Sunday, September 25, 2022

REVIEW: The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter (manga, vol. 1) by Kazuki Irodori, original story by Yatsuki Wakatsu, character design by Kikka Ohashi, translated by Emma Shumacker

The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter is a fantasy manga series based on a light novel series. It's basically m/m isekai. I bought my copy of this first volume brand new.

Review:

Kondou Seiichirou is an overworked accountant who's heading home one evening when he hears a girl crying out for help. He rushes to her, only to get pulled along with her into a new world where she's expected and wanted and he's...an unexpected extra. The girl, Shiraishi Yua, is named the next Holy Maiden, a girl destined to save the kingdom from a deadly miasma. Kondou is asked what he'd like to do, and he requests an accounting job.

It doesn't take long for Kondou to start digging in places he isn't wanted, attracting some powerful enemies. He notices something fishy going on in the kingdom's accounting books and makes it his personal mission to clean things up and ensure that the country is financially stable enough to weather the hardships he's sure the miasma will soon cause. In the process, he overworks himself to the same degree he was overworked back in his own world, and tries to make up for it with "nutritional tonics." Thankfully, at least one of the people keeping a close eye on him is willing to help him out when he suddenly ends up in trouble.

This reminded me intensely of The Saint's Magic Power Is Omnipotent. Isekai fantasy romance in which two people are accidentally transported into a new world instead of just one. One of those people is a Holy Maiden who's supposed to help dispel a miasma. Instead of being labeled another potential true "Holy Maiden," Kondou, unlike Sei, was just dismissed entirely as being unimportant. However, Kondou, like Sei, requested to be put to work and immediately began overworking himself just as much as he'd done in the real world.

Some differences: Of course, the m/m romance aspect. Plus, Kondou's love interest, Aresh, isn't so much sparklingly perfect as he is intensely serious. Aresh spends pretty much this entire volume glaring at Kondou from the sidelines. Also, there's no sign that Kondou has any magical abilities - he drinks healing potions rather than makes them.

So far, Yua, the Holy Maiden, hasn't gotten much page-time, but it's being strongly hinted at that she's being used and the situation (deadly miasma that only she can clear) may not be exactly what she's been told. Like Aira, she's young, naive, and seems to accept everything she's being told.

As far as the romance goes, that's still in the early stages and not exactly what I'd call romance yet. Basically, Kondou overuses nutritional tonics in an attempt to work past his normal limits and ends up overdosing. Aresh heals him with magic which then causes new problems, as Kondou's non-magical self proves incapable of properly processing all that magic. Infants in this world sometimes have this problem, which their mothers cure by cuddling and holding them in order to gradually build up their tolerance to magic. Kondou's an adult though, and this particular case is more serious than what infants experience, so Aresh has to rely on emergency treatment. Namely, sex. The sex isn't explicit, but it definitely happens...and Kondou's biggest reaction, upon waking up, is horror that he's late for work. Does he remember the sex? I'm not sure.

Anyway, I'm interested to see where this goes and will be reading the next volume.

Extras:

A bonus chapter from the POV of the boy from whom Kondou commissioned an abacus. Also, one full-color illustration and a couple afterwords, one from the artist and one from the original light novel author.

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