Episode 8

**The Kind Demon Kolulu** (やさしい魔物コルル, *Yasashii Mamono Koruru*) is the 8th episode of the Konjiki no Gash Bell!! Anime. This episode first aired in Japan on May 25, 2003.

## Overview

A little girl, Kolulu, stands alone in the middle of the pouring rain both dirty and in tears. A young schoolgirl, Shiori, hears Kolulu's cries and welcomes her into her home. When Shiori tries to gather any information from Kolulu that can help return her to her family, Shiori learns that Kolulu is all alone with nobody that can look after her. Shiori then decides from then on she will look after Kolulu as a big sister and accepts her into her family. As the days go by, her desire to protect Kolulu becomes stronger. Shiori would then see a bright glow emitting from Kolulu's backpack and discover Kolulu's pink spell book and see that there's more to Kolulu than she could have expected.

## Plot

Kolulu stands off to the side of a busy sidewalk soaked with both her tears and the pouring rain among the sea of people who continue walking past her. Hearing her cries, Shiori approaches her, wiping away her tears, and offers her protection from the rain with her umbrella. Shiori would then bring Kolulu home with her to get her out of the rain.

Inside, both Shiori and Kolulu introduce themselves to each other. Kolulu is then seated by Shiori at the dinner table to wait as she looks for spare clothes and prepares a warm bath for her. As Kolulu sits alone in the dining room, she begins to take notice how quiet and empty the house appears to be. She looks around and sees various clues that give some information on Shiori's life at home such as the wrapped up pre-cooked meals on the table and notes written on a white board addressed to Shiori by her mother. Shiori eventually gets a bath prepared and calls Kolulu over for it where she provides Kolulu with fresh clean clothes and offers to clean up both her bag and dress.

Now feeling warm and clean, Kolulu sits with Shiori at the dining table for dinner where Shiori encourages her to eat as much as she wants. Shiori eventually takes a moment to talk to Kolulu about the fact she had brought her in so she wouldn't catch a cold and wonders if Kolulu has family looking for her. Kolulu stops eating and tearfully tells Shiori she has no family looking for her and that she's truly all alone. After hearing this, Shiori quietly gets up to head to the kitchen and returns with some flan pudding for Kolulu. As Kolulu thanks Shiori for this, Shiori responds telling Kolulu to call her 'big sister' from there on. Kolulu eventually realizes what this means and is overjoyed knowing she'll have a big sister to look after her from there on.

The next day at the playground, Gash plays in the sandbox alone until Naomi arrives informing Gash that she and her friends have found a different place to hang out and won't be coming back to the park anymore. Naturally curious, Gash asks Naomi were this new place is to which Naomi laughs and tells Gash she's not telling him. As Naomi drives off in her toy car, laughing away at Gash's misery, Umagon approaches Gash. Gash immediately perks up seeing the little horse wondering if he wants to play with him. Naomi starts to slow down in her toy car visibly irritated as she overhears how much Gash is laughing and having fun despite her making him feel miserable just moments ago. Naomi turns the car in reverse and speeds towards the duo ultimately resulting in Naomi crashing into Gash's sand sculpture and, upon impact, sending Gash and the little horse flying away. At home, as Kiyomaro leaves the house for school, he's slowed down by Gash who pleads to Kiyomaro to go with him to school as he doesn't want to be alone by himself. Annoyed and looking for a way to get Gash to leave him be, he reminds Gash about his friend, the Vulcan 300. Now that he remembers it, Gash eagerly goes over to play with the Vulcan 300 which gives Kiyomaro a chance to silently head off to school without having Gash notice he even left.

At the park, as snack time for her finishes, Kolulu remembers her big sister Shiori will be there soon to take her home. As Kolulu leaves her spot at the park, she takes a moment to pick some flowers and creates a miniature flower crown for her doll, Tina. Kolulu's thoughts are then interrupted as Gash notices Kolulu, surprised that there's someone else there at that park. Kolulu immediately recognizes Gash but before she says anything, Gash continues speaking saying it's the first time he's ever seen her there and asks her name. Kolulu pauses briefly realizing that Gash doesn't seem to remember her. After Gash introduces himself first, Kolulu does the same and explains to Gash she had just moved into town recently. Happy to have met someone new, Gash eagerly introduces Kolulu to his Vulcan 300. Kolulu follows up by introducing Gash to her doll, Tina.

