Manga Bookshelf

Discussion, Resources, Roundtables, & Reviews

Sean Gaffney

I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level, Vol. 7

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By Kisetsu Morita and Benio. Released in Japan as “Slime Taoshite 300 Nen, Shiranai Uchi ni Level MAX ni Nattemashita” by GA Novels. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jasmine Bernhardt.

I’ve gradually gotten used to this being the isekai version of K-On! (the illustrations helping along, as they get more and more ‘moe’ with every volume), and this volume in particular reminds me that Azusa’s laid-back style works so well here because the entire world is laid-back. The idea of someone being killed off or an evil villain trying to take over the world feels so foreign to everything we’ve read here to date, and the result is that you have a reader who is completely relaxed in reading this book. There’s never any serious conflict, and that’s good! The characters are all various varieties of “cute girls doing cute things’, and that’s good too! There are no stories in this series that run longer than about a quarter of the book, so you don’t have to pay too much attention, and if a character returns, you’re helpfully reminded where they showed up before. On the downside, reading this may make you fall asleep.

Things that happen in this book: At Pecora’s birthday party, she changes Azusa into a fox girl, which ends up backfiring when Azusa starts beating up everyone in the demon kingdom in an effort to eat abura-age, which reminds you how Japanese this series is and also likely makes you turn to Google. Azusa and company then go to see one of the goddesses in this world speaking at what amounts to a business convention, and she is startled to find this is the goddess who first sent her to this world… who has since been demoted, as she refused to deal with anything but cute girls. There’s a battle to see who the next Dragon Lord is, which turns out to be a typical beauty contest. We get Around the World in 80 Days, Killing Slimes style, which is to say it’s pretty boring. And in the longest story in the book, the cast discover an ancient civilization, now inhabited by stuffy ghosts and a very unstuffy ruler who is annoyed no tsukkomis exist here.

This is fun and insubstantial as always. The ancient ghost queen is amusing as she talks in a broad accent, and also seems content to treat her temple like it’s a dungeon raid. Azusa is less grumpy than usual here, having fully accepted everyone’s eccentricities. That may, in fact, be the biggest negative in the book – everyone’s gotten too used to each other. No one fights anymore, no one gets upset. Conflicts are resolved almost immediately. It’s definitely a series that you should read after you’ve read a volume of something serious, bulky and filled with plot – it acts as a dessert or a palette cleanser. That said, this is absolutely the worst kind of series to marathon. If you read all seven books at once, you’ll give up. One book every few months is just the right pace.

High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even in Another World!, Vol. 1

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By Riku Misora and Sacraneco. Released in Japan as “Choujin Koukousei-tachi wa Isekai demo Yoyuu de Ikinuku you desu!” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Nathaniel Thrasher.

There are series where you want to concentrate hard on the worldbuilding, characterization, and moral quandaries. And then there are series that you want to read like popcorn, where you are not in the mood to think hard about anything. If you want one of the latter, then this new LN series is right up your alley. Thinking too hard about anything going on in this first volume, from its questionable “heroes” to its tendency, as with so many other light novels, to have its villains be the worst of the worst in so many ways, to its annoying White Man’s Burden viewpoint of isekai, you will probably end up finding this series quite annoying, especially as I don’t think it’s doing anything interesting with any of those issues. If you just sit back and enjoy the isekai candy and cool fights/schemes, then it’s a hell of a lot of fun. Check your brain at the door.

The gimmick here is that it’s an isekai times seven. Seven of Japan’s most powerful people, who are all teenagers and all friends, are swept away while on a plane trip to another world. We meet stereotypical samurai Aoi, morally terrifying doctor Keine, cowardly magician Prince, introverted inventor Ringo, arrogant businessman Masato, Prime Minister of Japan (in high school) Tsukasa, and “journalist” Shinobu, whose specialty is really being a ninja. Some of these are, obviously, more important than others in this first book, which focuses on Masato (in this volume) and Tsukasa (likely for all of them, he seems the “primary hero” sort). We also get Lyrule, who is the elf who is on the cover. She’s sweet, has a mysterious past, has a great figure, and she and Tsukasa bond almost immediately. In any case, this book focuses on them settling in with the village that rescued them and saving it from the local nobles, who are Very Bad Guys.

The author is also the writer of Chivalry of a Failed Knight, which is for magic academies what this is for overpowered isekai. Which is to say, the author wants to play in a fantasy world playground. There’s lots of ridiculous fun in this, from Ringo being able to build a nuclear power plant from scratch in about three months to Masato taking down the monopolistic trade company in the space of ONE DAY, to basically everything Shinobu says or does. (Who are secret ninja always named Shinobu?) We get a sense that each of the prodigies has their own tragic past – Tsukasa revealing his own father’s embezzlement leads to abandonment by his mother, and Masato’s father killed himself due to lack of money. I’m sure more will come in later volumes. And there’s also a lot of fun action sequences here as well, mostly due to Aoi, who is so terrifying bears run away from her, but also Tsukasa, who turns out to be well-protected against assassin’s bullets no matter what the world.

This series will, I anticipate, always be ethically suspect and have a tendency to fall apart if you look at it closely. But I had fun reading it, and will definitely get the 2nd book.

Manga the Week of 7/29/20

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SEAN: July is coming to an end, and there’s still a few things for you.

J-Novel Club has the 3rd Bibliophile Princess novel, Cooking with Wild Game 8, and a 4th manga for How a Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom.

No debuts for Kodansha next week, and the only print book is Yuzu the Pet Vet 2.

ASH: The first volume looked cute, but I haven’t actually read it yet.

MICHELLE: Same. I do hope to rectify that soon.

