It ambushes you with actual mythology in the time it takes to boil a kettle. Hakone is a hot spring spirit whose centuries-long nap left her stuck in the body of a little girl, and the show plays that for jokes without ever forgetting she's a genuine deity trying to claw her power back. Touya is the perfect straight man: a high schooler who wandered into an onsen and walked out on divine payroll, and his exasperation is the engine of every punchline. The real flex is how much spirit-world lore gets smuggled into three-minute chunks, enough that you start taking the rules seriously in a series designed to be background noise. It drifts in the middle stretch, no argument, a few episodes wander off looking for a point. But it stays warm, and warm is the whole job here. Watch it the way you'd sit in the water: no rush, steam on the face, nowhere else to be.

Hakone is a hot spring spirit who wakes up at a spa resort in modern-day Japan after a long slumber. While she slept, she took on the look of a young girl. Touya, a high school boy, comes across her at a hot spring and ends up helping her win back her original powers. Along the way, Hakone mingles with the locals as she works to become her former self again. The short-format series blends comedy, slice of life and the supernatural.