By Kuji Furumiya and Haruyuki Morisawa. Released in Japan as “Babel III: Torikago Yori Izuru Youki” by Dengeki Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Amelia Imogen.
So, first of all, I want to note that I *loved* this volume. It’s not only my favorite volume of Babel so far, but it may actually be my favorite book by Furumiya I’ve read so far. That said… boy, this is absolutely exhausting to read. As always with this author, it’s a brick – the digital version comes in at 463 pages – and much of it, especially in the back half, is a series of “is this going to end badly with Shizuku dead?” mini-cliffhangers. More to the point, while the start of the volume does indeed continue the themes of the previous one, showing Shizuku trying to explain how teaching language can be a good way to solve the current crisis – it rapidly derails into Shizuku doing what she does best, which is speaking to those in power and smacking them down. With Lars that mostly just led to a lot of arguments. With Princess Ortea, it leads to revolution.
We pick up from the cliffhanger of the previous book: Shizuku is being kidnapped and brought to another country by the evil mage Niké, with Erik’s life being threatened till she gives in. (As a result, Erik is almost entirely absent from this volume.) When she gets there, she discovers that mages have been conducting cruel experiments on children to solve the language issue, and Shizuku is there to try to solve it with her own solution, education. The one she has to impress is the cruel and capricious Princess Ortea, who has been running much of the nation behind the scenes and has a tendency to have people who displease her executed. As the book goes on, Shizuku becomes Ortea’s aide, and gradually comes to realize that there’s a lot more going on here than an evil princess and her worried brother the King. Is the answer overthrowing the monarchy? Yup.
For the most part, I adored this, though I could do without the curse above Shizuku’s womb that’s even more agonizing because she’s a virgin. The only thing more annoying than having superpowers that only work because someone is a virgin is having suffering that is even worse because someone is a virgin. That said, the best part of the book is talking about how you cannot erase your past actions, even if they’re atrocities (especially if they are), but you can try to atone for them and move forward, especially if you care more about the country than about power. Honestly, I kind of wonder if the final book will end with Lars and Ortea marrying, as while they get on even worse than Lars and Shizuku, I could see it working – they’re very similar. As for the lack of Erik, fear not, we do get a romance of sorts, as evil mage Niké turns out to not be all that evil really, and also gradually falling in love with Shizuku, despite her bad habit of getting kidnapped and shot at and stabbed and having painful womb curses put on her. Shizuku needs a break, let’s be honest. Anyway, needless to say he gets nowhere, but he does get in a kiss before she leaves, which is the one thing in the book that reads like a cliched anime moment.
The next book is the final one in the series. After Book 1, I was fairly sure that she would not be returning to Japan, but now I’m not so sure. Will Shizuku have to give up and settle down here? And can she solve the Babel crisis before she returns? A terrific series.
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