SEAN: Hey, remember all those Kodansha digital books that were on last week’s Manga the Week of? They seem to have gotten bumped to next week, so add them to this list.

Wait, stop the presses! Kodansha is, in fact, releasing all 35 volumes of Shaman King – including the never-before-in-English ending – digitally. This is a Weekly Shonen Jump series from back in the day, with Kodansha now holding the rights. I assume it will have a new translation. It’s a cult classic.

ASH: Wow, that’s impressive!

SEAN: Besides that, digitally there’s a whole lot (note: this is based on the dates on Kodansha’s website). Altair: A Record of Battles 20, Boarding School Juliet 16 (a final volume), DAYS 19, Farewell My Dear Cramer 11, I Fell in Love After School 6, I Want to Hold Aono-kun So Badly I Could Die 6, Kakafukaka 10, Kiss Me at the Stroke of Midnight 11 (print later), Magus of the Library 4 (print later), Real Account 12-14 (print later), Saint Young Men 7, UQ Holder 20 (print later), Watari-kun’s ****** Is about to Collapse 8, When We Shout for Love 2, and Yuzu the Pet Vet 3 (print later).

(Yes, some of the digital titles like Boarding School Juliet and Saint Young Men are also getting print later, but here I mean “COVID-delayed print edition”.)

ASH: In general, I’ll be waiting for the print edition, even if I have to wait longer considering the circumstances.

MICHELLE: I’ll be reading several of these, most especially the soccer pair.

SEAN: Seven Seas’ debut is Kingdom of Z, a zombie apocalypse romantic comedy that looks to be for fans of High School of the Dead. It runs in Kodansha’s Comic Days.

Seven Seas also gives us BL Metamorphosis 2 (yay!), High Rise Invasion 13-14, King of Fighters: A New Beginning 3, Little Devils 4 (the final volume), Magic User: Reborn in Another World as a Max Level Wizard 2 (print version), Mushoku Tensei 6 (print edition), and My Room Is a Dungeon Rest Stop 3 (digital edition).

ASH: Even though this is only the second volume, BL Metamorphosis is already one of my favorite series being released right now.

MICHELLE: I never got around to reading volume one so this is another one where I’m hoping to get caught up by volume two.

MJ: I’ve been slow to pick up volume one, but I need to get on that!

SEAN: Tentai Books has a light novel debut, Welcome to the Diner of the Exiled! (Tsuihousha Shokudou e Youkoso!). Guy betrayed by everyone meets girl betrayed by everyone. Together, they do not fight crime. They open a diner. I smell a slow life title.

Vertical has, digitally, a 14th Witchcraft Works.

Finally, Yen On has Kingdom Hearts III: the Novel 2. Which hopefully is not as confusing as its title.

Short list, mostly because it was mostly two publishers. What interests you?

May These Leaden Battlegrounds Leave No Trace: Bullet Magic and Ghost Programs, Vol. 1

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By Kei Uekawa and TEDDY. Released in Japan as “Uchinukareta Senjou wa, Soko de Kieteiro” by Fujimi Fantasia Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Roman Lampert.

It’s hard not to think about 86 when reading this new Yen On series, and I do wonder if war-torn teens fighting hopeless battles and getting blown to bits’ is a new light novel trend like villainess otomes. That said, if it’s trying to be another 86 it’s not too bad, getting a majority of the parts right. The main plot itself runs on a plot device I personally dislike, and there some tonal dissonance about a third of the way through, but when the book is being serious it’s very good at ramping up the tension and showing us a young, driven man who wants to end war and the white-haired, mysterious girl who is here to help him do so – and also tease and mock him, because it’s still a light novel. We even have an unlucky childhood friend of sorts. And while it doesn’t hit on ‘war is hell’ quite as much as 86, certainly war is not portrayed in a positive light here at all.

We open with Rain, a military academy soldier who manages to escape certain death by way of mysterious silver bullets he finds on the ground. Indeed, this war is run on ‘magic bullets’, each of which have a different function. The bullets Rain finds, when they kill a person, erases them and everything they achieved from existence. Later he discovers the owner, a young girl named Air, who arrives at the Military Academy where he normally is when war is not omnipresent and proceeds to explain that she is a ghost that is being forced to return whenever war is at its worst. She wants to use Rain to stop this endless cycle. Unfortunately, his partner and not-quite-girlfriend Athly is not happy with this, and what’s more, just eliminating the right people from history does not always solve the problem.

Let’s start with the issues I had. First of all, the ‘if you kill the man who invented cars there won’t be cars’ rule of time travel is very, very dumb. To be fair, near the end of the book we see that her analogy is not all it’s cracked up to be, but it’s still bad. Secondly, the section of academy life about 1/3 of the way through the book, which is meant to be a light-hearted bit of breathing space in an otherwise grim book, feels like it belongs in a different novel entirely. That said, setting up Athly as the cute normal girl with a crush on our hero does end up paying off later on down the line. As for Rain and Air, I am hoping, based on plot spoilers that I won’t get into, that they avoid their own romantic relationship. Honestly, romance seems secondary here to warfare, and that’s fine.

To sum up: this is a decent, solid debut for those who like grim war stories and fantasy/magic-based soldiering. I’ll be getting the next book.

