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

In general, if you’re going to have an unbalanced book, it’s best to have the strongest material be towards the end than towards the beginning. This is a problem for Arifureta Book 10, which has as its first third or so some of the best scenes in the entire series, then tries its hardest to keep it up. Unfortunately, keeping it up would require the reader to feel a lot more sympathy – or a lot less – towards Kouki than they do. This means that we spend a good deal of the last half of the book waiting for Kouki to finish typing his Reddit post on how girls he deserves won’t sleep with him. To be fair, the book very clearly takes a negative stand on this sort of behavior, and I appreciate that. I’d appreciate it more if this wasn’t also a male power fantasy where a bullied loner literally gets revenge on his high school class and also has sex with all the hottest babes. Which it still is.

Before that, though, there is the battle with Yue and Shea. I haven’t talked about Yue much in these reviews, mostly as there hasn’t been that much TO talk about. Here, though, she gets some backstory showing off who she used to be and the family that she loved – including a set of double reversal betrayals, which left her so devastated that she’s tried hard not to think about her past at all, including why she was sealed rather than just killed off. After meeting up with Shea (who sails through her own test), A pensive Yue makes the mistake of saying that if anything happens to her, she wants Shea to take care of Hajime. Actually, the bigger mistake may be that she doesn’t get why that’s upsetting to Shea. What follows is one of the best fights in the series, as Shea and Yue go toe to toe with each other as Shea tries to beat the resignation out of Yue. The funniest part is that it takes in Kaori’s fight as well – normally the idea of Kaori as the “Steph” of this series annoys me, but it’s handled SO well here I can’t be churlish.

Elsewhere, Tio also sails through her test, showing off that she’d be a fantastic character if she weren’t such a depraved masochist. Suzu is forced to admit that she lives her life by deflecting, and Ryutarou that he really would rather not be a sidekick character (even though he totally is). And then there’s Kouki, who is forced to admit that he’s jealous of Hajime and not as good as he thinks he is… and fails miserably. At this point I’m fairly sure Kouki is not going to be killed off, as if he was this would be the perfect place to do it. Instead we simply see him fail – again. He comes to his senses later to a degree, but there’s still seething resentment underneath everything he does. It’s well-written, but also means that I have to read far more about him than I really want to. Also, I suspect he’ll be useless in the upcoming battle that the cliffhanger suggests.

There’s only a couple more books left in the “main” storyline judging by when the webnovel is, so the cliffhanger ending may be moving us to the climax. Everyone (bar Kouki) has evolved and powered up. They know they can now get home. All that’s left is beating the bad guys. I expect the next book will have a lot of that. Till then, at least we can enjoy Shea beating the snot out of Yue and Kouki railing against the friendzone.

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

The last few Arifureta reviews have begun with me discussing some aspect of Hajime’s personality, but for the most part, after realizing he now has a way to return to Japan, Hajime’s character arc seems to be coming to an end. There is discussion here about how he can possibly fit in back home after all the changes he’s gone though, but Hajime’s attitude to this is basically “can’t do anything about it now, so will see what happens when it happens”. There’s also a side story towards the end of the book that shows that he’s not really as changed as everyone may think, as we see much of his core character even as a bullied high school student. Instead of discussing Hajime, I’d like to focus on the two characters who get the most attention during this volume (the first of a two-parter), and that’s Kouki and Shizuka. Who are suffering from the same problem but going in two very different directions.

The function of this final dungeon, aside from the snow and ice and a bunch of bigfoot monsters, is to make those who try to conquer it confront their negative traits. This starts as whispers in the ear, and ends with a full on “my evil twin” confrontation. We don’t actually see Kouki’s battle in this volume, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and say he’s not going to pass. In fact, I’ll even go further: I don’t think Kouki as an antagonist is going to be resolved in the series. I’m not sure it will get to the point where he’s an outright villain like Eri, but Kouki sees the world, and those around him, in black and white, and as long as he keeps doing that he’s never going to accept that Hajime isn’t “bad” in some way. It can be very frustrating to the reader – and indeed the other cast members, all of whom know exactly what his inner turmoil is but refuse to bring it up as they know once they do he’ll snap and that will be it. Expect snapping next book.

As for Shizuku, who is getting yet another picture on the cover, she not only has to confront her repressed love for Hajime, which has been bubbling up for some time, but also her repression of everything else in her life. We see her backstory as a girl who wants to do feminine things but has an amazing talent for kendo, and as a result is slotted in as ‘tomboy’ by almost everyone. Her friendship with Kouki’s who’s more an annoying little brother than anything else, also causes her to be ostracized, and it’s only Kaori who’s able to save her. (This also gives insight as to why she’s so willing to put up with Kaori’s eccentric behavior bordering on stalking towards Hajime – and why she refuses to admit her own feelings.) In the end, Shizuku’s main issue is that she needs to be more selfish. She takes a good first step at the end.

As noted, this turns out to be a two-parter, and the author says he’ll show the other cast members confronting their dark selves, including Kouki. I suspect they’ll conquer the dungeon, but the question is what will they do about the rest of the plot, which takes a back seat here aside from occasional mentions of Eri. The latest volume comes out in Japan next week, so we may need to wait a few months to find out.

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

In my review of the first book in this prequel series, I said that it was Miledi’s book and Miledi’s series. Here I’ll go further: I think that Miledi is meant to compare directly with Hajime. Yes, in terms of personality, she reads more like a horrible fusion of Shea and Tio, but as we see a lot in this book, even more than the last one, she is wedded to her ideals and prepared to do anything in her power to preserve them, even if that means taking on the Church, a bunch of pirates, or even a giant seas monster with her ungodly gravity powers. (Ungodly would suit her fine, I think). As for Oscar, he has Hajime’s snark down pat, but after this book we really know who he’s meant to be. He’s Shinpachi from the Gintama series. No, really, the author even straight up ripped off the glasses joke. Oh yes, and we get a new Liberator as well. That’s her on the cover.

The author suggests that the seemingly sweet big sister type who’s really a sadistic tease is a surprise for this book, something which… isn’t true, but whatever. Meiru is a lot of fun, though, and is not only a big sister to her captured real sibling, but also to a huge pirate family that she heads up. Yes, it’s Arifureta does One Piece. Miledi and company are arriving at the city the pirates work out of to find the next Liberator, and after a host of misunderstandings that eventually get resolved, find she… doesn’t want to join them. Well, that’s fine, we went through this in the first book. Till then, there’s sea monsters that get attracted to Miledi’s magic, and casino capers, etc. Of course, eventually the Church is ordered to destroy these pirates once and for all, which leads to the last half of the book, which is one giant melee battle that is highly entertaining provided you love 120-130 pages of fights.

Honestly, I’m surprised there isn’t a much higher body count in this prequel. We already know it’s going to end badly, and it always seems like there’s going to be some dead innocents, but so far the author has done a pretty good job of having them saved at the last minute. (There are a couple of Oscar’s orphan kids who are in a coma from the last book, but Meiru may be able to save them too). In fact, despite the grim Church and the ever-present threat of death, this is a fun book – I would say of all the Arifureta books, this one balances the wacky humor and the thrilling serious plot the best. Miledi is annoying as hell, but not to the reader, just to the characters – an important development! Even the art is really good, showing off both the silly and dramatic (the picture of Miledi giving the finger to the villain may be my favorite).

This is a long book, like most of the Arifureta series, but for fans, it’s a must read. Even casual readers who are turned off by Hajime being Hajime in the main series may want to give the prequel a shot.