The Holy Grail of Eris, Vol. 5

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By Kujira Tokiwa and Yu-nagi. Released in Japan as “Eris no Seihai” by DRE Novels. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Amelia Imogen.

It’s been a while, hasn’t it? This is a series that I thought ended with the third volume, and then we got a fourth, which at first was “digital-only” in Japan. Then the series changed publishers in Japan, and DRE Novels put out the first four books with new cover art, and I think a couple of bonus short stories. (No, Yen will not be redoing those.) Meanwhile in North America, we had a series that was contacted between Yen Press and GA Novels, now belonging to a different publisher that works exclusively with J-Novel Club. Talks had to be had. But here we are, with Book 5, and Book 6 is just around the corner! In between Books 4 and 5, we had the anime, which was received pretty well, though the reaction by fans felt a bit familiar, and this fifth book underlined the fan reaction with a highlighter. Namely, with the intense intimate female friendship between the two leads, why is the series het? The answer is, of course, that women are allowed to have intense intimate female friendships and still like men.

Connie is back from her vacation, and everything seems well. Unfortunately, the dregs of Daeg Gallus are still around, and they’re targeting the Kingdom’s important mythology. To help deal with this, a baron by the name of Camille Miller has decided to take steps to discredit them. This first involves, for some reason, framing Connie for the bombing of the statue of the hero in a town square, which goes about as well as you’d expect given her fiancee is head of the police and the king is in her debt. Changing tactics, he then decides to announce that she’s another Saint, just like the Saint Anastasia of old. Can Connie try to figure out what’s going on, stop the terrorist group that is still trying to destroy everything, *and* not punch Camille Miller in his smug face? Meanwhile, in the past, we see Scarlet’s grandmother and find out the real story of both Saint Anastasia and the Grail family.

So, for those who loved the anime and are curious, Randolph is technically in this, and he and Connie are still engaged. But even the author admits he’s not in the book very much. This isn’t, at its heart, a romance, it’s a mystery series with added thriller aspects. As such, Connie and Randolph aren’t the main “couple”, Connie and Scarlet are. Thematically, this series is about them. Likewise, in the past, we expect to see the story of a romance between Cornelia and her somewhat fanatically loyal friend Percival Grail, but that’s also pretty much a fakeout, and the important relationship is between Cornelia and her maid and best friend Asha. That said, again, the relationships take a back seat to the mysteries here. Fortunately, the mysteries are very good, and I found it amusing that most of the present-day sleuthing was just Connie reading old histories till she got bags under her eyes.

There is a short story volume after it, but the 6th book, with its incredibly bisexual cover (she has two hands!), does appear to finally wrap the series up after a couple of fakeouts. I’m delighted to see it continue. I hope we never see Camille Miller again, but I’m not optimistic about that last part.

Adachi and Shimamura, Vol. 13

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By Hitoma Iruma and raemz. Released in Japan by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Airship. Translated by Molly Lee.

Glory be, we finally get a volume that isn’t just short stories, and takes place in the present day! After so many alternate universes, flash forwards to the future, and the terrifying vision of Adachi’s idea of heaven, we are back in a normal yuri romance. OK, yes, no series with Yashiro is normal, but you know what I mean. As always, Shimamura is the narrator. It’s amazing how far she’s come since the start. Adachi, when not dealing with Shimamura, is pretty much as she’s always been, introverted, uncommunicative, and giving off a strong “fuck off” aura. Shimamura, who I described as attempting to learn what human emotion is in prior books, is absolutely filled with them here, and a lot of the book is her suddenly breaking down as she once again deals with her childhood dog maybe dying (again, the dog does not die in this book), or her cutely realizing how much she’s in love with Adachi. A depressed teenager who barely interacted with life is now happy and content. It’s nice to see.

