By Rika and HIROKAZU. Released in Japan as “Isekai ni Kita kedo, Seikatsu Mahou shika Tsukaemasen” by Mag Garden Novels. Released in North America by J-Novel Club. Translated by sachi salehi.
I don’t think I’ve mentioned Ascendance of a Bookworm in these reviews yet, which is a bit of a surprise. We do have a reincarnated girl who is now in the nobility but knows little about it, trying to earn money for her family by inventing things she remembers from back in Japan. She has a posse of friends and classmates, she has adorable siblings, and she has a dad who’s kinda useless. (Sylvester is the dad I mean in this case.) And she’s even intriguing royalty. But if this is a Bookworm lookee likee, there’s one thing that it’s been missing to this point: where’s Ferdinand? Good news, as hitting this series like a bomb is court mage Primus Geitz. He’s the most powerful magic user in the country. He’s a bit of a jerk, but also immediately understands Patience in a way few have so far. And he’s already proposing, much to her horror. Now we’ll see how close it really gets to Bookworm.
We pick up where we left off, with Patience and company discovering amazing new things in the local ruins. As the book goes on, more and more people show up to verify and explore this, and unfortunately, Patience (and later Angela) is the only one who can activate the Open Sesame trap door that lets them into this. She’s also using her household magic to clean ancient moldy ruins and ancient hard to read texts into just as new. And she’s using echolocation to find where the electricity and wiring is in this ancient ruin, as that’s a lost art in this magic-only world. And she’s using teleportation to rescue her brother from … well, not certain death, but a scary dark place. And she’s also telling everyone how solar power works. Finally, it’s up to Geitz, rapidly becoming her least favorite person, to say what we all guessed: she’s not using Household Magic. It’s a lot bigger than what.
Again, Patience is going to have to deal with a fiance soon. Not only does this world not really believe in marrying for love, it also tends to engage em young to keep them tied down somewhere important. That’s especially true of Patience, who is rapidly becoming the most important 11-year-old in history. And this book doesn’t even have half of her fiance candidates. Probably because it adds Geitz. Unlike Ferdinand, though, Geitz has not yet revealed his softer side, and is happily ready to bribe and blackmail Patience’s brothers as he realizes that she’ll do anything they say. I suppose she can always try marrying royalty… but the job she actually is starting to want, a sort of wandering diplomat, is feeling farther away with this book, as she simply as too much magic and too many innovations.
And what’s worse, this arc still isn’t over. And there’s far too many plot strands still up in the air, including Patience’s father. Did I also mention she’s now a Baronetess? I didn’t even know that had a feminine version. For those who enjoy watching OP tweens suffer.
0 Comments