Gash is suddenly taken back seeing how well made Tina looks and, after realizing then how inferior his Vulcan appears to be in comparison, comments on Tina assuming that Tina must have been store bought. Kolulu refutes this claim explaining how Tina was hand-made by her big sister Shiori who made Tina to keep Kolulu company while she was away at school and had spent several days working on Tina. After hearing this, Gash remembers how, in comparison, Kiyomaro had spent only five minutes creating Vulcan and how it was made using a snack-box and some chopsticks. As Gash tries to find something positive to say about his Vulcan, it's chopstick arm slips out of the snack-box body causing Gash to fall into despair seeing his Vulcan fall apart on him. Just then, Shiori arrives to take Kolulu home. Before they leave, Kolulu remembers she had made a matching flower crown for Shiori similar to Tina's as a way of expressing her gratitude for making Tina. Shiori lifts Kolulu up, giving her a piggy-back ride and the two girls run smiling and laughing all the way home.

Shiori and Kolulu arrive back at home to have a meal together before Kolulu takes a nap after the long day. In Shiori's room that early evening, Kolulu is fast asleep tucked in and Shiori looks at the flower-crown that Kolulu had made for her that day. Shiori begins to think about how things used to be different before Kolulu came into her life and remembers how distant and isolated she had felt whenever her parents were around only to tell her how they never seem to have time for her. Shiori, although saddened by how absent her family has been from her life, looks over to Kolulu. Shiori reaffirms her feelings for Kolulu seeing her as her only family and swears that if she truly has nobody else in the world like her, she swears to always stay and protect her. A faint glow almost instantaneously begins to emit its light from Kolulu's bag and Shiori quickly opens it to discover a mysterious pink book glowing bright inside. In what felt like being in a trance-like state, Shiori opens the book to discover a readable passage inside the book that's also glowing bright pink. As Shiori utters the spell, *Zeruku*, Kolulu rises up from her bed in an attempt to warn Shiori to not read the spell only to find herself too late to stop her as the spell begins to take effect.

Shiori watches in complete terror as Kolulu's body undergoes a total physical transformation causing Shiori to freeze up in fear but finds herself unable to look away. Kolulu's *Zeruku* spell had transformed Kolulu into a monstrous and violent form of herself and she soon breaks out of Shiori's room through the window and begins to slash at everything in her way. As Shiori races to the door, Kolulu's rampage causes a street light to fall in the middle of the road subsequently leading up to a three car pile-up crash. When Shiori steps outside, she at first doesn't recognize the figure in front of her as Kolulu until Kolulu herself confirms it's her. Kolulu begins menacingly approaching Shiori demanding her to cast the spell once more in order to help her cause more havoc and release her power. Shiori, scared seeing Kolulu like this, pleads for her to return to her normal form. Just then, Kolulu's *Zeruku* form begins to slowly wear off and Kolulu orders Shiori once more to cast the spell quickly. As Kolulu struggles to keep her *Zeruku* form active and is slowly turning back to her original form, she questions why Shiori refuses to fight and comments that it's futile to resist as it is their destiny to fight. Before Kolulu passes out in Shiori's arms, she gives her a grim warning that she'll never be able to escape her destiny

At home the following day, after Gash attempts to convince Kiyomaro to remake the Vulcan 300, a news broadcast in the background reports on the incident that had occurred the previous day which gives Kiyomaro a bad feeling hearing this. At the same time, Shiori looks at the crime scene that's just in front of her house struggling to process what she had seen. Kolulu takes notice of Shiori's anxiety and wonders if something bad had happened yesterday to which Shiori tries to convince Kolulu that nothing happened and suggests they should just head out to play ball in the park. Soon enough, Kiyomaro and Gash eventually arrive at the crime scene while also on the way to the park. Although Gash is oblivious to feeling as if something was off, Kiyomaro finds himself in deep thought wondering if the wreckage was the result of an enemy demon.

