Dragon Goes House-Hunting, Vol. 1

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By Kawo Tanuki and Choco Aya. Released in Japan as “Dragon, Ie wo Kau” by Mag Garden, serialization ongoing in the magazine Comic Blade. Released in North America by Seven Seas. Translated by Nan Rymer. Adapted by T Campbell.

It can sometimes be hard for a book to live up to its premise. Some series just have such a good starting point that the imagination takes off before you even read it, and this can lead to expecting too much. Fortunately, there are a lot of funny moments in Dragon Goes House-Hunting, a book that mostly relies on the titular dragon reacting in a ridiculous manner to the various houses that he’s being shown. Because make no bones about it, the premise of the title is absolutely what happens. Every chapter the demon lord who is also the dragon’s realtor has a fresh new house to show off, and every chapter we see the ludicrously off-putti9ng reasons no one up till now has bought it. If I’m being honest, there’s only one big flaw in this series: I found Letty, the dragon himself, to be rather irritating and wussy. But that is pretty much the point.

Letty is a pampered NEET of a dragon who has been thrown out of his parents’ house for accidentally letting the dragon eggs he was watching get stolen. Letty seems to live IN a video game world, as he points out the eggs will just respawn when the next adventurer party cones along, but gets thrown out anyway. He is a young, naive dragon with lots of people who want him dead, and so, after many harrowing situations, ends up in the hands of Dearia, who is a respected architect and real estate broker… as well as a demon lord, a fact that is third on his list. Dearia is pretty mild-mannered, and seems quite happy to find Letty a house. The trouble is, this is a fantasy RPG-land. And Letty is a massive wuss. Combining these leads to things like the house with all the built-in traps, or the house that’s haunted, or the house with the portrait that reveals your deepest secrets if you don’t give the right password.

Despite Letty irritating me a lot of the time, he’s basically good at heart, and the best part of the book was the growing friendship between him and Dearia. Towards the end Dearia simply decides to build him a house to order, and while this works out fine at first, it does highlight the problem that Letty is not like other dragons, and would much rather just curl up and stay away from the hustle and bustle of the universe. Dearia seems to have been friends with another dragon in the years before he met Letty, and it’s not hard to see that the endgame here may simply be Letty staying with Dearia and going on journeys with him. But if that happens, we wouldn’t see more ridiculous houses and Letty’s reaction to them, i.e. the primary reason to read this series. It may not quite match up to the premise in my head, but it’s pretty fun.

Seirei Gensouki: Spirit Chronicles, Vol. 1

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By Yuri Kitayama and Riv. Released in Japan by Hobby Japan. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by Mana Z.

Ooof. Despite the fact that this combines the hot new trends of the last few years – reincarnation into a fantasy world AND going to a magical academy – the first volume of this series felt older than its 3 or so years, like something that came out in the dregs of the late 00s. Sadly, I use the word ‘dregs’ deliberately, as I did not really enjoy this book very much. It has almost no humor, which doesn’t help. In fact, the author seems to have decided that since they’re going to be writing a hero who is overpowered and also has the ladies falling for him, the way to balance this out is to make his entire life as miserable as possible. The reincarnated hero finds out that his childhood sweetheart he promised to marry seems to have forgotten about it.. and then she disappears anyway. He’s then killed in a bus crash. And put in the body of a 7-year-old orphan working for a group of thugs. Who are then all murdered. It’s that kind of life.

The cover features the disappeared girl prominently, which is surprising as she never appears in this new world as I expected her to. It’s possible she’s in the memories of one of the other girls we see in this book, but if so she’s hiding it well. Our hero ends up in the body of Rio, and his own memories and Rio’s merge together to create one of the more staid, boring heroes I’ve ever seen in a light novel – and I’ve read Black Bullet, for God’s sake! The new merged Rio sees that his life is a constant parade of crap, and the cynicism and knowledge he gets from his Japanese part allows him to stoically endure everything. He ends up rescuing one of the princesses… only to be tortured because they think he was in on it. When cleared, he’s sent to the magic academy… filled with nobles, so everyone hates him. He works hard and doesn’t make waves… which really doesn’t help, because the first time a scapegoat is needed when a noble screws up, guess who gets blamed? It’s wearying.

