Altina the Sword Princess, Vol. 9

Leave a reply

By Yukiya Murasaki and himesuz. Released in Japan as “Haken no Kouki Altina” by Famitsu Bunko. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Roy Nukia.

I’ve been waiting for plot developments like the end of this volume to happen for some time. Regis is a bit of a Golden Boy throughout the series – that’s the point, he uses his brains and Altina’s brawn and royal presence to help seize the day, even when it’s involving a bubbling under civil war. And now he’s been noticed enough that he’s forced from her side to Latrielle, the heir apparent, and is giving him the best advice fictional books can buy. Now, we’ve seen him lose troops based on his decisions before, to the point where he almost passed out, but the advice was correct and they won the day. Here, though, not to spoil too much, his advice is good but they do not win the day. Someone has anticipated him. They lose, and there are many casualties. And this is when you realize that, for all that the country is supposed to be on the same side fighting Britannia, Regis is very much surrounded by enemies.

Of course, the book is not just about Regis. Jessica, Franziska and Martina want to rescue their brother, but can’t, and they’re deep in enemy territory. So they accept the kind offer of the man who saved them last time to stay at his place. His place, of course, turns out to be the castle, much to their shock. (Elize is there as well, but one senses the author is not really sure what to do with her.) Altina is back at her fortress, dealing with Eric’s game-breaking injury, and finds that even though Regis is away from her side he can still come up with advice to win the day – in this case, suggesting a career change for Eric that would still allow them to remain a soldier protecting Altina. We get a brief glimpse of the enemy, which is dealing with a major problem – Queen Margaret is bored with all this and therefore doesn’t care what happens.

And then, as I noted, we get Regis’ plan to defeat the enemy, which is anticipated and rebuffed. He does get in one small triumph, which allows us to meet yet another new cast member and promises to take up a chunk of Book 10, but it also involves the deaths of a LOT of men – and these are not his own troops of the Fourth Division, which is back at Altina’s side. The generals were already annoyed with Regis for sacrificing their units earlier, they’re now livid. Fortunately for Regis, Latrielle is not stupid, and knows that the plan could have worked and exactly who was clever enough to anticipate it. The generals may be angry, but they know not to argue with their future King. As for Regis, I think it’s a good lesson for him, especially mentally. Now if he can only work on his physical stamina, which is laughably pathetic.

The author already admitted the final part of this book got so long it has to finish in the next book, so we’ll see what happens then. In the meantime, this is a solid volume of Altina that shows events moving along slowly but surely – will we see the end of the war with Britannia next time?

Suppose a Kid from the Last Dungeon Boonies Moved to a Starter Town, Vol. 6

Leave a reply

By Toshio Satou and Nao Watanuki. Released in Japan as “Tatoeba Last Dungeon Mae no Mura no Shonen ga Joban no Machi de Kurasu Youna Monogatari” by GA Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Andrew Cunningham.

The previous volume showed us that there really is a long-running plot arc to this book, and gave us hints that it might actually be headed in that direction. The trouble is that even the people who are trying to manipulate the plot the way they want are big goofy flakes. Our two villains are mostly big Lloyd stans, especially in this book, where you get the sense that they came up with the entire plot not to force Lloyd into his hero role but to get Lloyd’s autograph. As for Alka, we do here a BIT more about her past here, but again it takes a back seat to shanigans… as does Alka, who is thankfully absent for most of this book, though I give her credit for showing up at the end and getting the best part of the book to herself. As for the main cast… there’s here to make movies.

Despite the fact that normally technology would not be nearly advanced enough to do this, there is a burgeoning film industry in the next country over. Sending the army to investigate by disguising them as extras and crew, Lloyd is also looking a bit older. After several comments on his cuteness have him depressed about his manly status, Alka gives him a rune that makes him look in his mid-20s… and SMOKING HOT, to the pleasure of everyone in the room. As for the movie itself, the director is the King, who has a few secrets, and the lead actor… has quite a few more. Then there’s the fact that the lead actress seems very familiar to some of the cast, and also the assassin who seems to want to kill Lloyd, though clearly against her will. Can all this converge and make sense?

