Episode 42

Sent out to hunt down tea cakes for her daughter, and still guilty that her combat lessons led her daughter to punch Damian, Yor struggles even to ask neighbors for bakery tips, terrified her ignorance might look suspicious enough to warrant an SSS report. At the department store she catches a woman toppling down the stairs with an armful of cake boxes. The grateful stranger, Melinda, is so impressed by Yor's reflexes that she recruits her as a substitute for a Lady Patriots Society volleyball match. Yor initially tries to win the game alone, then learns to rein in her strength and enjoy herself, and although the team loses, the mothers invite her to tea afterward. There she confesses her private doubts about being a good wife and stepmother and is warmly reassured, right up until talk of Eden Academy prompts her new friend to give her full name: Melinda Desmond.

Back home, Loid identifies Melinda as the wife of Donovan Desmond, the former prime minister of Ostania, though WISE has long written her off as a high-risk target with little useful knowledge, estranged from her own family. Yor recounts the rest of the day, including Melinda's oddly cold flicker when apologizing came up and her tense expression after suggesting Anya might be behind Damian's newfound enjoyment of school. After ruling out a staged encounter through Anya's alibi, Loid openly encourages the friendship while privately drafting the Mommy-Friends Scheme as his Plan C, a second route toward Donovan running through Yor. Anya overhears his thoughts and panics at the prospect of dueling friendship operations, resolving to deepen her own bond with Damian before Yor renders her obsolete.

The next day the Shopkeeper approves Yor's request to keep seeing Melinda but warns her about the woman's conservative politics, and Yor's offhand mention of Loid's curiosity about the National Unity Party visibly catches his attention. Anya's campaign fares far worse: a bread-in-mouth collision gambit borrowed from Becky's romance stories ends with a yakisoba burger sprayed across Damian's head, leaving his hair styled like hers and his temper worse than ever.

Melinda Desmond debuts alongside her friend Nola, giving the series its first open channel into the Desmond household. Her flashes of coldness beneath the warmth hint at something unresolved in her feelings about Damian.

Loid formally establishes Plan C, folding Yor's new friendship into Operation Strix as a parallel approach to Donovan, while the Shopkeeper's reaction to Loid's political interests seeds future complications on Yor's side of the ledger.

Anya's Friendship Crash attempt collapses spectacularly, souring Damian on her again just as mother and daughter begin their competing schemes.

The episode covers Chapters 65 and 66. Anime-original touches include Melinda's headscarf and sunglasses landing neatly atop a stack of boxes after the rescue, Donovan replacing one of the guards in an image of Melinda's past, and an added scene of Becky laughing at Damian's noodle-covered hair.

Anya's imagined showdown with Yor over their rival friendship schemes is staged to mirror the Poop God sequence from SPY x FAMILY CODE: White.