Bookshelf Briefs 7/21/20

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Glaeolia, Vol. 1 | Edited by Emuh Ruh and zhuchka | Glacier Bay Books – One of the newest and smallest publishers of manga in English translation is Glacier Bay Books. Glaeolia isn’t its first project, but the planned series is its most ambitious so far. As stated in the introduction, “this publication originates from a desire specifically to shine a light on the small press and indie manga scenes and the literary power that resides there.” The first volume succeeds magnificently in doing this by presenting twelve short manga with a wondrous range of artistic styles and expressive narrative techniques. It’s a fascinating, engaging, and arresting collection in which many of the creators are making their English-language debut. For anyone interested in contemporary independent and alternative manga, this series and Glacier Bay Books’ other publications are well-worth seeking out. As for me, I am eagerly anticipating the next installment of Glaeolia, whenever it may be released; the first volume was remarkable. – Ash Brown

A Man and His Cat, Vol. 2 | By Umi Sakurai | Square Enix – “All the feels” may be the most overused phrase in the English language right now, but I can’t think of a more succinct way to explain A Man and His Cat‘s appeal: it will make you smile, laugh, and cry big, ugly tears, mostly because the title characters have sad backstories. Volume two delves a little deeper in Kanda’s marriage (he’s a widower) and childhood (it was unhappy), helping us understand why he’s developed such a strong attachment to Fukumaru. Interspersed with these sniffle-inducing vignettes are jokes about hairballs and cat paraphernalia, as well as a few flashbacks to Fukumaru’s kittenhood. The tonal shifts are jarring and the artwork somewhat crude—Fukumaru looks more like a bowling ball than a cat—but Umi Sakurai still manages to convey the warmth of Kanda and Fukumaru’s interactions with a direct simplicity that’s hard to resist. -Katherine Dacey

The Misfit of Demon King Academy: History’s Strongest Demon King Reincarnates and Goes to School with His Descendants, Vol. 1 | By Shu and Kayaharuka | Square Enix Books – I hadn’t even realized the anime had debuted when I was reading this first volume of the manga, and so found I was echoing folks’ concerns about the title as they watched it: this book is all about the overpowered protagonist, and is not only proud of that it’s smug about it. Our hero is reincarnated and grows to adulthood in a month because he wants to, goes to magical academy, passes the test by literally killing and resurrecting a man over and over again, and immediately makes a fast friend of the school’s Rei Ayanami clone, whose dark past we will no doubt get into in book two. The parents are very silly, and I liked them, but honestly, this is only if you like ludicrous heroes. – Sean Gaffney

The Quintessential Quintuplets, Vol. 11 | By Negi Haruba | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – This is a volume of two halves. The first half finally gives us the backstory of the quintuplets, and shows us that it was Yotsuba who met Futaro… mostly. And seeing that her relationship with him can easily be faked by one of the others, decides to make herself different. Sadly, her overconfidence regarding academics destroys her self-worth, which explains why she spends so much time helping anyone but herself. The other half of the book has Itsuki, oddly enough, still being the only quint not in love with Futaro (oddly as she was first girl) and Ichika making a career-based decision to leave school, though she is at least convinced to make it a leave of absence. Still fantastic. – Sean Gaffney

The Quintessential Quintuplets, Vol. 12 | By Negi Haruba | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – It’s School Festival time! Futaro and Yotsuba are overworked, the class is having a rivalry between pancakes and takoyaki, and Itsuki’s college prep is… not going so hot. Miku isn’t doing college at all; she wants to go to culinary school, which ends up being fine with Futaro. Most importantly, Futaro admits he loves all the quints… but knows that’s not the answer they want. He asks them to each get a focus arc till he can decide. Thus we get each of the sisters getting a “what we did at the festival” arc, which features two sisters in this volume, and no doubt has the other three next time. We also get kisses. That said, it’s still up in the air, as Futaro doesn’t think he’s going to choose ANYBODY. That never works in harem manga, guy. – Sean Gaffney

The Quintessential Quintuplets, Vol. 13 | By Negi Haruba | Kodansha Comics (digital only) – The majority of this volume is the other three quintuplets having their arcs. Miku’s arc involves her gaining courage and self-confidence, never a good sign when you’re in a harem manga. Yotsuba’s involves her literally collapsing from overwork and having to take the last day off (to apologize to everyone for collapsing), and learning to stop blaming herself, which goes… sort of well-ish. Itsuki has the best arc, confronted with her real father, who immediately tries to control her life and gets obliterated by nearly the entire cast in epic fashion. That said, I wouldn’t blame anyone for only thinking of the last 20 or so pages, when Futaro makes his decision on who he wants to spend his life with, and the fandom, no doubt, goes berserk. – Sean Gaffney

Ran and the Gray World, Vol. 7 | By Aki Irie | VIZ Media – I didn’t anticipate that I’d be reading Ran and the Gray World in its entirety, but here we are. The battle against the bugs concluded in volume six, and taken solely on its own merits, volume seven is a pleasant denouement. Ran finally wakes up and her sorrow over Otaro’s fate makes the whole town cry. From there, time accelerates as we see her beginning to mature for real, becoming more conscientious and eventually leaving home to work on her magic. By the end of the volume, it’s years later and Ran purposefully refrains from telling her nephew about the magic shoes that could turn him into an adult before he’s ready for it. I like this growth in her (and her age-appropriate romance with Hibi) but it’s impossible to forget the problematic Otaro stuff that led to it. Still, I would read more by Irie in the future. – Michelle Smith

Tearmoon Empire, Vol. 2

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By Nozomu Mochitsuki and Gilse. Released in Japan as “Tearmoon Teikoku Monogatari” by TO Books. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by David Teng.

A majority of the fun in Tearmoon Empire 1 was the dissonance between Mia’s actions, Mia’s reasons for those actions, and the narrator caustically calling her out for the reasons for those actions. That’s still very much present in the second volume – in fact, if anything the narrator’s malice is even more prominent. But something strange happened, because suddenly I ended up being less interested in Mia’s headspace and the silly misconceptions of the people around her and more interested in the world that’s been created here and what’s going on with it. And with good reason, too: here we find that Mia may have jumped back in time to try to make it so she isn’t executed, but that doesn’t mean that the forces behind the scenes are not still gunning for her, or that they don’t still need revolution to happen. Mia, after all, was not the Big Bad in the old world, just a selfish Royal. So can she not only save herself, but the future of multiple countries?

