BOSS BATTLE BY THE SEA!
Creative Staff
Story: OKAYADO
Art: OKAYADO
Translation: Ryan Peterson
What they say
Sun, sand, and girls in bikinis playing volleyball…it’s Eita’s dream come true! Except for one little detail—these girls are half-animal. Eita’s beach fantasy quickly dissolves into a nightmare when a giant squid shows up, bringing naughty tentacles to the party. All too soon, Eita, Aero, Jawea, and Asterio must leave their beach paradise to seek out Steela, the Witch of the Deep. But first, Eita must face his murkiest opponent yet: the evil Angler!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Eita has his new gauntlet, and he’s also got a new mission. Having finally realized that he’s sort of floundering because he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do, Eita and his harem have decided to seek out Steela, the so-called Witch of the Deep. Sadly, the only clue they have is that Steela lives within the deepest reach of the ocean. What makes this even more tragic is that, well, none of them are really made for deep sea travel. That doesn’t stop them, however, and it’s off to find the witch we go!
Naturally, searching for a witch involves a trip to the beach. And, of course, a trip to the beach involves a swimsuit scene. Since this is a harem manga, we’re also given a tentacle moment when Jae-san and Aerio are attacked by a kraken during their swim. Eita defeats the kraken easily enough, but then, much to everyone’s shock, a woman they never met congratulates him—Steela, the very person who they were searching for.
Steela is a scylla. She’s a cephalopod from the waist down, which in laymen terms means she has tentacles. Her species appear to be a very insular race. I guess this makes Steela, a scylla who lives among other Out-People, an anomaly within her species. We don’t know much about her yet, other than that she has powerful magic and was responsible for creating the whirlpool protecting the merpeople village.
It’s the merpeople village that Steela has Eita and the others go to. Their visit appears to be unwelcome, however, especially Eita’s. He is attacked by several mermen and it’s only thanks to Jae-san, Aero, and Asterio that he’s not beaten black and blue. After the incident with the mermen, they travel to the witches house, where Steela informs them of a great threat that the merpeople village is facing. Using a television instead of a crystal ball, she shows the group what the threat is via clairvoyance. It’s a massive fleet. Of course, the fleet is a small problem compared to the gigantic gigas that’s shaped like a sea serpent. One of the 12 Divine Generals, this serpent is out for merpeople blood.
While they’re watching, the gigas tries to attack the village by destroying the tower in the center, which contains the orb that controls the whirlpool. It’s unsuccessful—or so everyone thinks. Only Eita notices the small figure repelling along the tower. He leaves before the others can call out to him.
As Eita makes for the tower, someone is already fighting against this new baddie. Introduced earlier in the manga, Marina Gillman does her best to defeat a man known only as The Angler. From what little information there is on the man, he’s a fisherman who’s got a bone to pick with the merpeople. Marina is easily defeated, and she would’ve become roast pike if not for Eita’s timely appearance.
For the sake of spoilers, I won’t say exactly what happens during the battle, but new information is introduced into the story that I feel could become a game changer in the future. The plot seems to thicken, the puns are rampant, and volume 3 is left on what is quite possibly the worst cliffhanger seen in an OKAYADO manga.
Before getting into what I didn’t like about volume 3, let me tell you what this volume did right. First, the artwork is fantastic. I’m always impressed by OKAYADO’s drawings, especially his illustrations of women. The introduction of Steela is also well done. I personally like her character design. The idea of an octopus woman is intriguing. The action is also pretty impressive. I usually consider OKAYADO a harem expert, so seeing impressively detailed and immerssive fight sequences within the panels was a nice touch.
Now for the bad. The puns are way too much here. Seriously. There was at least one pun every five pages. Also, while the artwork is impressive, I wasn’t a big fan of the cliffhanger. It was even worse because I felt like they could have ended this arc if they wanted to, but they instead decided to give us a filler stand-alone story after the cliffhanger ending.
In Summary
I think volume 3 had a strong beginning, a great middle, and a somewhat disappointing end. Even so, I’m still excited for the next volume. I can only hope that volume 4 learns from the mistakes of its predecessor.
Content Grade: C-
Art Grade: A+
Packaging Grade: B
Text/Translation Grade: C-
Age Rating: 16+
Released By: Seven Seas Entertainment
Release Date: February 9, 2016
MSRP: $12.99
