The Executioner and Her Way of Life: Curtain Call

Leave a reply

By Mato Sato and nilitsu. Released in Japan as “Shokei Shoujo no Virgin Road” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jenny McKeon.

Siiiiiigh. I should not really be surprised, but this final volume of The Executioner and Her Way of Life turned out much like many of the previous ones I’ve read. It had a slow start that made me want to skim, an interesting middle bit where I thought it might achieve something, and a disappointing ending where the author doesn’t really give the readers the resolution they want. It’s a bit of a mess, and I guess that fits. Fortunately, there are good bits in the middle. Also fortunately, the characters that I didn’t want to die don’t. But the epilogue has a bit of an “and the adventure continues” feel to it, like you might see in a Shonen Jump anime cancelled prematurely. “Rest assured, everything is still happening much the same.” That said, if there’s one character I blame for this disappointing final volume it’s Gadou. She’s a pill, she’s not fun to read, and she’s brought along her evil alternate self. She sucks.

We pick up right where we left off, with Menou and company trying to defeat Hakua, despite Hakua being nearly omnipotent. They finally manage to do this, mostly thanks to Akari snapping out of her funk, but end up getting pulled into… modern Japan? Well, not quite. It’s a modern Japan that’s basically been set up as a perfect environment for Hakua, now the teenager who was in hospital her entire life, to “get well” and go to school, make friends, etc. Sadly for Hakua, Menou, Akari, and Gadou are also in this reality… and another person, who allows our favorite princess her own life back but decides instead to go body-hopping and ruin everything in this reality just to try to kill Gadou. And look, I get that, it’s Gadou. But this is still a tantrum. Can Menou fix everything, save Hakua, and return to their own world with Akari?

To get to bits I liked: the brief look at Akari’s awful life before she ended up isekai’d was quite effective, and helps tie in to a scene later on when she has to deal with Hakua’s new reality, which is definitely NOT the Japan she was taken from. Hakua’s plotline in general was also handled well, and was probably my favorite part of the book, giving a definite closure to her story. But the epilogue was just meh. Everyone’s cleaning up after the events of the previous ten books. There are still splinter terrorist groups, so Menou and Momo are still basically fantasy cops, now helped by Akari and Ashuna. As for the yuri, no change there. Momo and Akari still love Menou, but that’s as far as it goes, and everything stays status quo. I was vaguely amused at Maya, who no longer has to be a little kid forever, suddenly shooting up like a weed. And it’s kind of amusing seeing Sahara, who is a born administrator, whine about how she can’t stop administrating.

Really, I can’t quite explain why the ending didn’t land for me, except it didn’t. If you watched the anime and wonder what happens next, I’d recommend fanfics.

Rise of the Lowborn: Ascending the Ranks by Crushing Incompetent Nobles, Vol. 1

Leave a reply

By Kosaka Hanane and Kurogiri. Released in Japan as “Heimin Shushhun no Shōkan, Munō na Kizoku Jōkan o Jūrin Shite Nariagaru” by Fujimi Fantasia Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Jennifer Ward.

Yes, it’s time for another episode of “Sean reads a title way outside of his wheelhouse”. Much to my surprise, there isn’t a specific event here that necessitates our protagonist spending the rest of the series getting revenge. Instead, it’s merely the crushing weight of disappointment and betrayal from his previous life that has led him to regard this one with disdain. But make no mistake about it, this book is basically “you know your boss who lords his status over you? Or those rich kids at high school who mock you when you can’t afford the nice things? Wouldn’t it be great if you could destroy them forever?” Hazen is especially good at doing this, and is frankly a villain in all but name. Fortunately, he’s surrounded by one or two interesting characters, but I have to say, much of this reads like a teenager’s spite diary.

After graduating third in his class at the military academy… but getting his diploma last because he’s a filthy commoner… Hazen briefly talks to his two (2) friends, verbally destroys an arrogant noble who drops by to mock him and then heads off to his new assignment, a frontier post where commoners have been assigned for some time now and “mysteriously disappear”. Hazen is not like those other commoners. He’s different. He arrives, is assigned to the worst unit on the frontier, and proceeds to take command by cutting off the heads of two of the worst sergeants in charge, forcing everyone to actually be physically fit, and generally treating the soldiers like human beings… provided they’re not nobles. He also manages to make peace with the local native tribe, and then prepares to invade the fortress that no one has ever been able to invade. He does all this with 100% no emotion whatsoever. It’s all logic. His twisted logic, but hey.