Mia has a lot to do here. It may be summer vacation, but she has to stop arrogant counts from destroying the forest of the tribe that ends up fighting against her in the future; deal with the man who personally executed her; and worst of all, her not-quite-boyfriend Abel’s country is undergoing a very familiar revolution. Fortunately, she still has the magic ability to have her every word and deed misunderstood in the best possible way, and it’s still just as funny. That said, as with the first book, sometimes the misunderstandings have a serious core, as we see her avert a genocide and, yes, stop a revolution, but also force the future rulers of these kingdoms to change the way that they think, and not be so quick to turn to execution and unforgivable actions. That said, don’t worry, the narrator is here to remind us that Mia is shallow and only thinks of herself.

(My pet theory is that these are books commissioned by a future Mia to counteract the slavish hagiographies that are being written about her.)

The narrator, as ever, is sometimes correct but also sometimes full of it, and even they have to occasionally stop and say “OK, Mia was being genuinely good here”. (For a great analysis of the narrator in this book, see this Beneath the Tangles article.) Actually, my favorite scene in the entire book shows us the bad future that Mia originally came from, where a desperate Ludwig is trying in vain to stop her execution, and he points out that Mia, once actually taken in hand and shown she’s being vain or arrogant, is taking pains to actually learn from her mistakes. (It also contrasts with King Sion, who in this bad future did not have Mia’s words to misunderstand and take as well-meant advice.) That said, as I indicated, the plot is the best part herre, with a lot of tension, some good action scenes, and a terrific denouement where Mia takes out the villain as only Mia can.

As with My Next Life As a Villainess, this book feels complete at two volumes, with the main future having definitely been changed and everyone being quite happy. Also as with My Next Life As a Villainess, there’s more books to come, and next volume may see Mia having to face an even more startling future. Till then, this remains an absolutely terrific series. The author recommends in the afterword it be used for book reports. Sounds good to me.

Pick of the Week: Mostly Mujirushi

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ASH: While the weekly floodgates of manga appear to have been reopened, there’s one release in particular that has my attention this week – Naoki Urasawa’s Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams. I actually don’t know much about the manga beyond its creator, but that’s enough for me to pick it up.

KATE: What Ash said! Any week that brings us a new Naoki Urasawa title is a good week in my book.

SEAN: Urasawa is another one of those authors that I know I should love but I simply can’t get into their stuff. As such, I’ll go with Barakamon this week, as I thought it was over and now there is one more and this makes me happy.

ANNA: Urasawa for me! I’m always intrigued by his work.

MICHELLE: I’m for sure intrigued by Mujirushi, but after a spectacularly awful week personally, I find that the low-key shoujo comforts of That Blue Summer appeal to me the most.

MJ: I’m going to go with Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams, though Urasawa can be hit-or-miss with me. But the title makes it sound like Probably My Thing, so that’s good enough for me.

The Genius Prince’s Guide to Raising a Nation Out of Debt (Hey, How About Treason?), Vol. 3

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By Toru Taba and Falmaro. Released in Japan as “Tensai Ouji no Akaji Kokka Saisei Jutsu ~Sou da, Baikoku Shiyou~” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jessica Lange.

Calling your main character a “genius prince” can be a bit of a two-edged sword, as you need to have him continuing to be reasonable clever while not killing the audience’s disbelief. So far these books do a good job in holding to that balance. Sometime it leans straight up in Wein’s direction, such as when he describes having a book ghostwritten that will give bad advice to nobility and make it easier for him to eventually take them down. And sometimes it has Wein straight up flummoxed or panicking, which is just plain fun (as the illustrator of the book will tell you). And then there are the moment when you realize that Wein has a steel core that lives for one person alone, and threatening that person can cause things to get very dark very fast. All this comes together in this book, where Wein has to deal with possibly becoming one of a group of noble elites… all of whom seem to be extremely broken.

Wein and Ninym (who are on the cover again – these covers are very Strike the Blood in their choice of subjects) have just returned from touring the country in the middle of winter, but have to head right back out again when Win is invited to the country of Vavarin for a conference and also a religious festival. It smells like a trap. It is a trap, but that’s not going to stop Wein. That said, he also has to deal with the Remnant Army, the remains of Marden, which was torn apart in a previous book. After getting separated from his guard by bandits, he ends up taking in a representative from the army, Zeno, who is a) a girl dressed as a boy, and b) probably even more than that. (It’s not much of a surprise, trust me.) Zeno is filled with thoughts of revenge, but is also fascinated by Wein, who is doing his best to keep several balls in the air… and then trying to move as quickly as he can when all the balls drop.

There is one really terrific scene in this book, which I will try not to spoil much but involves a murder. These books can get a bit too intellectual for their own good at times, so it is good to remind us that Wein is a royal prince who can get away with a lot of things that other people cannot. It also reminds us that insulting Ninym is bad enough, but threatening to kill her means your life is forfeit. Speaking of Ninym, I wish she had more to do in these books – she gets some good scenes, but this is a series about Wein first and foremost. I wish there could be more balance in their relationship which is imbalanced by definition. I also enjoyed the rebellion by home by the traitorous general, which again did not surprise me in its twists and turns but was very satisfying narratively. As was the twist ending, showing how much Zeno really learned from Wein.

These are great books, especially if you like political intrigue. I’m anxious to read the next one.

Umineko: When They Cry, Vol. 21

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Story by Ryukishi07; Art by Kei Natsumi. Released in Japan in three separate volumes as “Umineko no Naku Koro ni: Twilight of the Golden Witch” by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Gangan Joker. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Stephen Paul.

