Much better. This one actually had stakes, and character motivations became more interesting, and dark background bits came out in the open. I actually enjoyed reading this volume. I was actually curious what would happen next. Not everything was a big surprise, but there were some surprises as well.
I wouldn't go so far as to call this great stuff, but it's much more entertaining. The sudden romance hints seem a bit much, and there are still a lot of elements to the story which seem kind of half-baked or overly cliche (I am so tired of villains and heroes who are insufferably smug), but this volume made me want to keep reading, which seems like a miracle after the last two volumes! Kudos!