First off, as always I warn readers, there’s slavery in this. In fact, there’s slavery used as comedy – the schmuck of a noble that Hazen spends the entire book destroying is told the only thing he’s good for is being a slave, and that he’s probably not even good enough to be a high-grade slave. Hazen’s shtick is that he’s utterly blunt about everything, but assumes people will be OK with that since he’s just telling the truth. It also helps that he’s almost all-powerful at magic and combat, too. Fortunately, the book has a few upsides. At one point he finds an orphan girl whose sole purpose is to be a tsukkomi and yell at Hazen, and she does it very well. I also liked his bodyguard, the massive woman on the cover, who he realizes will be ground up by the military machine, so he makes her his bodyguard so that he can use her but not grind her up. (In case you’re wondering, the third girl on the cover appears in the book for about 3 pages, despite multiple color pictures and a bio. This is odd, as there is a plot-relevant woman who could be on the cover but she doesn’t even get any art at all. Possibly as she’s one of the native tribe and not a green-eyed blonde.)

If you .like series where the hero always acts with “cold logic”, with the exception of one or two moments where he goes “you know what? That makes me mad” like Droopy, this should be like catnip for you. I’m not sure I plan to read any more, though. Hazen is just not fun.

High School DxD: Durandal of the Student Council Election

Leave a reply

By Ichiei Ishibumi and Miyama-Zero. Released in Japan by Fujimi Fantasia Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Haydn Trowell.

As we are nearing the end of the series, it’s nice to see that it has actual character development for multiple people and is not just “they got stronger, so that is their character development”. We see that Kiba is still filled with righteous fury over his past. We see that Asia still struggles with self-confidence issues, even though she’s now the president of the Occult Research Club. And then there’s the cover girl for this volume, Xenovia. When she arrived, she was the sort to just go all Leeroy Jenkins on whatever problems she had. But over the course of the last several books, we’ve seen her try to grow from that and apply actual strategy, sometimes even using different weapons or trying other ways to attack. So one of the best jokes in the entire book comes near the end, when she’s told “no, that’s not what the real Xenovia is. You need to not think more. You just charging ahead is MORE effective because it is you.” And it’s true. Xenovia is all vibe.

As Xenovia prepares for student council elections, where she’s running against Sona’s hand-picked candidate, the cast is met with a new crisis. After the events of the last book, a considerable portion of folks on the side of the angels – literally – are very unhappy with the whole “make peace with demons” thing, and believe the only good demon is dead. Which, to be fair, these are mostly the ones who had demons kill everyone they loved. They’re also led by three cardinals – a really strong one, a really strategic one, and a mascot kid. OK, he’s also really powerful, but that’s not a role he serves here. They’ve decided to attack DxD, who are basically a symbol of everyone they hate. As such, try to contain your shock, the back half of this book is one big fight.

One thing I really liked about this book, one of the better ones in the series, is that the fight is very performative. It’s a fight that has to happen to teach a lesson, rather than one that has to end with one side dead or near dead. (We get that in the cliffhanger, to be fair.) And the cardinals not only accept Irina, Xenovia and Asia working for the other side, but they’re still happy to see them. Kiba finding out he’s not the sole survivor of sword experimentation, and Asia getting all her fan mail delivered to her at long last, these are really heartwarming scenes, and they were great to see. As for Xenovia, as the author notes, she’s in “Cool” mode here rather than “Cute”. Her speech to the school, where she had something well-prepared but kinda dull and decided to ditch that and wing it, is also very her. And an “I love this school” student council election speech is, of course, very shonen, just like this series.

Unfortunately, Ravel is now dead. Right? I’m sure that must be what happened. Also, the afterword says the next book will be a new spinoff devoted to short stories, but I don’t know if Yen Press will agree. We shall see. In the meantime you do you, Xenovia.