This is the final volume of Umineko: When They Cry, unless Yen licenses Tsubasa, which I suspect is about as likely as Hinamizawa Bus Stop. It’s a very good climax, essentially divided into two parts. the first is the “action finale”, showing off Ange and Battler doing battle with Erika and Bernkastel, with everyone getting a chance to kick some ass (even Krauss, in one of the funnier bits) and with Lambdadelta going above and beyond the call of duty, essentially sacrificing herself to save the siblings. Now, given we’re in the meta world, sacrificing yourself is not as permanent as it sounds, but it’s still quite heartfelt. From the sdtart, Lambda has been more interested in fun than Bernkastel, who just wants pain and suffering. (Of course, if the pain and suffering was fun, Lambda was all in.) We see another Higurashi flashback that reminds you of Lambda’s origins as Miyo Takano, though honestly there’s a lot of Satoko in her as well.

(It’s also my last chance to complain about Squeenix insisting on using “the first cover” every single omnibus, as it means we don’t get the awesome BeaBato final cover on the outside.)

The second half of the book is the aftermath, which faces up to the fact that most of the cast is dead, and that if Ange wants to have a future she’s going to have to “die” as well. Fortunately, if there’s one thing we’ve learned from Ryukishi07 it’s how words can be manipulated to mean multiple things. Ange erases her identity and lives on as a famous children’s author, who writes books essentially starring Maria and Sakutarou. (Well, mostly. This was based on a game, as you know, and the manga did include the game’s “bad end”, where Ange decides magic is a lie and kills everyone around her, earning praise from Erika. I appreciate the need for completeness, but it feels really out of place in the manga itself.) As a Higurashi fan, I must admit it’s very odd to see a nice, friendly Okonogi here. But then again he’s getting everything he wants. Certainly I’m sure he prefers dealing with Ange to dealing with Takano.

The other reveal is what we’d seen hints of this entire arc: Battler survived the tragedy as well. Well… sort of. One one last twist that combines the real life and the meta world, Touya (his new name) has a sort of amnesia – he recalls Battler’s life but doesn’t think of it as his own memories. This is why Ikuko’s books were so accurate. After a number of years (both are in middle age), Ange is finally invited to meet Touya and get the explanation, and Battler’s spirit is able to find peace (and separate itself from Touya). That said, the REAL ending of the book feels like the one with Battler and Beatrice, showing what really happened as they escape the mansion’s tragedy. Unfortunately, as we already know, this ends badly, as Beatrice/Sayo still can’t imagine Battler accepting her body and can’t forgive herself for coming up with a mass murder plan, even if she wasn’t the one doing the murders. It a gorgously bittersweet tragedy, that ends happily only provided you believe in magic.

So I think in the end Uminako manga readers will be very happy with this. Umineko visual novel fans may be slightly less happy, but this ended up being a story that needed to be told more tha a mystery that needed to be solved. Don’t be a goat. Enjoy Umineko.

The World’s Strongest Rearguard: Labyrinth Country’s Novice Seeker, Vol. 3

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By Tôwa and Huuka Kazabana. Released in Japan as “Sekai Saikyou no Kouei: Meikyuukoku no Shinjin Tansakusha” by Kadokawa Books. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jordan Taylor.

Tempting as it might be to simply cut and paste my review of the second volume here, I will try to find new words to say about this series. For one thing, I think I’m going to have to come to terms with the fact that I enjoy it quite a bit, and not just because I’m hate-reading it. It’s still not a good series objectively, but subjectively it’s fine. It reminds me quite a bit of In Another World with My Smartphone, but so far has avoided all the traps that that work fell into, such as making its hero something of a relaxed sociopath. Arihito continues to attract women, and continues to be relatively oblivious to their overtures towards him. It’s a relatively huge light novel which takes place over a mere day and a half, and there’s still stats galore, including picking out new bonuses, etc. It should be dull as dirt and mildly offensive. Instead… it’s peaceful.

Arihito’s party (still unnamed, which is brought up but not dealt with here) arrive on Level 7, which has a lot more people on it but also a lot more people who have essentially stopped trying – it’s hard to go from 7 to 6. Well, hard unless you’re our heroes, who over the course of this book defeat two of the three named monsters you need to move up. They soon team up with a four-woman group called the Four Seasons (a name pun) who they saw being harassed/blackmailed by a group that are being set up to be antagonists but in this book are mostly just foreshadowing. The two parties team up and fight off giant moles and insects, then go to the next dungeon level and battle killer sheep. Once again, everyone does amazing things, and once again, everyone feels as if they need to “be the one protecting” everyone else. All this, plus a nice Chinese dinner and a bath/massage.

Reading this series is sort of like reading a game of Jenga, because it would take only one wrong move for the whole thing to come tumbling down. Arihito has to remain self-deprecating and mild-mannered because the alternative is a leering guy banging his (by the end of this book) eleven women who have fallen for him. Likewise, they’re all perfectly content to simply make the occasional overture (that he doesn’t get) and have a few bouts of self-hatred themselves. The battles are very well-written, to the point where I don’t even mind the inserted stats, which says a lot. I will admit that, in a book trying to remain so emotionally placid, sometimes it aims for a tearjerker and doesn’t quite get it – the scene with the demihuman and his late fiancee was not quite as sad as the author meant it to be. But for the most part, there aren’t really any sharp edges in this. It’s an isekai that a salaryman can happily read on the train home.

As noted, this volume does introduce a few plot points that are then left dangling – I expect the next book will take care of that. At least they didn’t move to Level 6 already. Still, this remains a book that’s easy to read.

Manga the Week of 7/22/20

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SEAN: It’s another one of those weeks. Get ready to be buried.

