Serpo Arc

## Arc Chronology

The **Serpo Arc** is the third story arc of the *Dandadan* manga series.

Having taken an interest in the yokai powers demonstrated by the Turbo-Granny in their first confrontation with her, the Serpo return to capture Okarun and extract the Turbo-Granny's powers from him. Alongside Aira, Momo helps Okarun fight back against the aliens but is currently conflicted with him after an incident occurs prior to the Serpo's sudden arrival.

## Synopsis

### The Incident

At the Ayase house, Aira is invited over to eat with Momo, Okarun, Seiko and the Turbo-Granny. Believing that Aira has it out for her because she had previously dropped a basin on her head, Momo apologizes to her for this past stunt but demanded that she apology to Okarun for making a fool of him at the time. Aira clarifies to Momo that she did hold a grudge against her for this but that she sees her as a demon who she must defeat in order to protect the world. Momo then ends up getting into an argument with Aira as she denies her claim. Before leaving, Aira asks Okarun why he chose to rescue her despite her view of him as a demon as well, to which Okarun replies that it was because it was only natural to help those in trouble. Momentarily, Momo, Seiko, and the Turbo-Granny return Okarun's kintama back to his crotch area, much to his happiness.

The next day at school, Momo discusses with Okarun on their plan to find his other kintama but hears him wanting to spend his time working on a report. Momo allows him to do so and spends her lunch with her two friends. She then starts to have a sneaking suspicion about Okarun, thinking that he is hiding something from her. Miko tells Momo of her assumption that Okarun is associating himself with another girl. Momo denies this assumption but finds herself picturing Aira in her head. She then goes out to get drinks for her and Miko while still feeling uneasy about Okarun. Meanwhile, at the edge of school, Okarun workouts in private to become strong against future foes, however, he is found by Aira who attempts to kiss him as a way to confess her feelings, much to his shock. Okarun then tries to distance himself from her advances and ends up falling on top of her. In a sudden turn of events, Momo catches the two and expresses her disappointment to Okarun, believing that he lied to her about the report in order to spend time with Aira and walks away in refusal to hear him explain himself.

### The Return of the Serpo

Shortly after feeling depressed in class, having had the earlier event engraved into her mind, Momo finds herself within a flooded Empty Space and sees a large eel-like figure from across the hall. Momo hides from the creature but accidently creates a sound in the water that causes the eel to react by shooting a water compressed blast at the classroom she is in, which misses Momo. As the eel travels elsewhere, Momo wonders where Okarun is at.

After finding himself within Empty Space as well, Okarun runs into Aira and informs her of his speculation that an alien has come to their school, having recalled being in Empty Space when the Flatwoods Monster made its appearance, and that they can only escape by defeating the alien. The two then find themselves attacked by a humanoid crab alien. Okarun enters his Turbo-Granny transformation to defend him and Aira from the alien but suddenly becomes subdued by psychokinesis. The culprits are revealed to be the Serpo who have returned to capture Okarun for his yokai powers that intrigued them after their first confrontation with the Turbo-Granny. With the Serpo's psychokinesis also canceling out his powers, Okarun becomes helpless as the Serpo prepare to perform surgery on him. However, he is saved by Aira after she awakens Acrobatic Silky's powers, which further makes her believe that she is her world's chosen one.

With her awakened power, Aira fights the crab alien and the Serpo while Okarun desperately tries to find clothes; having been stripped naked by the Serpo during their intention to surgical remove his powers. Aira manages to gain the upper hand against the crab alien with the help from Acrobatic Silky's agility, however, after being bound by the Serpo's psychokinesis, she is left open to receive a powerful punch from him that sends her crash back. With Aira also having yokai powers, the Serpo state their intentions to capture her as well and once again use their psychokinesis to subdue her and Okarun from using their powers to fight back. However, Momo arrives on time to cancel out the Serpo's subjugation on them with her own psychic powers, allowing Okarun to launch himself at the crab alien.

The Serpo become shocked and worried to face Momo again, revealing that they sent out the water creature after her in order to avoid this confrontation. While Momo gives her support by continuing to cancel out the Serpo's powers, Okarun and Aira fight together in facing the crab alien who has been physical enhanced by his superiors. The battle is then disrupted by the flooded Void suddenly overflowing, along with the walls and ceilings being turned into water as well.

While remaining afloat, Momo, Okarun and Aira look down to see the water creature swimming below them, which Okarun enthusiastically confirms is Nessie, and try to swim away from it after it starts to attack the Serpo. Not finished fighting the three, the enhanced crab alien continues his assault on them underwater by launching shockwaves that ends up sending Aira up towards the watery ceiling to drown. With the enhanced crab alien blocking her way to psychically grab Aira out, along with the Turbo-Granny's power taking away his ability to swim, Momo and Okarun try to figure out a way they can save Aira but become unable to properly work together due to Momo still being mad at Okarun for what happened earlier at school. Seeing as how she is bothered by this, Okarun becomes assertive in that he tells Momo that he will explain to her fully as to what happened at the time to clear her misunderstanding, however, he is interrupted by the enhanced crab alien making another attack at them. After diving down on Momo to move her out of the way of the attack, Momo manages to come up with the idea of using her powers to control Okarun like a living speed boat in order to reach Aira and rescue her from drowning.

