Last time on Log Horizon, Marielle and Co. get attacked by fishmen. But Naogutsu’s group also has some goblins to fight! In fact, there’s a lot of goblins. Oh, and these super important Knights of Izumo, who are supposed to protect everyone, decide to just disappear. According to Krusty, this many goblins can only mean that the Return of the Goblin King event has begun. Naogutsu and Marielle’s groups manage to meet up,but they notice a goblin unit making its way to the helpless village of Choushi. Shiroe also spills the beans on the memory loss thing, and Krusty confirms it, as it’s happened to him. Meanwhile, the kids manage to hold off some of the goblins attacking Choushi. While the politics heat up, Princess Raynesia breaks the ice by just offering to recruit people from Akiba herself. When they arrive, Akatsuki changes her into “proper” (a.k.a. fanservice-y) clothes. She and Shiroe give an epic speech, and a bunch of people join to fight back. Also, the twins arrive at Choushi and there is no goblin issue whatsoever, mainly because Marielle’s group already beat them to the punch. The group of 1,200 players splits into units and agrees to meet up at the Midrount Equestrian Gardens. The thumb-twiddlers are at odds with what Raynesia did, but Michitaka smooths them over (I think? I can’t understand any of this political crap…). While Shiroe is organizing stuff, a bunch of Fishmen appear in Choushi. They win, but they lose Rudy, who was a Person of the Earth, and can’t be revived… But Shiroe uses the power of Buddhism and his super-crafting skills to bring him back for long enough to have him sign a contract for him to join Log Horizon, making him an Adventurer who can’t die. Meanwhile, Raynesia and Krusty’s group are attacked by goblins and Dire Wolves, but they’re dealt with smoothly. In the end, the Goblin King was a scrub and never actually showed himself.
I’m sorry, but volume 5 was about as bad as I expected. The whole volume revolved around this Libra Festival thing, as well as the cliche love triangle between Minori and Akatsuki. There was no way for me to write a whole post about that volume alone, so that’s why I’m condensing these two volumes into one post.
The only interesting thing that occurs is what happens in the interlude at the end of the volume. The world of Log Horizon gets a lot bigger and scarier in one fell swoop, and it made me mildly interested in the story for the first time since volume 1.
The layer cake of conflicts gets even thicker in volume 6. For the first time in the series, a murderer attacks Akiba in the dead of night, and somehow, no alerts go off. Also, the Goblin King returns, and since they didn’t kill him the first time, this raid’s gonna be a lot tougher. But as far as the former conflict is concerned… well, the guy’s only been targeting adventurers, who get revived… Yeah, as established ages ago, Log Horizon is not meant to be an emotional rollercoaster. In fact, every time something serious happens, it’s almost immediately followed up with something goofy. Chapter 1 of this volume ends on such an ominous note, and the first thing that happens next chapter is Henrietta trying to put Raynesia into a skimpy nurse’s outfit.
If you couldn’t tell from volume 6 being titled Lost Child of the Dawn, this one’s all about Akatsuki. She deals with an existential crisis because she’s an Assassin. She devotes herself to protecting Shiroe (because she wuvs him or something arbitrary like that), but realizes that she can’t cut it. Her skills are great for stealth-killing single targets, but, naturally, that doesn’t help in big groups or head-on fights. Get ready to be constantly reminded that Akatsuki’s short, and that she’s sad, and weak!
In fact, that’s been a running theme in Log Horizon’s writing: redundancy. For some reason, the author is telling you rudimentary aspects of the series over and over again. They repeatedly tell you that Adventurers are immortal, People of the Earth are not, Henrietta is a lolicon, and even that Raynesia is a woman. In addition to the boring characters, this is the biggest reason for my declining joy in Log Horizon. I assume that the anime would naturally be better because of the lack of writing, but I’m not so sure anymore, given that I’m not the biggest fan of TV anime.
Oh, and for the record, the climax of the volume has a REALLY abrupt ending. I read the last few pages like eight times because I legitimately couldn’t understand what was occurring. Maybe I was just sick of Log Horizon at this point…
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Verdict (Volume 5): 5.5/10
Verdict (Volume 6): 6.9/10
After the boring bonanza of volume 5, volume 6 at least shows some semblance of… er… being interesting? I’m at my wits end with this franchise. I tend to side with critics more often than not, but this is one time when I do not. What do you like about Log Horizon? Seriously, I desperately want to know. I’ve already acknowledged that I like the idea of the world, and Shiroe being a clever-leader-type guy as positives. But that’s not enough. I’ll try to give future volumes a shot, but I’d still love some input.
Weeb Revues 