ASH: It’s good to see some things returning to normal!

SEAN: First, some late additions; these are out this week, but the release date was only just confirmed. They’re both Bookwalker titles. The first is Tenpuru, an ecchi harem manga from Kodansha’s Comic Days (I think Tenpuru is meant to be Temple). The second is Why the Hell Are You Here, Teacher?! (Nande koko ni sensei ga!?), an ecchi not-harem title about a guy who can’t stop getting into risque situations with his teacher. It runs in Kodansha’s Young Magazine. Both titles recommended for horny guys.

As for next week, Dark Horse debuts its deluxe edition of Hellsing. The manga was always a lot more… bonkers than the anime, so I’m not sure if I’m going to reread it, but it’s worth checking out.

ASH: If it’s anything like the Berserk deluxe edition, this should be a great release of Hellsing for those interested in the series.

SEAN: J-Novel Club gives us the long-awaited second volume of Tearmoon Empire, as well as the 3rd Teagonia.

Kaiten Books debuts a new digital manga license, My Dad’s the Queen of All VTubers?! (Oyaji ga Bishoujo ni Natteta Hanashi). It’s a Manga Action series from Futabasha, seems to be a comedy. Title is likely the plot, as we see a lot these days.

Kodansha’s latest digital debut, Cells at Work: Baby!, is not about Red Blood Cell and White Blood Cell finally getting their groove on, alas. It’s about the newest cells and what their job is. It runs, believe it or not, in Kodansha’s Morning magazine.

ASH: I hadn’t realized just how many spinoffs of Cells at Work there already were!

SEAN: Also debuting is Sue and Tai-chan, which was delayed from a previous Manga the Week of, so let me go copy and paste. It’s another cat manga from the creator of Chi’s Sweet Home. This one runs in Be Love magazine, so seems more for housewives than kids. But… I mean, it’s still a cute cat manga.

MJ: I love Chi, so I’d always take more cat manga from this creator!

SEAN: In print? Living-Room Matsunaga-san 3, Something’s Wrong with Us 2, and The Seven Deadly Sins 38.

Digitally, we get Abe-kun’s Got Me Now! 2, Dolly Kill Kill 4, GE: Good Ending 7, Gleipnir 7, Kakushigoto 5, MabuSasa 4, Something’s Wrong with Us 3, That Blue Summer 7 and The Seven Deadly Sins 39.

One Peace has a 9th volume of Hinamatsuri.

Seven Seas debuts, in print, Buck Naked in Another World, a light novel that does not live up to its title.

ASH: Ha!

MJ: Also got a laugh out of this.

SEAN: Also out in print: Classroom of the Elite 5, Dragon Goes House-Hunting 5, Goodbye My Rose Garden 2, Himouto Umaru-chan! 10, Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid: Kanna’s Daily Life 7, My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero’s 2, Our Wonderful Days 3, and Primitive Boyfriend 2.

ASH: I’ve been meaning to give Goodbye My Rose Garden a try; better get on that before I get too far behind!

SEAN: There’s also an early digital release for Classroom of the Elite 6.

Sol Press has a 3rd digital volume for the light novel Why Can’t a Detestable Demon Lord Fall in Love?.

Tokyopop has a new print BL title: There Are Things I Can’t Tell You (Kimi ni Ienai Koto ga Aru). It’s from the publisher Printemps Shuppan, runs in their magazine Canna, and is about childhood friends growing up and realizing they love each other.

MJ: I have to admit this sounds like my kind of title.

SEAN: Vertical, in print, has the 6th Knights of Sidonia Master Edition.

They also have digital editions of Bakemonogatari 5 and CITY 9.

The big debut from Viz is Mujirushi: The Sign of Dreams. This is complete in one volume, ran in Shogakukan’s Big Comic Original, and is a father/daughter psychological drama.

ASH: Not only that, it’s by Naoki Urasawa, one of the creators who solidified my love of manga. I’ll definitely be checking this one out.

ANNA: Oh! This might be the one thing I’m interested in this week.

MJ: Oooooo.

SEAN: Viz also gave us a series of RWBY anthologies before, but now we have RWBY: The Official Manga. This is a prequel to the animated series, and ran in Shonen Jump’s online app.

Also from Viz: Beastars 7, Children of the Whales 15, Hell’s Paradise Jigokuraku 3, Levius/est 5, Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt 14, and No Guns Life 6.

ASH: Beastars and Hell’s Paradise Jigokuraku are my priorities out of this bunch.

SEAN: Yen On has three different light novel debuts. High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even in Another World! (Choujin Koukousei-tachi wa Isekai demo Yoyuu de Ikinuku you desu!) is one where we’ve seen the manga before, and it’s had an anime as well. This is the isekai you get when only geniuses are summoned.

I’m a Behemoth, an S-Ranked Monster, but Mistaken for a Cat, I Live as an Elf Girl’s Pet (S-Rank Monster no Behemoth Dakedo, Neko to Machigawarete Erufu Musume no Kishi (Pet) Toshite Kurashitemasu) is what it sounds like, but it’s also notable for being the first Yen On light novel to have a Parental Advisory warning. From what I hear, it’s simply because of the constant mention of boobs in the series. Sigh.

ASH: Huh. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen an advisory warning on a novel before.

SEAN: May These Leaden Battlegrounds Leave No Trace (Uchinukareta Senjou wa, Soko de Kieteiro) is a more serious, war-torn drama type of story, along the lines of 86.

