So I hadn’t planned on putting book reviews on this site. However, given that I’m reviewing anime games and anime JRPG it sort of makes sense to include light novels here rather than on my Goodreads page. So as I’ve said before, I’m a big fan of the SAO series and after a bit of a wait, due to Amazon having difficulty sourcing it, volume 24 of the light novel series finally dropped this week. When I say dropped, I mean the English version because of course, the original version has been out for a fair chunk of time. So volume 24 follows on pretty much where volume 22 left off. Volume 23, of course being a collection of short stories. We start off with Kirito and Argo meeting up with his former employer (despite him supposedly being in hiding, out of the public eye etc) and being told that there has been some unauthorised access to Underworld. Yes, Underworld is back in the story even though it’s had a full arc and seemed largely paid off. After this meeting Kirito returns to the Unital Ring setting with a relatively short period of him exploring with Alice before meeting up with Argo, and we get to our first real plot twist of the of the novel.
Whilst infiltrating a meeting of a large number of players, ostensibly to discuss strategy, a rogue mage unleashes a spell that effectively forces all of the attendees, including Kirito, who gets caught in the crossfire protecting Argo, to agree to her demands, otherwise they’ll be killed. The demand being quite simple; that the group support work together and attack the homestead that Kirito and the others have built. After that, story pivots away and we have a short interlude in the real world where Asuna’s 18th birthday is discussed and the gift storyline is paid off. Then it is back into Underworld which is now seemingly in some sort of internal disarray where incarnate (magic) users either haunted down persecuted )it’s never quite made clear). It ends with Kirito having a brief encounter with an individual who seems to resemble his dead partner from the Alicization stories Eugeo. The story then pivots again and we have the conclusion back in Unital Ring, which ends with the party meeting up with some new players from another game including Agil’s wife, rather disturbingly portrayed as an insect. The story ends up with the boss fights and the revelation that said boss is none other than a reskin of the Skullreaper from the original Aincrad arc.
I’ll be honest, this story felt a little bit like setup and filler. I get the impression that the author was planning to get as much of the exposition out of the way he could before moving on to the next book indeed. In the author’s notes at the end he says the story is finally starting to move. So it does feel that this is a bit of a setup book. As a result, there’s not a great deal that happens. There are however, some good features starting wit the switch from traditional RPG to survival MMO type game as a setting. I do think that the pure RPG element has been rather played out and it pretty clear but there’s been a fair chunk of research into how survival games operate. Certainly the storyline with the player versus player , and the idea of a band coming together to take on another player is something that will be familiar to anybody who’s played any sandbox survival MMO RPG games. It’s definitely a nice touch. The storyline round Asuna’s 18th birthday is also well done and the payoff with the gift is quite pleasant. It’s quite a touching little section and the Abec illustration is very sweet.
The author does skirt close to what seems to be something of a hobby horse with this obsession of what is real and what is virtual reality but steers away; in the end focusing on what is a touching scene between Kirito and Asuna. Argo is certainly becoming a fully fledged character in this arc which is welcome. I’ve written before on my reviews on Goodreads how it’s good to see her getting some screen time in the excellent ‘Progressive’ series. I always felt she was a character that definitely needed a bit more screen time from the original arc so seeing her flushed out here, playing an active role and also getting a tiny bit of character development is a good thing.
There are however, bad things in this book The main one is the plotline involving the rogue mage. It doesn’t make a great deal of sense on a number of fronts. First and foremost a spell that is used to bind the people is something that seems massively overpowered; even the characters in the game say they can’t figure out how such a strong spell can exist after only three days in the game. Given that Kirito’s party includes an advanced AI that has previously hacked pretty much every game the party have been in and is usually able to find out pretty much what’s going on before anybody else; it seems very OP. So there’s definitely questions around this rogue mage and of course no background is provided. Part of me is wondering, does she relate to the mysterious transfer student that introduced herself to Asuna in volume 21? Given that there’s been no repeats of that character and no real payoff with that storyline, it’s possible I guess. Alternatively could it be that this person was in the original SAO game as a member of Laughing Coffin? After all, the author has returned to that storyline more than once; though it would be rather lazy in my view to fall back on it again. Is this somebody related to the original fairy dance arc and Asuna’s captivity and arranged marriage that ended rather badly? At this stage, it’s it’s hard to say for sure, but the whole premise of the decision to attack the Kirito homestead doesn’t really make a lot of sense. Yes, survival MMO RPG see a lot of PvP but the rationale given is that this mage wants the players to band together to complete the game (presumably for the prize or in the hope the ‘normal’ games will be restored). This seems a strange rationale as a result going after one of the strongest to potential players in the game, so early on doesn’t work for me. Especially when said player hasn’t really expressed any interest in breaking the game or doing any of the usual Kirito things. It all feels a bit flimsy. We’ll see how it pays off. But this feels like a good idea poorly executed.
The next big issue is the total absence of most of the support cast. Apart from a few brief scenes Asuna barely gets mentioned. Likewise, Lisbeth, Silica and Sinon on all pretty much vanished from the story despite having some promising setups in books 21 and 22. This is something that’s been a bugbear of mine throughout the series. Leafa likewise, barely gets a mention though given I’m not a massive fan of that character, I could probably live with that. It does feel that the author only brings these characters in when he either has no choice or he wants to fall back on the rather tired sexual assault tropes that one of my main criticisms of the series. It’s happened to often and in my view, one of the justifiable criticisms that get levied at it. The absence of the back cast is really frustrating as it does feel that he’s created some interesting characters but he just doesn’t make use of them or when he does he just does a setup and then pretty much thrown away. Alice seems to get a lot of page time. I have to be honest, I find her a bit of a flat character but that’s just my view. It just seems a shame that some of the others have just so badly neglected. Again, it’s unclear how long this arc is going to be and it may transpire that they get some time in the future but will see.
The final big issue that I have with this one is it’s not developing the relationship between Kirito and Asuna at all. In ‘Progressive’ even when they’re not in the life or death situations there are plenty of occasions when they just do normal things. They go to the shops, they take in the scenery. It gives them a greater depth of character, and it also makes the relationship feel much more real. Here though, aside from the brief and present giving scene, the whole relationship is pretty much ignored. There’s barely any time the two of them seem to spend together in the real world either. It sort of feels like the author doesn’t really know how to move the relationship forward after the events in the Mother’s Rossario arc. I’ve seen some leaked images online that suggests that the next book does have the two of them fighting together again and that would definitely be an improvement.
In conclusion, this is not a bad book, I was able to read it in about two hours. I wouldn’t say it was unputdownable, and it’s definitely not the strongest in the series. As I say feels a bit like a setup shot. Hopefully, volume 25 and 26 can pick up but at the moment the ‘Progressive’ series of books at the moment are more enjoyable for me. I just think that they’re offering more but we’ll see where they go as there is a lot of narrative debt being banked there. As usual, the artwork from a back is fantastic with some really nice images (which I have copied from the SAOpedia site). Part of me does wish they were all coloured, but even in the black and white they do look really, really good. So that’s really all I can say on this one. I’d say check it out if you’re a fan of the series, but I wouldn’t go in with too high an expectation on this one.
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