Konjiki no Gash!! Chapter 63

**The Battle in the Park** (公園の決闘, *Kōen no Kettō*) is the 63rd chapter of Makoto Raiku's Konjiki no Gash!!. This chapter was originally released in Japan as part of volume 7<nowiki> on October 18, 2002.

## Plot

Gash announces to Kiyomaro that he’ll be heading out for the day and Kiyomaro notices that Gash appears to be more worked up about something. Just as Gash leaves the house, Umagon tries to come with him but Gash tells him to stay behind. He explains to Umagon that he has a battle that afternoon against his playground bully Naomi and that he is determined to finally beat her once and for all. Unbeknownst to Gash, Naomi was already planning a trap for him at the park. Once the two finally meet, Gash runs straight towards her to attack. Before he could reach her though, he falls down a deep hole that Naomi had dug out just in front of her to trap him. As Gash looks up from the hole to Naomi, he sees that she has his Vulcan 300 in her hands. To further torment Gash, she ties and strings up the Vulcan 300 to the top of the park’s clock structure and leaves Gash where he is. As Naomi turns her back, the other kids at the park begin to talk about her and wonder why she picks on Gash. The kids then all decide that they should all head to the mountains to go play for the afternoon.

At home, Kiyomaro watches TV and catches a news report about the Mochinoki Zoo’s newest animal attraction, Gabrio the lion. Kiyomaro is amazed seeing the size of the lion and expresses that Gash would probably like to see the lion too. Upon mentioning Gash, Kiyomaro begins to wonder what Gash was doing. Some time later, Gash manages to get out of the hole he was stuck in and tries to retrieve the Vulcan 300 that was still stuck at the top of the clock structure. Just then, a few of the kids that were with Naomi call out to Gash to tell him that something had happened. The kids then lead Gash to the edge of a steep cliff where they tell him that Naomi was now stuck on the side after she had slipped while trying to catch a lizard. Gash and the other kids look around the cliff for anything that can possibly let them get down to rescue Naomi and one of them points out a cave that was just nearby her. Not long after finding this cave, they find Gabrio the lion, who had recently escaped from the zoo, right next to Naomi who was currently oblivious to it.

Gash and the other kids scream at the sight of the huge lion and call out for Naomi to run away from it. Naomi doesn’t notice the lion at first but when she does, she also begins to scream in fear of it. While this is happening, the kids struggle what to do to save her but Gash already begins to take action and starts climbing down the steep cliff. One of the kids tries to tell him it’s too dangerous and even asks if Gash is truly willing to risk his life for Naomi who had only ever constantly bullied him. Gash thinks about all the various times Naomi had picked on him at the park but when he hears her scream and cry for help, Gash responds saying that he will be the one to save her. Just as he says this, Gash slips and falls off the cliff but manages to grab a tree branch. While clinging to the tree branch for his life, Naomi looks up and sees that Gash is in need of help much like her. She stares up at Gash while the lion behind her gets closer but before it attacks, she suddenly begins rapidly climbing up towards him. Naomi grabs Gash and the two of them make it to safety at the top of the cliff. While Naomi tries to play off the incident claiming she wasn’t scared, one of the kids thinks to themselves about how Naomi went out of her way to save Gash when she saw that he was about to fall. That early evening, Kiyomaro is seen still watching the news report about Gabrio the lion and learns that the lion was now safely recaptured. At the same time, Gash finally returns home and tells Kiyomaro of the miserable experience he had that day and insists that he needs to start training in order to become stronger than Naomi.

## Features

### Characters by Appearance

* Gash Bell
* Kiyomaro Takamine
* Umagon
* Naomi

### Locations

* Mochinoki City
	+ Takamine Residence
		- Kiyomaro’s Room