By Sasara Nagase and Mitsuya Fuji. Released in Japan as “Yarinaoshi Reijō wa Ryūtei Heika o Kōryaku-chū” by Kadokawa Beans Bunko. Released in North America by Cross Infinite World. Translated by piyo.
After four volumes of absolute breathtaking drama, where you worry every single page that Jill is going to either die or end up thrust into a war that will cause everyone else to die, it’s a relief to have a volume that is comparatively a relaxing romp. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the main plotline is still “there’s a secret plot to destabilize things so that the Dragon Emperor will be forced to go to war and the timeline can go back to its old, Jill-is-dead self, but that’s the plotline of the series as a whole. Whereas this book reads like Nagase-san took a reader poll saying “Hey, if I was to have Jill in any cliched situation you can imagine, what would it be?”. And the winning entry was absolutely “I want to see Jill as the new teacher having to deal with a bunch of awful delinquent students who just need the power of someone who cares and can punch them hard.” “Can she wear a cap?” “Oh God yes.”
Jill has plans. She doesn’t want to just be a good wife to her future husband, and she doesn’t want to just punch everything in sight in his name. She wants to help him make her adopted nation even better. Towards that end, she’s come up with a plan for an academy, and wants to go to the nearby La Baier military academy in the Grand Duchy of Laika… which, coincidentally, also has another member of the royal family there – Hadis’ younger brother – as well as a noble who Jill remembers as being a schemer in her previous life. Jill is approved to attend the academy – honestly, approved far too fast – and Hadis ends up tagging along, because of course he does. Unfortunately, when she gets there, she finds not only that the younger brother is one of the worst of the delinquents, but that she’s not there as a student… but as a teacher?
I’ve said this before, but I love how this author always seems to know exactly what the audience for these books want. Yes, a lot of tense intrigue and action, with one false move and the series will end forever tension. But, more importantly, the fact that Jill and Hadis rarely feel that tension themselves. After the events of the last book, Hadis has discovered that the best way to both get revenge on Jill for ignoring him and also find her at her most attractive is to infuriate her, and also possibly side with the enemy. (The actual enemy is in flux through a lot of this volume, and will involve even more of the extended family from hell.) Everything may be going to hell in a handbasket, people’s lives are at stake, but that doesn’t stop these two nitwits from fighting like they’re flirting and vice versa. It is, frankly, cute.
Unfortunately, there’s a nasty cliffhanger that suggests that we may be back to “everyone is trying to destroy Jill’s happiness” next time around. Fortunately, the next book is out very soon, so we can suffer then. This is, almost, a fluffy respite.
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