Also out in light novels: Bungo Stray Dogs 4, The Greatest Demon Lord Is Reborn As a Typical Nobody 3, The Hero Is Overpowered But Overly Cautious 4, Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon: Sword Oratoria 12, the second volume of Kingdom Hearts III: The Novel, the third and final volume of KonoSuba: An Explosion on this Wonderful World! (don’t worry, there’s a sequel to this side story in a couple of months), Magical Girl Raising Project 9, Re: Zero 13, and the WorldEnd EX side novel.

Yen’s manga side has two debuts, and the first is… oh dear. To Save the World, Can You Wake Up the Morning After with a Demi-Human? (Sekai wo Sukuu Tame ni Ajin to Asa-chun Dekimasenka?) is the latest in a series of not-quite-porn-but-pretty-close licenses Yen has picked up, this one runs in Young Dragon Age (which, judging by its title, is for series TOO RACY for Dragon Age, a terrifying thought). The plot involves… well, I can probably guess.

MJ: Why, Yen, WHYYYYYYYY?

SEAN: The second is a spinoff. That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime: The Ways of the Monster Nation. It runs in Micro Magazine’s Comic Ride.

Yen also has some less appalling titles. Barakamon 18 + 1 is a welcome return to that series. There’s also The Case Study of Vanitas 7, For the Kid I Saw in My Dreams 5, Goblin Slayer Side Story: Year One 5, The Hero Is Overpowered but Overly Cautious 2 (the manga version), Horimiya 14, I’m a Behemoth, an S-Ranked Monster, but Mistaken for a Cat, I Live as an Elf Girl’s Pet 2 (the manga version), Monster Wrestling: Interspecies Combat Girls 3, No Matter How I Look at It, It’s You Guys’ Fault I’m Not Popular! 16, RaW Hero 2, Sacrificial Princess and the King of Beasts 10, and the 4th print volume of Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun.

ASH: I’m mostly here for Toilet-Bound Hanako-kun, which I’m thoroughly enjoying.

MJ: Has anyone kept up with The Case Study of Vanitas? I was such a big fan of Pandora Hearts, but the beginning of this series wasn’t as strong as I hoped. Has it gotten better?

SEAN: Yen’s release schedule always seems to exhaust me. Are you picking anything up?

The Invincible Shovel, Vol. 2

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By Yasohachi Tsuchise and Hagure Yuuki. Released in Japan as “Scoop Musou: “Scoop Hadouhou!” (｀・ω・´)♂〓〓〓〓★(゜Д゜ ;;) .:∴DOGOoo” by MF Bunko J. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Elliot Ryoga.

It should not come as too much of a surprise to find that this second volume is not quite as funny as the first. The Invincible Shovel has a few choice gags that it hammers on with the subtlety of a truck hitting an isekai protagonist, And so the element of surprise is gone here. That said, this ended up being funnier than I expected, particularly as it went along. We meet a couple more heroines who add themselves to the uninterested Alan’s not-quite-harem, including a ditzy sage and a sheltered princess, everyone misunderstands things in a sexual way due to the use of ‘shovel’ to mean absolutely everything, and we get somewhat incrementally closer to finishing the quest, as there’s a mid-range boss to defeat and we get a glimpse of the big bad. And then there’s Lithisia, who definitely levels up in this book… in both good and bad ways. Alan may be the OP hero, but in the end Lithisia is the most terrifying.

I’d mentioned in my review of the first volume that the word ‘shovel’ was used 703 times, and in this second book it’s 880. Note that we don’t really get variations – at one point an illustration shows Lithisia is clearly holding a trowel, but it’s referred to as a shovel, and we don’t see spade or other types either. This is deliberate, both for the comedy – the overuse of the word, especially from Lithisia inventing new words including it, is ridiculous – but it’s also meant to be exhausting, to leave the reader so drowning in shovels that they just learn to let it roll over them. We feel much like Catria, the sole voice of reason in this title, who wants things to make sense but is constantly cursed by Alan using his shovel to make instant tunnels through gigantic mountains, remove a memory block to help someone recall their past, and force the villain to confess his evil deeds by literally digging his own grave.

As for Lithisia, I will admit that I did get very tired of her constant horniness, which ends up carrying over to the other characters. The idea of ‘shovel’ meaning sex… or, frequently in this book, masturbation, as Alan says that they can learn to shovel better by themselves, is the sort of thing that’s mostly interesting to 15-year-old boys. Fortunately, there’s more to her than that… in a somewhat scary way. Lithisia devoting herself to the Way of the Shovel is funny, but Lithisia being able to brainwash others to the same vision is alarming. The shovel is gaining more and more followers, though as a worried Alan notes, they don’t actually have the shovel superpowers that she assumes come with the job. This actually has a serious core at its deluded center: she’s afraid that when the quest is over, Alan will leave her, and so vows to TAKE OVER THE WORLD! to ensure she remains by his side. It’s… sweet? In a way?

As I said earlier, your enjoyment of this title may end up being how tolerant you are of the word ‘shovel’ and the female cast being horny on main most of the time. But it’s still gloriously silly enough that I’ll be shoveling the next book. Um, reading. I meant reading. Shovel.

A Wild Last Boss Appeared!, Vol. 1

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By Firehead and YahaKo. Released in Japan by Earth Star Novels. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Kevin Chen.

Sometimes you get books where the concept is drab and you’ve seen it before, but the execution is excellent, and sometimes you get novels with a great concept that can’t quite pull it off. This comes closer to the second type, which may surprise readers given that it’s another “Japanese gamer is pulled into his game world” sort of book. But there are intriguing things going on here. It’s sort of reminiscent of Overlord, in that we have a gamer who arrives in his game world as the villain he created, complete with minions (most of whom have to be tracked down, admittedly) and whose self of self is being somewhat overlaid with the character. That said, this book does not seem to be nearly as dark as Overlord gets. It’s just Lufas getting used to being back in the world (which is 200 years later), getting used to being a woman (the gamer who created her was male), and getting used to being far, far more powerful than everyone else. Does it work? Somewhat.