At the park, as Shiori and Kolulu play volleyball together, Shiori still finds herself unable to focus playing as she thinks to herself if she never reads from Kolulu's book, then Kolulu will continue to stay as her kind self. Shiori fails to catch the ball as she had been distracted thinking about this and Kolulu questions her again about yesterday's events. Shiori quickly plays this off denying anything bad had happened and quickly tosses the ball back to Kolulu to keep her from thinking about things too much again. The ball just barely escapes Kolulu's grasp and rolls onto the street. As Kolulu goes over to retrieve the ball, a large truck can be seen speeding down the street heading in Kolulu's direction. Realizing it'll be too late for Kolulu to notice the truck and escape, Shiori quickly grabs Kolulu's pink spell book in a last-ditch effort to protect her and reluctantly casts her first spell, *Zeruku*.

Kiyomaro and Gash both hear *Zeruku* being cast and immediately dash towards the scene. From there, they see Kolulu, now in her *Zeruku* form, escaping out of the truck wreckage and about to slash at innocent bystanders but is then immediately struck down by Gash's *Zakeru*. Kolulu is struck again by *Zakeru* once more as she attempts to get back up to attack Gash. Shiori sees how hurt Kolulu is getting and rushes to her side. As part of the promise she made to herself to protect Kolulu by any means, even as much as she hates to recite Kolulu's spells, she casts *Zeruku* again in order to fend off against Kolulu's attacker. Both Kolulu and Gash attack each other with their spells again sending them both backwards. Shiori, pained by seeing Kolulu in pain and injured, begs for Kiyomaro and Gash to not hurt her. Just then however, Kolulu's spell book begins to glow bright and Shiori eventually discovers that a new spell has appeared in the book. Shiori, encouraged by Kolulu to read the new spell, casts Kolulu's second spell, *Zerusen*, which is revealed to be an attack that allows Kolulu to eject both her fists as homing missiles toward Kiyomaro and Gash sending them both flying backwards getting caught in the blast of it.

When Gash and Kiyomaro get back on their feet, Gash suddenly recognizes Shiori as the girl he had seen yesterday. As he looks closer at the duo, Gash notices how, despite them fighting, both Shiori and Kolulu are crying. Gash points this out to Kiyomaro as well then tells him that he can't bring himself to fight them anymore seeing how much emotional pain they're in and hearing from Shiori herself begging them to stop attacking. Despite seeing this too, Kiyomaro however remains partially skeptical, feeling that they still have to defend themselves but is stopped by Gash before he reads another spell. Out of fear as well, Shiori casts *Zeruku* again and Kolulu lunges toward Gash holding him in place with her claws.

As both Gash and Kolulu are at a stalemate holding each other in place, Gash tells Kiyomaro all that he knows about Shiori then begins to call out to Shiori telling her that he knows she's Kolulu's big sister, tells her he's Kolulu's friend, and requests for her to cease using any more spells. Shiori as well recognizes Gash as the boy she saw at the park, apologizes profusely, and pleads for Gash to help Kolulu. As Gash suddenly realizes the demon before him is Kolulu, Kolulu slams Gash onto the ground and prepares to strike him directly. Shiori rushes towards Kolulu with Tina in hand tearfully begging for her to stop. Shiori makes it in the nick of time throwing herself between Kolulu and Gash to stop Kolulu's attack. Shiori holds Kolulu in her arms reminding her who she is. Kolulu's *Zeruku* form begins to slowly wear off the longer she is being lovingly embraced by Shiori and soon returns to her original self.

