A mermaid school asks High Guardian Academy for help to deal with the sea dragon, so they send 6 strong students along with Professor Caraway. An incident occurs that makes Snapdragon to question their gender identity.
- An Aesop:
- As explained by Professor Caraway, if someone disrespects you, violence won't make them respect you.
- Also by Professor Caraway, while he chose to change his sex to be his "true self", Snapdragon has many other options to consider if they decide to reject their Testosterone Poisoning father.
- Bait-and-Switch Silhouette: Rosemary gets excited to find a mermaid, but behind the fog it's just professor Redbud in a swimsuit.
- Bilingual Backfire: Rosemary asks the mermaids if they need to come up with some warning signals and starts making noises. Elodie begs her to confirm she doesn't know the language, implying it was something offensive.
- Bittersweet Ending: Snapdragon seems more comfortable with exploring their identity and is slowly growing closer to Amaryllis. However, the girls’ mission to capture the Scypith fails due to Sage losing control of her magic and they’re forced to put the badly injured creature out of his misery.
- The Corruption: Scypith was known to be a friendly dragon, but is currently craving for mermaid flesh. The same purple goo that was hurting trees near the Academy was discovered on him.
- Dramatic Irony: Snapdragon cries to Professor Caraway that no one can change who are they born as. A viewer can guess what Caraway is going to suggest considering he's confirmed to be transgender in an earlier episode.
- Giver of Lame Names: Rosemary tries to come up with a cool team name, and only she likes them or cares.
- Father, I Don't Want to Fight: In the flashback when Snapdragon's brother Yarrow took their pet bunny, their father Hawthorn puts a shame on Snapdragon for not being aggressive enough to protect it and recommends fighting Yarrow regularly. Snapdragon later confirms he hates his dad's masculinity and wants to be an "elegant" warrior.
- Floral Theme Naming: The Serenia Honors Institute students continue the plant-based naming with Elodie, Coral, and Kelp.
- Love at First Sight: Thyme gets lovestruck when seeing Coral for the first time.
- Mercy Kill: Sage mishandles her New Magic and the mission turns from "capture Scypith alive" to "put him out of his misery as he's bleeding out". Rosemary volunteers and is not okay with it.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Cal keeps pushing to Snapdragon that they'd love to meet mermaids because they've cosplayed as one at the festival. One mockery too far and Snapdragon starts beating them in the face until Caraway notices.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Caraway tells Snapdragon he should have suspended them from the mission right away for attacking Cal, but as a teacher decided to keep them on standby duty until he can inquire more about their motives.
- Robotic Reveal: The evil squid in the beginning of the episode is just Caraway piloting a machine meant to test the Guardians. Despite the river being filled with blood.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Despite being chosen, Cal quits the mission and returns to the Academy because Snapdragon has beaten them up after provocations.
- Tentacled Terror: In the beginning of the episode the students are fighting a giant water squid. Turns out it's a training robot piloted by Professor Caraway.
- Tempting Fate: After stabbing tentacles enough times to make them disappear, Rosemary asks has it died. Then the squid emerges in full.
- Terrible Artist: Olive figures out that the hundred sausages across Rosemary's diary are actually swords and remarks on their quality and quantity.
- Took a Level in Kindness: Compared to earlier episodes where Snapdragon was treated like a sidekick, Amaryllis hugs them and tells she'll support them regardless of how they look.
- Transformation Sequence: The main four's elaborate transformation into mermaids with magic rings is an obvious Pretty Cure Shout-Out.
- X-Ray Sparks: Rosemary learns the hard way why petting Bubbles' electric horn underwater is a bad idea by momentarily being turned into a skeleton.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: After getting a concerning look from the other two of the Triads for the usual morbid remark, Hemlock comments that being immortal with them is too boring.
