumi walking past. She sees Maria and asks her about Isumi but Maria says she hasn’t seen her.

No captions necessary (I'll type one in anyway). This one is just pure lulz.

Back at the beach, Hayate and Ikusa are confronted with the “mystery person” from the previous chapter and it turns out to be Yukiji in a mask. She starts calling herself “Higanman” and claims to be seeking revenge on Hayate for yesterday. It seems that the ghost who was possessing Hinagiku has been transferred to her and the ghost now wants revenge on Hayate for taking his treasure (all that boxed curry from the island). Ikusa calmly deduces that she’s been possessed.

Hayate: Nice eight-pack, bro.

An amusing conversation between Hayate, Ikusa and “Higanman” ensues and Ikusa vows to defeat this evil spirit as a lifesaver, but Higanman argues that hurting him will hurt Yukiji too. Of course, Hayate knows how durable Yukiji is, so he has no qualms about it and tries to strike her right in the face, but she successfully evades at least three successive blows from him (two are offscreen). Hayate eagerly tells Ikusa to go all out on Yukiji since she can take it.

Higanman fires some kind of spirit hadoukens at Ikusa, who effortlessly dodges them and then moves in for the finishing blow, but he is taken by surprise when Yukiji blocks his attack with one hand and uses some kind of spirit blow which pushes him back several paces away.

The evil spirit relishes the strength of his host body and shows that he’s even managed to steal Ikusa’s treasure in the scuffle. Ikusa says its war if he doesn’t return it, but the Higanman is unperturbed by his threat.

Suddenly, the pouch glows and gives the ghost even more power and Hayate concludes that it’s because of the King’s Jewel inside, but Hayate’s attention is then taken away with a nearby scream from Nagi.

Review: Whoo! Lots of stuff happening here and another Nagi cover FTW! First of all… all of my guesses as to who the mystery person might be were dead wrong as it turned out to be Yukiji who has presumably contracted the ghost who possessed Hinagiku and made her sick. Pretty sure someone guessed this scenario correctly in one of the forums and/or blogs that I lurk, but I can’t remember who. Anywayz, props to you whoever you are, mystery soothsayer person.

Secondly, wow! Ikusa’s huge! Did you see the difference between him and Hayate? Ok, so maybe Hayate’s in semi-chibi form, but how about how he towers over Yukiji? Betcha he’s at least 183-185 cm.

Ikusa: Hmph! Don't get cocky. I'm only using 10% of my powers!

This chapter establishes several things at least. Now we know almost for sure that the King’s Jewel really is inside that pouch as it gave the ghost some kind of power. So if it’s not the King’s Jewel, then it has to be some other kind of magical artifact, but it’s highly unlikely to be anything else at this point.

This chapter also establishes that both the Katsuras are really top-tier in terms of strength in the Hayateverse with the way Higanman in Yukiji’s body was able to block a blow from Ikusa. Granted, it probably wasn’t a 100% committed blow, but remember that Ikusa has stood on par with Athena’s magical memory recover hammers with just his physical strength alone and has cut off King Midas’ right arm with the Shirousakura pretty handily.

Anyway, enough about Ikusa. Let’s talk about Nagi for a bit. I like how Hata sorta redeemed her character a bit in this chapter what with her getting tired and giving up so easily the last time. This chapter shows that she still cares for Hayate even though she did bail out on him and she’s actually eager to get back and help him out after she’s rested up a bit. With that said, it seems that she’s in trouble again and needs rescuing according to the cliffhanger in the previous arc.

All-in-all, this was another great fast-paced chapter for the beach arc. I wouldn’t say it was worth a one-week wait, but Hata does deserve a break every now and then with the way he’s been churning out these chapters fairly regularly.

Naturally, I have no idea what Nagi is screaming about this time.

Speculation Corner: Okay, I’m honestly all out of guesses here as to who Nagi’s mystery tormentor/abductor could be. Hata just makes it impossible to guess with the lack of information before these cliffhangers – which isn’t a bad thing, btw. I’m just pointing it out. Anyway, I’m gonna go with Yozora Housen on this one… or it could be that she’s just screaming over something absolutely trivial like a giant cockroach getting in her way or something.

Okay fanart time, so that Goddess of Gensokyou from last time requested this one too. I kinda like how moe her face turned out here… although I do not (openly) encourage more fanart on the same subject matter.

If you don't get the scene in this image... good! You don't want to know.

This is other one is also fanart request from a Hintko-chan. Naturally, I don’t support this pairing… with that said, if Hayate continues to be a dunce about Nagi’s feelings, I wouldn’t mind if Himegami or some other new male character started showing interest in her and she actually responded. At least we know that Robot 13/13-kun got a rise out of him a few hundred chapters ago. I’d like to see how he responds if a real rival (other than the Hamster’s brother) started showing some interest in Nagi. I mean, Maria got all those letters from the boys when she was Nagi’s age and I don’t see Nagi losing to her in terms of looks (when they were the same age… nah, Nagi’s way cuter), so why shouldn’t she have a few admirers of her own?

I never have and never will ship Himegami x Nagi

Anywayz, that wraps up this review. See ya in the next chapter!