Kolulu eventually wakes up, now as her true self, seeing Shiori, Kiyomaro, and Gash looking over her. As Kolulu comes to her senses, she notices how injured Shiori's arm is and looks around only to see the massive devastation she had caused. Shiori tries to reassure Kolulu that it's all over but Kolulu ignores this and holds out her spell book to Gash requesting him to destroy it. Gash is taken back in surprise realizing that if he does, she'll be sent back to the Demon World. Kolulu explains that her continuing to be there in the human world would only bring danger to others as her "other side" was brought out when her spells were recited. She continues saying that because her own will to fight is weak, another personality takes over her which is exactly what everyone had seen. Kiyomaro starts to feel troubled learning how this separate personality forces her to fight in the battle to decide king when in reality she never wanted to fight to begin with. Kolulu again requests Gash to burn her book so that her other personality will go back with her in the Demon World no longer able to hurt anyone anymore. Gash struggles with being presented this request and refuses, leading him to argue with Kolulu to stay in the Human World knowing how much she loves being with Shiori and that he'll just be the one to protect her from now on. Kolulu, despite hearing this, can't accept Gash's offer and cries knowing she can't bear being part of the Demon battle.

Kiyomaro is both saddened and frustrated learning the predicament Kolulu is in despite how much she wants to stay in their world, she's adamant on returning to the Demon World for everyone's sake. His eyes meet with Kolulu' and he realizes he has to be the one to fulfill Kolulu's wish. Kiyomaro instructs Gash to look closely at Kolulu's book, and, after gathering his strength to make the hard call, Kiyomaro casts *Zakeru* which sets Kolulu's book on fire. Gash, initially angry with Kiyomaro for tricking him, sees Kiyomaro broken down to tears after casting the spell. Kolulu thanks Kiyomaro for fulfilling her request and reassures the both of them it was for the best. As Kolulu starts to fade, Shiori rushes to Kolulu, clasping her hands, asking her to not leave her as she'll be all alone again without her. Kolulu comforts Shiori telling her that she's never alone because she'll always be with her and requests for her to try talking with her family about her loneliness. Kolulu continues promising Shiori she'll always look after her and that they'll always be sisters. Kolulu then turns to Gash and tells him that if he becomes the ruler of the Demon World then perhaps then demons wouldn't be forced to fight anymore. Gash realizes then that becoming a kind ruler will be exactly the kind of ruler he will strive to be and promises Kolulu he'll be the one to win the battle to make that come true. Kolulu smiles one last time hearing this as the remnants of her book are burned and she soon disappears along with the flames. From then on, Gash swears on his word that he will win the battle and become a kind ruler.

## Features

### Characters by Appearance

* Kolulu
* Shiori
* Gash Bell
* Naomi
* Umagon
* Kiyomaro Takamine

### Locations

* Mochinoki City
	+ Takamine Residence

### Spells by Appearance

* Zeruku (Debut)
* Zakeru
* Zerusen (Debut)

