📚 本好きの下剋上 🪱 Arc 2 Offshoot Reading Thread

Japanese Reading Book Clubs
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some more

That’s the sentence that made me start furiously search the internet, and I half forgot it when I came back. (Well, mostly because of wishful thinking I guess)
So, yeah, that plus the “why would you care about seeing a kid naked” when in the bath makes me really feel like she is indeed in her Myne body… but how? It is not part of her memory.

Well, if so, it’s very disappointing. For me, that scene was establishing that they are both adults and close in age. Not quite equals (because of the huge difference in social status), but much more close than the apparent age gap would imply (something he could not unsee, thus putting the basis for possibly getting closer, and later feelings when she gets older). My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.

But, heh, the hug is still there (which is still putting them closer) and there are many more moments throughout the series.

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Vol 5 epilogue reply

My impression was that while both he and Myne are viewing Myne’s memories, they’re both still viewing them all as a third party, hence her Myne form. But that’s just speculation on my part. :person_shrugging: Perhaps the manga clears it up? Surely that’s not in a fully first person perspective?

It’s still continually weird to me Ferdinand is young 20s. Bro feels like he should be young 30s.

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epilogue 5

It starts first person at least, with him having to ask Myne to move her head around to look at stuff.
Good point about the manga, though. I’ll try to find that section.

Edit: found it. It is implied that it is from her point of view, but she is depicted as Myne. Maybe it’s just that her sense of self as Myne is now much stronger than her sense of self as Urano? Not clear. But it leads to weird depictions where the angle of her arm grabbing the towel is impossible considering her height in 3rd person.

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Sounds good to me!
And yeah, I hope to catch up by then~

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Book 5 overall stuff

For me, it’s mainly this: volume 5 showed that 神官長 has one outstanding characteristic that no one else we’ve met is even close to approaching.

He’s the closest thing this world has to a homegrown bookworm. Didn’t one of the chapters mention that half the books in the temple library were his personal contribution, and he has even more in his secret room? His collection is ridiculously huge, given what we’ve heard about the expense and rarity of books. And he reads at a higher level than anyone else we’ve seen. He looked at the picture book Myne gave him and didn’t just read it in a simple way like everyone else, he did a literary analysis. He critiques her stories and reads between the lines of her writing style. Myne is too book-crazy to have a relationship with anyone who’s not also a big reader, and 神官長 is a handsome and capable bookworm. It’s going to be hard for anyone to beat this.

I am now in the middle of volume 6. This one has more plot, less slice-of-life than volume 5. (yay)

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Are you aiming to finish part 2 before the new season starts?

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No, I’m just going through them on auto-pilot for the time being. I started learning some Korean around New Year and it’s taking up a lot of my mental energy. But reading Honzuki along with the audiobook is pretty comfortable for where I’m at in Japanese now, so it’s a low-stress way to make sure I keep doing some Japanese practice every day.

But now that you’ve mentioned it, I guess I might as well go watch the anime once I finish this book. :slight_smile:

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Anime S2 Epilogue vs Volume 5 Epilogue vs Manga Epilogue

So I went back and rewatched the anime epilogue to be sure. It’s definitely much shorter, it’s partially done in the card cut out style, but for the most part it’s a disembodied Myne and Ferdinand discussing things seen out of Urano’s eyes.

When we do get to look in from outside, it’s definitely Urano, not Myne, and the memory voices are also clearly not Myne.

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We do jump back to Myne for the breakdown, but it’s Myne in a black meta void and not Myne in the memory. Also, it’s just her face but I think Myne is drawn older here.

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On “dark sky hair” this is probably purposely ambiguous, but Urano’s hair is black (in the anime but I think volume 1 chapter 1 also confirmed this?), so it could describe both Myne’s dark blue hair and Urano’s black hair. Also Urano is Japanese so it’s not a bad guess.

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Vol 5 Epilogue talk

Thanks for digging into the anime! Interesting how it seems to be relatively vague in all three versions. I did notice that in the LN the narration would switch between first and third person for Ferdinand (and the text actually differed from the audiobook in one of those cases), which leads me to believe that the epilogue likely went under several revisions for that reason.

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more volume 5 epilogue

Thank you for checking!

Okay, well, then, screw it, I’m going back to my original understanding of the scene, then.

That was also the case in the web novel, if I remember correctly (and I visibly generally don’t, but let’s ignore that), so it may just be an unedited remnant of it.

