The Carbide Wolf
Creative Staff
Story: Reki Kawahara
Art: Hima
Translation: Jocelyne Allen
What they say
The Acceleration Research Society, a mysterious organization maneuvering in secret, makes their headquarters at the top of Tokyo Midtown Tower, where the Archangel Metatron is enshrined. This completely invincible Legend-class Enemy guards the Society from all would-be attackers, and so the Seven Kings meet in order to devise some means to defeat the Enemy, and the Acceleration Research Society along with it. Their secret plan they come up with requires Silver Crow gain a new ability, Theoretical Mirror.
While Haruyuki is stumped at how to even begin this difficult task, Ardor Maiden aka Utai Shinomiya starts to talk about a sad past…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
I think Accel World volume 11 has slightly renewed my enjoyment of the series. The previous few volumes felt tedious to sludge through as we were given overly redundant descriptions and the every thought and action of Arita Haruyuki right down to the most minute detail of the most inane aspects of his life. What I feel should have taken two only volumes to conclude at most ended up taking around 4 or 5 just to finish the arc. However, the last volume, volume 10, finally ended what I believe would be considered the Chrome Disaster Arc.
With the Chrome Disaster finally purified, the Seven Kings of Pure color no longer have any reason to put a bounty on Haruyuki’s head, and thus they move onto other matters. In the previous volume, we learned during Haruyuki’s rampage when he was transformed into the Chrome Disaster that the Legend-class enemy, the Archangel Metatron, has appeared in the Tokyo Midtown Tower of the Unlimited Neutral Field. The Acceleration Research Society has made this place their secret base of operations. Somehow or other, they turned the Legend-class enemy into their own guard dog. With the seemingly invincible enemy protecting their opponents, the Seven Kings of Pure Color have created a strategy to get past the Archangel Metatron.
They plan to have Haruyuki learn the ability known as Theoretical Mirror.
Of course, he doesn’t learn it during this volume.
If there’s one thing I’m slightly bothered by with Reiki Kawahara’s writing, it is that the writing is meticulously slow and sometimes tedious to read. He goes into great detail about everything, even things I feel should be glossed over so the pace doesn’t feel like it’s always crawling at the speed of a snail. That said, while I dislike how slow the series sometimes feels, I can’t lie and say that all of the information we get isn’t interesting. He does a good job of exploring the world Haruyuki and the others live in. I just wish that information we were given held a bit more relevance.
This particular volume explores more of Utai Shinomiya’s character, who we haven’t actually learned a whole lot about. I confess, what we learn about from her past is pretty heartrending. I think Reiki Kawahara did a great job giving her a powerful and depressing past, and he finally explains why her Brain Burst avatar is a Shrine Maiden with two colors—red and white. I like that she comes from a family of Noh play actors. At the same time, learning about how she became a Burst Linker, about her parent, and about the scar inside of her, really tugged at the heartstrings. However, by learning about her past, we also learn that there was someone aside from Haruyuki who had the Theoretical Mirror ability.
Having never read Reiki Kawahara’s other series, Sword Art Online, I can’t compare the two, but Accel World has a very in-depth game mechanic that is explained in quite a bit of detail. We slowly learn more about how the system works. We learn about the Incarnate System, what sort of powers and abilities specific colors have, and now we’ve learned why some people have Metal Color avatars.
Of course, while learning about why some people gain Metal Color avatars, we’re also introduced to a new metal color called Wolfram Cerberus. Arita watches a duel where this new level 1 Burst Linker defeats a level five named Frost Horn, and then he’s challenged and subsequently defeated by Wolfram Cerberus himself. About half of this volume deals primarily with Arita struggling to accept his loss, get stronger, and then face Wolfram Cerberus in a rematch. Like I said before, despite this arc seemingly being about defeating the Archangel Metatron so the Seven Kings of Pure Color can storm the Tokyo Midtown Tower, nothing on this front really happens.
In Summary
While there were some things about this volume that I didn’t like, including how slow some parts felt, I can appreciate how the story is progressing. There’s a lot of things happening all at once right now. New plot threads are being created as previous ones close. If nothing else, Reiki Kawahara is doing an excellent job of creating a series that contains numerous conflicts within conflicts.
Content Grade: B
Art Grade: B
Packaging Grade: B
Text/Translation Grade: A
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Yen Press
Release Date: Septemper 19, 2017
MSRP: $14.00
