MAY THE BEST GODDESS WIN!
Creative Staff
Story: Natsume Akatsuki
Art: Kurone Mishima
Translation: Kevin Steinbach
What they say
It’s time once again for the annual Eris Appreciation Festival, and everyone in Axel Town is in high spirits… except for Aqua. In her mind, it’s totally unfair that Eris gets an entire festival thrown in her honor while she doesn’t. So Aqua announces that she’ll be having an Aqua Appreciation Festival at the same time, and both Kazuma and Chris get dragged into helping out. And once the festivities are underway, Chris also ropes Kazuma into helping her infiltrate a noble’s mansion in pursuit of armor… that can talk?! Two festivals plus one mysterious suit of armor equals chaos for Kazuma, and it won’t end until the whole town gets caught up in the madness!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Volume 8 of Konosuba starts off strong—with a flash forward?! Yes, we begin with a scene where Kazuma and Aqua are at a festival. Aqua is giving Kazuma her heartfelt thanks, along with the most honest smile Kazuma has ever seen from her. It’s enough to make even the most cynical of hearts—Kazuma’s—throb with emotion. After the prologue, the clock is rewound and we get to see how this touching moment came about.
The first thing about this volume that may interest everyone is that it happens shortly after Kazuma discovers Chris is actually Lady Eris. I like that the dynamics between them haven’t changed much. They still banter, still get along well, but I think Kazuma now has more respect for Eris/Chris than he did previously. I like that out of all the women in his life now, the one he believes is the most perfect heroine is her. And because she is the perfect heroine, Kazuma won’t actually touch her because he doesn’t believe he has a chance of anything happening between them, which makes him a lot freer with his words.
There is so much going on in this volume. Emperor Zel hatches but imprints on Vanir instead of Aqua—which infuriates our resident useless goddess to no end—the Eris Appreciation Festival is being prepared—which infuriates our resident useless goddess to no end—and Chris/Eris has roped Kazuma into helping her steal a set of armor from a noble’s mansion. The armor is, apparently, another Sacred Treasure. Going by the name Mr. Aigis, the armor is a talking suit that can sing, dance, and wants to be worn by a hot woman with big titties and minimal clothing. Given how ludicrous Konosuba is as a story, reading about a perverted suit of armor does not surprise me. Not in the least.
I think Akatsuki Natsume-sensei is getting a lot better at his craft. This volume was hilarious. There are so many great moments, like when Chris begins arguing with Aigis because he doesn’t want to go with them and find a master unless she is willing to find him a hot woman. He dislikes the idea of a man wearing him because he doesn’t want man sweat in his insides… which is just all kinds of weird. The moments of hilarity and great dialogue pile up to create something that actually had me laughing out loud several times.
Back to the story, Aqua wants to have an Aqua Appreciation Festival held in her honor alongside the Eris Appreciation Festival, which normally would never happen, but Kazuma has come up with a brilliant idea to earn some money by pitting the Axis and Eris Churches against each other. Of course, Kazuma being Kazuma, he ends up going overboard and getting into fights with the other members of the council charged with planning the festival because he introduces too many outrageous ideas. That said, quite a few council members approve of many ideas he comes up with, like the one where sales girls have to wear swimsuits.
What really made this volume stand out was definitely the harem progress. There are a lot of moments between Kazuma and Megumin and Darkness. Kazuma is getting closer to them both, and now he doesn’t know what to do. Of course, he ends up complaining to Chris, who is just not at all interested in his romantic pursuits. Poor Chris. In either event, the romance seems to be moving in some interesting directions, especially at the end of this volume, though I don’t want to say too much for fear of spoiling it.
In Summary
Volume 8 is downright hilarious and probably one of the best volume for comedy. While the story itself doesn’t seem to progress a lot, there is just so much going on that it feels full—of content. I like the direction this volume takes, the comedy, the character progression, and everything else. It helps that the writing has improved a lot. The characters also have very distinct voices now. Even though this series doesn’t have many dialogue tags, it’s very easy to know who is talking based on how they talk.
Content Grade: A+
Art Grade: A+
Packaging Grade: B+
Text/Translation Grade: A+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: April 23, 2019
MSRP: $14.00