So what does Rio have going for him? Well, the heritage of his parents, who were from the fantasy equivalent of Japan before being murdered (we’re in fantasy Europe, no doubt) allows him a different type of magic from the others, and it lets him enhance his body physically. His older self did kendo and the like before getting killed, so Rio is also an excellent swordsman. Everyone praises him for being mature, because, well, he has the knowledge of a whole other person in his head, and he also doesn’t get mad. Or happy. Or anything in between. Oh yes, and his teacher Celia, who’s five years older than him, has fallen in love with him in a sort of cliched anime way. As has the princess he rescued. We’re also introduced to the older princess and the class president, who haven’t fallen yet, but it’s only a matter of time. Usually there’s at least one guy introduced to be a token friend (see: Demon King Daimaou). Not here. He’s Valentino, men fear and hate him, women adore him. Or will once he grows up, he’s still only 12. But such a mature 12!

The book ends with him leaving the school (as he’s been scapegoated – again) and setting off to his parents’ homeland. An assassin is being sent after him, but she’s cute and female, so I’m not holding out high hopes. This has quite a few volumes in Japan, and there was the occasional time I was almost interested – mostly when around the teacher, Celia. Sadly, the hero is such a dull, depressing blank I can’t really recommend going any further.

Sunshine Sketch, Vol. 9

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By Ume Aoki. Released in Japan as “Hidamari Sketch” by Houbunsha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Manga Time Kirara Carat. Released in North America by Yen Press. Translated by Sheldon Drzka.

Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been thirty-three months since my last Sunshine Sketch review. This is mostly as it’s been that long since the last volume – the series is coming out at a far slower pace now, so it’s taken a while to get the new volume to these shores. That said, it really doesn’t feel like we’ve been away. There’s not quite as much art class here, though we do see several of the student doubting their art progression. The majority of the volume is devoted either to the class trip that Yuno and Miyake and company take to Kansai, as well as visiting Hiro’s college and starting to think about where they want to go to school after graduation. Yuno shares the cover with Matsuri, the new girl introduced last time, and she seems to be nice, sort of like Miyako without the weirdness. It does beg the question, though: the series survived Sae and Hiro graduating, can it survive Yuno and Miyako too?

Of course, Sae and Hiro are at their nearby colleges, so they do manage to show up here as well, when Yun o and Miyako visit for an open campus tour. This allows us to get in several “lol, Hiro is pudgy” jokes, which aren’t very funny, as well as Hiro tossing Miyako like a caber in revenge, which is. As for the school trip, the characters of Nakayama and Mami, Yuno and Miyako’s classmates, are greatly expanded on here so that we can have the standard “we are in a group of four” field trip fun. Nakayama seems to be terrified of anything “naughty”, which leads to a few amusing gags, but Mami is more “generic friend”. The group visits temples, has pillow fights, etc., and we occasionally cut back to Nazuna and Nori, who are back at the apartments missing them.

Despite Sae and Hiro’s appearance, there’s little yuri tease there. Instead it comes from Natsume, who is also at college with Hiro and whose tsundere love for Sae does not really seem to have diminished, and Miyako, who does her best “Sae-san” impression a couple of times on Yuno, and we see that the subtext may not be quite as broad as it was before but it’s still there. At one point, it’s lampshaded that no one at the school is boy crazy at all. Funny, that. It’s almost like Ume Aoki knows what would make her lose a large portion of her audience. That said, for the most part this series is still meant for those who like 4-koma slice of life stuff, and runs on the charm of its main cast. Yuna and Miyako are still the best things in it. I’m hoping it won’t be another thirty-three months before the next volume.