Saki 212: Decision

There are a few things in this chapter you might miss if you only give it a quick read so I wrote some chapter's notes below. If you are interested, please give it a look. Beware, the notes contain spoilers for the chapter obviously.

Well, the first thing is not really a spoiler so I'll just say it right here. The uniform Teru and Satoha are wearing in the first two pages is probably from their participation at the World Junior Championships. We were told in the last chapter that they were "partners", most likely meaning they were Japan's representatives at the tournament. Why they travel in a military helicopter though, I have no idea.

Saki ch212 (Mega)
Saki ch212 (Mediafire)
 

Chapter's notes

  In page 3, when Teru says "2600", note that Satoha is raising her hand even though it's not her turn. Most likely, Satoha was about to call the tile Yuuki discarded. This way, she's putting pressure on Teru to win the hand quickly before she does. Teru has no choice but to win from Yuuki even though she would have liked to cheapen her hand even more. By pushing Teru to win a hand worth more than 2000 points, Teru's draws later on will not be as good (as explained in page 2), so Satoha scores a small victory against Teru here.

  But Teru takes her revenge on the next hand. She makes the 9s appear safe when actually that's exactly her winning tile. As Hisa says, if Teru was simply looking for a bad wait, she could have discarded the 2s or the 5s. She discards the 8s because she knows Satoha is very good at reading the discards and guessing what tiles each player has. By setting a trap specifically targeting Satoha's "strong defense", she ensures her win. Notice how angry Satoha looks on page 8. This isn't just a matter of simply dealing into someone else's hand.

  But wait a minute... if we go back to page 3, it was Yuuki the one who dealt into Teru's hand. And what kind of hand did Teru have there? Tenpai on her starting hand! That's like, Yuuki's specialty! Yes, if it wasn't for Satoha's interference, Teru may have won a cheaper hand on the 3rd or 4th turn instead of the 2nd but, by immediately discarding all her draws, she makes it plain to anyone (specially to Yuuki) that she had tenpai from the start.

  So now let's fast forward to page 13 and the last hand of the chapter. If Kuro draws a (red) 5p and a (red) 5s, she could be in tenpai in two turns waiting for either a 7m (the dora) or a 8s. True enough, Kuro draws a red 5p on her first turn (all according to plan) but then... she deals into Teru's hand. And what's on Teru's hand (page 15)? The 7m! A dora! But drawing doras is Kuro's specialty! Did that dora abandon Kuro for Teru or did Kuro "send" the dora to Teru so she could win from her later? Who knows? But in any case Teru wins from Kuro with a dora in her hand (the dora Kuro wanted to boot). Ritz made a correction to page 15 and Teru doesn't seem to have the 7m anymore.

  To summarize, Teru is not just winning consecutive wins here, she wins a hand from each of her opponents taking advantage of the special skills and abilities of each one of them. She gets tenpai with her starting hand and wins from Yuuki, she sets a careful trap with a "safe" tile and wins from Satoha and she gets a dora?? (the dora Kuro wants) and wins from Kuro. Teru is angry (internally)! And she's making it obvious to them so there's no doubt she's sending them a message. It's like she's saying "Ok, you've created me enough trouble, how about I teach you some humility now?".

And that's all for the notes of this chapter.