As noted, our hero is a gamer who played a fun MMORPG (she’s the blonde on the cover, not the blue-haired girl), taking on a character who ended up playing the role of the villain. She was taken down by seven heroes in a massive battle (which the gamer was totally in on, this was a controlled event) and killed off. Suddenly the gamer finds himself in what appears to be that world, two hundred years later, summoned as part of a botched spell to summon a hero. Lufus has no interest in dealing with the folks who summoned her (the character is a woman, something that actually has a lot less relevance than you’d expect) and so goes back to her old Dark Tower, which she finds is rather decrepit but still standing. It also has her minion and expodump girl Dina, who Lufas created as an NPC and then forgot about, but who can helpfully explain what’s happened since Lufas’ death. She decides to round up her twelve monster companions, which first involves talking one of them down from his roaring rampage of revenge.

There are interesting things going on here. The gamer’s memories and Lufas’ have sort of melded together, and as the book goes on the relevance of “this is a game I played in Japan” lessens, which is interesting. To my surprise, the book also has virtually no fanservice at all, and in fact Lufas notes that she doesn’t really feel any desires for women anymore – or men, for that matter. This does, admittedly, make you wonder why the gender bender was conceived of to begin with, except that Lufas looks really beautiful. There’s also some foreshadowing that one of the characters is not what they seem, and it’s handled very deftly. I am rather relieved that the book slowly starts to drop the gamer stuff as it goes along, as the gamer sometimes uses vocab and ideas that make me suspect he was one of those basic sexist Japanese guys. More to the point, while I appreciate that it has a long game in mind, the book meanders. It’s not meant to be a slow life title, but sure feels like one at times, especially when Lufas is doing things like making Golem Winnebagos.

So I’d say that the series has not quite gelled yet. That said, it’s interesting enough that I’ll read more, and folks who (have I said this a lot in my reviews lately?) don’t mind overpowered heroes will find something to enjoy here.

Pick of the Week: Love and Cats

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MICHELLE: Despite not loving The Wize Wize Beasts of the Wizarding Wizdoms as much as I’d hoped to do, I am still really looking forward to Nagabe’s Love on the Other Side short story collection. Perhaps the inclusion of the word “poignant” on the back cover blurb indicates there will be fewer disturbing stories. Not that disturbing stories are a bad thing, but given the state of the world at present, it’s sweetness that I crave.

SEAN: Not too hard for me: the 2nd volume of A Man and His Cat is definitely my pick this week. I want to see if it can keep up the balance between man and cat.

ANNA: I’m also curious about Nagabe’s Love on the Other Side, so that’s my pick!

KATE: I also have a bad case of A Man and His Cat-scratch fever this week.

ASH: I enjoyed the first volume of A Man and His Cat, and I’m also really looking forward to the next installment of Blank Canvas, but I’m thrilled that more of Nagabe’s work is being released, so my pick this week goes to Love on the Other Side.

MJ: I’m ashamed to say I still haven’t read the first volume of A Man and His Cat, so though I’m sure I’d love it, I can really only give my pick to Love on the Other Side. It’s nice to find myself interested in multiple titles this week, though, which has been happening less and less often.

Outbreak Company, Vol. 14

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By Ichiro Sakaki and Yuugen. Released in Japan by Kodansha Light Novels. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Kevin Steinbach.

Short stories here, two starring Shinichi and one Hikaru, of varying quality. The three together do remind you that this series has been sort of coasting ever since the Japan arc. The author says that he plans to end it in three more volumes (it ended up being four), so they at least have an endgame in mind, but there is very much the sense of “killing time” here. That said, at least the stories, for the most part, avoid the worst of Shinichi’s otaku qualities. The first one is a continuation of the prior volume, and offers us our hero hiding in his room to avoid seeing the girls in love with him. The second one involves Brook and Cerise hatching a family, and Shinichi trying to bond with the new lizard baby, who unfortunately sees him as food. And in the final story, another magical maguffin is found that ends up turning Hikaru into a girl for real.

The first story is the weakest. For all that the series has seen Shinichi achieve a lot of things and even save the world once or twice, there has been little to no actual maturity in his character. That’s really been emphasized in the last couple of books, as he’s totally unable to deal with the idea that more than one girl might be in love with him. Seeing him deal with this by hiding in his room and reading manga/playing games is totally in character but also 100% annoying to a reader who sort of wants him to grow up. That said, there was some nice suspense writing here as the team uses an obvious but effective lure to get him out. As for the second story, it shows Shinichi in a slightly better light. He could have simply given up and avoided the new baby, but he’s stubbornly determined to make it like him. This shows off the qualities Myusel and Petralka see in him.

The final story is the most interesting, though it loses a bit when the author admits the editors gave him the idea. It’s actually a sex-change slime, discovered in the caves and turning out to be yet another piece of long-lost technology. It fastens onto Hikaru and essentially leaves his real body there while putting his consciousness in a female body. The rest of the cast have some discussion of how Hikaru identifies – Shinichi discovers that he wears real bras and panties rather than male underwear, and they discuss how much he might identify as a woman. That said, Hikaru’s own POV narration is more matter of fact about it – he thinks of himself as a man, and is attracted to women, but dresses as a girl for reasons of family upbringing. Probably the most interesting part of the story is seeing Elvia forcibly bathe Hikaru, who realizes that getting involved in wacky harem comedy “I saw your boobs!” scenes is easier than it seems.

There weren’t really any big missteps taken here, and it’s certainly pleasant enough. That said, it’s not a good sign when, after each volume finishes, you’re thinking “When will this series come to an end?”.