- #1
I only read the first ten or so chapters, but the novel is written so poorly that I had to drop it, and that has to do with the worldbuildingWorldbuilding is a great way for the reader to get to know the novel's setting. It's great, but when you execute it on such a middling level that it really just becomes info dumps and walls of text, it's not fun to read. The main problem with the worldbuilding of this novel is the pacing and how useless it is.When worldbuilding happens, there should be some purpose. This novel just does the most dry, repetitive nonsense worldbuilding ever. It just has no purpose. The novel is extremely verbose when it comes to establishing the reasons behind magical girls and monsters spawning in Japan. First of all, is this even necessary? The mystery is part of the plot that unfolds later on, but instead it's just some generic surface level explanation of "somehow, there was a rift" and there you go. Or the most miserable explanations on how magical girls got recognized. They're somehow under government supervision and the new "government" is quite omnipotent. From scouting magical girls, making deals with Gods, rebuilding the previous collapse of society, and quite literally having perfect supervisional prowess. I have to say that the things that get explained away by "the government" is very numerous. Again, is there a point? How did the government become so efficient? Why did magical girls agree to cooperate with the government? What's the actual technology behind the things that detect demons in advance? So many questions are caused due to the poor worldbuilding at hand.And again, I have to ask: why? There wasn't much of a superbly crafted plot or anything. It's just some normal generic world with demons and magical girls. By using such surface level answers regarding the government and agencies that control magical girls, you actually cheapen the story.Magical Girl Raising Project has a similar plot and setting, but over the course of 14 volumes, it has as much worldbuilding regarding the magical girl world than this novel does in 10 chapters. But it's much more well executed and actually makes you curious about the world at hand. There are multiple factions, dissidents, traitors, and people with different agendas that gather around. What about this novel? It's quite straightforward with the motivations of magical girls and the fact that the government moves like a well oiled machine rather than the corruption filled one that we are all aware of in modern day doesn't really make a lot of sense.