Hmm, just 5 chapters for this volume! I like the idea of a week break after we finish volume 7.
Chapter 36
Wow, Qifrey’s back story is really horrific! He had his eye gouged out and was buried alive! His memories were erased by the つばあり帽 before he was put in the coffin - so he doesn’t know his backstory before being buried alive. I wonder how quickly we will learn more?
Koko is off to 図書の塔 - it’s certainly a cool looking building. Looking forward to seeing what is inside.
That’s one forbidden Forbidden Forest. Everyone says so.
I’m kinda afraid this will become one of the central mysteries of the series and we’ll only find out at the end. Also, why did the badhats take his eye and then abandon him in a place where the police was bound to find him? Was this supposed to be a similar plan to what they did to Koko, i.e. did they try to make him learn forbidden magic by inflicting an injury only forbidden magic can heal? I mean, this might actually work now that he’s losing sight in his healthy eye, but I still don’t get what they hope to get out of it. I keep hoping that their plans will start making sense.
It’s messed up that the police wanted to erase his most recent memories and throw him out, but then again, we’re used to them doing stuff like that by now.
I think is the other way around, Beldarut talks about 証拠隠滅 (although admittedly he talks about the memory wipe specifically here). It’s a bit weird though, if he was supposed to die, why wipe his memory?
But then again it was a very lucky find I think, if Beldarut wasn’t with the cops he would have probably died in there.
My impression was that the つばあり帽 needed the eye for something and discarded K-dog when they were done but your theory is plausible as well.
I quite like this backstory so far though, it explains why K-dog doesn’t like water and also why he specializes in it (per the convo with young Oru). The degrading eye (and how Oru finds about it) is also a good source of conflict. It all feels pretty well woven together which gives me hope that the author knows where she’s going with the つばあり帽 side of the story.
One thing I didn’t quite get is what Beldarut was hoping to achieve with that conversation with koco. Is he completely out of touch or was he goading her into doing something rash? Did he really expect her to give up on her mother if 禁止魔法 was the only way? Is he setting up a trap for her and K-dog?
I was wondering what that was about, too. The whole timing seems sus. Was there really a windoor in his bedroom, conveniently set to open near the library tower? One of the more benevolent explanations I can think of is that it’s some sort of test to see how K-dog and Oru react. Or does he hope that K-dog and Koko together can find a way into the library and that they’ll come back with knowledge that doesn’t only solve their own problems but can also cure his paralysis?
(I also think I didn’t understand the conversation about K-dog and the library perfectly and there might be some sort of hidden clue in there.)
My understanding is that he had basically a similar motivation as koco does, he wanted to gain access to the library in order to figure out what had been done to him and how he could undo it.
But then he gained access and seemingly immediately gave up on it. Koco first assumes that it means that he didn’t find what he was looking for but Beldarut explains that he did find it, but in order to go through with it he had to use 禁止魔法. That would give him what he wanted, but it would mean having to flee the とんがり帽子 world since he would become a criminal by doing so.
Since it had effectively become his new home, that meant destroying his new life and having to start from scratch once more as a fugitive.
Apparently that was too big of a sacrifice and he gave up. But now Oru suspects that his remaining eye is degrading and that might have given k-dog the motivation to reconsider his position, this time using koco as a proxy for his schemes.
Given it’s a magic portal that allows you to cross directly to the tower of books, it feels like it would be helpful if it dropped you off, you know, at the entrance, and not on the other side of a lake inhabited by a deadly monster…
This was explained in volume 1, they built it that way on purpose, so that the lake monster can eat people who got banned for repeatedly returning their books late. Jk, K-dog did explain it early on, but I can’t remember the details…something about the monster keeping away noobs I think.
Hm, this week we found out that Koko set the destination herself, at least according to Beldarut. Still seems sus, though. He wants us to believe he just did nothing while she fiddled with the controls?
I sure hope Koko decides to go to the library. Seems like a waste of a good opportunity to push the plot forwards otherwise.
So happy to have a chapter where Koco and Qifrey are together and can talk, was so satisfying that I don’t even mind the cliffhanger. (that being said, definitely think that she will go left)
I’m giving up on trying to understand whatever the fuck Beldarut is trying to say on page 51. I’ve been at it since yesterday and I just can’t make sense of it.