Also, I’m really glad I can participate so much without feeling like I’m going to spoil something major every other word :stuck_out_tongue:

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本好き5 done! I’ll check in with you March 1 @shitsurei regarding the next book.

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Vol. 5, フェシュピールとロジーナ&側仕えという仕事

How much paper are they making now???

~80 kids in the orphanage, I bet the picture book will be over 10 pages, the pages need to be thick for the image so that’s more source material + POC + the gift to Wilma (a stack of paper for sketching?!)

Did we already demolish the forest and got all young trees or not yet?

Anyway, yeah, onwards to “well, we have some money but it’s still (never) not enough to do what we want, so time to do it ourselves”. I love it.

Rozinne… No local common sense + singular obsession + assumption that stuff people say doesn’t apply to you
…
Myne has really grown, ah…

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Vol. 5, イタリアンレストランの内装＆レストランのシステム作り

Myne is not even hiding that she just wants to see the insides of the ink 工房 to be able to cough-steal-cough have a reference to how it’s done when she does it herself.

I feel like all this play-pretend in front of Fuugo will blow up in their faces someday, when they meet at the market or in Benno’s shop or anywhere while she’ll not be dressed to play noble.

Myne wants to invite 神官長 to the restaurant’s 試食会?!

I was wondering which of these three was she thinking about: him coming to the city in his priest clothes, in full blown nobles clothes or dressing up more commonner-style and pretending not to be a noble (is that an option? I would love to see him try to be less proper, as a reverse of what Lutz and Myne are doing)

But the plan is to apparently make him into the face of the restaurant lmao

相手が神官長なので多少失敗しても問題がない気楽なお呼ばれ

Wowowow really?

The dinner itself seems like stressful even where she needs to follow proper manners (does she know what to follow?) and she also needs to perform! And that is how she perceives it? I think she already trusts/likes 神官長 more than I expected.

So ok, they managed to eat together but they really are incapable of communicating in public. Hilarious.

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Forgot to send one more

Vol 5. 外に出るということ & インク作りの下準備

A second casual mention of prostitution on the subject of waitresses. I’d like a bit more details about who exactly has that profession and if that means they are not married somehow. But maybe let’s let it slide away into oblivion.

Myne: tell me your secrets

Ink workshop owner: I wouldn’t?!

Myne: ok, then let me guess it. Is this how you do it?

Owner: My family secrets?! Stolen?! How?!

Figuring out at this stage that local ink is going to create holes in paper in about ~10 years make me really happy we cut that deal with the parchment guild to use that for contracts and not our plant paper. Jeez.

I like the flashbacks to Urano’s mom getting into a bunch of DIY hobbies trying to make her interested in anything but book. That’s some seriously good lady.

What I didn’t like was the vocab. It’s been a while since the paper creation material nightmare, so I got complacent. Even going with “she’ll explain in a moment, no need for Wikipedia” this was tough. I felt like Benno - “Lutz, (helppp) what is she saying?”

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Man, you’re blasting through volume 5 Kroki. :open_mouth:

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I’m left alone and unsupervised for both days off this week :rofl:

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Ok, this time really the last ones for today

Maybe I should be compiling them into a single post next time when I’m not 100% I will not be picking up the book again that day…

Vol. 5, 油性絵具 黒 & 木版画による絵本作り

When Myne casually referred to her past life in a convo with Lutz I was taken by surprise - seemed like they were not mentioned it explicitly aside from some “before?.. ahh…” some time ago. I actually spent a moment to reflect on the reveal and how long ago it was.

And when 神官長 went straight for the throat I realized that must’ve been the reason to mention explicitly before. The contrast.

Damn that was intense.

“Aren’t you a little too articulate? Like a foreigner whose only problem is language itself and not the ability to formulate thoughts”

(So you really are a spy from Drachma!:rofl: )

She’s 7 years old, let her evil spy nature be, man.

Anyway, I am deeply impressed by our pretty priest. Both in keeping the eye contact, making that leap and actually confronting her, not raging because of Myne’s “dream” theory and just sort of finding a place to stop? Being able to say that he cannot make any conclusions yet and exit convo gracefully.

When I grow up I want to be this 20-something year old lmao.

The best (and scariest) quote is this (and thank God, if he couldn’t read her I bet we’d be finding out what inquisition and torture they have there…)

君は隠し事も嘘も下手で顔に全てが出るのだ。君に騙されたり、顔色を読めなかったりするような貴族はいない

Also if we pretend I didn’t watch the anime for a sec, I’d say that I’m low key happy ink printing didn’t work out. It’s been too smooth and for a second I got worried we’ll just be done to move on.

