Dr. Stone Chapter 87 Review by BelserionChapter Title: Senkuu Department StoreContinuing from last week, the villagers are still in shock over Senkuu’s announcement of building a hot air balloon to fly in. Reminiscent of their last fight, Yo once again tries to contain himself from laughing at the “savages” as Magma loudly proclaims that humans can’t fly, stating that he also has no idea how Senkuu plans to do it by scratch. Suika thinks the ability to fly like birds would be amazing. You’d think knowing Senkuu; they would all know to trust him by now. I guess they’re still learning.
Despite being fired up for the rough road ahead, Senkuu surprises everyone by showing that they only need hemp yarn and cloth to make the balloon. Although Nicky worries that the hemp might tear in the sky, Senkuu assures her that the first balloons humans flew were made from hemp so it should not be a problem. Senkuu goes on to convince everyone how simple it is to make but with one hurdle. Yuzuriha already knows where this is going and states they’ll need lots of cloth. Senkuu being the scumbag that he is, pretends not to have realized this and considers it a great coincidence that they have a craftwork member right there, aka Yuzuriha. He really is despicable in a hilarious way.
Yuzuriha assures Senkuu he can leave it to her and her team, consisting of Taiju and a confused Yo who wants to know when he became a part of the team. Now if we remember a few chapters back, Yo offered to help Yuzuriha put broken statues back together, as a way of getting into their good graces. He obviously didn’t realize it was a permanent position. Taiju takes over the job of crushing the hemp to make thread, a fact Yo points out to a confused Magma right before the two start fighting again. After Yuzuriha explains the Thread making process to them, Yo settles down and actually starts having fun. But as with anything Senkuu related, of course there’s a catch. They need to make tens of thousands of kilometers of it.
After they complete the thread making process, they now have to focus on making cloth. Yuzuriha goes through the process of showing the group how to maneuver the threads, how slow and steady it is, but everyone protests that it would take an eternity to finish, which for what they want to do with it, is an well founded complaint. Yuzuriha acknowledges this and decides to ask Senkuu to make her a loom to make the process a bit faster. She daydreams about a cute piece of board with strings running through it, but Senkuu and Kaseki present her with a huge piece of equipment, it looks like a malformed grand piano with lights and pedals and gears. It’s actually beautiful in a monstrous way. Not at all what Yuzuriha envisioned, but better with a faster output. Senkuu is worried she doesn’t like it and wonders if she wanted it electrically powered, but Yuzuriha assures him it’s fine.
It takes her a few days, but Yuzuriha finally manages to produce mountains of cloth needed for the hot air balloon. She mentions that there were some failures mixed in that would not be ideal for a balloon because it wouldn’t be able to keep the air in. Gen decides to rally the troops by promising that the person who makes the longest thread will win 10,000 Dragos (the money introduced last chapter). Senkuu is worried because Gen promised money they didn’t have, but Gen promises that soon they would have more than they know what to do with. His idea is to take the ventilated cast off cloth and make merchandise from them to sell in the newly thought up “
Senkuu Department Store”. Overhearing their plan, Yuzuriha gets beyond excited and volunteers to be the one to make them. Everyone comments on her sudden personality flip, claiming she’s turned into a warrior beast.
Yuzuriha spots Ruri, Kinrou and Suika passing by and accosts them to be models for her clothing line. The clothes are fabulous, she has a mens line, womens line, kids line, you name it Yuzuriha made it. If you guys want to see the clothes she made check out the chapter, you won’t be disappointed. Gen is amazed at what she’s created and only from hemp cloth. Mirai comments on how expensive they are but despite that everyone still wants the clothes and soon the department store is crowded with buyers. Senkuu remarks that while he would have preferred giving it all away to the hard workers, Ryuusui’s presence makes it impossible since the money originates with him and is the only thing he cares about. This is accurate because Ryuusui practically buys out the entire store, realizing too late that he’s basically given Senkuu all the money he needs to buy the oil from him. If we remember last chapter, as compensation for being their captain and taking them to the other side of the world, he acquired the rights to any oil they would find and offered to sell it to them. Ironically they would have to purchase it from him with the money he created. So this was karma in all its glory. Never underestimate Senkuu and his allies.
I’d rate the chapter 8/10Yuzuriha really grabbed the spotlight this chapter, highlighting her specific skill set. This was just another way the author shows off how character driven the plot of this series is. No one is filler. Now that they’ve gotten the money to pay for the oil as well as the cloth to make the balloon, I’m guessing the next step is to make the basket to attach to the balloon. That should be easy enough to make, so most likely they will take to the sky soon. I’m really anticipating the reactions of the villagers who get to fly for the first time. It’s always nice seeing appreciation for things we take for granted. The plot is moving along nicely, it’s not being rushed which was one of my main concerns when they made it clear that someone’s life was on the line depending on the outcome of this trip. I like the introduction of Ryuusui as a character and also the inclusion of those we considered “Tsukasa’s lackeys”. Hopefully it continues like this.
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