Monthly Archives: July 2020

The Hidden Dungeon Only I Can Enter, Vol. 1

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By Meguru Seto and Takehana Note. Released in Japan by Kodansha Lanove Books. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Tiva Haro. Adapted by Cae Hawksmoor.

As I was commenting on Twitter about reading this book, I kept calling it “trash”. And it really is. But wait, it’s not actually bad. In fact, you could do far worse than this kind of trash. But – it’s still trash. The lead is a stock light novel hero, the sort referred to these days as “Potato-kun”. He gathers together a group of young women, all gorgeous, all who are either already in love with him or fall for him almost instantly. His powers essentially rewrite reality to a certain extent, and aren’t powered by MP but rather LP, which means he can do more provided he gorges on delicious food, makes love to beautiful women, etc. It’s not actually an isekai (he’s the son of a baronet, and genuinely from this world), but isekais have happened here before, so there’s soy sauce and miso. I was expecting it to hit the plot/character beats that would cause me to groan and drop it in annoyance. But… it didn’t.

Our hero is Noir, and as I mentioned before he’s the son of a Baronet, which means he’s nobility but the lowest rung, meaning nobles don’t give him the time of day. He has a great ability where a voice in his head tells him the solution for any problem… but it gives him crippling pain to use. And the job he had lined up for adulthood was given to a higher noble’s son. All he has is his adoring busty childhood friend who clearly is in love with him but he hasn’t caught on to this. She discovers that the pain of using the skill is lessened by kissing, and this in turn leads him to a dungeon no one has found, and an adventurer who’s been trapped there for 200 years. From there, he’s ready to become an adventurer, go to Hero Academy, save the lives of cursed young ladies, and… yeah, you get the picture. This is trash.

So why is it good? It knows its boundaries, and knows when to push and when not to. For all that his skill is powered up by sexual acts, hugging, lap pillows, and the like usually suffice – the closest this gets to 18-rated is the instructor who decides to reward him by sitting on him. He gets a skill that is called ‘lucky pervert’, and after falling into his friend’s boobs and seeing an old lady’s panties, he quickly rewrites the skill so that it happens ‘very rarely, and never in a serious situation’. For a generic guy, he’s a bit smarter than most (still dense, of course). In one epilogue, he sees a bunch of kids bullying a boy for “hanging out with a girl”, and very quickly tears apart their logic – aside from mentioning Emma’s chest a lot, there’s little of the stock sexism we see in these books. Heck, there isn’t even any slavery (and it makes me sad that this is so rare I’m happy to note it). Even the little sister in love with him is restrained compared to others.

So basically, if you bought the book because you wanted it to be a nice, friendly OP fantasy with a lot of cute girls in a harem, this is a good book to buy. It hits all those buttons, and isn’t appalling. It’s also getting an anime soon, so you get in on the ground floor. It’s trash. Embrace that.

The Asterisk War: The Steps of Glory

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By Yuu Miyazaki and okiura. Released in Japan by MF Bunko J. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Haydn Trowell.

There’s good news and bad news in this new volume of The Asterisk War. The bad news is that this is the start of the series’ THIRD tournament arc, and with a few exceptions, battle scenes are what we’re going to get. The good news is that this author is quite good at writing battle scenes, particularly with a lot of young men and women kicking ass in various kinds of ways. We do get more at the start of the book showing the growing relationship between our villain, Madiath Mesa, and Ayato’s mother Sakura, whose real name seems to be Akari. It’s no surprise by now that she’s a girl shunned by the rest of her family due to “out of control” powers and forced to essentially live in a shed for most of her childhood, given what we’ve seen of this world to date. We do also get a bit of Kirin investigating, though that’s mostly her almost getting killed. The rest is fighting and foreshadowing of more fighting to come.