### The Serpod Dover Demon Nessie

After Momo and Aira strip down to their underwear, as ordered by the former since the extra water resistance was making it hard to move for them, the three prepare to face their enemies with the plan of fighting them with all they got. Before they could dive down to confront the aliens, Momo, Okarun and Aira look down to see a Serpo fused with the crab alien and Nessie, having used amalgamation cables on the two as a last resort to take down the humans. Continuing to use Okarun as a living speed boat, the three try to avoid being hit by the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie's water blast attack. Having used up all of the water in its body, the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie recharges by sucking in water from its gills, which causes Momo, Okarun and Aira to realize its weakness in that it cannot fire the water blasts continuously. Aira then makes an attempt to prevent the fused creature from firing any more blasts by targeting its gill neck, however, the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie punches her away with its mantis shrimp arms belonging to the crab alien and sends out a barrage of shockwave punches towards the three. While trying to avoid being hit, Momo is given a clue by Okarun on how they can defeat the fused alien but becomes separated from them after the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie lands a hit on them.

Viewing Momo as the most dangerous, the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie chooses to target her with the intention of beat her to death. However, before he could land a hit, Momo uses her powers to lower the water level, causing the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie's arms to rip apart just as planned after having figured out earlier that it would not be unable to handle its mantis shrimp strength if out of the water. The Serpod Dover Demon Nessie then moves into trap Momo in its mouth and dives down into the water to have her drown and recharge for another blast at close range. However, after Aira grabs the fused alien's neck with her hair, Okarun uses it as a road to run on, in order to compensate for the Turbo-Granny's inability to swim, and propels himself at a tremendous speed to tear the Serpod Dover Demon Nessie in half and save Momo.

### Blood Donation

With the Serpo defeated, Momo, Okarun and Aira escape Empty Space and return back to their normal school, much to their relief. However, the three end up in an embarrassing situation where their classmates catch them out in the halls in their underwear, resulting in them running away in panic and having to explain themselves to the school nurse. After the nurse leaves, Momo questions why the Serpo are seeking yokai powers from people like Okarun and Aira instead of targeting the yokai themselves. Okarun gives his theory in that the yokai's presence on Earth is preventing an alien invasion and that the only way they can combat against them is to abduct special people with yokai powers and study them to evolve their advance technology. After Momo and Aira give their opinion on this theory, the two shift their concerns to their recent embarrassment, which leads to Aira voicing her idea to blame the situation on Momo. Not wanting to have to go through the trouble of trying to think up any more excuses, Momo gives Aira her permission just as her friends come to pick her up.

Now alone with Okarun, Momo demands that he explain himself about the incident between him and Aira earlier at school, to which he informs her that he was training alone in secret but was in a situation where he tried to stop Aira's advances towards him. Okarun is then teased by Momo after also revealing to her that he was secretly training to look cool in front of her and prepares to leave after becoming embarrassed. Before having him go, Momo tries to tell him something that was on her mind, however, she is interrupted by the sudden arrival of her two friends who came to check on her and receive an explanation about her incident. After giving a vague reason as to why she can't explain the earlier situation fully, Momo ends up hearing Miko hypothesizing that she got into a fight with Aira over Okarun and denies this.

While acting vulnerable, Aira is comforted by her classmates for what happened earlier and hears them coming to the conclusion that Momo is the one responsible, with the nasty rumor spread around school being evident that Momo is a bad person. Feeling guilty as her classmates start to badmouth Momo, Aira confesses to them that the rumor was false and that she was the one who spread it around school.

After confessing, Aira walks out of the classroom and sits outside feeling depressed for having ruined her reputation. She is then met by Momo who figures out, based on the absence of her followers, that she did not go through with her plan to blame their incident on her. Just as Aira tries to deny this, the two become shocked to once again be confronted by the Dover Demon who is bleeding a white substance. With the thought of needing to earn income for his family driving him, the Dover Demon prepares to continue where he left off in the battle. However, the alien falls down in front of Momo and Aira due to being too injured and exhausted.

After waking up from having a dream of his son, the Dover Demon finds himself treated and taken care of by Momo, Okarun, Seiko and Aira at the Ayase house. He then expresses his gratitude to them, as he states that it was the first time in his life that he was treated kindly, and tells them that he will never try to harm them again. After he joins them for dinner, the Dover Demon tells Momo, Okarun and Aira about his predicament of having to earn income for his son's blood transfusion. Feeling sympathy for him, Okarun offers to give his kintama for the Dover Demon to sell but hears Momo's objection since the alien needed to earn consistent money, which the Dover Demon agrees. The Dover Demon then prepares to leave to no longer be a burden but is stopped by Seiko to have his blood analysis after she became familiar with the scent it gave off. After confirming that the alien's blood is the same as milk, Seiko offers the Dover Demon a cow from a farmer she knows to solve his problem. As Momo, Okarun, Seiko and Aira watch as the cow is being taken on the Dover Demon's spacecraft, the alien tearfully thanks the group and promises to support them if ever needed.

Shortly after, Momo prostrates before Seiko, along with Okarun and Aira, as she begs for her grandmother to buy new uniforms for the trio. While willing to buy uniforms for Okarun and Aira, Seiko orders Momo to perform a Hiroshi Abe facial expression for her amusement, having seen through her hidden intentions of "trying to exploit the financial means of adults". Momo agrees to comply and is soon forced to answer the door after a visitor arrives. Momo then becomes shocked to see that the visitor is Jiji, who Okarun learns from Seiko is Momo's childhood friend and first crush.