Review copy kindly provided by Yen Press

About the Mangaka

This is a combination project between Mizta Ushio, doing the art, and Ohta Akiyoshi doing the story. Unfortunately that pretty much all I can find on them hehe. I did find that Mizta-sensei has a weblog, but since I can’t read Japanese I can’t say what’s on there. Though it seems she’s talking about the Kaze no Hana manga. Ohta-sensei doesn’t seem to have a weblog or site, so I can’t provide any info. If you know of anything about these two, please use the contact page and let me know.

About the Manga

As with volume one of this series I was greatly anticipating this release, sadly this time it failed to impress me.

Mizta-sensei’s has improved a small bit in this volume, and if I’m honest I could forgive that if it wasn’t for the other problems.

For me volume two was a headache trying to read, and the reason is because it’s only three volumes long. Volume two dose very little to explain the relationships between the two opposing sides, and even less on what’s actually going on.

Several times I was forced to go back and re-read parts, even re-reading volumes one and two together doesn’t help with the understanding. Readers have a bare understanding and nothing else to work with.

This becomes a problem in volume two when the hidden history starts to unravel, this is a problem because I get the impression that it’s expected we already know aspects of the history that are excluded. This ends up with readers scratching their head wondering what the hell is going on.

Once again it’s Ohta-sensei’s writing that saves the story, his script flows as well as can be expected, and while it’s restricted because of the art, what he does say is concise and clear.

Once again Elina returns for the translation and does another awesome job. I once again love how she leaves the names and stuff as intact as possible, and just has a glossary at the end of the book. Much better than translating everything, I like to see my manga as close to the original as possible!! Thumbs up Elina!!

The gutter problem still persists to a degree in this volume as well, though it’s no where near as bad as the first. In fact none of the text is hidden this time, which is great.

Once again however there are too many inconsistencies to really enjoy this story. To many characters have personalities and do things that don’t really fit their previous actions.

It’s hard to really get to grips with where the bad guys end and the good guys start.

One element was conspicuous by their absence, the assassin sent from the Vatican, I was expecting some sort of appearance in this volume, but nothing happens.

I don’t see how this can all be resolved in just one more volume, to be honest I can’t see it being resolved at all. rather I see this ending with Momoko somehow magically getting her memories fully returned, and being able to use her sword properly. However beyond that I don’t see anything else being resolved. Even if they try to rush it, I can’t see it being done, and rushing the story any more would totally ruin things.

Hopefully there’s a second series of manga on the way that will carry on the story, or a light novel series. The premise of this story is great, and is interesting. It would be a great shame for it not to be explored and allowed to grow properly.

Yen Press are back on form with this release, the paper great, and the colour page at the font is awesome. Shame Mizta-sensei can’t draw that good consistently in the manga.

The cover art for this volume is also delicious!! and Yen give it a nice good glossy cover.

Sadly I can’t say I’m eagerly looking forward to volume three, but I am interested in how it ends up, just to see if my thoughts on the end are right

Where to Buy

As always for Yen Press titles I have the usual three places for you go. Little Brown, Waterstones and the Book Depository

For the American’s we have Amazon, and another Amazon for the Canadians.

I’ve recently received feedback asking me to add a place to buy in America, since most manga is shipped to the UK America and Canada, I’ll list places for all three. Please bare in mind though that I am in the UK, so the only American and Canadian links I’ll be giving are Amazon, since they’re the only company I know of.

As with the UK links, they won’t be affiliate links, as in I’m not making any money off of items if you buy from my links. I don’t write reviews for the purpose of money, I do it cause I love manga