## Manga & Anime Differences

* In the manga, Kolulu is changed into her pajamas in Shiori's room after her bath. In the anime, Kolulu is changed into her pajamas in the same room she took a bath in.
* The events that took place in the playground has some notable differences to its portrayal in the anime.
	+ **Manga events:** As Gash begs for Kiyomaro to allow him to go to school with him, Kiyomaro initially tries suggesting that Gash goes to other places on his own such as the Botanical Garden or the playground. Gash then informs Kiyomaro that the Botanical Gardens that day is closed and at the park the previous day he saw that nobody was there except for Naomi who was passing through. Naomi had then informed him that they found a new place to go too and weren't going to tell him where.
	+ **Anime events:** Gash is seen playing in the sandbox alone until Naomi approaches him informing him that she and her friends have found a new place that they'll be going too and won't be coming back to this particular park anymore. Gash questions where this new place is only to be denied that information. As Naomi leaves, Umagon shows up once again and reunites with Gash. Naomi becomes upset hearing Gash and Umagon laugh and have fun despite seeing Gash appear so miserable knowing he'll be alone at the playground just a moment ago. Naomi turns her toy car she's driving in reverse and charges at the two. She then crashes into Gash's sand sculpture and the impact sends Gash and Umagon flying away.
* In the manga, the Vulcan 300 was created for the first time as Kiyomaro's response to give Gash some company while he's away. In the anime, the Vulcan 300 had already been created in an earlier episode. Kiyomaro only had to remind Gash about the Vulcan 300 so he could leave for school without him.
* The events that take place once Shiori and Kolulu are home from the park have some notable differences.
	+ **Manga events:** In Shiori's flashbacks to her parents, both Shiori's parents are seen telling Shiori that they're both respectively busy and instruct her to leave a note on the whiteboard at home if she needs anything from them. Shiori is also seen remembering all her little interactions with Kolulu and thinks on how Kolulu is her real family now.
	+ **Anime events:** When Shiori and Kolulu return from the park, after Shiori lets Kolulu know that they'll be having dinner soon, Shiori looks to the whiteboard right by her and sees a new message from one of her parents explaining they'll be busy that month because of work and request Shiori to leave a note there if she needs anything. Shiori erases this after reading it, then the scene changes to a later point in the day where Kolulu is fast asleep in Shiori's room. Unlike the manga, Shiori does not think about all the little moments she has had with Kolulu, but her overall expressed thoughts and feelings about Kolulu remain the same.
* The order of events starting from Kolulu's transformation into her *Zeruku* form to Shiori and Kolulu playing at the park are different between the manga and anime.
* In the anime, Kolulu slashing down a light pole in the street in her *Zeruku* form results in a three car pile up when the first car crashes into the fallen pole. In the manga, Kolulu severely wounded the first three people she saw nearby Shiori's house and can be seen partially covered in her victim's blood.
* In the manga, Gash yells at Kiyomaro to not read any spells *after* Shiori casts *Zeruku* and chooses to handle Kolulu's attacks directly on his own. In the anime, Gash yells at Kiyomaro to not read any spells *before* Shiori casts *Zeruku*.
* In the manga, after Shiori stops Kolulu from attacking Gash, part of what Shiori says to remind Kolulu of who she really is was to show Kolulu Tina and the flower-crown she had made for Tina. In the anime, Shiori drops Tina onto the grass after the moment of impact when she throws herself in between Gash and Kolulu.
* A minor scene in the manga shows Shiori collapsing a bit onto the grass along with Kolulu but is caught by Kiyomaro. Shiori reassures Gash and Kiyomaro that she's alright and thanks Gash for helping them. The anime only features Shiori thanking Gash.
* Kolulu's goodbye to Shiori is slightly different between the manga and anime. In the manga, Kolulu expresses to Shiori just how much she loves her and will always watch after her because they're sisters. In the anime, Kolulu never directly says she loves Shiori but still mentions she'll watch after her because they're sisters. Kolulu in the anime also advises Shiori to try speaking with her parents about her loneliness at home too.

## Censorship & Other Localization Differences

* White-board messages written by Shiori's parents were altered significantly between the Japanese and English versions of the anime. The white-board messages in the Japanese airing of the episode had more specific information written on them than in the English localization of the episode.

* In the Japanese airing of the episode, when Shiori goes to prepare a bath for Kolulu, Kolulu is left alone in silence sitting at the dinning room table simply looking around the room at various things such as the pre-cooked meals left for Shiori to heat up and messages addressed to Shiori by her mother that were written on the white-board of their house. In the VIZ localization of the episode, Kolulu does not sit in silence but instead Shiori speaks in the background openly discussing how her parents are never around and telling Kolulu that she could eat the food they left for her on the table.
* For unknown reasons, a minor scene when Shiori and Kolulu return home from the park where Shiori stands in front of the dinning table speaking to Kolulu was replaced with a recycled scene of a close up of Kolulu for a brief moment despite there being no visible reason why it needed to be in the VIZ localization of the episode.
	+ The particular scene used was recycled from an earlier point in the episode when Kolulu comes into Shiori's home from the rain and appears both dirty and wet.
* A scene in the Japanese airing of the episode that shows the moment of impact where Kolulu lunges at Gash when *Zeruku* was cast was censored over with a black screen that displayed a slashing effect over it in the VIZ localization of the episode.
* In the original Japanese airing, Shiori thanks Gash for his help during a brief scene in which everyone is by Kolulu's side waiting for her to wake up after the battle she just had. In the VIZ localization, this scene was made silent instead.