First bit of the book: Shimamura goes to see her grandparents, gets overcome with emotion at seeing that Gon is still tired and listless but not dead, unleashes Yashiro on a new set of folks, meets a “childhood friend” from another Iruma series (more on that later), and comes out to her grandma. The rest of the book: it’s school festival time! Honestly, Shimamura wasn’t aware they had one, and neither was Adachi – they likely skipped before now. But this is a new, dynamic Shimamura who does things, and so she comes over to help with their classes’ candied fruit cafe. And Adachi also comes, because Shimamura asks her, and that’s the only reason. The festival is cute – we see Adachi serving and Shimamura waitressing, they get to tour the sites together on a date, they go see Hino and Nagafuji in a class play that sounds like it was based on another work by the author, and they see a concert that I’m pretty sure is based off ANOTHER work by the author. Then, after the festival is over, Adachi invited Shimamura to her house for their own private festival. (No, not like that.)

I’m sure hardcore fans of Iruma are delighted at seeing all the cameos from their other series pop up in A&S. I did work out the girl making the ceramics is from a collection called End Blue, I think? And yes, the series can be read without knowing who the hell these people are. But man, for people like me, who want to track down references, it’s a pain in the ass, as 90% of Iruma’s work is never coming out here. (And, let’s face it, the crossover with My First Love’s Kiss was deeply unwelcome.) That singer and piano player are no doubt from another series, and I don’t know which one, and that just bugs me. And because Iruma doesn’t own the characters, I won’t even get Sayaka from Bloom Into You showing up. Other than that niggle, this is a strong volume, absolutely drenched in Shimamura’s feelings for Adachi, and I can mostly ignore Adachi’s obsessive “there is only one person in my world” feelings, which Shimamura sees as cute but a bit worrying. The “roleplay us ten years in the future” at the end is really sweet.

So yes, a nice, relaxed volume, with no child predators or possible heat deaths of the universe. Next up, a third short story collection, though that doesn’t count 99.9, or the other numbered volumes that have basically been short story collections in all but name.

Imperial Reincarnation: I Came, I Saw, I Survived, Vol. 7

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By Masekinokatasa and Kaito Shinobu. Released in Japan as “Tenseishitara Koutei deshita: Umarenagara no Koutei wa Konosaki Ikinokoreru ka?” by TO Books. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Gwendolyn Warner.

One of these days we’ll have a nice relaxing book where Carmine is given a respite from constant chaos and attempts to take over the Empire, but that day is not today, and honestly probably we’ll never get that. That said, at least Carmine is finally starting to ditch the need to pretend to be a dumb puppet emperor… mostly. He’d like to do this, and he gets to demonstrate that he does know magic after all in a truly ludicrous sequence where he drops a magic nuke, but for the most part the conceit can still be useful. Especially when, following up on the cliffhanger from the last book, the old leader of the Imperium, the religious republic next door that is the Empire’s biggest threat, shows up seeking asylum. Along with his loser son and a terrified aide. So Carmine once again has to pretend to be kinda dumb while he figures out what to do, because every answer seems to be “but that will lead to war”.

Carmine is so caught off guard by the news of the asylum seekers that he has to fake a contagious illness for a few days to gain time to think and gather information. Then he heads back to the capital, meets the Imperium guys, and big surprise, they’re terrible. The former leader is the decadent Roman emperor sort, and his son is scheming and wants power, but doesn’t really have any smarts to back it up. They also clearly have spies in their entourage. In the meantime, of course, the Empire is still fighting a war on several fronts, so Carmine also has to head over to another front line to see how things are going… where, unfortunately, he arrives far too quickly thanks to Count Ethiac, who essentially drugs her horse to ride at top speed for hours to get there as fast as she can. Oops.

The author seems to be swapping out eccentric but unhinged women every book. At the end of this one Count Ethiac is dumped, mostly due to making everything more difficult. In her place we get Illumino, who is the granddaughter of the Gotiroir, who are the “Mongolian horde” equivalent in this series. She’s very strong and very good at being a bodyguard, but cares nothing about anyone around her, so is a terrible commander. She’s also interested in Carmine, and wants to marry him, mostly because he’s the only guy who’s NOT interested in her. Carmine has now found a third weirdo he doesn’t want, which is a shame, as I think Rosaria is dropping hints she would like a couple more wives, if only to build a power base. I apologize for only talking about the mostly non-existent harem in this series, but the alternative is discussing military maneuvers, and no.

Another cliffhanger, as someone is trying to assassinate Carmine! He’s framed as an old enemy we should remember, but this cast is so huge I don’t. I’m sure it’s dramatic. Will he live? Oh, probably. Decent read.