I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level, Vol. 16

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By Kisetsu Morita and Benio. Released in Japan as “Slime Taoshite 300 Nen, Shiranai Uchi ni Level MAX ni Nattemashita” by GA Novels. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Tristan Hill.

I was sort of dreading this volume, to be honest. This series never has anything happen to it other than adding new cast, and at the moment the 28th volume is coming out in Japan, meaning we get further and further behind every time we see it. I’m sure Yen Press is trying to renegotiate its light novel contracts to say “surely we can cancel SOME titles, right?”. But if ever there was time for a really good volume, this is the time, as the second season of the anime debuted last week, and is promising more of the same, only in animated form. Great news, though, this is actually quite a strong volume, when compared to other volumes in this series. It’s strong because a) it’s run out of CD dramas to add, so has to include another “Laika’s Schooldays” short, which are excellent. Second, there are fewer, longer short stories within, and that means they have room to breathe for once.

The stories: 1) Pecora is holding a comedy competition, and non-demons are also invited to join. Laika and Flatorte, Flafa and Shalsha, and Rosalie all compete from Azusa’s team, and her daughters ask her to write them a script, because she’s the best at comedy (note this is Japanese comedy, meaning they’re all boke/tsukkomi routines); 2) While visiting a museum, Azusa touches an artifact that turns her into an old lady for a week, and while dealing with this, she’s asked to go to a witch convention; 3) Halkara suggests taking their pet mimic for a walk; 4) Goodly Godly Goddess has written an RPG, and the *entire* cast of the series is brought in to populate it; and in Laika’s side story series, her third year begins with dealing with some delinquents who are doing the dragon equivalent of joyriding.

There’s only one weak story here, with the mimic. The old lady one is also not great, but I was highly amused with its idea of a witch convention being much like a real work convention, with cute games and prizes for the winners. The comedy one I was expecting to be bad, but it really worked well – the routine Azusa wrote and Flafa and Shalsha refined was not only surreal and creepy but also funny, though I agree with the judges that Laika and Flatorte deserved to win, as they’re both naturals. Best of all is the final main story, a giant parody of RPGs like Dragon Quest III. This is the second time that Azusa has essentially tested a game for god (something she points out), but this one is more involved and involves everyone pointing out all the cliches and poor writing that go into these RPGs where you frequently have to smile, nod, and go get the fruit so that the boy will give you a clue. I also had fun trying to figure out who would be cast as what (as does Azusa).

This is not a good book as a book, mind you. It’s a good volume of Killing Slimes for 300 Years. There’s a difference. But if you like the series, this is solid.

Housekeeping Mage from Another World: Making Your Adventures Feel Like Home!, Vol. 9

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By You Fuguruma and Nama. Released in Japan as “Kasei Madoushi no Isekai Seikatsu: Boukenchuu no Kasei Fugyou Uketamawarimasu!” by Ichijinsha Bunko Iris NEO. Released in North America by J-Novel Heart. Translated by Hengtee Lim.

It’s always interesting seeing how light novels based around a typical “fantasy RPG’ setting handle monsters. Some of them tend to go in the direction of “monsters are people too”, particularly when it comes to demon lords, to the point the recent manga Frieren was written in part to push back against that. A lot more of them tend to see monsters as simply things that our heroes hit with their weapons for drop loot. Housekeeping Mage tries to sit somewhere in the middle. We already know about the slime familiars, and we get another familiar added to the extended family here as well. But we also get a dragon that is the subject of cruel experiments, and while they can sympathize with its plight and give it the best death possible, they still have to kill it, because the alternative is the loss of human settlements. On the bright side, that does lead to some really cool fight sequences.

Alec and Shiori are called back to Brovito, home of the foot baths, in order to investigate a rumor that there’s a fenrir in the woods. What they do find turns out to be not QUITE a fenrir, but certainly an intelligent wolf variant, one who immediately bonds with Alec as a soulmate, and is made into a familiar so rapidly it’s almost comical. The bulk of the book, though, it taken up with a crisis: an ice dragon, buried in a frozen lake for two hundred years, has woken up, and the knights are unable to handle it, so have called in the adventurers. This will take everyone’s skills, and there’s a big chance there will be some deaths. And to make things worse, this is the fault of the Empire, whose dying embers are still glowing, and who even know have grudges to settle.

The series has gradually been getting more optimistic and less bleak with each book, so I was not too surprised that after the great battle, the casualty count was low. Honestly, it’s more interested in romance, now that Alec and Shiori are lovers and ready to get married as soon as he can sort out his family issues. (His brother always seems to be on the verge of visiting but never quite makes it by the end of each book.) We also get another inevitable proposal here, as Clemens and Nadia finally make things official after he takes an arrow for Alec and almost dies. Speaking of which, the reason he doesn’t die, doctor Ellen says, is because she’s been studying harder and learning more thanks to Shiori’s example. For all that Japan loves to write about folks dying from heart attacks from working too hard, most of these books agree that if it’s a job they love which is rewarding, they want to work ALL the overtime and do ALL the things.

We’ve caught up with Japan, so I’m not sure when we’ll get the next book, but the author says it should wrap up in 2-3 more arcs. I’m still enjoying it.

Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear, Vol. 20.5

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By Kumanano and 029. Released in Japan by PASH! Books. Released in North America by Airship. Translated by Jan Cash & Vincent Castaneda. Adapted by RFD.

I have frequently whined about having to review a lot of these .5 short story collections, mostly as they tend to feature things like bookstore exclusives that out of necessity cannot have any effect on the plot. But in something like Kuma Bear, a series that is so dependent on Yuna’s POV that any scrap we get from other characters is most welcome. If there’s one thing that we’ve learned about Yuna throughout this series, it’s that she – still! – hates herself. Every time she talks about her physical appearance it’s to talk about how short, flat, and plain she is, and every time she does anything for others she plays it off as being self-serving or nothing special. But when you see Yuna in the eyes of other characters, she’s described as “slim, pretty and feminine”, and everyone and their brother talks about how kind and nice she is. Honestly, this world warps to that kindness – which is why the darkness of the past is – mostly – not seen anymore.

I say mostly because this volume, for the first two-third or so, adapts the bookstore-exclusive stories from Vol. 10-16, which means it has the beach trip to Mileela, including in the party the women from Mileela who were abducted by bandits. Neaf in particular was raped and had her family murdered, and they HAVE to discuss it here, but it’s elided to “something terrible happened”, as they’re always talking about it to kids. After these stories we get five more written just for the volume, which honestly have the same feel as the stories we’d just read. The last quarter of the book is the most unique, as it has Yuna, Fina and Noa watching the first season of the Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear anime.

Believe it or not, the last section is by far the most interesting and rewarding. If you’ve ever been to the Archive Of Our Own fanfiction site, you may be familiar with a genre called “Reaction Fic” or “Characters Watch the Show”, and this is essentially an official version of that. That said, the best of those fanfics analyze the source and are able to give new fresh takes, and that’s what we see here. I’m sure it’s not canon, but here we see Yuna’s past in Japan and her isekai’d status revealed to Fina and Noa, and Yuna narrating that she regards having to learn to cook and clean for herself because her parents were never around as “cherished memories”, as they let her live on her own here. That’s horrible! She also sees Noa’s optimism and positiveness about herself and thinks that she should learn from Noa as she’s so negative. I agree so much. Lastly, they also watch the anime original parts, including the final episode, which Yuna herself describes as “like a yuri anime”. They’re not beating the allegations.

So this was more rewarding than I expected, and at 400 pages or so it’s good bang for your buck. It’s not all moe cuteness. Just… mostly.