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Vol 5. 白黒絵本

Noooo don’t use thick paper for a template ruler, order one made from wood. Didn’t we JUST cover that paper is more expensive?!

Thank God if failed, jeez.

ヨハン (the read head from 鍛冶工房) is such a pure sweet boi.

Kids in orphanage: reacting badly to the mention of a baby, as Myne was warned before (Fran said that in the temple babies are not a good thing)

Myne, completely forgetting about it: no-one understands how great the picture book is, oh how I wish the world would catch up already

Dang sister, this one is on you

Vol 5. 子供用聖典の準備

ガリ版の基本のやり方 ④印刷 | 手刷り印刷屋「後藤ガリ版印刷所」|福岡県久留米市｜パッケージ・ロゴ・ラベル・名刺デザイン印刷｜絵画教室｜

I ended up looking it up. As Myne herself reflected in this chapter, no matter how much you explain it, if someone doesn’t know what the object is, they wouldn’t get it

Hmm? The first Wilma’s picture’s printing attempt is just 微妙? I perceived “微妙” to be mean “idk, kinda not good” and not “ew, that’s atrocious”.

In the anime it was pretty… Atrocious.

Vol 5. 子供用聖典の製本

Wilma is doing her best :two_hearts:

Guys, look at Myne!

She says she doesn’t want to stay in her room and wants to be involved in the book making process even though 灰色神官達 are uncomfortable with her there.

Does she remember that the only reason she was making books was because no-one else could? I’m so excited about her passion for books now being extended to the invention/creation too (to the process and not only the result!)

No-one is used to folding paper so even adults are not managing to do it quite right, “like awkward foreigners making origami for the first time”. Wow, I’m in the book :joy::joy::joy:

Sewing the book together was described harder than it could’ve been. My suspension of disbelief was broken a bit whenトゥーリ got surprised by making a knot following Myne’s instructions. Considering her profession I bet she can recognize what the thread is doing and how knots are made, thanks Myne.

A book :pleading_face: is done :pleading_face: after almost two years of trying to get here :pleading_face::pleading_face::pleading_face:

You’ve done amazing job, kids :sob::sob::sob:

And that’s the end of

The next cover screams action. It has that white lion eefara was curious about from the cover of og!vol5. In this edition we really get to know what’s when :joy:

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That’s a great ending point for that volume!

And I really like the next book cover; all the important elements are there!

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Vol 5. 収穫祭のお留守番

This is day X when the God of Darkness blahblah, the best night to get wed.

Nobles will be wed at night as the blessing is the strongest then.

Commoners in the city will be wed during the day before, cos too many people to do at night.

…oh, yeah, and the farmers will be wed in autumn when we go to their villages to get taxes & food for the temple from them.

The temple is not even pretending to care anymore :rofl:

So in autumn there is a “help request” from the knights and then in spring there is a “land blessing”, both of which require mana. Myne will be going out twice a year!

Also I find the whole 血祭り conversation to be hilarious. No matter what Myne says (including the death penalty) she doesn’t ACTUALLY mean that, as a modern person, but 神官長 absolutely 100% doesn’t know that.

Vol 5. マイン十進分類法

So 神官達 is very rich and has lots of books you say? Is that aside from his secret room so full of documents being actively used that each time they go there (pretty often!) they move papers to make place to sit all over again?
Are you one of us, Head Priest?

Myne: Dewey system → Japanese system → Myne system
神官長: who is that person? I have not heard this name before
Myne: oh, I didn’t know him personally and he’s long dead, anyway

…ANYWAY??? Are you even trying???

貴族院 - gonna assume it’s some sort of academy, cos Google gave me the House of Peers in Meiji government lol

World-building :heart_with_arrow:

Myne is a surprisingly good manager. It’s very nice to see her so aware of the people around her.

Vol 5. ベンノへの献本と仮縫い

A prayer casually appearing in Myne’s narration was fun to see, she’s becoming one of them, 神官長 would be proud

Ok, another suspension of disbelief broken here - Corinna-sama asking Myne how to hide extra fabric?..

I’m going to read that as “Corinna casually getting Myne design secrets without paying for them (she is a merchant after all!)” and not as actual absence of skills to come up with ideas to hide extra fabric in the clothes.

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