By Sarasa Nagase and Mai Murasaki. Released in Japan as “Akuyaku Reijo Nanode Rasubosu o Katte Mimashita” by Kadokawa Beans Bunko. Released in North America by Yen On. Translated by Taylor Engel.
Those who have read my reviews of this series know who my favorite character is, and I am delighted to see that this final volume gives her some wonderful things to do. After ten volumes where she has been a giant chaos gremlin, Lilia is now a mother, and has to face a situation where she will be deciding her own daughter’s fate for her. And there is a brief moment – it only lasts a page – where Lilia shows fear and regret over it. Now, Lilia being Lilia, she vows that she will raise her daughter to be the sort who can laugh at this sort of responsibility. She even manages to have praise for her husband and his actions in this book. that said, at the end of the day it’s the relationship between her and Aileen that’s more important. To both her and the narrative – this has always been a story that empowers women, and it does so right to the end, where the final fight literally takes all the men and puts them in a viewing room to watch the women fight.
Seven months after the events of the tenth volume, Aileen and Claude are headed off to a conference to decide the new ruler of Hausel, who needs to be able to predict the future, and also be a woman. She’s not concerned, as she is pretty sure that there aren’t any more otome game plots that can possibly kill her, off, right? Unfortunately, the antagonists of the tenth book are back, and Diana and Cattleya are determined to make Cattleya the new ruler by force, blackmail, and various other blunt object tactics… which of course include Cattleya marrying Claude and raising his new daughter, leaving Aileen to abdicate. This should be easy because, once she realizes what’s going on, Aileen goes back to the persona she put on for Book 10, which is an Empress with a button for a brain.
Honestly, it’s amusing how easy this is for Aileen and company to take care of. The antagonists are not only in the “this is a game” mindset that even Lilia has finally abandoned, but they also think that if things go badly they can destroy the world and get a reset, not understanding this is reality and it doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t help that they’re literally the only people not to immediately see through Aileen’s facade of stupidity, as all the other princesses and queen consorts are savvy enough to see what she’s doing. The ending shows all the women in the book working together to save everyone in the country, take out Diana and Cattleya, and also save Diana and Cattleya, because this is a book that has both its heroines and villainesses live happily ever after. Well, eventually. After some prison time, perhaps.
By the end of the book, we flash forward to the future, where Aileen and Lilia’s daughters are thick as thieves, and headed off on new adventures now that it’s time to go rule a country. Will we get more of the series set in the future? Probably not, this was a pretty excellent finale. One of my favorite villainess series. I’ll miss it.
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