By Ryo Shirakome and Takaya-ki. Released in Japan as “Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou Rei” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Ningen.

I do sometimes worry that the author of the Arifureta series has forgotten why we’re reading it in the first place. In regards to the original series, it’s to see Hajime’s ludicrous overpowered antics and the wacky banter between him and his companions, and with Zero it’s the exact same thing only it’s Miledi. The main series has more harem romance to it than Zero, which seems content to tease only Oscar and Miledi and not have it go further, but, well, romance isn’t why I read it, at least. And, in regards to this volume of Zero, while I can appreciate the author writing some really cool battle scenes because he enjoys it, with lots of the bad guys and good guys bringing out increasingly ludicrous powers, fight scenes are not why I read Arifureta either. Sadly, that makes this volume a big ol’ slog, as a good eighty percent of it is battles.

We head into the forest that we’ve seen in Arifureta’s 2nd volume, home of the Beastmen, and here (at least at the start) at the height of its powers. Well, half the group are here. Things have gotten dangerous enough that Miledi’s Angels split up at this point, with Oscar and Vandre helping to settle everyone from the last book, while Miledi and the others head to the forest, there to meet their next potential Liberator, and also try to stop the battle, as the Church has gotten there first. Speaking of the Church, Laus is continuing to have doubts over what they’re actually doing, and things are not helped by the Church’s religious fervor taking on more and more aspects of brainwashing. Can he continue to fight for something he doesn’t believe in any more? Or should be change sides and joining the Liberators.

I will admit, which I said that I wanted more wacky antics and less fights, when we DO get wacky antics, I’m not sure they’re the ones I wanted. Lyutillus is the Elven Queen of the forest… and also a masochist. The author admits she’s meant to be a mirror to Tio in the main series, and given Tio is my least favorite of the girls in that, I wasn’t really going to be enjoying this. Better was Miledi’s usual stuff – when she’s deliberately trying to be annoying to distract the mood, it’s fantastic, and her confrontation with Laus towards the start of the book was absolutely hilarious. Laus, in fact, is the best thing about this book, as his loss of faith is very well handled. I’ve long since come to terms with the fact that the gods are villains in this world, therefore the fact that everyone in the Church tends towards being a monster is hardly a surprise. I am quite interested in seeing how this switching sides works out going forward.

…I say that, but we know how this is going to end – the main cast all dead (bar Miledi’s soul) and branded as heretics. The bad guys win is the premise of this. But we’ve still no idea how long it’s going to be, and I’m happy to see it play out. As long as it’s not just fights. Or creepy sexual gags. Sigh. Not gonna have much luck there, am I?

By Ryo Shirakome and Takayaki. Released in Japan as “Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou Shouhenshuu” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Ningen

This was not the Short Story collection I expected, to be honest, at least not till the final third of the book. What it is is a rounding up of most of the very short stories that the author wrote for giveaways, store-exclusives, etc. A lot of series have these, few bring it out as a real volume. (J-Novel Club has quite a few of them as Premium Extras for subscribers, and indeed I think a lot of these originally appeared as exclusive extras in earlier books.) The book breaks down in four sections: the first are short-short stories taking place within the timeline of approximately Books 1-5 of the main series; the second is an alternate universe where the characters are at a “magical academy” type school; the third has three short takeoffs on popular fairy tales; and the fourth is the short story written exclusively for this book, which has the main cast (along with Myu and Remia) ending up in the crossover event we all wanted to see.

The cover features Hajime, reminding us why he’s rarely on the cover as he looks far more chuuni than grimdark; and Myu, whose character trait in this volume is to show off how she’s taking after her “daddy” despite only having been around him a short time. As for the content… I’m gonna be honest, while these were cute, about 2/3 of the book does not lend itself to a review. There’s lots of harem fights, there’s characters being dorks, there’s indiscriminate destruction of anyone who would dare go after Myu, etc. The Academy/Fairy Tale chapters are even less important, so I’ll skip them entirely. I did enjoy the chapters showing Hajime’s parents, first in a flashback showing off their otaku occupations (honestly, they remind me far too much of the parents from Outbreak Company) and then showing how upset they are at their son’s disappearance.

The main reason to get this is the last story, which has the cast, taking a final voyage with Myu (and Remia) before leaving her behind, and ending up spirited to a cursed city by a phantom whale that seems to only communicate with Myu. Unfortunately, the monsters here are too powerful for this group to handle. Yes, even Hajime. Fortunately, this whale can also reach back… in TIME! Yes, you guessed it, the cast of Arifureta meets the cast of Arifureta Zero, with Miledi being somewhat baffled as to why everyone hates her, Meiru becoming a total siscon about little Myu, etc. Eventually they do team up to take down the Big Bads, and we see Miledi and Yue comparing themselves to each other, as do Oscar and Hajime. Sadly, due to plot contrivance, they don’t remember the meeting afterwards, but hey. (This story also serves to show that Remia’s “ara ara” personality is for show, as if we hadn’t guessed, and also that she may be falling for Hajime for real.)

So in the end, this is pretty light and fluffy, and not an essential purchase. But it’s reasonably fun, and the last quarter was quite entertaining. Arifureta fans should like it.

By Ryo Shirakome and Takaya-ki. Released in Japan as “Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou Rei” by Overlap Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Ningen.

I’ve been comparing Miledi to Hajime in these reviews of Zero. And just as Hajime was written to be the ultimate in “I am cool and badass and will happily abandon anyone other than Yue to a fiery death” and then walked back to where he is now reasonable a decent person, likewise Miledi was introduced in the main series as the most annoying person in the world and then we gradually see in Zero how much of it is a front. It’s a front she feels more comfortable with, in fact – despite her complaining, she’d much rather be yelled at for being irritating than praised for being a force for good, mostly as it embarrasses her too much. It’s also a good way to avoid simply having her be too perfect – Miledi is going to save everybody, loves everybody, and has magical powers that can take out a demon lord possessed by a God. Of course she has to be annoying. You need SOMETHING.

As you might guess by the cover, the new Liberator who join’s Miledi’s forces in this book is male, and men don’t get Arifureta covers, meaning Meiru and Miledi pull double-duty. They’re headed back to meet up with Oscar and Naiz’s group, to see if they can revive the comatose kids (spoiler: not quite yet), when they suddenly find out that there was an attack on the base and most of the group was kidnapped. As it turns out, they were kidnapped to avoid ANOTHER kidnapping. Vandre is half-demon, half-dragon, and all tsundere, as he kidnapped Miledi’s group to try to get them to help him own group of people being tortured for experiments by the Demon King. Of course, Miledi will totally save them anyway, especially when it looks like there’s more to the Demon King than meets the eye. But can she do it while fighting off a powerful local disease?

First off, the book begins and ends with broad characterizations of cross-dressing gay men who are, of course, sexual predators for the lulz. Ugh. This is not the first time the author has gone to this well, either. Aside from that, it’s a decent enough book. As with the other Zero books, it leans heavily on fight scenes, particularly in the second half, but there is also a decent amount of characterization, particularly of Vandre, the new guy, and Miledi. Vandre and Oscar also look to be adding a new annoying trait to the Liberators, as they don’t get along and snipe at each other constantly in a “vitriolic best buds” sort of way. I do wonder if they can actually weaponize this trait, the way that Miledi has weaponized being annoying to the point where it throws villains off.

We do also get a look at the Church here, briefly, and see that, thanks to evil people and also brainwashing, it may only have one sensible person in it. They’re also trying to get a jump on Miledi in snatching up Ancient Magic Users, so next time we head off to the forest. Till then, this remains a decent spinoff, particularly if you like fight scenes.