Saya is on the cover this time, and does get a bit to do, as she’s in the tournament. I was amused that chaotic, unpredictable fighters are her weakness, which makes perfect sense given her own personality and her love for Ayato. Ayato actually gets the most troublesome fights, not a big surprise given he’s the main character, and learns the hard way that the nature of this tournament (one-on-one, as opposed to pairs or groups) means everyone is far more brutal – several characters are hospitalized and the narrative has to tell us “it’s OK, they’re going to live”. He fights a big guy who has a few surprise Luxes that he can bring out, which shows off that there are various factions trying to influence this tournament as much as possible. He also fights a very nice girl and is very nice back at her, and it’s a good thing their battle is fierce otherwise I suspect the audience watching these fights would have been rather bored.

For those wanting more Julis, sorry to say you will have to wait – she’s barely in this book, and we don’t get to see any of her preliminary bouts. Instead we get a large number of characters, some of whom we’ve seen before and some we haven’t, but I can guarantee you I’ve mostly forgotten who they are. That’s fine, we’re not here for character development, we’re here to read some nice fights. Hilda’s battle was excellent, and I look forward to seeing the Mad Scientist fight, even though the narrator for some reason wants to tell me I won’t be able to get it. I was also amused at the student council presidents of the various schools trying to figure out how to explain the various borderline-illegal things their students have done. Next volume promises us the start of the real Tournament proper – in other words, battles where we may NOT guess the outcome in advance.

This is apparently the final arc in the series, per the author, which doesn’t surprise me given the main cast is about to graduate. I am assuming that many good fights will be had, all the remaining women in love with Ayato will confess to him, and he will end up with Julis, because in the end Asterisk War is well-written cliche but still very, very cliche. Still, I’ll be back next time.

The Saga of Tanya the Evil: Ut Sementem Feceris, ita Metes

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By Carlo Zen and Shinobu Shinotsuki. Released in Japan by Enterbrain. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Emily Balistrieri.

This book came out just before the anime began in Japan, and right about the time the manga started. As such, it’s the first one to be possibly influenced by both of those sources. I’ve talked before about how I don’t think Tanya’s pragmatism is usually as evil as the author wants us to believe, but sometimes he digs deep and shows us that there really is a difference in the way she (and her soldiers) think and everyone else. This book has an Ildoan Colonel observe her unit during a Federation attack, and is horrified that the soldiers not only plan to attack a town but also to bomb a church. Tanya’s cheerful explanation of how this is all perfectly fine due to the rules of war (and the fact that the Federation hasn’t signed any agreements) can be chilling as you realize how she’s not thinking of morality in a general sense at all. And then you remember that this is meant to be an anti-war series, and it all makes sense.

Tanya is all smiles on the cover, partly as she’s entertaining the observer and tries to be on her best behavior, but also has there’s a very real chance that we may be achieving peace again. Lergen spends most of the book in Ildoa, negotiating a peace with excellent terms for the Empire. And the generals (and Tanya) make sure that those terms are acceptable by absolutely trouncing the Federation, who have stronger weapons, better shields and well-trained men now but still lack aerial mages, and that’s making all the difference. Unfortunately, peace is not decided by the generals. We get another look at the ruling government of the Empire, and it’s chilling. By the end of this book, you realize that there’s no way the series can possibly end with anything but total, 100% defeat for the Empire. That’s a ways down the road, but… get used to war is what I’m saying.

The last volume was mostly talk and little fight, and this one goes in the other direction, being mostly filled with battle after battle. Our core team stays alive, and wins each battle, but there’s no mistake – things are getting harder. The enemy is starting to prepare for Tanya’s pyrotechnics, and she’s stunned when, for the first time, one of her “blow everything to hell” attacks does not blow everything to hell. Even when they do win due to clever tactics and overwhelming mage superiority, the Federation are able to make their retreat to fight another day. Even worse, they do so in an orderly fashion – discipline is winning. These are not the enemies Tanya wants to fight, as they’ll only lead to bad things for her and her fellow soldiers. That’s why she’s so happy at the end of the volume, not knowing what’s been happening with her government. I expect a big freak out from her at the start of the eighth book.

So a good, strong Tanya volume, better than the last, and reminding you again that when war is being fought, no one wins. The title’s translation, “As you sow, so shall you reap” could not be more appropriate.