Well, yes, it can. It makes sense in a wacky comedy plot sense, but it all does come together. The best thing about Last Dungeon Kid is it will not ever back down from being silly. Even titles like Bakarina have the occasional dramatic moment slipped into the book to make the reader tear up, but this book subverts al that with the finest comedy timing. Fortunately, the comedy is pretty good. Alka and Maria are absent most of the book, so there’s less humiliating fanservice this time around, and Selen is honestly behaving herself as much as she ever will. The exception to this is Micona, who I almost wish was still possessed by evil, as her one-note attacks on anyone who gets near Maria are the most tiresome part of the book. I did also enjoy the serious subplot in the book all the way through, including when it had its seriousness yanked out from under it and mocked.

At the start of the book we also met a lot of kings and nation leaders, and next time around we’ll see mo0re of them. For the moment, though, this is quite good comedy, especially if you don’t expect anything more from it, like romantic resolution. That’s not happening.

ROLL OVER AND DIE: I Will Fight for an Ordinary Life with My Love and Cursed Sword!, Vol. 4

1 Reply

By kiki and kinta. Released in Japan as “Omae Gotoki ga Maou ni Kateru to Omou na to Gachizei ni Yuusha Party wo Tsuihou Sareta node, Outo de Kimama ni Kurashitai” by GC Novels. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Jason Muell. Adapted by Brock Wassman.

So I am putting a content warning before this review, something I rarely do. This review will be talking about the plot of the 4th Roll Over and Die novel, and will be describing scenes of graphic horror involving children and infants. If this will upset you, I definitely recommend skipping the review, and the book.

You know, I’m beginning to get the sense that the cute relationship between Flum and Milkit is not really a priority in the mind of the author. Oh, don’t get me wrong, there’s a few cute scenes here. The two emotionally stunted young women are clearly in love with each other but lack the vocabulary or experience to do anything about it. We get a kiss on the cheek. Milkit gets a bit jealous. But really, if you want cute yuri there are so many other books you could read that are not this one. This book is here for one thing and only one thing: detailed descriptions of graphic horror. If you know what an Italian giallo film is, or enjoy the works of Herschell Gordon Lewis, this gore-spattered action novel might be for you. For the rest of us, it is a very long slog through endless pages of mutilated corpses, body possession, and towards the climax of the book infants literally rain from the sky and have to be butchered. It’s a lot.

The majority of this book deals with the rest of Mother’s second-generation children. Ink, the first-generation, is happy with Eterna (and, let’s face it, despite the age difference their relationship is clearly swinging romantic as well). Nekt, the child from the previous book, is dealing with her heel-face turn, and trying to get the other children in her group to join her in becoming human. Unfortunately, they’re far too tied to Mother, and would much rather perform this world’s version of “suicide by cop”, i.e. killing as many innocent people as they can before getting killed. Also unfortunately, the person who might be able to help them turn human also seems to be secretly evil. Honestly, everyone’s a little secretly evil in this book, except our main cast. Can Flum manage to save anyone? Or will the children have to be put out of their misery?

This book is not without its merits. As always, the author can write an excellent fight scene, and is very good at painting a picture of exactly what’s happening, for good and ill. The Hero’s Party (minus Jean, still deliberately left out of the plot except for one scene) are reunited, and falling over themselves to apologize to Flum, who is far more gracious about it than they perhaps deserve. There is an interesting revelation in this volume that suggests that, far from being a generic fantasy world, this world is closer to home than expected. Unfortunately,. I couldn’t enjoy any of this because I was drowning in blood and gore. Men die, women die, children die, babies die. Babies especially die, as Mother’s final battle tactic is to create babies that attack and try to possess our heroes, and have to be killed. They are butchered, hurled against walls, and blown up by magic. And by the end of the book I found it hard to really care about anyone.

There may be more in this series to come – this is the last book in Japan, and it came out 18 months ago, but there’s still lots of content from the webnovel left to go. But I think I’m done here. I prefer my yuri to not be drenched in so much blood that I can’t see the romance.