There's a new girl in town! And for some reason, she keeps calling Darkness "Mama." Surely there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for that...right? Meanwhile, Darkness has taxes to collect! It's time for the high-income adventurers to pay their dues, and Kazuma's at the top of the list. Naturally, one night after a long game of Cat and Mouse: Tax Evasion Edition, they find themselves handcuffed together, and Darkness sees it as the perfect opportunity to ask Kazuma a burning question: "...Do you like Megumin?"
I have officially lost interest in the series. This has become mostly a comedy for the sake of being a comedy. I mean the idea of a comedy fantasy is totally my thing, but we are not even doing the main plot anymore, which is to defeat all the Demon Lords, and I’m wondering if we’ll ever get back to it, because it’s been like this for several volumes already. Plus, I never signed up for a room-com at all, and I don’t like where this is going. Nothing ever happens between Kazuma and Megumin, or Kazuma and Darkness, there’s been teasing to the extreme for at least three books and the author is not taking it anywhere. This book was basically Darkness been ashamed of confessing to Kazuma, something that is exhausting because she’s been doing that since like book 7. I really wanted to see them defeating the Demons, I really wanted to see them grow more as characters, and I don’t particularly care for romantic interests, but if they were going to happen now was the time. I need the story to move forwards because I’m more of a plot reader, and this plot got stuck like five books ago. I’m not much of a character reader, but I can stay with them if I see a constant grow, which is also not the case. So I’m not going to continue, this is not for me anymore. This type of comedy I can do with standalones, but with series, I tend to grow desperate. So if you’re looking for something that is just comedy, this will do. If you’re looking for a plot, you might have to wait a lot for it to get going again.
I have mixed feelings about this volume, there are the romcom parts which are fantastic, then there are the comedy/adventure parts that feel rushed almost filler like.
Darkness's character took a nosedive into an irredeemable monster and a shit friend. Her character assassination and Kazuma's scumbaggery (usually I enjoy this about him but it just became unforgivable at this point because it was at the expense of Megumin) killed my desire to continue with this series
The author tried to go in a RomCom direction this time, and tbh it just doesn’t work that well. The characters don’t fit the story, and the series loses what made it unique. The last chapter we get a brief return to comedy and is by far the bests part of the book.
This Darkness focused addition to the series was as great as usual. It gives some hope for a harem plot to happen but I am still doubtful about whether we will get one.
This volume is really Darkness-heavy, which to me is a good thing, since I felt she was too underutilised throughout the series. Kazuma and her take center stage here and it's a fun little side-story with low stakes and plenty of moments for the characters to shine through.