Hayate the Combat Butler

Hayate Ayasaki is a sixteen-year old boy who has been working hard earning money as a bicycle delivery boy. He loses his job after his employer finds out he is still in high school, and his irresponsible parents spend the money he had earned. Hayate tries to kidnap a young girl named Nagi Sanzenin, but fails in his attempt. Later, Hayate saves her from other kidnappers and Nagi repays him by offering him a job as her new butler. However, overcome by injuries received during the rescue, Hayate collapses and is taken from the scene by Nagi's private helicopter.

Awakening within Nagi's mansion, Hayate incorrectly concludes that he has died and gone to heaven, and resolves to make the most of it. While he is enjoying a soak in an enormous indoor bath, the water re-opens his wounds and he passes out. When he regains consciousness, Nagi and Maria explain that he is Nagi's new butler. Eager to demonstrate his aptitude for the job, Hayate begins cleaing the mansion at a remarkable rate, drawing on cleaning skills he gained during previous employment. He finds a manga that Nagi has been drawing, and when he mistakenly refers to it as a picture diary, Nagi ejects him from the room. Believing himself fired, Hayate leaves the mansion and is immediately abducted by the loan sharks that are after him. All seems lost until Nagi, wearing an unconvicing disguise, appears and rescues him by paying off his debt. Hayate will now work as Nagi's butler to repay her.

Hayate wakes up Nagi one morning to find a large white tiger sleeping with her in her bed. The tiger, named Tama, nabs Hayate and carries him outside to fight. Hayate inevitably loses. Afterwards, Klaus, who is still upset about Hayate being Nagi's butler, challenges Hayate to a match with a robot to see if he has the necessary skills to be a butler.

When Nagi goes to school, she forgets to bring her lunch and Hayate offers to bring it to her. Once he gets to school, he is stopped at the front gates by a teacher (Yukiji) who thinks he is an intruder. Hayate eventually gets into the school, but the teacher continues her pursuit. Once inside, Hayate meets the student council president of the school, Hinagiku Katsura, for the first time, and helps her down from the tree she was climbing. As a reward, she brings him to the top of the Student Council tower so that he could see from the terrace. Yukiji, who is still searching for Hayate, finally finds him there and ends up fighting Hinagiku. After taking Nagi's bento box from Hayate, she jumps onto the railing of the terrace only to get blown off by a breeze. Hayate promptly rescues her, which ended her hostility to him. In the process, however, she had thrown Nagi's bento box onto to ground and spilled its contents.

Nagi does not want to go to school today and instead stays home to hang out with some friends. One of her friends, Sakuya Aizawa, arrives and starts to teach Hayate to be a better comedian despite Nagi insisting that he is a butler. Hayate later goes out to pick up some more tea wearing a cashmere coat, but finds the journey perilous.

Continuing from the last episode, Isumi gets to Nagi's mansion but Hayate leaves to pick up the tea that he was supposed to get. Hayate is ambushed by Isumi's protective staff and the loan sharks from the first two episodes. Hayate eventually makes it back, but comes down with a cold. The next day after Hayate has healed, he meets a young boy and his maid who have come to Nagi's mansion. The boy, Wataru Tachibana, is Nagi's fiancé.

Wataru, who is infatuated with Isumi, challenges Hayate, whom he perceives as a rival, to a duel. Hayate loses to Wataru on purpose, hoping for a romantic conclusion between Wataru and Isumi that will allow Nagi to break off her unwanted engagement. However, his overly obvious act ends up hurting Wataru's feelings. In order to reach Wataru and apologize, Hayate, together with Isumi and Nagi, must brave the Tokyo subway system.

Nagi gets Hayate to first try on a female school uniform, much to his displeasure and before he can do anything about it, Maria comes to Nagi's room and sees what is going on. Nagi and Maria then proceed to put Hayate in a full cat-girl outfit which entices Tama's animal instincts. Afterwards, Hayate runs into Klaus and initially tries to run away, but in the end Klaus' instincts take heed, and Maria must interfere. Later, Hayate and Maria play a game of pool where if Hayate loses, his debt will increase to 200 million yen.

Hayate tries to motivate Nagi to go to school finally, and offers to take her to and from school everyday from now on. Nagi reluctantly agrees and goes to school for the day, but when she comes back it turns out she forgot her notebook at school. Hayate offers to go to school late at night to bring it back and at the school gate he runs into one of the school's teachers he met earlier.

This episode, which is anime-only, takes place during the same time as episode eight and shows some other strange things that were going on in the background. A demon living inside an old video game is awoken and takes three of the student council members from Nagi's school inside the game where they must defeat her to return to the real world. Hinagiku, the student council president, arrives soon after and they go to destroy the demon, but she ends up ending it herself.